tinpanalley wrote:Ok, cool. Just wanted some feedback. That's all useful. In my experience with sports games, you have to know what the different skill levels do in order to know how to tweak sliders. In NHL 04 (I know, sort of random, but it's just one good example) as you go from easy to the hardest level, what actually happens is that the game goes from boosting your attributes to dampening them. So the easiest mode has everyone skating around top speed like the ice has absolutely no resistance and every little check sends players flying. Then you go to the hardest level and everything becomes more laboured. Is there a similar progression in Madden 08 or is it like more games where it simply changes the skill level of the CPU?
It's hard to say. Awareness determines to some degree jump animations, closeness of defensive coverage, and maybe if they'll intercept instead of swat.
QB Accuracy seems to affect both the accuracy of throws and the distance. It's recommended to notch it down a bit of you don't want bullshit magic 60+ yard bombs by the CPU in 4th quarter.
RB ability works in conjunction with the break tackle slider in obvious and vague ways. For example, obviously it makes breaking tackles easier and taking down the RB harder, but that's also affected by the defensive "tackle" stat in the opposite direction. But RB ability also works with the RB's awareness I think for certain animations I think (like the sideways skirt between defenders/blockers). I turn RB ability up to between 52 and 58, but turn down break tackle to 35 or so.
Then there's the ones for your O and D-line, which affect pancakes, whether blocks break, and so on. Most people set those low, like 18-20. I think I have them around 34 and 36 though. Definitely turn interceptions down. At the default of 50 you'll be looking at easily 4-6 picks against you in any given game, and possibly 7-10 total per game. I turn it down to 7. Leads to between 1 and 4 picks per game total, which seems more realistic to me.
I also turn up all penalties to at least 70, because at the defaults penalties rarely occur. I also turn defensive pass interference way up to like 95, because it's bullshit that it rarely gets called on obvious interference at defaults.
But.... yeah, it's not simple, and it's not obvious how everything interacts. I played a year of franchise playing with the sliders as I went, then started over with a new franchise, tested again until I got something that felt right by game 4 or 5 of my current first season. It's something you can only really work with on feel, but you can check out the sliders sub-forum for tips and other peoples' settings. I personally think I need to turn some of the CPU settings up because I'm stomping all over them. But then, the Eagles are 8-1 right now in real life and I'm at 11-2 currently, so I'm waiting to see how things pan out next season after the draft before I make any further changes. I have had some close games and one or two I was losing but turned around in the last few minutes, so it's not a constant stomp-fest, which is another reason to wait and see, since my team has consistently had better stats than CPU ones I've played against.
