It's been a loooong time since I've played, but wanted to give this another shot. My last meaningful try was seasons 23-27 in Naismith....last time around I took a decent program (Swarthmore) and was able, through some skilled manipulations, to fit the entire team into the toilet. I scouted with the eyes of a jellyfish and enjoyed recruiting success at a rate similar to asking my wife what she wants for dinner.
I was going to jump into Allen because it is starting next, and try to get a grip on scouting and recruiting thanks to some of the newer forum posts/guides that are out there, but I have the option to jump back into Naismith at D2, even though I never moved up. Any opinions on which place to start? I'm essentially a newb and probably need the lesser competition, but didn't know if having the extra money and earlier access to D1 players would make it any easier to figure out recruiting. Also, if I play in Naismith at D3 do I get any bump in recruiting because of coaching experience? I feel like this was a thing way back when, but if it was it didn't help me much.

It really depends on your personal preference and what you’re looking for. D2 may be slightly more competitive at the championship level, but is not really meaningfully more difficult to raise a team to the competitive level (ie, it’s not really harder to get your team to the ~B+ level at D2).

If your goal is to win championships as soon as possible with the team you choose, probably go with D3. If your goal is to move up to a top level D1 program quickly, choose D2. If you just want to learn the game, and have fun, then do what you want, it really doesn’t matter. You may want a mentor, or at least spend time looking through the forums though, because a lot has changed. Scouting can be fun, but an advanced version can be pretty complex (and you should know that at both levels you can land recruits in the D1 pool, and you should probably avoid scouting and recruiting the D3 pool ever, that should be considered just for sims). Once you land a team, don’t start spending scouting money until you know what you’re doing.

Welcome back MIT.

I actually came back to HD last month after roughly 10 years. Two of my biggest changes would be how recruiting works and player development (I believe potential was only introduced in ~Season 30 Naismith) but the core remains mostly the same (which attribute are most important for each position and such)

I highly suggest reading up on the updated HD guides to freshen up.

I tried D1 and quickly dropped to D3.

thx all, D3 it is

I came back recently after a long hiatus as well and had a mix of all 3 divisions. and just like that I am back to all DI teams. DIII and DII recruiting is painful for me.

D2 and D3 are comparable. Like shoe mentioned, it all depends on whether you want to get to a D1 school.

With changes to the game (getting to D1 is easier now), there is an abundance of coaches at D1 schools, so recruiting has gotten tougher. The coaches taking over low major schools or total rebuilds have to rely on players that upper tier D2 schools are really focusing on, so in turn the D2 schools will start looking at the players the top tier D3 schools may be looking at. The trickle down effect can be brutal for the D2s and D3s, but its all part of the game.

From my perspective in D2 Naismith, I think it's easier to have success at D2 more than D3. There are some D3 lifers in Naismith and the absolute juggernaut University Conference make it tough year in and year out. There are some D2 lifers as well, but we've seen quite a few decide to move up or move down that as long as you don't massively screw up your recruiting you should end up in NT or PIT every season in my opinion.