Question about game play changes in patches - did pass game get tweak?

[keyser soze]

As some of you know it has been FOREVER since I have been able to play this game due to TRANSFER FAILED issue. However, after getting my gamertag changed I am up and playing again. The one thing that I have noticed is that the PASSING GAME now seems WAAAAAAAAAAAAY EASIER on heisman? Is this a known thing that took place on one of the patches? If so which one? I went from being a team that could hardly pass to now throwing it with relative ease against zone coverage.

[psusnoop]

As some of you know it has been FOREVER since I have been able to play this game due to TRANSFER FAILED issue. However, after getting my gamertag changed I am up and playing again. The one thing that I have noticed is that the PASSING GAME now seems WAAAAAAAAAAAAY EASIER on heisman? Is this a known thing that took place on one of the patches? If so which one? I went from being a team that could hardly pass to now throwing it with relative ease against zone coverage.

Not much help here as everything that I'm in is on All-American but I still struggle at times throwing the ball but I know that is me usually. I'm a terrible rock slinger so I try and stay out of passing the ball more the 15-20 times a game.

I haven't though noticed a difference throwing from these recent patches on AA for what it's worth.

[Oneback]

In all honesty, passing against zone has never been hard, even after the improvements this year. If you find some complementary passing plays and learn the correct reads you can complete passes all day long, especially in the intermediate area. The most difficult route to complete is the deep post (oh how this has changed from a few years back) from a receiver lined up out wide. The problem is an inherent problem with spot dropping zone coverage's, there will be window's to throw the ball through in the intermediate areas.

The deep ball is difficult to complete because defenders react as soon as the button is pressed and know the exact spot the ball is being thrown. Combine that with the fact that safeties are super aggressive in jumping routes instead of playing with proper leverage and you've got a recipe that thwarts throwing the ball down field unless you've been able to take advantage of the coverage via play calling (4-verts vs Cover 2, etc).

The key to having a good passing game is to focus on the intermediate routes, beat man with runners and throw deep when the coverage dictates you'll have a wide open man (flood vs Cover 3, 4-verts vs Cover 2, etc).

[keyser soze]

Hmmmm, so maybe it is just my playing style that changed and how I read the play. Just seems a LOT easier for both me and my OD partner. He is putting up CRAZY passing stats this year.

I don't know how he does it but I read inside out in this game. I look to TE first, then slot, then outside. Sure I might miss a few open deep passes but I greatly reduce sacks and INTs this way.

[Oneback]

Are you calling any different plays? My entire passing game consists of Verticals, Corner (Smash, Shakes), Dig (Shallow, Levels, Drive, Mesh), Spacing (Stick, Scat), Play-Action (Boot and Flood) and Screens (HB, WR). Each of those concepts is read a little different, but once they are learned the only thing that will stop a passing attack is a pass rush or the other team calling man coverage's and being flat out better than yours.

[keyser soze]

I don't have many plays but the ones that I do call are very similar in nature and are something like this:

TE on a fly (hit him if LBs blitz)
TE or slot running an out (second look if LB is covered, sometimes first look on blitz)
WR on a fly out (Sometimes he is WIDE open as the FS gets stuck inside on the TE)
TE on backside running a deep drag or slant (vs. zones with no blitzing this type of route opens up late for huge gains)

I look to RUN first but when I pass it is typically something like this. When I played Purdue they decided to let me WR run deep by himself a LOT and he careered. Most games I wont throw a single deep pass to my WR though... I don't manually catch anything on my own! LOL

[jaymo76]

I also feel that specific passing plays have been made a little easier. It seems as though on the slant routes that the defenders are playing further off. My completion % is higher from the summer and I have thrown very few INT's.

[JeffHCross]

I personally felt, on '11, like the passing game got easier as you got deeper into the dynasty, because the recruits didn't progress enough to be as good as the original roster players they were replacing. So you'd end up with too many bad secondaries on the other side of the ball. That could be a factor in what you're seeing, depending on what you've been playing while you were having the Transfer Failed issue.

[keyser soze]

LOL, I was having my way with Minnesota so I took a second to look at their safeties. Guess what the starting AND backup strong safety speed is for Minnie in season 5? Just guess... pathetic!

[JeffHCross]

Playing Minnesota in Season 5? Wouldn't be surprised if it was sub 80.

[keyser soze]

Playing Minnesota in Season 5? Wouldn't be surprised if it was sub 80.

Yeah man, 76 and 78 speed!!! Unbelievable! How do they allow this? I don't have a single TE that is that slow and I recruit blocking TEs!

[SmoothPancakes]

Because Minnesota sucks, even in real life?

[keyser soze]

Do you even watch football? Have you ever played? Do you think stinky div 1 teams have safeties that are the same speed as fast offensive guards? Sometimes you people baffle me.

[JeffHCross]

Do you even watch football? Have you ever played? Do you think stinky div 1 teams have safeties that are the same speed as fast offensive guards? Sometimes you people baffle me.There are 38 safeties on the default roster with sub-80 SPD. Two CBs, too. There are 15 offensive linemen with >70 SPD, including one with 81.

Would I perhaps call shenanigans on those numbers? Yeah. But at least, in this case, the recruits aren't completely counter to what's in the default roster.

And there's no call for questioning if Smooth "even watch[es] football".

[Rudy]

My passing game stunk when I had this game and based on my weak passing skills may always stink. Some of you guys are good and probably can't relate to me but the zone improvements killed my passing game. AA felt flawed and I wasn't having fun so I tried Heisman. I liked a lot of things better on that mode but even with pass coverage at 0 I struggled and wasn't even completing 40% of my passes. It's something I struggle with in Madden as well although it is definitely easier there.

I'd love to see the coverage slider split between man and zone. I'd also love to see the knockdown slider brought back so I could determine how easily a LB/DB could get their hands on the ball as those annoying swats really frustrated me. But I would also love to see a slider to adjust how well the defensive players bounce back and forth in their zones. I think they do this too easily this year, passing off one WR after another. Most LBs and especially DL don't bounce back and forth much at all. Good coverage guys can move around more but when I watch I usually see those guys drop to a spot and only tend to move when guys in front of them come very close. They are clueless to players behind them and are often a step late on the crossing routes although they do punish WRs when they get hit. It just seemed to me that LBs cover a lot of good ground before the pass has been thrown in zone. That is probably necessary for you good passers but I would love the option to turn off or tone down this ability to help my weak skills out.

[keyser soze]

There are 38 safeties on the default roster with sub-80 SPD. Two CBs, too. There are 15 offensive linemen with >70 SPD, including one with 81.

Would I perhaps call shenanigans on those numbers? Yeah. But at least, in this case, the recruits aren't completely counter to what's in the default roster.

And there's no call for questioning if Smooth "even watch[es] football".

when I get time I will compare this to the SS's in season 5. I assure you that EA has seen to it that many are in the league. I know Minny has 2 on their team alone at the SS position.

Of the 38 on the original rosters, how many of them are in AQ schools?

[JeffHCross]

how many of them are in AQ schools?I don't care enough to count :D, but I did notice that some of them were on teams that I would consider better than Minnesota.

I don't think the problem is that there are too many. I think the problem is that recruiting is still too disparate between the schools.

Minnesota's got twelve :3star: recruits and eight :2star: recruits coming in 2012. That's actually worse than they did in 2010 or 2011, including two :4star: recruits in 2010. I haven't looked at Minnesota's in-game progress in a long time, but I'd be stunned if they pulled in a 4-star recruit, ever, in Dynasty mode. I'd be equally surprised that they ever pull players like those numbers.

[keyser soze]

I don't know if my perception of 79 speed is just maybe warped but I just started clicking down the rosters on my OD and every team (including Alabama) that I looked at had at least 1 safety under 80 Speed. One of the schools had 6 of their 7 safeties under 80!!!! Lowest speed I found (only checked about 10 teams) was 71 speed.... Just seems far too low for me for any div 1 athlete to be that slow at the safety position... at the very least I do wish EA would factor this into their play calling and call defenses that recognized this problem and didn't put their players in impossible situations. A team with no safeties faster then 80 better be in cover 3 all day long.

[Oneback]

This is one of the biggest issues that needs to be addressed with recruiting/roster management.

First, a lot of the recruits don't fit the position profile. The easiest way to fix this is to look at any one of the recruiting services. ESPN's own recruiting website would be a great example and start to build positional height and weight ranges by star rating, next would be to build player archetypes per position using the player types already in place again factoring star rating. Let's take defensive ends for example, you'd end up with a 5-star recruit who's height is typically between 6'3'' and 6'6'' and weighs between 240 and 260 pounds (these numbers may be a little off but its probably close), you then build archetypes based on the run stopper, balanced and pass rusher player types. ESPN even provides an overall rating for these players, rate accordingly.

This would require changes to the progression system which when it comes right down to it is broken anyways. One of the things that the progression system needs to account for is 18-22 year old's are still growing into their body and it's not abnormal for a 6'4'' 250 pound linebacker coming out of high school end up a 6'6'' 310 pound defensive tackle by the time he graduates from college.

This brings me to #2 - Roster Management - I don't have a problem with some recruits coming in that are too slow for the position, but the CPU should move them to a position they would fit, those sub-80 speed safeties would be playing outside linebacker in a 4-3 scheme. This should apply to all positions, slow corners become safeties, slow safeties become OLBers, slow OLBers become MLBers, slow MLBers become DE's, slow DE's become DT's and slow DT's switch to the offensive line. Slow offensive linemen move to the bench.

We should also be able as molders of our team be able to tell each player what their target weight is, and in some cases their speed may suffer if we ask them to gain too much weight or the may lose strength if we ask them to drop too much weight. This doesn't really matter until there is a physics based system but it would add a nice touch to off-season player development.

[Rudy]

Totally agree about stratifying recruits by proper weight/height by position. Quite frankly I had proposed a random weight generator for each position based on a few key attributes. I had posted an excel sheet for a few positions like HB and OL. It would feel more real.

As for safeties under an 80 speed I don't have a problem with that. I've always held the belief that 4.6 speed = 80. I imagine there are quite a few college safeties that don't possess 4.6 speed.