WoC 27

My guess is franchise/ WoC will be getting the next big update in 27. My hope is we see that be WoC. I think franchise should have a connected feature but its something I'll likely never use and with the salary cap being introduced in UT I have no need for franchise. 

WoC needs to focus on a few things

1. More games/ quality games
2. Immersion
3. Progression
4. QoL

More/ quality games

This last year we lost "match room size" mlthe only explanation I can come up with is that RA tried to increase the number of times you match with an opponent at the expense of a quality maychup. What we need to do is get to the root of the issue and nurture that.

There are Facebook groups, discords, forums, leagues, friend groups, etc that play together or search for other players in the hopes to find someone. The game needs to add tools within the game good enough that these other ways are rendered obsolete.

As a player I wish I had a virtual player profile. The profile could be as basic or particular as I want.. things it could say? Days/ times I'm available to play. Mode(s) I like to play, position(s) I like to play, Achetypes/ strategies/ systems I've adopted, casual vs competitive or both, server location, competitive level, etc. I could then search for clubs that match my criteria. You could also allow it to have a range of how closely it matches what you're looking for or even allow you to place importance on anything. Perhaps playing with other playstation players or something is important, or having a mic. Once you get a list of teams that would fit, you can push a button suggesting you're interested in joining. You will also have a tab that shows any ongoing games that the club currently has ongoing and you can watch.

As a club you get the same features but it will be what you're looking for. You can also scout any games that those players are currently playing whether it be a club game or drop in game. I hate seeing clubs of 2 wings and then we search again and get a club of a center and a D.

Finally and this would be a HUGE add and something I couldn't imagine being added in a year.. Leagues. League gaming is really big. There are all kinds of leagues but you gotta search them out.. why not have leagues actually BUILT into WoC? Allow a commissioner to decide the league rules and what not. Have open recruiting built in, scheduled games (and a HUGE bonus would be allowing teams to play games early) say a player/ team won't be available one day. It would be cool to allow an opponent just to play their game whenever they're able and it doesn't necessarily have to go in any kind of order. 

Lastly, goalies. Human goalies make WoC FAR more enjoyable, unfortunately the cpu is often better than an average human goalie so many decide not to play the position. I think more tools/ boosts need to be given to humans and more love. Add the ability to create a mask.. it doesn't have to be crazy, even of its just a handful of generic designs and they can color them as they see fit. Anything that can push more humans to play the position and find a club the better the whole mode will be.

Immersion

As of now I enter WoC and see my player standing there.. I have a list of modes to play, if nobody i know is on I have either drop in (where i risk playing with trolls/ people who play with 0 structure) or I don't play. 2K on the other hand opens up to a whole city with players walking around and games going on. I'm not asking for a whole city.. however, if there were small audio bits about eashl news or someone talking about league play it would feel more alive.. or tabs where I can watch ongoing pickup games or club games or league games.. it would feel far more Immersive. I would feel like I was part of a world of hockey.

Progression

I wish we built our player through the year. A full BAP built in would be cool. Hopefully with the +/- 10 attribute points EA is just looking at the importance we put on diff attributes and can create a better system and one in which we can build up our skater.

If we are taking clubs from year to year, why not also take banners.. let me take my nhl25 season 1 club finals championship banner with me to 26.. that way I see that in the rafters in each of the next games. Allow us to select "X" banners to throw up in the rafters and you just pick which ones you want. A club who has been active for years should have a bunch of banners hanging. That would be cool to see even if I was the away team.

QoL

The lobbies need to be built from the ground up.. the errors, drops, etc are just too much. It's far beyond time for these to be fixed. Allowing us to join a game after getting kicked or allowing someone to join if they get in late would be cool, I'm sure that may get exploited though.

The menus need to be smoother. If its the background animations dragging it down then remove them. I don't know of any other game that takes as long as this. 25 was better than 24 but still unnecessarily slow.

Club practice should have more options. Allow us to run 2 on 1s or whatever mix we want. We should be able to scrimmage or practice however we want.

Club challenges would be cool too. Have a very short ladder of challenges for a club that faces the cpu. The game would grade each player. This would allow new/ bad teams to see what they need to work on or how good/ bad they are. 

Other thoughts..

The blue line trap is overused and boring in 6's. I personally wish we could choose to use Olympic/ euro ice for our club. Being able to choose these stadiums would also make games feel different and teams could be built to play differently. 

Threes eliminator should allow club uniforms and also allow us to choose the ice pattern. Also I wish you could have home ice rules. Allow for money zones instead of money pucks.. change up the game!

The arcade mode that releases periodically shouldn't always have the same boosts.. there should also be a bit less of them. It's a fun mode when it's around but sometimes it's almost too chaotic.

Why not allow more than one club? On Fridays my club plays. If I want to play on Saturdays or Wednesdays I either lose the tracking stats and progression in that club and join the other or just sacrifice that progression. What if I want to play league play on "x" days but play with friends on "x" days? What if I play 3's with one club, 6's with one club and threes with another? I know people who have diff accounts to do this.. just allow us to be in 3-5 clubs.