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Kyamprac · 02-28-2022, 10:00 PM

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6. Written, up to 4 TPE - Grab Bag: Pick up to 4 Challenge Cup related topics to write about! Each topic is worth 1 TPE. Each answer must be 50+ words.

a. Los Angeles has been riding their top players for almost a full minute more of ice time than Hamilton has theirs. If you were a coach, do you buy into this strategy? Do you let your top guys leave it all out there every night or aim for the most balanced attack possible?

Los Angeles just needs to keep doing whatever it takes to win. We don't expect the Cup to be handed to us and we'll scrape for every goal we can get. Whether that means riding our top players or throwing some wild and wacky lines at Hamilton, think it's all on the table.

b. Guy O'Shea and Evangelos Giannopoulos have been absolute block machines for Hamilton in the playoffs with 109 between them. If you’re looking for offense in this series, how do you get around these two defensemen?

The Panthers are just going to need to move the puck and take advantage of the breaks that are given to them to get past Ham's defenders and and find the net. Besides that, a few well placed hits might serve them well - Burke seems to be leading the way on that front for LA right now so hopefully she can keep it up.

c. Los Angeles’ defense, on the other hand, has not been afraid to join the play and put up points. How do you prepare for a five player offensive attack? How do you counter?

The LA defenders aren't afraid to get in there and score some goals - their hard and fast attack may just have a chance at beating Ham on the rush. If the Hawks give us too much trouble, Slothface will just have to get in there and serve some knuckle sandwiches. Worst case, we know we can rely on Olaf to shut the door if they manage to slip by.

d. The starting goalies for these teams, Olof Karsikko and A Jobin have been nearly unbeatable up to this point with a 0.937 and a 0.927 SV% respectively. If you’re a player on the other team, how would you get inside their heads so that you can put the puck in the net?

Maybe because of his age, Olaf has been sorely underestimated by a lot of teams this year. He has been a total beast, and manages to pull of some pretty spectacular moves even without having a pile of heat to back him up. Nobody's getting in that man's head - he's bound and determined to get LA that win and he's going to do everything he can to make it a reality.

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12. Milestones, up to 3 TPE

+3 TPE

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18. Written, 3 TPE, zzSnoop Lionzz 150 words min

Well it happened. A general strike by the goalie union led to a mass retirement of goalies and now ALL of them have either quit the site (based) or recreated as a skater. HO has implemented a bot goalie system, but decided goalies were too underpowered and gave the goalies 20 in every stat, even the mental ones we can't upgrade. How does the season play out now that goalies are gods (godbots?) among men. Does anything really change?

I have no experience in the sim whatsoever so I'm talking completely out of my ass here for TPE and going based entirely off of assumptions. But honestly I imagine not much would change. From what I've been told, goalie TPE isn't as consequential as some might think and goalies with average TPE can still perform fairly well in comparison to their max-earning counterparts. If all teams have totally maxed bot goalies, their performance might see marginal improvement but I don't expect a dramatic impact to the sims themselves. That said, it would be a shame to lose in-person goalies in the sim because a lot of them are tied to some pretty fun users in the league. Would kind of suck to not have those people around as often. Also goalie is just generally kind of a desirable position in hockey I think for players who go for these kind of games so I guess it could maybe impact recruitment/retention as well. But in the sim itself, I still expect the sim to sim and go on business as usual.

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19. Written, 3 TPE, Bodysnatchers 150 words min

You've uncovered a devious plot employed by the Texas Renegades of the SHL. In order to create the [i]illusion[/i] of parity, sometime after game 1 they swapped bodies with all of the Los Angeles team! The Panthers ARE the Renegades! I fucking knew it! How do you expose this to the SHL masses, and get them to believe you? Or do you let their evil plan work, and have the SHL believe we are leaving the era of the big 4 forever?

You've got this all wrong - the Texas Renegades didn't swap bodies with the Los Angeles players. It wouldn't even make sense - why would they want to win a championship under the guise of the Panthers name? Creating fake parity for the sake of parity isn't enough. No, it's more like a Space Jam kind of scenario where the Panthers players just magically sucked all of the abilities of the Renegades players out of their bodies and stored it in a special glowy hockey puck. On our way out of the locker room before each game, we each touch the puck and murmur a few magic words. Doing that enhances our own individual abilities by complementing them with the ones we got from the Texas players and (hopefully) makes us more powerful and one step closer to taking home a Championship. No one will ever suspect a thing because Bugs Bunny and his meddling Looney Tunes pals aren't around to expose us.

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20. Written, 3 TPE, Free Advertising 150 words min

If you're in another sim league and are using 4 of those CW tasks here, you can do this task to advertise that league in your CW. What league is it? Is it fun? How does it work? What are the pros/cons of that league, especially in comparison to the SHL?

I've had a player in the ISFL for just slightly longer than I've had my player here. My player is going into her 11th or 12th season and kind of an old lady running back that's still clinging to her twilight years. At one time I probably would have told you the ISFL is my favorite league, but that's probably no longer the case for a whole pile of reasons. That said, they've shown some signs of improvement again over the last little while and if football interests you it may well scratch the sim league itch. There are a lot of pretty amazing people in the community too, so downfalls aside it's worth a join for that.

I've also got a fairly young and fresh player in the PBE. I don't know hardly anything about baseball, but the streams are really fun to watch and I've enjoyed the community there as well.. so if that's more your interest than football, I say go for it! Affiliates make multi-leaguing pretty easy peasy, the only real challenge is money.

Pickle Juice · 02-28-2022, 10:37 PM

Trivia Verification Word: juiceisloose

2:
Back in the early seasons of the SHL, it is exactly how you would picture it in your head. The stands are filled with hat wearing men in gray and brown suits, there is a nasty cloud of cigar and cigarette smoke up in the rafters where no banners hang. The white paint on the ceiling is slowly turning yellow, but the lights remain white shining down onto the ice. The players who just finished their pregame six pack of beer are skating onto the ice. They have wooden sticks and loose skates, no helmets and limited teeth. Goalies, after recently hearing about the requirement to wear helmets the next season, have begun pulling their teeth in protest. It’s a brutal style of play but holy shit it is fun to watch. Who cares about speed and goals when you can watch two tall skinny men throw bones until they’re both knocked the fuck out. What a time.

3.
Hamilton has a rich history of wining cups to the point where they could be called a dynasty in the past few seasons. Their last championship, in S61, was not the case of an underdog team prevailing. Hamilton dominated the regular season and had one of the best cores of all time. They had three hundred fifteen goals for throughout that regular season with only 141 goals against. That is a seriously impressive goal differential, the best in the league that season. They suffered only 3 losses throughout the entire playoffs that season. They won the presidents trophy as well as the Mathiachouniard trophy, had multiple individual season award winners on the team including a one of the best goaltenders in SHL history. The team was stacked and it was clear from the beginning of the playoffs that they were the team to beat. Absolutely dominating the regular season then continuing that trend in the playoffs.

4.
A dino league huh. I guess there would be a team call the t-rex’s and another called the raptors. The winning trophy every season at the end of the playoffs would be a statue of the sun or a meteor or something like that. Cavemen in the stands and cavewomen shaking their ass with pom poms on the sidelines while the announcers describe it as a family friendly event. I imagine it would be very similar to today’s games, just a lot colder and outdoors. The ice age would probably be the birth of hockey right? All that ice around. Just needed some berries for the blue and red lines. Boom, an ice rink. How do they measure? What’s the unit of measurement? Who cares, it’s better than sitting in the cave all day. No television so everyone has to go to the games. Great sense of community, hunters and gatherers alike sitting next to one another, no pitchforks and torches. Not a phone in sight, just good classic fun.

6.
a. Honestly I have always been more of a depth guy, as a Blues fan especially. I think there is a serious advantage for teams who can find a way to still win while resting their top guys for extended lengths early in the games. Obviously teams who are top heavy with star players can succeed, but it becomes less of a team effort and more of a one to two line effort at that point.
b. Move the puck! Just keep moving the pass with crisp passes, don’t center your game plan around shots from the point with screening forwards down low. Try to set up your offensive zone and get shots off from down low, attempt to score more off of the rush as well. There are plenty of ways to get around a stellar defensive pairing if you are creative.
c. Fight fire with fire and play a strong counter attack game. Be aggressive, if they are shifting two defensemen up into the attack then have 1 forward behind them for a streak pass up the ice and a quick breakaway. After one or two of those then they will stop playing their game plan and start playing yours.
d. Score early and play a possession oriented game to maintain the puck and limit the other teams scoring chances. Fire shots on net frequently and with purpose to rattle the goaltender. Maybe even talk a little shit on the ice about the scoreboard. Give him the stinky mitts to the face even, the world is your oyster.

Milestones, +2TPE

Championship week total: +16TPE

***CampinKiller*** · 02-28-2022, 11:18 PM

CW pass

***honkerrs*** · 03-01-2022, 12:56 AM

cw pass

dankoa · 03-01-2022, 06:37 AM

2. I wasn't around in the league all the way back then but I was here pretty early on (back in S25) and can remember what it was like then and what changes we've seen take effect in the league since those days which means I can probably guess what S1 was like. I think the main part is that the forum the league used then was terrible. It had barely any of the functionality we see today, and the league itself was set up on a very old version of STHS which didn't really offer the most engaging experience when it came to simmed games. I don't really know if anything would have happened differently on the ice, but I know that a lot of the userbase was a lot more confrontational with each other and that's something that's definitely changed a lot since. Crazy to think that the SHL has been around as long as it has at this point; will be interesting to see if it has another 63 seasons left in it!

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175 words

3. The franchise that I play for currently is the Philadelphia Forge, who as a fairly recent expansion team have not won a cup yet. As this doesn't really leave me anywhere to go in terms of writing a response to the PT, I'll instead talk about the last time that a team I was on won a cup, which was the Texas Renegades squad I was a member of a few seasons back. The team then has been through a fairly long drought since its last cup in S37, and had the roster to finally get it done which had been the missing ingredient for a long time. The main change however was getting Puoli behind the bench coaching; the guy is simply a genius, and he was what the team needed to get them over the line and put another banner in the arena. Fantastic work from someone like him to get that team to where it got to; it's a shame I wasn't around for the next one that roster won, but I'll always have great memories of that campaign. Hopefully it won't be long before the Forge are able to claim one too!

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196 words

6.
d. Cracking a hot goalie is always a tough ask, and FHM certainly loves to make some goalies become absolutely unbeatable in the playoffs. I think in my mind, the best way to do it is with some pre game trash talk, really get inside their head and rattle them up a bit before the game even starts. Beyond that, getting physical in the game usually seems to have some effect.

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70 words

12. Milestones (+3)

13. i always find it funny that people look at Texas as a boring finals participant considering they are the best example of parity being possible in this league. They won single season games in the first FHM season that the league had, and have since turned themselves round into one of the very best teams in the league which should be held up as an example. But anyway, yes, I think we are going to start seeing a lot more variety from next season on. Given the number of guys getting absolutely destroyed by regression this offseason, notable GM resignations including in Texas and teams worsening, it's now essentially time for a new crop of teams to start making appearances in the finals. On paper, there's no way that Hamilton should have made it in this season, so hopefully next season onwards we'll see the new regression system actually make them have to take a step back but I'll believe it when I really see it.

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166 words

14.The two biggest examples of this in recent memory are definitely Texas and Baltimore. Like I mentioned in another prompt, people like to forget that very recently, Texas were a bad team in the depths of rebuild, winning only 9 games in the first season that the league had in the FHM era. Being able to turn things around to the extent that they have has wholeheartedly changed the way they're perceived and has them considered a perennial cup contender for the most part. Additionally, Baltimore went through a similar process recently, making the call in the mid S50s to pull the plug on what they were doing and go for a hard rebuild. Although they've yet to win a cup, they were one of the big favourites this season and should be right back again next year. In my mind, that's what makes a rebuild successful; obviously cups and playoff appearances had credence to the belief that it's a successful rebuild, but the true measuring stick is the change in public perception as teams go from being dumpster fodder to a serious contender.

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184 words

16/16

fever95 · 03-01-2022, 06:48 AM

1. fever +3
5. +3
[Image: S3rGw0B.png]

6a. +1
If you have the luxury of having a deep team, I would go with a more balanced attack team strategy, running all the lines through for most of the game. If your team is not as deep, I would say relying on your top players more than your bottom lines would be a good strategy, having your top lines logging a lot of minutes while the bottom lines log less than league average minutes per game. (76 words)
6b. +1
Players that block a lot of shots are difficult to play against and frustrate opposing offenses but my strategy to get around players like that would be to keep on cycling the puck down low in the corners and trying wraparound chances as well as looking for an opening to feed the puck into the slot for a quick one timer from pointe blank range. (65 words)
7. +2
[Image: 1Z6HhgD.png]

9. +3

12. S63 Milestones +3

lilstifler · 03-01-2022, 06:53 AM

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12. Milestones, up to 3 TPE

Milestones are folded in with CW. So just link your Milestone claim as task 12 for up to 3 TPE towards your 16 total.

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Post your claim in the milestones thread for tpe earned per stat, and then link that post in your CW submission. This is done because the person who grades CW will be a different person than double-checks milestones.

CLAIM 2TP

Code:
1. CW TRIVIA, 3 TPE max - 1 TPE for participation, 0.5 TPE for each correct answer. This is completed through a Google form linked below. Make sure to spell your answers correctly or you will not get credit. Post your verification word in your CW post.

verification word: lilstifler

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2. Written, 3 TPE, Back In My Day (150 words min.)

The SHL has been around for the sim-time equivalent of 63 years now! That’s a lot of time for things to change. What was the league like 62 years ago in season one? Did nobody wear helmets? Were players allowed to smoke on the ice? Plenty would have changed in over six decades!

So much time has passed. A time like a human lifetime. I can't imagine that this league has existed for so long. Generations have changed, game habits have changed. Since I have not seen the beginning of the league, I can only mention some hockey played at that time. I assume it was time without rudeness. No force-free techniques. Much slower and cleaner hockey. The hockey games were probably passed without helmets, because the throws didn't follow so high and so strong. It was possible that only one judge was asked for the game, because it was much easier to keep track of everything. I suppose the length of the game was different, because physical fitness wasn't as high as it is right now. Anyway, if I had a choice between hockey and modern times at the moment, I'd rather hang on to modern hockey. It's common to play quickly, and I don't want it to change.

(150+ words)

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15. Written, 2 TPE, The yearly IIHF task (100 words min.)

Write your predictions for this year's IIHF tournament or WJC if you care about that more. Will there be surprises? Will any players make their country proud? Who's gonna suck? Be bold!

This promises to be an exciting tournament. All teams remain increasingly competitive and remain more and more interesting. If we look at history, there has always been a team that is worse than the others. On this basis, it can be seen that it is slowly changing. My forecasts would be based more on teams' popularity this time. The USA and Canada are certainly overheaded by favourites. They have a huge player resource and great potential. But a historically serious opponent is the Finnish team. It's last season's champion and it's a serious application for this year's champion title. The status of the tournament will certainly be taken as always by Latvia and perhaps Austria, but things can change significantly.

(120 words)

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4. Written, 3 TPE, Extinction Event (150 words min.)

Rumour has it that millions of years before the SHL began, there was a pre-historic “Dino Hockey League” that dominated the global sports market before a meteor wiped out most life on the planet. Describe that ancient league. Maybe name a couple of teams or players, tell me about how the Dino league’s rules differed from our current ones? This one is pretty loose, just have fun with it!

This hockey league is legendary. Many know about it, and their stories are always exciting. We cannot, of course, verify this information because it is just a rumor and none of us have lived for so long, unfortunately. But we can only tell from the stories that this hockey league was cruel and viewable. Who wouldn't want to see dinosaurs on the ice. But the stories tell me that hockey was not played on the ice, but in the open fields of the meadows. With the ball and branches that dinosaurs break down on the way to the game. The equipment certainly wasn't important. Games more or less resemble a game of life and death. The main favourite in these games had been the Tironazauru team. They have the greatest fighting potential. Cruel beasts who wanted only and only to win. No one else really managed it. The 'Ants' team also fought valiantly, but we all know what the outcome could be.

(160+ words)

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6. Written, up to 4 TPE - Grab Bag: Pick up to 4 Challenge Cup related topics to write about! Each topic is worth 1 TPE. Each answer must be 50+ words.

a. Los Angeles has been riding their top players for almost a full minute more of ice time than Hamilton has theirs. If you were a coach, do you buy into this strategy? Do you let your top guys leave it all out there every night or aim for the most balanced attack possible?

b. Guy O'Shea and Evangelos Giannopoulos have been absolute block machines for Hamilton in the playoffs with 109 between them. If you’re looking for offense in this series, how do you get around these two defensemen?

c. Los Angeles’ defense, on the other hand, has not been afraid to join the play and put up points. How do you prepare for a five player offensive attack? How do you counter?

d. The starting goalies for these teams, Olof Karsikko and A Jobin have been nearly unbeatable up to this point with a 0.937 and a 0.927 SV% respectively. If you’re a player on the other team, how would you get inside their heads so that you can put the puck in the net?

a.) In my opinion, this is a routine tactical combination for teams that don't have as much resources on their new talents. It's not a bad move, especially if it brings good results. As the result is already known in the performance of this task, I can say that this tactical game did not work this time. But I would also choose such a tactical game if I had such a situation with the players on my team.

(70+ words)

b.) They are leaders, but they are human anyway. Anyone can be wrong. In their case, they might not be able to protect themselves properly. The main thing is to put pressure on them to be wrong. Everything needs to be done simply and quickly. A quick pass will lead to a good shot, which can also prove fatal and fall into the net.

(60+ words)

c.) It's always heavy when all shift players are able to score. It's hard to protect yourself because you don't know from which side you might find something dangerous. Just have to be careful, if more thinking about what an opponent might do, the bigger problems can start to arise for themselves. With a cool head, you have to go and play as you can.

(60+ words)

16/16 TPe

Urq660 · 03-01-2022, 10:01 AM

1.
Moist

4.
Well now, hockey with dinosaurs? Anyone who doesn’t do this prompt doesn’t deserve any TPE, why on earth would you not want to talk about dinosaurs playing hockey?? Obviously, certain fundamentals would have to change, like the goal would obviously have to be a lot bigger, otherwise you’d never get a puck in, unless the goaltender was a compsognathus or something. In the interests of inclusion, T-rexes would be allowed to play, however their short arms would not make them very good, unless they had extra long hockey sticks. Or they could just use their tails? That would make it a bit unfair, with dinosaurs with big bony tails having the advantage, like stegosaurus’.
Damn, I am definitely putting way too much thought into this! Dinosaurs playing hockey would be amazing, I would definitely was a brachiosaurus or diplodocus in goal, there is nothing getting past that glorious chonk! To sum it up, dinosaur hockey sounds better than regular hockey, there, I said it!

12.
Milestones

13.
Now, I am allllll for a different team being in the Challenge Cup Finals, even if it would have been better to have Los Angeles’ second round opponents in the final instead (hey, who’s said I’m biased?? Just because I’m on the Seattle roster, doesn’t make me biased). But, sorry to be the bearer of bad news, I feel that this could be something of an aberration, rather than the dawn of a new era. I would love love love the league to become more competitive across the board. Unfortunately, as is the way with sims, some people are more interested in the ‘win at all costs’ mentality than the more social aspects of the league, and will figure out the meta that will let them pull out season after season at the top, or teams that change their strats to ones that game the system for the playoffs. It’s just the nature of the beast and I believe that next season, the finals will revert to type. I would be very happy to be proven wrong, though!

15.
IIHF hasn’t really been on the radar for me these past couple of seasons. After a successful run in World Juniors, winning all 3 medals at different points, my brief IA spell meant I was quite a way off where I needed to be, TPE-wise, to be even bothering the Great Britain water boys. Combined with my job in WJC Head Office, that has been my focus, I haven’t really had a dog in the IIHF fight. Until this season! I am excited to see how my player stacks up in a new tournament. Oddly, I always played better in World Juniors than I did for my J team. And I scored in maybe my second game for GB? So I’m excited to see what the rest of the tourney brings!

21.
Oh Leviadan, mate, what are you doing? Has Slash not managed to scare you away from touching this job with someone else’s 10 foot pole? I don’t believe that I need to do anything to make this job harder for the illustrious new PT Head. This league has a real knack for people making it known, extremely vocally, when something isn’t to their exact liking, so his job is going to be an utter shitemare (shitstorm and a nightmare combined, keep up) without any additional input from someone else, especially a no-mark like me. I wish Leviadan all the luck in the world, he is gonna need it!

*Drokeep* · 03-01-2022, 10:04 AM

1-TRIVIA WORD: loaf (3TPE)

4-(3TPE)
There is a remnant of the ancient dino league... its no other than the colorado raptors/mammoths! They were actually the youngest franchise of the old dino league, so it makes sense they stuck around until the shl!

The main legend I want to stop and talk about its the goat forward gretzky rex. He has a 2 point per game average and won the cup with every single team, plus even managed to win goalie on the year in his only season as a starting goalie. One day we hope we can get such a legend back in action.

The dino league unfortunately ceased to exist when a catastrophic world shattering event wiped out all the players and facilities. There are rumours that a handful of legends survived going underground and that still to this day you can hear the roars and cheers of the legends of yore playing. (Swing by ign arena and catch a raptors game to relive the old days)

6-(4tpe)
A-I believe that is the way to win in this league. Yes lap lost but you have to run your first line into the ground, that's why you pay them the big bucks. The only downside is that this strategy is mainly effective if you don't let the series get to more than 5 games.

B-The only way to finesse defenders like these is too cook up some spicy dangles or take shots near the net. I believe all it takes is a Sven Svenson kinda guy to dash rught past them. If not a strong defender can take them both on to neutralize them in the offense

C-The only way to deal with a full offensive team is to make them pay for their push. This can be achieved with having a speedy forward in any line that can get the jump on the lap defensemen that are so high they wont be able to catch the lone forward

D-To beat goalies like these you gotta play the intense mind game and have heavy screens. After you score the first goal you gotta hammer then mentally so they can't recover from the initial burst. After that its a matter of shattering their confidence further as the series goes on, that way by the last game, theyll be a husk of their former selves

16-(3TPE)
[Image: New_Project.png]

18-(3TPE)
FHM going to FHM. Somehow the changes in the goalies screw up the fickle simulation engine and the league sees an unprecedented number of goals scored in the season. Goalies are so Op, they feel that they are unbeatable, so once the first goal goes in, they have a complete breakdown and allow multiple goals more. The record of goals scored in a match belongs to Hamilton vs Texas, where the final score of their final regular season matchup was 89-86. Everyone in the league is relatively happy, because even though the scores are not realistic, everyone is getting trick loads of points, and no one is sad to see goalies getting murdered.

Lastly teams have to adapt to such a situation, so now the most valued commodity in the league are dmen, because the longer you can keep out that first goal, the better your team ends up faring. This creates a very coveted market for new creates in defensive positions.

***retuperkele*** · 03-01-2022, 10:25 AM

Task#1 - 3 TPE
verification: perkele

Task#2 - 3 TPE
Going back 62 years is a very long time, especially for a sport. With all the new rules being added to the game, it has shaped up modern hockey to its glory we all know as it stands now. But did you know, that 62 years ago, hockey goaltenders didnt wear helmets at all? Back in the days of the 1970's, goalies only used to wear some sort of "scary attire" to make their opponents go off balance during a breakaway. It was none other than the glorious Gilles Meloche, who suffered a severe head trauma after being hit in the forehead with a puck, to be the first one to ever wear a proper "helmet" in a hockey game. Of course it was not the goaltender helmet as we know it today, but more towards a Petr Cech-esque helmet (for those who dont know, Cech is the most famous football goaltender to wear the helmet". Fast forward another 60 years from present times, who knows how hockey will look like them

Task#4 - 3 TPE
Recent archeologists have discovered that dinosaurs used to play hockey. Thats right, hecking dinosaurs did play hockey in their time. But that was not the type of hockey that we are accustomed to, before the big meteor wipe, their hockey resembled floor hockey very much. Because, as the archeologists say, the global temperature was above 15degrees at all times, there was no way there would have been ice anywhere in the world at that time. Instead, dinosaurs used to play on clay surfaces, with hockey sticks made out of palm trees, as they were much more durable and adjustable rather than any other piece of material they could have used. The rules? There were no rules. The goal? To be able to slam a giant rock behind some standing palm trees that were guarded by fierce looking stegosaurs, because who else would defend the goal? Line switches would occur rarely as the dinosaurs did have immense stamina, but not enough to last it throughout the game. Pterodactyls would fly onto the court to drop a new dinosaur to replace the former one, and they would also grab the exhausted one and drop them into the pond to cool down.

Task #6 - 4 TPE
a) I think with the current roster that the Los Angeles Panthers do have, it is very safe to run their best players on high minutes. I like how that strategy has formed them into a force to be reckoned with, but at the same time their players who are playing significantly less than their high end counterparts are proving themselves worthy too, even though with very much less ice time.

b) Yes, it is true that O'Shea and Giannopoulos have been very unforgettable for teams that have played against Hamilton, but in my opinion you can get around it very easily. Instead of relying on long range shots by defenders, the key is to play high tempo hockey. With sudden back and forth movements going on the wing and the blueline, it is very hard for Hamilton to keep up, which will eventually open up opportunities, which is where you strike.

c) I think there is little to no counterplay going around a 5-man attack, other than putting on high amounts of pressure, and waiting for them to make a mistake with the puck. That is where you go in, and launch a counterattack when they are very vulnerable. If I was playing against Hamilton, I would include high mobility players on the roster.

d) One thing to come in mind is to exploit goaltenders limited mobility by playing high tempo. Safe passing with great movement is the key to success. Second, I would make one man on each line to be a literal statue in front of the goalie, in order to make their concentration crumble. Nothing better than the good old pressure

Task#12 - 3TPE
Milestones

juke · 03-01-2022, 10:38 AM

Quote:1. CW TRIVIA, 3 TPE max - 1 TPE for participation, 0.5 TPE for each correct answer. This is completed through a Google form linked below. Make sure to spell your answers correctly or you will not get credit. Post your verification word in your CW post.

Verification word: juke

+3 TPE

Quote:3. Written, 3 TPE, Those That Came Before (150 words min.)

When did your franchise last win a Challenge Cup? Write about that team, some of the key players, and what intangibles they had going for them to be able to win it all. If your franchise hasn’t yet won a cup, choose any cup winning team and talk about why you’d like your current team to emulate them. Did they have an all time great roster? Were they scrappy under dogs?

CHI last won a Challenge cup back in season 57, winning in 5 games over the perennial contenders HAM. I think that the main thing CHI had going for them back in S57 compared to the current roster is that I wasn't on it, which pretty much negates any chance of winning it all again. Add in the Darian curse as well today and the contender status looks grim for the syndicate. A big part of this S57 team's identity was their ability to show up in big games and thrive under pressure. They were taken to game 7 in round 2, where MAN's goaltender Larson played like a superhuman, but CHI was able to finally crack him in game 7 OT. Then they had to do it again the next round, with the series against the ever-strong BUF also went to 7 games. Then on the biggest stage, they only took 5 games to take down the Steelhawks, a feat that seems almost impossible to do in FHM, and I'm guessing it's the lowest amount of games it's taken a team to beat HAM in the FHM playoffs (too lazy to double check so just assume it's true), and they managed to do it when the cup was on the line.

+3 TPE

Quote:6. Written, up to 4 TPE - Grab Bag: Pick up to 4 Challenge Cup related topics to write about! Each topic is worth 1 TPE. Each answer must be 50+ words.
a. Los Angeles has been riding their top players for almost a full minute more of ice time than Hamilton has theirs. If you were a coach, do you buy into this strategy? Do you let your top guys leave it all out there every night or aim for the most balanced attack possible?
b. Guy O'Shea and Evangelos Giannopoulos have been absolute block machines for Hamilton in the playoffs with 109 between them. If you’re looking for offense in this series, how do you get around these two defensemen?
c. Los Angeles’ defense, on the other hand, has not been afraid to join the play and put up points. How do you prepare for a five player offensive attack? How do you counter?
d. The starting goalies for these teams, Olof Karsikko and A Jobin have been nearly unbeatable up to this point with a 0.937 and a 0.927 SV% respectively. If you’re a player on the other team, how would you get inside their heads so that you can put the puck in the net?

a. I think this is context dependent. It's not necessarily something I would do for the entire duration of the regular season, but in the playoffs I think it makes sense. Especially when you're up against teams who have balanced rosters top down, getting your best players out there for an extra minute could make a big difference if you don't think that your 3rd line will be able to match up well.

b. Just miss them with your shots 5head. What LAP should do is take a page out of my book, and instead of shooting shots on net that could easily be blocked, send the puck wide by 5 feet. A missed shot and a blocked shot both count as a 'corsi for' event, but only a missed shot will count as a 'fenwick for,' so if anything you're padding your stats by following this strategy. Plus you get the chance for a weird bounce or deflection.

c. I am so thrilled to see my old NL pals choc and festy thrive on LAP's blueline. Not only are they great players, they're great lads as well, so it's great to watch them find their groove, even despite the fact that both of them torched me countless times in the conference finals. The simple answer to this question is that there is no counter, choc and fest are unstoppable and will set the league on fire.

d. I can't answer this because Karsikko just dunked on CHI the round before. If I knew how to get in his head then we would've. I think he had something like 2 shutouts and only let in 4 goals in 5 games or something crazy. I guess the only thing that HAM could do is pull a Kreider to slow him down, but I hope that doesn't happen and I don't advocate for running the goalie.

+4 TPE

Quote:12. Milestones, up to 3 TPE
Milestones are folded in with CW. So just link your Milestone claim as task 12 for up to 3 TPE towards your 16 total.

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Post your claim in the milestones thread for tpe earned per stat, and then link that post in your CW submission. This is done because the person who grades CW will be a different person than double-checks milestones.

Milestone link here

+3 TPE

Quote:13. Written, 3 TPE, Parody (150 words min.)

BWOMP BWOMP BWOMP PARITY ALERT PARITY ALERT- Well, a new team in the finals since the mid s50s, it only took ten seasons. Is parity solved? Will new teams make it in as the old guard becomes a forgotten waste of brain space? Don't forget, Hamilton is here AGAIN. Yes we have new teams... but what if it's TEX HAM again next season? Is that even likely?

I certainly wouldn't say parity is solved, especially considering who the winner of the cup ended up being, but I think it's certainly a relief for everyone to see a new team other than HAM/BUF/TEX/CHI in the finals since literally S55. And that's coming from someone on one of those teams. I will say that parity seems to be trending in the right direction. New update scales and harsher regression has already had a few teams dropping ever so slightly in the standings, and new rules to limit FHM tactics should hopefully even up the playing field a bit. We also saw a few of the earlier rounds taken to 6 or 7 game series when in seasons past they could've easily been sweeps or 5 games. But, I don't think it's quite enough for right now. I think that those 4 aforementioned teams will still be hanging around for a bit longer and making themselves known among the top of the standings. Changes will happen slowly so that nothing randomly breaks the league, but hopefully still continue to trend in the right direction. I think the answer to parity lies somewhere in the concept of some form of 'playstyle' settings which would limit how many of the same builds/ratings each team can have. It's a fine line though, because when a team is good at FHM people will say that TPE doesn't matter and only tactics do, but if you go too hard the other direction then people will complain that only the highest TPE teams win. Seems like a hard balance to find so I don't envy HO, but I do believe in them. Except patty.

+3 TPE

*slothfacekilla* · 03-01-2022, 11:30 AM

1. PBE Affiliate +3 TPE

2. Milestones: https://simulationhockey.com/showthread....pid3181861 +1 TPE

*Count Chocula* · 03-01-2022, 11:44 AM

GM CW Pass

TheCC · 03-01-2022, 12:00 PM

1. Verification word: choccy

12. Milestone

*Keven* · 03-01-2022, 12:13 PM

Code:
1. CW TRIVIA, 3 TPE max - 1 TPE for participation, 0.5 TPE for each correct answer. This is completed through a Google form linked below. Make sure to spell your answers correctly or you will not get credit. Post your verification word in your CW post.

cats

Code:
6. Written, up to 4 TPE - Grab Bag: Pick up to 4 Challenge Cup related topics to write about! Each topic is worth 1 TPE. Each answer must be 50+ words.

a. Los Angeles has been riding their top players for almost a full minute more of ice time than Hamilton has theirs. If you were a coach, do you buy into this strategy? Do you let your top guys leave it all out there every night or aim for the most balanced attack possible?

b. Guy O'Shea and Evangelos Giannopoulos have been absolute block machines for Hamilton in the playoffs with 109 between them. If you’re looking for offense in this series, how do you get around these two defensemen?

c. Los Angeles’ defense, on the other hand, has not been afraid to join the play and put up points. How do you prepare for a five player offensive attack? How do you counter?

d. The starting goalies for these teams, Olof Karsikko and A Jobin have been nearly unbeatable up to this point with a 0.937 and a 0.927 SV% respectively. If you’re a player on the other team, how would you get inside their heads so that you can put the puck in the net?

a. As a hypothetical coach, I think ice time is something that can and should vary greatly from team to team. If you have a team split with superstars and rookies then it makes sense to play your top players with more minutes relative to the rest of the team. If you have a more balanced roster then also balancing player time as well makes more sense.

b. I can see two solutions here. Trying to fake shots and passing instead might fool those two blockers. Focussing on higher quality shot attempts with a low chance of getting blocked might work out better than just trying to take a low quality shot that could just end up being blocked. You could also try to match up the lines differently so your top shooters aren't playing against their top blockers.

c. If all five players on the opposing line are a threat to score then I guess the solution is to put pressure on all of them. Force the defensemen to make a quick decision instead of giving them time to evaluate the situation and choose the best option of what they want to do. Always keep in mind that they can and will score if you give them time to think.

d. For two straight seasons the Pride have tried and failed to get in the head of Karsikko so he might just be unbeatable. As for Jobin, I think just sticking to the basics of creating traffic in front of the net and deflecting the puck are the ways to go. It's very tough to chip away at the mental focus of a goalie so it might be better to focus on physically fooling them with unexpected or unseen puck movements.

Code:
12. Milestones, up to 3 TPE

Milestones are folded in with CW. So just link your Milestone claim as task 12 for up to 3 TPE towards your 16 total.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Post your claim in the milestones thread for tpe earned per stat, and then link that post in your CW submission. This is done because the person who grades CW will be a different person than double-checks milestones.

+3

Code:
14. Written, 3 TPE, Blew it up (150 words min.)

In your opinion, which team is has performed a successful rebuild and built a legacy around starting from the bottom? What constitutes a successful rebuild? Cups? Playoff appearances? Is this team still poised to do great things in the future?

We've seen quite a few successful rebuilds in the FHM era so far, but the clearest success story so far has been the Baltimore Platoon. Back in S53 when they were still playing in West Kendall they were clearly in the bottom half of the league. 11th out of 16 teams. This mediocre standing would be very familiar for the Platoon for the next 6 seasons as well, placing no higher than 11th out of 18 and as low as 17th of 18 twice. Despite little to no movement in their standings over the course of the first 7 seasons of FHM, there was some magic brewing in Baltimore. In season 60 something changed. Whatever moves and strategies that the Platoon were building up towards for so many seasons finally paid off. They became one of the top teams in the league and have stayed there for a solid four seasons. The fact that the team jumped suddenly from no greater than 11th for 7 seasons to no lower than 3rd for the next 4 seasons means they performed a successful rebuild by forming a solid foundation and not trying to climb too high too quickly.

Code:
15. Written, 2 TPE, The yearly IIHF task (100 words min.)

Write your predictions for this year's IIHF tournament or WJC if you care about that more. Will there be surprises? Will any players make their country proud? Who's gonna suck? Be bold!

After looking briefly at the teams for this year's IIHF tournament, I think team Japan has some of the best odds this year. Last season when I wrote this prompt I figured team Sweden would be the best by far and was off by quite a bit so we'll see if this season's prediction ends up panning out. I expect the trio of Jack Klompus, Ryu Jones, and Ryosuke Sato to be the three driving players for Japan's possible success this year. All three are at the peak of their careers and had a lot of success during the SHL regular season. They have a lot of great players backing them up as well and have seen enough success in the past for me to be confident in their chances this year. I also think Canada will do well of course.

Code:
21. Written, 2 TPE, No take backs 2 100 words min

Leviadan has made the grave mistake of becoming PT director. I'm already sapping his life source and joyful innocence (yum). How could you, as a user, also make his job unnecessarily difficult? Make media about his shit PT prompts? Write your submissions in Spanish?

DISCLAIMER: IF YOU DO ANYTHING TO MAKE HIS JOB HARDER YOU WILL BE BANNED

In order to make Leviadan's job much more difficult than in needs to be, I would figure out which site theme they use and then write all my PTs using the same colour text as the theme. I would go out of my way to use horrendous formatting and spelling to make the job of reading my PTs extremely difficult while still ensuring they are valid. Also, I would write a thunderdome thread about every single prompt as soon as it's posted to complain about how horrible it is and how much of a better job I could do but provide no positive feedback or ideas on how to improve.

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