Free Agents in Historical Mode

[chickenwingzach]

I started playing a historical game starting with the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1967. I am now in 1985 and what I have been noticing is that there are abnormally few free agents available in each offseason. I'm wondering if this is normal in a historical sim, or if something else might be going on?

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by chickenwingzach

I started playing a historical game starting with the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1967. I am now in 1985 and what I have been noticing is that there are abnormally few free agents available in each offseason. I'm wondering if this is normal in a historical sim, or if something else might be going on?

I think what you are seeing is normal. FA rules back in the 70's and 80's were different than what we are used to in the current era.


Also, FHM's historical database only focuses on players that "made it". Players that were drafted but never got anywhere do not appear in the game, thus making the number of players less, meaning there will be less free agents overall.

[Adam B]

Originally Posted by eldur00

I think what you are seeing is normal. FA rules back in the 70's and 80's were different than what we are used to in the current era.


Also, FHM's historical database only focuses on players that "made it". Players that were drafted but never got anywhere do not appear in the game, thus making the number of players less, meaning there will be less free agents overall.

Actually ever player who has been drafted is in Historical I believe.

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by Adam B

Actually ever player who has been drafted is in Historical I believe.

Not if you play with rookies entering the game automatically with the teams that drafted them (bypassing the draft).


I also know not all players were there in historical back when I was going through an actual draft (I was playing that way up until FHM4), often times the draft had no more players past the 4th round or so, which made trading for things like a 6th round draft pick completely useless. It may have changed in FHM5, I have not played that way yet, but right now, in FHM5, if you select the option to have players enter the game on the team they were drafted by, many players that were drafted but never made it are not in the game.


I just double checked in my historical game (I'm at the start of the 2001-2002 season after starting in 1992-1993) and I double checked to make sure some of the Sens draft picks that never made it were not in the game and the ones I checked are nowhere to be found. (ex Cosmo Dupaul). Those players did not appear on my roster, nor did they appear in my unsigned draftees.


In fact Anton Volchenkov was drafted in 2000 and he's nowhere to be found in my game. I hope he's gonna show up, he was my favorite player :/

[Adam B]

Originally Posted by eldur00

Not if you play with rookies entering the game automatically with the teams that drafted them (bypassing the draft).


I also know not all players were there in historical back when I was going through an actual draft (I was playing that way up until FHM4), often times the draft had no more players past the 4th round or so, which made trading for things like a 6th round draft pick completely useless. It may have changed in FHM5, I have not played that way yet, but right now, in FHM5, if you select the option to have players enter the game on the team they were drafted by, many players that were drafted but never made it are not in the game.


I just double checked in my historical game (I'm at the start of the 2001-2002 season after starting in 1992-1993) and I double checked to make sure some of the Sens draft picks that never made it were not in the game and the ones I checked are nowhere to be found. (ex Cosmo Dupaul). Those players did not appear on my roster, nor did they appear in my unsigned draftees.


In fact Anton Volchenkov was drafted in 2000 and he's nowhere to be found in my game. I hope he's gonna show up, he was my favorite player :/

Let me rephrase, any Draft Pick who played in the NHL is in the game (There are a few exceptions to this as we filled out some early draft classes with players who were selected but never turned out). That's why as you get to newer draft classes there can be less, until the game starts to generate fictional players. Cosmo Dupaul was a guy who never went anywhere, which is why he isn't in.

It's possible we may get them in eventually, but guys who never made it to the show aren't going to have stats that even worthy of being in the game.

As for Volchenkov...I just jumped in and checked- starting a game in 2000. Volchenkov is in the game, but his rights are not set to the Senators, he's a FA. (You can find him if you use the search function). I'm guessing that's an error and we'll get that fixed. In the mean time if you're in Commissioner Mode, you can edit his league rights to the Senators.

[JeffR]

Originally Posted by Adam B

Actually ever player who has been drafted is in Historical I believe.

No, working on it, but not yet.

[JeffR]

Originally Posted by eldur00

I think what you are seeing is normal. FA rules back in the 70's and 80's were different than what we are used to in the current era.

Yeah, that's the reason. Teams retain the player's rights even if he doesn't sign a new contract, so they don't become free agents unless the team releases them.

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by Adam B

Let me rephrase, any Draft Pick who played in the NHL is in the game (There are a few exceptions to this as we filled out some early draft classes with players who were selected but never turned out). That's why as you get to newer draft classes there can be less, until the game starts to generate fictional players. Cosmo Dupaul was a guy who never went anywhere, which is why he isn't in.

It's possible we may get them in eventually, but guys who never made it to the show aren't going to have stats that even worthy of being in the game.

As for Volchenkov...I just jumped in and checked- starting a game in 2000. Volchenkov is in the game, but his rights are not set to the Senators, he's a FA. (You can find him if you use the search function). I'm guessing that's an error and we'll get that fixed. In the mean time if you're in Commissioner Mode, you can edit his league rights to the Senators.

So that's what I was saying in the start...players that didn't make it are not in the game.


As for Volchenkov, he's not in my game. Did he "disappear" or "retired without trace" if he wasn't signed from Free Agency in 2000 ?

[Adam B]

Just search via last name and see if he pops.

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by Adam B

Just search via last name and see if he pops.

That was the first thing I did. He did not pop. I just checked again with both a capital "V" and a small "v" and same result. Could it be he will appear later when he moved to North America ?


Also, while we are on the subject, I do have a question. Playing historical with players joining the team that drafted them without going through a draft, players join the team in one of two ways and I'd like to understand the logic behind it.


The first way the player will join the team is he will be put in the "unsigned draftees" section of the game, which is where most of the players end up and it makes sense.



Some players, though, join the team with a contract already (if memory serves, they are all above 20 years old) like with the Sens, Magnus Arvedson and Andreas Dackell for example. Is that the reason why, their age ?


Players that join the team that way are put in the contract list, but are not assigned anywhere. Since we don't get a message stating those players have joined, it makes it super easy to miss they are there, and I suspect (I'm not sure 100%) that it can affect their development if they are not assigned to any team and are just sitting in your contract screen.


I've found out the hard way in a previous save that I had players sitting in my contracts screen that I didn't even know I had (when I need a call up, I go to the roster screen of my farm team, and since they are not assigned to any team, they don't show up there) so now I scour my contracts window every July 1st to make sure I got everybody assigned, but a new player might miss this very easily. Would it be possible to maybe add a message on July 1st ? Like, at the same time you get a message that tells you all the changes in the league and new players added, maybe a personal message stating "Here are the new players that have been added to your team" to make it easier.

[JeffR]

If the draft isn't used, players appear in the year they first became property of a team (via drafting or signing), even if they didn't actually play an NHL game that year. There are a few exceptions, mainly Soviet-bloc defectors who were drafted years before they defected, e.g. Anton Stastny, where I deliberately left the data out for their pre-defection seasons so they don't show up until they actually came over.

If the player played any games for the NHL team in that season, they're automatically assigned a contract when they're added. If they didn't, only their rights are set; it's up to the user (or AI) to decide whether or not to sign them. Originally, all of them got a contract, but that was changed because the AI had trouble adjusting to a large number of new contracts every season, and because it wasn't realistic in a lot of cases - if a guy was drafted in the 9th round, was never signed, and then happened to play a single NHL game for another team 10 years later, it didn't make sense to force his original drafting team to sign him right out of the draft.

Volchenkov, though, has an error in his data - he's missing the entries that should mark him as Senators property in 2000 and 2001, so he won't show up until 2002. (Adam probably started with drafts on, that's why he's seeing him in 2000.) I'll get that fixed, but it won't be in time for the upcoming update, the data deadline has passed on that.

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by JeffR

If the draft isn't used, players appear in the year they first became property of a team (via drafting or signing), even if they didn't actually play an NHL game that year. There are a few exceptions, mainly Soviet-bloc defectors who were drafted years before they defected, e.g. Anton Stastny, where I deliberately left the data out for their pre-defection seasons so they don't show up until they actually came over.

If the player played any games for the NHL team in that season, they're automatically assigned a contract when they're added. If they didn't, only their rights are set; it's up to the user (or AI) to decide whether or not to sign them. Originally, all of them got a contract, but that was changed because the AI had trouble adjusting to a large number of new contracts every season, and because it wasn't realistic in a lot of cases - if a guy was drafted in the 9th round, was never signed, and then happened to play a single NHL game for another team 10 years later, it didn't make sense to force his original drafting team to sign him right out of the draft.

Volchenkov, though, has an error in his data - he's missing the entries that should mark him as Senators property in 2000 and 2001, so he won't show up until 2002. (Adam probably started with drafts on, that's why he's seeing him in 2000.) I'll get that fixed, but it won't be in time for the upcoming update, the data deadline has passed on that.

Thanks for the explanations. It all makes a lot of sense. Do you think in future iterations of the game, we can get a message on July 1st to point out which players have joined the organization ? Like I mentioned, it's a bit cumbersome to have to go dissect the contracts window to see if new players appeared there.

[JeffR]

Yeah, that's not a bad idea, I'll see if it can be done. The way players are added, it might have to be one message per player instead of one message with a list of everybody, but there shouldn't be so many of them that it gets spammy.