Posted by milwood on 3/8/2015 9:09:00 PM (view original):
Oh, I thought you started this thread a great way by warning people it was a rant. You should have left it there instead of trying to defend your position. Your position isn't even that wrong under normal circumstances. But this wasn't normal circumstances. Why your gameplay didn't work was correctly explained to you. Just accept why it happened and move on with more knowledge about this game than you had before.

Was it correctly explained by him? We still don't know how the distro was set up.

I wouldve played -5 too. Shoot all day with mid-70s perimeter guys, I'll take my chances.

You flip a coin long enough, you'll eventually get 20 heads in a row. That doesn't mean the coin is broken.

Posted by tkimble on 3/8/2015 8:43:00 PM (view original):

Posted by bistiza on 3/8/2015 8:26:00 PM (view original):

Posted by zorzii on 3/8/2015 12:22:00 PM (view original):
I am thinking this thread is about coaching. And it is not simple. This is what makes this game fun. If it was easy, would we play? The distro is certainly about plays run to a player, not shots taken. Say you run a play for someone, he got doubled up or was not in position or received a bad pass, will he shoot at all cost? I doubt it. The game is simulated and unless we can predict what the other team will do, there is no way the distro ends up being what we decided it would be for our players. The defense that probably disrupt the distro the most is man to man. Sometimes I am scratching my head as why I lost a game, why I shot so bad, why I was unable to score over 50... Sometimes I look at teams, check mine and think : I am winning this and it ends up being a nightmare. Coaching. I guess this is why good coaches specialize in a specific offense and in a specific defense.

I am pretty bad at playing press. My teams (I will drop one) lose most close games. I'm pretty bad with Motion offense. Everytime I add another dimension to my recruiting to suit FLEX or ZONE or MAN TO MAN, sometimes I forget about stuff I already knew that were important and it's back to the drawing board. Should I play UPTEMPO, NORMAL or SLOW, how do I set up my distro, which player will score against particular défenses etc.

That is why good coaches are consistent, they know all about that.

Sure, the distro is plays run for a player, but more distro equals more shots (relatively speaking). If it didn't, it wouldn't serve much purpose.

When I give a guy a lot of distro, I expect him to shoot more than guys with less distro. 

On the question you asked which is more personal than having to do with the game itself:

If it was easy, would we play? I don't know about you, but yes, I would. I'm not here for the challenge - real life provides enough of those. I'm still here only because I am successful enough to keep me here. If I was terrible or even only decent, I wouldn't keep playing. I'd give up on it because it's a game and if I can't win to at least a minimum level at a game, it's not worth playing (let alone paying to play it). 

If there were no challenge, I might arguably find it to be MORE fun. I know this because I never tire of playing sports video games against a computer and absolutely destroying the computer opponent. That to me is much more fun that barely beating or sometimes losing to the computer opponent.

lol

I know, right?  That last paragraph actually speaks volumes.

Posted by bistiza on 3/8/2015 8:35:00 PM (view original):

Posted by yanks250125 on 3/8/2015 6:05:00 PM (view original):
You put this up and then bash everyone who tries to help.  Everyone had a pretty similar conclusion after looking at it.  If you want to rant, fine.  If you want to learn, listen to the HOFers here and improve.  Or...just go 23-3 every season against bums and lose in the first or second round of the NT over and over then blame the game.

I'm interested in learning, yes.

However, if the game works as some people suggest, then it's not nearly as fun for me now. I have no incentive anymore because game planning was part of my fun and from what's been said, the gameplanning aspect of HD doesn't mean nearly as much as I thought it did.

Game planning is important, if you're doing it right.  Perhaps you didn't set your game plan correctly.  You given much of the info from your game, but not the most important piece of info that applies to your "problem", which of course is your distro settings.  If you feel like you need to keep those top secret, it will be very difficult to get a proper analysis of what might have went wrong in your game.  People here are trying to help you, you should take advantage of that and let them.

Posted by getbedarded on 3/8/2015 11:05:00 PM (view original):

Posted by milwood on 3/8/2015 9:09:00 PM (view original):
Oh, I thought you started this thread a great way by warning people it was a rant. You should have left it there instead of trying to defend your position. Your position isn't even that wrong under normal circumstances. But this wasn't normal circumstances. Why your gameplay didn't work was correctly explained to you. Just accept why it happened and move on with more knowledge about this game than you had before.

Was it correctly explained by him? We still don't know how the distro was set up.

I wouldve played -5 too. Shoot all day with mid-70s perimeter guys, I'll take my chances.

If this works this way, then -5 doesn't have any drawbacks as far as I'm concerned. The setting is relatively meaningless. Run whatever you want and it'll work.

Posted by emy1013 on 3/9/2015 3:17:00 AM (view original):

Posted by tkimble on 3/8/2015 8:43:00 PM (view original):

Posted by bistiza on 3/8/2015 8:26:00 PM (view original):

Posted by zorzii on 3/8/2015 12:22:00 PM (view original):
I am thinking this thread is about coaching. And it is not simple. This is what makes this game fun. If it was easy, would we play? The distro is certainly about plays run to a player, not shots taken. Say you run a play for someone, he got doubled up or was not in position or received a bad pass, will he shoot at all cost? I doubt it. The game is simulated and unless we can predict what the other team will do, there is no way the distro ends up being what we decided it would be for our players. The defense that probably disrupt the distro the most is man to man. Sometimes I am scratching my head as why I lost a game, why I shot so bad, why I was unable to score over 50... Sometimes I look at teams, check mine and think : I am winning this and it ends up being a nightmare. Coaching. I guess this is why good coaches specialize in a specific offense and in a specific defense.

I am pretty bad at playing press. My teams (I will drop one) lose most close games. I'm pretty bad with Motion offense. Everytime I add another dimension to my recruiting to suit FLEX or ZONE or MAN TO MAN, sometimes I forget about stuff I already knew that were important and it's back to the drawing board. Should I play UPTEMPO, NORMAL or SLOW, how do I set up my distro, which player will score against particular défenses etc.

That is why good coaches are consistent, they know all about that.

Sure, the distro is plays run for a player, but more distro equals more shots (relatively speaking). If it didn't, it wouldn't serve much purpose.

When I give a guy a lot of distro, I expect him to shoot more than guys with less distro. 

On the question you asked which is more personal than having to do with the game itself:

If it was easy, would we play? I don't know about you, but yes, I would. I'm not here for the challenge - real life provides enough of those. I'm still here only because I am successful enough to keep me here. If I was terrible or even only decent, I wouldn't keep playing. I'd give up on it because it's a game and if I can't win to at least a minimum level at a game, it's not worth playing (let alone paying to play it). 

If there were no challenge, I might arguably find it to be MORE fun. I know this because I never tire of playing sports video games against a computer and absolutely destroying the computer opponent. That to me is much more fun that barely beating or sometimes losing to the computer opponent.

lol

I know, right?  That last paragraph actually speaks volumes.

How so? Seriously I'd like to know what you think it says.

Then I'll tell you precisely why I feel that way if you'd like.

Posted by emy1013 on 3/9/2015 3:25:00 AM (view original):

Posted by bistiza on 3/8/2015 8:35:00 PM (view original):

Posted by yanks250125 on 3/8/2015 6:05:00 PM (view original):
You put this up and then bash everyone who tries to help.  Everyone had a pretty similar conclusion after looking at it.  If you want to rant, fine.  If you want to learn, listen to the HOFers here and improve.  Or...just go 23-3 every season against bums and lose in the first or second round of the NT over and over then blame the game.

I'm interested in learning, yes.

However, if the game works as some people suggest, then it's not nearly as fun for me now. I have no incentive anymore because game planning was part of my fun and from what's been said, the gameplanning aspect of HD doesn't mean nearly as much as I thought it did.

Game planning is important, if you're doing it right.  Perhaps you didn't set your game plan correctly.  You given much of the info from your game, but not the most important piece of info that applies to your "problem", which of course is your distro settings.  If you feel like you need to keep those top secret, it will be very difficult to get a proper analysis of what might have went wrong in your game.  People here are trying to help you, you should take advantage of that and let them.

I appreciate the help, honestly, I do, but if what is said is true, then this game is not what I thought it was. It's a whole paradigm shift for me, which I didn't expect as it's not like I haven't had any success at the game at all.

-5 will not work the majority of the time because in general it will give up too many open threes and draw more fouls. However, in this case it worked because your opponent had an incredible defender that was able to compensate for the -5. However even with this incredible defender that team playing -5 is still vulnerable to a team loading up on threes. And yet another however, your team does not have a legitimate perimeter threat. You have a couple or few guys that could hit a few in the course of a game, but you definitely don't have a game changing outside threat.

A lot of what you are saying is accurate about how a team should be able to beat a -5. Your game planning is sound for attacking a team that is going to play heavy negative. The problem is you just don't have the players on your roster to execute that game plan.

Posted by bistiza on 3/9/2015 7:27:00 AM (view original):

Posted by getbedarded on 3/8/2015 11:05:00 PM (view original):

Posted by milwood on 3/8/2015 9:09:00 PM (view original):
Oh, I thought you started this thread a great way by warning people it was a rant. You should have left it there instead of trying to defend your position. Your position isn't even that wrong under normal circumstances. But this wasn't normal circumstances. Why your gameplay didn't work was correctly explained to you. Just accept why it happened and move on with more knowledge about this game than you had before.

Was it correctly explained by him? We still don't know how the distro was set up.

I wouldve played -5 too. Shoot all day with mid-70s perimeter guys, I'll take my chances.

If this works this way, then -5 doesn't have any drawbacks as far as I'm concerned. The setting is relatively meaningless. Run whatever you want and it'll work.

you should try this then, run -5 all season, and see how well you do ;) 

note that i don't actually recommend that... obviously. just saying, if you don't think it has drawbacks, try it, and you will see it does. 1 game sample is meaningless.

the # of 3pta is low, but your team is not very good at 3 point shooting. and why are you starting lachance over borland? that is a really bad decision, outside of this game. when i look at the two teams, its pretty close, basically a toss-up. you have to keep in mind that +/- setting is one of MANY factors that go into the outcome. for +/- to be able to take you from a 60% to 90% favorite, it would have to be a massive factor, maybe 10 or 20% of the game outcome, just on one factor. do something similar for tempo, distro, and depth chart, and what now the player ratings are completely meaningless? it does not (and should not) work that way. +/- is important but its a small piece of the whole. if your justification for why you should have won a game comes down to 1 setting, then you weren't much of a favorite, period - the RNG can easily outweigh any of these little couple % of the total equation type settings. the game would be broken otherwise. the only possible exception is with respect to tempo in certain high fatigue settings, that can be pretty enormous in impact.

so in short, looking at both teams, it was a close matchup. the other guy took a chance, hoping your mediocre 3pt shooting wouldn't burn him, and it didn't - not really a surprise there. the 3pta was definitely on the low end of the range, but the low per ratings of your guards absolutely factors into that - your starting line has really crappy 3pt shooting ability. if you are relying on winning with the 3, with this weak of a 3pta team, in the s16, i would say that is the real issue. once you make these deeper rounds, you have to be in a position to have a stronger plan than that, if you want to expect to advance.

overall, good team though, and a good season. should get a prestige bump, nice job!

So, what are keys in your opinion as to why Borland would have been a better 3-point shooting option for bistiza?

Is it because although Lachance has a better PER at 76-74, that is offset with the combination of Borland's advantages in Speed, Athleticism, and especially BH (80-46)?

Also, a general question...

At times in the forums, people have referred to having "slasher" guards... I gather that his BH has to be good to be effective... but to get a guard to "slash", is it just a matter of putting his 3-pt setting at "-2"...?

If so, how does this differ from going "Low Post" via that -2 setting? Is the game able to figure out that I'd want to use my guard's BH skill rather than his (hypothetically) poor LP rating?

Yes the 2 points of perimeter is very minimal. The difference in ball handling is a major contributing factor because there is such a huge difference. The speed and ath will also help. I still wouldn't comsider Borland a great perimeter shooter or even very good but he should be good enough, if used enough all season, would make someone think twice about playing a -5.

Name	Yr.	Pos.	A	SPD	PE	BH
Andy Brubaker	Jr.	PG	50	67	76	66
Vince Lachance	Sr.	SG	55	71	76	46
Ryan Borland	Sr.	SG	61	79	74	80
Wendell Horn	Sr.	SF	82	38	69	60

3 point shooting is a combonation of PER, SPD, BH and ATH, they aren't all equal and PER is definitely the most imporant.

Borland is clearly the best 3 point shooter of the bunch in a vacuum.

Posted by colonels19 on 3/8/2015 10:17:00 PM (view original):

Posted by colonels19 on 3/8/2015 9:59:00 AM (view original):
This thread reminds me of what a dick I used to be.

1

USED to be? just kidding

Best thread in a while, IMO.

First, I think Milwood pointed out something really important earlier in this thread, something I still struggle with at times - there is how each of us *thinks* the sim *should* work, and then there is how it *actually* works.  Get these two things mixed up at your peril.  I don't think the C should be a "stand-alone" defender in the 2-3 zone, for example, but when that information eventually was released I had to rethink how to attack a zone defense based on the opposing C's defensive capabilities.  I still think it is wrong, but I have to take it into account if I want to maximize my chance of beating a 2-3 zone opponent.  There are a lot of things wrong with reality, too - unless you can change them, you have to optimize your life relative to the constraints.

The other thing that jumps out at me is that despite repeated requests, Biz had still not posted his distro.  I'll just say that I think what a lot of people consider as an extreme distro really isn't.  One player set to take three times as many shots as another is NOT extreme.  A recent game for me included three players set at 12 (including one nonstarter), two players set at 3 (including one nonstarter), three players set at 1, and the remaining players all set at 0.  Don't be afraid to use 0 and 1 for offensively challenged guys or guys who are matched up against stellar defenders.  Having your best scorer set to only take three times as many shots as your poorest scorer, for example, is not a winning ratio.  Why let your worst guy shoot at all? - set him to 0 or 1 and forget about him.  Players will transfer for lack of minutes, but not for lack of shots (unlike reality).  Depending on the situation, there might be one player you want taking 25 shots for every 1 shot taken by a weaker teammate.  Don't run from that - exploit it.

Posted by milwood on 3/9/2015 9:07:00 AM (view original):
-5 will not work the majority of the time because in general it will give up too many open threes and draw more fouls. However, in this case it worked because your opponent had an incredible defender that was able to compensate for the -5. However even with this incredible defender that team playing -5 is still vulnerable to a team loading up on threes. And yet another however, your team does not have a legitimate perimeter threat. You have a couple or few guys that could hit a few in the course of a game, but you definitely don't have a game changing outside threat.

A lot of what you are saying is accurate about how a team should be able to beat a -5. Your game planning is sound for attacking a team that is going to play heavy negative. The problem is you just don't have the players on your roster to execute that game plan.

In my opinion, the ill effects of playing a -5 doesn't mean anything if you can have "an incredible defender" who is able to successfully compensate for it.  I don't care if you have a world class defender, they aren't superman, and they can't guard the paint and the perimeter at the same time.

I think my team's three point threats were sufficient. Not great, but sufficient.