[JeffR]

Adam's posted the FHM6 announcement at the top of the forum, and you'll be able to get the highlights and screenshots from the link there (as well as the streaming we will do later in the week.) But the comprehensive list of what's new and changed is far too long for those formats, so I'm going to post a much more complete version of it here so you can see the full list of what's been done in 6. A couple of things to note, though:

1) We're still making changes and will be right up to release, so I'll update this with any significant new information as it happens.
2) I'm sure I've missed several things; I'm checking back through my older emails, PM's, Slack conversations, and design notes for stuff I've omitted here and will add it as I find it.

That said, here's what we've done:

Additions and Changes

-new rivalry system adds special effects to rivalry games (player performance, fan response, chance of unusually physical games, etc.); includes full starting rivalries for modern playable leagues and all historical seasons, but rivalries will also adapt to in-game events so they may fade and new ones can arise
-FHM5 saves can now be imported (save must be on July 1; all new data fields introduced in FHM6 will get placeholder/default values)
-skater overall ratings (ability/potential) can now optionally be based partly on stats; the exact formulation of this calculation can be adjusted to change the proportions contributed by the current/recent seasons and the overall stat contribution to the ratings
-lines screen now has an option to lock players in a particular spot (AI line selection help won't unlock them; AI Setup Organization will)
-lines screen now allows saving/loading of full lineup/lines setup
-added Exhibition Mode that allows single-game or multi-game matchups between any two playable teams in the database (modern or historical, including modern vs. historical)
-new calendar view for team schedules
-hovering over team names now displays a brief team summary popup with relevant team data (strengths/weaknesses, outlook, GM, etc.), similar to the individual player info popups
-fan happiness is now modeled, will change in response to game events and can affect job security
-all teams now have away jerseys and will use them in the in-game views when on the road (when using facegen jersey sets with only home versions, default away team colours/jersey will be used)
-new job security screen tracks owner happiness, fan happiness, and team chemistry, which all affect the chance of being fired
-NHL teams can now invite unsigned players to preseason tryouts (including those under contract to other teams)
-historical mode now allows editing of league structures on July 1 (so it's now possible to expand/contract/relocate teams, change playoffs, edit rules, etc. in ahistorical ways; note that enabling this option will turn all real historical changes off completely and any further rule/league changes must be made by the user)
-option to disable real league evolution added to historical mode startup (also turns editing and commissioner mode on by default)
-user can now start as a real GM in historical and standard modern games, using that GM's ratings and identity instead of his own
-Swiss League is now playable (Swiss second level)
-NIHL National is now playable (UK second level)
-German second level is now playable
-Spengler Cup (minus "Team Canada", since we can't yet mix national and club teams) will now be played in late December
-added real staff to historical mode and various system to model them; all historical starting years should have every team with their real owner, GM, and head coach from that season; some other staff are included (particularly in more modern seasons) and the scout, assistant coach, and trainer database is continuing to be researched and expanded
-added prospect rankings (individual and teams)
-added top player rankings (individual and teams)
-added power rankings during regular season
-added leaguewide injury list
-added best/worst ranking of individual game performances players
-players' hidden ratings now change dynamically in response to in-game events (this was already happening with injury ratings, but has been extended to others, e.g. trades may lower Loyalty, playoff success may improve Big Games; the usual mechanic is a check after a good/bad event using an appropriate personality rating to determine if a change is require - the Big Game improvement depends on a successful check against the player's Handle Success rating)
-enabled loans of NHL-contracted junior-aged European players back to European teams (similar to how NHL-CHL loans work)
-added worldwide team rankings (teams in playable leagues only)
-historical facegen jerseys are now available for all historical NHL teams
-historical logos are now complete for all NHL teams
-24 new historical challenges
-play-by-play logs from individual games can now be saved (this is turned off by default and must be specifically enabled, since it can eat huge amounts of disk space very quickly)
-currency symbol can be changed and a financial coefficient added to convert all in-game dollar values to another currency unit
-autoplaying of non-playoff games now displays current league standings and leaders as the games are resolved instead of single game results
-new language effects - players on teams where few/no teammates or coaches speak their language may become isolated and unhappy
-added new in-game sounds
-updated 2019-20 player ratings, team rosters, league rules, and histories
-added new lower levels of international tournaments (Division III-A/B), several new countries that participate in international hockey will now generate players (Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Thailand, Malaysia, Philippines, Kuwait)
-uniform number history in historical database significantly upgraded
-new historical option to start with career stats cleared
-historical seasons can now be started with teams using their end-of-season rosters, rather than the start-of-season ones (note that this only changes players who moved from team to team during the season, not e.g. retirements or releases)
-a small number of newly-generated players will be created as sons of existing players, potentially with similarities in playing style and/or talent level
-enabled editing of player generation settings to adjust quality for individual nationalities
-NHL teams can now offer mutual termination of contracts (i.e., with no cap hit) to unhappy players in some circumstances
-option to add expansion draft for new teams added to league structure editor (expand league wizard has been removed since it's now redundant due to that)
-player suspensions are now possible for both in-game and non-game causes; on-ice suspensions are a multi-stage process where the league will review incidents and decide if they merit a suspension
-added a large number of very young prospects (so at least some real players will be present in NHL drafts through 2024)
-players "graduating" from their final season of college hockey will now become available in mid-April instead of having to wait until July 1 to become free agents
-added new Nation screen to summarize data for each country
-most of the major hockey countries now have modifiers to their initial player generation to reflect national tendencies (e.g. Russians will usually start with slightly higher passing ratings but lower fighting ones)
-news subscription default options reworked to change default options and add more flexibility
-added "rust" system to make players coming off long layoffs less effective at first, and changed AI lineup selection preferences to avoid triggering the rust conditions if possible, which makes AI usage of fringe players more realistic (extra players on a roster will be much less likely to spend almost all of the season without playing)

Smaller Gameplay Fixes/Changes

-reworked preseason player fitness check, it will now be more common for players to show up out of shape, and their reactions to the GM's response will be more realistic
-"On Vacation" status no longer occurs for players during the offseason (was causing more problems that it was worth)
-Iron Curtain rule in historical can now be disabled
-added possibility for players with "Europe" junior preference to change that to "Major Junior" after being drafted by an NHL team
-attendance formula reworked to take advantage of new fan happiness tracking
-GM contracts are now auto-renewed, you don't have to accept them manually (or worry about missing the email offer)
-AI player role selection should now properly exclude roles not appropriate for a player's position(s)
-the difference between Talent and Potential now has an age-based cap on it, so there shouldn't be any more 1-star, 4-potential 26-year-olds
-historical should now generate new trainers properly
-fixed problem in AI line selection that was penalizing players who had been injured after they returned to full fitness
-baseline salary values updated to reflect 2019-20 salary trends
-team budgets reviewed and adjusted
-Swiss promotion/relegation system should now work correctly
-fixed preseason storylines that were occurring in excessive amounts
-lowered penalty frequency in playoff games
-redefined player personality classes to get more variety from existing ratings
-World Championships now use the correct current OT format in the group stage
-changed menu handling on some screens to prevent gradual game slowdown after a lot of menu usage
-made teams more reluctant to hire older staff (note that this will make it unlikely that you'll get a new job if your own GM is extremely elderly)
-added rare chance of superstar generation (independent of regular national player quality)
-the next World Cup now set to 2020-21
-corrected outbound transfer setting in some leagues to prevent losing players to other playable leagues with no notice/compensation
-reworked "job in jeopardy" system for GM's and coaches so it doesn't occasionally initiate under trivial circumstances, which could lead to strangely-timed firings
-removed possibility of end-of-season firings for coaches/GM's hired late in a bad season
-volume of lowest in-game sound setting turned down significantly, and then turned down some more after that, so it's low enough to be talked over
-fixed strange historical expansion team roster behaviour with recent draft picks
-AI will now place more players on the trading block as the deadline approaches, then will remove most of them if no deal goes through for the player
-adjusted AI trading tendencies; will now make offers to human GM's more often, trade for goalies less often, and prioritize the more common types of trades
-changed mechanics of starting scouting error on veteran players
-Hlinka-Gretzky Cup playoffs now have the proper format
-fixed some playoff format errors in early historical games
-subdivided player history screen into multiple categories, defaulting to the highlights (full display is still an option as well)
-world database updated, several countries received small increases in player generation quality and a couple of regions had incorrect data fixed
-many historical players re-rated in line with current ratings standards, process will continue until they're all done
-Swedish-speaking areas of Finland should now generated an appropriate number of Swedish-named/speaking players
-lowered exaggerated user Tactics rating from starting templates (no longer needed, was specific to old tactics engine)
-staff in non-recalc historical games should now retire at more reasonable times
-in historical, players who have a father set in the database should now have the correct person listed as their father in the game
-large adjustments made to team's decision to go into win now or rebuild modes; they'll also adjust their preseason choice in midseason is response to the team's current performance
-made signification changes to how a team's strengths and weaknesses are determined; more than one of each type can now be identified and both will be more common
-fixed issue allowing some ELC-required NHL prospects to request and sign non-ELC deals
-fixed "college players only" qualifier for some storylines that wasn't working properly
-some award type determination calculations adjusted
-fixed incorrect schedule length data for 1994-95 NHL season (schedule itself is unchanged, but AI now understands the season is only 48 games long, not 84)
-depth chart mechanics changed slightly to give top prospects and players currently on the team's roster slightly higher placement
-league quality ratings/ratings offsets in many leagues tweaked to enable proper operation of new stats-influenced ratings system
-players in college leagues may now change their mind about their preference for college hockey, allowing junior teams to sign them
-significantly reduce chance of players' defensive ratings growing beyond their potential (should cut down on the number of great 2-way players in later years)
-Enforcer/Physical template types for European generated players will now be rarer
-players from non-hockey countries will no longer occasionally be generated with bizarre ratings
-corrected LNAH playoff seeding
-reworked injury data file, day-to-day injuries will be much more likely now; also corrected several errors in body part classifications
-corrected bug that would gradually drain away fan loyalty from teams
-AI's priorities for offering contract extensions adjusted to increase bias towards higher-potential players (somewhat dependent on the GM's own prospects vs. veterans preference)
-changed default facegen uniform style
-corrected data error that would freeze the screen when attempting to edit certain players with broken data
-added missing national team logos
-fixed role selection AI error that resulted in very unaggressive teams overusing physical-type player roles
-players who've already worn a particular number for a team in the current season should no longer require a new number to be set each time they're sent to the farm and then recalled (assuming that number is still avaialble)
-adjusted routing of junior-to-college players so fewer good players go to Division III/ACHA and more to Division I
-re-signed RFA's should now get their preferred number assigned correctly if available
-the historical western league should now show the correct name (PCHA/WCHL/WHL) for the season currently being played
-using AI Create Lines with a 14-skater roster (e.g. NHL in 1917-18) will no longer results in the "Not Enough Players to Create Lineup" warning despite the lineup being full
-generated players that have dual nationalities that speak the same language (e.g. Canada-US) will no longer get that language listed twice, once as fluent and once as good
-fixed trigger for storylines that should affect college-preference players only
-fixed relative Goalie ability/potential calculation
-when an AI-run team replaces a trainer (e.g. due to retirement) in historical mode, the new trainer now appears properly in the Trainer box of the Staff screen
-"Create a player" should now create better players, i.e. with a value a little more appropriate to the selected level (but still with some variation)
-scouts assigned to the entry draft in a historical game should no longer generate blank reports
-reversed puck location in the game view (e.g. it jumps to the other end of the ice on a shot) fixed
-increased effects identity of visiting team has on attendance
-Coach of the Year award should no longer fail to be awarded about 20-25% of the time
-the structure editor now prevents a league from being reduced below 2 teams (screen can't be exited with <2 teams in the league)
-expansion teams in historical games should now hire the proper number of coaches and scouts
-fixed awarding of home ice advantage in many playoff formats
-multiplayer exports should now properly update lapsed player rights, staff firings, staff re-sginings, and loans of NHL players to junior leagues
-"Create a player" should now create better players, i.e. with a value a little more appropriate to the selected level (but still with some variation)
-when additional GM's are added to a multiplayer historical game, they no longer receive an extremely high starting salary
-scouts assigned to the entry draft in a historical game should no longer generate blank reports
-per-game scoring/penalty settings (goals per game, etc.) adjusted for all tournaments (international and Spengler/Memorial/CHL)
-AI teams in historical mode now include staff on the Minor League teams when evaluating candidates for job vacancies
-fixed error in goalie contract demands that was lowering the demand excessively. No more cheap long-term goalie signings.

UI Fixes/Changes

-tacical slider bars now have 5 settings instead of 3
-new font and background graphics
-the order of the conferences on the autoplay screen in multi-conference leagues has been reversed (so e.g. for NHL, westertn teams are now on the left)
-facegen is now the default option for player images, not the uniform-back view
-bottom of game setup screen should no longer cut off at 1366x768 resolution
-on the trade offer screen, sorting is no longer reverted when you add a player to the trade
-new in-game location marker, will use home/away colours to prevent the same one from being used for both teams
-boxscores now show overtime period summaries after OT6
-large amount of new message/news text added
-many tabs and screens relabeled for better clarity
-fixed duplication of current season entries on leaderboards
-the career GR average no longer includes seasons with 0 GR
-added start-screen links to OOTP forums, social media, etc.
-AI's will no longer tend to make an excessive number of trades when in smaller leagues
-clicking a specific place on the tactics slider bars should now move the setting to the closest one to that location, rather than the end settings only
-GAA leaders should now appear on the team history screen in historical for teams that are added after the start of the game
-fixed display bug that showed 100% fitness for injured players when their fitness was actually lower
-ratings of 0 now have have a black background bar like the other ratings, so they don't appear as a full white bar
-removed incorrect team text/secondary colour settings that were causing some interface bars to be unreadable
-staff career stats screen now shows the name of the franchise as it was in the season listed, instead of its current name
-if user goes to the staff free agent screen while looking at another team's staff, the staff he hires no longer go to the team he's looking at
-news title "Reaction to Tade Proposal from..." changed to "Reaction to Offer from..." (since it's used for transfers as well as trades)
-the wildcard standings in fictional games with an NHL structure should now show the 3 divisional leaders as it should, so the wildcard candidates are listed correctly
-League-Stats-Team Attendance now sorts by Home Avg (descending) instead of ascending
-international tournament name displayed in the title bar should now update immediately when switching between tournaments
-"Disable Player Info Popup" on the settings-interface options (from the start screen) now disables team popups as well
-the "Retired Players" search filter on player and staff searches now defaults to "All Players"
-on the Team Data page, farm teams are now sorted in order of league reputation, highest at the top
-after opening a player profile from the prospect or positional rankings, the arrow buttons will now move to the next/previous player in the rankings
-added new mouseover tooltips
-fixed duplication of some region names in region selection menus
-team leaderboards should now complete properly
-adjusted tendencies of non-playable team player movement system in several leagues
-custom background logos should now work properly in all situations
-fixed issue preventing some play-by-play text from appearing properly
-fixed broken colour schemes with some generic logos that were making the UI unreadable for their teams
-text in the player search box no longer remains there after returning to the start screen and starting/loading a new game
-reorganized historical challenges menu
-fixed width of depth chart columns at wide resolutions
-the "good game" news items for international tournaments no longer show the wrong nation's logo
-ELC and 2-way status are now shown on the contract view of the team roster screen, and a couple of unused settings have been removed
-when the Champions League standings are selected from the league menu of one of the leagues that participates, the league name should now change to the tournament name as it does with the Memorial Cup
-fictional games started with the NHL format but fictional players no longer start with a partial awards history
-the "view complete list" option on the Central Scouting PM's should now go to the NHL scouting page regardless of which league is currently selected
-the "good game" news items for international tournaments no longer show the wrong nation's logo
-ELC and 2-Way status are now shown on the contract view of the team roster screen, and a couple of unused settings have been removed
-reversed puck location in the game view (i.e. it jumps to the other end of the ice on a shot) fixed
-fixed lines/lineup UI issues that result when human GM of a national team has injured players that require replacement in mid-tournament
-per-game scoring/penalty settings (goals per game, etc.) adjusted for all tournaments (international and Spengler/Memorial/CHL)
-tweaked the "is player signable" filter option: before, it took minutes to show such players. Now, in most leagues, there is no delay at all, in leagues that use the overage rule, it takes 1-2 seconds.

Other Fixes

-fixed potential crash in Memorial Cup if the playoffs in a CHL league run unusually late
-fixed crash in trade window after changing leagues and then teams in historical
-added safety checks to prevent roster problems from causing a crash when games are about to be played
-fixed one source of non-repeatable early-season crashes
-fixed crashes when trying to click on team names after navigating to League-History-(Specific Season from the list at the bottom) - Standings tab
-fixed potential preseason crash
-fixed screen cutoff at 1366x768 that was preventing scouting assignments
-achievements related to international play no longer recorded in player history as occuring on January 1, 1900
-fixed occasional crash when clicking on player names in draft logs from previous years
-players in historical games should no longer get favourite teams listed that are minor league teams or long-extinct
-fixed potential crash in late-starting historical games
-the zone starts splits should now be calculated properly
-added a large amount of historical uniform number data
-in the New England Whalers challenge, free agents should now be signable by WHA teams