Roster have to be happy?

fantavet · 01-23-2001, 04:49 PM

Brand new to the FOF series. Using FOF 2001. First mistake I made as GM is dumping a lot of low end vets and rookies and signing some decent free agents for depth.

What I'm finding out now is these guys don't like to be inactive or 3rd on the depth chart. I have a few disgruntled and 1 angry player 12 games into my 1st season. Of course all over lack of playing time.

Will these players effect anything in the game? Can I just hang on them for this season? Their contracts expire this year anyway.

Sorry for such a bush league question but I'm 9-3 now in my first year and I'm trying to avoid disaster.

Morgado · 01-23-2001, 06:51 PM

Contentment with playing time affects only one thing: how willing the player is to re-sign with your team. This will take the form in higher or lower demands for contract salaries or outright refusal to sign a contract to play for your team.

for example, a player who is Disgruntled at your team will demand higher pay and possibly shorter duration contracts than one who is content. Likewise, an Unhappy player will probably have harsher demands than a Disgruntled player. Angry, Livid, and Demanding Trade players typically will outright refuse to play for you, citing "Due to complaints about playing time, my client is unwilling to sign with you." (Or something like that).

So the 64 dollar question is this - do you care if you will be able to re-sign this player? If the answer is yes and you expect to use this player in the future, you ought to try to keep him happy. If the answer is no and the player is simply a roster-filler or has-been veteran who's playing backup for a bit, then don't bother. Even a player who is demanding a trade cannot hold-out or anything (No Barry Sanders stunts in FOF).

As you've observed, veteran players typically grumble when they don't receive playing time. This will be the case even if the younger player starting in front of them is the better player. You could have a maxed out rookie starting and maybe a halfway decent 7th year veteran as backup - the veteran will start whining after a few weeks if his loyalty and play for winner numbers don't balance him out.

That's another thing to take into consideration. Although unproven, I believe that loyalty and play for winner has something to do with how bitchy a player gets. So if you're defensing Super Bowl champs, that guy who really wants to play for a winner will not complain as readily as someone who doesn't care and is just in it for the money. Take note that play for winner is a double edged sword because if you're not successful then high play for winner guys will demand more. In the end, Loyalty and play for winner are contract demand adjusting ratings (number of years and dollar amounts are both affected).

There has been a slight bug observed in FOF2001 that Unhappy players are unreasonably difficult to appease. Once a player hits Unhappy, they may stay Unhappy even if you start them for three years straight (like my starting C in the WLC). The rule of thumb is to never, *ever* let a player you want to keep on your roster degrade to an Unhappy state. The recommended way of doing this with a backup is to watch the postgame reports and spot guys who have just become disgruntled. Immediately go to your Game Plan and swap them in as a starter for one game. You can sometimes put this off if the next game is a must-win game or something. But, I find it is better to nip it in the bud as early as possible. After starting one game, most players are content - you can swap your real starter back in. If they are still pissy, you could keep em in one more game if you like to try and get em to normal.

Starting players is not he only way to appease players. You'll not that there is a pull down thing for each position in your gameplan screen for Starter's Playing Time. This is new to FOF2001. Picking 5-7 will ensure your starter plays almost every down in a game. If you pick 3-4, you will get a regular rotation between starter and first backup. If you pick 1-2, you will get constant rotation among your starter and the top two backups (if applicable) with the starter getting maybe 40-50 percent of the snaps depending on endurance ratings (they swap when they get tired I think). My belief is that you're basically telling the CPU coach to swap in a substitute when the guy reaches 10*X percent of his endurance. So a 6 will keep the starter in until he drops to 60% endurance and swap in. This is all speculation though, and should not be taken as official word on how the playing time sliders work.

The thing about swapping in substitutes is that this counts as playing time. I've come to believe that somehow contentment with playing time is calculated off how many downs a player has played. So even if a player is a backup, letting them rotate into the game gets them in on some downs. Often times, this is enough to keep them happy. Apparently starting a game counts for more than just the downs played, so I think being named a starter for a game has some bonus effect on contentment with playing time in addition to number of downs played (which is why starting a guy for one game makes em happy so fast). My belief here is that number of downs demanded increases with experience, which is why veterans get bitchy if they don't play much faster than a rookie.'

Oh yeah, one last thing about keeping players happy - your coach has a rating called Discipline. This seems to control two things. First, the more disciplined your team, the fewer penalties you should have (not proven but logical). Secondly, the more disciplined your team is, the less likely someone is to whine about playing time. This is like an across the board modifier to all players tacked on to whatever base "crybaby" value they have. So a whiny player under a Poor Discipline coach will bitch sooner than that same whiny player under an Excellent Discipline coach.

And just to make sure it's clear - yes, you can hang onto those Angry players for just this year and let their contracts run out (then they walk) without any real bad repercussions while they're on the team. Just don't plan on re-signing them next season.

Hope this all helps you out.

------------------
"Solomon yo! Watashi ga kaette kita!" (Solomon! I have returned!) - Major Anavel Gato, Compeito Island 11-10-0083

[This message has been edited by Morgado (edited 01-23-2001).]

fantavet · 01-23-2001, 10:08 PM

Thanks for all the advice. I'll have to look at playing time. I coached the Patriots in my first year (won the Super Bowl, 15-4 overall, yea!) anyway in week 16 I had the division all wrapped up. Even though my coach was rated as very good re: injuries some of my best players got hit with injuries down the stretch.

I was nervous so I benched alot of key players (inactive) or put them low on the depth chart. So my Safety, Milloy, becomes disgruntled after just one game out! He's been miserable ever since. Yet he started every game but one!

I'll check to see if I can boost his playing time but my 3rd safety, Atwater, moans that he isn't playing enough. Since I only have 3 safetys I can't see how 2 of them can moan!

Oh well, now that I won the whole thing every player on my team thinks they are a superstar and are demanding a boat load of money! Which leads me to a new topic.....

01-23-2001, 06:51 PM	#2
Morgado High School JV Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Washington, DC	Contentment with playing time affects only one thing: how willing the player is to re-sign with your team. This will take the form in higher or lower demands for contract salaries or outright refusal to sign a contract to play for your team. for example, a player who is Disgruntled at your team will demand higher pay and possibly shorter duration contracts than one who is content. Likewise, an Unhappy player will probably have harsher demands than a Disgruntled player. Angry, Livid, and Demanding Trade players typically will outright refuse to play for you, citing "Due to complaints about playing time, my client is unwilling to sign with you." (Or something like that). So the 64 dollar question is this - do you care if you will be able to re-sign this player? If the answer is yes and you expect to use this player in the future, you ought to try to keep him happy. If the answer is no and the player is simply a roster-filler or has-been veteran who's playing backup for a bit, then don't bother. Even a player who is demanding a trade cannot hold-out or anything (No Barry Sanders stunts in FOF). As you've observed, veteran players typically grumble when they don't receive playing time. This will be the case even if the younger player starting in front of them is the better player. You could have a maxed out rookie starting and maybe a halfway decent 7th year veteran as backup - the veteran will start whining after a few weeks if his loyalty and play for winner numbers don't balance him out. That's another thing to take into consideration. Although unproven, I believe that loyalty and play for winner has something to do with how bitchy a player gets. So if you're defensing Super Bowl champs, that guy who really wants to play for a winner will not complain as readily as someone who doesn't care and is just in it for the money. Take note that play for winner is a double edged sword because if you're not successful then high play for winner guys will demand more. In the end, Loyalty and play for winner are contract demand adjusting ratings (number of years and dollar amounts are both affected). There has been a slight bug observed in FOF2001 that Unhappy players are unreasonably difficult to appease. Once a player hits Unhappy, they may stay Unhappy even if you start them for three years straight (like my starting C in the WLC). The rule of thumb is to never, ever let a player you want to keep on your roster degrade to an Unhappy state. The recommended way of doing this with a backup is to watch the postgame reports and spot guys who have just become disgruntled. Immediately go to your Game Plan and swap them in as a starter for one game. You can sometimes put this off if the next game is a must-win game or something. But, I find it is better to nip it in the bud as early as possible. After starting one game, most players are content - you can swap your real starter back in. If they are still pissy, you could keep em in one more game if you like to try and get em to normal. Starting players is not he only way to appease players. You'll not that there is a pull down thing for each position in your gameplan screen for Starter's Playing Time. This is new to FOF2001. Picking 5-7 will ensure your starter plays almost every down in a game. If you pick 3-4, you will get a regular rotation between starter and first backup. If you pick 1-2, you will get constant rotation among your starter and the top two backups (if applicable) with the starter getting maybe 40-50 percent of the snaps depending on endurance ratings (they swap when they get tired I think). My belief is that you're basically telling the CPU coach to swap in a substitute when the guy reaches 10*X percent of his endurance. So a 6 will keep the starter in until he drops to 60% endurance and swap in. This is all speculation though, and should not be taken as official word on how the playing time sliders work. The thing about swapping in substitutes is that this counts as playing time. I've come to believe that somehow contentment with playing time is calculated off how many downs a player has played. So even if a player is a backup, letting them rotate into the game gets them in on some downs. Often times, this is enough to keep them happy. Apparently starting a game counts for more than just the downs played, so I think being named a starter for a game has some bonus effect on contentment with playing time in addition to number of downs played (which is why starting a guy for one game makes em happy so fast). My belief here is that number of downs demanded increases with experience, which is why veterans get bitchy if they don't play much faster than a rookie.' Oh yeah, one last thing about keeping players happy - your coach has a rating called Discipline. This seems to control two things. First, the more disciplined your team, the fewer penalties you should have (not proven but logical). Secondly, the more disciplined your team is, the less likely someone is to whine about playing time. This is like an across the board modifier to all players tacked on to whatever base "crybaby" value they have. So a whiny player under a Poor Discipline coach will bitch sooner than that same whiny player under an Excellent Discipline coach. And just to make sure it's clear - yes, you can hang onto those Angry players for just this year and let their contracts run out (then they walk) without any real bad repercussions while they're on the team. Just don't plan on re-signing them next season. Hope this all helps you out. ------------------ "Solomon yo! Watashi ga kaette kita!" (Solomon! I have returned!) - Major Anavel Gato, Compeito Island 11-10-0083 [This message has been edited by Morgado (edited 01-23-2001).] __________________ "It looks like an inkblot." - Keith Olbermann as a child, responding to a Rorschach test

01-23-2001, 10:08 PM	#3
fantavet n00b Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Londonderry, NH	Thanks for all the advice. I'll have to look at playing time. I coached the Patriots in my first year (won the Super Bowl, 15-4 overall, yea!) anyway in week 16 I had the division all wrapped up. Even though my coach was rated as very good re: injuries some of my best players got hit with injuries down the stretch. I was nervous so I benched alot of key players (inactive) or put them low on the depth chart. So my Safety, Milloy, becomes disgruntled after just one game out! He's been miserable ever since. Yet he started every game but one! I'll check to see if I can boost his playing time but my 3rd safety, Atwater, moans that he isn't playing enough. Since I only have 3 safetys I can't see how 2 of them can moan! Oh well, now that I won the whole thing every player on my team thinks they are a superstar and are demanding a boat load of money! Which leads me to a new topic..... __________________ Fantavet "I'd cut my grandmother if she didn't have at least a 40 in Breakaway Speed"

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