Running an Off Meta Offense: The Weird and Wonderful World Of H2H- A Playbook Deep Di

[Slaticus]

Hey and Happy Friday Operation Sports! ! Hope everyone is having a good one in these really miserable times. Some of you may have read my prior stuff like my classic offenses (Wing T)The Ibone or the Veer and Shoot or seen any of my daily highlights that I try to post. I come from a football background and coached for a while and even though I have left that world behind, I still love the game and try to bring that same energy into Madden through re-creating classic offenses every year and playing either in sim leagues or taking them into the hell hole that is H2H. To my very great surprise, the Wing T has been BY FAR the most viable offense I have ever ran on H2H and I have had just a lot of fun with it, climbing inside the top 500 online.

But, enough rambling. We all know there is a certain Meta on offense. You can find a whole bunch of Money Plays online, motion packages, hot route set ups, basically anything that can and will break the AI in Madden. Just off the top of my head, Trips TE Inside Zone and Levels Y Sail, the Singleback Pair stuff, H Pro Shot Plays, and the various slot fades are murder on the AI. Now, I am not saying there is anything wrong with running this stuff and you can have a lot of success with it. But I personally would get bored as **** repeatedly running the same shot plays and hoping to get lucky. Just bores me to tears.

Obviously, there are some plays I run (trap springs to mind) that are meta plays, but that is not the only play I run. If someone give me 4-3 Wide 9s, bet your *** I am running trap. That is just good football. The point, for me, is to make the opponent choose what they are going to defend pre and post snap and using minor formation changes to take advantage of an opponents pre-snap alignment. Like I outlined in my Wing T Post, I use unbalanced and balanced formations. Additionally, in this iteration of Madden, the game assigns the strength of the formation to the wide side of the field or, if it is the middle, to the right *almost* which is something you should be aware of when aligning in balanced formations.

Example of balanced formation: Singleback Ace Close


Example of unbalanced formation: Singleback Wing Flex Close

Ill come out in 12P and really mess with alignments. Only really works if you have good TEs.

Now, lets look at some alignment games you can play with really, really simple audibles.

We are going to start out with one of my base play calls Gun Wk Flex Inside Zone

The opponent has aligned in a base 3/4 with what appears to be Cover 1 or a Cover 0 blitz against me. Unless he's pressing on the outside, my slot receiver should now be open. Ergo, I can check to my second play in a different formation, which is right next to it in my formation order, Gun Wing Slot Wk and run RPO Read Bubble. This play absolutely feasts on the edge. Speaking of edge plays...my personal favorite swap. Gun Wing Slot Offset Jet Pass Fk Zone is murder as well. And if they are single high and have flipped the SS to the twins side, all that has to happen is the corner getting blocked and you have an easy gain on your hands.

Gun Wing Slot Offset Jet Pass Fk Zone

For whatever reason, this Madden has a lot of plays that I refer to as "one offs" that don't appear in any other formation (and I think they should). The devs, in their wisdom, have decided against me, sadly.

These are a few of those examples.

Formation: Gun Dbls Y-Flex Offset-[RPO Read Double Screen]

This one I actually just found the other day and I have been having a lot of success with it as it is a "Read" play, which, as opposed to the alert/smoke/lookie actually means that the QB begins a running animation right after he doesn't hand the ball to the RB. I use the left hand WR screen as an alert and read the backside. If the opposing player doesn't have any one over the slot or is off with inside leverage, I go there right away, ignoring the read side of the play (TE/Slant). This has generated a number of good plays for me. (There is a similar double bubble read play in Gun Spread Flex

Formation: Gun Spread HB WK- [Cake Read Option]

)

This is a bit of an older play as it has been around since at least NCAA 14 IIRC. It is still a very good play especially if you are running HB quick base and can get the user to pursue the pulling guard.

* Formation: Gun Open Flex - [RPO Read Y Flat]

Ok so literally everyone knows when they see this formation that HB dive is coming. So change it up. I have literally never given the ball and it has been a first down or a touchdown for me quite a bit. See it in action

* Formation: Singleback Doubles Off Close - [Switch X Comeback]

]

and Switch
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I am not saying these are my base pass plays...but damn do they work. That bunch fly is generally open VS Cover 3, the Comeback cleans up against man, and the switch (POST/WHEEL) wrecks man, cover 2, and quarters.

Formation: Gun Doubles Y Off - Fake Jet HB Wheel

If you have seen any of my videos or read any of my guides, you'll know I run Jet Sweep to death. [Occasionally it leads to plays like this]. The Jet sweep is one of the best plays in this years game and not enough people run it.

I find that if can align in a few formations that your opponent doens't often see a couple of times a game a lot of fun and not get stuck in and endless loop of PA Crossers from Trips.

Anyway, if you read through all of that, thank you!

[redright88]

Real old school post, man! Love the depth you get into, the individual reads, the philosophy. Seriously, many thanks for posting.

[Slaticus]

Quote: Originally Posted by redright88

Real old school post, man! Love the depth you get into, the individual reads, the philosophy. Seriously, many thanks for posting.

Thanks, I have been on this board for a long, long time, since back when the only options were this website and utopia sports.

Those were the good old days IMO