Ive heard much debate over whether some things effective or not. So I guess I will ask the questions and get the responses from the vets themselves.

1. How often do you actually gameplan for each game? IE, depth chart changes, distro changes, tempo changes, +/-, etc.

2. Do you actually see the changes work or do you make them just in case they do effect the SIM, you're good?

3. Does mix and matching to get a better Guard on Guard/Center on Center SPD/ATH change really matter? I know it should, but when/if you make that change, do you see the fruit of your change?

I am sure I will think of more but let's start with that. :-)

Thanks!
~West

1. Every game. Not always pleased with the results, but I put the effort in for every game.

2. I do believe my teams perform differently based on the changes. Especially +/- settings and lineup adjustments.

3. Yes, but more effective with bigs than smalls.

1. I probably spend 10 to 15 minutes per team. I have a set way I do it now (only taken me about 30 seasons )

2. Sometimes you see things work and sometimes you don't. Kind of like RL.

3. I will mix and match to get an advantage on the offensive end if I see an opponent with a defensive liability. But I don't switch my guys to try and shut someone down on the defensive end. Haven't had luck doing that.

1. I gameplan for every game. I have certain things I look for and I make changes accordingly. I probably change either tempo or +/- every game. I change my depth chart maybe once or twice a season if there is a really bad mismatch (usually based on speed). I check shooting % about every 5 games and adjust, if necessary, but not based on who my opponent is.

2. I have pulled several upsets due to my changes. I have also shot myself in the foot. In general, I go with the percentages and take my chances.

3. My five starters are my best players (unless I have offered a freshman a rare start) so I believe I have my best offense on the court with my starters. I don't play M2M defense so I don't have any reason to change there. As I mentioned in #1 above, about twice a season I will swap out a starter and a backup if they are about equal and one has better speed or sometimes better defense.

I am not going to answer the questions directly, as partly due to personal circumstance, my answers would not send the message I would like to send in my response. However, I would recommend you game plan for as many games as possible. If that is too much, focus on just one team, or just two, instead of all 3. Its better to really dig deep in one team, or in one system, than to scratch the surface of many.

There are a few reasons to game plan: 1) the immediate impact on your % chance of winning the upcoming game, 2) the information you can gain about your team that will help you set them up better later in the season, and 3) the information you gain about your system and the game engine that will help you plan and set up all future teams better.

The debate you hear all the time is pretty much over the first reason - the impact on your chance of winning the upcoming game. Its true, in general, that the changes a coach makes on average for a game don't have that big of an effect on the outcome (although, certainly not negligible). However, the changes a coach like OR would make to a team's setup for most other coaches, given the opportunity to coach 1 game for them as well as possible, would generally have a really significant effect.

So, when you are game planning, and observing the results after wards, keep in mind the two other reasons I mentioned above! You really want to get your team in tip top shape for the post season, as well as building your game planning ability. Also, by playing with game planning settings a lot, you can expose details about the sim engine - make a small change, observe a small result, that is how we can comprehend things. If you don't focus on game planning, then you are basically comparing the outcome of whole seasons, and the changes in your team and the teams you play from season to season are huge. So its practically impossible to separate out the causes and effects at that level. You want to make changes at the lowest level you can, to give you the best chance of figuring things out.

I woudl like to be a bit contrarian on #3. . .your five best players, number wise, should not neccesarily be your starters. For example, for a few seasons my arguably best player came off the bench over several positions - and was more effective there. Sometimes, numbers or not, you can't really tell what the best lineup will be without trying, unless the gulf is really a vast one between the starter and the next player and they are the same in kind as well as degree. Sometimes, depending on the composition of the rest of your lineup, the slightly worse overall sharpshooter might be better than the slightly better all around ball handler. Or the guy who is a slightly weaker player but a superiour rebounder might be a better choice if you have a weak rebounding team. .etcetera.

i am probably the ultimate "micro-manager" in all of HD, though i am definitely slowing down. I used to spend a good 30 minutes gameplanning for each game. i realize that it is possible to make a very good gameplan in 10 minutes or less.

furthermore, my 30 minute gameplan is probably not any better than the 10 min gameplan. maybe once every blue moon you catch something that you wouldnt catch in 10 minutes, but very rare. and that may even be offset by the times that i overanalyze things and make last minute change that end up being the exact wrong thing to do.

....BUT... i think where you gain (and I think Bill kinda said this) is in understanding your team better, understanding the game better, getting a better handle on your conferencemates and other rival coaches and their tendencies. in the end, i do it because thats just how i do things. In life and work, my best asset is that i really think things through. and, my worst flaw is that i *really* *think* *things* *through*.

So i enjoy all the tweaking and adjustments and second guessing , etc. but, wheter you enjoy it or not, i think it is a good idea to spend a good 10-15 minutes per gameplan until you feel like you really understand the game to a point where that is not necessary.

also, i agree 100% with billG on this point..... if the # of teams you have is not leaving enough time to gameplan throughly for each game... then reduce the nmber of teams.. or put one or two of the teams on "autopilot" (minimal gameplan) while you focus on the others.

on #3, im not sure that i allways see the fruit of my changes. but, if i understand correctly, one of the major changes in HD4.0 is that the engine will be looking more closely at individual matchups. and so i think we should be seeing the fruits of these tweaks a bit more clearly.

i also agree with ars. in fact, i really like to have at least one scorer coming off the bench. These Super-subs are often one of my best 5, but i like them coming off the bench.

one thing i think you do have make sure to think about is:
"how many minutes is my super-sub getting per game?"

if he answer is 15 or something like that, then you need to make some adjustments.

some things you can do to make sure these supersubs get more minutes:
put him at GT (getting tired)
make sure the starter in front of him is at FF (fairly fresh)
if possible, have the starter in front of him be a player with low ST (prefer 65 or lower)
have him listed as #2 on the depth chart at two or more spots (assuming he works as a swingman)
have the starter in front of him listed as second on the depth chart at another spot.
the option would be to use "target minute" approach, but, as far as i know, that approach is just flat out messed up and no one uses it (i would love to hear if there is someone who actually uses it with success) i cant even recall what the problem is... i think your players get tired faster for some reason?


If your super-sub is really a starter-type player (ability-wise) I would say that you have to get him 20+ min per game unless his stamina is a factor.

I gameplan every game. I believe it affects things. Although a great gameple by a weaker team won't always win, I do believe it can give you a 20% chance of winning a game that 2 sim gameplans would give you a 10% chance of winning.

I think changes work...they do something....its up to you to decide if you helped or hurt your chances.

I don't do it much. I don't usually have much of a difference on my guys, but I will do it more to exploit a weakness in an opponent playing man than to shore up a weakness on my side playing man. on my side I will typically mess around with my depth chart more than reassign starters.

sadly, my GP time is about the same as OR's, but my success is nowhere near it...

OD, how the hell do you spend 30 minutes on one GP? i'm not being snide-- i really want to know what you do for that long.

FOr me? Look at their past games, see what other teams tried against them and what worked and didn't and what they tried against other teams.

Quote: Originally posted by wronoj on 11/19/2009sadly, my GP time is about the same as OR's, but my success is nowhere near it... OD, how the hell do you spend 30 minutes on one GP? i'm not being snide-- i really want to know what you do for that long.

30 minutes a game is a good target for important games. during the NT, I make damn sure I know: their tempo (or the likely probability distribution), their +/- setting (or again, the likely probability distro), their complete depth chart, who is taking the shots, how we match up at every position, including important backup positions.

from there, i like to try to figure out how to best exploit the other player's setup. to do so, you have to figure how you will compare, on average, on rebounding, 3 point shooting, 3 point defense, points inside, defense against, turnovers forced and committed, among other things. finally, go for a % chance winning. if you really want to align your intuition with the sim engine, write down your % chance of winning every game for a hundred games or so, and see how you did... and what adjustments you need to make to your perception on par with reality. once you can predict the outcome of a game for two arbitrary teams, you can much better plan your team during recruiting.