Game Systems Discussion: Scouting

[JeffR]

(I've had this written for a while, just hadn't posted it yet while busy with last-minute stuff, although some of you may have seen a shorter version in the newsletter. One more coming after this, about player generation and the background leagues.)

Explaining the new scouting system first requires a little bit of discussion about how scouting usually works in this type of game, and whether that reflects real hockey scouting.

The most common scouting system in sports strategy games that include one is discovery-oriented; Football Manager is probably the best example. You send out your scouts, and they report back if they've found any useful players (that's a big oversimplification of what can be done in FM, you can also target specific players to learn more about them, but discovery is the biggest part of the it.) You may get email/news notification if there's anyone that really stands out, and the information you know about players the scout "sees" is upgraded.

But that's not really appropriate for a modern hockey game. Unlike soccer, where it's possible for a player to develop in third-world obscurity and where they tend to be acquired by professional teams at younger ages, hockey is mainly played in a highly organized way in a small number of developed nations, and has mechanisms like drafts and minimum age rules. Draft-eligible players are highly visible and get watched and rated by many different professional and amateur scouts and organizations. There's a big demand for that information, and it gets disseminated widely over the internet. In short, it's very, very difficult and rare to find a hidden gem no one else knows about. Case in point: the big secret of the 2012 draft was Mark Jankowski, who was playing high school hockey in Ontario, not exactly a typical path to stardom. But he was ranked #74 in Central Scouting's North American list at the start of 2011-12, by midseason was getting media attention as a possible sleeper pick, and eventually wound up being Calgary's first-round selection. That's what passes for a "discovery" these days.

It doesn't make much sense, then, to build a scouting system for a hockey game with a discovery emphasis (and, honestly, those can get a little annoying, spamming you with messages about players that the scout has seen.) Instead, what we've done is to emphasize the quality of scouting in a way that separates the user's team from its competitors. In the new scouting system, young players get a "Consensus Opinion" attached to them when they're generated. This is the general opinion that scouts agree on when they're discussing players amongst each other, that tends to get published by the less-insightful scouting services and draft guides, and eventually gets settled on as conventional wisdom in public message boards. This can have either a positive or negative change in his perceived value by teams, overrating or underrating him in their eyes, by varying degrees (sometimes, the popular opinion is pretty accurate.) I won't say exactly how much it can change them, but it's enough to knock a legitimate first-round talent several rounds lower if he's badly underestimated.

Those inaccurate perceptions will gradually fade as the player ages, but not before the player advances past the early part of his career - i.e., the stage when teams have to make decisions about whether or not to draft or sign him while he's still developing. So, then, the role of scouting in this new system is to reduce that error - a good scout spending a lot of time in an area he's familar with can eliminate most of the consensus error even in cases where the popular scouting opinion about a player is very wrong. Your job is to put your scouts in places where they can do the most good.

When you start the game or take over a team, you can assign the scouts via the scouting menu - simply click on "add job" and you can choose a new target for him. Typically, you'll want to assign the scouts who are best at evaluating potential to amateur scouting roles, and those who are better at evuating current ability to scout professional players. It's also a good idea to place a scout in the region, typically near his home, where he is the most knowledgeable (we'll be adding a better indicator of whether or not he's in the "right" place to the scouting screen, right now it's not very helpful in making geographic choices.

The "ability" and "potential" ratings you see in-game are always post-scouting correction - your scouts' analysis is built into them (if you're unemployed, you just see the general opinion.) Likewise, the AI teams see players in the same way, dependent on the filter provided by their scouts - if they have few scouts or bad ones, they'll make more mistakes in evaluation.

You can change a scout's location whenever you want, but be aware that the game is tracking the amount of time your scouts spend in a given region and classification (pro/amateur). Constant coverage is the only way to optimize the error-reduction for a region; when determining how much to correct the consensus opinion, the game considers the amount of time your scouts have spent there, their scouting skills, and whether or not they "know" the area they're scouting. Near-perfect scores in all categories will eliminate almost all the error in the consensus opinion, but it'll be very rare to achieve that. Mainly, you're trying to minimize the effect, so when you go "off the board" with a draft pick that other teams would ignore, you've got legitimate reason (hopefully) to claim "he was a first-rounder on our list and couldn't believe he was still available."

I love how you have compared Soccer and Hockey there and how it works out. I've never really thought into like that! Interesting stuff Jeff, thanks!

[Mordrehl]

Except ... at the lower levels of hockey, ie say the Canadian Major Juniors (WHL, QMJHL, WHL) I think there is a matter of discovery ... however, that is a minor point to my main issue

Every NHL team has scouting lists, ranking players in eyes of the franchise. The CHL teams most likely do the same thing. Currently in FHL there is nowhere this information is localized. Sure, I can back to my news item about the draft preview ... but I want to see every single player thats coming up for the next few drafs. I want to as an NHL GM look at the CHL drafts for who's entering those leagues etc etc

Right now, there is no centralized location for this. There is no easy way that I saw for example to do a player search alaa EHM (ie search the entire DB and filter by age, position, nationality, league etc etc)

[dave1927p]

the only problem with this is that you cannot know when you go off the board. There is no ISS ranking.

I hope to see both a list of the ISS rankings (or top 200 which is the general consensus) and next to that list is your scouts top 200 predictions.

All that information should be displayed in the draft screen side by side along with that players current league, team, age and stats, potential and ability.

Overall sounds like a nice start to a system.

[yzerwing]

My only issue at the moment is that some intangible things aren't visible, that were in previous builds, as the scouting tab is gone. Things like if the player is lazy, has a bad attitude, etc. are nice to know.

[AHockeyKid]

Thank you for this post. I can adapt to this new system (as opposed to the version in beta), but I do have one request - give us the ability to scout a specific player. After you have played for a while, many marginal NHL players (and prospects) may end up with ratings assigned to them, but early on I often find myself in a situation where a computer team sends me a trade offer with a player that has no ratings. As a result, I have no way of comparing him to the player the other team is trying to obtain from me. I'm not saying that the ratings assigned by my scouts have to be accurate, but I would like some input on the trade.

I can understand signing an occasional player only to discover that my scout's ratings were too high (his actual ability is lower), but it is very frustrating when you have no ability to evaluate a trade offer.

Is there something I'm missing? Or a workaround?

Thank you for the great work on this game, and the excellent communication with the player base! (I cannot begin to imagine the amount of work involved in trying to get a project like this off the ground - let alone to a final release).

[JeffR]

Originally Posted by Mordrehl

Except ... at the lower levels of hockey, ie say the Canadian Major Juniors (WHL, QMJHL, WHL) I think there is a matter of discovery ... however, that is a minor point to my main issue

Not as much as you'd think. Case in point, Dale Hunt, the kid who went #3 overall in the WHL draft in 2005 (after being the favourite to go #1 for most of the year.) He was playing single-A bantam (technically, "Rural AA") in Macdonald, Manitoba, in a league with other farm towns. Other than the more difficult to reach corners of BC, about as obscure as you can get in Western Canadian bantam hockey. But the only flaw in the coverage of him was that he wound up overwatched and overrated as he rolled through outmatched competition like a 13-year-old Todd Bertuzzi (if anyone remembers him being a star in the first EHM, that's because I got fooled, too.) And that was eight years ago, with the amount of coverage increasing significantly in the interim.

Every NHL team has scouting lists, ranking players in eyes of the franchise. The CHL teams most likely do the same thing. Currently in FHL there is nowhere this information is localized. Sure, I can back to my news item about the draft preview ... but I want to see every single player thats coming up for the next few drafs. I want to as an NHL GM look at the CHL drafts for who's entering those leagues etc etc

Right now, there is no centralized location for this. There is no easy way that I saw for example to do a player search alaa EHM (ie search the entire DB and filter by age, position, nationality, league etc etc)

Fair point. I'll see what we can do about providing the information on draft-eligible players in a better way.

[Javs]

Originally Posted by JeffR

Not as much as you'd think. Case in point, Dale Hunt, the kid who went #3 overall in the WHL draft in 2005 (after being the favourite to go #1 for most of the year.) He was playing single-A bantam (technically, "Rural AA") in Macdonald, Manitoba, in a league with other farm towns. Other than the more difficult to reach corners of BC, about as obscure as you can get in Western Canadian bantam hockey. But the only flaw in the coverage of him was that he wound up overwatched and overrated as he rolled through outmatched competition like a 13-year-old Todd Bertuzzi (if anyone remembers him being a star in the first EHM, that's because I got fooled, too.) And that was eight years ago, with the amount of coverage increasing significantly in the interim.

I kinda disagree, how many NHL Stars were 3-4 round picks in the CHL? (or even later) sure not a lot, but a few were. A lot of 3-4 liners on CHL teams are undrafted in the CHL (the odd 1st, 2nd liner), mind you they don't go anywhere in pro hockey 95% of the time.

I think it sounds like a great system, but maybe there is a way to make the general consensus just a bit wider range for junior hockey? Especially if we get into Jr.A leagues being playable where sometimes players just appear at 18-19 or even 20 and just dominate the league (mostly due to physical maturity) again mind you these players don't go too far in any other leagues.

[Puckhead]

This may not the best place for it, but since it's part of evaluating players skills, I'm going to repost this here:

Originally Posted by Puckhead

Scouting is very fundamental, I agree. And it would be great to be able to demand scouting reports on the player/league/region that the player wants.

Also, as I said in a different thread: please implement the option to compare players. EHM had the options to compare those players that you looked at most recently (ratings or detail screen of a player) and it was pretty cool and useful to make trading and line-up decisions. But also for drafts this could be helpful, for example to compare two very players that are very close together in the pre-draft rankings to make sure that you are able to pick the best for your team.

Jeff, can you say something about this? Will this be implemented sooner or later? Thanks.

[moore4807]

I'm in agreement with most of the posters here, but if I could have my wish list it would look something like this...

1) Since we seem to be using the tab feature, Scouting should have its own back.

2) Break the scouting areas down to continents/countries/regions for easier groupings, but also leagues within that region should be allowed to be scouted for that "discovery" player (otherwise agreed with your opinion Jeff, for scouts familiarity).

3) Scouts - profiles including age, experience, skills (off., def. goalies), There should also be a personality rater. Some scouts go to work for a team because its a paycheck, some because its a steppingstone to something better, some because they are good at it. Eager scouts show up at 530a practices, while lazy ones make phone calls at 9a when they roll out of bed...

4)There should be a head scout in this game to oversee scouts (mgr) and he/she(?) reports to the manager/owner and occasional controversies could result from differing opinions including scouts quitting or refusing to work under a head scout. Or even the owner stepping in to overrule a draft pick... ((Think George Steinbrenner of Hockey!)

5) Agreed with others about player comparisons - A brief OOTP style box needed for reasons stated. Also why no OSA scouting like OOTP? You talk about general consensus - isn't that what it is? Call it O.S.O. instead, other scouts opinions - lol!

Finally can we eventually get an option for ratings to be 1-100 like OOTP? It's way down on the list, But I prefer that over 1-20...

PS - I have no idea how much coding changes or hours of work required for my wants, I do know from experience that 5 out of 100 suggestions make it, while the other 95 end up in the well meaning garbage... no harm, no foul in asking right?

[hluraven]

Originally Posted by JeffR

But that's not really appropriate for a modern hockey game

You appear to have made the mistake of thinking that the NHL is the only league in the modern hockey world. In many leagues around the world, including playable ones in FHM, scouting very much is discovery based.

Everything you said makes perfect sense, is innovative and if done well will be fantastic for the NHL. But, the lower the league, the less relevant or downright wrong this method becomes, especially in European leagues where there is no drafting.

[Puckhead]

Originally Posted by Puckhead

This may not the best place for it, but since it's part of evaluating players skills, I'm going to repost this here:

Jeff, can you say something about this? Will this be implemented sooner or later? Thanks.

In addition to this, I'm going to repost the EHM screens of the SI-solution for comparing players here:

Attachment 299406

Attachment 299405

Attachment 299407

Something similar would be amazing.

[RBLwebguy]

Originally Posted by Puckhead

In addition to this, I'm going to repost the EHM screens of the SI-solution for comparing players here:

Attachment 299406

Attachment 299405

Attachment 299407

Something similar would be amazing.

Have you seen the player compare screen OOTP built? That is a pretty good one as well!

Here is a screenshot

[Merla]

Originally Posted by RBLwebguy

Have you seen the player compare screen OOTP built? That is a pretty good one as well!

Here is a screenshot

Wow. That looks Amazing. Love the menu on the right side as well.

[Jimayo]

Are you suggesting there are no more Henrik Zetterbergs?

[Puckhead]

Originally Posted by RBLwebguy

Have you seen the player compare screen OOTP built? That is a pretty good one as well!

Here is a screenshot

This looks pretty good too, but with the ability to compare statistics (season and career) of two players would be even better. Jeff, please let me know about the rough estimate for implementation of this feature. Thanks.

[anguscl]

Originally Posted by Puckhead

This looks pretty good too, but with the ability to compare statistics (season and career) of two players would be even better. Jeff, please let me know about the rough estimate for implementation of this feature. Thanks.

You can, it is part of the dropdown in the middle of the compare screen.

[PromisedPain]

Jeff, do you think you'll ever bring back the scouting reports into the game? Like describing the players' strengths, weaknesses and career estimations. (if the player is expected to be a franchise player, first liner etc.)

[Mordrehl]

If there are "hidden" ratings in FHM, this is where the scouting and scouting report section become far more "discovery" dependant.

Sure, every team may have a general consensus on a players raw skills, but scouting players/shortlist/leagues/drafts should reveal the intangibles like consistency, professionalism, ambition, work ethic etc

How well a scout evaluates those things would of course depend on that scouts ability, but there should be some way for this to be done. And it should be presented for every player on their own info screen.

[QMJHL_GUY]

Sorry buddy but Mark Jankowski played high school hockey for Stanstead College which is based in Québec, not Ontario.