Help me stop getting roasted on defense

[TannerYoho]

Hey everyone.

I use the eagles and I just cannot stop the CPU on all madden. It seems they have someone wide open every single play. 400 yards to alex smith, Matt ryan, and 30 to stafford through the 3rd quarter.

I've tried...

Cover 2
Cover 3
Man to man
Blitzing

No matter what I do it seems like every play he finds a wide open reciever, typically due to my safeties not reacting to anything around them and standing in their zone When it's man to man Jesse James is beating even my cornerbacks on slants, outs, and seam routes. How do you guys overcome this? I have lowered CPU QB Accuracy a few notches and still only get about 7 incompletions a game but even those only come when I switch on to hit stick or intercept the ball. If i lower to All Pro I will dominate on offense so I dont want that.

Any tips?

[timhere1970]

In my last game i put reaction time to 5 and it kept luck from tearing me up. That was all pro though and could have been placebo. It seems players are slow to react to the ball being thrown let alone cutting away from the pass direction. My access is over but i hope they tune this prior to launch.

[Hooe]

A few thoughts:

Call your defense with purpose. Don't mix up your calls just because you can, make sure you know what each defense does and does not do and call it according to what you anticipate your opponent doing. For example, if you're playing against the Falcons, you probably don't want to call too many coverages which will leave Julio Jones with a one-on-one matchup on the perimeter (Cover 4 Quarters, Cover 3 Sky / Match, Cover 1, Cover 0). If the offense calls a lot of 3x1 formations with an awesome WR as the lone receiver, consider calling Cover 6 to bracket that lone receiver. In Franchise, if you know you're going up against an offense which calls a particular passing concept a lot (which you'd see in Weekly Training), don't call pass defenses which are vulnerable to that concept.

Understand how your defensive front affects your coverage. For example, if you call a 4-3 Normal Cover 3 Sky and the offense comes out in Singleback Doubles (and let's assume the offense hasn't flipped the play, so the tight end is on the offense's right-hand side and the slot receiver is on the offense's left-hand side), your defense is going to align with your weakside linebacker over top of the slot receiver due to how the how the defense is set up to stop the run. If you come out with 4-3 Under Cover 3 Sky vs Singleback Doubles, your free safety will be over top of that slot receiver instead (due to differences in the run fits of 4-3 Under vs 4-3 Normal). Obviously, putting a safety on a wide receiver is a better matchup for your defense.

Pressure the quarterback. Making a quarterback throwing an inaccurate pass in Madden generally requires that he be under pressure. If you're sending four and not getting to him, you probably need to send more, especially on early downs to try and force the offense into one-dimensional play calls.

[Kid OS]

For me, during the beta I had success with blitzing on every single down. The key is that you must understand how defensive concepts work, and you have to be able to create your own plays by using the hot routes and adjustments.

First, you want to master offensive concepts. Learn the routes and how they work together to get certain players open. Once you understand that, you go and master the defensive concepts that are designed to stop those offensive concepts. After you have a true understanding of what defense is supposed to stop what offense, you have to go and account for your user skill. This is where the blitzes come in. Whatever player you hot route on a blitz, you have to replace his original assignment by usering another defender. This means you now have two assignments for the player you are usering. Once you have two assignments, you now have 2 offensive players that you must keep your eyes on. That also means that the QB is going to be eyeing those two receivers as well. At this point, you have to practice on baiting the QB into throwing the ball to the player you want him to throw it to. You essentially have to leave someone open until the last second. This results in the QB having around 3 seconds to make a decision, or he'll get sacked by the blitzer.

My defensive concept mostly gives up check down passes to the flats or user interceptions. I hope this works for you.

[XxRnSxX]

Quote: Originally Posted by timhere1970

In my last game i put reaction time to 5 and it kept luck from tearing me up. That was all pro though and could have been placebo. It seems players are slow to react to the ball being thrown let alone cutting away from the pass direction. My access is over but i hope they tune this prior to launch.

Is that working this year, something about the sliders being reversed or something. The reaction time is really bad for user controlled defenses. I am getting killed from WR's going underneath and my DB being brain dead about covering his man.

[Hooe]

One more thought, this is generally more helpful against observant user opponents but it can be useful for you building out your defensive strategy against any opponent: if you have a versatile piece on your defense, maximize his skills.

For example: I frequently play as the Cowboys. Jaylon Smith is freaking awesome. Outside of the obviously great players (OVR 90+), he might have the most diverse and complete skill set of any defender in the game. He can run sideline to sideline, he can tackle, he can cover tight ends one-on-one, he's not helpless against decent slot receivers, and he can rush the passer with effectiveness.

If I'm playing a nickel set, I generally play Smith at his natural middle linebacker position and drop him into coverage. In my base defense, however (particularly if I'm playing an over or under front which puts a linebacker on the line of scrimmage), I slide Smith over to outside linebacker to put an extra threat on the edge. Based on what the offense does, I hot route Smith to zone, blitz, or man up someone. He's basically the queen on the chess board for my defense.

I will be very sad if he gets hurt whenever I start my Cowboys franchise, lol.

[timhere1970]

Quote: Originally Posted by XxRnSxX

Is that working this year, something about the sliders being reversed or something. The reaction time is really bad for user controlled defenses. I am getting killed from WR's going underneath and my DB being brain dead about covering his man.

It seemed to but it was just one game. Worth testing though.

[binga30]

Does anyone have a self made playbook that kind of shows the offensive formations and what they are designed for, and then the defensive formations that are designed to stop said offensive formations? If love to learn this myself some day, but with limited time would appreciate any sort of cheat sheet available.

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