Distinct player builds: do we really need them?

[Janikka]

This is related to the other player builds thread that I resurrected, but I chose to start a new thread because this isn't really about which player build to pick. Be warned that this is a long post with some conflicting ideas and a stream of consciousness. I tried to formulate it somewhat logically but it may get confusing or contradictory. I was thinking further about how we yearn for more variation in builds actually used by players.

Player builds come with preset attributes these days. It used to be you'd build your own player, deciding what you needed and didn't need so much. People found what worked best, and we ended up mostly playing with very similar builds. It wasn't so different from now in that regard. The most notable differences came from selecting player size and customizing the skates and sticks. The two-way forward was once the go-to player type as you could maximize the attributes that were the most useful for EASHL. They had an attribute for fighting, for instance. There was really no reason to trade points from anything useful for that. On the other hand, certain attributes that sounded useful didn't seem to have much of an impact on the ice. Beyond the actual customization, there was the grind of acquiring more attribute points to spend, all the way into "Legend 3" where you had the highest amount available.

I don't miss the customization, and I don't miss the grind. Some feel the former provided more variation in team compositions and the latter a rewarding sense of purpose. From my perspective, the builds used were often hardly distinguishable and the grind was a pointless necessity.

So preset builds were a great move in my mind. They didn't quite turn out the way I expected, though. EA had the publicly stated idea that these different builds would translate into varying roles on the ice better than the old customization. You know, just like in real hockey where each player is employed in a certain way. Think a line with the classic grinder-playmaker-sniper composition, or an enforcer whose job it is to protect the more skilled players from scary actions like dirty hits or a punch in the face. Real hockey goons are nearly extinct now, but you get the idea. Even before preset builds they tried to direct people into role play with features such as "intimidation" where a player on the receiving end of several crushing hits would get scared of his own shadow and have his attributes nerfed.

It was a beautiful vision. However, to me it's unnecessary. I like to see variation in roles, sure. But are different builds even required for that? I think not. I think the better route to such variation is a natural one. Consider Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. There's a game I've played a lot to minimal success. In competitive CS, everyone is equal as far as their in-game character yet organized teams have very distinct roles out there. You have the sniper, the entry fragger, the creeper, etc. Granted, some of the variation comes from buying different gear.

I would contend that we already have this sort of thing in EASHL and especially the ECL. It's just typically not as organized as with professional teams in certain other games. Even if everyone picks the power forward because it's perhaps the strongest build overall, the player roles will not be identical. I'm not just talking positions here, though that's certainly an aspect that emphasizes the varying roles between players. Centers will naturally gravitate toward their idea of what a real hockey center does, and the same applies to all the other positions.

Beyond that, though, think of the team you currently play for. On the surface we see six players adhering loosely to roles dictated by their chosen positions. Examining their play closer, though, more details in distinct player roles emerge. It's typical to have a go-to player for a specific action. If you need to carry the puck through the opponent's defensive trap and into the offensive zone, a team may have a specialist for that. No words or even conscious agreement is required here. You'll just have one or two guys doing that specific thing far more than anyone else on your team. In the long run, it becomes part of that player's role on the ice game in and game out. Or, just to draw an example off the top of my head, NOS has one defender who's rather fond of dumping the puck in. The team accepts this as part of that player's role on the ice. We aren't getting through the trap right now, but I'm glad we have our designated carrying-the-puck-into-the-zone guy, or our designated dump-in guy, or what have you. Another obvious example would be defensive pairings where one is the more offensive defender and the other stays further back to compensate. That's one of those things where we instinctively emulate real hockey, of course.

I picked CS:GO as a parallel earlier. It was a convenient choice for me to make my point. What about a game like Dota, though? Could you imagine that with identical builds? And unlike CS, many multiplayer FPS games are designed around varying character abilities. R6: Siege and Overwatch, for example. I can see that a very convincing argument could be made for different player builds in EA Sports NHL.

And it doesn't need to be an either or, between distinct builds or naturally formed roles. Why not have builds emphasize the differences between players and their roles that already exist? The way to achieve this seems obvious: balance the preset builds better. Have the sacrifices for getting specific strengths truly matter. Make the trade-offs count so that you really need to rely on others to compensate for the innate shortcomings of your build.

I mean, if that's truly what we want. One might also want to have the absolute best players not be limited by their builds in any way so they can stand out above the rest and do all the things they're good at to the best of their ability, not just the things where their build allows them to excel. But then again, you could argue that clearly specialized builds may actually highlight the skill between players better compared to a more uniform template. Carving out a niche for oneself and truly excelling at it would become a more viable way to the top as those niches would be in high demand from teams looking to fulfill specific needs.

 

[Lauri]

Could have like it was before without the grind and preset builds have a set value which you add some amount of points for those skills that suit you best. 

[Janikka]

Just now, Lauri said:

Could have like it was before without the grind and preset builds have a set value which you add some amount of points for those skills that suit you best. 

I've actually toyed with this idea in my mind before. While the grind had some appeal to many casual players, I would imagine that it was a necessary chore to most players participating in competitive leagues such as the EHL. On the other hand, I feel like EA didn't fully succeed in making the attribute customization actually matter. I mean, we all ended up maximizing and minimizing pretty much the same attributes based on what was more useful in 6 on 6.

[FreddeSwede]

Personally I don’t think the player build matters that much to one player. But I do think that in EASHL, in this specific game mode, chemistry does matter. Not only between the actual players, but between the player attributes.

When it comes to prebuilt or costumized player builds, I’d like EA to go back to costumized. Mostly because it adds to the immersion and makes your player feel more like your own.

If it matters much on the ice? I doubt it. Because after all the only thing that makes a team successful in EASHL 5v5 or 6v6, is not what you do with the puck. It all comes down to what your teammates do when they don’t have the puck. 

 

Edited December 14, 2017 by FreddeSwede

[I_Alex28_I]

Enforcer Goalie is needed. Hextall Style

[Limppuhuuli]

I miss the good old days when real customization was possible. It was easier in my opinion to really pick a certain role instead of trying to be a jack of all trades. All the attributes didn't work like they should have though, but I would still like to get the old system back maybe without the mandatory grinding. Grind was helpful for learning to play with certain strenghts as one couldn't really be good at many things before getting most of the attribute points, but it shouldn't be a something that you have to do.

[FreddeSwede]

11 minutes ago, minokin said:

Good topic Janikka!

I have played EASHL since the beginning but have always been a bit frustrated over how the gameplay mechanics work when it comes to player builds.

On one hand, the idea of having distinct roles assigned through a certain player build is exciting but NHL18 in it's current state does not come even remotely close to a game like Overwatch where you actually have to be really careful of your choice of character/build. Every character has a set role in a whole 'nother sense than in NHL18. But then again, it's an FPS MOBA, the gameplay mechanics are designed after that and the scripts as to when something is effective against a certain character is clearly distinguished.

On the other hand, a more skill-based, unscripted game would be equally as exciting. Then it would truly come down to the teams creativity, mechanical skill, tactical prowess and the individual skill of players. I follow your thoughts regarding CS. A highly un-scripted game where all aforementioned traits is the core of that game. But how does that carry over to a game that in my mind is heavily scripted? Imagine Overwatch where you only can choose Soldier 76. In NHL18, every puck pick-up, goalie save animation, stick lift, hit avoiding animation ( mainly PWF bumps off defenders), face-off animation and shot animation is probably filled with so much variables that it makes it really hard to code it properly so that it doesn't feel very scripted. I'm talking about how the game decides who wins those situations. Ok, in some sense it comes down to your speed and reflexes, but not as much as in other un-scripted games like CS and Rocket League. In CS I imagine that you have a more simplified coding when it comes to variables. In almost every face-off with an opponent is decided by how fast you can push those WASD-buttons or move your mouse and click. 

To summarize it all, both ways have their pros and cons and it ultimately comes down to which type of game we want NHL18 to be. I myself would want to see more of the unscripted stuff where it comes down to your own mechanical skills rather than a code that decides who wins what

 

Over and out!

/Minokin

Good post! There’s a few reasons to why the game is scripted, pre-programmed based on positioning, and uses the same game engine in all game modes. 

1. Hockey is a team sport. There’s either bots or other players on the ice. 

2. How are the bots supposed to behave, as in ”be programmed”, in an unscripted 1v1 game? Random movement? 

3. In an FPS games theres no bots. In a FPS theres no rules.

If you compare FIFA to NHL, in this game mode, they have almost the same ”issues”. Exept the playing field is much bigger. But you see the same wierd player speed changes, wierd penalties, strange tackles, insanely stupid passes and wierd goals.

It’s because the engine is based only on positioning. There’s no RNG in this game. Even the puck is affected more by timing and player positioning, than of actual physics or player attributes. And lets not forget about Internet delay and consistency. 

[miisolegend]

27 minutes ago, Limppuhuuli said:

I miss the good old days when real customization was possible. It was easier in my opinion to really pick a certain role instead of trying to be a jack of all trades. All the attributes didn't work like they should have though, but I would still like to get the old system back maybe without the mandatory grinding. Grind was helpful for learning to play with certain strenghts as one couldn't really be good at many things before getting most of the attribute points, but it shouldn't be a something that you have to do.

I totally agree! Build your own player was fun to.

Edited December 14, 2017 by miisolegend

[FreddeSwede]

34 minutes ago, minokin said:

Even better post

I presented my post with the noob-glasses on, so to speak. I don't know much about how NHL/FIFA is coded but if we were to find common ground:

Less randomized shit, more skill

It would be magnificent to experience an iteration of NHL that is somewhat of a hybrid when it comes to script. With that I mean more skill-based but still works in an environment you describe with positioning being the base. 

OFF-TOPIC (But still relates to the things described with this post)

Please give us a spectator-mode so we can start broadcasting the game with great quality! Imagine watching a Final where we could change angles and stuff 

I totally agree. I’d love to see the EASHL-game mode being less scripted. But that’s pretty much it. Any other game mode, where you don’t have a full team(6v6), it would be impossible to make a good hockey-sim. Instead you would end up with an arcade version of the game. And I don’t know about the other players here, but that’s not something I’d enjoy playing.

If you ask me, I think the reason why EA hasn’t done this already is simply because the playerbase is too small in this particular game mode compared to 1v1 or HUT. It’s simply put, not worth the money or the effort from EA’s point of view. 

 

Edited December 14, 2017 by FreddeSwede

[Frilander]

4 tuntia sitten, FreddeSwede kirjoitti:

Good post! There’s a few reasons to why the game is scripted, pre-programmed based on positioning, and uses the same game engine in all game modes. 

1. Hockey is a team sport. There’s either bots or other players on the ice. 

2. How are the bots supposed to behave, as in ”be programmed”, in an unscripted 1v1 game? Random movement? 

3. In an FPS games theres no bots. In a FPS theres no rules.

If you compare FIFA to NHL, in this game mode, they have almost the same ”issues”. Exept the playing field is much bigger. But you see the same wierd player speed changes, wierd penalties, strange tackles, insanely stupid passes and wierd goals.

It’s because the engine is based only on positioning. There’s no RNG in this game. Even the puck is affected more by timing and player positioning, than of actual physics or player attributes. And lets not forget about Internet delay and consistency. 

this is true, games definitely not about RNG (in common word luck)

[MartindalexC]

5 hours ago, FreddeSwede said:

Good post! There’s a few reasons to why the game is scripted, pre-programmed based on positioning, and uses the same game engine in all game modes. 

1. Hockey is a team sport. There’s either bots or other players on the ice. 

2. How are the bots supposed to behave, as in ”be programmed”, in an unscripted 1v1 game? Random movement? 

3. In an FPS games theres no bots. In a FPS theres no rules.

If you compare FIFA to NHL, in this game mode, they have almost the same ”issues”. Exept the playing field is much bigger. But you see the same wierd player speed changes, wierd penalties, strange tackles, insanely stupid passes and wierd goals.

It’s because the engine is based only on positioning. There’s no RNG in this game. Even the puck is affected more by timing and player positioning, than of actual physics or player attributes. And lets not forget about Internet delay and consistency. 

1. "There are either bots or other players on the ice", this applies to csgo as a comp game type means 5v5 (players & bots). 

2. Bots in csgo are programmed to be FUCKING RETARDED and that's not an understatement, third party hosts such as faceit change the bots so they're not so detrimental to the team. Not sure what point this is making though in regards to justifying why the game is "scripted" (don't think you know what this means).

3. Rip. And there are some rules, granted they're mostly based around managing an economy. 

 

Thing is I don't know what argument you are trying to make, if you were to say that in 'competitive' fps / nhl there are no bots then you are correct, but you can't then justify stuff being "scripted" because "how are bots supposed to behave". 

59 minutes ago, Frilander said:

this is true, games definitely not about RNG (in common word luck)

 

I don't think you guys grasp what RNG actually means either honestly.

 

NHL is RNG reliant as fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk. Take a shot? Well that's rng as it takes your input, skating direction, stick direction probably, and last but not least your players inherent shooting accuracy and power. 

Puck reception? Lol, again how is this not rng? You can't get better at receiving passes to the point where you will pick it up 100 times out of 100 because the game straight up doesn't allow you to.

Picking up loose pucks, especially near the boards / near other players? Yea, again how is this not rng? You are completely reliant on your guy sticking out his dick and picking that shit up. You can't trigger the animation, you can't change the speed of it, you can't control shit. In cs if you use an awp you can control your (in)accuracy based off of your movement, if you have bad movement you can't be as mobile and will have to rely on a small, but albeit significant, amount of rng for your shots to hit (e.g.: if you can't counterstrafe quickly don't even try entrying with an awp). 

Goalie saves? Hands up if you're a goalie and you've been in perfect positioning (and I mean, perfect, no previous movement, stationary, no screen et cetera) and the puck went straight through your pad.

I get where you're coming from with the positioning argument but you're mis-intrepretting having good positioning and being lucky, that's not to say that being in good position is not a skill, because it absolutely is, just not in the ways you guys are thinking about. 

[Frilander]

1 minuutti sitten, MartindalexC kirjoitti:

1. "There are either bots or other players on the ice", this applies to csgo as a comp game type means 5v5 (players & bots). 

2. Bots in csgo are programmed to be FUCKING RETARDED and that's not an understatement, third party hosts such as faceit change the bots so they're not so detrimental to the team. Not sure what point this is making though in regards to justifying why the game is "scripted" (don't think you know what this means).

3. Rip. And there are some rules, granted they're mostly based around managing an economy. 

 

Thing is I don't know what argument you are trying to make, if you were to say that in 'competitive' fps / nhl there are no bots then you are correct, but you can't then justify stuff being "scripted" because "how are bots supposed to behave". 

 

I don't think you guys grasp what RNG actually means either honestly.

 

NHL is RNG reliant as fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk. Take a shot? Well that's rng as it takes your input, skating direction, stick direction probably, and last but not least your players inherent shooting accuracy and power. 

Puck reception? Lol, again how is this not rng? You can't get better at receiving passes to the point where you will pick it up 100 times out of 100 because the game straight up doesn't allow you to.

Picking up loose pucks, especially near the boards / near other players? Yea, again how is this not rng? You are completely reliant on your guy sticking out his dick and picking that shit up. You can't trigger the animation, you can't change the speed of it, you can't control shit. In cs if you use an awp you can control your (in)accuracy based off of your movement, if you have bad movement you can't be as mobile and will have to rely on a small, but albeit significant, amount of rng for your shots to hit (e.g.: if you can't counterstrafe quickly don't even try entrying with an awp). 

Goalie saves? Hands up if you're a goalie and you've been in perfect positioning (and I mean, perfect, no previous movement, stationary, no screen et cetera) and the puck went straight through your pad.

I get where you're coming from with the positioning argument but you're mis-intrepretting having good positioning and being lucky, that's not to say that being in good position is not a skill, because it absolutely is, just not in the ways you guys are thinking about. 

all about timing, like in csgo  

Edited December 14, 2017 by Frilander

[MartindalexC]

Just now, Frilander said:

all about timing, like in csgo

Ah....

The silver's handbook 

[Frilander]

Just now, MartindalexC kirjoitti:

Ah....

The silver's handbook 

yes, go b?

[MartindalexC]

1 minute ago, Frilander said:

yes, go b?

*rash b men fawkin nuub

[Frilander]

Just now, MartindalexC kirjoitti:

*rash b men fawkin nuub

davai bombu..

[MartindalexC]

Just now, Frilander said:

davai bombu..

idynahui

[Lauri]

As a goalie i raise my hand for that point martindalex. 

[MartindalexC]

Just now, Lauri said:

As a goalie i raise my hand for that point martindalex. 

I rest my case then 

[FreddeSwede]

12 minutes ago, MartindalexC said:

1. "There are either bots or other players on the ice", this applies to csgo as a comp game type means 5v5 (players & bots). 

2. Bots in csgo are programmed to be FUCKING RETARDED and that's not an understatement, third party hosts such as faceit change the bots so they're not so detrimental to the team. Not sure what point this is making though in regards to justifying why the game is "scripted" (don't think you know what this means).

3. Rip. And there are some rules, granted they're mostly based around managing an economy. 

 

Thing is I don't know what argument you are trying to make, if you were to say that in 'competitive' fps / nhl there are no bots then you are correct, but you can't then justify stuff being "scripted" because "how are bots supposed to behave". 

 

I don't think you guys grasp what RNG actually means either honestly.

 

NHL is RNG reliant as fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk. Take a shot? Well that's rng as it takes your input, skating direction, stick direction probably, and last but not least your players inherent shooting accuracy and power. 

Puck reception? Lol, again how is this not rng? You can't get better at receiving passes to the point where you will pick it up 100 times out of 100 because the game straight up doesn't allow you to.

Picking up loose pucks, especially near the boards / near other players? Yea, again how is this not rng? You are completely reliant on your guy sticking out his dick and picking that shit up. You can't trigger the animation, you can't change the speed of it, you can't control shit. In cs if you use an awp you can control your (in)accuracy based off of your movement, if you have bad movement you can't be as mobile and will have to rely on a small, but albeit significant, amount of rng for your shots to hit (e.g.: if you can't counterstrafe quickly don't even try entrying with an awp). 

Goalie saves? Hands up if you're a goalie and you've been in perfect positioning (and I mean, perfect, no previous movement, stationary, no screen et cetera) and the puck went straight through your pad.

I get where you're coming from with the positioning argument but you're mis-intrepretting having good positioning and being lucky, that's not to say that being in good position is not a skill, because it absolutely is, just not in the ways you guys are thinking about. 

Listen dude. This is not a debate. Simply because I don’t have or want to.

Just ask EA on what premises they built their game engine on. I find it pretty amusing that you and others hate bots, but have nothing negative to say about them in a 1v1 game? I find that hilarious. And why is that, do you think? 

[iSvamp]

dafuq is this

[MartindalexC]

4 minutes ago, FreddeSwede said:

Listen dude. This is not a debate. Simply because I don’t have or want to.

Just ask EA on what premises they built their game engine on. I find it pretty amusing that you and others hate bots, but have nothing negative to say about them in a 1v1 game? I find that hilarious. And why is that, do you think? 

???????????

Don't state opinion as fact then? And where is this stuff about me hating bots? Ask rusty, we love them here at nor 

 

[FreddeSwede]

1 hour ago, MartindalexC said:

???????????

Don't state opinion as fact then? And where is this stuff about me hating bots? Ask rusty, we love them here at nor 

 

Like I said. I’m neither interested or in need to prove anything. Also you’ve got no obligation to trust or take anything I say seriously. 🤷‍♂️

[MartindalexC]

5 minutes ago, FreddeSwede said:

Like I said. I’m neither interested or in need to prove anything. Also you’ve got no obligation to trust or take anything I say seriously. 🤷‍♂️

wat