Fix WoC balance
The worst is goal tending. I've already suggested to have better cpu goal tending we need some sort of sliders to change their playstyle such as how long they'll hold the post or how quickly they'll bite on a 1T. Ideally people play goalie themselves, but without changes how many people are gonna want to? Look at discord and Facebook at all the clubs looking for goalies and defensemen.. it's currently such a thankless job. How can we fix it?
Most people don't want a human goalie because they fail to save the more routine shots. They want them because they pose some chance to stop a breakaway as the CPU goalie has almost 0 chance. Most human goalies are gonna have a worse save percentage than a CPU. I believe the best way to fix this is to give small boosts to human goalies. Either through better attributes, or bigger boosts like better rebound control.
Give more incentive.. clubs/ players get more xp/ coins for playing with a goalie. Goalies get more time in the limelight for their performance. The announcers talk more about the goalie.
Update goalie play.. Ideally from the ground up. Speak with players who play goalie the most, and bring in high level goalies to sit down and talk about a new/ better system.
This game desperately needs more goalies. It also needs more defenders.
Defenders are ALWAYS on the short end of the stick. The LT/L2 abuse. EA builds like McDavid build and Spectre are just far better than anything defensive build and much faster. So defenders have to choose to have the McDavid speed and no defensive abilities or defensive abilities but not the speed.. couple this with hits coming in extremely late after you pass it up the ice and clubs getting mad at their defenders for giving up a breakaway despite being slower or smaller (getting hit) and not being able to cover for everything. Then the pokecheck and stick lift are not the most dependable tools, we're forced to use DSS, and you're just not gonna get a lot of people wanting to play defense.
The fix here is to give defensive builds at LEAST the same ability/ speed of the forwards. Once again, give them the limelight more often.. we are always showing the goals, maybe let them talk about the defenders and how well they are shutting down offensive chances and stuff.. or what they are doing offensively from the backend. Their ability to get the puck out of the zone.
The forwards for FAR too many games in a row have received some sort of boost. They have more over powered EA builds, tons of dekes and more every game, they can make themselves huge and use reverse hits against nearly any defensive action, they can hit the opposing defenders long after they pass, they can be faster than any defensive build can be, they can use LT/L2 to become extremely hard to defend against, they can recieve a pass without holding vision control or turning toward the pass, while a defender MUST do this if they want a chance to intercept, etc. A lot of these need to be addressed.
This game just holds the forwards hands so much and constantly rewards them. When defenders have to aim their DSS while forwards don't even have to aim their passes. When defenders have to really choose when to poke or stick lift in fear of a penalty but forwards have nearly 4 seconds after a pass to hit a defenseman, when defenders have to use vision control to try to break up a pass or intercept and somwtimes they still don't get it, meanwhile a forward can recieve it without turning, including if its a slap shot pass, Forwards being drawn into loose pucks/ rebounds while defenders always feeling like they don't fully have the right to a rebound shot or the loose puck immediately following a poke check, after a poke check the defender gets an articial speed nerf while the forward can often repossess the puck after a poke and then skate around the defender due to the speed nerf.
The truth is most people would want to play forward without all these boosts and the limelight. They dont need MORE incentive to be a forward. We need more full clubs and less teams of 2 or 3 forwards. Most of the people I knew that played defense have quit playing the game altogether. We need to start finding balance.
