Dump 'N Cheese -- Broad Street Bullies in NHL 11

Feature Article

Submitted on: 12/02/2010 by Juha Leskinen

A while ago my friend sent me this picture after an OT victory in EASHL.

This prompted me to write about the physical aspects of NHL 11 and how it affects the EASHL. Our club -- as well as our friend's club over on the PS3 side of things -- tries to play a game of hockey resembling hockey in real life. Both of our clubs have been talking about how NHL 11 exaggerates the physical aspect of the game now that the new physics engine has been introduced into the game.

If you have a team whose strategy is to hit everything that moves until your opponents are so intimidated that they fumble every single pass they try to make and can't intercept a pass if the puck was the size of a Frisbee, then it becomes very difficult to play the game for the intimidated side. After the other team has been turned into a beer-league team, then even the grinders can score a goal easily.

The problem is not the Broad Street Bullies style of hockey. In fact, I think it is amazing that you can play the game this way and do well while checking entire teams senseless. The problem is that there are not enough penalties called for interference. Even after you have dumped the puck or passed it away, you can still get flattened, and the 6-foot-11 monster just moves on and does the same to the next guy.

It can get extremely frustrating spending half the game on your back while yelling "interference" after each hit. I use a playmaker build and make sure that I pass or dump the puck early so I will not turn the puck over by stubbornly skating into a hit. But lacking the puck makes no difference because a devastating hit still takes me out for a few seconds. And that gives the opponent plenty of 3-on-2 and 2-on-1 chances in the offensive zone.

Now that the patch is out and a new tuner is out along with it, things have calmed down a little bit with the checking -- thank you EA for that. I have played maybe 10 games since the patch, and the checking has been balanced out a bit. There are more glancing blows instead of huge hits so the patch has helped. The release notes for the patch also stated that the delay regarding interference had been cut by a quarter of a second, which seems like a long time, but in my opinion it could have been cut even more. In the 10 games I have played, interference was called only once out of maybe 20 occasions where it should have been called.

I do not know why the developers have made NHL 11 so Bully-friendly. Is it just to promote the new checking engine, or is it just so difficult to balance the sliders and penalty logic?

Regardless, just to make it clear, I love to watch a team that plays a physical brand of hockey. It's just that with the current lack of interference calls, teams know this and some teams abuse it.

Going back to what started me on the subject, 62 hits in a 2-on-2 game, can anyone top this? If I recall correctly, the game ended in the third OT, but that is still 30-plus hits in a standard three-period game.

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Member Comments

# 1 addybojangles @ 12/02/10 01:54 PM

That is a RIDICULOUS number of hits. I think the record for our team is in the mid-20's and also from a game that went into three overtime periods.

It's a problem, I'll agree with you there. Although true physics engine? Yeah, I'm not buying it. When the puck can fly up, land on a goalie's back then magically appear under his pads, you're not playing with a true physics engine.

# 2 FBeaule04 @ 12/02/10 03:43 PM

Well, no doubt it's ridiculous, but you have to understand something. Either you adapt to the game, either you get drilled every game.

Our club, the Cold Ice Holes had a tough time in October winning a game or 2. We would get our Off. D flattened out while our 2 playmaker and sniper would be destroyed in the offensive zone.

So one day, there was a change. 2 forwards changed for Power Forward while the 3rd one went for Tough Guy. On D, one moved to 2-Way D with huge numbers in checking and strenght while I moved to Def. Tough Guy.

Results : A 10 game over .500 in november.

We aren't intimidating the opposition like the exemple you put there, but we hit a lot, we take a lot of penalties but we don't get blown away by the opposition now. It's tough to get in our zone on your feet because if you deke someone, you get boxed out anyway and send on your rear.

We average around 40-45 hits a game as a team, and lose most of our game by 1 goal.

Is this realism? No! But that's the way EA wanted the game to be played. Plastered people, send them to the dressing room with big hits, make them think twice before trying to get in the zone and punish the guy who dangle all over the ice.

And it's not like there's cheating in this, it's just the way it's been made by EA.

# 3 FBeaule04 @ 12/02/10 03:46 PM

As far as the 62 hits in a game, my best was 37 in a 4 on 4 games. 62, ouff, that a lot of hitting, I guess you only do this for the hole game.

As a 5 guys team, our best was 72 hit for a 3 period. I remember that the team on the other side was really frustrated since we won the contest 7-2 in the end.

# 4 Fiddy @ 12/02/10 04:18 PM

gotta love NHL 11 Arcade Hockey.. its a fun game!!

# 5 SinisterAlex @ 12/02/10 04:27 PM

I've been complaining about the hitting in this game since day one. It's unbelievably unrealistic in terms of the hitting and needs to be COMPLETELY tonned down for NHL 12. Or at least give us a counter to hitting. Allow us to brace ourselves for a hit like players do in real life NHL. In NHL 11, if you see a hit coming, the only way you can stop yourself from getting hit it by deking around the guy... if you don't do this, you're going to get crushed everytime.

If there was someway to brace for a hit, our players wouldn't fall down to the ice like they were Styrofoam blocks.

# 6 milesizdead @ 12/03/10 04:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AtomicLegend


	If there was someway to brace for a hit, our players wouldn't fall down to the ice like they were Styrofoam blocks.

Yeah, it�s funny. Sometimes I notice that before I get crushed (a hit I can�t avoid) I flick the right trigger towards the checker, meaning to lean against him. Instead I get an interference penalty

So even my instincts tell me there should be a "brace" option, and on the right stick maybe

# 7 jyoung @ 12/03/10 10:12 AM

I agree that interference calls need to be increased.

However, I welcome the physical play that has been brought to NHL 11.

NHL 09 and NHL 10 were games dominated by 5'7" 150 midgets jacked up on speed.

Now you see less midgets out there on the ice and playing at a respectable height/weight won't put you at a huge disadvantage like it did in the last two years' games.

# 8 thedudedominick @ 12/03/10 02:57 PM

I think there needs to be more penalties called on the goons who play like this. I love the physical aspect, but why did they take out the game misconducts. There is no danger in smashing a guy with his back to you and against the boards anymore. 2 minute penalty sometimes, other times no call. Those guys that blatantly board or check from behind should be tossed. There also needs to be more charging calls as 90% of the hits in this game could be called for charging.

# 9 Trevelyan @ 12/04/10 06:34 PM

I agree that when you're playing against bad players, there is a ton of hitting. You can probably average 20+ hits a game if you only play OTP. But I will say if you go play EASHL, and play against the better teams in the elite divison, you don't get that many hits a game, for experienced players they're just not that hard to avoid.

# 10 Roggie @ 12/06/10 02:08 PM

I think my record for hits in OTP was 24 in a non-overtime game. Never go into OT in OTP. The 24 hit game was playing as a tough guy going for my Legend card (team play as a D man isn't easy sometimes). But this stuff NEVER happens in the EASHL.
http://www.easportsworld.com/en_US/clubs/562A0001/2750/overview
There's a link to my club. I'm a defensive D man (play as a TWD, but I'm a shutdown D man by nature), so I'm not even averaging a point per game. I also only average about 1.3 hits a game. If you look at our stats, none of our goalies have a GAA over 1.75, so we know what we're doing defensively. But by looking, you can tell we don't check much. Sure, hitting is fun. We play a few teams who hit like crazy. But we've noticed intimidation isn't nearly as cranked up as it was last year. So, in the end, positional play is MUCH greater than mass checking.

# 11 jyoung @ 12/06/10 08:42 PM

I just played a game where the other team's winger came in and checked me every time after the face off.

I am the center.

Not once in this game was an interference penalty called, and this guy must have hit me about 30 times directly after the face off.

The period of time you can hit someone right after they've had the puck definitely needs to be tightened up.

I'm surprised more goons haven't caught on to this dirty tactic.

At least we won the game 7 - 3.

# 12 kerosene31 @ 02/04/11 10:00 AM

The problem isn't the physics engine, but the unrealistic physics-defying boosts. You can make a huge player and then just boost your agility and speed so that you don't pay any price for your gargantuan size. We are seeing a lot more massive players who aren't losing much in speed.

As always in the EASHL: boosts > physics.

Still, you should be able to counter the hitting with good, smart puck movement. My defensive d-man is 6'0 and 205 and I don't get hit very often. The counter is to use "east-west" hockey. Most hitting teams are super aggressive and you can simply pass the puck around them.

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