The Fc game is lost.

Are you suggesting the draft system can be overhauled such that it does not  function like a glorified slot machine? Because that’s what it is now — and it’s the high cost, low odds, and no certainty of obtaining a player of your choice that would have to be addressed. I mean, if the whole premise of the game is to build a fantasy squad then we have to have some element of control (regardless of whether we are P2P or F2P). There’s a reason the majority of FCM players are F2P (or, like me, ultra-low spending “F2Pers”) and it’s because (a) we love football and (b) we don’t like wasting our money in casinos. So, we’re here for love of the game and will stay just so long as EA provides some certainty of a payoff for the “grind” and doesn’t try and have us “over a barrel” by sticking a high-priced/low-odds slot machine between us and a decently competitive team. [And, as I’ve said before, if you want me to spend real $$$ then improve gameplay and offer me a subscription service or something that isn’t a slot machine with poor payouts.]

I still say there was nothing wrong with the shard system and that the draft system was a “solution” in search of a “problem.” Literally NO ONE asked for it, and I haven’t heard anyone offer a compelling argument for why we should believe it can be made to work better than the shard system. And make no mistake, that should be the threshold we apply, because merely making things less awful than they are now is not going to cut it. The draft system landed like a sucker punch to the F2P community not just because it tried to coerce us into gambling in a crappy new casino, but it also disrespected (indeed, sought to render nearly worthless) the TIME we’ve invested grinding to get to where we are.

I honestly think the problem here is bigger than EA imagines because it’s not just that people are peeved about the draft system. It’s that they (accurately) perceive that EA doesn’t really respect their time or their intelligence. Let’s face it, no company that did either (let alone both!) of these things would have sprung the draft system on its users as part of one of the most highly anticipated events of the year, tried to “sell” it like it was some sort of exciting improvement(!) and then sat virtually silent for six weeks while the community protested and pleaded EVERY DAY for them to bring back shards. Only a company that is supremely out of touch (and/or holds its customers in a special kind of contempt) behaves that way. And so, if it’s merely the former (and not the latter) of these then EA needs to launch a serious fence-mending campaign. My advice would be (a) bring back the shard system for the next event; and (b) if EA wants/needs to explore a different model going forward for business reasons, then have a dialogue with the community and try to reach a mutually acceptable third option (e.g., a heavily modified draft system with reasonable reward guarantees and exchanges — i.e., certainty). But let’s be real — the “draft system” is tainted at this point because of how totally ham-handed these last 6-8 weeks have been handled. If they merely tweak it with some minor changes around the edges users will perceive that as slapping “lipstick on a pig” and you’re still going to see an awful lot of previously-loyal users (like this one) walk away in disgust.