Part of the frustration with this mode is the overall lack of information on how things work. As far as I know if you change any strategies when playing games, it negates any chemistry boost you have from the coach. At the same time, do players overalls then fluctuate throughout the game based on who they are on the ice with at the time or do they always have the boost assigned to when playing 5 on 5 or PP or PP, etc..? In my experience, the simming is completely random anyways as I’ve tested numerous times by simming complete seasons without making any changes and have ranged from bottom of the league to Stanley Cup champs. Again, I don’t know if this is true because I have never heard if CPU controlled teams are affected by line chemistry or not, but I do like to go through and change all top players that are a TWF because the player type doesn’t fit and I’ve noticed more often than not teams who have TWF as their best players don’t seem to perform as well even if they are high overall teams.
I have said this before, this mode really isn’t that far off from being really great. However, as this year has taught me it is also not that far off from being completely unenjoyable. One of the problems I come across this year when it comes to being able to edit players inside the mode is that they take so long to have good rosters due to the agreement they have with the NHL. I have to spend so much time re-editing player types and potentials before I start a new franchise that if there is an update with added players and better overalls that I want use, I just have no desire to do so with the state of the mode right now. So because I can't do it inside the mode, if I do end up missing someone (because they don't release roster notes saying all of the players that were added) I have to start a new franchise in order to edit them.
It wouldn’t surprise me at all if it was due to the agreement they have with the NHL/NHLPA that doesn’t allow us to edit certain features of players. The agreement does not seem to be great and they have a lot more limitations than the other sports games have on what they can do.
I am all for having more customization and control in the game mode, especially if they can’t figure out how to give us a properly working game. What would make more sense though is to fix the chemistry system and have player types be actually based on their attributes. I think they would have to add more attributes and use a weighted system for ratings to do this, but that’s another discussion.
The GM logic was actually improving in previous years (slightly) until they decided to change how each team was classified and add the trade deadline. I just want to be able to pick up the game and not have to spend the majority of my time trying to fix the glaring issues this mode has myself. I would even say that morale has really improved over the last couple of years to the point that I enjoyed it more when it was turned on and yet this year having it on creates even more issues. It’s definitely going to be a tough sell for NHL 22 considering the amount of work needed to make this game enjoyable again.
@Beauts90 @LordDecland @SkylerJames13
I know we're talking AI GM logic in a couple threads, but something just struck me as I was playing just now...
I'm a Pens fan, and as such, watched the game and ceremony last night for Sid reaching 1000 games. There were stats aplenty about how many people have done so, have done so for one team, who has more games played, etc. One of those guys is Marc-Édouard Vlasic, on the Sharks. I'm nearing the playoffs in my current FM year 2, and on the Trade Deadline, I remember the Sharks sold off essentially their entire team, while 2 points out of second in the Pacific, and 4 out of first. Playing against Buffalo just now, who are barely holding onto a wild card spot, I realized Vlasic was out there skating around.
If (ha ha) they ever fix AI GM logic, I think a component of that fix needs to include special circumstances for long-time Franchise players. Where they were in the standings (and they're actually holding position anyway), there's no way they would have kicked off a drastic rebuild IRL, and definitely not trade off such a tenured player.
During year 1, I happened to notice the Pens did the same thing, but at least they were way out of it at the time, and they kept Crosby and Malkin (but sold off basically everyone else, aside from Letang, who apparently had no takers, even sitting on the Trade Block for a long time). They signed absolute garbage players in the off-season, are somehow now sitting at second in the Eastern Conference this season, and grabbed Brent Burns from SJS at this Deadline (because who wouldn't want a 1-2 of Letang-Burns??).
It's just so GD erratic. Anyway, just wanted to share the anecdote. To the guy in the other thread arguing for keeping Edit off for Franchise Mode, if he happens to be reading this thread, this story is one of the reasons we want Edit in FM. We're not trying to break the game (but again, who cares if we did... it's an offline mode), we're trying to correct the idiocy. We're not going to pay $80 for a roster update every year. We're not contributing to EA's profits by buying HUT packs. We want a functioning sim.
So I’m late to the party apparently but this is an absolute joke.
Bought the game Sunday. Put about 15 hours into meticulously managing the first 3 years of an expansion GM before I noticed this bug ravaging my top prospects.
Went to Reddit to find out the only fix is to just scrap it and start over? That is just unacceptable.
Did I miss something or has EA just ignored this game breaking bug for 2 months now?
Yes it's being ignored... sorry you're only finding out now. "Scrap and start over" also doesn't seem to work, because we have evidence to the contrary for every potential "solution" that's been brought up so far.
Frustration post time again...
Somewhere in these conversations, someone mentioned that players get a "playoffs stat increase", which then gets taken away at the start of the next season, possibly being a contributor to this bug. I just need to say it's just been soooooooo funnnnnnn getting caved in for the last month and a half of this season because every other team in the league is boosted. My powerplay can't even get a shot off anymore, and teams that are out of the playoffs and playing minor league callups are playing like Team Canada, and their goalies which would never otherwise see the light of day in the NHL are playing like Patrick Roy.
<sarcasm font> At least I can adjust the sliders in Franchise Mode to level the boosting back out. </sarcasm font>
I'm going to be soooooo excited to start season 3, just to see if my players will now be "double nerfed" (progression bug between seasons 1 & 2, and then again between seasons 2 & 3) compared to the rest of the league. Hopefully, my 40-year-old defenseman retires so I have some salary cap space to sign a player that didn't get nerfed simply by being on my team, leading the league in points, and winning the Cup.
Oh, and my goalie in his mid-20s will be winning the Vezina for the second straight year and still not improving his 81 OVR since the progress bug takes his numbers away.
<sarcasm font> Makes total sense.</sarcasm font>
😠😠😠
Natural Growth bug destroys player progress. Turn of morale to mitigate issue. With morale off the salary demands go through the roof.
Junk game that they refuse to fix just so they can squirt out a few more HUT packs.
I laughed so hard when I read those patch notes and saw the thread marked as closed before anyone could reply. “Yeah, we know this patch isn’t good news, but here you go!”
I have been playing the NHL games since I owned a PS1. It's been over a decade. Near damn TWO decades. And I'm not going to be buying a PS5 merely to play NHL. I had a good time with NHL 16-20, but 21 is such a mess with it's features and lack there of I can barely enjoy it. EASHL 6's is the only thing I play anymore. Be A Pro and Franchise and other primary offline game modes are so broken, buggy and inconsistent they are not even fun to play. I suppose I should be thankful I got to play virtual hockey on PS1-PS2-PS3-PS4 all these years, but man is NHL 21 a massive let down.
Other than the updated jerseys, version 1.50 includes the following bug fixes..... but I doubt this 'player progress' issue comes under "other under the hood minor fixes"
Bug Fixes
Community ManagerThe patch notes you're mentioning are from NHL 20. They do not apply to NHL 21.
Ah, they also just updated this on the website I got this info from. Mistake on there's and my part. Good to see you're still keeping an eye on this thread EA_Aljo 😉
Community ManagerAll good. If you have any other feedback, let us know. Thanks!
@EA_AljoMy Calder winning Center drafted 7th overall (Elite Med) is -7 or higher across the board in all stats.
He started as an 89 top line C to a 4th line 81 from game 1 to game 2 lol Lets hope this gets fixed soon and can be implemented into current franchises.
Came back after a few weeks to see if this bug has been fixed and to absolutely no surprise it hasn't been. The fact that the only thing they are updating is jerseys pretty much solidifies that they are done making any more changes and have shifted focus to making the next game. I mean you hear from people like Aljo that the devs read these bug reports and made changes if necessary, yet this thread has now been out for months, has hundreds of comments full of people having the same critical problem, and NOTHING has been done. Really makes you wonder if they are reading these, or at least the reports regarding offline modes.
If any of you can't take of this game anymore, and I don't blame you if that is in fact that case, then I suggest going back to NHL 20. It's basically the same... if you get past the fact that a lot of players aren't were they are now it's at least playable. Once you get in a few years these wack AI GM's trade away or lose all their best players within the first few years anyway. I also highly recommend not buying next years game early or the for the first couple days after release until it's ensured that there aren't any game breaking bugs in franchise again.
We’re due one more patch from EA at most. No indication if this is a fix being aimed for that patch, or if they are even going to release a 1.60 patch at all.
I sure hope they fix it in the next couple weeks. If not it’ll mean that we spent $80 for a game that we (people who solely play Franchise Mode) can’t play. Cool.
