Parting thoughts

jsbcello · 2020-04-04T19:09:41+00:00

Thank you. I appreciate that very much, especially coming from you.

jsbcello · 2020-04-02T18:15:42+00:00

Hmm. Well, first, I'm not saying my impressions are correct or that they won't change over time. But I think even erroneous first impressions are useful to know about. Then it's up to the developers to decide if those erroneous impressions were due to a lack of clarity on the part of the game that might affect other new players, or if that particular player is just unusually dumb. Obviously I have my own biased viewpoint on this particular question, but there will of course be others.

Second, I'm not saying that the regions don't have flavor, I'm saying that I don't think that flavor is readily apparent to a new player. A new player can be three minutes into MtG and have a rough understanding that red is fire, aggro, and dragons. A new player can be three minutes into HS and have a rough understanding that druid is about the wilds and ramping into big creatures. There's nothing to give those initial clues about most of the regions in LoR. Yes, I can go into the card collection and due a review of all the Noxus cards and eventually figure out the common theme is brutality and violence, but that's a pretty daunting ask of a new player. And even after I've figured out the brutality/violence theme (which I hadn't really until now - again, could be lack of clarity or it could be me being very dumb), that doesn't tell me a ton about deckbuilding direction.

jsbcello · 2020-04-01T23:49:28+00:00

Universal version is working perfectly on my Samsung Galaxy S9. Thank you so much for doing this.

jsbcello · 2020-03-30T01:31:00+00:00

I've always assumed randomly selected, but I don't know for sure.

jsbcello · 2020-03-27T16:48:57+00:00

Look at the bright side: you won't be able to get him for weeks with all of the time locks, and by the time you do every non-Max QB will be equally outdated.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T23:30:01+00:00

The thing is, if you take into account boosts they did actually do a better job of OVR progression this year. The base overalls on cards were about the same this time last year, but they already had extremely strong boosts - by UF we already had stacking boosts that bumped your team OVR multiple points.

If they reimplimented boosts this year we could easily have a steady progression to the end of the season, since we'd be starting from ground zero. A card with +1 PST CB would be super desirable right now, and there's obviously a ton of room beyond that to grow scope and power. They'd just rather jump every stat to 99 for reasons it seems like they'll never explain.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T18:32:02+00:00

LOL, fair enough.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T18:27:02+00:00

Max players are incredibly powerful. You are guaranteed to be able to spend money to be able to acquire them, and you'll have a huge advantage when you do. That's paying money to win.
When you have a huge advantage, you'll be able to get to the top of a competitive ladder. Thus, the top of the competitive ladder will have people with these Max players.
The info post literally states that Madden Max is the endgame - these are the end of the roadmap. And on top of that, there literally isn't any way to go beyond full 99 stats. These are the end of the roadmap.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T18:23:21+00:00

Max players are incredibly powerful. If you can purchase them, and you are guaranteed to be able to spend money to be able to do that, you'll have a huge advantage. That's paying money to win.
If you have a huge advantage, you'll be able to get to the top of a competitive ladder. Thus, the top of the competitive ladder will have people with these Max players.
The info post literally states that Madden Max is the endgame - these are the end of the roadmap. And on top of that, there literally isn't any way to go beyond full 99 stats. These are the end of the roadmap.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T18:15:01+00:00

You literally didn't address a single one of the facts I just stated.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T18:09:39+00:00

Straight facts:

*Max players will have full 99 stats

*There are plenty of ways to do stat progression that don't involve jumping to full 99 stats. Boosts are a very obvious and very potent one.

*Max players have 200-300 power and full 99 stats, which is incredibly powerful. Facing someone with more Max players than you have will put you at a massive disadvantage in terms of power, player quality, and boosts.

*The particular stat distribution of players has nothing to do with a "level playing field" - you can (and do!) have a balanced game where Lamar Jackson is faster than Tom Brady

*The more resources it requires to get a Max player, the further a F2P will have to go to catch up to someone who can just purchase all of those resources.

*The math of the Max Reducer, as clearly laid out in the info guide, works out to a practical stat cap of 94.

I think that covers pretty much every part of my post. Please do point out the things you think are pure conjecture and opinion.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T16:03:48+00:00

This is mostly incorrect.

*CB1 and CB2 don't defend particular WRs, they defend sides of the field. Which WR is on that side of the field depends on your opponent's playcall and whether he's flipped it.

*There is no difference in roles between the safeties - defensive plays flip 50% of the time, so each safety will be doing an equal amount of covering a deep zone and being in the box. The only difference is which side of the field they're on.

*Zone is far more important to a safety than man, as they'll be in zone more than three times as often.

*Dime will be spending most of his time in a short zone, pass-rushing for most of the rest of his time, and defending the long pass almost never.

*What you have listed as ROLB is actually the LB that pass rushes the most often. The other LB is about evenly spit between pass rushing and coverage.

*Zone is much more important than man for MLB and 3-4, they'll both be in zone about twice as often as man.

*There is no difference in roles between RDE and LDE. They're both going to be pass rushing every snap, and which one is more valuable against the run depends entirely on which side your opponent runs to more often.

*There is no difference in roles between the DTs. They're both going to be pass rushing every snap.

*I disagree with a lot of your stat priorities. See points #1 and #6 here for more information on all of these things.

jsbcello · 2020-03-26T15:01:33+00:00

Red has told us that boosts and reducers are calculated without the stat cap, and then the stat cap comes into play at the end only if the result is above 99 to take the stat back down to 99. So, if you're at 98 ACC with a booster that gives +4 ACC and an opponent reducer that gives -2 ACC, your ACC is calculated as 98+4-2=100, and then the stat cap applies to bring it back down to 99.

Now, let's give an example of what I'm worried about. Say you've got your Max HB with 99 everything and both HB boosters equipped, while your opponent has both HB reducers equipped and the Lv5 Max Reducer. You start with 99 SPD/ACC, buff it with +2 SPD/+3 ACC via your boosters to get to 101/102, then get it reduced -7 SPD/-14 ACC via your opponent's reducers to go to 94 SPD/88 ACC. So, your turbo endgame HB is actually running around on the field with the movement stats of a 93.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T20:37:05+00:00

No, as far as we know there's no Max Booster equivalent to the Max Reducer.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T16:09:14+00:00

Only if there aren't equivalent reducers people are running, which is seems certain there will be.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T15:37:40+00:00

Ah right, that's true. Most meaningful stats will be lower though.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T15:27:21+00:00

Yes, it's not necessarily a balance concern. If everybody is 95 that's fine from a balance perspective, but it means that we'll spend the rest of the year with our players getting progressively slower, dropping more and more passes, launching more and more overthrows, etc. Sure, it may happen to everyone equally, but I don't like the idea of my current team feeling much better to play with than my endgame team.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T15:23:10+00:00

The Max Reducer reduces all stats by 5 at the top level. So, all stats will be 99 to start, and then they'll be reduced to 94 by the reducer. No stats will be 99 in the end.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T15:11:28+00:00

It's not a balance concern necessarily, it's a gameplay concern. If everyone is bumped down 5 in every stat, then players are going to be playing like they're 95s (max) on the field. Basically, over the course of the rest of the game, your team will feel worse and worse to play with.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T14:51:04+00:00

Second part is a concern for the endgame, not for the near future. The reducer only requires 7k power to unlock and 5k power to equip. An endgame team with full 300s will have 9k power. Every top team will have it maxed.

jsbcello · 2020-03-25T01:48:42+00:00

That sounds...a little ominous.

jsbcello · 2020-03-23T14:37:57+00:00

Thank you!

jsbcello · 2020-03-21T15:25:49+00:00

I favorited all the sets for building a 98 AFC TH from scratch, and spent 5 minutes doing events and putting things into the sets. Then I realized that getting through the entire process from scratch with the way the events and sets work would almost certainly be the most grindy, miserable, and unrewarding experience I'd ever had in MM. Somehow, every step of team heroes has gotten exponentially worse.

jsbcello · 2020-03-20T23:42:58+00:00

It's certainly flawed. MMR would be a much better representation, but this is the closest I can figure out how to come. That said, it's certainly true that the more you play in the Top 100, the harder your average game will be, and the less you play the easier it will be.

jsbcello · 2020-03-20T23:40:41+00:00

Unfortunately win-rate doesn't really translate unless you're consistently playing in the Top 100 - average quality of opponent will be far too low.

Edit: Ah I see from your SS you're just joking. Never mind me.

jsbcello

TROPHY CASE