Interesting info on PBAI values

[Ben75]

Recently I decided to try and figure out what some of these PBAI values in the playbook files actually mean. Although Packfan's playbook editor is awesome and one of the best utilities for this game, I've come to think some of the labels he applies to the PBAI tags are off.

Here's what I did: I created a playbook and assigned each PBAI value to one and only one play. Then I renamed the play to the number of the tag, and played some games while using the playbook and hitting the "Ask Madden" button before each play. Made some surprising discoveries.

First, only about 13 tags were actually called on during my games, excluding special teams situations, and it became quite predictable. I'll run down the list of what I saw:

(I am mostly ignoring run/pass and focusing primarily on down and distance situations. I think in Packfan's editor he must have looked at what the default PBAI values were set for custom playbooks, which might certainly give clues, but is unreliable at best.)

PBAI 1: I'm convinced this is for 3rd and short yardage (1-3 yards) for pretty much anywhere on the field except the goalline. I recorded one exception (1st and ten at the 23 yardline) but I never saw it repeated.

PBAI 3: This signals a goalline situation. I only saw this tag called upon when inside the 5 yard line (1st, 2nd, and 3rd). Probably goalline running situations. I never observed it called upon in short yardage outside of the five yardline.

PBAI 4: This is not short yardage run, but rather redzone offense for 1st and 2nd down. If the cpu is anwyhere between the 20 and 5 yardline, this is the tag called upon. I saw no other values called (so it must be for both run and pass, but I also didn't recall having a 2nd and long there. On third down, other PBAI values come in to play. PBAI 4 is only called in the redzone.

PBAI 6: This one is important. It has nothing to do with two minutes as labeled in the editor. It covers all plays run on second down, minus long yardage situations (over 12-13 yards). Whether it's 2nd and one yard or 2nd and 12, the game engine looks to plays tagged with this value.

PBAI 7: This is for 3rd and medium (4 to 8 yards, approximately). If you have 3rd and 5 in the redzone, the game looks here.

PBAI 8: This one is for long yardage situations (3rd and 8+ or 1st, 2nd down and 10-12+), and it's correctly labeled in the playbook editor.

PBAI 10: As labeled in the editor, this is for two minute offense (passing).

PBAI 13: Also labeled correctly as clock control run.

PBAI 21: This is not for WR Options, but for Hail Marys. The only time I saw it was when I set up and Hail Mary situation (down by 3+, seconds left in the game).

PBAI 22: This one I can't really tell, but it was called upon a few times. I only saw it in short yardage situations.

PBA 38: The cpu looks to this for first down plays, seemingly 99% of the time. (correct in the editor)

PBAI 40: This is called short yardage pass, and this appears to be correct. It is usually called for on third down, but I saw exceptions.

While it may be suprising, these are the *only* PBAI values I have thus far seen called in the game. There may be rare scenarios that rely on the others but I haven't seen them yet. I plan to keep looking, though.

I'm starting to think that the mechanics of the play have little to do with most of these PBAI values, and that they have mostly to do with down/distance, field position, score, etc...though admittedly I don't know how one would determine whether a particular value is an outside run vs. and inside. All we can really do is look at the game situation and observe what's happening.

I tried adding two tags to a lot of plays and noting what came up, but it still looked like the above tags are the most important ones. Particularly important is PBAI 6, which covers second down plays outside the red zone, universally. If you're like me you had very few plays tagged to this value and so the cpu is not making use of the variability contained in your playbook. A good rule of thumb: if a play is an important part of the offense if should be tagged with PBAI 38 or 6, or both. Otherwise, the cpu will not likely run it.

[Drizzt_13]

Do you have any theories on why the other tags were never called? It would be interesting if we could develop a program that altered these tags so as to develop more nuance in coach playcalling. I would try to help you and do a similar test but my madden install is pretty messed up right now, I can't go more than two years in a franchise before it won't progress through free agency and anytime I try to open up the playbook or roster features in madden it crashes.

[Ben75]

A few more observations:

PBAI 5: This appears to be used exclusively when a team is backed up inside their own 10 yard line.

For PBAI 6: I noticed in my last test there were a couple of plays when this was called upon on first down in the opposing team's territory (40-20 yardline). This puzzles me, since PBAI 6 is called upon on second down all other times (other than the redzone and inside your own ten). I was ahead 9-0 with 8 minutes in the second quarter when this happened. Perhaps the tag is designed for more conservative playcalling situations, but it's hard to conclude that when it is called exclusively on 2nd and 1 as well as 2nd and 10.

PBAI 1 is also called in 3rd and 4 situations around the goalline as well.

As far as why the other tags aren't being called, I'm at a loss. I thought maybe that they operate as sub-categories. For example, on a given down and distance the game engine goes first to the main tags, and then based upon the scenario looks for plays within that grouped tagged with some of the others, but here it becomes tricky to break it down further, and so far no patterns have jumped out at me.

It also occurred to me that coaching sliders may have an effect, so I went into franchise mode and cranked up the offensive coaching slider to 100% aggressive, but again I've noticed nothing different so far.

All in all, here is what it looks like to me so far:

PBAI 1: short yardage, 3rd and 4 or less
PBAI 2: No Huddle plays
PBAI 3: Goalline offense (inside the five)
PBAI 4: Redzone offense (20 yard line to the five)
PBAI 5: Backed up inside own ten
PBAI 6: Second down plays, 12 yards or less (conservative playcalls?); in rare cases first down call
PBAI 7: Third and medium (4 to 8 yards)
PBAI 8: Long yardage situations

PBAI 10: Two minute offense
PBAI 13: Clock control

PBAI 17: ???
PBAI 20: ???
PBAI 21: Hail Mary
PBAI 22: Some sort of short yardage call (rarely called)
PBAI 23: ???

PBAI 26-31: ???

PBAI 34-37: ???

PBAI 38: First down plays
PBAI 40: Short yardage passing (4 yards to go or less), anywhere on the field

The reason I'm convinced the primary determinant is down and distance is because I see no deviations whatsoever from the above structure. Now, it's possible the "play type" tag comes into the picture but I haven't looked at that yet. That might be what I do next.

BUT... I suspect that the "play type" tag is what the engine uses to control playcalling based on the run/pass ratio and conservative/aggressive settings. In the .pbo file under the PBAI table, each entry has the play number, the AIGR tag, and a percentage. By default, the play percentages are distributed evenly among all the plays for a given tag. So, if you have ten first down plays (PBAI=38), then each one will have a percentage of ten. It seems reasonable that when the run/pass slider is manipulated, the game engine reads the play types contained in each PBAI category and adjusts the percentages accordingly. Just a hypothesis at this point.

[solarkev]

Great work Ben75.

Is it possible that the unused PBAIs are for defense?

[Ben75]

Defensive PBAI tags are separate values.

I did find out that PBAI 37 is for two point conversion plays. I also suspect that PBAI 34 might be specifically for a QB sneak (inches to go), though that's iffy at this point. I've only seen it called once - on a 4th and inches at the goalline.

[Gridiron]

Ben75, do you know of any or the best way to permanently overwrite or reselect the 5 audibles in a user's playbook?

I do not like having to manually select them every game.

Thanks.

[Ben75]

This is not something I've messed with, but the audibles in your user profile might be overriding the ones set in your playbook, so you might try not using a profile during your game. Other than that, I'm not sure. You can try selecting audibles in your profile that correspond to the formations you have in your custom playbook and see if that works.

[Ben75]

UPDATE:

Now that we have an uncompressed stock offensive playbook, I went back through and looked at AIGR values and saw what plays the cpu had tagged to stock playbook (bears). Here is what I know:

[stock pb=] denotes what play and formation mixes the game has tagged to the AIGR #.

AIGR 1: Third and short situation from pretty much anywhere on the field; stock pb = most all formations, mostly run plays w/ some PA and short passes mixed in.

AIGR 3: Goal line running situations; stock pb = mostly power running/GL formations, nearly all runs (inside and out) with a couple PA passes and one normal curl play

AIGR 4: Red zone 1st and 2nd down (5-20 yards to go); stock pb = mostly runs (about 75%) and mid-short passing

AIGR 5: Backed up near own goal line; nearly all formations (including GL); stock pb=mostly runs with some safer passes

AIGR 6: Second down plays (2 to 12 yards); stock pb = any formation, pretty much any play (170 plays tagged with this value)

AIGR 7: 3rd and medium; stock pb = any formation (including GL), short and medium passes w/ draws and some outside runs mixed in

AIGR 8: Long yardage; stock pb= all pass plays, mostly deep throws

AIGR 10: Two-minute offense; stock pb= mostly shotgun (3,4, and 5 WR sets), all pass plays with the exception of 1 draw play.

AIGR 13: Clock-control run; stock pb= mostly running formations (including GL), all running plays

AIGR 17: This values has nearly every running play (minus the reverses and end-arounds). Not sure why.

AIGR 20: This value has nearly every pass play. Again, not sure why.

AIGR 21: Hail Mary plays

AIGR 22: Can't tell what the tag is for, but stock pb = all goal line formation PA passes + 2 short passes from I-formation.

AIGR 34: Seems like a short yardage situation; stock pb = mostly power formations (including goalline) with some 3-4 WR sets mixed in, mostly runs with a few passes

AIGR 35: stock pb = mostly passing formations, mid-deep passes with some draws and screens

AIGR 36: this tag only contains pass plays (multiple WR mostly but some I-form plays mixed in); stock pb = medium passes with some deep throws

AIGR 37: stock pb = multiple formations (including GL), nearly all runs with a few short passes sprinkled in.

AIGR 38: first down plays

AIGR 40: short yardage passing; stock pb = all PA passes, mostly from goal line formation but with a few passing formations as well.


AIGR 23 and 26-31 are not referenced at all, so I think at this point we can conclude they are not used. As of now, I'm interested in: (17, 20, and 22) and (34-37)

With the exception of #22 which I've seen only once, none of the other tags in these two groups ever showed up. I can think of a few reasons why. Perhaps they are secondary tags that are only called upon after the first tag. So, on first down, the cpu nearly always looks to #38. Then based on the run/pass sliders, it might go to #17 or #20 for either a run or pass.

Or perhaps there is even a third level involving 34-37 with respect to the conservative/aggressive sliders. I cant' really say at this point, but I'd like to hear some other opinions on this. I'm attaching the playbook.

It's also important to note that these are the values for one team; the play makeup would likely be different for others.

[JDHalfrack]

You're doing some good work here! More playbooks should help you out (I hope). Here are playbooks 41-44. I'll pull out more later this week.

Just a little side note: I pulled out some of the other files in Gamedata.Dat (files 80 and beyond). They contain like mini playbooks that have the routes run in the passing drills and mini camp practices and things like that. Interesting, but not really helpful.

Anyway, good luck, and keep up the good work!

JD

[Ben75]

Thanks a bunch. I'll take a close look at them when I have time.