First post, but I'll try to get straight to the point.
As I believe in getting it right the first time (no sense in dragging this out and wasting your guys' time with excessive back-and-forths), I'd like to lay out the user case so you can very accurately gauge, understand where I'm coming from and exactly what I'm looking for (see: "What I'm Hoping to Achieve").
Feel free to skip this part, but it's some background on me and where I'm coming from:
Spoiler:
What I'm Wondering About:
I am interested in playing the game purely Sim. If I play the actual games themselves, I find it will get boring at some point relatively quickly as it simply becomes too easy to beat (despite not cheesing, and playing on highest difficulty settings) - I also have a hard time withholding myself from obsessively demanding so much of myself (detail wise) in each game that though it can still certainly be fun, just also becomes unnecessarily stressful and more importantly, time consuming! Manually playing a single game can take over an hour of my time, and while I may not mind doing that every now and then, I'm all about efficiency, so if I'm not gaining much benefit/learning from playing the game than I could be doing something else (ex: Simming) then I get bored (and a bit frustrated as I retrospect), relatively quickly. I'd like to Sim because I then have to figure out how to optimize everything to still make it (the team) successful and work, which is exciting to me. So then, say, in a given hour I will have had to resolve and work through so many more things than I would've simply manually playing the game (where for example, breaking down the defense, coverages, etc can become very easy and will have been basically all I had to do).
What I'd like to avoid:
Building some unrealistic juggernaut of a team that would never actually exist in real life (ex: the current real-life Rams team somehow staying as talented as they are for more than the next ~2-3 years).
I think what I'd ultimately liken it to is I'd like to run a team like the Patriots, where they never really have many superstars, but their COACHING and preparation is so outstanding that they are able to take ~average/above-average players and make the whole team GREAT (and obviously highly successful) because of how they so efficiently utilize each player to their strengths, within their given roles (Bill Belichick has a quote I always liked: "Know your personnel!" - very true in anything! Management, etc).
How likely is the above (re: Patriots philosophy) possible in Madden? Or is Madden still set up to where the AI figures if you don't have superstars then you aren't doing sh*t (and will largely ensure this)? I ask because I envision a team that's mostly not going to be 90+ OVR players, with the exception of very few positions (ie. forces the realistic Cap Philosophy: "what positions are worth investing disproportionately in, to me? Because the rest, I need to spread out across a 53 man roster") - it's hopefully going to mostly be a constant building and re-building process where I need to always be developing talent, remaining competitive, and ever on the look out for the next talent (just as it is in the real world), because in a sport with an actual salary cap, you need to be creative and constantly working.
What I'm Hoping to Achieve:
A Sim that is not easy and is also very realistic.
Some things that constitute realistic to me I guess could be:
- Realistic performance statistics (ex: QB's not throwing for 6,000 yds),
- Injuries are very impactful (as they are in real life) and occur at a realistic frequency,
- Importance of depth chart ("next man up!"). The 1st String should be the obvious starters but your 2nd Stringers do certainly need to be at least capable to fill in during injuries to tie you over; ex: you lose your starting LT so you need to have a well-prepared backup plan, a lineman who's obviously most likely not absolute starter material but has solid enough stats to fill in. This actually ties in together with the next one ==>
- Importance of player development. On a real team, even the backups all get coached up - so it's important that the whole team develops, so that you can have "next man up" be effective.
- Realistic player development
- Cap Management! Forcing me to really consider Cap Philosophy - ie. what positions are most valuable to me and worth expending extra $$$ on (ex: "Free Safety, MLB, and QB are three that I feel I absolutely need to ensure very high level talent at, so when those are up for contract negotiations, I'll be a lot more willing to listen to their demands, even though I need to spread the $$$ out across 53 players")
- Team/Organization Financials (ex: needing to actually fill seats, and sell merchandise/etc to fund Signing Bonuses, etc). This puts more pressure on me to have to handle more things to make the whole thing work, as I can't just get away with "cheesing" player contracts (ex: "all signing bonus, because that's not my problem!").
That's all I can think of for now.
What mods, slider sets, house rules, or settings and things of that nature do you guys think would maximize the odds of the above being replicable?
I sincerely and truly do appreciate any and all of your replies on this!
I've long held out on returning to Madden because I wasn't sure how doable this is, but with it finally returning to PC, I've thought to buy it and see about giving it a go since with it being on PC I assume a lot more is possible now.
Thank you all!
- Biological
