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spooked · 09-21-2020, 12:41 AM

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1800~ words, with some work on graphs maybe. Note: just a little case study, no flames only love

I was listening to the Rich and Luke podcast, and they identified that my previous proposal of reducing the cost of weekly training for send downs was “stupid” Surrender

. I agree! It was a little stupid, but it got me paid, and got some people talking more openly about some of the issues we have been seeing with FHM and a couple other things impacting the site. Instead of reducing cost of training, they stated that a max ceiling of applied TPE could be a more direct solution to improving the experience for middle tier entry level players, and by proxy should also help address my argument of the site being a little discouraging to players who fall behind early in earning TPE. I think that this idea is also a wonderful proposal to look at and I am glad that they spent some time thinking about alternative solutions that would help build the bridge between low and high tpe player competitiveness.

I am not sure they considered the push back something like that might have really, as the reason I went for something which did not interact with highly-involved users is I have always found that group particularly resistant to changes. Which is for good reason, obviously they like the site and they are successful generally in the current and maybe even previous iterations of how the league has been run. It is just a fact that there are different types of users on the site, and ones who are doing well and are enjoying the current setup will not want much change to happen. Nothing wrong with that! But a max ceiling on applicable TPE is a very touchy proposal as it would not only impact high-end players, but it would almost exclusively impact them and it would do so in a negative way. But is it a good idea? Personally I think it could be, it might force people down more one-dimensional build paths which I think might be one of the bigger issues with the site. It could help teams turn around their success a little quicker, maybe, I am not sure. But I will do a little write up here just to look into it!

Now, in my previous article I mainly argued around the points of easing training to help bolster the bottom end of draft classes early in their careers, and also somewhat improving their cash situation. I still think that this could be something that could be looked at, not the cash concept specifically maybe, but just discussing the user experience of a send down and how their contracts work while costs go up and just the general user experience there feeling a little wonky. But I think the idea of just capping applicable TPE is one which would help the league as a whole rather than just supporting a specific class of players, although I am not sure how much it would really change to be honest.

As I highly doubt the idea will be put into words and I need cash, and have the time, I will kind of go over the general arguments of why you might want to implement a TPE cap and what it could end up doing to the league overall.

The basic pitch given in the podcast (https://www.twitch.tv/videos/746383893?t=1h8m56s GO WATCH) was to directly cap out TPE that can be applied at 1700 TPE. The argument is that by simply capping the TPE applied at 1700, it would potentially reduce the power of overpowered players, while also artificially improving the competitiveness of lower tpe (800-900 TPE) players by reducing the level of competition they face.

What does a 1700 cap look like though? I will start out with just a quick comparison of what the difference in TPE might look like between a roughly 2000 TPE player, a roughly 1250 TPE player and finally a roughly 950~ TPE player (the top end of the players who are “getting killed” in the SHL). I will be using a trio of Centers from Hamilton, who all have very similar builds at the moment, eerily similar really, which I would be interested to discuss STHS style strengths and weaknesses to see if that might also be a path as Rich mentioned as an option in the podcast.

[Image: 772cb4f9a2.png]

Here is a quick chart just to visualize what they look like in a better format:

[Image: 3de0253046.png]

So what do we see? Not really that much, all are close-ish so obviously the current update scale is fairly aggressive near the top, but there is a clear couple of trends we see from the graph.

1. 2000 TPE basically just makes Aaron Wilson better than the comparables in literally every way, without any specific role in mind or anything like that. 2000 TPE is the goal and 2000 TPE is enough to very easily hit very high levels across a lot of different ratings. So in this case the more TPE you have, the better overall player you get. More skills, faster, stronger, everything.

2.It seems like no matter what TPE you have, Bravery, Faceoffs and the various 5 skill ratings are all very common across the three players. Seems like no matter what amount of TPE you have the update scale currently just means you completely ignore some things entirely after a certain point based on your positional need.

Not much can really be identified through this yet though. So I will roughly scale back the 2000 TPE build to 1700 TPE based on the general applied TPE levels already there and see what it looks like now:

[Image: 77c4fefff6.png]

Doesn't seem like much changes honestly. It is a little closer, but even 1700 in the current update scale is enough to have a high rating in all identified important skills for a position. So what can we really say or learn from this?

I think the only thing you can really say is would a 1700 TPE cap help? Yes, it probably would. Would it be easy to implement? Yes, it would. Would it fix the issue of lower level TPE players being not useful? I am not confident in that. I think part of what I had learned from my previous article around cash was that the biggest issue most people seemed to link it to was the inability for lower level players to compete, and the lack of upset potential that can create in FHM.

I think you could apply a 1700 cap to the league, I think high level players would probably not be too happy with it, but I also don’t think it would do much since that extra 300+ TPE to the max levels do not actually represent a huge amount of impact on player builds since the update scale is punishing. But what about if you consider it alongside a new update scale, or a strength and weaknesses system which also locks players into more specific rating ranges. It could have some more potential to create interesting changes. But that's a larger discussion to have.

I have a different takeaway from this quick study, does the league have an issue where a lack of player role control forces players to focus on building same-y builds with a focus on just being good at everything and allowing the GMs to manage deployment and roles? I have heard some players want more control over their player, and there could be something learned here where player TPE limitations could indirectly influence GMs without having to micromanage or audit lines of teams. If the league forces players to make more choices on what they want to be good or bad at it could make top tier players still have areas of their game where they are beatable while also providing a bit of control to players on their actual performance in the sim. Is something like that possible through a general TPE cap, would it require a more direct player role system implemented? Does it need to touch any part of the TPE system or update scale? No idea.

I think I will conclude this media here, I think from the graphs it's fairly obvious that a 1700 tpe cap would probably not have a ton of impact on the league, but it would likely help midfield teams be more competitive. I do not think it would help rebuilding teams much though as a 2000 TPE and 1700 TPE player are both much better than the level of player you might find in the middle of the rosters of low-end teams and I don’t think it would change the balance of the league much as both high-end TPE amounts still results in a super-player who is essentially good or great at all important skills. But maybe having a competitive midfield is enough for the league to feel a little better and help keep complaints and concerns down? Not for me to say, but that could be discussion to have.

From here, I think maybe the path to making any meaningful change would be to try to identify the issues with the FHM engine specifically so we know what we are trying to resolve with the TPE and Role systems(speed is bad now? what?), decide If we really want to make 800-900 TPE players be able to compete and with how much of a chance to be successful against better players, and/or if we want to provide players with more agency on their role through role selection, tpe limitations, or role-based capping to create certain archetypes (Strength/Weakness). I think the only thing that is certain right now is that FHM as an engine has not really been seamless so far and there are some issues it has introduced to the league. Hopefully we can get it ironed out and make some improvements that will fix all the issues people have identified.

TL;DR: 1700 Cap would help even out the top and middle of the league a bit and create a bit more unpredictability in that area, but you would need to test to see how it would impact lower level players more. The league needs to come together to identify what exactly it wants as it seems like everyone wants something different. Looking at roles to both limit TPE builds and create player agency in deployment is an interesting concept which could combine the idea of the 1700 cap with the STHS style role TPE scales to help diversify the league a little and control player ability to avoid just having players be good at everything.

Nhamlet · 09-21-2020, 01:01 AM

What I took away is that Hamilton just clones their players/users.

caltroit_red_flames · 09-21-2020, 01:18 AM

You've identified a problem and instead of proposing a solution you said "let's drop some C4 on the whole system and see if that fixes it".

Other real possible solutions for fixing lack of player diversity:
- Add archetypes in the mold of PBE and ISFL's
- Modify the update scale

Evok · 09-21-2020, 01:27 AM

Theres no way i would agree to be locked off tpe i earn. You already do it in jr and its too much...

Andy · 09-21-2020, 01:50 AM

I'm not capping at 1700 TPE that takes the fun out of it and doesn't motivate people to be top earners because what's the point then? They should be rewarded for going above and beyond. I think the update scale should be changed to allow 800 - 1200 to be more *viable (keyword here) vs where they are now. I would like to see testing done at going over 20 to 21 for an exorbitant amount of TPE as a possibility but testing and such would be needed and possibly only one stat could go over 20 or something?

caltroit_red_flames · 09-21-2020, 01:51 AM

09-21-2020, 01:50 AMAndy Wrote: I'm not capping at 1700 TPE that takes the fun out of it and doesn't motivate people to be top earners because what's the point then? They should be rewarded for going above and beyond. I think the update scale should be changed to allow 800 - 1200 to be more *viable (keyword here) vs where they are now. I would like to see testing done at going over 20 to 21 for an exorbitant amount of TPE as a possibility but testing and such would be needed and possibly only one stat could go over 20 or something?

Going over 20 does not improve the attribute unfortunately.

*Carpy48* · 09-21-2020, 02:06 AM

btw. your chart looks a bit like a butterfly.

09-21-2020, 01:27 AMEvok Wrote: Theres no way i would agree to be locked off tpe i earn. You already do it in jr and its too much...

Also for goalies TPE makes no difference anyway, let us have more.

***hockeyiscool*** · 09-21-2020, 03:53 AM

How about we go the other direction and allow skill ratings above 20, there's your next article.

**RomanesEuntDomus** · 09-21-2020, 04:51 AM

I didn't think your previous idea was stupid at all, but this one kinda is Tongue

. At least you good a good article out of it though!

dankoa · 09-21-2020, 05:03 AM

yeah please don’t do this

Avakael · 09-21-2020, 05:15 AM

what about a case for putting a cap in your ass buddy

Avakael · 09-21-2020, 05:17 AM

For real, though, if people are just putting up the same build, address that directly. Capping TPE outright will just mean everyone will have the same build, just with only 1700 TPE. If some stats are clearly superior to others, well, that's why we had strengths and weaknesses. We can probably do that but better.

***golden_apricot*** · 09-21-2020, 06:25 AM

09-21-2020, 05:17 AMAvakael Wrote: For real, though, if people are just putting up the same build, address that directly. Capping TPE outright will just mean everyone will have the same build, just with only 1700 TPE. If some stats are clearly superior to others, well, that's why we had strengths and weaknesses. We can probably do that but better.

yes some attributes are just better, why put 100 tpe into fighting skill when you dont fight more often than someone with 5? I agree that some system of strengths and weaknesses is likely the best route here but that is not the first route that HO should take when it comes to player building, an alteration of the update scale at lower tpe is the first step they should and are working on.

**RomanesEuntDomus** · 09-21-2020, 06:51 AM

Unpopular opinion/question but are lower/mid-TPE players really doing that poorly? Things have definitely gotten tougher for them compared to STHS but some of that might also be due to the general lack of parity we have seen so far which should work itself out over the next few seasons, with hopefully fewer super rosters around to trample on everyone else.

The update scale is already so much more forgiving in the lower attributes than the high ones, going from 5 to 13, which is half of the entire attribute range, costs you just 32 TPE. This is less than it costs you to get one measly point to get from 18 to 19. If we made that discrepancy even bigger by softening the scale in the lower tiers or making it tougher in the high ones then things would start to look pretty absurd imho. What would probably help lower-TPE players the most would be to maybe make the middle-tier of the scale more forgiving, the part between 13 and 17 where you start actually developing your strengths. But then we run into the issue that this also benefits the high-TPE players so while the gap would get somewhat smaller, we would pay for that with some more inflation at the top-end.

Samsung virtual assistant · 09-21-2020, 08:08 AM

09-21-2020, 06:51 AMRomanesEuntDomus Wrote: Unpopular opinion/question but are lower/mid-TPE players really doing that poorly? Things have definitely gotten tougher for them compared to STHS but some of that might also be due to the general lack of parity we have seen so far which should work itself out over the next few seasons, with hopefully fewer super rosters around to trample on everyone else.

The update scale is already so much more forgiving in the lower attributes than the high ones, going from 5 to 13, which is half of the entire attribute range, costs you just 32 TPE. This is less than it costs you to get one measly point to get from 18 to 19. If we made that discrepancy even bigger by softening the scale in the lower tiers or making it tougher in the high ones then things would start to look pretty absurd imho. What would probably help lower-TPE players the most would be to maybe make the middle-tier of the scale more forgiving, the part between 13 and 17 where you start actually developing your strengths. But then we run into the issue that this also benefits the high-TPE players so while the gap would get somewhat smaller, we would pay for that with some more inflation at the top-end.

^^

i had 17 points as a 800 tpe defenseman on the lower pairings, and i wasnt even in the talks for ROTY. I think this talk about what is viable and not is getting absurd. Most rookies arent good at all in the NHL, in FHM everyone at least scores a couple points per season. over 90% of the players in the league scored 10 or more points this season. Sure it sucks, but everyone isn't going to make a splash their first season, and those who do play on lines with good players, just like it usually is in real life.

The thing i hate the most with this 1-20 system is that it takes literally several weeks to improve 1 attribute when you get high enough.

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