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Old 08-19-2013, 04:14 PM   #1
Irr11
Minors (Double A)
 
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Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: Switzerland
Posts: 168
Suggestions

Hi everyone

Sorry if I have to open a thread but I only found "bug" threads; this is rather about suggestions and feedback.

First of all, I want to say that I'm glad that this game exists. At times I caught myself playing the beta version for hours and I'm really looking forward to playing the full version.

I have now played two seasons with the LA KIngs and here are some suggestions that I make, bugs I noticed etc.:

-I think the players should have ratings from 50 to 99, like in the EA NHL games.
Since you have scales from 1 to 20 for their different skills, there could also be an overall rating between 1 and 20, which would simply be the average (all ratings divided by 20).
I do not agree with several ability/potential stars. Examples:
- Malkin's ability (3 1/2 stars) and potential (4) are waaay too low. And Saku Koivu's potential is 5 stars? The guy is almost 40... Even Matt Read has the same potential, Chris Kunitz has even 4 1/2. This can't be right.
- E.g. Tony Lydman, Brooks Orpik, Braydon Coburn and Matt Greene have more stars than Doughty and Voynov. The scouting report says that Greene is "by far the best defender on the team" and that the others are inferior to him. Seriously?
Btw, this has also led to player such as Jared Spurgeon getting a $10.9 million (!) cap hit. He's not a 5-star player either.
I think that this needs the most serious updates, but I went through several teams quickly and I think that generally most rating are ok.

-Some positions are wrong. Regehr and Martinez are LD's, Voynov is a RD. I'm not sure if there are mistakes on other teams as well, but based on what I saw I think it's largely ok.

-I think the trade system needs a lot of work. Player values should be calculated by the CPU based on rating (see above), upside, age, contract and positional needs. Right now I think it's tedious and unrealistic.
Here are examples of what I think is wrong: Once I offered Player X and my 2014 1st round pick for Player Y. My scout said it was a balanced offer. Then I added my 2015 1st round pick and suddenly he said that they will not accept. How can the addition of a first round pick make an offer worse? Moreover, the player rights seem to be "hated" so to speak.
Whenever I add the rights of an unsigned player it makes the offer worse according to my scout. That doesn't make sense.
I know that this is just a game and that it cannot be perfect; in real-life trades aren't always perfect either. But I still think that it could be a little bit more realistic, at least when you play the 2013 season ;-)
I traded Mike Richards and Penner for Malkin; I doubt that Ray Shero would ever accept this.
I also traded Martin Jones and a 2nd round pick to Boston for Dougie Hamilton.
Furthermore, I think the scout's suggestions need an improvement. If he says it's a "balanced offer" it's 100% sure that they'll reject. If he says "I think they'll accept" it's 100% sure they do. Perhaps the balanced-offer-text should be replaced by a simple "they won't accept". Also, I think there should be a middle ground. The scout shouldn't always be right. I'd like to negotiate, I think it should be like the contract negotiations
(which, I think, are well done!). I offer too little, they ask for too much, and then we try to find a middle ground, but with each round the negotiation mood gets worse.
I know that this is a tough feature, and I don't understand a lot about these technical things, but I'm sure that there can be an algorhithm or something like that that takes care of it as well as possible.

- I think the prospects ratings should be much better. They should have an upside/potential rating (perhaps also from 50 to 99), and I think there should be more than only "top prospect" and "decent young player".
Dougie Hamilton, for example, is more than just decent. Top prospects should be harder to trade for. For example, I traded Keaton Ellerby for Filip Forsberg. To get Drouin, MacKinnon and Nurse (from three different teams) it took only David Kolomatis, Brandon Kozun, Jordan Weal, a 2nd round pick and two 3rd round picks. No joke. I could've also had Seth Jones for Jordan Weal and a 2nd round pick but I already have too many RDs anyway.
After only one season, I have MacKinnon, Drouin, Nurse, Mrazek, D.Hamilton, Baertschi, F.Forsberg, Hertl and Frk in my system and I neither had to give up one of my best roster players (Quick, Doughty, Voynov, Kopitar, Carter etc.) nor one of my top prospects (e.g. Toffoli, Pearson, Vey). Don't get me wrong, I love my team But I think it's veeery unrealistic what I was able to do.
On a side note, do prospects actually develop, i.e. do their ability ratings rise over time? I'm only in 2014 in the game, so I don't know yet.

- The season starts in 2012 but some 2013 moves (buyouts, trades) are already included. I think the season should start in October 2013, otherwise I think it's weird if I play in 2012 with the 2013 rosters. For example, Schneider is already on New Jersey whereas Iginla and Morrow are still on Pittsburgh. Either update everything or nothing.

- On the PP lineup I wouldn't have the real positions LD, RD, C, LW, RW. Rather, I think it would be better if I could choose a formation (e.g. umbrella and that stuff) and then have "left/right point", "left/right half-wall", "in front of the net", "'Gretzky's office'" etc. Right now, I have forwards on defense (i.e. at the point) and forwards on their off-wing,
and I think that makes my PP suck.

-Black letters on a dark background (at the top of the screen, e.g. the team's record) and white on white are not the best idea ;-)

-The player search should be more detailed. I know that I can search for names, but I'd like to have a search interface which contains everything I can search for.
For example: I want to search for any LW in the NHL, AHL and KHL who's between 24 and 28, whose rating and upside are at least XX and XX, whose cap hit is not more than $3.5M and who's at least 6'2''. Just a random example, but you get the idea.

-I'd like it if I could change the jersey numbers of my players

-I think the standings are more realistic than in EA Sports' NHL and I think that the average results are perfectly realistic but I think that my team goes on extremely long streaks. I won 13 of my first 15 games, then I suddenly lost like 16-17 of 20 games; it's not possible that with a team like the LA Kings I drop from 2nd to 13th just like that. Okay,
I made some roster changes (Scuderi, Martinez, Mitchell, Frattin, Penner, Richards, Srivens out; Jagr, Lecavalier, Malkin, Josi, D.Hamilton, Vokoun in) but chemistry can't be everything. Acutally, I think that the quality of my
roster improved. Even the team that finishes 30th overall doesn't have such huge negative streaks.
Another example: In the 13/14 playoffs I'm playing as the President Trophy winner against the 8th seed. I win the first three games. Then I thought I give some ice time to my backup players. So I inserted a 4th liner and a bottom-pair d-man. Suddenly I lose four straight: 0-2, 1-4, 0-6, 0-3. I don't know what to say... I was absolutely stunned
by this. From 3-0 to 3-4 (combined score 1-15!?!) against the 8th seed only because I made two marginal changes? I don't think this is correct. Bottom line: The game cannot react so sensitively to (minor) lineup changes.
I like the standings in general, and even though in the NHL sometimes things happen that we do not expect, I think that some positions are exaggerated. The Winnipeg Jets have really finished 1st in the East (!) with 108 pts; the Sabres are third with 102 pts. The Capitals, Devils and Senators are at 12-14 with 78-82 pts.
Phoenix is 2nd in the West with 105 pts, whereas the Blues are out of the playoffs and the Ducks are only 14th with 70 pts.
Then in the 13/14 season it's the same story. In January I'm first in the West, then my team suddenly melts and loses 7 out of 9, while scoring only 7 goals in those losses.

- The 2013/14 Eastern Conference ended with the really overrated Sabres (see above) at 1st and Boston at 3rd; that's not possible. The winner
of the Southeast Division (Tampa) had 15 fewer points than Buffalo but according to the old system they should've had that third spot behind the winners of the Atlantic and Northeast. Actually, not one Southeast team made the playoffs.

-The game simulations are too long, even if it's at 6x speed. I'd be glad if I had the opportunity to have a period finished in 10-20 seconds or so (whatever is technologically possible).

-The assistant is supposed to take care of my tactics but he never does anything. They're always at normal and balanced.

-Menu music wouldn't be bad I think that some instrumental music would be best. (NO HARD ROCK!)

-I want to be able to send prospects back to junior. I traded for a Red Wings prospect from Halifax, and after that I couldn't return him to (or keep him in) junior, so I had to send him to the AHL, which was bad for his mood. I think that when NHL teams swap prospects they are allowed to keep them in junior, aren't they? But perhaps I am wrong on this one...
Also, I'd like to have the possibility to keep European prospects in Europe. Signing a prospect to an entry-level deal doesn't necessarily mean that he has to be on the NHL team. Because when he's on the NHL team, I have to send him down, he becomes a scratch on my farm team (see also below) and his mood becomes very bad.

-Can I dress/scratch my AHL players? Does the CPU do that? I want to decide who plays on my farm team, I want my best prospects to get a lot of ice times. Right now when I send a prospect down (I have to call them up when a regular gets injured), he gets automatically scratched and there's nothing I can do about it. Then they never play and they're unhappy, which is not good.
If I cannot dress/scratch them it would at least be good if the CPU did that, i.e. if the 19 best players were always automatically dressed, or if I at least had the possibility to "tell" the CPU that a certain player MUST be dressed.

-I think that compared to real NHL numbers, the stats-leading goalies have a slighty too high GAA (currently 2.24) and slightly too low SV% (currently .922). Usually it's around 1.90-1.99 and .928-.935 or so.
Speaking of goalies: I think they're never pulled, even if they give up 9 goals.
Also, shutouts are not counted (they're all at 0 on the stats page) and nobody has an assist. Usually, most starters have like 1 or 2 assists in one season.
Also the skater stats could be a little bit better. 84 points (!) were enough to win the Art Ross Trophy. 44 goals were enough to win the Rocket Richard Trophy, 56 assists were enough to lead the league (by Mikkel Boedker?!?). Everything else seems very good.
Yet, for example Crosby's stats are somewhat puzzling. In 12/13 he only had 63 pts in 82 games, in 2013/14 even only 48. That can't be right...

- In the playoffs goalies could regenerate better. After a 7-game series my starter has a fitness of 75. I know that it's hard to play an entire postseason, but in the playoffs it's usually only one goalie that plays; if I start only one, his fitness will quickly go in direction 0 if I have a deep run.

-When I call up a player I'd like to have the possibility to decide for how long. For example, I could decide if I want him on my team "until the next game", "for 7 days", "for 14 days" etc. I think this would be helpful if, for example, I place a roster player on the injured list for 7 days. Otherwise, I always have to send them down manually.

-In this case I'm again not sure if it's possible in the real NHL, but I'd like to offer contracts (or make transfer offers) to undrafted players in European leagues. I'm not sure (yet) if I can do it in the game when their contracts expire, but even if they have a long-term contract, I'd at least like to be able to ask the player if he's interested to come to the NHL. Then the CPU can generate replies such as "yes", "no", "maybe", "ask next year" etc.

-When I go to my team's "scores/schedule" screen it would be nice if it could jump directly to the most recent game, otherwise I always have to scroll down. Or perhaps, instead of a list view, it could be a calendar which always shows me the current month.
However, if it was possible to sim a game within a few seconds (see above) I think I wouldn't even need it since I'd never have
to check the result after a game ;-) (right now what I do is using "finish today" instead of "play game against...")

-I'm not sure if this is a bug or just me not understanding how the real NHL works. I just wanted to start the 13/14 season but I couldn't because I'm over the salary cap. The cap is at $70M, my payroll at 74. Since there was no time to trade (the game was that day), the only possibility was to demote players. I sent down a player earning $9.5M, but the
payroll only went down from 74 to 73-something. In the end, I had to demote 5 (!) players whose cap hits were worth almost $25M. And only then, after the match, my payroll went down to 50-something. Why not immediately?? Three important players were claimed by other teams while it would have been enough to only give up the most expensive one!

-I want the possibility to exit the game without having it saved (for example when I want to try some things I do not want to be saved)

-The awards do not have their correct names.

-In the play menu it says "play game against" when I play on the road and "play game at" when I play at home.

-On his profile screen Jonathan Quick is written Ouick. And his home town Milford is in Connecticut, not Illinois

-It would be nice if we could play with national teams too, once a year at the World Championship, or if you want even only once every 4 years at the Olympics. We'd just select the 23-man roster, create the lineup and sim the games.

-Since I'm a fan of editing I wouldn't mind having a database editor (for player ratings) :P


I know I've written a lot and it's not meant as criticism (it's not like I started the game and noticed everything at once; I collected all these points over a few weeks); I'm very glad that this game exists and I appreciate your efforts, and I know it's a beta version, I just wanted to point out some things you might consider.
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