I remember thinking that a fun variant of HD would be super turbo HD - where you do an entire season in a long weekend - recruiting cycles every 15 minutes, just 30 minutes to prepare for recruiting, games every hour,............best run in a huge windowless room with lots of snacks!

Posted by gillispie1 on 6/13/2016 11:59:00 AM (view original):

Posted by dcy0827 on 6/13/2016 11:56:00 AM (view original):

Posted by CoachSpud on 6/13/2016 10:49:00 AM (view original):
I'm not ignoring the possible effects of increased or decreased populations of human coaches at all. My point was that we had an artificial and unrealistic time frame for scouting and that undoubtedly had a big effect on players dropping to lower levels. And if players do drop to lower levels, who is to say whether that makes improved teams across the board or whether that makes "super teams?" That remains to be seen, not a conclusion for you to jump blindly at one way or the other. And before you jump to conclusions, also consider the possibility that D1 and D2 sims will scoop up a lot of players that human coaches don't recruit. One season with an unrealistically compressed time frame and coaches learning a completely new system doesn't form a basis for crying "the sky is falling" nor for praising the beta. But it does seem to be a step in the right direction.

How can you possibly think that players similar to the one dropping won't make D3 teams better? It's safe to say at this point that the populations in each world will decrease, even if only slightly, and that's just by seeing what coaches have posted on the forums. With less human coaches, examples like this will become more common, this I can guarantee.

What is happening now is EXACTLY what happened with the "potential" roll out. It was supposed to be beta tested, then beta tested some more, and then beta tested even more than that. What REALLY happened is what's happening now with this update. It was supposed to be tested, tested, and then tested some more. Instead, it's being fast forwarded out the door, with OBVIOUS errors, because someone would apparently rather meet a deadline with half assed work then be a little late and have it done correctly. This is standard WIS protocol and it sucks because all of us end up paying for a flawed product while they scramble to fix it behind the scenes.

It's very obvious from all of your posts that you're an optimist and good on ya for that. I'm not. I'm a pessimist. I expect the worst and hope for the best, that way I'm not disappointed when something inevitably fails. Call it......getting boned too many times by the government or whatever people in charge you want to use as an example. Fact of the matter is, with everything I've read and seen so far, this IS a sky is falling scenario. One, because this update is so very obviously NOT ready to be rolled out yet we're getting it anyway and soon apparently. Two, if as many coaches do leave or drop teams as it appears, then there won't be a game left, unless you like playing in 10 Sim conferences every season. As I said on a different post in a different thread, between two ID's I run 16 teams (well, already down to 15). I will slowly drop teams as each season ends until I have probably 3/4/5 teams left. So best case scenario, 11 teams become Sim coached, worst case 13 and that's just from one user.

Make no mistake, without some major marketing push and just keeping the status quo, there WILL be a decrease in coaches and most likely a significant one. I've been playing non-stop for over a decade now and I simply cannot go through another debacle like the roll out for potential but as someone who has seen it before, seen the effects, fair warning. The game is about to take a huge hit, one it may not be able to recover from this time. The sky IS falling my friend. The only question is, will it hit the ground or not? My guess? BOOM!!!

potential was not beta tested at all, was it? i thought that was only internally tested by WIS. maybe i just wasn't part of it, but i can't remember a single comment about a beta test for it, which seems weird. the beta test that was a worthless POS was the beta test for the engine rewrite.

Maybe it was for the engine re-write. I'm almost positive though that there was, at one point, beta testing done for potential as well. It was just pushed through so quickly and with a total lack of communication from the developer that it may as well have been done internally.

Posted by taniajane on 6/13/2016 12:31:00 PM (view original):
Again, those who work hard, should have a huge advantage.

Or those that dont work hard (at real jobs)

I admit I am in this not working hard crowd, but even I dont want to schedule my life around a game I play for fun

This, a million times this. What seems to be lost in the shuffle here is what OR just posted. This is a GAME, not work. If OR is accurate (and I have no doubt that he is, I can't remember him missing on anything yet) and it is paramount that you have to be there for the first cycle and that you basically have to check every three hours thereafter or risk missing out on your recruits, then this just went from fun to a damn job.

People play this to escape reality for a brief moment. To get away from their "real jobs". Just about everyone I know doesn't want to have a second job. Advantages shouldn't be gained by those who have more time to devote to the game. The way it is set up now, recruiting is THE most important aspect of the game, bar none. I don't care how great of a coach you are, if you don't have the horses you aren't going to win the race. I'm not in the beta as I've stated before, but the coach whose opinion I probably value the most about this game has just told us that the game has become more like work. No thanks Seble.

There were/are plenty of other fixes that would have remedied what he considered the biggest problem. He was told over and over and over by some of the most respected, intelligent coaches that play this game yet chose to ignore their advice/opinions on how to make some simple fixes. Instead we get a brand new shiny toy that will temporarily appease the masses because it's something new making it look like improvement have been made. But all it really is and what most people seem to be missing is that its a diversion to take attention away from the "real" problems by focusing on the new shiny addition/update.

It's change for the sake of change. That's all. This "update" never needed to be done but my guess is that someone high up the food chain started looking around and someone lower down the food chain had to come up with someone "new", some kind of "improvement" in order to justify their programmer position. The higher up saw this "dog and pony show" of an unnecessary update, thought it looked like quite the attention getter, gave the staff a pat on the back and a thumbs up, went away smiling, while everyone below him breathed a HUGE sigh of relief that they wouldn't be needing food stamps or unemployment benefits for another year. We get nothing for months on end, not even a quick post in the forums, nothing is being done correctly on any of the other games, and then out of the blue we get this massive update which "fixes" a problem that, frankly, didn't really need fixing. On the priority list of HD things to do, this shouldn't have even been in the top ten. RECRUIT GENERATION, not RECRUITING was the biggest problem. HIRNGS/FIRINGS come in a close second. Yet the two biggest problems get...........................ignored. I swear it almost seems like certain people are taking the attitude that if I ignore it for long enough maybe it'll go away on its own. Or better yet, fix ITSELF!!

Its a crying *** shame what this game has become. Before Tarek sold out and sold his soul to Fox, this was a really good game. But almost immediately after Fox took over the downhill slide began. Oh sure, I'll admit there have been some improvements to the game. Potential was an okay addition, although as Vandydave pointed out and I echoed many, many times, the game already HAD potential. It just wasn't labeled as such and didn't have the fancy shmancy colors. I'll not go through all that again in this post but anyone who was here before "potential" was introduced should understand what he and I are talking about (and as Mully pointed out Tarek was still here then anyway). The Projection Report is the best addition Seble has made....by far. Not sure about the Draft Big Board because I don't play D1 anymore. But that's been just about it since Tarek left. Months upon months of crickets and tumbleweeds. Wow.

And to those of you who will inevitably remind me that I am free to quit any time I want I say this: I'm going to cut my teams down drastically. Then I'll try this apparent nightmare of an update. If I decide that I like it, I'll keep the remaining teams. If I decide that I don't, you'll never even notice I left. Peace!

Posted by metsmax on 6/13/2016 1:55:00 PM (view original):
I remember thinking that a fun variant of HD would be super turbo HD - where you do an entire season in a long weekend - recruiting cycles every 15 minutes, just 30 minutes to prepare for recruiting, games every hour,............best run in a huge windowless room with lots of snacks!

ha

Two things:

1. I agree with the time concern in Beta, especially because so much of my time was spent on repetitive, menial tasks. (A few filters on the recruit search screen would probably save 50% of the time spent there - including the skill filters that are already on current.)
2. I have no clue how I'd recruit successfully with just one or two slots open (at least anywhere except at top-tier D1 schools). In the current system, I'll often wait for at least a day or two, be able to FSS across a broad section of the country (half or more at D2 or D1), and find high-potential hidden gems that no one is targeting. Or you can really hone in on one local recruit and be willing to put every last penny into defending him. Both strategies can work.
But in Beta, you can't afford to wait even one cycle, because you'll never catch up on attention to the early schools. And unless you match up perfectly on preferences, you're not going to overcome a school with equal or higher prestige, even if the recruit isn't their top target. Recruiting has switched from a coach-driven decision (how much effort you put in and what type) to a recruit-driven decision, and recruits make that decision based on factors that schools with one or two slots are rarely going to win.

I like some of the changes - having a variety of scouting options, and the general concept of attention points. We'll all have to learn to manage that asset in a creative way. But there's more time required for menial stuff, and fewer ways to be smart and creative in finding recruits.

I posted this on the beta boards a few days ago but think it might fit in better here. Seble, set up a list of 10 things he wanted this update to accomplish in September. There are 2 questions. 1) Is the goal necessary or beneficial to the game and 2) is this update successful attaining that goal. I only tried to attain that 2nd question because no matter how much talk we had at the time about these goals it appeared to fall on nearly deaf ears.
Post:
So, here are the issues Seble saw (according to a post he made last September). Italicized and in blue are my thoughts. I'd like to hear the opinions of others.

1. Elite schools have too much advantage, with the combination of prestige and extra recruiting money. I think this update definitely changes the role here. It was scaled back some by changes after I was leading for the #2 recruit at d2. I still think you'll see some lower level schools beat big 6 schools though bc top schools need to spread their resources between tons of valuable recruits; whereas, lower level schools can go all in on one and not worry as much bc the lower you go on the talent curve the more options there are available. I think you'll see 5 or 6 d2 and d3 players scoring 30+ efficiently under this system. A proper fix to this may be to cap the level of recruit a lower level can grab (say below top 100 at position at d2 and unranked at d3). Otherwise, the lower levels of HD might be a game of who can grab the most unstoppable star not who can arrange a quality set of players.
2. There is not enough battling going on for the top recruits, most likely due to the belief that elite schools can't be beaten and the fear of losing that money. Battles appeared to be plenty. One issue I do see is that I believe players will need to check this new system more frequently than under the prior system because there appears to be more moving parts. Something else im interested in is if dumping funds is productive in this system. 10 mins before signings I spent 5k to go from low on the #251 recruit to very high. I didn't get the recruit but I wasn't the only very high school. If it is possible to fund dump that could make many angry and cause a situation where people are just pressing refresh for the 30 mins before signings.
3. The status of your school related to a recruit can be confusing and hard to track due to vague messages. As I understand it, the very low to very high system is straightforward and easy to understand. One thing I don't understand is why I can't see who other schools are going after if I have scouted their prospects. I think I should be able to see that if we have both scouted the same player. Otherwise, this might become 200 clicks to determine information I can already find but isn't centralized.
4. Some battles last until the end of recruiting, leaving the losing schools in a bad position. This really isn't something I can speak to. I filled my 5 ships by 11 pm last night. For me, this was definitely the case but that's a small sample size.
5. There are not enough schools willing and able to recruit outside of their region. Something else I can't really speak to. I stayed regional because I wanted to find as many d1 prospects as I could and then just go after the decent ones who were ignored.
6. Scouting players is rudimentary and frustrating. In some ways this has been fixed. In other ways, not so much. Frustration level was lessened by being able to fss by division but the 4 level system also involved finding duds and assistant coach search seems extremely random. I'd call frustration a wash. As far as being rudimentary there are certainly more scouting options but I don't believe that there is more strategy. Strategy is increased by choosing between options but at the end of the day we have a specific amount to spend on scouting now. Seperating scouting and recruiting budgets takes away a major strategic decision. I've been against separation of the budgets since the first time it was brought up and still haven't gotten a decent answer as to how separating the budgets increases strategy. The only answer I've received is that there is concern that users would spend their cash too early and then be screwed, but isn't this an issue that attention pts and makings scholarship offers free are intended to resolve? Also, we could just separate when you get percentages of your budget to protect users. I've argued for a 25% up front, 50% at the start of recruiting, and 25% at the second recruiting cycle system.
7. Player decisions come down mostly to money spent (assuming other factors are fairly equal), making it a glorified auction system. This seems like an auction system + luck to me. So I'm not sure much has changed in this respect.
8. Recruiting takes place at the beginning of the season, which is tough for new coaches, who haven't had a chance to learn the game. This is definitely changed. I do worry about boredom from experienced coaches. Imagine if you have all your scholarships filled and bow out in the first round. That's a long time between seasons. That isnt the biggest concern but could be an issue as far as engagement is concerned.
9. Due to the benefits of postseason money, there is way too much cooperation between teams in the same conference. I think this addresses this. I have heard concerns that doing this encourages coaches, especially at lower levels, to go to empty conferences. I do like the conference strength preference for recruits and am interested to see if this balances out the lack of postseason cash. I'd like to hear someone else's thoughts on this.
10. SimAI teams are pretty terrible at recruiting, leaving many undesirable rosters. The simai seems to be smarter. This is one of those 'wouldn't it be cool if' things but I've always thought it would be fun if sims had different personalities. So, some heavily invest in recruits and some try to get on as many list as possible. Maybe this already happens. I really don't know and at the end of the day don't think it's a big deal.

I'm a bit confused. Italicized are Seble's words? Because if they are then this game is in big trouble.

For example, look at point number 3. If the italicized words are Seble's then who in the hell wrote this program?

Posted by emy1013 on 6/13/2016 4:46:00 PM (view original):
I'm a bit confused. Italicized are Seble's words? Because if they are then this game is in big trouble.

For example, look at point number 3. If the italicized words are Seble's then who in the hell wrote this program?

Agree, I gave up reading who said what or thought what

Posted by emy1013 on 6/13/2016 4:46:00 PM (view original):
I'm a bit confused. Italicized are Seble's words? Because if they are then this game is in big trouble.

For example, look at point number 3. If the italicized words are Seble's then who in the hell wrote this program?

no, regular print is seble's

Posted by emy1013 on 6/13/2016 4:46:00 PM (view original):
I'm a bit confused. Italicized are Seble's words? Because if they are then this game is in big trouble.

For example, look at point number 3. If the italicized words are Seble's then who in the hell wrote this program?

Haha I'll format differently. Looks ok on the tablet but that doesn't always convert.

Posted by bhansalid00 on 6/13/2016 4:08:00 PM (view original):
Two things:

1. I agree with the time concern in Beta, especially because so much of my time was spent on repetitive, menial tasks. (A few filters on the recruit search screen would probably save 50% of the time spent there - including the skill filters that are already on current.)
2. I have no clue how I'd recruit successfully with just one or two slots open (at least anywhere except at top-tier D1 schools). In the current system, I'll often wait for at least a day or two, be able to FSS across a broad section of the country (half or more at D2 or D1), and find high-potential hidden gems that no one is targeting. Or you can really hone in on one local recruit and be willing to put every last penny into defending him. Both strategies can work.
But in Beta, you can't afford to wait even one cycle, because you'll never catch up on attention to the early schools. And unless you match up perfectly on preferences, you're not going to overcome a school with equal or higher prestige, even if the recruit isn't their top target. Recruiting has switched from a coach-driven decision (how much effort you put in and what type) to a recruit-driven decision, and recruits make that decision based on factors that schools with one or two slots are rarely going to win.

I like some of the changes - having a variety of scouting options, and the general concept of attention points. We'll all have to learn to manage that asset in a creative way. But there's more time required for menial stuff, and fewer ways to be smart and creative in finding recruits.

The last sentence says it all.

yep last

Posted by dcy0827 on 6/13/2016 2:53:00 PM (view original):

Posted by taniajane on 6/13/2016 12:31:00 PM (view original):
Again, those who work hard, should have a huge advantage.

Or those that dont work hard (at real jobs)

I admit I am in this not working hard crowd, but even I dont want to schedule my life around a game I play for fun

This, a million times this. What seems to be lost in the shuffle here is what OR just posted. This is a GAME, not work. If OR is accurate (and I have no doubt that he is, I can't remember him missing on anything yet) and it is paramount that you have to be there for the first cycle and that you basically have to check every three hours thereafter or risk missing out on your recruits, then this just went from fun to a damn job.

People play this to escape reality for a brief moment. To get away from their "real jobs". Just about everyone I know doesn't want to have a second job. Advantages shouldn't be gained by those who have more time to devote to the game. The way it is set up now, recruiting is THE most important aspect of the game, bar none. I don't care how great of a coach you are, if you don't have the horses you aren't going to win the race. I'm not in the beta as I've stated before, but the coach whose opinion I probably value the most about this game has just told us that the game has become more like work. No thanks Seble.

There were/are plenty of other fixes that would have remedied what he considered the biggest problem. He was told over and over and over by some of the most respected, intelligent coaches that play this game yet chose to ignore their advice/opinions on how to make some simple fixes. Instead we get a brand new shiny toy that will temporarily appease the masses because it's something new making it look like improvement have been made. But all it really is and what most people seem to be missing is that its a diversion to take attention away from the "real" problems by focusing on the new shiny addition/update.

It's change for the sake of change. That's all. This "update" never needed to be done but my guess is that someone high up the food chain started looking around and someone lower down the food chain had to come up with someone "new", some kind of "improvement" in order to justify their programmer position. The higher up saw this "dog and pony show" of an unnecessary update, thought it looked like quite the attention getter, gave the staff a pat on the back and a thumbs up, went away smiling, while everyone below him breathed a HUGE sigh of relief that they wouldn't be needing food stamps or unemployment benefits for another year. We get nothing for months on end, not even a quick post in the forums, nothing is being done correctly on any of the other games, and then out of the blue we get this massive update which "fixes" a problem that, frankly, didn't really need fixing. On the priority list of HD things to do, this shouldn't have even been in the top ten. RECRUIT GENERATION, not RECRUITING was the biggest problem. HIRNGS/FIRINGS come in a close second. Yet the two biggest problems get...........................ignored. I swear it almost seems like certain people are taking the attitude that if I ignore it for long enough maybe it'll go away on its own. Or better yet, fix ITSELF!!

Its a crying *** shame what this game has become. Before Tarek sold out and sold his soul to Fox, this was a really good game. But almost immediately after Fox took over the downhill slide began. Oh sure, I'll admit there have been some improvements to the game. Potential was an okay addition, although as Vandydave pointed out and I echoed many, many times, the game already HAD potential. It just wasn't labeled as such and didn't have the fancy shmancy colors. I'll not go through all that again in this post but anyone who was here before "potential" was introduced should understand what he and I are talking about (and as Mully pointed out Tarek was still here then anyway). The Projection Report is the best addition Seble has made....by far. Not sure about the Draft Big Board because I don't play D1 anymore. But that's been just about it since Tarek left. Months upon months of crickets and tumbleweeds. Wow.

And to those of you who will inevitably remind me that I am free to quit any time I want I say this: I'm going to cut my teams down drastically. Then I'll try this apparent nightmare of an update. If I decide that I like it, I'll keep the remaining teams. If I decide that I don't, you'll never even notice I left. Peace!

well, as bad as what OR said sounds to you... its worse! now, instead of poaching, we have ebay-style sniping. i was behind on a recruit at 7:55 the day of signings - and then knocked the other guy down to low at 7:58, signing the guy a minute later. throughout recruiting, i often found myself checking in multiple times per cycle, as the lead would change, and i didn't want to risk being behind when the cycle ticked. yeah...

i haven't checked in today, but up until now, seble's solutions have ranged from limiting the number of HVs per time period, to limiting the number of HVs, period. like that is going to help restore the balance (well, i did all i could, but too bad my 1 hv and 1 cv could not beat the higher prestige guy's 1 hv and 1 cv for the hundredth consecutive battle. guess luck is just against me. or too bad i have a life and didn't check in every 6 hours on the dot to do my HV and fell behind some other dude and lost for that reason alone). the solution is to factor in lead changes and the like into if a recruit will sign, not signing if a newcomer just took the lead, that sort of thing (i outlined a mechanism to accomplish such a thing, will see if seble goes for it). the good thing was that lots of people were not happy with the sniping deal and the many complaints seem to have convinced seble that it is a problem which needs a resolution. hopefully his solution comes around to something decent, instead of the above...

I've played with it some - having started activity on the beta late. Feels rather hopeless with a late start.

And everything I have seen in my limited usage supports my fear that this system will demand much more time and effort in order to succeed. Tooo much for me, I think.

I guess I had a much different experience than others. I thought it was a lot LESS time consuming than current. Partly I attribute that to the small scouting budget and me not knowing what I was doing. But I only had a few real target to go after. So I went after them. I was on 2 by myself and 1 had a whole slew of coaches.

I literally couldn't do anything but continue to pump attn points into the recruits cycle after cycle for a couple days before I could even send a HV. I sent an HV and CV to the guys that I was on against only SIMs and moved onto a backup from the one that I was battling for. Eventually the first two guys signed and the 3rd guy let me send him an HV. After the new period rolled around, he signed too.

So... During the whole time, I barely did anything. Just sat there, waiting to send an HV or CV. Then I did it. Then they signed. I actually forgot it was even going on sometimes and I'd pop on, check it out, see I still couldn't do anything and then sign off. Took about 1 min.