(07-13-2018, 11:03 AM)pirkster Wrote:

(07-13-2018, 10:44 AM)Bullseye Wrote: One thing I realized about playing Madden is that when in Franchise mode, you have to switch playbooks every 3 or 4 games, otherwise the computer will adjust to your play calling, and you will end up with those games where they stop all of your runs and jump all of your routes.

I try to approach the schedule like NFL teams do.  In the preseason, I use just Balanced offense and 4-3 defense for weeks 1, 2 and 4.  In week 3, I use the main playbook to "reacquaint" myself with it.

Then in the regular season, I play mostly with the Jaguars playbooks on offense and defense.  When I switch up, I try to use playbooks of teams that are similar in approach to the Jaguars, but have minor differences that will impact playcalling.  Like the Chargers,  Falcons and Seahawks run similar defensive schemes to us in real life.  I will switch and use one of their defensive playbooks.  Offensively, since Marrone was under Payton in New Orleans, sometimes I will use their offense.

I've noticed that, too.  I sim in franchise, so I see it on the stat line and scores.

It's also tied to your players and their attributes, and how they fit systems.

When I promote new players to starting roles at QB and RB you have to be extremely careful to watch production and be able to adjust the playbook.  I use the generic playbooks.  If your QB doesn't have the arm the previous starter had but is accurate you may have to go to quick passing game.  If you're replacing a stud RB that can handle a run heavy offense, the replacement isn't likely to be able to handle it - you'll have to go more balanced.

If you put a new starter in and you let him struggle, his confidence will drop with poor performance and it spirals downhill quickly (he'll lose awareness points) and what's bad gets worse fast.

Rookies can be more injury prone until you can get their attributes up as well.  Confidence and health can be a problem if you aren't paying attention as a coach/GM.

One of the big problems I have when playing franchise mode is the draft, especially evaluating QBs and offensive linemen.

In an earlier version of Madden, they had a "combine" where you actually controlled prospects and ran them through positional drills, to see if their actual performance matched up with their ratings.  Some skill guys would have high ratings, but were slow as molasses, while other lowly rated guys were fast.  You could test QBs on their accuracy or arm strength.  The downsides to that approach were:

• The OL blocking drills were maddening and I can't recall ever successfully completing the drills, much less getting a gold rating
  
• you could only work out 8 prospects in any given draft.   So out of roughly 300 players in a draft pool, you could only work out those 8.
  
• Outside of having a photographic memory or actually reducing your list of targeted players to writing, there was no way to catalog the guys you wanted or not.
  

But I liked being able to work out the prospects and was sad when EA ditched the combine.

Now they have a more comprehensive draft board system where they have preliminary draft round projections, later combine results with 40 times, etc., and the ability to customize your own draft board within the game.  But inexplicably, QBs and OLs are ranked differently in their combine scores.  While the elite prospects at other positions usually have rankings above 7.0, typically the top ranked QBs and OLs have combine scores in the 5-6 range.  Without the combine/individual workout feature I described above, it is difficult to evaluate players at those two positions as they relate to other players overall.

I kind of have a better grasp on how to figure it out, and learning how to adjust your draft board is key, but it still makes it unnecessarily tough.  For QBs, I can see doing that.  OL's?  not so much.

---