Scorer?

3 Pt Shooter?

Assist maniac?

In other words, what in the WORLD makes an Offense FLOW in HD?

i dont know a whole lot, but i would first get an idea in your head of how you want your motion offense to flow? you have to be realistic and have 2 primary scorers and work around them IMO....and the rest of your players compliment them.

this is my DIII wentworth team: http://www.whatifsports.com/hd/TeamProfile/Ratings.aspx?tid=4731

i may have a different idea of how i want my team to get its points than you (i.e. you may be a low post or slasher guy)

look at teams that are winning and match a style with yours and copy them and add your twists

Scorer?
universally: athleticism + speed + Offensive IQ are necessary for any position to score. For big guys, in the new engine it appears low post is by far the biggest factor, but rebounding also helps put the offensive board back in. Also, a PF with decent perimeter can really dominate. For guards its superior speed + decent BH and acceptable perimeter (passing is necessary too, but not for scoring). I haven't seen the new engine really hurt any guards with poor LP skills. For small forwards, good speed + above average perimeter and low post, along with decent ball handling will produce.

3 Pt Shooter?
speed + perimeter + Offensive IQ. A player without speed will never get open enough to get a good look and obviously a player without perimeter will never make the shot no matter how open.

Assist maniac?
passing + speed + Offensive IQ. In HD, speed also means quickness (yes I know that seems like it should be athleticism, but Seble/developers have stated otherwise) and a player cant be a great passer without quickness to get that pass off, and the passing skills to get it there.

In other words, what in the WORLD makes an Offense FLOW in HD?
1) Know the offense you are running, and what makes it work. Know what individual skill sets make your particular offense work. For example, I know in the triangle, I need a big man with good LP and a SG who can catch and shoot. There's a full article pinned at the top of the forums about the offenses run in HD.
2) Proper team and player game-planning. Use exhibition games to find who the best scorers on your team are, or experiment a bit moving the distribution around until you find something that works; when you find the right formula, you will know. Exploiting game-to-game match-ups via offensive distribution or defensive positioning can make or break a game.

Also, don't always feel the need to play someone at their assigned position. This season I am doing fine starting 2 SG, 1 SF and 2 C. If you have a speedy C/PF with decent perimeter, some teams can even fit him into the SF position.

But no matter how good a player/recruit looks, always remember defense, especially in this new engine where individual match-ups can be more exploited. Even in a zone, a poor or slow defender can weigh your team down. In this game, offense is obviously not everything. There are many teams that win by shutting down the other team defensively.

brrexkl, when picking up a new team what matters most is recruiting the right players.

When recruiting, always remember: drop-downs, drop-downs, drop-downs. I tried Gridiron dynasty for a couple seasons, and what sets HD apart is that a good recruiting class should consist almost entirely of drop-downs, meaning when you start recruiting, every player you're recruiting should be listed to go a division above you, especially in DIII (because of potential, DII can be a bit different). At any division, if you find yourself battling a Sim AI from your division, move on because you should be looking at better players.

Especially with the new recruit generation now out, it seems potential is everything, so Future Stars Scouting is becoming more crutial. First, find and add all recruitable players that will fit your team within 400-500 miles (for a young DIII team). Next, find what states most of these recruits are from and when recruiting starts, buy the most affordable/best valued states (most targeted recruits per cost of state). From FSS, you should now know what players you love, what players you'll take, and what players you no longer want.
From here there are many different styles of recruiting, but the main commonality is patience and wait for the right players to drop down.

Thanks, guys! So, Speed rules in HD regardless of what you are trying to do (SPD + DEF, SPD + PASS, SPD + PER, etc.)

For DIII, what constitues 'quality'. For instance, when I'm gunning for that 3 Point Shooter, what is the LOWEST SPD/PER I should be searching for?

I've got a PG I recruited with 70 Ball Handling (now 75 as he has improved quiet a bit) and his passing is comparable to the rest of my Guards. I figure he's the safest bet to not turn the Ball over, so I want to run the Offense through him.

I've got a C with good Low Post, but his FG% went crazy low so I took away his Distro. I'm trying to piece things together game by game, (and I have just won 2 in a Row, though I think it may have been teams with less talent than I have) but I'm having a difficult time of it.

Speed rules from the guard and SF positions. In the post you really should favor more athleticism.

In a guard I generally prefer SPD of at least 50. Above 40 BH will work at the 2 guard spot, but I like to aim for 50+ BH at the PG spot. For a good perimeter scorer you need 40+ in PER.

For a PF/C just having a high LP rating wont necessarily translate to a high FG%. Aim for guys with +40 in athleticism to play the post and +40 LP. Those will be much better low post scorers than a guy with 55LP and 20 Athl.

brrexkl, you should make sure that you're getting advice from the right people. The forums are good, but I would also highly recommend sitemailing people in your world that have been extremely successful over a long period of time.

Not suggesting sp isn't important, but it doesn't significantly impact things like passing. And for scoring for g's/sf's, I don't view it as head-and-shoulders above ath. For perimeter players, you'll want to factor in ath along with sp, pe, iq and also bh.

I would not change who you recruit much at all based on the offense that you are running. Target the absolute best players that you can.

And I would not use exhibitions -- or any sample size of just a couple games -- to determine who your best players are or who to give your distro to. It's extremely easy for good players to be bad and bad players to be good over just a couple games. You should be able to tell by the ratings (along with iq) who your best players will be. And once you get deeper into the season you can start making tweaks to distro, etc. but don't make the mistake of jumping to conclusions based on a very small sample size.

athleticism helps too. In D3, for a player to be considered 'ok' at something you probably want a 30 with average potential. For good, you want 40, and for excellent you want a 50 with average potential. Maybe subtract 5-10 points for good potential depending on work ethic.

A freshman with 40 ath/spd/per/bh/pass guard in D3 will be pretty good, but you almost always have to sacrifice something.

I personally think ball handling affects shooting % for guards a ton.

Quote: Originally Posted By reinsel on 6/07/2010
athleticism helps too. In D3, for a player to be considered 'ok' at something you probably want a 30 with average potential. For good, you want 40, and for excellent you want a 50 with average potential. Maybe subtract 5-10 points for good potential depending on work ethic.

A freshman with 40 ath/spd/per/bh/pass guard in D3 will be pretty good, but you almost always have to sacrifice something.

I personally think ball handling affects shooting % for guards a ton.

This is 100% true.

brrexkl feel free to sitemail me if you need any team building advice. Ultimately you should choose your own style of play and then the players that will work well in that system.