• NCAA Football 11 - First Live Tuning Package Available


    Russ Kiniry has announced on the EA Forums that the very first live tuning package has been deployed from this blog.

    Hi NCAA Fans,

    It's Russ Kiniry here again to add some more details about our first Live Tuning Package (LTP) from Roy's "Thank You" blog on last Thursday. We continue to work hard on all the feedback we've received from the community, but I wanted to provide an update on our progress and offer some insight on the questions we've seen surrounding the LTP's.

    THE FIRST LIVE TUNING PACKAGE FOR NCAA FOOTBALL 11 WILL INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING UPDATES:

    • Increased the default starting values for all Recruits.
    • Slightly increased progression for low and mid tier teams.
    • Tuned CPU recruiting to prevent teams from signing too many players at any one particular position.
    • Increased CPU's focus upon needed positions in recruiting.
    • Top schools will sign 5 star prospects earlier in the season.
    • After a recruit Soft Commits, any CPU team that is not ranked in the top three will spend significantly less time calling the recruit.
    • Addressed an issue with big lineman jumping too high and deflecting passes.
    • Tuned ESPN U Top 150 Players to be more in line with actual top 150 recruits by decreasing the number of Fullbacks and Kickers.
    • Tuned Field Goal, Kick Offs, and Punting in Super Sim.

    WHAT DOES THAT ALL MEAN?

    For gameplay you should notice that larger players cannot jump as high to swat down passes making things look and feel more authentic. In Dynasty mode, it means two things. First, the majority of the teams in Dynasty will be slightly better than before due to having access to higher rated Prospects and slightly better progression. Second, CPU teams will do a much better job of accurately filling their rosters.

    Let's take a closer look at the details behind the Dynasty changes and what they actually do. *Caution* Lots of charts and numbers inbound. Skip ahead to ‘Going Forward' if you don't like math.

    This first charts shows the players in Dynasty Mode (by Overall rating) and compares the before and after of LTP 1. In the first Line Graph you can see a sample of one sim of Dynasty (each year is a line) where Players would end up being rated significantly lower than the default roster, which is shown as the Red Line.



    On the second Line Graph, in future years the Players are now shifted forward to be more in line with the shipped Rosters. These are all averages of a number of Sims we ran over the last couple weeks. Again, the Red Line is default and the rest of the lines are averages of future years (since one Dynasty can always have some different highs and lows depending on the recruiting classes). The biggest reason why the above charts are important is they show how much the Overall ratings of players change in a Dynasty as it advances. The closer the future year's lines are to the red line (default year 1) the less deviation you'll see from years 1-3 and 4+.

    Next let's take a look at what the actual numbers look like for different Prestige Teams.



    You can see these changes, on average, had an increase on the top end teams (6 and 5 star) and a much larger impact on the lower teams. A big reason why you'll see the top teams increase in Average Overall is that they are getting slightly better Prospects AND, more importantly, they are doing a more efficient job at recruiting in general. Remember the CPU teams are not wasting as much time on players they can't get and are filling their needs better. The lower teams get the benefit of better recruiting logic and better Prospects like the higher teams, but also slightly higher Progression than they had before LTP 1.

    What that means is on average lower prestige teams will end up being rated higher in future years of Dynasties before LTP 1. Basically, less D rated teams, which you can see in the next chart:



    The left side is a sample of data before LTP 1, and the right is using LTP1. You'll notice a big shift in the lowest teams (previously 46% down to only 24%). And we moved a few teams that were close to being A Rated before into that elite range. There is only so far we really want to go with these numbers as it will soon start to impact the top end Players too much. These LTP are a little limited in what they can control, but just being able to make the changes above without a patch is a huge step forward for the NCAA Football franchise.

    GOING FORWARD

    The goal of these Live Tuning Packs is to fine tune the game using both your (community feedback) and our own internal testing. We want to continue to make adjustments to the game where they make sense, and not use this to make large sweeping changes, given how much of the game is "just right". Continue to tell us how you feel and what you'd like to see on our forums.

    Some additional LTP changes will not be put into place until after Title Update 2 (currently estimate is in Mid-August). More details to follow, but we expect to address items such as Kicker and Awareness Progression.

    Let me also clear up a couple of common misconceptions about NCAA 11 and the way progression and awareness work "under the hood":

    • Teams do not get progressively worse in extremely late years, for the most part what you see in years 6+ will be consistent over the long run due to the fact that the entire NCAA is taken over by our generated Prospects at that time. To put it simply you won't look at year 10 and everyone in the NCAA is rated 60 Overall or lower.
    • The Awareness of a player does NOT affect his ability to Run Routes, Play Defense, or Block. Each of those have their own ratings that drive how good the player is:
    - Route Running (RTE)
    -Defense: Zone Coverage (ZCV), Man Coverage (MCV), Play Recognition (PRC) and Pursuit (PUR)
    -Blocking: Run/Pass Block Footwork (RBF, PBF), Run/Pass Block Strength (RBS, PBS). And the assignment each player gets is based on the offensive play vs. the defensive play.
    • Every Kicker (no matter his ratings) CAN kick a 30 and under yard field goal. Granted accuracy can causes misses as well, but they do have the distance.

    We hope that you will enjoy these changes to NCAA Football 11. Your continued feedback and enthusiasm for the game is greatly appreciated. Keep visiting our Forums for the most up to date information.
    Thanks,
    -Russ Kiniry
    Designer NCAA Football
    Comments 67 Comments
    1. JBHuskers's Avatar
      JBHuskers -
      Q&A that Russ has posted as well:

      Q: Will I need to restart my Dynasties for these changes to work?
      A: You do not need to start your Dynasty over, these changes will be applied to all Offline and Online Dynasties after you download the file. Dynasties that are past years 4 and 5 might take a season or two before everything is back on track.

      Q: Should I put my existing Dynasties on hold? Or do I just continue playing?
      A: Continue playing the game, like the previous question these changes will work on any current Dynasty.

      Q: Are the Live Tuning Packs optional? Can I revert back to the older version if I don’t like the changes?
      A: For Offline game modes if you do not download the file the changes will not be made (or you can delete the file from the File Management screen), however for all Online game modes you will need the changes. Do note that any changes we make are to improve the game.

      Q: Will this update fix the high number of injuries or fumbles?
      A: Both are very subjective thing, the data we’ve been tracking does not indicate there is a high amount of either. But we will continue to monitor them. Keep in mind if you’re trying to break out of a lot of tackles your chance to fumble goes up and you can use the Game-Planning options in Play Call to cut down on fumbles.

      Q: Will the LTP change my Rosters?
      A: There is no impact on Rosters.

      Q: How do LTP’s impact my sliders settings?
      A: None of the changes in Live Tuner Package 1 will change anything with Sliders. You will not have to reset them.

      Q: Do LTP’s have different effects on each difficulty level or does everything change?
      A: For the game play changes, yes. But they have been tuned to be in-line with the difficulty of each level.

      Q: How will Online Games be impacted – do I need these for Head to Head?
      A: They will automatically be downloaded for every Head to Head game. You do not need to save them.

      Q: Does this fix Dynasty Not Available?
      A: We’ve been working on these as quickly as possible (and have fixed a number already). Please keep checking our NCAA 11 Forums for more information.
    1. psusnoop's Avatar
      psusnoop -
      Looking forward to seeing how well this addresses the issues
    1. sl8b's Avatar
      sl8b -
      Q: Will I need to restart my Dynasties for these changes to work?
      A: You do not need to start your Dynasty over, these changes will be applied to all Offline and Online Dynasties after you download the file. Dynasties that are past years 4 and 5 might take a season or two before everything is back on track.

      Q: Should I put my existing Dynasties on hold? Or do I just continue playing?
      A: Continue playing the game, like the previous question these changes will work on any current Dynasty.
      For us offline dynasty players (and OD's I guess), this is great news. I for one am happy with the update. I know it is a disappointment for some, but it's a great start for me. Now I can rest easy knowing I'm not wasting my dynasty time. I'm also going to go ahead and have faith that we won't need to restart dynasties for the next patch or LTP.
    1. JBHuskers's Avatar
      JBHuskers -
      Quote Originally Posted by psusnoop View Post
      Looking forward to seeing how well this addresses the issues
      Quote Originally Posted by sl8b View Post
      For us offline dynasty players (and OD's I guess), this is great news. I for one am happy with the update. I know it is a disappointment for some, but it's a great start for me. Now I can rest easy knowing I'm not wasting my dynasty time. I'm also going to go ahead and have faith that we won't need to restart dynasties for the next patch or LTP.
      Agreed....I'm pretty stoked on these changes.
    1. AustinWolv's Avatar
      AustinWolv -
      This is good progress and shows some study to back it up. While the 'homework' can always be subjected to interpretation, this is much better support and customer service than we've seen in the years of past NCAA versions. Kudos on that.

      They just flat-out addressed what the community is having problems with. That is good stuff and hopefully can apply to some other items that people have noted.
    1. steelerfan's Avatar
      steelerfan -
      While I'm happy about the changes, I'm concerned it won't be adequate for kickers. Time will tell.

      Fortunately, I'm at home so I can fire up my Dynasty and push forward immediately!
    1. rhombic21's Avatar
      rhombic21 -
      This contains ZERO substantive gameplay fixes, so please save the "awesome customer service" line.
    1. steelerfan's Avatar
      steelerfan -
      Just to take some of the mystery out of the downloading of tuners, I just fired up the game and was asked (afrter I pressed Start) if I wanted to download it. So, you are prompted and are made aware when a new set is out.
    1. JBHuskers's Avatar
      JBHuskers -
      Not EVERYTHING can be fixed on live tuning, that is what a patch is for....I would agree with Austin....this is good "customer service" and a direct result of fixing what the majority of the community is wanting fixed.
    1. JBHuskers's Avatar
      JBHuskers -
      Quote Originally Posted by steelerfan View Post
      Just to take some of the mystery out of the downloading of tuners, I just fired up the game and was asked (afrter I pressed Start) if I wanted to download it. So, you are prompted and are made aware when a new set is out.
      Yep .... you HAVE to do it for any online game mode, you could reject it if you dont' go online and like the tuning the way it is...but I'm not sure why you would want to do that.
    1. Kwizzy's Avatar
      Kwizzy -
      Can't help but notice there wasn't 1 team that Improved from their original ranking in the 4 years of data he posted, even after LTP1. They all got worse, just not quite as drastically as before the tuning. I would think that some teams would have to get better. Maybe this is just the case for the teams shown, but it's just something I noticed.
    1. steelerfan's Avatar
      steelerfan -
      Quote Originally Posted by rhombic21 View Post
      This contains ZERO substantive gameplay fixes, so please save the "awesome customer service" line.
      All Austin said was that the interaction between EA and the community has been far superior to past years. I cannot disagree with that at all.
    1. JBHuskers's Avatar
      JBHuskers -
      Quote Originally Posted by steelerfan View Post
      All Austin said was that the interaction between EA and the community has been far superior to past years. I cannot disagree with that at all.
      You'd be blind to disagree with that.
    1. jaymo76's Avatar
      jaymo76 -
      For people such as myself now four years into dynasty these changes will take a long while to work through the teams as pretty much all of the original roster is now graduated. The kickers and awareness will continue to be issues until the patch though. I will be interested to see how these changes impact the game going forward. I suspect for those of you in season 1 or 2 that things will improve much quicker.
    1. cdj's Avatar
      cdj -
      Quote Originally Posted by Kwizzy View Post
      Can't help but notice there wasn't 1 team that Improved from their original ranking in the 4 years of data he posted, even after LTP1. They all got worse, just not quite as drastically as before the tuning. I would think that some teams would have to get better. Maybe this is just the case for the teams shown, but it's just something I noticed.
      I think that's because by Year 5+ (probably earlier), CPU teams will have more freshman on the roster than they do with the default roster file, bringing down the OVR rating.
    1. steelerfan's Avatar
      steelerfan -
      Quote Originally Posted by cdj View Post
      I think that's because by Year 5+ (probably earlier), CPU teams will have more freshman on the roster than they do with the default roster file, bringing down the OVR rating.
      I noticed what Kwizzy said too. I hadn't thought about what you're saying, cdj. Very good reasoning.
    1. cdj's Avatar
      cdj -
      Russ posted this at OS in regards to the OVR question:

      So if you look at the OVR line graphs you'll see that the recruits are still not 100% on par with the default rosters as you get to future years (but still WAY better than what we shipped with). I really didn't want to make too many drastic changes as I feel the top end (in player Overalls) is really good and if I messed with it too much that got broke.

      -Russ


      I'd be interested in seeing the avg. number of freshman per team in base roster versus future years and also the percentage breakdown of team ratings in base roster.
    1. steelerfan's Avatar
      steelerfan -
      Quote Originally Posted by cdj View Post
      I'd be interested in seeing the avg. number of freshman per team in base roster versus future years and also the percentage breakdown of team ratings in base roster.
      I really believe your reasoning is correct and may not have been considered by Russ and the other devs. Like I said, good reasoning, brother.
    1. gschwendt's Avatar
      gschwendt -
      Quote Originally Posted by cdj View Post
      I think that's because by Year 5+ (probably earlier), CPU teams will have more freshman on the roster than they do with the default roster file, bringing down the OVR rating.
      That's why you get paid the big bucks.
    1. souljahbill's Avatar
      souljahbill -
      Quote Originally Posted by Russ View Post
      The Awareness of a player does NOT affect his ability to Run Routes, Play Defense, or Block. Each of those have their own ratings that drive how good the player is:
      - Route Running (RTE)
      -Defense: Zone Coverage (ZCV), Man Coverage (MCV), Play Recognition (PRC) and Pursuit (PUR)
      -Blocking: Run/Pass Block Footwork (RBF, PBF), Run/Pass Block Strength (RBS, PBS). And the assignment each player gets is based on the offensive play vs. the defensive play.
      I guess this explains why sometimes, people don't block who I wish they would block. I remember having one run where I only needed the FS touched to take it to the house and the TE, who I was trailing, didn't go after him. He instead stopped, turned around, and went to a linebacker who I already passed up and was no longer a threat. Needless to say, I was tackled by the FS. I screamed at that TE for a least 3 plays.