Pipelines: A Total Redesign

[JeffHCross]

( See the second post for the TL;DR version )

Introduction
As should probably be obvious from the title of this thread, this post will be proposing significant changes to Recruiting Pipelines. In short, I feel that recruiting pipelines do not properly reflect the benefit that a school gets for “dominating” recruitment in an area. Or that pipelines allow a school to “lock down” a state's borders. I believe what I propose today will allow that to change.

The Problem -- As I See It
Using the Roster to Establish a Pipeline
The first problem is that four players on a roster “establishes” a pipeline. This is to represent, I believe, a coach going into a high school player's office and being able to say “listen, we've got other kids from this area, and they've been successful.” But, in real life, the presence of four players from a state does not establish any sort of pipeline. At least not in the major football factory states. Four kids from Ohio on Michigan or Florida does not mean that either of those schools will be able to recruit Ohio like Ohio State.

The “State” of Miami
In real life, a pipeline is not to a state (at least not usually). It's usually to an individual school (like Ohio State and Cleveland-Glenville) or area. There have been suggestions that one way to improve this would be to break the states down into recruiting regions, such as Miami did with the “State of Miami” concept in the 80s.

(On a side note, if EA decided to break the states down into regions, I would love to see them use the media markets. It would be overly complicated and border on ridiculous, but it does make sense to me that the way to break down states is by what TV stations they would see coverage from.)

While I believe that could help the situation, I also think that may be taking a hammer to a problem that requires a chisel. Breaking the states into regions (without any other changes) would mean that, for example, Ohio State would need X number of players from Cleveland to get a pipeline, X number of players from Cincinnati, etc. And without the X number of players, they'd have no pipeline at all. Say they have only 3 players from the Cincinnati area … are you telling me that Ohio State has no “pipeline” type advantage to the Cincinnati area? Unlikely.

The concept of breaking down the states into regions would also put a premium focus on where recruits hometown's are. As far as I can tell, right now that is largely random. If the difference between Cleveland and Columbus is suddenly important, the placement of recruits would be something that would need focused on. I believe that time and effort could be better spent elsewhere.

One Size Fits All Pipelines
The final basic problem I see with pipelines, as they are, is that they are a constant, equal bonus applied to every team and every school. Even if we accept that pipelines are state-wide, and we accept that it only takes X players to establish a pipeline, I still fail to see how we can accept that a pipeline from Ohio to California (for USC) has the same level of influence as one from Ohio to Michigan (for Michigan), or even in-state Ohio (for Ohio State). In the game, every pipeline is a solid 25% bonus. But in the real-world, not every pipeline has the same level of pull.

The Alternative -- Name Recognition
In short, my suggestion is that pipelines, as they are today, are totally thrown out. No more dependencies on how many players from a state are on your roster. No more universal bonus regardless of the distance or state. No need to increase the complexity of pipelines or recruiting by breaking the states into regions or areas.

Instead, I would like to propose a system that could replicate what the real-life recruiting pipelines really are, in my opinion: name recognition of the school and name recognition of the coach. Though throughout the rest of this post I will continue to use "pipeline", just for ease of nomenclature.

I should, naturally, mention a disclaimer that I have never been recruited by a college, nor has anyone I know. So this is all just guessing based on what I've read and seen.

Using Results to Establish a Pipeline
The first, and primary, piece of this is establishing a system that bases pipelines on the results that a coach, and school, has with players from a state. If you recall, earlier I mentioned that a coach, in so far as my understanding, will use success with players from the area as leverage to recruit someone. This includes pipelines from specific high schools, where one successful player can lead to others from the same area. But the key is success. Under my design, it's not enough to recruit players from a certain state. You have to succeed with those players to earn a pipeline. Both on a team level (wins and losses, TV coverage) and an individual level (awards for players).

I'm just going to throw out some numbers here, so you get the idea of what I'm talking about. Following the 80/20 rule of trying to get 80% of the design on paper while not getting myself lost in the details.

For both coach and school recognition, every school has a scale of 0% to 100% for every state. I imagine it would look something like this, and replace the existing Pipeline screen in-game:

State	# of players	Coach Rec.	School Rec.
Alabama	7	35%	60%
Alaska	0	0%	0%
Arizona	3	10%	5%
...	...	...	...
Wisconsin	15	50%	83%
Wyoming	1	2%	6%

Break It Down
So how do you get name recognition for your coach and school? I believe the easiest thing to do is make the criteria the same, but the value of the result different. I imagine school recognition is about half as volatile as coach recognition (simply because coaches will go dramatically up and down over time, while a school's reputation will be more steady). In the items below I'm going to suggest some numbers -- take those as the coach's recognition, not the school's.

So here are some examples of events that would make name recognition increase:

• Heisman trophy winner
• Award winner
• All-American
• All-Conference
• Bowl or CCG Victory (or, similarly, a conference championship)
• Rivalry Game Victory
• Top 25 Victory
• Any victory
• National TV Victory
• Signing a 5* recruit
• Get hired at a new (better?) school

And, of course, there need to be some negatives, otherwise everyone eventually gets to 100% everywhere.

• Upset loss
• National TV loss
• Conference loss
• Cutting a player (now people can't sign 25 every year without repercussions)
• Losing a Bowl or CCG
• Any loss
• If discipline was in, then having a player significantly suspended or kicked out of school
• Get fired (or, for the school, fire a coach or have a coach leave for a “better job”)

(Some of these ideas can stack, so a National TV loss that was an upset, in a bowl, will cost significantly more than any one of those three individually. The stacks would work both for positive events and negative events.)

So, for example, let's say I'm Auburn and it's 2010. Let's break down some of the events that went their way, and some of the (possible) point values those events could have associated with them:

• Defeated an unranked Miss St. team on the road. That gets a 1% bump in Alabama (team victory), and a 2% bump in Mississippi (for the location of the road game). Plus maybe additional bumps for a conference game?
• Defeat a ranked #12 South Carolina team at home. 2% bump for the team victory, and 1-2% extra for it being Top 25. As with above, possibly an additional bump for the conference game? That's in Alabama. Then a 1% bump in South Carolina (basically, the away team's state gets a 1% bump, the home team's state gets a 2% bump)
• Defeat a ranked #6 LSU team at home, on CBS at 3:30. 2% bump in Alabama, 1% bump in Louisiana. 1-2% extra in each because of the Top 25. 1-2% extra in each because of it being national coverage.
• You get the idea. The victory over Alabama would get an extra bump for being a rivalry game, and the victory over the Cocks in the CCG would be extra for that reason too.
• The National Championship would be a … let's say 10% bump in every state across the nation (again, we're throwing out numbers here). Plus a 25-30% bump in Alabama itself. And some extra bump in Oregon (opponent) and Arizona (site of the game).

And now we get to the awards:

• Winning the Heisman is a big deal. In terms of bringing in a recruit, maybe it's half as important as winning a national championship (which is still pretty important). So, 5% national boost. But to Georgia (Cam Newton's home state), that's huge. Lots of press, to be sure. Maybe equal to a national title? 30%? More? 50%? I could even be influenced enough to think that it's an instant boost to 100%.
• Newton won several other awards, of course, but let's be honest … only the hardest of the hardcore football fans pay attention to the Home Depot Awards Show. So while there's certainly bumps for those awards, they are nowhere near the Heisman. And, like the Heisman, they go to the player's state, not the school's. That's where the whole idea of using results to establish a pipeline comes in.

The list of negatives follows the same general principle, except that each negative is magnified versus the positive. Much like human nature is to remember bad events rather than good ones. Or, at least a fan base's nature. So for every 1% you get in credit for a victory, you lose 3% for a loss. An upset victory gets 2%? Upset loss loses 6%. A win on the road gains 3%? Losing at home loses 9% (and that doesn't seem like enough). Etc, etc. So, on pure wins and losses, you have to go 9-3 (Earle Bruce!) just to keep everything even in a state. Of course, with some victories being on the road and losses being at home, y'know, things will never just “stay even”. Which is the idea here.

Now, one thing before I forget … this system would have some way of balancing out for lesser teams, though I'm not quite sure how. But I know Kent State doesn't deserve to lose as much influence because of a home loss as Ohio State does. So there has to be some weight to the system by prestige or ranking, I'm just not immediately sure how to do it.

Regions of Influence
One of my other big gripes about the way pipelines are done currently is that there's no influence over the surrounding states. The system implies, if we assume no schools have a pipeline, that Ohio State, Virginia, and USC have an equal “pipeline” (meaning: none) to the state of Indiana. From proximity alone, we know this isn't true. Because of proximity to the state, and TV coverage, Ohio State is going to have a sphere of influence over Indiana recruits that the other two don't. Remember, this isn't about a “pipeline” per se, but rather a reflection of the fact that an Indiana kid is being recruited by Ohio State. Which, because of the proximity, is going to mean a little bit more than it would if Ohio State was halfway across the country.

Now, the game tries to replicate this by giving closer schools a Proximity at Home advantage, which only helps for those players that care about that pitch. For everyone else, it's basically a toss-up between close schools and far-away ones. Which, while it may be true for some, it's unlikely that a closer school won't have that little bit of tug for just about everyone. Maybe it's an aunt, cousin, or friends at school that have gear from State U, but that kid will probably know someone that will push him toward that school -- not because he'll stay at home, but because it's the big school that's close by.

To that end, I propose that we split the country into regions. Immediately, the conference footprints would be the first level of regions. But not every association between two states is because of a conference. There's also geography and TV markets to consider. So, in addition to conference footprints, you could also have geographic regions (e.g. the New England states grouped together, or the Deep South) or other obvious connections. In particular, I think it would be beneficial if the “major” football states (e.g. Texas, California, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Georgia, etc) were all in more than one region, so there was some overlap.

Why? Because part of your successes (and failures) in a state also influences the region. We don't operate in a vacuum, after all. If Penn State signs a 5* recruit out of New Jersey, it's not just New Jersey that will be influenced by that -- it's the entire Northeast (hey, Penn State might be a good school for Johnny in New York!) AND the entire Big Ten (Penn State's making some big waves in recruiting!).

I should emphasize, I'm not proposing getting rid of pipelines (or “recognition”, in my nomenclature) at the state level. I just think success should also be a regional concept, in addition to a state concept.

Different Sizes of Pipes
So the final piece of the puzzle: how does this all work? The current system says that a school either has a pipeline or it doesn't. If it does, the pipeline is worth a 25% bonus for every piece of every call. I said above that each school has a 0-100% rating for every state, for both the school and the coach. I would propose upping the total bonus to 30%, but split it evenly between the school and the coach. 15% bonus from the coach, 15% bonus from the school. So if you have 60% name recognition from the coach, but only 10% for the school, you get a (.6*.15)+(.1*.15)=10.5% bonus. If you have 50% name recognition for the school, but 100% for the school, the bonus would be 22.5%.

Isn't this a little complicated?
While, at first, this system may seem overly complicated, I think in practice it won't be. With the new dynamic recruiting ratings, we have systems like Championship Contender, where your school can move up and down throughout the season, and you don't know quite what influences it. You know, vaguely, that having better players will get you a better ranking, but that's it. I think the same could be said for this proposal. Anyone who wants to take the time could figure out what the best ways are to improve your pipeline (and, of course, I would assume those positives and negatives would be documented somewhere), but, overall, the idea is pretty simple. Want to improve your pipeline to certain state? Recruit those players. And win. Most of the complexity, in my mind, is in the back-end programming, not what the users have to worry about.

Anything else?
First, you may wonder why I decided to split the name recognition into both the school and the coach. Well, for one, a school's name is established over time, and is less susceptible to drastic changes, so it will increase and decrease less dramatically. For two, coaches move on. Coaches are fired, and new coaches are hired. A new coach will bring his own name recognition to the new program, and the school's name recognition isn't going anywhere. There may be some changes due to how the previous coach left, where the new coach came from, etc. But, to put it simply, Ohio State is still Ohio State and Urban Meyer is still Urban Meyer.

Second, I should discuss atrophy. I should first say that I have absolutely no idea how this could possibly work. Is it per week, per year, or what? Not sure. Maybe it's just a reset at the beginning of a pre-season. But, obviously, name recognition decreases over time, and not just because of bad results. It also decreases because of a lack of results. Notre Dame is still a top-tier program, but the Golden Dome is not quite what it was in Lou Holtz's heyday (or earlier), and it's not just because Notre Dame has had losses, it's also because they haven't been competing for national championships (until this year) and that's partly why the Notre Dame, as a brand, does not ring quite as true for today's recruits as it did in the past. So, every year, some of the name recognition is going to decrease. I'm thinking, off the top of my head, around 20% a year. Now, unlike the “bumps” and “losses” I discussed earlier, this isn't a straight subtraction from your total. Instead, it's 20% of your total. So a name recognition of 10% loses 2%, while 100% loses 20%. The weighted loss is an attempt to acknowledge that some programs have more to lose than others, while still having coaches and schools lose their influence over time.

Finally, one concern I do have is that the system of giving bonuses for wins and losses might be magnifying advantages that schools already have. A team like Alabama, with three national championships in four years, is already going to be loaded with tremendous recruiting pitches, and probably have every advantage under the sun. And this system would probably give them some additional advantages. However, I think this system also evens the playing field. Alabama will get some national bonuses (which, I think is fair, because almost any kid who gets called up by an Alabama coach is going to feel pulled to go there, at least some, right?), but the local school is still going to have an advantage, over time.

Look at it this way … if you have two Powerhouse-level schools, say Florida and Ohio State, going after the same kid, and the kid is from Florida. Both schools have “pipelines” to Florida, according to the game. Florida and Ohio State are going to have very, very similar recruiting pitches, in the game. Florida's only real advantage is Proximity to Home. But if the recruit has a Low in Proximity to Home, Florida now has, effectively, no advantage over Ohio State, even though the recruit is from Florida! I think my idea overcomes that, because Florida is much, much more likely to have a “full” pipeline to Florida, while Ohio State is not.

I also think re-doing pipelines (whether my idea or someone else's) is the only way that DGB ever goes to Missouri.

Well, I think that's it. Thank you for taking the time to read it. I appreciate any questions, comments, or criticisms you have.

[JeffHCross]

TL;DR version:

• As they are now, pipelines are too easy to generate (only need four players)
• As they are now, pipelines are the same for everyone (25% bonus), regardless of distance, how many players from a given state, or success with those players
• My idea is for a school to gain a pipeline to a state by recruiting players from that state and having success with those players. Victories, awards, and championships would create pipelines (over time), while cutting players, losing games, and getting fired would cause a coach to lose them (over time).
• My idea would stop people from recruiting four 1-star players to get a pipeline to Florida or California
• My idea includes pipelines for both a coach and a school, meaning that a coach can change schools and still have the pipelines he used to, while a new coach will benefit from the long-term connections of the school.

[acropora52]

Jeff, really interesting thoughts. Definitely would go above and beyond what's been implemented in the past.

A possible simpler implementation would be the following:

keep pipelines at 4 players. However, if you have 10 or more players, the boost goes up to 40%. If you have 15, up to 60%. If you have 20, up to 80%.
This would give a significant boost to teams that recruit and focus on certain areas. For example, in real life, it's rare to get a Louisiana kid away from LSU if they want the kid. Same with Texas (prior to this last year) and with the Florida schools. I do think that if you cut a player from a state, it should directly and negatively impact your pipeline to that state.

I think that coach prestige and national championships are factored into the other aspects of recruiting, though it would be nice if they fixed coach prestige and also tradition. In my online dynasty, 4 straight top 5 finishes and two MNCs = c+ tradition and d coaching prestige.

[JeffHCross]

Simpler, yes, but still easy to manipulate IMO. Plus, it still doesn't match what a real life coach must do to establish a pipeline. BUT, I agree that would be an improvement over the current single-level system.

Also, I think your problem with Program Tradition is that you're using Teambuilder teams, right? It probably doesn't properly comprehend that your school on has four years of tradition.

Coach Prestige is another matter. My defending champion coach is A+, so it does work, but it also has some confusing results.

Thanks for reading.

[morsdraconis]

Haven't had a chance to read it all (actually busy at work for once) but REALLY interesting stuff from what I've read so far.

From this section:

Now, one thing before I forget … this system would have some way of balancing out for lesser teams, though I'm not quite sure how. But I know Kent State doesn't deserve to lose as much influence because of a home loss as Ohio State does. So there has to be some weight to the system by prestige or ranking, I'm just not immediately sure how to do it.

Personally, I would think the boost numbers would be able to take into account the prestige level of the two conferences, the teams themselves, and even the rankings of the two teams and apply bonuses/penalties accordingly. Considering current prestige levels and rankings, Ohio State losing to Kent State would be HUGE recognition for both Kent State and the coach whereas it would be pretty detrimental to Ohio State's recognition.

At the same time though, one has to considering things like Michigan losing to Appalachian State a few years back. How much did losing that one game actually hurt that program, in the long run of things? Not as much as you would probably think. In the end, it would need to be something fairly small (1-5% I would think) penalty wise, but pretty big for the bonuses for the small teams beating big teams (maybe even has high as 8-10%), but, if that small team continued to have success like that one time, the percentage would slowly creep back to normal ranges (1-5%) as it would become common place for that team to pull off an "upset" win (think like Boise State where it went from being upset wins to expecting them to play well against quality opponents).

[morsdraconis]

Having read it all, I think this is a fantastic idea. If I have time later (or you want to), I'd like to see this idea projected out for a low conference like the Sun Belt to see what type of changes you'd see over the year.

[Schauwn]

Could this also take into account where the coach is from or (Alma Mater for created coaches) to assist in recruiting. If a coach graduated from the school he's coaching at, then that should/might mean something to the recruit....

[JeffHCross]

Personally, I would think the boost numbers would be able to take into account the prestige level of the two conferences, the teams themselves, and even the rankings of the two teams and apply bonuses/penalties accordingly. Considering current prestige levels and rankings, Ohio State losing to Kent State would be HUGE recognition for both Kent State and the coach whereas it would be pretty detrimental to Ohio State's recognition.

Pretty much what I was thinking, but I wasn't sure of an easy/simple way to implement it (or explain it). So I thought mentioning it would be enough, for now at least

At the same time though, one has to considering things like Michigan losing to Appalachian State a few years back. How much did losing that one game actually hurt that program, in the long run of things? Not as much as you would probably think.

That individual loss? Not much, in part because they bounced back and ended up having a decent season that included a bowl win over Florida. But I do think it was a significant black mark on Lloyd Carr. In my personal opinion, at least.

In the end, it would need to be something fairly small (1-5% I would think) penalty wise, but pretty big for the bonuses for the small teams beating big teams (maybe even has high as 8-10%), but, if that small team continued to have success like that one time, the percentage would slowly creep back to normal ranges (1-5%) as it would become common place for that team to pull off an "upset" win (think like Boise State where it went from being upset wins to expecting them to play well against quality opponents).

Yeah, I think you've got the general idea for what I was thinking. I was kind of thinking (broadly) that it would X% multiplied by the inverse of your prestige rating. So, something that's 1% for a 6-star school would be 6% for a 1-star school. But that might be overboard, especially if that 1-star school pulls off a Butler or George Mason style season for the ages. They'd be getting 200% for stuff, lol.

Having read it all, I think this is a fantastic idea. If I have time later (or you want to), I'd like to see this idea projected out for a low conference like the Sun Belt to see what type of changes you'd see over the year.

I thought about projecting it with a middle-of-the-road conference (e.g. Mountain West) that has a mix of strong teams (e.g. Boise) and lesser teams (e.g. New Mexico). Unfortunately, my perfectionist-ism may get the better of me, as I'd probably get stuck in the details and the numbers, rather than the broad overview. If I have the chance (and feel so inclined), I'll take a look. But if you want to give it a try, feel free. I'd be happy to see people run with my ideas!

Could this also take into account where the coach is from or (Alma Mater for created coaches) to assist in recruiting. If a coach graduated from the school he's coaching at, then that should/might mean something to the recruit....

Absolutely. I realized that after positing, with the well-known example being Bo Pelini using his Ohio ties to recruit for Nebraska, even before Nebraska joined the Big Ten. I guess the question is, then, whether or not we believe the Nebraska's successes are going to be well known in Ohio, because Pelini is an Ohio coach. I would tend to think not. Maybe around the Youngstown area (his hometown), but not in the major cities like Cincinnati or Columbus.

But we also know that Pelini's Ohio ties are of serious benefit when he comes to Ohio. So there has to be some middle ground there, right?

Hmmm ... could we just have an "automatic" name recognition bonus for a coach's home-state? With the amount of bonus determined by his prestige?

Something like ... assuming a coach with no recognition in a state is 0%, a coach who is from that state gets ... 5%? ... per level of prestige? So a coach gets a 5% bonus, and a coach gets a 25% bonus to his recognition for that state? But, unlike other facets of name recognition, that number doesn't get influenced by individual success or atrophy every year ... it's just steady with a given prestige level?

Something like that could work.

[plotty]

Really like the breakdown of the pipeline theory. I agree that things need to be changed and should incorporate week-to-week activities. If you sing a five-star from a certain location then you should see an increase in interest not just the state but the entire region. Likewise if you lose out on a recruit there should be a consequence, especially if that player fills a must need. Now FYI I am playing NCAA 12 and see effects based more on play-calling. If I pass more as the season progresses, I tend to get more and more interest from wide receivers. Conversely if I run the ball my running back interest increases. Right now I am seven seasons into a Maryland dynasty, and have won 3 national titles. I have built pipelines locally (Ohio, Maryland) and on a national scale (Texas, California)...but do not cheese them and recruit 1-star players...and the position effect is there, regardless.

The drawback? Since I score so many points (Coach Moder BTW) my kicker gets some serious action. The damn computer (even after I have recruiting assistance OFF) keeps recruiting kickers and punters. The latest class I had...I ended up with 7 kickers and 3 punters. Needless to say, they found their way on the cut block in the preseason.

[JeffHCross]

plotty, if you're still on NCAA 12, that's probably from the setting that allows the CPU to make scholarship offers. Even if the CPU can't modify your board, if they have the ability to make offers, you'll end up with extra guys at the end of recruiting.

Also, FYI, the effect of playing style is even stronger in 13. There's a new recruiting pitch for it.

[SmoothPancakes]

As I told Jeff when I was informed about this redesign idea that he had, I love the idea. It would definitely change up things when it comes to choosing where to recruit. I've always felt it was sort of cheap in my dynasty, at FIU and now at Tulsa, having the entire state of Florida, the entire states of Oklahoma and Texas, getting 25% bonus on all of my recruits (it seems like 98% of my team at Tulsa is from only Oklahoma and Texas) because of pipeline bonuses. So stuff like breaking the states down into regions would definitely change things up.

It would definitely make it harder to game the game. Like for me at Tulsa, I now have Florida as a pipeline, to go along with Oklahoma and Texas. I have 7 guys on my roster from Florida (5 of them are seniors, but I'm targeting four new players in recruiting) so I am basically able to haul in 3 or 4 star recruits thanks to the advantage I get from pipeline bonuses. Louisiana may be a pipeline next season. I have two on my roster now, and I'm targeting three from Louisiana this year. Colorado, I have no players on my roster, but I am targeting three recruits this year, so get one more next season and boom, Colorado is now a pipeline. I don't have anyone from California, but I'm targeting two players this season. Sign those two and sign two more next year, and I'd have California, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas all locked up as pipeline states and be able to reel in talent from coast to coast with help of the pipeline bonuses.

And this is all with random targeting. I target by position needs and by what prospects are already interested in me, usually immediately adding those with me in their top 5 or 8 to my board in the preseason. So not even targeting specific states, I could have most of the major recruiting hotbeds locked up as pipelines by the 2018 season. Just imagine what I could do and what kind of pipelines I could have if I intentionally recruited and targeted specific states. And I could do that regardless of if I went 12-0 or 0-12. So yeah, this system would definitely make recruiting more realistic and make you have to put up actual results in the season to get those bonuses, as opposed to just targeting the right areas and locking up the talent hotbeds and make yourself into the next Alabama.

There is the issue of keeping it simple enough for Joe Schmoe to pick the game up and play it and not feel overwhelmed by the recruiting, but also keep it complex enough as described to make recruiting tougher and more realistic. We'd have to have some way of making sure it would actually get implemented correctly and not half-assed (or with EA's own interpretation of this idea), but if done correctly, it would without a doubt improve the recruiting in this game ten-fold.

So it has my vote of full support and I hope we can somehow get EA to look at this, talk with Jeff about it and see it implemented sometime down the road.

[JeffHCross]

There is the issue of keeping it simple enough for Joe Schmoe to pick the game up and play it and not feel overwhelmed by the recruiting, but also keep it complex enough as described to make recruiting tougher and more realistic.

I think the simplest thing about this is that the underlying principle is easy: recruit guys and win. The casual observer could not even bother looking at, or to understand, the pipelines and his recruiting would probably not suffer for it. Whereas the current system has to be monitored or you lose all bonus (and, most likely, lose a lot of recruits).

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Smooth.

[TIMB0B]

Haven't had a chance to read it all (actually busy at work for once) but REALLY interesting stuff from what I've read so far.

From this section:



Personally, I would think the boost numbers would be able to take into account the prestige level of the two conferences, the teams themselves, and even the rankings of the two teams and apply bonuses/penalties accordingly. Considering current prestige levels and rankings, Ohio State losing to Kent State would be HUGE recognition for both Kent State and the coach whereas it would be pretty detrimental to Ohio State's recognition.

At the same time though, one has to considering things like Michigan losing to Appalachian State a few years back. How much did losing that one game actually hurt that program, in the long run of things? Not as much as you would probably think. In the end, it would need to be something fairly small (1-5% I would think) penalty wise, but pretty big for the bonuses for the small teams beating big teams (maybe even has high as 8-10%), but, if that small team continued to have success like that one time, the percentage would slowly creep back to normal ranges (1-5%) as it would become common place for that team to pull off an "upset" win (think like Boise State where it went from being upset wins to expecting them to play well against quality opponents).

I'm not sure if you were alluding to this, but the bonus could be like the "adviser bonus" that randomly appears for recruits and awards double points. Perhaps a big upset win could be the adviser bonus for that week following the win?

NOTE: 4-star program prestige needs to be the ceiling for nonBCS schools (and it needs to affect the polls as well). Even while Boise was at their pinnacle of success, they still couldn't pull in any 4-star recruits (or crack the top 5 in the rankings). That's not to say it can't happen, but this is where proximity to home comes into play. Southern Miss nabbed 5-star WR Deandre(?) Brown from their own backyard five years ago or so. There were other factors such as a new coach coming in who was bringing a spread passing offense that affected his decision, but I doubt very much Brown would have left his home state for another nonBCS school out of state. A BCS school? Sure.

[JeffHCross]

Tim, thanks for your thoughts. I agree that something like that bonus would make sense, though Appalachian's victory is still a positive for them today. Other upsets haven't resonated as much so maybe there's something more there.

Good point about non-BCS and out of state recruits.

[TIMB0B]

Tim, thanks for your thoughts. I agree that something like that bonus would make sense, though Appalachian's victory is still a positive for them today. Other upsets haven't resonated as much so maybe there's something more there.

Good point about non-BCS and out of state recruits.

I'm sure it would frustrate those that want to build a Sun Belt team into a 6-star powerhouse, but they still can if they take a realistic approach and eventually move their school to a BCS conference.

Regarding App-State, that victory is good for them as an FCS school. They continue to be a powerhouse at that level. We don't know the affect it would have had on them if they were FBS. Troy has been somewhat of a giant killer since they first joined the FBS, but they haven't really been able to capitalize in recruiting on those upsets. Much like Boise (and them beating OU), they have a ceiling because they're nonBCS schools.

[WolverineJay]

Some very good ideas in this thread.

I think Next Gen games make the kind of depth you are describing Jeff a real possibility. I would welcome this type of depth in all areas of the game, but on/off options and difficulty levels would need to be implemented for the casuals or anybody who just wants a simpler experience.

[Jayrah]

Jeff those are some awesome ideas. After reading that they are changing up recruiting this year, I'm interested to see if they've done something with pipelines. I'm betting that was one of the things that was addressed, at least orally

[JeffHCross]

Thanks for the replies, guys.

I would welcome this type of depth in all areas of the game, but on/off options and difficulty levels would need to be implemented for the casuals or anybody who just wants a simpler experience.

If it's well designed, and I selfishly think that what I proposed here at least has a chance of being well designed, then you wouldn't need an ON/OFF switch for the depth. Pipelines, as they are now, are something the average player has to at least think about occasionally. It's a 25% difference in recruiting a player. You either have it, or you don't.

With this system, you get a bonus for practically everything you do. Win and you'll have bonuses. Lose and you won't. Most players would be able to handle that enough, on the macro level, that they wouldn't need to understand the details.

It certainly wouldn't be any less confusing than the x2, Pitch Unlock, whatever bonus system we've got now, and that one has practically zero documentation or explanation.

There are ways to change the system I proposed here to make it simpler while still having depth. The easiest would be to link the coach's and school's prestige together ... as one goes up, the other does. But the school's move at a slower (much slower) rate so that you can have a single bad coach (thinking Carl Torbush and Rich Rodriguez following Mack Brown at UNC and Lloyd Carr at Michigan) without significantly undermining the prestige of the school.

I agree that the Next Gen games make this system more likely. Firstly because it will allow for the possibility of re-designing recruiting. Secondly because of the additional processing power that this system would take.

Jeff those are some awesome ideas. After reading that they are changing up recruiting this year, I'm interested to see if they've done something with pipelines. I'm betting that was one of the things that was addressed, at least orally

Yeah, I'm very interested in seeing what they changed. Even if they didn't implement something like this (let's be honest, the chances that they had the same idea I did, at least to a large extent, is pretty slim), I'll be happy with any change to pipelines. It shouldn't be a 25% bonus, You Have It/You Don't system. That just isn't realistic.

[TIMB0B]

The easiest would be to link the coach's and school's prestige together ... as one goes up, the other does. But the school's move at a slower (much slower) rate so that you can have a single bad coach (thinking Carl Torbush and Rich Rodriguez following Mack Brown at UNC and Lloyd Carr at Michigan) without significantly undermining the prestige of the school.