i was wondering if others would be interested in this change. its something i've been wondering about for a while... it seems to me the ability to switch between multiple systems (especially on defense) is pretty common in real life, but in HD, its hardly viable, because of the practice planning limitations. practicing 15-20m in a defense you will only use occasionally, that seems pretty hard to justify! but, having all those options would also be pretty cool. so, i've tried to think of a fair way to allow multiple systems, with a reasonable penalty, that might make it usable. kind of fits in with the whole "what if" theme, even if half of the possible combinations make no sense, realistically.

i think the easy change would be to automatically designate (behind the scenes) the most highly practiced offense and defense as the "primary" set. then, any minute practiced in any other set, up to 50% of the minutes in the primary set, would be doubled. for example, if you practices 20m in man, 10 in press, and 0 in zone, man would be designated primary, and you'd get credit for 20m of each. or, if you did 20 in man and 7 in press, it would be like having 14 in press. i had some other ideas with user designation, but it seemed they might be abused to milk minutes in the primary set. here, you really can't do that, as best i can tell. there'd have to be a tie breaker, i guess.

so, a few questions. im assuming this is an easy change, but im curious if anyone thinks its useful. how many people would think they might take advantage of something like this? how many think its totally useless? second, is it too powerful, not powerful enough? you could play around with that double figure, or the "up to half the minutes" figure - you could allow a 50% increase up to half the minutes, or allow double increase up to 30% of the minutes, or whatever. i'd like to see it meaningful - because to me, increasing the range of systems through compositions, that really opens up the strategy book. most of these simple changes are small in impact, but this could be a huge one. i just worry if its not calibrated right, it could hurt things - if its too potent for too small a cost, it could upset the balance (although, only if coaches learn to really use it well, which isn't so horrible) - and if its too weak, it could be something that detracts from many teams, with coaches trying it and just basically getting screwed over for their efforts. seems to me, its got to be worth it if you totally nail the use, but it can't be overpowered. any thoughts?

This is an interesting idea, and I definitely DO think it would be useful. I'm not sure how "easy" of a change it would be from a coding perspective, though.

Would definitely be too powerful since you could switch back and forth between defenses with no penalty. Generally IRL when teams switch between defenses they tend to be very basic with the set thats not their primary. Generally its a man team switching to zone and if you compare that to a team like Syracuse that plays zone and practices zone all the time its going to be really simplistic. Most teams do it just as a change of pace to alter the rhythm of the game.

I don't think there is a good comparison in HD since theres no momentum (a big reason teams change defenses).

There is some appeal to this idea, but I wonder whether there are simpler ways to get to this result - the doubled value thing worries me as a potential for unintended consequences

what if every player got better at ALL systems at a rate that corresponds to say 5 minutes of practice.  THEN if one wanted to invest 5 or 10 minutes in a second defense that would be equivalent to 10 or 15 minutes.....?   the one generic change - everyone improves in all systems a little - would make this more feasible without other changes.

and that sort of general hoop IQ improvement seems consistent with reality - you take a bunch of seniors who have never themselves ran a zone and tell them - play zone - they will be better at it than when they were freshmen...I think

I spend actual minutes in a second "D" for most of my teams, and would prefer better in game options screen under team game planning!  I would also like to see a "save gameplan" feature to help in gameplanning for teams and then having to remember all the settings you used!

Compare how GD handles team practice minutes?  That sort of non-linear treatment might work for this idea.  The curve is just too steep in GD (i.e. some forum answer basically stated that 1 min. of 3-4 is about ½ of 8 in 4-3).  I don't know how the RL ole'ball coaches will feel about this, but my suggestion would be that the defensive categories be changed to: Zone, M2M & Trap.  

If you wanted to run a 1-3-1 trap, you would practice both zone & trap (the double teams mostly occur by location on the court, rather than individual player).  Likewise, if you want to doubleteam out of M2M or zone, then you'd need to put a few minutes into trap (or it would backfire).   There would need to be a separate setting (and end of game option) for taking the defense fullcourt or letting it pick up halfcourt (subject to +/ settings).  So, if you wanted to run "the system" or like Loyola Marymount used to, then you would only need to practice trap and check the setting for "fullcourt". 

On the offensive side, my only idea would be to make fastbreak a setting exactly similar to "fullcourt" extension of defense.  The weakness being that teams wanting to run "the system" would have to set some halfcourt offensive setting.  However, teams that did not practice fastbreak could be penalized in the end of game/end of half "quickshot" offense.  

The end result would be that teams would want to practice one offensive system + some minutes in fastbreak and one primary defensive set with a minute in each of the other two skills.  Then, the defenses in game could be m2m (m2m), 3-2 & 2-3 (zone), 1-3-1 (requiring zone & some trap), 1-2-1-1 Trap (requiring trap & some zone), FCP (trap only), I suppose you could even get box + 1 or match-up zone (zone & m2m).  

Anyway, that's a total engine rebuild and probably a pipe-dream, but I think it would be just excellent, if implemented properly.  I think scaled practice minutes would be necessary to implement that, but just not as scaled as GD.

i want something similar to that too rogelio, but i think that is a huge change. it would be awesome if they did it and did it well, though :)

It's a little bit different, but of the vein of "the way sets work in HD is unrealistic"

Posted by jetwildcat on 5/22/2014 1:29:00 PM (view original):
It's a little bit different, but of the vein of "the way sets work in HD is unrealistic"

I can see what you are going for in teams being unprepared to play vs. zone (if most of their competition plays m2m), but when I try to imagine game-planning and setting practice minutes in that system, my third eye gets crossed.  

Posted by rogelio on 5/22/2014 1:53:00 PM (view original):

Posted by jetwildcat on 5/22/2014 1:29:00 PM (view original):
It's a little bit different, but of the vein of "the way sets work in HD is unrealistic"

I can see what you are going for in teams being unprepared to play vs. zone (if most of their competition plays m2m), but when I try to imagine game-planning and setting practice minutes in that system, my third eye gets crossed.  

i pretty much agree with this. i think being prepared for a given defense is just too involved, although, i like how it would possibly add more strategy in game planning. i suppose i consider this a simpler way to do the same thing.

in retrospect... i could have done a much better job with the opening post. i think i made it sounds more complicated than it really is, its just getting a bonus in practicing secondary sets, to make it more cost effective. i would personally love to do that, i don't even care if it was less than optimal, i would do it anyway, unless it totally crippled the team (like practicing 4 sets today would)