Some changes need to be made to scouting...

 1. Keeps telling me guys are high potential and they show up with normal potential and cap out after about 8-10 points.

2. He always scouts the same skills over and over again, without giving me the ones I actually want!

If #1 is actually true, open a support ticket immediately.  I suspect it's not actually true.

You'll find no shortage of people who are with you on #2.

AS llamanuts said, your first problem may not be happening the way you think - just a suggestion, but you may want to look at how you are interpreting what the scout has to say.

I don't have the link right now, but if you search the forums, you can find a link to a page which will give you all the "low-high" and "high-high" messages. Anything other than those which looks like they "may be able to see some improvement" or something similar means AVERAGE potential and NOT high.

Here's the link he was referring to.

#1 can't be right, you must have misinterpreted it, or something. #2 has been discussed, and the consensus seems to be that there should be a kind of premium scouting trip, where you can chose what attribute you want the scout to tell you (this ST would of course be more expensive).

I think if there was a "premium scouting trip" option, the price would not only have to be more expensive but enough so that it would still be worth it to use the "random" scouting trip to save money. Otherwise, no one would ever use the "random" option.

It would be great to have a "Head Coach Scouting Trip".  You would think that by seeing the player yourself, you should be able to see the desired attributes.  Hope this idea gets implemented. 

In case I wasn't clear before, I'm all for adding the option of a premium or head coach scouting trip - I just want to see it priced appropriately so there is a "trade-off" and a reason to choose either option. You want to save money, go for the random trips we already have and hope. You want to make sure, you pay an appropriate amount for it.

I think there has to be some random mistakes built in.  How many scouts are going to give you a perfect assessment after having seen a kid play 1 or 2 high school games?

There are no mistakes.  And it wouldn't be good for the game if there were.

Agree, #1 is not correct. Either there was misinterpretation of the scouting message or the kid showed up, practiced once and went from blue to black with slightly over 20 points of improvement left. 

Also the scouts aren't perfect. They might tell you a kid is high-high in perimeter and that could mean he gains 28 points or he gains 80 points. That is quite a range and far from perfect. Maybe what you would like to see is more of those low potentials areas turn into average or high potentials? If there were random mistakes though, why even bother with scouting?

I think there has to be some random mistakes built in.  How many scouts are going to give you a perfect assessment after having seen a kid play 1 or 2 high school games?

I understand this would be a realistic idea, but it would be TERRIBLE for the game if mistakes were included.

No one wants to make critical recruiting decisions with incorrect information. It just ruins the entire point, and just for the sake of "realism" that few people care about in this case.

No one who takes this game even remotely seriously wants to deal with those kinds of things.  For example, no one wants to get a scouting report which indicates a player has high/high potential in a key attribute only to find out it was a "mistake" and the guy is actually in the red  in that area when he comes in.

Random elements of this game have been being removed for years.  Collectively, the HD community basically hates them.  The idea is that the real challenge is in understanding how all the elements of the recruiting and game engines work and how best to take advantage of that understanding.  Random elements undermine your ability to succeed in those central challenges.

Posted by dahsdebater on 11/27/2013 1:10:00 PM (view original):
Random elements of this game have been being removed for years.  Collectively, the HD community basically hates them.  The idea is that the real challenge is in understanding how all the elements of the recruiting and game engines work and how best to take advantage of that understanding.  Random elements undermine your ability to succeed in those central challenges.

well said.

theres always the theory that its extra-tough to deal with random events (like injuries) and maybe that gives coaches who work for it an edge... did you plan for these eventualities, have the depth to absorb them, etc... but in practice, people just seem to hate it. it would be sweet if people were like, man, i really handled that brutal injury to my star point guard well, we really didn't suffer much, that was awesome! but sadly what everyone is really thinking can't be posted here 

I don't like random events.  I like knowing for sure that I will have an advantage and that the players I recruit will progress for 4-5  years exactly as I plan.  That is the way real basketball works and since we are trying to continuously re-run a NCAA season from years ago, makes the most sense.  Let's keep it "extra tough" for people who don't understand the system but not include anything like that outside of our control.  I mean, geesh, I am coaching a basketball dynasty here, not dealing with variables outside of my control and adjusting to those.