Re: Franchise Mode information: should you buy it?(100% don’t buy it)

@IrishOwl 

MLB the Show's franchise mode allows for fully editable players in every aspect. It also has an unlimited season length, so the "you won't start a new one" or "buy the next game" statement doesn't really hold up. No disrespect intended. 

Scouting in NHL is inherently broken for many reasons.

1. Prospect generation eventually does not exist within certain regions. In this case "Rest of World" and "Allsvenskan." It renders having scouts in those areas useless.

2. Prospect scheme preferences are broken:

   2A) Forward prospects after the first or second draft never have "carry" "efficient" and "don't block" as scheme preferences. And the ones that do are always prospects who will never reach the NHL, i.e. "AHL Top 6" (or less) potential.  

   2B) Defensemen prospects after the first or second draft will never have "balanced" as part of their preferences. And if it's indicated in the scouting report they do have "balanced" as a preference in any capacity its not accurate and once they're drafted it will be revealed that it will either be "pinch/shoot" "pinch/cycle" or "hold line/shoot" or "hold line/cycle."

This renders most coaches totally useless as well given that the coach and chemistry system is totally broken as well. Offensive and defensive coach schemes will eventually be rendered obsolete by the 4th or 5th season. Especially if you prefer to have a team that has 100% computer generated players.

3. Scouting interviews do not reveal anything useful that isn't already available with direct scouting of a player, and is limited to only 3 or 4 items. Player style (SNP, OFD, PLY etc...), NHL readiness, biggest strength, and biggest weakness.

4. Character values do not actually do anything. They don't impact chemistry even though it should be a primary driving force. It's not actually connected to anything, and if it is, or is supposed to be, its not evident at all.

5. Player types are not in line with their attributes. It would be expected that players who are snipers would have high shooting abilities. I find that player attributes are rarely in line with their play type. And given that we can't edit players it makes scouting rather futile.

The actual reason they removed editing players was so that we couldn't edit player types to gain full chemistry values (PWF + PLY + SNP = +5 chemistry)...but given that they totally nixed that formula when they introduced X-Factors and didn't re-introduce player editing is a monumental failure/oversight.

6. Gems never pan out. All the "gems" feature does is add a green (or red) diamond to a randomly selected prospect that will never amount to anything. All they did was add a column to the prospect database to make you think the system is doing something. It's not.

7. Also, why is the age range for scouting 17-50?....does anyone actually have players older than 36 on their team? I personally don't scout players older than 30.

I could go on and on, but these are just a few of the issues, off the top of my head, that plague scouting. The problem with them adding new features is the fact that they don't fix the problems that infest the features they've add the year before...and the year before...and the year before.

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@IrishOwl wrote:

Scouting revamp/update:

I'm not sure what's wrong with this system. I mean other then the fact we should have 25 Scouts. You need to explain the weaknesses of this system to me sometime.

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I agree it’s not terrible, but it is time consuming and monotonous as hell. If the menus were faster I don’t think it would bother me as much.

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@jjbyrd04 wrote:

@IrishOwl 

3. Scouting interviews do not reveal anything useful that isn't already available with direct scouting of a player, and is limited to only 3 or 4 items. Player style (SNP, OFD, PLY etc...), NHL readiness, biggest strength, and biggest weakness.

 

 

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omg I HATE interviewing prospects and coaches. It takes so damn long just to ask three questions. I’d rather be able to select three things I want to know and then immediately get the answers all at once. 

@IrishOwlif you think that removing the 25 season cap is a bad thing, then you must work for EA. You realize in 25 seasons you have NO WAY unless you sabotage yourself on purpose, to build, get old, rebuild, and go through all the real ups and down a franchise has, then you are going to add up to 48 teams a season and still only have 25 seasons? Its asinine. Your argument is that you would never buy a new one if it never ended? How about all the people that wont buy the new one because nothing has changed? You don't think that alienating the largest user base in the game is a recipe for disaster? (I am going off the fact that every year Franchise mode is the BIGGEST section of the Answer forum, but the most ignored as well.

@jjbyrd04Gonna throw this into the Suggestions forums if you don’t mind.. great explanation for scouts being crap, better than I can articulate 

@jjbyrd04 

You realize that MLB The Show and NHL are totally different games and are operated by different subsections of EA. They came out in an interview and said they felt players were cheating themselves by having the fully editable options. It was fully editable until NHL20. Until EA puts a better project team in charge of NHL it won't happen. TRSUT ME, I WANT IT, but I also know they won't bring it back any time soon.

As far as scouring, bro I'm sorry. I'm had GEMS turn from Top 6 Fs and Top 4 Ds into Elites. I've had a Low Elite GEM got Franchise. I've also had a lot of dubs, but we all do. I've also found a few player pop up in Rest of the World and Allsvenken. Its not as many, but usually I get 3 to 5 players between 1 and 250 in those areas every year. I just don't scout them often. 

The interviews guarantee play style, so I use it to determine in a TWF with three bars is actually a SNP. They also give you an accurate account of years until the player is NHL ready. They don't really work for Strengths and Weakness, I'll give you that, but then again I scout those. No good having a center with a weakness for faceoffs. (LOL).

I also don't find your issue with Balanced on defense.  What I find is that center years, the game leans more heavily one way or the other, so heavy pinch one year and heavy shoot the next, but I always find a couple balanced players.

Now, what I will admit is broken is the 4 bars don't always means guaranteed. What I'd like to see is a training module, like in FIFA were we can train our players to fit certain needs. Like, spending 3 weeks turning from a Balanced/Balanced to a Pinch/Balance. Or six weeks turning from a Pinch/Shoot into a Pinch/Cycle, but that's not a Scoyting issue, that's a general Franchise mode issue.

When you say character values, are you meaning Trade Values? They have nothing to do with Chemistry, its how much they are worth in a trade. So, I'm not exactly sure why you brought this up here.

I 100% agree with your statement about the editing. X-Factors, however, were not added for Franchise. They were added more for online play. You can simply and entire season with X-Factors turned off and get similar results with them turned on. It really only benefits games played by a player not by the PC.

Your final point is actually kind of pointless. You don't about anyone over the age of 32, but I've got Mark Giordano and Marc Andre-Fluery on my team. Both are nearly 40 and kicking it pretty hard. My last play through I got lucky and snagged Pastrnak off free agency and Leo Draistail in a very difficult trade. Both played on my Top 6 until there were 42 and 40. So, yes you can absolutely have older players making a difference on your lines. 

So, it sounds more like you are having bad luck with you drafts.

@Bahamuta 

I don't think its a bad thing, and no I don't work for EA. I am explaining to you way they don't do it.

Its all about the replay value. If they let you run a team forever, you'll never need to buy a new game unless you want new features.

Personally, I wouldn't play past 20 years. Doesn't mean I think its a bad thing, but I like a little realism in my games. The longest running GM, David Poile, stayed with the Predators for 21 years and then 15 with Washington. No one has ever served for more then 20ish years as a GM with a team. Ergo, I never play more then 20 years.

So, yes I don't get to see my last couple years of prospects grow, but I set the next GM up as best as I can, which is what IRL GMs do.

@Bahamuta 

I understand what you are saying, but nonetheless, marketing managers don't see it as you do. They need to set limitations, or at least feel the need to to ensure what they want.

I get you are trying to explain you point as far as your wants, but remember, that EA is in the business of making money, and this helps ensure that people that would never buy a new game, have to buy one

I'm not trying to argue with you, just pointing out the logic behind their refusal. I understand you don't like that, which is why every year you and @heavydutyrammer beg for these things. I'm not saying stop, just merely answering your questions becuasr EA won't answer them for you. The last thing they want to do is go on record why they won't meet your needs. Its the same reason they won't make an official statement as to why the removed editing players. It would be a PR nightmare if they told gamers they don't trust them.

EA PLS just patch in multi team control. For the love of god.

in terms of character values, he is referring to if a guy is super competitive, super professional, gets along with everyone, etc. one would think if you have 3 players who are all primadonnas, they would have bad line chemistry.   

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@kyl_35 wrote:

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@IrishOwl wrote:

Scouting revamp/update:

I'm not sure what's wrong with this system. I mean other then the fact we should have 25 Scouts. You need to explain the weaknesses of this system to me sometime.

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I agree it’s not terrible, but it is time consuming and monotonous as hell. If the menus were faster I don’t think it would bother me as much.

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I learned this by accident - since it isn't intuitive.

Place them in the league that you want and then do NOTHING else.  Do NOT tell them to scout prospects for x amount of time.  Just put them there with NO instructions.  They do a decent job of scouting if you do that other than the inherent problem with potential predictions being way off most of the time that you get anyway.

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@Bahamuta wrote:

@IrishOwlif you think that removing the 25 season cap is a bad thing, then you must work for EA. You realize in 25 seasons you have NO WAY unless you sabotage yourself on purpose, to build, get old, rebuild, and go through all the real ups and down a franchise has, then you are going to add up to 48 teams a season and still only have 25 seasons? Its asinine. Your argument is that you would never buy a new one if it never ended? How about all the people that wont buy the new one because nothing has changed? You don't think that alienating the largest user base in the game is a recipe for disaster? (I am going off the fact that every year Franchise mode is the BIGGEST section of the Answer forum, but the most ignored as well.

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I think this is because they are still considering it Be-a-GM mode and GMs don't stick around for more than 25 years.  They took away everything that made it feel like you had a career as a GM such as keeping records for you as a GM, but they think it is still that mode.  That is the only realistic reason I can see for a 25 season limit.

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@IrishOwl wrote:

- Fully editable players.

Never going to happen. They took it out for a reason and have said they aren't putting it back in... 

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What reason is that, exactly?  What possible, rational reason could there be?  I can think of reasons for spite, but not a rational reason for removing that feature given that it is a single player mode.  It would make sense if we did play against another player, but not as a single player mode.

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@IrishOwl wrote:

@jjbyrd04 

When you say character values, are you meaning Trade Values? They have nothing to do with Chemistry, its how much they are worth in a trade. So, I'm not exactly sure why you brought this up here.

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I believe he means the variable that applies to a player's character.  If they are professional at an early age or if they throw a fit if they don't win.  I think it is there for the purposes of the morale system, not line chemistry, but I read that as being the "character value."

@heavydutyrammer 

I can confirm it’s locked unless you are playing the game. I saw the bug report about it just now actually.

I actually don’t think this is a bug and is intentional.

I remember when coaches were first introduced they talked about having to leave strategies as the coaches in order to get the chemistry bonus. I bet this has something to do with that.

I haven’t had a chance to see if they have increased the amount of coaches that are available if we do want to change our coach.

It is staggering to me how amazing NBA2k and the my eras mode is when I am so used to the garbage that EA puts out. They have no shame. 

@heavydutyrammer 

That’s the thing about these features they lock us out of, there is no logical reason to lock us out other than they screwed something up and can’t figure it out or don’t want to explain how it works so it’s easier just to lock it.

I wouldn’t care about editing players if EA got things right. Have player types be automatically assigned based on attributes and then we don’t need to be able to edit types.

Having strategies locked just makes it inconvenient. If we don’t want to use them now while playing the games, we have to manually change them every game. If we want to change strategies, we should just lose all chemistry bonuses unless we use the coaches. Also, we should be able to have conversations with the coach about changing them.

I can go on and on about all the disappointments with this “fully custom league”, but I think we all agree on it and I just don’t even want to bother anymore.

Can we at least still change a players beard ffs? The presentation issue they can maybe reverse but the lack of player editing in franchise mode isn't changing, they never bothered last year and by the looks of how much of a mess 23 is, we'll maybe get to at least turn wingers into centers again by 24, prob. 25.

@bg0vzeyqov1y Care bro, you're going to get called Toxic soon.

@jjbyrd04 We might not 100% agree on everything, but I'll be sad to see you go. You've got a lot of good ideas.

@heavydutyrammer I read an article yesterday where the EA Dev Team already said they aren't working on anything new, so they can focus completely on NHL 24. So, I don't think we're getting anything we asked for. I'd say maybe next year, but doubtful(whoops I'm being toxic).

@IrishOwl 

Likewise bro. Respect!