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| Main / Rookie Area / How to build a new franchise Search Forum | |
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| posted: 2021-07-26 15:05:04 (ID: 100160610) Edits found: 6 Report Abuse | |
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Preseason
Claymore 1, here we go. The team got a spot in the NC North division, which is pretty competitive. The Gladiators III, a elite relegated team, will probably be the division leader. We want to battle for the second spot with the NI Ravens, which joined the game in season 41. The Voghera Locomotives, a veteran team, has missed to sign contracts with all their defense players, so will have a very tough season. The first two league games will be a real challenge, playing the probably best NC teams, but generally I expect many interesting close games. There will be even a chance to reach the playoffs in the first year. The Supercup schedule is very tough. 4 top teams, three of them from Elite league and 3 more games against very competitive teams. So the playoffs aren't a realistic target. The Champ of champs draw isn't much better, we will be playing the reigning Claymore 1 champ in round 1. Due to our schedule it doesn't make much sense to push the development of the team this season. So we will continue the slower build of the team. I have agreed a series of friendly games against another Claymore 1 team, the Stone Mointain Hawks 2. They are owned by another top manager, who just re-joined the game 3 weeks before I started this project. They are pushing a bit more and seem to be a bit ahead of us. Let's see, if an interesting rivalery develops. 1) Front Office -> Sponsors I recommend to choose either the one with the lowest or highest weekly base payment depending on your expected success. For my team it didn't seem to make a big difference this season based on our schedule. I tend to be optimistic, so I went for the highest bonus payments. 2) Team -> Draft Board I am not going to gamble on possibly uncapped physicals, so I am having only 24 players on my list. 6 of them are marked as top picks. I have probably my biggest need on the offensive line, but will go for the best available player in the first round. Depending on my first pick and the available player I may prioritize an OLer in round 2. 3) Team -> Playbook For the moment I will continue with just one playbook. The defense playbook has just 18 lines and varies the formations based on the down and yards to go. Additionally there are some settings for the end of each half to avoid big plays. The offense playbook has more than 100 lines to cover special situations. Especially on 4th downs and the end of the halfs. In the future there will be a second experience playbook to favour specific formations to give the positions, where experience needs to be improved most, some more playing time.  Scouting is a very big topic on the playbook design. There are some top teams, which prepare individual playbooks for most games. If the offense of your opponent is quite predictable, it can give you an advantage to guess right on pass/rush plays and to have the corresponding formations on the field. Scouting of the opponents defense isn't that benefical from my point of view, but can give you also some hints (e.g. if always very run or pass heavy formations are used against a specific formation).
Scouting and preparing a playbook can easily take a few hours. It can give you the key benefit in an important game, but in some cases you can have the better team, the perfect playbook and you will still loose due to bad luck. Defense I like LB blitzes very much and have them normally set to 75% except the opponents QB is quicker than my blitzing players or I am pretty sure to expect running plays. I believe a sack is the easiest way to stop a drive. I don't recommend to use the Dime and 3-1-7 formations, they aren't very effective. The Goalline defense shall be used only in goalline situations, else there is a high risk of a big play. I normally also don't use the 5-2 and 4-3-4 defense. 3-3-5: best pass defense, but tends to give up many 1st downs on running plays, allows very few big plays 3-4-4: good pass defense, moderate running defense, allows some big plays 4-4-3: average pass defense, good running defense, allows many big plays 5-3-3: average pass defense, best running defense, but gives up more long runs than the 4-4-3, allows most big plays Offense Normally I use all formations and won't prepare for standard situations in the playbook. Nevertheless it may make sense to create also settings for the standard situations in the playbooks. E.g. if you don't have a good player on a specific postion and want to avoid some formations or if you spotted a weakness in the defense of your opponent. 4) Games -> Games I have created 3 profiles setting the depth chart, playbook and 1st/2nd/3rd down orders. Pass and Rush Standard depth chart, 1st/2nd down: pass and rush, 3rd down: mainly pass Prefer Pass Standard depth chart, 1st/2nd down: prefer pass, 3rd down: mainly pass Mainly Pass Experience depth chart, 1st/2nd/3rd down: mainly pass The first two one's will be set for the competitive games to give some variation and to avoid being scoutable. The last one will be used in friendlies and bot games. I want my players to get as many snaps as possible to gain maximum experience. As run plays always consume 30 seconds and incomplete passes only 10 seconds, I will massively pass in these games. Last edited on 2021-07-27 12:49:43 by Shadow |
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| posted: 2021-07-27 12:53:43 (ID: 100160624) Edits found: 2 Report Abuse | |
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Day 3
What a start! We have won our first game with a last minute field goal against the top team in our division. Additionally the NI Ravens went bot, so it looks like it is very realistic to reach the league playoffs. The next tough games are on the schedule. Bandits, an Elite team, in the Supercup tonight and tomorrow Madrid, the probably best team in the Claymores NC conference. Let's see, if we can make another surprise. This seasons draft was very successful. The number 1 and 2 of our draftboard joined the team. A 22yo strength 50 / speed 50 defender with very good intelligence. He can play LB or DL and is already well trained, but needs more experience. And a 20yo DLer with strength 50 and also very good speed and intelligence. In round 3 we have got a reasonable kicker as the leftover. I will try to sell him, but if he doesn't find a new team, he could also stay as a backup for our top kicker. Defensively the team has a very good foundation now. Offensively the OL is still our problem. All players are very young and talented, but not at league 1 level yet. We have seen it already in the first game, that the team will have problems to establish a running game this season. Last edited on 2021-08-02 05:24:53 by Shadow |
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| posted: 2021-08-06 05:27:15 (ID: 100160834) Report Abuse | |
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Day 7
The first 4 tough games have been played and the team has done exceptionally well. Probably we have been unterestimated. We had the halftime lead in all games, but lost the last two one's due to too many inteceptions. You could say bad luck, but I would say it's been the better quality of the opponents players. @ Gladiators III: 30 - 29 / Rating 65.3 - 73.0 / Yards 317 - 451 / Turnovers 2 - 1 / Sacks 9 - 0 @ Bretzfeld Bandits: 28 - 17 / Rating 67.4 - 74.8 / Yards 444 - 414 / Turnovers 0 - 0 / Sacks 7- 4 Madrid 20212: 24 - 26 / Rating 67.3 - 80.6 / Yards 422 - 316 / Turnovers 1 - 5 / Sacks 5 - 0 @ Diorite Lions: 20 - 31 / Rating 66.9 - 81.1 / Yards 419 - 344 / Turnovers 1 - 4 / Sacks 6 - 7 Generally one pattern was visible in all games, our opponents dominited both sides of the lines, which resulted in a rushing avarage of 3.0 yards vs 5.3 yards. The defense mostly did their job and the pass rush concept seems to work. We are at 27 - 11 sacks after the first 4 games. I have recruited the missing QB and CB assitant coach, so our coaching staff is complete now. HC 47yo / 80 CP / 3* EXP / 4* Con QB 44yo / 67 CP / 2.5* EXP / 4.5* Con RB 42yo / 62 CP / 2.5* EXP / 4* Con WR 36yo / 65 CP / 2* EXP / 4* Con OL 35yo / 78 CP / 1.5* EXP / 3* Con DL 43yo / 71 CP / 2.5* EXP / 3.5* Con LB 35yo / 76 CP / 2* EXP / 4.5* Con CB 50Yo / 67 CP / 3* EXP / 4.5* Con SF 43yo / 63 CP / 2.5* EXP / 4.5* Con Additionally two more players have joined the team. A 24 yo blocking back FB and a 25 yo DT. Both will give the team more experience and increase the quality of our starters. |
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| posted: 2021-08-27 13:35:13 (ID: 100161161) Report Abuse | |
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Day 28
The team is playing a great season so far with a 6-1 league and 7-1 supercup record. Currently the schedule is a bit easier with just 3 competitive games in the last weeks: Fighting Frankonian: 39 - 10 / Rating 67.5 - 64.6 / Yards 488 - 280 / Turnovers 0 - 1 / Sacks 4 - 0 Chuuou Hololivers: 30 - 14 / Rating 68.6 - 68.0 / Yards 523 - 270 / Turnovers 2 - 1 / Sacks 7- 0 Berlin Iron Tigers: 35 - 9 / Rating 69.3 - 70.3 / Yards 449 - 269 / Turnovers 0 - 0 / Sacks 5 - 0 The team managed to win them all in a very promissing way, so the league playoffs seem to be very likely and there is even a realistic chance to reach the supercup playoffs. Currently a retring manager is selling a few interesting players and I have decided to boost the team a bit more due to the current playoff situation. Still I will stay away from bidding wars and keep my salary cap of roughly 150k per player. I have just renewed my supporter account (RZA Store -> Supporter). I prefer to watch the games with the premium gamecenter. But most importantly I like to use multiple depth charts and game setting profiles. Also the transfer agent (Team -> Transfer Agent) is a great help to identity interesting players on the maerket.
You can get 5 credits per day by voting for the game on OnlineSportsManager.com (RZA Store -> Vote for RedZoneAction.org). |
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| posted: 2021-09-14 10:44:01 (ID: 100161442) Report Abuse | |
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Day 46
The winning streak continues. Some more exceptional wins by the team. The most impressive one was the second win against the Gladiators III, which has nailed the division title and the playoffs. It looks like even the bye week is already secured. Actually I would have preferred to get some income from the wild card game, but our bank balance is already well filled and we should have an extra game in the supercup playoffs. 4 top games are waiting next week. Guns&Roses (Supercup), Wildcats (CoC), BoneCrushers (Supercup) and Baguio Bucks (League). We will be the underdog in all 4 games. In the Supercup games the team just needs to avoid some blowout losses. We are currently 12-1 with a 579 point difference. In the past seasons a 12-3 record with at least a point difference of 457 was sufficiant to reach the playoffs. Champ of Champs will be the first real playoff game for the team. On a certain day anything can happen, but I fear we will need much luck and a perfect day to reach the second round. @Birmingham Dragons: 27 - 17 / Rating 69.9 - 65.6 / Yards 371 - 360 / Turnovers 3 - 1 / Sacks 4 - 0 Ibiza Flamingos: 51 - 24 / Rating 70.0 - 67.1 / Yards 618 - 312 / Turnovers 1 - 1 / Sacks 6- 0 Gladiators III: 19 - 13 / Rating 70.5 - 73.6 / Yards 377 - 330 / Turnovers 1 - 0 / Sacks 9 - 0 DolphinsPisa: 44 - 0 / Rating 70.7 - 67.0 / Yards 605 - 115 / Turnovers 0 - 0 / Sacks 2 - 0 I have bought 5 more cheap quality players on the transfer market. This brings us to 13 starters on the current roster, which have playoff quality. I did some very basic scouting this season. It has been a bit of a surprise, that many of my league 1 opponents don't have own playbooks and still use the default settings. This can be easily identfied, if they are playing pretty much the Dime defense against the Shotgun or if they run out of the I-formation / Wishbone on 3rd & 1 or 3rd & 2/3. I did set up a specific playbook for these games to utilize the weaknesses of these settings. E.g. I used the 5-3-3 defense on 3rd and short or played offensively pretty often a Shotgun formation on short yardage situations. |
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| posted: 2021-09-17 09:10:32 (ID: 100161499) Report Abuse | |
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Day 49
Another huge victory against a Dragons 1 top team secures the playoff spot. @Guns&Roses: 49 - 20 / Rating 71.8 - 82.8 / Yards 584 - 339 / Turnovers 0 - 0 / Sacks 4 - 1 There had been two factors for the result. Guns&Roses is having very basic playbooks. E.g. defensively they seem to have only one playbook line for each offensiv formation. So I could use this and had 20 of our 21 rushing plays against the 3-4-4 defense. Offensively it was also quite predictable, when they will be running. As a result I had on 19 of their 26 rushing plays my 5-3-3 on the field. Secondly the team had very good dayform, nearly all players seemed to overperform. Tonight we will visit the Wildcats for the first Champ of champs game. This one will be really tough. They are having good playbooks, which makes them unscoutable. But the team is highly motivated and will try to carry over the form from the last game. Realisticly I see a 10% chance against a well coached team, that is rated about 12 points higher. Let's see, what happens tonight. |
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| posted: 2021-09-23 07:42:18 (ID: 100161607) Report Abuse | |
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Day 55
The winning streak continues... a remarkable win against the Wildcats in the Champ of champs cup brings us an easy 2nd round game against a bot. @Highland Wildcats: 38 - 24 / Rating 72.3 - 83.4 / Yards 508 - 310 / Turnovers 3 - 2 / Sacks 4 - 3 @BoneCrushers: 33 - 17 / Rating 71.6 - 83.2 / Yards 475 - 409 / Turnovers 1 - 1 / Sacks 8 - 1 @Baguio Bucks: 35 - 13 / Rating 71.7 - 74.3 / Yards 500 - 355 / Turnovers 0 - 0 / Sacks 11 - 0 Tonight Angus, one of the RZA legends, is awaiting our team in the Supercup playoffs. His Black Dragons had been sometimes pretty inconsistent in the last seasons, but are definitively our most experienced opponent in franchise history. Let's see what happens... |
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| posted: 2021-09-29 12:49:55 (ID: 100161709) Report Abuse | |
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Day 61
A heavy defeat aginst the Black Dragons in the first Supercup playoff round ended the first tournament. The results looks pretty bad, but at least the offense was able to move the ball. @Black Dragons: 6 - 41 / Rating 71.8 - 82.7 / Yards 377 - 355 / Turnovers 1 - 3 / Sacks 6 - 11 Next are the Space Kraken, another Monarchs top team, in the 3rd round of the Champ of champs cup. Realisticly I am expectic a similar game as against the Black Dragons. In the league divisional playoff we will play the Gladiators III the third time this season. The team had been able to win the first two close matchups. It shall be another very close game this time, so anything can happen. |
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| posted: 2021-10-05 05:38:49 (ID: 100161787) Report Abuse | |
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Day 67
Two more games have been played. The team gave the Space Kraken a fantastic fight in the Champ of champs quarter final. Unfortunately we had at least one turnover two much for another surprise win. The divisional playoff game against the Gladiators was even closer and we managed to beat them the third time this season, which is a real achievement. @Space Kraken: 28 - 34 / Rating 73.0 - 83.1 / Yards 413 - 406 / Turnovers 1 - 3 / Sacks 4 - 6 Gladiators III: 24 - 23 / Rating 72.9 - 74.7 / Yards 453 - 404 / Turnovers 1 - 2 / Sacks 14 - 0 Tonight we will play the number 1 seed, the Rockford Titans, in the Conference final. They are having an experienced manager, but never had the really big success. Both teams seem to be at a similar talent level, so everything seems to be possible. The winner will advance to bowl game and represent the Claymore region in the Elite league next season. |
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| posted: 2021-10-14 12:30:38 (ID: 100161920) Edits found: 1 Report Abuse | |
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Day 75
I am so proud. What a major achievement of the team... Claymore 1 Champion in season 2 of the franchise history. Amazing and totally unexpected. @Rockford Titans: 52 - 17 / Rating 73.1 - 72.1 / Yards 586 - 326 / Turnovers 0 - 2 / Sacks 10 - 0 @Hell Hounds: 27 - 20 / Rating 73.7 - 79.6 / Yards 430 - 341 / Turnovers 2 - 3 / Sacks 7 - 1 I think there are two factors for the success. Firstly having a good roster composition with the right skills at the key positions. This made the concept work to stop the opponents offense by an outstanding pass rush. Secondly scouting and adjusting the playbooks in the key games was evenly important. The Titans in the Conference championship game had been very predictable and were using simple playbooks. They had been using basically only one specific defense formation against each offense formation. So I could use the formations, where I expected a week defense on the field. Defensively I knew, when they will be running. My base defense playbook has only 20 lines and I had to add 35 extra lines to perfectly match the Titans offense. As a result I had always the 5-3-3 against rushing plays and the 3-3-5 or 3-4-4 against passing plays on the field. The bowl game against the Hell Hounds was a different story. I had scouted them before and knew, they are having a quite complex playbook, which ment 192 extra lines on my defensive playbook. At the end this was probably the key to success. They had been running the ball 40 times and I had my 5-3-3 28 times on the field. On these plays the defense allowed only 2 yards per run, while it had been 6.9 avarage yards against the other defense formations. Knowing your opponent can help your team much, but scouting your opponent can take much time. There had been days, where I spend about 4 hours for a single game to scout the opponent and adjust the playbook. I have limited this very much in the meantime due to many reasons. Generally there are 4 types of opponents:
1) Using the default playbook (I have talked about this already) 2) Simple custom playbook - These teams vary their playcalling only by formation, quarter and yards to go. This make it pretty easy to scout them and also the playbooks can be adjusted very quickly to match their tactics. 3) Complex custom playbook - The playcalling varies also by position on the field and / minutes played in the quarter. This makes it a pain to adjust the playbook against them. In key games it may make sense to invest some time. 4) Multiple playbooks - The playbooks may not be too complex, but they contradict each other. E.g. Running on 1st down in the 1 Quarter in the first playbook and Passing in the same situation in the second playbook. I would say 60% of the top teams are falling into category 4 and another 35% into category 3. If I know a team is in category 4, I don't scout them anymore. I use my standard settings with some minor changes to surprise them. For the other teams I am doing some basic scouting on important games. Normally I take their last 10 competitive games and analyse them in Excel (against opponents with complex playbooks you will need at least 25 games). You can pull the data using the RZA game analyser by RonaldVennegoor or the Public interface by Pete. The easiest way to analyse the data is using pivot tables as demonstrated by Ronald in his video. On the offense I have a few very simple rules. I try to avoid running against the Goalline D, 5-3-3 and 4-4-3. If the opponent uses the Goalline D (outside goaline situations), Dime, 3-1-7, 5-2 or 4-3-4, I try to attack these formations as I believe they are less effective. Defensively I try to blitz, whenever a pass is more likely. Normally I use the 3-3-5 or 3-4-4 on any longer yardage or passing situations and the 5-3-3 or 4-4-3, when I am pretty sure the opponent will run. In most cases the 5-3-3 is the most effective run defense, but there is also a higher risk on longer runs or even big play passes, if your backfield isn't having enough quality. The 4-4-3 can be the better choice, when the opponent is always running over the ends. Having the right formation on the field can help a lot, but I have the impression the higher the quality of players the impact of the formations is reduced. Last edited on 2021-10-14 12:31:30 by Shadow |
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