Hi guys, I havent been putting anything online for the new version because we are currently working on an online knowledge base that will make everything easier to update and maintain from version to version.
Still, I wanted to put briefly some info about how the new depth chart/packages system works because this is one of the major additions in the new game, and may be hard to grasp when just looking quickly at it.
One of the shortcomings of previous versions was that they were not very flexible in terms of switching up depth charts ingame, the package system adresses that.
You will see on the depth chart screen that you have 5 packages for offense and 5 for defense. These packages can apply to any formation, and (obviously, since there are more than 11 positions on a package) not all formations use all (or the same) positions from a package. You can use the 'show graphic' option to see who lines up where in the different formations)
As you can see you can clone packages. so for example you if you have already set your offensive line and want to use the same players in another package you can clone the first one to move them over. Similarly you can let coaches set packages for you.
Anyhow. There are four things that factor into setting up a play now.
1) strategy settings
2) playbook
3) formation settings
4) packages
The process is as follows for offense:
1) You strategy setting looks at scenario (down and distance) and determines whether to call a run or a pass and which playbooks to use.
2) from this it goes into your playbook and selects a play based on run/pass and weight of plays.
3) it then takes the formation and type (run/pass) of the selected play and looks up your formation settings to find the package weights for that combination.
4) it selects a package based on the weights and loads that particular depthchart.
and for defense
1) Your strategy setting looks at scenario (down and distance) and determines which playbooks to use.
2) from this it goes into your playbook and selects a play based on weight of plays.
3) it then takes the formation of the selected play and the distance from the scenario and looks up your formation settings to find the package weights for that combination.
4) it selects a package based on the weights and loads that particular depthchart.
If you dont want to costumize anything you can just have a coach set the default packages and leave the formations preferences as they are (you can see they are all set to use package one 100% of the time).
Also important: it is default package (package 1) that determines who is counted as starters on the team.
If you are calling plays in single player you can select the package from the dropdown.
Also notice you can rename the packages to help yourself remember what they do. Just click on the package name (e.g. "Default Package") and type.
