FHM 12 and beyond wishlist

[stlcardinals19]

I'm glad there's now a Goals to Assists ratio in the league options window, but now I just ask for a Goalie Fatigue modifier (set from High, Higher, Average, Lower, Low) to help normalize the goalie stats I see. Having 5 goalies in my game rack up +70 games and over 15 w/+60 games a season is just grating to see and messes up the goalie stats. And also a Shots Per Game setting as well. I had 35(?!?!?!?) players take over 300 shots in my latest season. Would really do alot of good to have a setting that I could modify to get those league-wide numbers down

[djmacb]

Thanks for starting this thread. I’d like to see some additional enhancements in the 2D game:

- Ability to pick lines at the beginning of the game and after an icing – when historical rules allow – the AI can, but I cannot. I’d also like to be able to modify lines after a goal.
- Indicate where the faceoff is after a play stoppage
- Why no penalties on goalies?
- I have yet to see a penalty shot
- I’d like to see the time remaining for all penalized players, not just the time left in a power play.
- Fix penalties when there are more than 3 in a two-minute period. Link https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=361930.
- Mentioned above – I’d like to be able to save tactics
- Mentioned above – more feedback on how well the chosen tactics are working.
- Mentioned in another thread - the Dump and Chase tactic needs some refinement. The defensive team always recovers the puck.
- I’d like to see more in the way of team vs team records.
- League awards – only one defenseman is selected as an All Star for historical games before the 80’s.
- Empty net goals in overtime – if you select “Sim to the end of game” when one team has pulled its goalie, the AI will not replace the goalie during overtime.

[BarstoolBlues]

I'd like to see more variance in the season objectives/outlook as well. To me things like "balanced" and "top three-quarters of the league" are pretty bland. Like I kind of get it when you're playing as a middling team like the Penguins who are on the cusp of a rebuild and you're not quite sure where they're going to fit in the standings (as I am now - and it's been a fun save!) but I feel there should be something more tangible.

Things like "make playoffs" or "make a push for the playoffs." "Win your division." It would be nice if more was made of winning a division/conference/Presidents Trophy as well. I know that at the end of the day those don't really matter IRL and people only really remember the Cup winners, but it would be nice to have a record of it in the game all the same.

There could be an objective at the start of the playoffs as well. Win a series; don't be swept; make a deep run; win your conference; win the Cup.

[redtiger7]

Better scouting reports. Yes, I know this 18 year old prospect with a half star ability would be a fringe player. But what's he going to be like in 4 years?

Better drafts: I hate that I'm picking players with 1.5 stars potential in the 2nd round of a historical game. I hate how every team gets a 5 star player in the 1st round of a custom game. It's two extremes.

In game schedule editor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[tomkmb]

Originally Posted by redtiger7

Better scouting reports. Yes, I know this 18 year old prospect with a half star ability would be a fringe player. But what's he going to be like in 4 years?

Better drafts: I hate that I'm picking players with 1.5 stars potential in the 2nd round of a historical game. I hate how every team gets a 5 star player in the 1st round of a custom game. It's two extremes.

In game schedule editor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah I think the scouting reports can really be expanded upon and made more useful - especially as the current FHM development model/presentation doesn't lend to displaying you a potential on a per attribute basis and we all know that the ability/potential stars can vary over time - we really need more things to go on when it comes to drafting. For those of us that want to feel like we're delving deeper into it and making detailed assessments it sometimes feels like we're a little light on info, meaningful info I mean.

[Paolino]

in game Penalty shots please

[AlCzerviksRide]

A bit of love for us custom world builders. There's a lot here, but adding any of these would be amazing.

- I like to create large worlds, and doing that in one sitting in impossible. Create a system so that I can create one league or region, save it as a template, and come back later and keep adding. This would also keep my one stupid error that I inevitably make from ruining hours of work.
- Allow for promotion/relegation to be added later on in years. This would alleviate the above issue, as I could create a small world and grow it organically as I go along.
- More than one team promotion/relegation.
- Keep detailed stats from international club tournaments. When my fictional Red Wings play in a North American club continental tournament against a fictional Dominican powerhouse, I want to know each teams history in that tournament. And maybe head to head.
- Finances in the top flight should be much higher than those in the lower leagues, and market size should have a much larger effect on budgets. As it is, teams in the bottom tier with very small markets have the same budget as my teams in the top tier with huge markets. I would like to Wrexam a small club from a bottom tier and see if can promote them up to the NHL.
- I would also like to change historical plays drastically - i.e., Europe remains the same, but I would like to simulate that the 2009 mistake that the NHL made by putting PITTSBURGH PENGUINS on the Cup instead of DETROIT RED WINGS caused a huge split in the league and introduce promotion/relegation in a number of north american leagues who all play each other in a giant Champions League-type tournament.
- Multiple club tournaments available for a single team - a domestic club tournament, an international club tournament, etc. Maybe this requires me to input defined schedule dates for league play and different tournaments so there's no conflicts. I'm ok with that.

Like I said, there's a lot here, and a lot to build on in the future. Maybe some of these could be implemented sooner than others.

[Dan78]

Get the basics right, and keep developing them.

- More immersive and realistic drafting/scouting. The draft day should be a big thing in the game.
- Trading needs to be improved. Three-way trades, conditions on picks etc
- Development of players. You need to be able to influence prospects (What they should work on, where they should play. I had a top prospect from Israel drafted 12th in the NHL draft, and he kept playing in the Israel U18 league after the draft...)
-

[northjersey]

conditions on draft picks in trades is a big one, I second that

[tomkmb]

Originally Posted by northjersey

conditions on draft picks in trades is a big one, I second that

Conditions that are different from the current protection options in game?

[NYMike44]

I would love to see the ability to generate former players as coaches in historical mode, like in OOTP. The staff lists at the start are very rough in terms of quality of coaching skills.

[Leafsdude]

Two things I'd like to see:


- Allow player multi-select so I can change certain things on-mass (eg: add to shortlist or recall/demote before/after preseason).
- Since player number selection is pretty big for morale, how about the ability for players to "like" more than one number?


Other than that, just a general improvement to historical leagues and/or greater control on modifying rules (eg: an fully featured editor) would be nice.

[Javs]

CHL League Love

- Improved AI. Teams actually rebuild and go all in for championships.
- Better handling of overagers. Trading excess in the offseason / preseason.
- Better prospect generation. Players being drafted are below 5.0 relevant talent and the AI doesn't know what to do with them because they are so bad.
- Bigger differences between Big Markets and Small Markets. Staff budgets, player attractiveness, etc.
- Real life rules. U18 draft (players eligible for regular draft ages 16-17 and after the U18 draft if unselected become free agents). Underager rules (max 4 per team).
- Proper affiliation / loan system.
- Accurate trade freezes.
- Proper staff salaries / budgets.

[tomkmb]

Originally Posted by Leafsdude

Two things I'd like to see:


- Allow player multi-select so I can change certain things on-mass (eg: add to shortlist or recall/demote before/after preseason).
- Since player number selection is pretty big for morale, how about the ability for players to "like" more than one number?


Other than that, just a general improvement to historical leagues and/or greater control on modifying rules (eg: an fully featured editor) would be nice.

The multiple player selection/Tag control as it's referred to in OOTP baseball would be a huge huge QoL addition - I'm not sure if it's a limitation of the current GUI framework or what but if they're unable to add it then that would be better to know rather than speculate on every year as to why it hasn't been added. There are so many things that take multiple clicks in this game currently because of this limitation.

[tomkmb]

Originally Posted by Javs

CHL League Love

- Improved AI. Teams actually rebuild and go all in for championships.
- Better handling of overagers. Trading excess in the offseason / preseason.
- Better prospect generation. Players being drafted are below 5.0 relevant talent and the AI doesn't know what to do with them because they are so bad.
- Bigger differences between Big Markets and Small Markets. Staff budgets, player attractiveness, etc.
- Real life rules. U18 draft (players eligible for regular draft ages 16-17 and after the U18 draft if unselected become free agents). Underager rules (max 4 per team).
- Proper affiliation / loan system.
- Accurate trade freezes.
- Proper staff salaries / budgets.

This would be great - would go such a long way toward solidifying the CHL experience in game.

[BarstoolBlues]

I'm sure it's been said before, but something has to be done with free agency and the AI's roster management in general.

Into November 2025 and Jake Oettinger is still a free agent. In fact, in my current save there's a host of very decent goalies available - Lindgren, Lankinen, Samsanov. It's completely unrealistic and spoils the game a little. I can't even negotiate with Oettinger anymore.

Indeed, a month into the season and Montreal has waived Patrick Laine despite them being under the salary cap and him scoring 4 points in 3 games. He's gone unclaimed (little wonder, nobody is going to be able to afford his contract) so is wasting away in the AHL. Same thing has happened with Philip Broberg - traded to Calgary in November 2024, sent down to the AHL in November 2025 - and Jake Middleton. Maybe I just have a really bad save

[DaximusPrimus]

I have a few suggestions..

- FHM needs to go full sandbox. I'd like to be able to add leagues to a Standard Game.

- Goes along with the first suggestion but being able to change the NHL to a promotion/relegation league in a standard game as the league grows into the future would be really fun. Implementing this would give me hours of fun.

- Let me save team info and upload them into a league. You should be able to save the team details like name, nickname, abbreviation, colors, market size, fan loyalty, arena info, logos and jerseys of a team then upload them into any league during league creation or using commissioner mode. It's pain staking having to manually enter all of this every time I start a new save and this would save a tonne of time and get people actually playing instead of editing.

- Add more contract options. Limited no trade clauses where players submit their lists on July 1st or at contract signing. Bonus clauses for entry level deals. EA NHL just added some of this and it brings a tonne of immersion into contract negotiations.

[Castleview]

1. I would like to see the ability to activate/deactivate leagues at any
July 1st in historical games. So NHA, PCHA and WHA could all be revived, or started at an earlier date.

2. Also need the issues with historical editing in the NHA to be resolved,
and allow NHA to exist past 1917.

3. Add any teams in 'Import Historical Team' list to the list of teams in 'Add historical team,
so you can add a team without the franchise connections, or having the historical players included.
Also allow top European teams to be added as franchises to NHL or WHA.

4. Historical European leagues - KHL would be an obvious place to start.

5. Women's hockey - PWHA ? I guess there's licensing issues with that.

6. I could probably write a dissertation on improving trading, but I won't....

[Helloface]

Originally Posted by AlCzerviksRide

A bit of love for us custom world builders. There's a lot here, but adding any of these would be amazing.

- I like to create large worlds, and doing that in one sitting in impossible. Create a system so that I can create one league or region, save it as a template, and come back later and keep adding. This would also keep my one stupid error that I inevitably make from ruining hours of work.
- Allow for promotion/relegation to be added later on in years. This would alleviate the above issue, as I could create a small world and grow it organically as I go along.
- More than one team promotion/relegation.
- Keep detailed stats from international club tournaments. When my fictional Red Wings play in a North American club continental tournament against a fictional Dominican powerhouse, I want to know each teams history in that tournament. And maybe head to head.
- Finances in the top flight should be much higher than those in the lower leagues, and market size should have a much larger effect on budgets. As it is, teams in the bottom tier with very small markets have the same budget as my teams in the top tier with huge markets. I would like to Wrexam a small club from a bottom tier and see if can promote them up to the NHL.
- I would also like to change historical plays drastically - i.e., Europe remains the same, but I would like to simulate that the 2009 mistake that the NHL made by putting PITTSBURGH PENGUINS on the Cup instead of DETROIT RED WINGS caused a huge split in the league and introduce promotion/relegation in a number of north american leagues who all play each other in a giant Champions League-type tournament.
- Multiple club tournaments available for a single team - a domestic club tournament, an international club tournament, etc. Maybe this requires me to input defined schedule dates for league play and different tournaments so there's no conflicts. I'm ok with that.

Like I said, there's a lot here, and a lot to build on in the future. Maybe some of these could be implemented sooner than others.

This^

[redtiger7]

In the search function, have the results also return players who COULD play in the position you're looking for. So if you're looking for a RW, for example, include in the results players that are LW/RW, C/RW/LW, C/RW...