What Dynasty changes do you expect?

[Kwizzy]

I was just curious what everyone takes out of the description given for the Dynasty playbook. Based on the description below, what changes do you expect?

Playbook #3: Dynasty
Game days come to life with mid-game updates featuring a new studio analyst, plus enhanced commentary from NCAA Football veterans Kirk Herbstreit and Brad Nessler. Recruiting now goes deeper than ever with the addition of dynamic grades and the ability to scout players. Plus, there are even more ways to interact with your Dynasty from the web.

Just think this could be a good way to pass the time between now & May 7th. Could be fun to look back and see who's right too.

[Deuce]

I'm interested to see what the dynamic grades means and how the scouting is going to work.

I think increasing roster size would be nice but doubt that will happen. I'd also like to see CC taken to the next level. Hiring/firing coordinators...etc


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[ram29jackson]

on the tech side- I want to be able to load all the highlights you ay i can without the dang thing freezing , for the dynasty upload highlights

[JeffHCross]

I have it from a "reliable source" that they changed nothing.

Though I suspect he-who-shall-not-be-named was messing with my head.

I think it's obvious with some of the items mentioned in the Sights & Sounds that now Kirk and Brad will have more awareness of the on-going game. I believe that should extend to the potential, at least, for season statistics and dynasty discussions during the game. I expect the overall atmosphere of the commentary to be improved, or at least a solid foundation to be built for years to come.

The new studio analyst tease brings the possibility of Dari Nowkhah bringing some ESPNU updates to us during games. Maybe PS1-era on-going games and the sports ticker is going to make a return (though I don't see how this would be possible in Online Dynasty).

Dynamic grades suggests a reference to Dynamic Player Performance, the new addition to Madden last year. So, logically, that suggests busts and sleepers, if it ties to recruiting. Scouting would be a logical tie-in to busts/sleepers, particularly to those of us who have played Head Coach 09.

With Madden getting a healthy does of stuff from Head Coach 09 last year, I suspect some of it may be coming NCAA's way. I'd certainly welcome it, as evidenced by the fact that I've once again dove into playing HC09 in the last few weeks.

I also expect there are going to be several things that aren't remotely teased in that Playbook description. After all, why give away the whole story in the trailer?

[pantherone26]

As someone who doesn't play Madden, only NCAA, can anyone give insight as to what they think of the Dynamic Player Performance in Madden last year and how they think that will translate to the NCAA series? Opinions on whether you guys like that idea?

I'd like to see Spring Game's added to the dynasty this year. I believe ESPN is televising 12 Spring Games this year, they are starting to become more and more popular IMO. In fact, I just watched Tennessee's spring game online for the first time ever this morning! To me the Spring Game would really help in getting a look at some players that I haven't played much with, either incoming Freshmen or new starters. Also, I feel like it would help when determining who to start the next season. I don't know about you guys, but sometimes I have difficulty in deciding who is going to start the next season when players are very close in ratings. I really feel like some players just play better on the field and it takes me a game or two to decide who should start, especially at QB. Practice mode isn't enough for me, I rarely use it. I normally schedule a cupcake team in the first game so that I can see who I want to go to war with for the rest of the season!

I'd also like to see the return of the Magazine in dynasty mode, why was this ever taken out again?

GameDay would be sweet, but I doubt that's coming.

Hopefully they have kept Coaching Carousel and improved upon it.

I would also like to see the random, roulette style of pitches gone.

And my ultimate wish would be for a High School All American game with the top recruits in the country!

[pantherone26]

As someone who doesn't play Madden, only NCAA, can anyone give insight as to what they think of the Dynamic Player Performance in Madden last year and how they think that will translate to the NCAA series? Opinions on whether you guys like that idea?

I'd like to see Spring Game's added to the dynasty this year. I believe ESPN is televising 12 Spring Games this year, they are starting to become more and more popular IMO. In fact, I just watched Tennessee's spring game online for the first time ever this morning! To me the Spring Game would really help in getting a look at some players that I haven't played much with, either incoming Freshmen or new starters. Also, I feel like it would help when determining who to start the next season. I don't know about you guys, but sometimes I have difficulty in deciding who is going to start the next season when players are very close in ratings. I really feel like some players just play better on the field and it takes me a game or two to decide who should start, especially at QB. Practice mode isn't enough for me, I rarely use it. I normally schedule a cupcake team in the first game so that I can see who I want to go to war with for the rest of the season!

I'd also like to see the return of the Magazine in dynasty mode, why was this ever taken out again?

GameDay would be sweet, but I doubt that's coming.

Hopefully they have kept Coaching Carousel and improved upon it.

I would also like to see the random, roulette style of pitches gone.

And my ultimate wish would be for a High School All American game with the top recruits in the country!

[JeffHCross]

As someone who doesn't play Madden, only NCAA, can anyone give insight as to what they think of the Dynamic Player Performance in Madden last year and how they think that will translate to the NCAA series? Opinions on whether you guys like that idea?

I didn't play Madden, so I'm just going off of how it was described last year, and I love it. What it essentially boils down to is that an 80 OVR player doesn't play like an 80 OVR player every week. Sometimes he'll be 83, some 77, maybe even 90 or 70. The concept has been around a long time. I first became aware of it in how NASCAR Racing did their AI in 1994. Their ratings were actually ranges ... the best drivers (Earnhardt, for example) had very tight ranges at the higher end of the scale (let's say 95-99 to keep it in NCAA terms). The lesser drivers could still get up to that 95 rating, but their range was actually significantly larger, say 50-95. Before each race, the game would roll a rating for each driver and each rating, and thus it would be different every time you went on the track.

Dynamic Player Performance was a similar idea, though I didn't get an impression for whether the player ratings were being re-rolled per week/game, half, quarter, etc. Ideas like that, in my opinion, do a really solid job of emulating the fact that a player's or team's performance, from week to week, deviates from what we expect. The top guys, like Andrew Luck, don't deviate significantly, but even All-American aren't superstars every week.

I'd like to see Spring Game's added to the dynasty this year.

I don't want to see the Spring Game that we had on the Playstation 2 / Xbox generation, because I personally didn't think it had value to the overall dynasty. Plus, with the advent of Online Dynasties, you have to consider that items like that had significant value for those that were able to play it, while guys that wouldn't be able to get their game in would lose out. The competitive balance can't be upset that dramatically.

However, I would love to see Practice Mode available within the offseason of Dynasty Mode. And you could easily call that Spring Practice or even the Spring Game. Thereby getting the goal of your suggestion (ability to practice with your team) while not having to add an entire new mode or feature set. I think Practice Mode should be available at all times, especially in Online Dynasty, with the current roster, no matter what stage you're at.

I'd also like to see the return of the Magazine in dynasty mode, why was this ever taken out again?

I don't think it was ever "taken out" per se, it was just replaced with the ESPN.com-like headlines and graphics that you now have. Other than the cool covers, there's really nothing missing that the old Magazine feature had from the current game.

Hopefully they have kept Coaching Carousel

They'd never put the amount of effort that went in CC last year and then drop it.

And my ultimate wish would be for a High School All American game with the top recruits in the country!

I've asked this from almost everyone that's suggested it (and you may have gotten it from me before as well), so ... why? What can you get from playing with the #1 HB that you can't already see from his ratings? And is there something you can get from playing with the HSAAs that will make you recruit / drop a guy that you were on the fence about? I don't mean to dismiss your suggestion, I'm just trying to figure out what the appeal of this mode would be -- because obviously others see the appeal while I'm missing something.

[baseballplyrmvp]

I've asked this from almost everyone that's suggested it (and you may have gotten it from me before as well), so ... why? What can you get from playing with the #1 HB that you can't already see from his ratings? And is there something you can get from playing with the HSAAs that will make you recruit / drop a guy that you were on the fence about? I don't mean to dismiss your suggestion, I'm just trying to figure out what the appeal of this mode would be -- because obviously others see the appeal while I'm missing something.

exactly. you can already see every important rating for every recruit. there's zero point in having the high school all star games when all you have to do is compare that recruit to an existing player in your dynasty.

now, if they removed the ability to see every non measurable rating for every recruit (which i personally hope they did, and tied the new scouting option into it), i could see where the high school all star games could come in handy.....however, in that case, you should only be able to watch it, imo. you shouldnt be able to play as the recruits. but with the current recruiting model, there's no need for the all star games, imo.

jeff, you brought up a good point though, and the same kind of argument can be applied towards the spring game. is the spring game (by itself) gonna provide enough time/plays for someone who's unsure which player will be better at a certain position? personally, i dont think so, and i think the spring game doesnt add anything significant to dynasty. in order for it to contribute, it would need the spring camp.

[steelerfan]

DPP was great in theory, and probably cool for simming, but I found that the same players were hot every week. Particularly my OL.

Overall, it added nothing for me. Perhaps with improvements, it could be better.

I also agree that Spring/All-American games would have no purpose and, without a purpose, they are not needed in the series.

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[JeffHCross]

is the spring game (by itself) gonna provide enough time/plays for someone who's unsure which player will be better at a certain position? personally, i dont think so

I agree that it's confusing why I'll make the same argument in favor of one but not the other. Here's my reasoning: In Spring Practice, most of my team should be returning. So while I may want to see how my new QB will do (or, more often for me, how my team handles the new playbook I want to try) in my existing offense, there's not much uncertainty there.

By comparison, if I play a HS All-American game, I don't know anything about the majority of players. If I ran a play that I'm accustomed to getting 5 yards on, and I get stopped for a 2 yard loss, is that because of the offensive line? The back? The defense? Unless I've memorized the entire HS AA roster, I'm not going to know.

The other reason to have Practice Mode in the offseason, quite honestly, is because Online Dynasties can spend a decent amount of time in the Offseason, and there's very little to do if you've already completed your recruiting. Since there's no ability to export our Dynasty team (unlike Madden), we can't even practice with our new recruits or replacements.

I guess it's like this ... I don't feel it's likely that there's something I would see / feel / notice in an HS All-American game that would either stop me from recruiting an existing target, or suddenly decide that I must have that #2 WR. Whereas Practice Mode would allow those of us who otherwise schedule I-AA Northwest in Week 1 to bypass the uncertainty of our new squad.

That's why I wouldn't be in favor of a new mechanic or feature to simulate the Spring Game. I just want to have Practice Mode accessible in the offseason!

[JeffHCross]

Just switched over to ESPN and something hit me ... I'd like to see the following lineup for an ESPN studio show in-game:
Host: Jay Crawford (Ohio State fan)
Analysts: Robert Smith (alum), Joey Galloway (alum) and Chris Spielman (alum)

[pantherone26]

I've asked this from almost everyone that's suggested it (and you may have gotten it from me before as well), so ... why? What can you get from playing with the #1 HB that you can't already see from his ratings? And is there something you can get from playing with the HSAAs that will make you recruit / drop a guy that you were on the fence about? I don't mean to dismiss your suggestion, I'm just trying to figure out what the appeal of this mode would be -- because obviously others see the appeal while I'm missing something.

Well for me some players just have a "feel" to them. We can already know how fast a guy is, how agile, how tall, etc. but playing with them is different for me. I've had guys on my team that were rated 10 or so points overall less then a guy, but for whatever reason, those guys were my favorites due to big plays at the right time or winning me the game. Also, I like the idea of playing with a guy in this game and falling in love with him, then recruiting him like crazy to get him. Getting him would make recruiting that much sweeter, and losing out on him all the more heart breaking! Isn't that what makes recruiting fun? Now if you miss out on a guy, it's just a simple move on to the next one, but having a small connection to the player before recruiting begins would really be cool IMO.

[morsdraconis]

I want Practice Mode BEFORE the change of position time. I want to be able to take players and change their positions and see how they play against my other starters.

If they're going to continue to emphasize Athletes (hopefully making them even more able to play multiple positions), I want the ability to try them out at various positions before making the final decision. 1 or 2 points overall doesn't tell me much. I want to see them out there on the field.

[baseballplyrmvp]

Well for me some players just have a "feel" to them. We can already know how fast a guy is, how agile, how tall, etc. but playing with them is different for me. I've had guys on my team that were rated 10 or so points overall less then a guy, but for whatever reason, those guys were my favorites due to big plays at the right time or winning me the game. Also, I like the idea of playing with a guy in this game and falling in love with him, then recruiting him like crazy to get him. Getting him would make recruiting that much sweeter, and losing out on him all the more heart breaking! Isn't that what makes recruiting fun? Now if you miss out on a guy, it's just a simple move on to the next one, but having a small connection to the player before recruiting begins would really be cool IMO.

ok, but the high school all star games are a little under a month before national signing day. so are you really gonna be able to swing some recruit that much that you're gonna be able to make up 1000+ points in the 5 weeks of offseason recruiting? furthermore, since this is a high school all star game, and practically all of the recruits invited (based on the current recruiting model) are 4 and 5 stars, a good majority of those recruits would already be committed to other schools. so even if you were able to play and fall in love with those kids, there's a good chance you wouldnt be able to recruit them anyways since they're already committed.

btw jeff, the 5 offseason weeks of recruiting....when is that supposed to happen in real life? i thought the time from the national championship to NSD was a no contact period for coaches?

[JeffHCross]

before recruiting begins would really be cool IMO.

As MVP said above, I think you hit on a very good point here. Unfortunately, to me (as well as MVP), it's a strong point AGAINST what you're asking for.

In College Hoops 2k, the AAU games are played during the offseason, and the players are still going to be in high school the next year. You see rising SRs, rising JRs, even rising FR, I think. There's no similar model in real college football. The Army and Under Armour games are for graduated seniors, many of whom have already made their choices. And if the game was during the Bowl period, as it is in real life, 85% (or more) of the recruits you saw would already be committed.

Now, if they wanted to replicate what 2k did, they could have offseason camps for rising Seniors. That's true to real life, and then you could get a preview of next year's class (though there's the logical problem with the idea -- next year's class hasn't been generated at that point ... it would have to be a Preseason task, which extends the Preseason for ODs even longer).

If they could figure out something to do with that (maybe with the oft-requested ability to recruit underclassmen, then you'd have those recruits already generated), that would be worthwhile. Maybe you could bring in 44 guys (22 per side) that you're interested in, and see how they play. It's not quite the Army All-American game, but in my opinion this idea may be similar enough to the All-American game, yet also bring in more legitimate value to Dynasty mode.

I want Practice Mode BEFORE the change of position time.

In my eyes, Practice Mode should never go away. I know that's not true to real life, but I think you should be able to take the field with your team at all times, at least in Online Dynasty (when you can't just simulate through the offseason to get to try your team).

btw jeff, the 5 offseason weeks of recruiting....when is that supposed to happen in real life? i thought the time from the national championship to NSD was a no contact period for coaches?

It's been my opinion that the Offseason recruiting is a legacy of the old recruiting model (before In-Season recruiting existed) and doesn't actually replicate any real life time period. There are too many problems with it, as it currently exists, to believe it replicates something from real CFB.

That said, the period from the MNC to NSD is not no-contact. Definitely not. If it was, you wouldn't have all these stories about players that flipped during that period -- because there wouldn't be anyone to flip them.

There are the following Dead Periods between the MNC and NSD (for 2012):
January 9 — January 12 — Dead Period (the day of the MNC through Thursday)
January 30 — February 2 — Dead Period. (the Monday preceding NSD through the day after)
If memory serves, even the term "Dead Period" is misnomer. I believe the players can call the coaches, but the coaches can't call the players. Which sounds stupid, but that's the only explanation for why players are calling coaches the night before NSD to say they're going to so-and-so. If it was a true No-Contact Period, that wouldn't be allowed.

January 29 is a Quiet Period, meaning recruits can go to college campuses, but the coaches aren't allowed to visit recruits off-campus. Otherwise (and including the above limits), the entire period from November 27 (the day after the regular season ended, I believe) through Janaury 28 was a Contact Period (allowing off-campus, in-person visits, one visit per week, one phone call per week). This is the time period that Offseason Recruiting is supposed to replicate, but obviously it's not a 1:1 relationship.

DPP was great in theory, and probably cool for simming, but I found that the same players were hot every week. Particularly my OL.

Overall, it added nothing for me. Perhaps with improvements, it could be better.

Good example for why I said that I was judging DPP by the description, not by actual playtime with Madden. It sounds like, in practice, that DPP was just a fancy name for the Hot/Cold system we had for years. That was totally not my understanding of what it was claimed/designed/intended to be. And if that's all it is, that's pretty disappointing.

FWIW, I don't think the mention of "dynamic grades" in the Playbook #3: Dynasty description actually means DPP. I think it means sleeper and busts in recruiting, since it specifically mentions it with recruiting.

[JeffHCross]

And, after all that ... what I really came here to say was that after talking about Head Coach 09 again this morning, I would love to see players have a Play Knowledge amount, which affects players running the right routes, right plays, etc, and also stops people (like me) from constantly changing playbooks. Of course, there's a lot of back-end changes that have to be made for this to happen, and I don't expect it to happen anytime soon. But I would love it.

[JeffHCross]

"Even more ways to interact with your Dynasty from the Web" had caught my eye. Maybe there's some insight from this news article from Europe ...

At EA's UK showcase this week, EA's Northern Europe boss Keith Ramsdale said all of EA's game franchises, including FIFA, Battlefield, Medal of Honor, Star Wars, The Sims and Need for Speed, were being transformed in this way.

This means more than simple online play, Ramsdale explained. It involves being able to play a "brand" across multiple devices, each one contributing to a singular goal - and profile.

Ramsdale used FIFA by way of an example. "Imagine a player gets up in the morning, plays an online match on his 360 before going to work," he said. "On the bus, on his way to work, he practices his free kicks on his tablet. At lunch he looks at the transfer window on his PC. On the way home he chooses his kit on his smartphone.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...line-universes

[t2jbird]

"Even more ways to interact with your Dynasty from the Web" had caught my eye. Maybe there's some insight from this news article from Europe ...

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...line-universes

Good find! I expect to be recruiting for my dynasty from my iPhone come July. Ha

[baseballplyrmvp]

"Even more ways to interact with your Dynasty from the Web" had caught my eye. Maybe there's some insight from this news article from Europe ...

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...line-universes

i've been seeing commercials for sony thats allowing you to play your games across multiple platforms- starting on ps3, transferring it to your vita, being on computer, back to vita, then back to ps3. might be interesting

[ryby6969]

I think what dynamic grade means is like back on the PS2 days when you would scout someone and it would either confirm their 40 time or bench press, or it would change. It might bump them up from a B to say a B+, or drop them down from like an A to a B+.