EHM The Blue Line

I think it will also make finding young talent in trades more difficult. It's going to be tough to know if the players we're trading for are ready to compete at the NHL level or not.

It will definitely slow down/prevent preseason trades since we will need time to scout some players, which will probable vary from player to player. This will add an element of randomness, unless we all start from the same save again, where we have a shortlist of players that were scouted, say, during the last two months?

bruins72 wrote:Still, I think it would be pretty cool, especially using the next new version of the DB when it does come. We'd be operating purely off of scouting reports and such. This could make things VERY interesting!

Sounds like a good idea. Especially when all NHL players have been changed/edited for the next release.

m0fownz0r wrote:It will definitely slow down/prevent preseason trades since we will need time to scout some players, which will probable vary from player to player. This will add an element of randomness, unless we all start from the same save again, where we have a shortlist of players that were scouted, say, during the last two months?

Yes, I think we'll go with a saved game again. Everyone seems to really like being able to draft and trade early in the challenge.

jhcjobpb wrote:

bruins72 wrote:Still, I think it would be pretty cool, especially using the next new version of the DB when it does come. We'd be operating purely off of scouting reports and such. This could make things VERY interesting!

Sounds like a good idea. Especially when all NHL players have been changed/edited for the next release.

That's exactly what I was thinking. With the changes to the DB, we're not going to know who the young stud are going to be.

bruins72 wrote:

m0fownz0r wrote:It will definitely slow down/prevent preseason trades since we will need time to scout some players, which will probable vary from player to player. This will add an element of randomness, unless we all start from the same save again, where we have a shortlist of players that were scouted, say, during the last two months?

Yes, I think we'll go with a saved game again. Everyone seems to really like being able to draft and trade early in the challenge.

also good all start with same potential on prospects, otherwise some managers get get a 200 kid while others get a 170...

would it be possible to use same system as last 2 challanges. but change the age of players to only use players over 29 and only trade away signed players under 24?

I don't know about doing the rules like that. Just using older players would be a bit boring, IMO.

In that case I would say something like right in front of a playoffs push 34+ ufas so that you need to rebuild the next season with not much young talent to start with. Then we will see who is best at assembling an all or nothing team AND doing a tough rebuild in the same challenge.

You'd have to make it where in the first season (when we first start the game) you'd have to trade your younger players for vets to try for a Cup. Then in our first off-season, you'd flip it back to trading for youth and ditching the old timers. I can see some problems coming from this. Depending on the team, trading their youngsters would leave them with far too many veterans, leaving us with guys being waived for no reason. Also, we'd have to make the youngsters that are traded be only those currently under NHL contract and playing in the ECHL, AHL, or NHL. Players signed and loaned back to their junior club would be excluded. Also, unsigned prospects would be safe.

I'm still not sold on this though. I think it could be a huge headache and we'd have lots of people making mistakes/getting confused.

bruins72 wrote:You'd have to make it where in the first season (when we first start the game) you'd have to trade your younger players for vets to try for a Cup. Then in our first off-season, you'd flip it back to trading for youth and ditching the old timers. I can see some problems coming from this. Depending on the team, trading their youngsters would leave them with far too many veterans, leaving us with guys being waived for no reason. Also, we'd have to make the youngsters that are traded be only those currently under NHL contract and playing in the ECHL, AHL, or NHL. Players signed and loaned back to their junior club would be excluded. Also, unsigned prospects would be safe.

I'm still not sold on this though. I think it could be a huge headache and we'd have lots of people making mistakes/getting confused.

was just an idea fun with some different rules. Altough the start with savegame before draft with trade restrictions is superior to the earlier challanges for sure.

i loved the sharks and nucks challange. I didnt manage to post my stats from the sharks challange to be in it ( traded for 23-24 year olds and play 3 sesons and won cup all 3 times).

When i play solo i have these house rules :
1 trade per year, max 3 for 1
1 extra trade per 5 year (new one seson 1,6,11...) can be saved and used in the block (1-5)(6-10)(11-15)
1 UFA signing per seson with max 2M cap hit.
This ensures maximum longivity for the team and have to plan very long term and dont need to sit and try 4854854943 different trades to get maximum value first seson.

what if you were, say, locked into a terrible coaching group and forced to let them set your lines and tactics? or the same with scouts? some kind of major handicap to overcome.

Leaving the coach to handle lines and tactics take away a great deal of what we do in the challenges. At that point we'd only be making trades and handling contracts. We might as well just put the game on vacation and see what we end up with each season.

Time to figure out the new challenge, or have you done that already b72?

I just got the DB today and simmed a season so we'll be at the point where we can start scouting the draft. I'll try to get the news graphic and such all set tomorrow morning at work and then launch the new challenge.

Which teams are you looking at?

I think the Leafs would be interesting, completing their rebuild and making them a cup contender again would be cool.

I think they might be too far into their rebuild for it to be interesting. Too many good pieces to build with.

Peter_Doherty wrote:I think they might be too far into their rebuild for it to be interesting. Too many good pieces to build with.

Yeah that is true.. what kind of team are you guys looking for? maybe using the New Jersey Devils could work based on them having a lot of older guys on their roster.

Depends which teams miss the playoffs in his sim, the team which would be the biggest challenge while still having a team without the oldies that miss playoffs is the team we will use, atleast that's how the process have been the last few times

Personally i would like us to not have a stud goalie, that's the biggest challenge for myself, getting good defence with an average goalie is extremely hard for me. That's just my view though, i know that batdad for example can get good defence no matter who he has in goal

Peter_Doherty wrote:Depends which teams miss the playoffs in his sim, the team which would be the biggest challenge while still having a team without the oldies that miss playoffs is the team we will use, atleast that's how the process have been the last few times

Personally i would like us to not have a stud goalie, that's the biggest challenge for myself, getting good defence with an average goalie is extremely hard for me. That's just my view though, i know that batdad for example can get good defence no matter who he has in goal

Ok that makes sense thank for he quick replies!

No problems, just to be clear though, i'm just guessing from my experience on how the last 3-5 challenge teams were chosen.

Yes, the Laffs might be a little too close to being rebuilt. It's hard finding the right balance. Pete is right about goaltending. If you've got good goaltending it make things much easier. I did 3 different saves, all simmed out a year with an unemployed GM (named TBL Challenge). Before doing this, I was thinking that the Red Wings would be a good team for our challenge because of the number of older players they had. Unfortunately, they made the playoffs in each save. I thought about maybe the Wild or the Panthers. Both have some good younger players and might be a little easier. The team I was thinking of that looked like it could be difficult is the Boston Bruins. Their good players are all older. Their younger players and prospects are just okay. They really need to be restocked. Also keep in mind, we're going to try something new this challenge. We're going to play with the attributes hidden. That will make restocking your team with young players and prospects much harder to judge.

I'll take another look at the saves in the morning and I'll see how things look.

I like Bruins for this if we trade Rask The fact that Sweeney traded away the young stud defenceman along with drafting weird makes them a great candidate.

Yes, Tuukka would have to be traded. It's everyone 29 or older (or 28... not sure). This also takes away Bergeron and Krejci. Also, in one of the saves (or was it 2?), the Bruins have traded away Malcolm Subban.