Hopefully the last season of getting screwed at singing cycle by a team with 3 early entries - so 7 total scholarships - who didn't have to battle, and could drop a load knowing I had to battle for another guy and likely wouldn't be able to recover his last-second blitz. 3.0 couldn't get here fast enough as far as I'm concerned. I have not one solitary droplet of * to give about how hard it's going to be now for "elite teams" to replace elite talent every year. This is the aspect that has made D1 a bad experience, and it's well past time it was replaced with a model that makes more sense for a game that wants customers who actually pay for the game.

Posted by pkoopman on 9/6/2016 8:38:00 PM (view original):
Hopefully the last season of getting screwed at singing cycle by a team with 3 early entries - so 7 total scholarships - who didn't have to battle, and could drop a load knowing I had to battle for another guy and likely wouldn't be able to recover his last-second blitz. 3.0 couldn't get here fast enough as far as I'm concerned. I have not one solitary droplet of * to give about how hard it's going to be now for "elite teams" to replace elite talent every year. This is the aspect that has made D1 a bad experience, and it's well past time it was replaced with a model that makes more sense for a game that wants customers who actually pay for the game.

**** you too.

Who says EE's only happen to a few of the big schools. I coach at Utah in Tark and I have had EEs. Some were on the big board, "on the fence". The most crushing one happened to me when he wasn't on the big board at all but left and got drafted anyways. I have no idea how 3.0 works so I won't try to speak on it but right now if a school loses an EE they can replace him... unless you're not a Big 6 school and you have to get lucky and out recruit everyone else to get a player once a "decade" or so.

Basically what I am getting at is... 3.0 isn't a finished product. Why don't we see how a few real seasons play out before we talk about how messed up it is? What it seems like they are trying to fix is to spread the top players around a bit more. Fair or not, when the same schools get the top players and advance to the elite 8 in their sleep, they don't pay for the game. That's why they don't want this changed. Those of us little guys that hope for $20 in credits when it comes time to renew, we like the idea that we may get a good player a little more often. But is that fair to want that if what we are striving for is a game that is as realistic as possible? That's what WIS has to decide.

But for DII or DIII people to get involved in this debate is ludicrous unless they plan on making the jump. Why try to influence how things may or may not work if it doesn't apply to you? I'll never understand the whole idea of being a troll online...

The point is we KNOW it's a problem and have known since the beginning and there has been no desire to fix it.
A few seasons ago, I lost five ee's and had ZERO seniors.
I KNOW this would result in zero recruiting cash and zero scouting money while needing five players.
Solution 1- eliminate ee's. Pretty sure this can be programmed, even though I'm not a professional programmer. I'm a decently intelligent guy,
solution 2- have them declare before the first signing period. Have NO idea why this couldn't be done. How hard can that be?
Solutiin 3- before the season starts pick a number of ee's you want to "gamble" you will have. You get that much recruiting cash. If more declare, you get the extra cash just like you would at start of 2nd cycle. If less declare, you have to cut a player, taking loyalty hit and all after season is over. This is obviously programmable.

It IS a real problem.
It was pointed out before beta and during beta and could have been tested easily.
it was blatantly ignored as yet another way to punish success. Combo of all these things is killing competition in favor of lottery luck and intentional punishment for success.
Why in the world would anyone want to punish success in a sports competition simulation unless there are a bunch of crybabies wants handouts, participation trophies, and the like?

Posted by stewdog on 9/7/2016 8:13:00 AM (view original):
The point is we KNOW it's a problem and have known since the beginning and there has been no desire to fix it.
A few seasons ago, I lost five ee's and had ZERO seniors.
I KNOW this would result in zero recruiting cash and zero scouting money while needing five players.
Solution 1- eliminate ee's. Pretty sure this can be programmed, even though I'm not a professional programmer. I'm a decently intelligent guy,
solution 2- have them declare before the first signing period. Have NO idea why this couldn't be done. How hard can that be?
Solutiin 3- before the season starts pick a number of ee's you want to "gamble" you will have. You get that much recruiting cash. If more declare, you get the extra cash just like you would at start of 2nd cycle. If less declare, you have to cut a player, taking loyalty hit and all after season is over. This is obviously programmable.

It IS a real problem.
It was pointed out before beta and during beta and could have been tested easily.
it was blatantly ignored as yet another way to punish success. Combo of all these things is killing competition in favor of lottery luck and intentional punishment for success.
Why in the world would anyone want to punish success in a sports competition simulation unless there are a bunch of crybabies wants handouts, participation trophies, and the like?

Those are bad solutions. This is a commodities game. It isn't in the interest of the game, nor in the interest for most players to go back to a system where the best commodities can be hoarded by a few top teams. Then those top teams make the sweet 16 consistently, and don't pay much, if anything, for the game, and everyone else is *ed because they keep losing their best targets - who often would be fringe EEs at best, like what I lost to BC in Allen - to teams who just got an infusion of scholarship cash because of... Early Entries. That's winner's ball. It's what makes D1 suck in 2.0. I'm glad it's gone.

It isn't punishing success. The early entry system isn't a "punishment" at all. It's a (realistic) risk attached to very high end commodities. If you want to go after them, you may only have them for 2 or 3 seasons, and you may need to scramble when they leave. If you have acquired 5 players of that caliber in 3.0, you have been extremely fortunate, you've won a lot of dice rolls and beaten the odds. But you know the system, and that's the chance you take. It's not a punishment to lose an advantage that you're used to having. It's return to stasis. When you lose multiple early entries, while your team may not be as good as it would have been if they would have all stayed, it's not worse than it would have been had someone else gotten all those recruits to begin with.

And for all the complaining about Spud, your post is an illustration of what created him. Its a pretty common and legitimate reason why people don't like D1, why they go back to D2/3 or quit altogether. In other words, probably a pretty big reason why the game has a retention problem. It's easy to observe how the decks get stacked in 2.0 so that the top teams can re-load at will, ad nauseum. You're calling the people who aren't interested in playing that game anymore "whiners" who want "participation trophies". And then you wonder why someone like Spud gets sarcastic and dismissive? D1 sucks in 2.0, and it's not good for the game because that should be the centerpiece. If it's been gamed and parsed out to the point where most people don't bother for long, and the top teams have a meal ticket in perpetuity, it's not good for the game. Great coaches will find a way to rise up in 3.0. You'll just be doing it without being able to rely on replacing every early entry directly with a commodity of similar value.

Well said pkoopman. This improvement has led me to move up to D1, now that the playing field is more even. Looking forward to challenging myself against the top coaches now that the recruiting system is more balanced. I'm curious how things will play out.

koopman - agree and disagree with what you said.
1) Obscene post season cash is a big contributor to power conferences hoarding top recruits
2) Carry over cash is a big contributor to top teams restacking with top recruits.
BOTH of those components are gone.
3) Preferences have been added which GREATLY impact school choice.

An elimination of EEs would have been a logical solution. Current 3.0 solution is just a piling in order for less talented coaches to be able to compete.

Casper is a good example (no offense) - a mediocre coach who feels like now that "everyone" has a shot to compete that he will be able to prosper. Although this is exactly what Seble intended, it feels a bit like welfare.

Posted by mullycj on 9/7/2016 9:37:00 AM (view original):
koopman - agree and disagree with what you said.
1) Obscene post season cash is a big contributor to power conferences hoarding top recruits
2) Carry over cash is a big contributor to top teams restacking with top recruits.
BOTH of those components are gone.
3) Preferences have been added which GREATLY impact school choice.

An elimination of EEs would have been a logical solution. Current 3.0 solution is just a piling in order for less talented coaches to be able to compete.

Casper is a good example (no offense) - a mediocre coach who feels like now that "everyone" has a shot to compete that he will be able to prosper. Although this is exactly what Seble intended, it feels a bit like welfare.

1) Losing postseason cash hurts the low prestige teams in big 6 conferences far more than it hurts the elite.
2) Rollover also affects all teams. Anyone can order their class structure in a way to game the system. These two factors are actually the only reason I've been able to stash enough at Virginia in Naismith (illustrating the masochism of taking over a C prestige team in an A conference) to try to compete for one big guy per year. And I still almost always lost out (a few times to stewdog, lol) because I simply didn't have enough. Nothing matters as much on an individual team level as scholarships.

You don't think cream is going to rise to the top in 3.0? I think you're crazy. Those of us who don't like D1 in 2.0 and the card-counting, eBay-bidding winner's ball it resembles aren't looking for handouts. We just want to play a fun college basketball simulation.

ETA - shoe3=pkoopman for those who didn't know

good points shoekoop

" If it's been gamed and parsed out to the point where most people don't bother for long, and the top teams have a meal ticket in perpetuity, it's not good for the game. "

Right there is the core of the argument. And right there is the answer to everyone who wants to continue to be indemnified for their NBA-caliber players. I can understand people feeling a loss when their indefinite "meal ticket" passes on. However, I cannot see any reason for coaches at the top being so threatened by competition, unless of course some of them have understood what pkoopman is saying all along and feel insecure at the top.

Well stated, pkoopman. It is pretty unusual for an argument to focus so clearly on the merits of a matter and not the personalities, so kudos to you.

bunch of ******* clowns. **** you all. pieces of ****.

in my opinion, EE's are and should be a risk of recruiting great players

But, in my opinion, 3.0 makes the risk too severe - especially for EE's that are hard to anticipate - guys in the 80s and 90s on the big board for example. Seems like in the beta if you started trying to fill a spot in the 2nd cycle you could not usually get any DI talent - not excellent talent, just DI talent. For obvious EE's on might try to target late signers for their spots. But, for unforeseen EEs or when you get say 4 EEs but expected 2 EEs, the new game hammers you - more than I think it should.

I dont think it should be easy to grab an elite replacement, but I think it should be realistic to fill the spot with a guy who is a useful DI player.

Maybe it works out to be doable, but I messed around in the beta on a friend's account and it doesnt look doable. At least in the first 2-3 seasons of the new game, it will be ugly for people with good rosters.

Posted by mamxet on 9/7/2016 12:18:00 PM (view original):
in my opinion, EE's are and should be a risk of recruiting great players

But, in my opinion, 3.0 makes the risk too severe - especially for EE's that are hard to anticipate - guys in the 80s and 90s on the big board for example. Seems like in the beta if you started trying to fill a spot in the 2nd cycle you could not usually get any DI talent - not excellent talent, just DI talent. For obvious EE's on might try to target late signers for their spots. But, for unforeseen EEs or when you get say 4 EEs but expected 2 EEs, the new game hammers you - more than I think it should.

I dont think it should be easy to grab an elite replacement, but I think it should be realistic to fill the spot with a guy who is a useful DI player.

Maybe it works out to be doable, but I messed around in the beta on a friend's account and it doesnt look doable. At least in the first 2-3 seasons of the new game, it will be ugly for people with good rosters.

I don't argue the system is perfect, or the balance is just right. I have argued for some small tweaks, like a signings-free cycle at the beginning of the 2nd period, and maybe some new serviceable jucos created for the 2nd period, something to the tune of 1/3 to 1/2 of the early entries. My primary concern is for coaches changing jobs, but these would alleviate *some* of the early entry pain. But eliminating them, or having them declare early are non-starters, IMO.

On on the other hand, I can also understand if the developers would prefer the "problem" to work itself out through gameplay. Coaches should be self-regulating what they take on based on their taste for risk. For example, I knew Albert Lewis (Rutgers, Allen) could be a fringe early entry guy. Sure enough, he starts his junior year "on the fence". I'd have recruited him anyway. He's a solid player, will be great as a senior if he stays. To contrast, BC (the team that sniped my primary target at signing cycle) just signed 6 4-5 star players. Well within his right, as much as I detest a system that enables it to happen without significant battling. But am I supposed to now feel sorry for him 3 seasons from now if he loses 4 of those guys to early entry? I scouted all but one of his signings, they all look like potential EEs to me. He's taking on that calculated risk. If he doesn't like the possibility of losing many or most of his class without having the subsequent scholarship advantages that currently allow him to replace them, then he should have adjusted his gameplay this year, and targeted at least a few guys who aren't likely to be early entries. In that light, I understand the hesitation to implement a long-term fix for what amounts to a likely short-term problem. Obviously there will be some pain these first few seasons, especially if there are elite teams who have somehow evaded any knowledge of what's coming, and have yet to adjust their recruiting strategy accordingly. But I'm not very interested in a long-term fix that amounts to going back to the perpetual meal-ticket.

For what it's worth, I was definitely able to replace an early entry with a *serviceable* guy who had a late preference, even with only one scholarship for a graduating senior. But my strategy was to replace his production with someone already on my roster, so for me, serviceable is not an elite all-american producer in year 1. It's a guy (602 overall, plenty of green) who would be red-shirted and a major contributor down the line. Now whether or not I'd be able to swing that in big boy world, yet to be seen.

Posted by dacj501 on 9/7/2016 12:01:00 PM (view original):
bunch of ******* clowns. **** you all. pieces of ****.

Lol, you have a nice day too, dacj501.

a reasonable view - and maybe it works itself out

I bet it wont lead to a result that I see as fair. My favorite solution is to make up for the Attention Points that would have gone with a slot if it had been open in the first recruiting cycle - so that a coach would get the same aggregate amount of AP for an EE slot as for a regular slot.

If that turned out to be too little or too much to make it reasonably possible to get a serviceable DI replacement consistently, adjust. I do think that when you lose an EE should generally be replaceable with a serviceable DI player