Going to talk about some feedback I have been getting from you guys and hopefully answer some questions. So post anything you got and I'll get to them. Recruiting: - Holy crap it's difficult. Been through 4-5 seasons with various team and various coaching levels. Will talk more about the differences later. I haven't been able to nail down a solid strategy yet. - There is no toggle for recruiting difficulty. In my experience it isn't needed as you will definitely struggle to land the guys you want to land. That may change as I (or we) get better at recruiting, but for now it's a pretty good happy shmedium. - As far as strategy goes, I'm going to have to do a separate article (once I figure it out). There are so many dynamics, it's crazy. - You must focus on locking other teams out and signing guys during the regular season. You will only have enough points in the offseason retain/flip 2-4 players. If you are banking on more than that, I'm sorry to tell you that you will have to choose. - It's almost impossible to target gems without scouting them. Unlike last year where you could just look at the schools they are interested in. I tried that same strategy and was less than 15% successful. I spoke a lot with the dynasty devs at the CEs about this. It killed scouting for a lot of people last year. Let's also talk about visits for a second: -Scheduling visits later in the season gives you 100-300 point bonus on average. - There are several dynamics that come into play when scheduling visits aside from what order they are from the recruits perspective. Competitive and complimentary visits discount and add bonus points based on who is visiting that week. This complicates things as you will have to not only schedule around a recruit's unbooked weeks, but also the weeks where you don't have guys coming in that would qualify you for the competitive visit penalty. - There is a coach skill that improves your bonus points on a visit. Pretty powerful as it can allow you to make up critical ground on a guy with a good visit. Likewise, it can also help you lock other teams out (and thus stand a good chance of landing a commitment). Coach Progression: - Here are my results from the coach progression testing I have been able to do. Slowest: Earned about ~8500 points in a season. Was a lvl 27 HC to start and didn't even earn enough to buy an upgrade. My level up was 30000 points or something to that effect. Normal: Earned about ~ 16000 points in a season. Was a lvl 6 HC to start and earned 5 upgrades. Level-up was about 3500 points (on avg). Fastest: Earned about ~ 21000 points in a season. Was a lvl 27 HC to start and earned 7 upgrades. Level-up was about 3000 points (on avg).
What makes recruiting difficult? Is it that we have a new system that we are not familiar with or is the CPU routing you in recruiting?
Did you play with CC on? If not, was coach prestige dynamic this year Also, what kind of program were you running with?
Between 4* and 5*. And guys, for the last damn time, WHY WOULD COACH PRESTIGE BE DYNAMIC IF YOU HAVE CC OFF? You don't have any goals... so how can you get better or worse at your job? To answer your question, no I have not played with CC off.
Because if you're in an OD where you don't want players to move/get fired it's pretty lame to not have dynamic coach prestige..
It's a new system, yes. It has more to do with the CPU doing a better job of kicking your ass. You have to be very, very strategic about who you target. It's still easy to sign a few top guys if you want, but if you think you can do that and still fill out a class then you will be disappointed. It's also impossible to pick out the gems like it was last year. Test this for yourselves, go pick 10 guys you think are gems and scout them. Report back your findings... You have to pay very close attention to the weekly bonuses and the teams that are actively recruiting. If you have a 100 point differential each week it will be very difficult to keep up. Also, if you don't lock other school out during the regular season, you could lose your lead (no matter how big it is) to a school with nothing to lose and 10,000 points to drop on your target.
Even with the new system and "unknown strat" would you say that the process is more streamlined? Or is it still taking a good chunk of your time to recruit?
Well, the first few weeks are a bit rough as you get organized. But after that it saves what you did from week to week. So all you have to do is make adjustments.
So.... goals? Those things are what influence your progress/firing anyway. If you get fired for shitting on a program and tank your coach prestige to D+, what is the difference than joining as a new HC when you get fired? A: Nothing.
Were you finding yourself making slight adjustments week-to-week or huge drastic changes as the season moves on?
It really depends. Going to do some more testing with lvl 0 HC (since I assume that is where a lot of people who want to start at ground zero).
Depends on the school. At USC I wasn't making any drastic changes. At Georgia tech it was moderate. At North Texas it was a fire sale every three weeks or so.
Cool deal, also on recruiting side of the spectrum, did you notice if the CPU signed extras for your team after the season, or is the few that you signed all that gets signed?
The CPU did not sign any extra players. You do get walk ons per usual after training results if you are under the minimum at each position. jello1717
They level up per their own set of goals and then you cash in their upgrades how you see fit. OC and DC level-ups can only be spent in their respective trees.
So just out of curiosity...how would you recommend setting up an OD coach skill wise? All start at the same level, level 1? Normal/Slow progression? How should we handle assistant coaches if some schools have much better ones? Do you think all coaches should start at base level, including CPU, to even it out? Obviously I have to do some testing myself to make decisions for my league but I appreciate the insight.
Don't forget that you have the ability to edit coach rosters: http://forums.traditionsportsonline.com/threads/ncaa-14-editable-coach-profiles.99606/ So technically you can set your coordinators to the same level as well. As far as recommendations go, it really depends on what everyone wants. I think the guys in The Deuce are going to probably want to start at all lvl 0 coaches and coordinators with at least slow progression. I need to do more testing, however.
Yep, in CL we are all high-level programs so I was thinking that I would create everyone's coach on the roster file with a solid prestige rating (b/c we don't do CC) and probably edit the assistants to be at equal levels as well. My only concern is recruiting against CPU coaches that are like level 40, when we're stuck at level 1. Obviously we would like a challenge, but with programs like OSU, USC and LSU in the mix we should be able to compete with the likes of Alabama
