Breathing Life Into The Kicking Game [Meter Idea]

[DeuceDouglas]

The kicking game needs life. The AFC championship last year was decided on missed 32 yard field goal. 32 yards! I don't think I've missed anything short of 60 since last gen. I've got an idea for a new kick meter that I think would add some additional and much needed challenge but it wouldn't be without some other upgrades as well.

The Meter


How It Works


Basically you have two meters, one on the left and one on the right. You press A and one of them starts going back and forth around the meter. You press A again to stop the bar as close to the middle of the green area as possible. Once you've done that, the meter on the other side does the same thing in the opposite direction. The goal is to get both bars in the green and essentially try to have them line up as close as possible to where you want to kick. You could even have which one starts first decided by the footedness of your kicker for some added depth.

Power would be determined solely off the kickers ratings while also taking into account how well the meter bars are lined up. The better they're lined up, the more power you get on your kick. If they line up perfectly, you get a slight power increase to account for "hitting the ball perfect".

There also would be no more arrow. The green area would adjust along the meter to account for the angle you're kicking at. Here's an example of what certain kicks would look like from different spots on the field:


The Green Zone

The green zone is used to differentiate the level of kicker. A kicker with a poor accuracy rating will have a smaller green zone. A very accurate kicker will have a much larger area to hit and much more room for error. Here is an example of what a poor, average, and good kickers meters would look like:


The speed at which the line meters moved would be determined by both the level of difficulty you were playing on (Rookie, Pro, etc.) as well as the kickers rating. The lower the accuracy, the faster they move. Another addition that would be useful to this is a slider that would allow you to adjust the speed of the meter, regardless of difficulty. In addition, the meter would also be condensed for all kickers for the much longer field goals adding an additional challenge to hitting far field goals with poor to average kickers.

The Elements

I'm talking mainly wind here. And before I go any further they would have to fix the obnoxious fact that the wind meter is currently backwards and all wrong. Okay, now obviously there should be a power (and maybe even accuracy) decrease when it comes to kicking in adverse conditions like rain and snow. But wind is the most commonly seen thing that affects kicks.

What I was thinking is that rather than having a constant wind speed, they should go back to the way it was last gen where the wind would vary between an area of MPH. This would be displayed on the meter by having the green zone sway a bit in either direction to basically simulate wind gusts. You could also have the AWR rating play a role in how a kicker is affected by this by maybe having their meter sway a little more if their AWR is low and remain more steady if they have a higher AWR.


Alright, I believe that is all. Hopefully I didn't leave anything out in all that. I understand it is a long read, especially about something as trivial as kicking but it's just one of those things that has irked me over the years. I look at it like free throws in a basketball game. It's not a huge thing but if Shaq is going to the line and hitting 97 percent of his free throws it kills the feel a little bit.

Anyways, if you've made it this far I thank you for your time and would love to hear your thoughts!

[jerwoods]

Great Idea
what i would do is like have bobbled snaps and maybe they can try some tiger woods stuff
but your idea Is outstanding 5 stars

[at23steelers]

Great ideas bro!!! I disagree slightly with what you're saying. I LOVE your accuracy bar. Almost like vision cone for kicking. However, for power: what if they set up kicking bar so that depending how far the kicker's power rating is, is how far the meter goes? For example a 100 rating gives the kicker 100% of the meter potential while a 75 rating kicker could be 3/4 meter potential? Also, I hate the difficulty coordinating with how difficult the kicking meter is. Why don't they just have a slider rating that adjusts the kicking meter speed?

[DeuceDouglas]

Quote: Originally Posted by at23steelers

Great ideas bro!!! I disagree slightly with what you're saying. I LOVE your accuracy bar. Almost like vision cone for kicking. However, for power: what if they set up kicking bar so that depending how far the kicker's power rating is, is how far the meter goes? For example a 100 rating gives the kicker 100% of the meter potential while a 75 rating kicker could be 3/4 meter potential? Also, I hate the difficulty coordinating with how difficult the kicking meter is. Why don't they just have a slider rating that adjusts the kicking meter speed?

That's basically what I was trying to say in terms of the difficulty. Ideally, there would be a slider for the speed and it would be just like any other slider currently in Madden. Let's say it goes from 0-100. If you were playing Rookie it would be at 0 by default, Pro 20, All Pro 40, All Madden 60 with additional room to make it even tougher for those who want to take it a step further.

As for the power, the way I was looking at it is that if you get both bars in the green, you're going to pretty much get what you're kickers ratings are. And let's say you get them both in the green but they aren't exactly close together, the power drop suffered wouldn't be that significant so he might go from hitting it 100% to hitting it 95%. If you're in the green on one, and in the red for the other, the kick is going to take more so a drop in accuracy than it would power. Ideally it wouldn't really come too much into play except for longer field goals where you would have to be a little more precise.

[at23steelers]

Quote: Originally Posted by DeuceDouglas

That's basically what I was trying to say in terms of the difficulty. Ideally, there would be a slider for the speed and it would be just like any other slider currently in Madden. Let's say it goes from 0-100. If you were playing Rookie it would be at 0 by default, Pro 20, All Pro 40, All Madden 60 with additional room to make it even tougher for those who want to take it a step further. As for the power, the way I was looking at it is that if you get both bars in the green, you're going to pretty much get what you're kickers ratings are. And let's say you get them both in the green but they aren't exactly close together, the power drop suffered wouldn't be that significant so he might go from hitting it 100% to hitting it 95%. If you're in the green on one, and in the red for the other, the kick is going to take more so a drop in accuracy than it would power. Ideally it wouldn't really come too much into play except for longer field goals where you would have to be a little more precise.

Well, the one would be for direction and other for power. So if accuracy in green but power in red, then it would be perfect aim but probably fall short, depending on how far the kick is. Im not sure if the distance should also take in consideration in how far the kick is. Should it be dependent on the other factors, or be a factor itself on the meter?

[DeuceDouglas]

Quote: Originally Posted by at23steelers

Well, the one would be for direction and other for power. So if accuracy in green but power in red, then it would be perfect aim but probably fall short, depending on how far the kick is. Im not sure if the distance should also take in consideration in how far the kick is. Should it be dependent on the other factors, or be a factor itself on the meter?

I guess I was looking at it as more of an accuracy meter than a full on kicking meter. Where the players ratings play more of a role in the power of a kick than anything else. I figure in real life, there isn't whole lot of difference between kicking a 30 yarder and a 40 yarder. The power result between the two is usually the same whether they're good or no good and. I have the two meters to add a level of challenge while also allowing for a larger variation of possibilities. So basically they are acting together as a universal accuracy meter while the power is more determined by the skill of the player you're using while allowing for a potential boost created by user skill.

My thinking was that in terms of power is that it isn't really going to come too much into play on anything less than 50+ yard field goals where in that scenario, the meter would become a bit smaller and tougher but also with the added benefit of a power boost if you hit the meter perfectly.

[aznstarplayr]

As long it will challenge players not make easy field goals then great idea.
Also your idea will be great with the development idea from bad kickers trying to improve.

This kicking idea is good, but i wonder it could be used with holders or snappers as the red zones would mean botched hold or poor snap.

[bccards13]

I really like the idea of this but without the kicking arrow how are you going to determine the height of the kick? And with a new meter how would the punting and kickoff game change?

I really like this idea though. The challenging element is great, and an added difficulty factor for clutch situations would be great. You could base it off of their awareness ratings and in game winning situations with a low rated awareness a kicker's meter could be smaller and add the element of difficulty that the current system doesn't.