Posted by fd343ny on 11/30/2017 4:42:00 PM (view original):
why keep D3 and D2 at all?

shoe's "D3 sandbox" idea is pretty good. Separate the players/users from the "real" game and let them have at it. No rewards. Hell, I wouldn't even let them have a NT. Just let people play for free, learn if they want then, if they feel like stepping up, step up.

But the reason to keep them is because people are in them. People hate, I mean HATE, when you take their **** from them.

i also declined the Rupp experiment, because i didn't want to start at D3 and go through the motions for a year.

but i don't think WIS should make decisions predicated on goosing out more teams from existing users, since so many of those users play for free or at a deep discount anyway. in my opinion, dependence on a tiny but very devoted user base is not a winning strategy for the health of the game. i do think letting new players start at D1 with a team they have heard of is one possible way to achieve better retention.

here's a real life example of why i think starting at low D1 is the way to go. i suggested this game to a friend who wanted to coach his alma mater, Penn. he was a bit miffed that he couldn't start there, since it was vacant, but played for a few months before realizing it was going to cost him $100 and a year of his life before he could get the vacant low D1 job he wanted. so he quit. I'm sure there are a lot of people like that out there.

honestly, I appreciate the fact that all coaches at D1 are experienced, whereas only some D3 coaches are, but look how many vacant conferences we have in this game. new players starting at low D1 would have at least half their schedule against sims pretty much anywhere. just look around.

hippo- I'm with you, I think a lot of brand new users would find starting at D1 attractive and it'd probably help keep people around for awhile.

However, what if everyone starts at D1? Why would anyone drop down to D2 or D3 from there? You might as well not even have it at that point, right?

Posted by bathtubhippo on 11/30/2017 5:00:00 PM (view original):
i also declined the Rupp experiment, because i didn't want to start at D3 and go through the motions for a year.

but i don't think WIS should make decisions predicated on goosing out more teams from existing users, since so many of those users play for free or at a deep discount anyway. in my opinion, dependence on a tiny but very devoted user base is not a winning strategy for the health of the game. i do think letting new players start at D1 with a team they have heard of is one possible way to achieve better retention.

here's a real life example of why i think starting at low D1 is the way to go. i suggested this game to a friend who wanted to coach his alma mater, Penn. he was a bit miffed that he couldn't start there, since it was vacant, but played for a few months before realizing it was going to cost him $100 and a year of his life before he could get the vacant low D1 job he wanted. so he quit. I'm sure there are a lot of people like that out there.

honestly, I appreciate the fact that all coaches at D1 are experienced, whereas only some D3 coaches are, but look how many vacant conferences we have in this game. new players starting at low D1 would have at least half their schedule against sims pretty much anywhere. just look around.

Did you tell him this is all make believe and it doesn't really matter what the stupid name at the top of the screen says?

Haven't you said that people weren't quitting because the march to D1 was too arduous? I'm almost positive we've butted heads over that.

There really wouldnt be a need for D2 and D3...but you cant just drop those levels as they have users that love those levels and would be angry if they lost their teams. You would just leave them exist I think. D2 may even be impacted as the new coaches at low D1 would be going for the recruits that D2 teams go after...maybe making D2 like it used to be.

At any rate, all of this is fun to talk about....but not happening anytime soon

WIS should just tier the cost/rewards for each of the divisions (they do this in GD already at least from the rewards perspective). Lower the cost to play in D3 to maybe 4.95 and cut the rewards as well accordingly. D2 would be around $10 and D1 is the usual amount. If someone wants to fork out $15 to sign up for D1 immediately (or maybe still give them the first season at a discount), then they can join whatever division they want.

Posted by mullycj on 11/30/2017 6:04:00 PM (view original):

Posted by bathtubhippo on 11/30/2017 5:00:00 PM (view original):
i also declined the Rupp experiment, because i didn't want to start at D3 and go through the motions for a year.

but i don't think WIS should make decisions predicated on goosing out more teams from existing users, since so many of those users play for free or at a deep discount anyway. in my opinion, dependence on a tiny but very devoted user base is not a winning strategy for the health of the game. i do think letting new players start at D1 with a team they have heard of is one possible way to achieve better retention.

here's a real life example of why i think starting at low D1 is the way to go. i suggested this game to a friend who wanted to coach his alma mater, Penn. he was a bit miffed that he couldn't start there, since it was vacant, but played for a few months before realizing it was going to cost him $100 and a year of his life before he could get the vacant low D1 job he wanted. so he quit. I'm sure there are a lot of people like that out there.

honestly, I appreciate the fact that all coaches at D1 are experienced, whereas only some D3 coaches are, but look how many vacant conferences we have in this game. new players starting at low D1 would have at least half their schedule against sims pretty much anywhere. just look around.

Did you tell him this is all make believe and it doesn't really matter what the stupid name at the top of the screen says?

mind. blown.

no, but seriously, of course you're not wrong, but that's true of any game ever, whether you're picking a character, a team, etc. the fantasy matters to a lot of people.

@mike, not sure if you were replying to me or someone else, but i have always said players should be able to start at low D1 and play a team they've heard of. i think this would help immensely at getting new folks and keeping them during NCAA basketball season, specifically the "real" NT when interest is at it's widest and highest.

A compromise option might be to allow people to start coaching at D-II. Personally, when I take over a team in a world I haven't been in yet, I move up to D-II after one season - D-III is just going through the motions to get where I want to go. I have a friend who just started playing, and while we're going to coach in a D-III conference together for the foreseeable future, in the other world he's in, he's simply trying to move up to D-II (and then D-I) ASAP. I have to imagine many new coaches want to coach in D-I - why force them to spend one season at D-III, only for them to move up to D-II next season anyways? Allowing new coaches to start at D-II, they'll still have to "pay their dues" and build a winning team, before being able to move to D-I.

That being said, I would never want to completely eliminate D-III. While I prefer D-II and D-I, D-III is a different beast, and challenges coaches in unique ways. It's also fun being able to coach smaller, local schools.

Saying no one knows a D3/D2 school is a terrible argument. Many people went to school at one, had offers from one, has one near their area, etc.etc...

Now back to the OP question. I think increasing the turnover rate at schools that would be listed as 'low D1' isn't a good thing. Already see complaints about conferences being sabotaged by "ghost coaches" and such.

I always thought combining D2 and D3 into a D2/D3 super structure with a 128 team NT and a 64 team PIT would be fun. Take one game out of the Non-conference slate.

Because of bigger tournament size going an extra round or three in the D2/D3 tournament is easier and advancement to D1 is then easier if the same/similar advancement criteria are kept for coaches wanting to advance to D1.

New players get double the amount of teams they are likely to know and get to sign players earlier than they would at today's D3. Also they can advance quicker to D1 since advancing an extra round in the NT is easier.

Posted by johnsensing on 11/30/2017 4:19:00 PM (view original):

Posted by CoachSpud on 11/30/2017 4:17:00 PM (view original):
In many cases the silent majority plays quietly season after season, paying no attention to the kindergarten that the forums have largely become, entirely or mainly satisfied with their game experience. The loud minority on the forums shouldn't fool themselves into thinking they are a part of a majority just because they are loud.

Take a moment to think, people. Regarding letting people start at D1:
1. It would be a certain death knell for D2 and D3 in HD.
2. Some people like to play at a college they attended or is nearby to where they live or work. There are a helluva lot more D2 and D3 schools than there are D1 schools.
3. If someone is so attention-deficit crippled that he cannot tolerate moving through the ranks, there is no reason to believe he would tolerate the down time that some of you have so loudly complained about.
4. As currently constituted, D1 enjoys a degree of stability that supports the game experience. Allowing players to make D1 job changes in and out of Worlds almost willy-nilly would totally disrupt that stability, and risk (if not assure) the demise of D1.
5. I doubt that a financial model is attractive to WIS or SportsHub if limited to the number of users that could occupy D1, compared to the number of users that could occupy three divisions. I doubt there is incentive for them or SportsHub to undertake the investment in time and resources to diminish their game.
6. If you think everybody should play at D1, and D2 and D3 should be trashed, you obviously haven’t thought about the so-called problems of EE’s and recruit generation.
7. If you think the job process sucks, terminating D2 and D3 is no solution. The solution is fixing the job process. WIS could do this in a way that retains some stability in D1 and shortens the period in which users become D1 eligible without discarding D2 and D3 from the game.
8. If you think too many sim teams is the problem, terminating D2 and D3 is no solution. WIS could:
a. contract the number of conferences in each world, which of course has its own problems.
b. reduce the number of worlds, which of course has its own problems.
c. finally do something effective to market the game to new users.
Any of those three would be better solutions, properly implemented, than trashing D2 and D3.

A reminder to those who stop reading when they see my user name on a post, never see the content of the post (you know who you are), and immediately start spewing your bile -- you are still nothing more or less than background noise to me and many others, of no more significance to the world than a dust bunny under your bed. Let’s try to keep this thread on topic.

We're through the looking glass, people. This is a really well-thought out post, and I agree with the vast majority of spud's numbered points -- especially 4, 6, and 7 (is anyone still even complaining about the job process anymore?). That said, as usual, spud's totally unmerited faux-superior pose takes away a lot of the force of his otherwise cogent arguments.

Yeah, I edited it to try to remove the snark, but I admit maybe I missed some, and for that I apologize. Thank you for being one of the few to consider matters on their merits this time.

They simply need to fix the atrocious job system. What does it say to a new user that after 100ish seasons each world has been through there are still massive amounts of Sim AI at the highest level? Here new user, spend 10+ seasons to get to DI just to continue to go against mostly Sims. Or just start them at DII. I'd definitely have more than 2 teams right now if I didn't have to waste time going through the lowers again.

Posted by ftbeaglesfan on 11/30/2017 9:08:00 PM (view original):
Saying no one knows a D3/D2 school is a terrible argument. Many people went to school at one, had offers from one, has one near their area, etc.etc...

Now back to the OP question. I think increasing the turnover rate at schools that would be listed as 'low D1' isn't a good thing. Already see complaints about conferences being sabotaged by "ghost coaches" and such.

I always thought combining D2 and D3 into a D2/D3 super structure with a 128 team NT and a 64 team PIT would be fun. Take one game out of the Non-conference slate.

Because of bigger tournament size going an extra round or three in the D2/D3 tournament is easier and advancement to D1 is then easier if the same/similar advancement criteria are kept for coaches wanting to advance to D1.

New players get double the amount of teams they are likely to know and get to sign players earlier than they would at today's D3. Also they can advance quicker to D1 since advancing an extra round in the NT is easier.

"Ghost coaches" are nowhere near the problem that Sim AIs are. Sim AI is everywhere and cannot even out recruit DIII teams.

Posted by Benis on 11/30/2017 4:36:00 PM (view original):
I'm not reading that wall of text. Especially from a guy who has zero teams.


amirite Mike?

You probably should, he made a lot of very valid points.

Posted by emy1013 on 12/1/2017 3:52:00 AM (view original):

Posted by Benis on 11/30/2017 4:36:00 PM (view original):
I'm not reading that wall of text. Especially from a guy who has zero teams.


amirite Mike?

You probably should, he made a lot of very valid points.

Perhaps. But probably nothing that hasn't been said before.