What is you favorite Division to play at and why?

Division II.

It has the right mix of recruiting strategy and the right mix of roster flexibility. For the most part, DII schools have a big enough scouting budget to scout a good chunk (but not all) of the country and a big enough recruiting budget to go hard at several (but not all) of your main targets. The division penalty for reaching above your level is acceptable (unlike DIII which is absurd.) The rosters you can build will be talented but not EEish.

Nothing is as testing as playing in high DI against a brutal PAC-10-like schedule but, if you can find the right conference with the right human conference mates, DII is fantastic.

DII is the best game in HD3.0, I think, but I can't resist playing DI.

D2 for sure. Being able to get D1 recruits that are overlooked can make for some good teams. Besides the strategy of "dragging" recruits to RS2, I like other strategies such as watching D1 schools in your area with 2 openings and 4 offers. Once they sign their top targets, some coaches avoid approaching a D1 A+ school that's very high. But I like to attack aggressively. I just signed a player using this approach today actually.

In that example, the D1 can cut players of course. But it doesn't always happen, and you have a greater shot at a solid player

In another thread, coaches discussed what they designate their recruiting colors for..... I mark possible players like this as yellow. I use red for guys i'm not signing, but the recruit has some sort of information I can use..... like if i'm battling coach A, and I see coach A on another recruit in a battle, I'll mark him red. And just monitor what's going on around me.

At D2, I find all this useful when bunched together.

D1, easily. The lower divisions are fine while you wait for a spot, but D1 is the game. Handling mostly full power conference schedules; going after the best recruits you can find, while managing early entry possibilities; prospecting out each recruit so you understand how likely he is to leave early; finding the right mix of elite talent, and upperclassmen with high IQs; finding ways to keep elite talent satisfied; prioritizing your attention to give yourself a shot at elite talent in the first place. Big 6 conference D1 is hard, and a ton of fun, if you like competitive multi-player games, and can tolerate the possibility that you may lose a bit.

D3, because it feels the most like v2.0 before the game went FUBAR....except most of the great folks who used to play that division have now left that game altogether

I really like all 3. I think they are all different now, which is pretty neat.

D2. D1 is more challenging for sure, D3 recruiting needs to change, maybe cap at D2 recruits.

D2 has the best balance and is the most fun. Definitely the most competitive also. You will get into battles but a lot of the time it's against other D2 teams. It can be a waiting game a bit but not as bad as D3. Rebuilds can be pretty done pretty quickly.

D1 is the biggest challenge. Taking over a rebuild and working your way up can take awhile and be pretty tough. But you need to deal with randomness of EEs so that's frustrating. You will also be in MANY dice roll battles.

D3 used to be my favorite in 2.0 but now it's by far the worst. It's the most empty division so you have the least amount of competition but that means it's the easiest to rebuild. Recruiting is BORING and you will mostly just battle SIMs or just cross your fingers and hope someone doesn't come after your targets during RS2. You don't really need to battle in the typical sense to build a good team so if you hate dice rolls then you can avoid them pretty easily at D3.

“But you need to deal with randomness of EEs so that's frustrating.”

Early entries are not “random”. No one loses their backup 650 OVR sophomore PG to the riches of the fake NBA. Elite commodities are volatile. They are expensive to get, and they may not fulfill the term. High risk, high reward. What Benis means to say is at D1 you need to decide how much of that volatility your team is willing to take on. You have to assess every recruit not only for how good he is/will be, but for when he may be good enough to possibly leave.

If you are surprised by a guy who leaves early, you either don’t know how the system works, or you didn’t properly assess your commodity. In other words, user error. Or as Benis would say, “Derp.”

Yeah, I cant believe people are surprised when a player not even on the draft board goes EE.... <sarc>

Posted by mullycj on 8/2/2018 9:07:00 AM (view original):
Yeah, I cant believe people are surprised when a player not even on the draft board goes EE.... <sarc>

If you’re playing high level D1, you should be able tell the difference between players who will never leave early, players who may leave early, and players who will probably leave early. Prospecting recruits, understanding the probabilities, and managing the contingencies are part of what it takes to be successful at D1.

The Big Board is a tool to help measure, but it is not designed to take the place of your own assessment. Use it as a crutch at your own risk.

I've played D2 and high D1 since the 3.0 release, and I preferred D2 by a mile. In general, if your favorite part of the game is scouting and recruiting, you'll prefer D2. You have to decide how much to scout D1 vs D2, where to scout, and when to fight for recruits vs bail. I enjoy all of that. If your favorite part is managing an intricate set of probabilities and risk, you'll prefer D1 (managing early entries, finding complementary talent when you have walk-ons, etc). I just found D1 to be too arbitrary for my tastes, but to each their own.

And since I'm a masochist, I'm just about to start at Presque Isle in D3. We'll see how that goes.

Posted by shoe3 on 8/2/2018 8:46:00 AM (view original):
“But you need to deal with randomness of EEs so that's frustrating.”

Early entries are not “random”. No one loses their backup 650 OVR sophomore PG to the riches of the fake NBA. Elite commodities are volatile. They are expensive to get, and they may not fulfill the term. High risk, high reward. What Benis means to say is at D1 you need to decide how much of that volatility your team is willing to take on. You have to assess every recruit not only for how good he is/will be, but for when he may be good enough to possibly leave.

If you are surprised by a guy who leaves early, you either don’t know how the system works, or you didn’t properly assess your commodity. In other words, user error. Or as Benis would say, “Derp.”

"No one loses their backup 650 OVR sophomore PG to the riches of the fake NBA"

Would a player with.... 90 ATH, 90 SPD, 90 DEF, 90 PER, 90 BH, 90 PAS, 90 ST, 20 WE not go pro early? Especially as a sophomore? I honestly don't know because I don't play D1.

And also, don't some players decide to stay even if they're well worthy of the draft? I don't know this answer either, but I would think that would be the case. If not, it would just be a numbers thing, like..... once your player gets to "this" number, he leaves.

if it's not a set number that causes players to leave, or if it's not just the top 60 players leave, then it IS in fact, random.

no?

Posted by topdogggbm on 8/2/2018 5:12:00 PM (view original):

Posted by shoe3 on 8/2/2018 8:46:00 AM (view original):
“But you need to deal with randomness of EEs so that's frustrating.”

Early entries are not “random”. No one loses their backup 650 OVR sophomore PG to the riches of the fake NBA. Elite commodities are volatile. They are expensive to get, and they may not fulfill the term. High risk, high reward. What Benis means to say is at D1 you need to decide how much of that volatility your team is willing to take on. You have to assess every recruit not only for how good he is/will be, but for when he may be good enough to possibly leave.

If you are surprised by a guy who leaves early, you either don’t know how the system works, or you didn’t properly assess your commodity. In other words, user error. Or as Benis would say, “Derp.”

"No one loses their backup 650 OVR sophomore PG to the riches of the fake NBA"

Would a player with.... 90 ATH, 90 SPD, 90 DEF, 90 PER, 90 BH, 90 PAS, 90 ST, 20 WE not go pro early? Especially as a sophomore? I honestly don't know because I don't play D1.

And also, don't some players decide to stay even if they're well worthy of the draft? I don't know this answer either, but I would think that would be the case. If not, it would just be a numbers thing, like..... once your player gets to "this" number, he leaves.

if it's not a set number that causes players to leave, or if it's not just the top 60 players leave, then it IS in fact, random.

no?

No. That isn’t what random means. Random means without method. Early entries are determined based on probability. There is definitely a method, it’s not arbitrary or haphazard. There is something like a “random number generator” that gets used at the end to determine if a player *who is good enough to be drafted* will leave or stay. The use of RNG doesn’t mean the process is random. RNGs get used in every possession of every game - it doesn’t mean the game results are “random”. They’re based on series of events whose outcomes are determined by probability, and not absolute, fixed equations. “Random” gets mis-used as a way to disparage the game that exists by people who want a more fixed, predictable, and gameable process.

It doesn’t really matter, but the example of a player with 90 in all the cores but 0-1 in all non-cores would be something of a unicorn. Theoretically, such a player may reach criteria to be considered for early entry (though more likely if you take away 30 points in stamina and 20 points of WE, and give him 50 in LP). You don’t see many players with elite athleticism and no rebounding or block ability, and durability below 15 is rare, too. A player with 90 in all the cores is most likely going to have an OVR in the 750 range, not 650.