Subject: Questions & Answers

Cool, Vlady ... thanks.

I'm not crying, just trying to stay in the loop because I love the game.

I've been out of work for 9 months (financial industry), or I'd be a pro-pack owner by now for sure and not have to worry about this.

(Although, having all these bot teams in my division (10) creates a bit of a disincentive for me to shell out 50 bucks to watch a few extra games that aren't really competitive... so maybe I'd wait until I promote after all)

Can someone explain player quality to a new player? I'm trying to set up practice schedules and I'm confused. There is a quality number next to each rating and I assume this means how good they are at training that attribute. Then in the profile there is a number in () that seems to indicate how far until the next bump for that attribute. My question is, do the players get training bumps in games or only through practice? Does that mean I need to set my practices to maintain certain rations? And what are the best ratios?

I'll answer the second question first, the perfect ratio is not known, and there is a lot of discussion on the issue on the boards, check the q&a in the international area for more discussion as well. I would say the only consensus is that the secondary attributes should be no lower than 50% and don't need to be higher than 80% of the primary. Most people have ratios somewhere in between.

You got everything correct.

Players get bumps through Practice (nightly around 11:15 EST), although performance is also affected by Chemistry and Experience, which come from playing games.

Yes, you should train your players for their Main & Secondary Attributes ... read The Guide's section on Players again.

Ratio opinions will vary depending on who you talk to. Experimenting with goalies in friendlies is a good way to eliminate noise in your analysis (other players affecting the match ratings) and opportunity cost of losing games.

I've seen players allude to 5:4:3, or 2:1:1, or 1:.07:0.7, but your best bet is to try different things and decide for yourself, and go back and read sectiosn of The Guide occasionally. It's a lot to take in at once.

.. or scout the best players on other rosters instead of your own.

as far as quality, until you scout a player the quality is only a guess. but yes that indicates how well they train that attribute.

Yes you pick which area to train them in.

Players only improve from practice and players who play in games don't improve as much as players that don't (they however get other advantages such as earning experience and chemistry) In order to level that out you need to build your regeneration facility.

So attributes won't improve without practice? So that means that I have to practice other non-key attributes such as Def for Wings and Centers and Shooting for Defenders as I see fit?

correct, they won't improve if you don't practice.

as far as other attributes, as long as the quality is high enough, I train shooting for all players, tech for all players and passing for all players. I also believe in training defense for forwards and offense for some defenseman, but I would wait to get your training facility built up before worrying about those

When hiring staff, why would you ever have more than two people for a given position? I've looked at some of the top teams in the division and seen very heavy staffs. Is this because they are hired from job applicants and they are training them for replacement?

For me, mostly yes, I signed guys that were better and still have other guys on the roster. Some I am waiting to sell and some I believe will eventually surpass my current guys. For a while my policy was to sign everyone who applied, I have now scaled that back.

But there are some positions where you can specialize and 4 guys is useful. For example, you only need marketing the final week of the season, so it makes more sense to have 2 managers training in scouting and 2 in marketing. Ditto for the sports academy, where you only need youth training on the day you pull your academy guys and player training when you are running a training camp.

Only issue with specialists is thier salary. It's much higher. A 20:20 staff around 2K give or take nationality penalty of 25% for non country. Now make him 30:10 it's the same OR but your looking at 3000 plus or more.

Specialists have value don't get me wrong. I use them in SA in particular. I don't train atty 2 solely though. A bonus for 2 camps a season isn't worth 3K plus in my mind. I build 2 flat guys for camps that will both become full timers when my atty 1 staff get to expensive on cost/benifit. Based on my last 2 pulls they already are! hehehe

There are also facilities where I don't recomend specialists like coaching and physio. Huge increased costs and very importantly because head and assistant are wieghted on contribution you can't get flat practice influence for example. Either defense or offense will be influenced greater depending on the specialty of the head.

Should also mention that I see managers differently. As blues says you can have 2 atty 2 specialists. With the value of a sponsor contract versus seasonal salary you can make a strong arguement for 2 atty 2 specialists.

You only need marketing the last week of the season? What about souvenir sales?

Maybe overrated in this stage

are they actually connected? In the guide under staff it only mentions tv deals and sponsor.

And if they are connected, well, you were warned
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Marketing has a few purposes.

1) End of season contract negotiations
2) Souvenir Sales etc (allegedly)
3) PLAYER SCOUTING

The third is rather important.

You mean managers? I don't know how Marketing influences scouting . That is a separate attribute in its own