Consistently losing to people 'worse' than me

[atheimetal]

And I don't understand why. I know sometimes it just happens and the first time or two I chalked it up to bad luck, but I've noticed that no matter how much I outplay, outshoot, or out control the puck against someone it doesn't seem to matter. I manage to lose 2 - 1 with two of his goals being lobs from a random point on the ice somehow getting into my net. Or the goalie decides to queue a puck up for a pass while standing right in front of his net and it gets poked in. One game I limited a guy to 7 shots (all of which were him tossing it at the net because I wasn't giving him any circle, point, or front of the net lanes) and he STILL beat me even though I had three times as many shots from the front of his net, top of his circle, point, etc.

Is the only way to win in this game exploiting the bad goalie AI or what? I feel like I can do any number of crazy things but only score once or twice while someone else just skates in circles, tosses pucks in the general direction of the net and manages to score on 30% of his shots.

I've been a long time player of this series and it's becoming pretty uninteresting to play when I can't beat people at that clearly are new to the game. Does anyone have any tips or has anyone noticed the same issues?

[H to the Oza]

yeah its happened a few times to me as well. all I can say is keep at it, that kind of stuff happens sports all the time, youre bound to start raking in the Ws eventually

[IBYCFOTA]

Not to be rude, but maybe you aren't as good as you think you are or you are underestimating your opponents? Everybody has those games where the puck doesn't go in and the other guy wins on some absurd goal, but unless you have some really terrible luck there's no reason it should be happening on a regular basis.

[theglory]

I run into the same problem recently. For me, it is that I am not very good at aiming shoots.. I lost to this person out shooting them 30 to 5, final score 1-2, and they had like under 3 mins of TOP. lol

[ManiacMatt1782]

Get the goalie moving. If you are controlling the puck, get him moving 1 way and shoot the other. On cross the slot passes, don't always one time it. Sometimes it pays to receive the pass allow the goalie to over commit and shoot it back farside if time allows.

[Redskins Pride]

Quote: Originally Posted by IBYCFOTA

Not to be rude, but maybe you aren't as good as you think you are or you are underestimating your opponents? Everybody has those games where the puck doesn't go in and the other guy wins on some absurd goal, but unless you have some really terrible luck there's no reason it should be happening on a regular basis.

eh ... not to be rude but this game just doesn't reward good hockey. it rewards good video game hockey and learning to score from certain hotspots ... but not good hockey. like, somehow the goalies can play a tic tac toe play, sliding back and forth with amazing precision and clairvoyance, perfectly almost every time. it would be OK if each goalie was different and you had to "solve" them but ... they're all the same.

which isn't to say that that's a bad thing b/c this is in fact a video game, and a pretty damn good representation of the game. but there's just too many "Halak versus The Caps" type of games if you don't go for glitch shots every two seconds.

[Broncos86]

It rewards good video game hockey because this IS video game hockey. Honestly, I don't play online, because I don't like dealing with people and cheese. But really, in the end, it's video game hockey. The day EA perfects replicates hockey will be the day the NHL franchise loses a lot of gamers. Most gamers don't want to deal with puck cycling or a 4th line that, if they did well, generates ONE shot on net. It needs to be a representation of what people THINK is hockey, not what hockey truly is.

[sharks]

Quote: Originally Posted by Broncos86

It rewards good video game hockey because this IS video game hockey. Honestly, I don't play online, because I don't like dealing with people and cheese. But really, in the end, it's video game hockey. The day EA perfects replicates hockey will be the day the NHL franchise loses a lot of gamers. Most gamers don't want to deal with puck cycling or a 4th line that, if they did well, generates ONE shot on net. It needs to be a representation of what people THINK is hockey, not what hockey truly is.

The bolded part is what disappoints me the most. In my almost 50 HUT games, I have seen only one opponent cycle the puck in the offensive zone. Cycling should be encouraged and forced.

Luckily my dump and chase, cycle style of play has netted me a lot of wins so far.