Season 1 - Week 3

[Coach Kernzy]

I'll be advancing around 6 PM Central this evening.

Going to default Heisman so our week 3 games should be much tougher but as I've said before they just seem to be more realistic and I've had some of the best games I've played on default Heisman so please post here about your games and let me know what you liked and disliked and we can start really start honing in some sliders for us.

Schedule this week looks like this...
Memphis hosts FCS SE
Tulane travels to UAB
E Mich travels to Michigan
Kent St travels to Kansas St
W Mich hosts C Mich
New Mexico hosts Texas Tech
North Texas travels to Alabama
FIU hosts UCF

[SmoothPancakes]

That's going to be a loss for me. :( In my offline FIU dynasty, UCF bent me over like Tiger Woods bending over a waitress 58-9. That was on AA difficulty, with steelerfan's sliders. On Heisman difficulty, this is going to bad. I could possibly end up just supersimming the entire 2nd half, it could end up getting so ugly through just the 1st half.

[Archedemius]

Mine should be a loss also. But, I will probably play through and try to pad my HB's stats if I can. I don't care if I get 100 yards on 50 carries. I want the yards.

[Coach Kernzy]

I just want realistic games and outcomes and if that means getting my ass kicked every week then so be it. :)

[AustinWolv]

UCF? Heh man, I gots to play Alabama. Soooooo, yeah. Should be ugly and I'll report back on how it goes and feels game-wise.

[SmoothPancakes]

UCF? Heh man, I gots to play Alabama. Soooooo, yeah. Should be ugly and I'll report back on how it goes and feels game-wise.

:D Alright, in terms of teams we're playing, you do have me beat there. I was just mentioning that because of the unmentionable things that UCF did to me in my offline dynasty, where I'm only playing on AA, and have full control of my players on offense. I'm absolutely scared of what they'll do to me on Heisman in Coach Mode.

[Coach Kernzy]

We have advanced to week 3

[Coach Kernzy]

Well I thought we had.
I started the advance and then went upstairs...when I went back downstairs...

Bad news

I've locked up 3 straight times now trying to advance on stage 1 of 5 and it says Downloading Quarter Scores Game Data

I did get transfer failed once so hopefully it's just a temporary EA server issue but OMG if this screws things up...

I can still get in to week 2 just fine though, I wonder if we try transferring the commish to someone and let them try and then transfer it back to me. Grasping at straws here.

I sure hope its just an EA server thing.

[SmoothPancakes]

:fp: The TGT 360 OD is having the same problem. I thought we were going to be in good shape, since they were having the problem before we even advanced out of week 1, and since we were able to advance to week 2 with no problems.

[Coach Kernzy]

so its gotta be an EA server issue hopefully that will be corrected shortly

[SmoothPancakes]

so its gotta be an EA server issue hopefully that will be corrected shortly

Yeah, I think that was the conclusion they came to. Last I heard, JB had sent an email to one of the guys at EA to get it looked in to.

[Coach Kernzy]

Unreal, I've always give EA the benefit of the doubt I guess because their BS never affected me directly but now I'm pretty upset over this whole deal.

So I guess all we can do is wait?

[natcret]

If not up by the time I crash tonight, I will check tomorrow before lunch before I get on the road.

[Archedemius]

EA is saying the reason why things are locking up and crashing is because of our edited rosters. That's what I always heard.

[Archedemius]

Well... alot of the game freezes and OD freezes had to do with roster issues, and that the only fix until there is a patch is to whipe the rosters off.

[Archedemius]

One guy said he was a commish and had everyone leave OD, advance, and then reinvite. He said that worked.

[Archedemius]

Also, I sent jmiles a message on the xbox saying his recruiting probably isnt complete. he may have 10 mins or something that he didnt realize he had.

[Archedemius]

Nevermind, found a guy that says the roster bug isn't the culprit. UGH! Wait a few days after launch to get the rosters, a week or so before we get this going, and I've sat here for the last 5 days or so begging that this wouldn't happen to us.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well it is what it is and all we can do is wait I guess or of course I'm open to other suggestions but for now I'm going to bed and put this behind me for now.

[SmoothPancakes]

Well... alot of the game freezes and OD freezes had to do with roster issues, and that the only fix until there is a patch is to whipe the rosters off.

A lot of freezes that people are seeing, especially at the Press Start screen and whatnot, has to do with an issue with the default rosters, not custom, named rosters.


One guy said he was a commish and had everyone leave OD, advance, and then reinvite. He said that worked.

Sorry, but I vote no! on this idea. Last time I did that due to whatever the issue was that caused me to end up as the FIU OC rather than FIU head coach, I couldn't get back into the OD! The game refused to let me rejoin. I think I prefer passing on that idea unless we're all willing to risk losing a third person from the OD because the game again refuses to let me rejoin this time around.

[Coach Kernzy]

I tried again this morning and it locked up in the same place, I've tried at least 5 different times now so hopefully JB or someone here at TGT will hear from EA on what the deal is and can it and will it be resolved.

Until then, I guess we wait and hope it's resolved soon.

[natcret]

Thanks Coach for all the hard work. Since I have a bye, I will check the Dynasty site to see if things have advanced and do my recruiting updates.

One thing tho. I will be back Sunday late afternoon so if we advance to week 3 Saturday, I will take care of my recruiting on Sunday when I get back.

[Archedemius]

Thanks to the awesome bugs in the game, you might not have to worry about that for a long time heheh. :fp:

[JBHuskers]

Seems like it's a widespread issue on the 360 side. Still waiting for details. Sent Ben a video recording of me trying to advance last night.

[Archedemius]

Has anyone tried to do an online dynasty with no names, just numbers?

[Archedemius]

This stuff has been happening for a few weeks, and they are still posting at EA that they are still trying to figure it out. Jaga posted today saying they still don't have it figured out.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well that's horrible news.

Nothing we can do but wait though.

[Archedemius]

I'm running my own OD with no roster changes and no names. I'm recruiting and simming my games. I will post if it gets glitched or not. Going to run a few seasons. Just as an experiment, but what if I don't get the bug through 4+ seasons. Then theoretically we could have a dynasty simmed through until it's full of names and then start?

[Archedemius]

Already a few weeks past our freeze.

[Coach Kernzy]

We could in theory yes....

[Coach Kernzy]

I'm starting to think the problem is created when owners come and go.
That's what happened and first and now two guys leave and we have the problem again.
Who knows.

[Archedemius]

I don't think so. I read through a lot. And a lot of people who had 2 player dynasties, or 3 or whatever without losing anyone still had the problem. Named or randomly named. People haven't been having the problems with unnamed though. As far as I can tell.

[Archedemius]

People with randomly named players have been reporting that the tendencies didn't change either. But they didn't state if they were online or offline.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well keep doing your testing and then if you get through 3-4 season with no issues then we'll all discuss our options.

[Archedemius]

Doing it as we speak! Boy, moving to the next week as a commissioner is slow as hell.

[SmoothPancakes]

I really hope we don't end up having to start over. I'm now starting to get tired starting over and over. It's starting to kill the fun for me regarding doing an OD. :(

Also, while I know some want to just play, names or no names, for me personally, I need names, and real names at that. If I'm going to play even just a single season as FIU and try to care about their program, I need the real player names so I can feel like it's the real FIU team. That's why I'm loving my offline FIU dynasty right now, even at 3-5 on the season through week 10, because I'm playing as the real players and am becoming attached to the players on the team. That's also why I'm going to have no problem going a full three year contract with FIU in my offline dynasty.

[Archedemius]

That's why I threw out the option of simming to where everyone has names or using randomly generated. I too love that! That's why I'm trying to find a way to still kind of have that. I bought this game solely for online coaching this year. After playing offline dynasties for 7 years, I've really gotten bored of that. I guess I want the social aspect more than anything. The last time I truly had fun was with 2004 out in Iraq. When we all played an offline dynasty.

[Archedemius]

They just posted up an FAQ that has something to do with freezing. The usual router fix stuff. Routers have been known to cause problems in the past. http://support.ea.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/46/showhome/true

[SmoothPancakes]

That doesn't have anything to do with advancing an OD or not. That's just getting your router enabled to be able to play the game online, like actually play U v U in OD or play a normal Online game vs. a random or friendly user. We already know our routers work just fine because we were able to all join the dynasty, play our games, advance a couple weeks, etc.

[Archedemius]

Was just throwing it out there. Are we sure everyone has all those ports open? I also changed out my router today to one that is suppose to be slower than the old one, but low and behold, the newer faster one, was a piece of s. And everything is running a lot smoother over here with my old router. Not saying it has an effect, but there have been many times where a weird issue was solved by everyone actually forwarding ports or having their connections exactly the way it needs to be.

I made it all the way through a year + in the dynasty I just did with no names. May try random names later. It takes a long time to do this as a commish online.

[SmoothPancakes]

Was just throwing it out there. Are we sure everyone has all those ports open? I also changed out my router today to one that is suppose to be slower than the old one, but low and behold, the newer faster one, was a piece of s. And everything is running a lot smoother over here with my old router. Not saying it has an effect, but there have been many times where a weird issue was solved by everyone actually forwarding ports or having their connections exactly the way it needs to be.

I made it all the way through a year + in the dynasty I just did with no names. May try random names later. It takes a long time to do this as a commish online.

If it was an issue with ports, all of us either wouldn't have been able to get everyone to join the dynasty, or we would have never made it to week 3 before suddenly getting stopped. So it's not a router or port issue. It's either something corrupt with the dynasty or dynasty file, either on Coach Kernzy's system, or on the EA servers, or it's an issue on EA's side.

[Archedemius]

Hmmmm... When I think harder, you are right. Bouncing between routers and wireless/hardline connections, I'm pretty sure on that old(one of the two) routers, I didn't have half of the ports open for the game. Maybe I corrupted it haha. Been trying to un-f*ck my internet connection since I have moved in with the g/f.

[Archedemius]

I just keep putting 2 and 2 together and it keeps pointing to the downloadable rosters as the issue.

[Archedemius]

Bah, something is corrupted and you are right. Too many dynasties online that are multiple years in without glitching. At least a few of them had to be using named rosters, the odds and all.

[EatEmUp]

I'm gonna' blame my absence. I'm gone for a few days and all heck has broken loose. Oh. I'm back, by the way. :-)

But seriously, I didn't get a chance to recruit for week 2, but I set everything to autopilot before I went out of town. Uhhh... doubt you guys care, but I'm going to try to recruit and play my week 2 game? If it counts, great. If it doesn't, great. I've just missed video game football while on my FL vacation. Trying to catch up on my TGT reading. A lot going on, eh? Good to "see" everyone again.

[Archedemius]

Do that, and maybe Coach K can try to push ahead again. I doubt anything will work, but it is worth a try if you are changing the OD with what you are doing.

[EatEmUp]

For what it's worth, I've now turned my autopilot off, recruited for week 2, and played my week 2 game. I'll keep my fingers crossed. If for some reason that was the bug/variable unaccounted for, you guys have my gazillion apologies -- but I couldn't not make this trip.

[Coach Kernzy]

Tried advancing again, freezes in the same spot so until/if EA fixes the issue we're at a standstill.

[Coach Kernzy]

We have advanced to week 3...but...I had to remove everyone and advance so all your week 2 stuff was lost but at least we can continue now.
I've resent all of you an invite to the OD so get back in with your teams and let's get going again.

[Archedemius]

LOL! If I have a loss to an FCS team I'm gonna be pissed.

[Coach Kernzy]

Better one lost game than a lost OD...

[Archedemius]

LOL! I did! Wtf.... hahaha Well, technically I just got hired on so my record isn't tarnished by it. Of course I start off with two losses now. But that one lost to an fcs could screw me on my contract.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well like I said, either that or we would have waited who knows how long for the issue to be resolved.
So recruit, play and be happy :)

[Archedemius]

Ugh... letting the computer do my recruiting f'd things up. Gotta lot of work tomorrow!!

[SmoothPancakes]

I'm in, but it will be at least tomorrow before I get a chance to do anything.

As for the sim, I just got fucked out of my win against Louisville. :fp: After I get bitchslapped by UCF this week, hello 0-3 and goodbye season. Because of the shit contract that I got stuck with as HC of FIU, I'm probably getting fired after this first year.

As for recruiting, I lost every instant commit I had gained in week 2. My recruiting board for the most part is still intact, but I'm still tempted to just let the CPU do all my recruiting. It is just so drawn out, dull, boring, and takes forever. I didn't mind recruiting at all last year, but for some reason this year, I just hate it.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well now we got some more realistic outcomes and will from now on.
Again I'm playing an offline dynasty with default heisman and LOVING IT!!!!
I can't wait to get this baby going again.

I for one love recruiting, a lot of different options and so many different ways to do things and different strategies. It's a blast to pull off getting that possible player that can turn things around for you.

[SmoothPancakes]

Eh, early session recruiting just takes way too long and it too tedious. After about week 6 or 7, then it starts getting a little interesting as recruits start making decisions, races between teams get tighter, etc. But for the first half of the season, ugh. I don't even like recruiting in my own offline dynasty.

[morsdraconis]

Eh, early session recruiting just takes way too long and it too tedious. After about week 6 or 7, then it starts getting a little interesting as recruits start making decisions, races between teams get tighter, etc. But for the first half of the season, ugh. I don't even like recruiting in my own offline dynasty.

Dude, I wasn't even gonna waste my time with recruiting. What's the point when I was just gonna jump ship ASAP?

[SmoothPancakes]

Dude, I wasn't even gonna waste my time with recruiting. What's the point when I was just gonna jump ship ASAP?

True. If I don't get fired after this first season with a shitty as my contract is, I'm jumping ship for the first job offer that comes along.

[Coach Kernzy]

W Mich loses at home to C Mich because of some poor coaching and the loss of my starting HB early on.
It was tied 24-24 late in the game and driving and I had a play action pass called, I saw the blitz coming but decided to take my chances anyway, bad move, got sacked, fumbled and that was it, they drove down and scored, game over.

I love the default HEISMAN SO MUCH...plays great in my opinion. You have to set things up and earn your yards with good play calling. On d you can just blitz all the time or you'll get burned, you have to really mix it up and play smart.

Anyhow, this loss probably makes up for my Michigan win :)

[AustinWolv]

Awesome, the week2 advance fucked me out of the Houston win that I had. Now I got Alabama at their place and am down big late in the 3rd. The game is playing nice and realistic, so can't complain too much other than it sucks that the Houston win didn't count since it was such a good game and wasn't cheap.

[Coach Kernzy]

Yeah those of you that lost your wins in week 2 sucks for sure but like I said earlier, the way I see it better to lose one game than the entire OD.

[Archedemius]

Good to hear Coach K. Going to get slapped by U of M tomorrow. Hopefully I can recoup all the recruiting I lost from the glitch.

[Gnarlymutt]

Talk about a tale of two settings. Played the better part of a half against K state, but ultimately ended up simming the rest of the game. Perhaps it's the Heisman setting, or it could have been just one of those games... Not quite a whole half of football netted me zero (0, none, nada, zilch) yards of total offense, 0 points, 5 penalties on my OL, 2 ints, and at least 4 sacks. Literally nothing going, so I simmed it out. I'll be interested in seeing how this game goes for real this year. Not sure I'd count on K State rolling up 55 and 600+ yds of offense on Kent state. ;-)

[AustinWolv]

Lost 37-0 to Alabama and it wasn't unreasonable. Only part that kinda had me highly annoyed was: 1st play from scrimmage, my QB throws an INT and they get a FG. On the KO, my guy fumbles and they get another FG. Actually was holding their offense for a good part of the 1st quarter, then they got a TD late in the 1st and that was basically the end for my team.

Virtual Nick Saban is a dick. Went for and converted a fourth down fake punt pass when they were up 30-0.

[Coach Kernzy]

It'll take some time to get used to guys because it is much tougher and you have to play a little differently especially against great teams we won't have much of a chance. But the way I see it you really should play very tight games within about a letter grade or so of your team and have very little chance for upsets against anyone more than a letter grade higher or vice versa.
I'll say it again, I've been playing an offline OD with W Kentucky and I got smoked pretty good by Kentucky but pulled off a great close win over Temple I think it was and also lost a nailbiter to Ark St which ended up being my #1 classic game by a long ways.
Give it a chance and I think you'll learn to love the Heisman. I'd suggest all of you start an offline dynasty with similar rated teams or even your same team and get used to the Heisman. No longer can you just do whatever and hope to win like you can on All-American.

[Archedemius]

I definitely will give it a chance. I'm just frustrated with EA, and the loss to an FCS team with the skipped week. Time to get back on the recruiting trail and try to make up ground from the lost recruiting.

[Archedemius]

I also love how it says I kicked ass against FCS in the second week on the website. LOL!

[AustinWolv]

Yeah, I prefer Heisman and think it played well. Just highly annoyed after the great last minute win I had against Houston that it gave me a loss.

[Archedemius]

We should all be starting at 0-0 so that should compensate a little for our coaching records. Might screw us on our contracts though. I d on't know how that works when you join in the middle of an OD.

[Archedemius]

I lost 68-7. I suppose that is alright. I couldn't get a lick of yardage until I simmed the last 1/3 of the game. Probably was the only way to avert a 80 something to nothing score. LOL!

[Archedemius]

I suppose I'd like to see Heisman against an even team. Maybe I'll do one offline later.

[SmoothPancakes]

It'll take some time to get used to guys because it is much tougher and you have to play a little differently especially against great teams we won't have much of a chance. But the way I see it you really should play very tight games within about a letter grade or so of your team and have very little chance for upsets against anyone more than a letter grade higher or vice versa.
I'll say it again, I've been playing an offline OD with W Kentucky and I got smoked pretty good by Kentucky but pulled off a great close win over Temple I think it was and also lost a nailbiter to Ark St which ended up being my #1 classic game by a long ways.
Give it a chance and I think you'll learn to love the Heisman. I'd suggest all of you start an offline dynasty with similar rated teams or even your same team and get used to the Heisman. No longer can you just do whatever and hope to win like you can on All-American.

Eh, I think I'll just try to adjust on the fly here. I'm good with AA difficulty in my offline FIU dynasty. Just got my ass whooped by USC 40-10 in the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl to end my year 6-7. Definitely not going to try Heisman after that whooping.

[Coach Kernzy]

Well if we get a couple games in and this is to tough on you guys we'll adjust the sliders.

[Archedemius]

I just need to see how it works against MAC competition. I'm suppose to get whooped by UofM and PSU. I was getting negative yards no matter how many guys I put up front.

[Archedemius]

I think I got sacked at least 10 times in that game too.

It was 6 sacks, but felt like 30.

[Coach Kernzy]

Let's all get 2-3 games in on Heisman and then we'll adjust as needed.

[Coach Kernzy]

It was clear that default All-American was way to easy and now we'll find out about default Heisman and if that's to tough we'll dial it down and figure out where we need to be.

[AustinWolv]

Need to play at least 3 games before making any changes.

[Coach Kernzy]

I'm good with that for sure.

[Archedemius]

That oughta be fine with me. I just need 2 though to determine. PSU doesn't count b/c I should get whoop'd.

[natcret]

I had a bye fot week 3 so will check for week four. What about that post that was made related to Varsity mode being more realistic?

[Coach Kernzy]

There was testing done and apparently the CPU on varsity always seemed to do something to lose the game late, like it was almost built into the game that it was supposed to lose on varsity.

Heisman is the goods, give it a few games guys and you'll see. Maybe need to make some minor adjustments but it's great.

[Archedemius]

I think the same thing can be said for AA too Coach. For obvious reasons. I think Heisman will work and with a little slider adjustment, we may be able to squeak out some yards in our arse-whoopins. Do they use sliders for the players too? Even though the players our coaching?

[Coach Kernzy]

I can't stress this enough guys.
I have an offline dynasty going with Western Kentucky in the Sun Belt and I've easily had the best most realistic looking and feeling games I've ever played on NCAA.
We are going to get whipped by much better teams, the way it should be and we'll even lose to slightly lesser teams as I did this week against C Mich if you make mistakes. But you can also pull the occasional upset of slightly better teams if you call a great game and play well.
When we get into conference play against teams closer to our level I'm sure you'll all see Heisman is they way to go.

And again I encourage you all to play some games on default Heisman and get an idea of what I'm talking about.

[Archedemius]

I'm excited about it. I may have to do all new custom playbooks though, or add more to my originals. UofM surprised me with a 75% pass offense. Need some more nickel/dime defense.