Help me understand DGR

[Ile]

Hello!

Kind of new to Franchise Hockey Manager, so far almost everything has felt intuitive (I've even learned when the yearly crash happens so I can save right before and restart the computer to resolve it before it happens)

But one thing has puzzled me the past few seasons. I have a favourite defender, called Justin Gaumond. He is a defensive beast. Or at least, supposed to be. I run a very offensive minded squad, but I always want at least one defensive specialist and two two-way defenceman to balance it out, and have 1-2 somewhat reliable PK units.

Anyway, a few seasons in and Justin keeps racking up horrible game ratings. I would have understood if part of it is because his OGR would be bad, so that the average would be meh, but he is consistently the worst defender in the team in DGR, but his defensive skills are WAY better than anyone else in the team. Possible even in the entire NHL.

I had a closer look at the numbers and found that this season when he ranked worst in Game Rating among my defenseman and worst in DGR among my defenseman, he was leading in Shots Blocked, Hits and in Takeaways with a 1:3 Giveaway:Takeaway ratio. Numbers look... well, best in team. Yet his rating is worst? What am I missing here? Is he actually bringing the team down, or is the game just underrating his performances?

https://imgur.com/a/dThAdKe

https://imgur.com/a/BH5uarn

https://imgur.com/a/mIRN9Ck

https://imgur.com/a/3Kxb57r

I brought the numbers from his most common partner, Leon Engström, who has 70+ DGR both at home and away. As we can see on Leon's stats, he gives away the puck more than he takes it, and doesn't block as many shots despite more game time. Hits isn't important I suppose, they can be both good and bad. But still, does this not seem really weird? What am I missing?

I can tell that Leon has higher DPS than Justin, but why? What exactly is he doing better to warrant ~15 more DGR? Transporting the puck out of his own zone...?

All ideas are welcome!


Edit: Failing to link the print screens, working on it

Edit2: I'm sorry I wasn't able to get the images into the post, I made them clickable links instead. I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but images aren't working for me

[tomkmb]

I can't see the images (Imgur is no longer visible in the UK) so apologies if this information is included. What roles are you setting for the players? Game Rating is not a raw measurement of the players performance - it's relative to the role they've been assigned.

There's a little more detail here in the manual - https://manuals.ootpdevelopments.com...age=gamerating

Though I will say, that since I've been playing FHM, defensive defencemen have been chronically undervalued in the game world.

[Savoie45]

I don't think Game Ratings are directly affected by statistics. They may play a part, but tactics and player roles are a factor as well if I'm not mistaken.

[Ile]

He's a 6'5 237 lbs guy with 20 hitting, 20 stickchecking, 18 checking, 18 shot blocking and 19 strength playing as a Stay-at-home Defenceman which he is a 20 at.

Judging from your replies and the manual, I should care more about if I'm happy with his defensive numbers (his PK efficiency, shots blocked, and takeaway/giveaway ratio) than his Game Rating? I was a little worried that there were factors included that I couldn't see and that he actually is garbage on the ice.

[tomkmb]

Originally Posted by Ile

He's a 6'5 237 lbs guy with 20 hitting, 20 stickchecking, 18 checking, 18 shot blocking and 19 strength playing as a Stay-at-home Defenceman which he is a 20 at.

Judging from your replies and the manual, I should care more about if I'm happy with his defensive numbers (his PK efficiency, shots blocked, and takeaway/giveaway ratio) than his Game Rating? I was a little worried that there were factors included that I couldn't see and that he actually is garbage on the ice.

Well, it's my understanding that it's "Yes and No" both to your point and also kind of to Savoie's point above. The DGR and all it's offshoots are influenced by actions within the game on ice - so these contribute to statistics. It's worth nothing that the selected player role plays a large part in the calculations because effectively each role applies a different weight to the calculation based on the expectations for that role.

For instance, if you give someone an offensive minded role - they will get less reward for performing defensive duties and penalized heavier (in both their GR and OGR) if they fail to hit their offensive expectation by either misfiring on offensive actions when presented with the chance or simply not producing them at all. The same is true with defensive minded roles.

This is all stuff that I've inferred from tidbits Jeff has discussed on various streams over the last few years - this detail unfortunately isn't defined in the manual (maybe it'll make it in to some help screens as they're transitioning a lot of game info to that format now).

I'll add it to the QoL requests thread in the beta forums, it would be useful to have a slightly more detailed explanation of this.


A little aside to this - if you're playing with the 2D sim engine (either playing out games or just simming) you can check the post game analysis tab and it will show a section of 'Failed to stay in assigned role' for players - this can function as a little clue as to what the players 'preferred' role is, so that may be worth paying attention to - if you notice a player who is being assigned one role, revert to another frequently, then change their role to that and monitor their GR. Chances are their natural playstyle will lend itself better to their preferred role and ergo their game rating would reflect that (hopefully!).

[Ile]

I do not play with the 2D engine, I play with the classic text engine.

He was just awarded man of the match in a playoff game where he was 1+1, +2, 2 takeaways (0 GA), 2 shots blocked and a few hits in 21 minutes on ice, with a game rating of.... 52. For the entire playoffs he was 3+14 (0 minutes in PP btw) in 24 games, +23, 1:13 GA/TA, 43 shots blocked. And for that, he got a GR of 59.

I understand (now) that the game ratings are relative to their role etc., but this still makes no sense to me. Considering his role on the team and on the ice, his play off numbers are Conn Smythe'ish worthy to me. A stay at home defenceman with those defensive numbers, while also putting up 17 points in 24 games with 0 minutes in PP is really, really well done.

It's nothing game breaking ofc, but maybe it should be tweaked or looked at? As I said, I think the game overall is very intuitive and the GR is very helpful and easy to understand, but this case stands out to me to the point where I had to ask.

Conclusion is; he is my goat defender, regardless of his GR. As long as he puts up those numbers and we win cups, I now know not to care about his GR

[GMO123]

This thread might help:

https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=353832