I thought I understood how recruiting was working in 3.0 but was just checked in and was shocked that I was poached in 1 cycle by a team with lower prestige and similar preferences alignment. This was in Tark, the recruit was Bob Neal, signed by St. Johns. I don't want this to come across as ******** or whining (although I am of course frustrated as I clearly don't understand how this works), I just want to know how this happened.

History: I was on the recruit since the 2nd cycle, lots of AP up front, only Very HIgh team from that point on. I promised a start, promised minutes, and did a campus visit the next cycle. Steadily pumped Home Visits after that, getting up to a total of 15 home visits. When I went to bed last night after the 11pm cycle, I was the only "very high" team, with several "very low" sims--notably St Johns was not on the list at that point at all. I had about 450 AP into him. When I checked this morning, I was still the only Very High team, and St Johns showed up as moderate. I pumped the remaining 5 Home visits in, and shifted another 70 AP his way. When I checked after the 11am cycle today, he had signed with St Johns.

I just don't understand this mathematically or chronologically. St Johns never reached "Very High" status, they are just at "high". It is mathematically impossible for him to have put in more that 400 AP in two cycles, and we would have been maxed on CV and HV. I offered the start and minutes as early as possible which I though scaled throughout the rest of my effort. I have a higher prestige. His preferences with me were 1 Very Bad (Distance) but 3 Very Goods, 2 Goods, and 2 neutral.

Again, I just cant see how I lost this recruit in one cycle given the circumstances. I though 3.0 was supposed to eliminate poaching (or at least reduce it) but this situation went from not on the list, to moderate, to signed in two cycles. It is not mathematically possible for St Johns to have put in more AP that me in those 2 cycles, not possible for him to have put more effort, and the preferences should have been almost the same. Factoring in my higher prestige, this makes no sense to me. Given I had no opposition and was Very High from the start, I expected him to sign with me at the 11pm cycle last night.

Can anyone who understands 3.0 help me understand here?

St. John's had +6 preferences, highly unusual. What were your preferences? I assume you are both in the same division. What are your prestige and his prestige? How many openings did St. John's have? These are all relevant.

I'd say just from the info given, he started late, got to moderate fast because of the very good preference profile, went to high then next cycle offering whatever visits and promises he did, then got a good roll with the RNG, as a high beating a very high.

That's going to be the biggest adjustment in 3.0, getting used to the idea that you'll win and lose some that would have gone the other way in the more deterministic previous version.

Posted by pkoopman on 9/30/2016 12:24:00 PM (view original):
I'd say just from the info given, he started late, got to moderate fast because of the very good preference profile, went to high then next cycle offering whatever visits and promises he did, then got a good roll with the RNG, as a high beating a very high.

That's going to be the biggest adjustment in 3.0, getting used to the idea that you'll win and lose some that would have gone the other way in the more deterministic previous version.

That's what it sounds like to me

Posted by CoachSpud on 9/30/2016 12:08:00 PM (view original):
St. John's had +6 preferences, highly unusual. What were your preferences? I assume you are both in the same division. What are your prestige and his prestige? How many openings did St. John's have? These are all relevant.

He had 6 openings, I had 5, both of us had already signed one player.

Preferences:
Distance - Very Bad (134 Miles--St Johns should have been around 250 miles)
Success - No preference
Play Style - Strong Defense - Good (I Lead my conference in fewest points allowed per game, and in differential both my a large margin over St Johns). My Def team rating is higher
Offense - No Preference
Defense - Zone - Good (I play Zone/Press, St Johns Plays Man)
Conference Strength - Very Good
Coach Longevity - Very Good (I have been at Nova 21 seasons, St Johns Coach has been there 8)
Signing Preference - Early

By my score, compared to St Johns it would be: Distance -1, Play Style +1, Defense +1, Conference Strength 0, Coach Longevity +1, putting me up +2 on preferences.

Prestige: I am a high A (should be A+ after this draft, regardless of postseason), he is a solid mid B.

I don't understand how he was +6 on preferences--can someone link to where that scoring is explained?

I also don't understand how the recruit makes the swing from moderate to signing in one cycle. Can anyone estimate what the RNG chances were (80/20, 70/30, etc...). I though one of the points of 3.0 recruiting was that it took time to build into a recruit so you would almost always have a chance to respond to effort.

There was no way for Spud to know St Johns was +6, unless he saw the inside math. Or, he's wrong and just made up +6.

I agree this sucks and the formula should be adjusted from what you described. Hopefully a sensible balance is reached in the coming months as we get a larger sample size.

Did maybe a promised start or guaranteed minutes come into play for St John's?

And like guyo said, i wouldn't put any weight inti what spud said about +6. He would have no idea.

Posted by npb7768 on 9/30/2016 12:50:00 PM (view original):
I agree this sucks and the formula should be adjusted from what you described. Hopefully a sensible balance is reached in the coming months as we get a larger sample size.

Did maybe a promised start or guaranteed minutes come into play for St John's?

And like guyo said, i wouldn't put any weight inti what spud said about +6. He would have no idea.

I promised start and 20 minutes the first cycle after the scholarship offer, 3rd overall cycle in recruiting.

Posted by CoachSpud on 9/30/2016 12:08:00 PM (view original):
St. John's had +6 preferences, highly unusual. What were your preferences? I assume you are both in the same division. What are your prestige and his prestige? How many openings did St. John's have? These are all relevant.

What's your other ID Spud?

I'm disinclined to believe in coincidence. Sure, Oct was before notice, but in my head CS is seble still here posting after he left.

Moving forward, a solution to this could be that each player under the preferences tab would have a "Signing Tendency"... maybe a random 25% of recruits will always sign with the team that's ahead at 50.0001%, call them "Loyal"... another 25% will be "Erratic", with wild fluctuations in who they sign with... the final 50% will be regular as it is now (once we find a sensible balance).

Also: in Beta, i think at first there was no Timing preference, but eventually it was added where "Early", "by End of Period 1", "Whenever" and "Late" were added as preferences... this was a big improvement.

Posted by guyo26 on 9/30/2016 12:47:00 PM (view original):
There was no way for Spud to know St Johns was +6, unless he saw the inside math. Or, he's wrong and just made up +6.

I think he got +6 from the OP; 1 very bad (-2), 3 very goods (+6), 2 goods (+2).

Looking at it again it appears that OP was referring to the recruit's preferences with his own team. At first glance, it looked to be the other way around.

Posted by pkoopman on 9/30/2016 1:03:00 PM (view original):

Posted by guyo26 on 9/30/2016 12:47:00 PM (view original):
There was no way for Spud to know St Johns was +6, unless he saw the inside math. Or, he's wrong and just made up +6.

I think he got +6 from the OP; 1 very bad (-2), 3 very goods (+6), 2 goods (+2).

First time I've seen this. Is that really a known formula? Do we know VG is 2x the value of G for every preference, not 3x or 1.5x or 6x?

Posted by kcsundevil on 9/30/2016 1:07:00 PM (view original):

Posted by pkoopman on 9/30/2016 1:03:00 PM (view original):

Posted by guyo26 on 9/30/2016 12:47:00 PM (view original):
There was no way for Spud to know St Johns was +6, unless he saw the inside math. Or, he's wrong and just made up +6.

I think he got +6 from the OP; 1 very bad (-2), 3 very goods (+6), 2 goods (+2).

First time I've seen this. Is that really a known formula? Do we know VG is 2x the value of G for every preference, not 3x or 1.5x or 6x?

No, I think this is spud's formula.