Suggestions for future(s) version(s)

[Chilikonkarne]

Hello Gary,

Few suggestions I would like to escalate for future versions of the game.
For the record, I have been playing the pro game extensively (2, 3 and now 2017). Most of my time playing the game is spent on the CSL where we are currently running the 6th season with DDPB3.
The engine is solid (despite some oddity) but it reflects well a basketball game and allows a lot of strategic adjustment (Zone, Pace, DI, FC). I didn’t find many difference between all the versions though and my comments below aren’t much about the engine.
The CSL is a great league thanks to DDPB3, but also because another aspect you don’t find in the solo game in my opinion: Immersion.
CSL being a media driven league, the immersion is created by the community via articles, podcast and various interaction you cannot have when playing alone.
But here are few suggestions which could help to solve this in my opinion :

- I am from the football manager school where the immersion is amazing. I think the main reason for that is that the information is coming to you and not the opposite.
Indeed everything in football manager starts from your email inbox where you receive after each day of simulation the main news from your team but also from the league. In DDPB3, emails are not really used (trade, fight and mandatory actions – that’s about 20 emails a season). And you need to go look for the news around which are usually quite repetitive. Email give you a structure and a certain dynamic when you play since you start each day by reading them. I would love to see the next DDPB with a similar approach – each day you could receive a dozen of emails like :
o Your last game with the main highlights described in few sentences (and a link to the box score)
o Update on the last NBA night and main highlights (top performance, injuries…with link different box score)
o Scouting report on the next team (similar to the college game) with direct link to the depth chart
o Trade rumors / Coach movement / Free Agent with link the player, coach or team invoved
o Trade proposal
o Team orientation => Change in depth chart with a player promoting to the starting position, team looking compete or tanking
o Injury report
o Rookie Ladder and NCAA/International Prospect latest news
o Fan community : feedback after a big win or big lose, their player of the year from the team, feedback from former legends
o Interview from the press
o Sport reporters criticizing or praising a team, player, trade or decision.
o Candidates for awards and follow-up during the year
o Possibility to follow one player or team in particular and receive regular update/scouting about him
o Few scandals (this is NBA!)
o When a player/achieve a success (30.000 points in career like Dirk lately….) – can be at the league level but also franchise level
o …

I assume it would be technically feasible without much problem but would require a massive amount of writing (similar to pbp). However, it would make the game so much greater

- As said previously, the strategy is well balanced from a team perspective but it would be nice to give individual instructions from the defensive end.
Be able to determine before the game the matchup (Kawhi will follow James Harden, whatever position he will play…that would be a huge bonus in multiplayer leagues), tell a player to take it easy in defense if his discipline is quite low…

- Development – You told me in a previous threat that the development of a player is depending on his potentials, playing time and coaches.
It seems to be untrue as players achieve their potential even when they don’t play. I would therefore revisit the development part to really apply the above concept. In DDPB, you don’t see player like Darko coming with huge potentials but fail because the wrong environment and not enough playing time.

- Big injuries – They should have an effect on career and stop development. How many guys IRL retired earlier because of injuries?

- Defensive Statistics – the 2017 version is really missing them. In the CSL, we live for STP%, PA/SF and TOFC!

- Franchise Management – Add a scouting team to manage, more financial details (value franchise, turnover franchise, operational costs…), have financials objectives from the owner. One objective would be also to keep the fan base happy (obviously more difficult in few franchises). Change of owner putting all front offices job at risk…

- Historical Replay = This is a great feature and the reason I bought the 2017 version.
I understand the data generation is based on statistics and some category like HDL for big guys are tough to determine for example. Most of them have 45 HDL which is weird. Maybe some randomness when generating the attributes would help.
Playing the mid-90s NBA, I saw some oddities but I believe they mainly come from the fact the engine is based on the 2016-2017 season. It would be great to adjust the style of play based on the year like Fast break Basketball does via sliders.
Finally to have the salary cap updated automatically after each season based on real figures.

- HTLM – add some features like trades, awards, playoffs bracket, defensive statistics…

Hope these suggestions will reach you well and happy to discuss it with you or any member of the community!

[Gary Gorski]

Thank you for your loyalty to the game and the feedback - I will add them to my notes for DDSPB18

[Cleasby]

I would also like to add to the list a trade proposal button - similar to ootp. Where you can put a player up and picks up and see what the a.i. would be willing to offer.

At the moment I find the commentary/response back to be difficult to make moves.

[ECHood]

Another suggestion for the future: a day off (at least) between games in the postseason, like the real NBA playoff schedule. Playing games 1 & 2 and also 3 & 4 of a series back to back isn't a big deal in theory, but when someone gets hurt it would be nice if they had that extra recovery day. Also: is fatigue a factor in back-to-back regular season games? It's hard to tell, I haven't been playing long enough to see. It would be cool to make that like the real NBA too, and maybe you can have a second-of-back-to-back depth chart you can save that gives a few more minutes to your reserves and accounts for fatigue. Perhaps a notification if a player is feeling fatigued before a game and you can adjust the depth chart accordingly before the game.

[Tim Moungey]

The reason financials were removed after they appeared in the earliest versions of the series is because they didn't add anything - they were essentially a cosmetic feature that nearly everyone playing just ignored. Really, the only financials to care about are the salary cap/hard cap.

[SonOfShibe]

I have few suggestions related to multiplayer:

During a creation draft it would be helpful to have the ability to trade picks, vs. waiting until the draft ends then forcing them through.

Also in that draft, would love to be able to save it in progress. Our multiplayer league took a week to finish the draft. Every time I exited the game I had to 'catch up' the picks by reentering them one-by-one.

Also in the creation draft, would like to see the total salary of draftees taken by each team at any point. I had to keep a manual record of how close gm's were to the cap.

Pre-draft gm's should be able to see draftee ratings in a table format, sortable and filterable. You can see the raw data in the html, but in-game is where that info belongs in my opinion, so you can manipulate it.

Enjoying the game, these are just observations to make it better for the next version.

[Cleasby]

Oh and bring back TOFC and PA/SF basically the old key 3 stats

[C-Bailey24]

Oh and bring back TOFC and PA/SF basically the old key 3 stats

Ditto. And the college game too. Otherwise there's no way to evaluate how good individual players are on defense unless you play out your games.

[FBBVet]

Clean up the layout. FBPB has simple clean layout. Users can jump right and get started. The interface and layout is confusing and not simple for the most basic computer users in DDSPB. Too many bells and whistles. The game does not need all the extras. Strip the game down to make it easier for newbies to hit the ground running.

[thirdsaint]

Clean up the layout. FBPB has simple clean layout. Users can jump right and get started. The interface and layout is confusing and not simple for the most basic computer users in DDSPB. Too many bells and whistles. The game does not need all the extras. Strip the game down to make it easier for newbies to hit the ground running.

Sorry but I disagree with this one. It doesn't take but an hour to find every screen and it's easier than it was in DDSPB3. I don't want all the bells and whistles gone or the game stripped down. Could the interface be cleaned up more? Sure, but I don't want that to come at the expense of content.