Sliders for help defense?

[youALREADYknow]

I've tried a lot and it seems like the missing link for help defense is the ACE coach settings.

Raising Defensive Awareness (80-100) and Acceleration (plus w/o Ball) will result in more urgent rotations and recovery after help, but the problem is that almost all of the help defense logic is tied to ACE.

Help on drive? ACE
Help/dig on post? ACE
On-ball screen defender? ACE
Off-ball screen defender? ACE
Force ball handlers into help? ACE

The ACE system seems like OG/Czar's brainchild and they want complete control over it to push updates to online modes, but I'm hoping they give us ACE customization for 2K20. The default defensive ACE settings for most coaches are too conservative since they are set to Auto. I'd rather the coaches have more specific preferences to differentiate defensive styles more.

The game plays so much better when you can match coaching styles upfront instead of waiting on certain teams to get destroyed by elite shooters or dribble penetration before they adjust after timeouts.

For now you pretty much have to change controllers/teams, go into coaching, and manually set the ACE settings for both teams before tip-off. Move on-ball and off-ball defensive pressure down to Gap/Moderate on non-shooters and the help defense improves. If you have time to set the Hedge and On-Ball Screen settings for shooters and ball-handlers then you get some realistic gameplay.

[RyanFitzmagic]

Quote: Originally Posted by youALREADYknow

For now you pretty much have to change controllers/teams, go into coaching, and manually set the ACE settings for both teams before tip-off. Move on-ball and off-ball defensive pressure down to Gap/Moderate on non-shooters and the help defense improves. If you have time to set the Hedge and On-Ball Screen settings for shooters and ball-handlers then you get some realistic gameplay.

I'm honestly surprised to hear this worked for you. I swear I tried this and I was getting the same lack of help as before.

To be fair though, I didn't bother to change On-Ball Pressure settings, since I didn't think it mattered in terms of what the AI defenders choose to do off the ball. Are they tied together somehow?

[youALREADYknow]

Quote: Originally Posted by RyanFitzmagic

I'm honestly surprised to hear this worked for you. I swear I tried this and I was getting the same lack of help as before. To be fair though, I didn't bother to change On-Ball Pressure settings, since I didn't think it mattered in terms of what the AI defenders choose to do off the ball. Are they tied together somehow?

The Hedge settings matter more, but if you change the Center/Screener defense off Auto to Ice/Hedge and Pre-Rotate to Yes on certain P&R guards then you see MUCH better help defense off P&R actions. It also opens the floor a bit more to Capela/DAJ types since the default settings keep the screen defender at home with the roll man most of the time for the pass interception. I've even seen some secondary ball movement off P&R where the ball rotates from the paint to the corner and back to the top of the key.

I've seen truly sim help defense in Player Lock mode with the right coaching settings and sliders. My problem is the time it takes to get all of that setup for a simple Play Now game.

[RyanFitzmagic]

Quote: Originally Posted by youALREADYknow

The Hedge settings matter more, but if you change the Center/Screener defense off Auto to Ice/Hedge and Pre-Rotate to Yes on certain P&R guards then you see MUCH better help defense off P&R actions. It also opens the floor a bit more to Capela/DAJ types since the default settings keep the screen defender at home with the roll man most of the time for the pass interception. I've even seen some secondary ball movement off P&R where the ball rotates from the paint to the corner and back to the top of the key.

What exact settings do you use? Ice on-ball and Catch hedge? Maybe "No" for Stay Attached and Screen Help and Drive Help on (as opposed to Auto)? And you mentioned Pre-Rotate for elite P&R ballhandlers.

I was also thinking Double on Drive for elite slashers, but that might be too much. Teams almost always help on (for example) LeBron drives, but they don't really trap him habitually. I was just trying to think of anything I could do to make them more willing to help, and that seemed like a workaround until I saw that you were having success with your settings.

Quote: Originally Posted by youALREADYknow

I've seen truly sim help defense in Player Lock mode with the right coaching settings and sliders. My problem is the time it takes to get all of that setup for a simple Play Now game.

If you do a MyLeague, you can control all 30 teams, and set their coach gameplan beforehand. Last year, it wouldn't stick when you started a game, but I think they fixed that for 19.

[youALREADYknow]

I'll give some quick examples:

Curry
On-Ball Screen: Ice or Go Over
Hedge: Hard Hedge
Screen Help: Help & No Rotation

Curry's PF/C (Draymond/Cousins)
Stay Attached: No

LeBron
Hedge: Catch or Double
Pre-Rotate: Yes
Drive Help: Help & No Rotation
Screen Help: Help & No Rotation

[RyanFitzmagic]

What about non-superstars? It would suck to be able to still get easy baskets at the rim with them.

I assume pretty much the same as with LeBron, minus Pre-Rotate? That seems like a solid blueprint for pretty much all P&R ballhandlers.

And then the Gap/Moderate off-ball for average-and-below shooters. Still not sure if the on-ball setting matters in terms of help defense (maybe they'll be more willing to help if they know they don't have to recover back to Tight on-ball if their assignment gets the ball on a kickout), but I'll probably change it. No reason not to, really.

[RyanFitzmagic]

Yeah, I'm seeing the same exact behavior from off-ball defenders as before. They're staying attached to their assignment no matter what and refusing to help. This is with Help Defense Strength at 100 and the team Help Defense slider at 75, on top of the coach settings changes for the other team.

[MrWrestling3]

Quote: Originally Posted by RyanFitzmagic

Yeah, I'm seeing the same exact behavior from off-ball defenders as before. They're staying attached to their assignment no matter what and refusing to help. This is with Help Defense Strength at 100 and the team Help Defense slider at 75, on top of the coach settings changes for the other team.

I happened to be messing around this morning and might have found something; try increasing the Offensive and Defensive Awareness sliders by a little bit.

I did this and started getting a few multi man defensive animations on drives, but I didn't have alot of free time to test it extensively.