End of half clock management

[KW77]

sorry but this is a catastrophe... it wasn't great in PF20 and I'm sure it was discussed last season, but I've never seen it this bad. These two screenshots are the two end of half drives in the same game.


somehow an incompletion, a complete pass followed by a timeout, and another incompletion ran 90 seconds off the clock? The clock should have stopped after all three of these plays, instead it looks like the clock is just running.



I don't even know what's going on here. The big pass followed by the spike took 1:11 off the clock? Again, looks like the trailing Panthers took the entire play clock to get downfield and spike the ball, and then the clock ran again after it was spiked?

This is all happening while the Panthers are trailing (17-3 at halftime, 27-10 end of game) and playing "Aggressive" and at "Very Fast" Tempo. It's just inexplicable that only a couple plays can be run in 90 seconds.

[zac]

For what it’s worth, I think this was the same in PF20. It seems there’s no logic from what I can tell to run a hurry up offense in PF20 or PF21 (or I just can’t figure out how to get my teams to do it). I’d assume not a quick fix but something to improve with future versions / years.

[Cleasby]

For what it’s worth, I think this was the same in PF20. It seems there’s no logic from what I can tell to run a hurry up offense in PF20 or PF21 (or I just can’t figure out how to get my teams to do it). I’d assume not a quick fix but something to improve with future versions / years.

This.

But I do wonder if there is something that could addressed as a patch to at least limit the clock issues in the last 2 mins of a half. Especially when a team is aggressive and fast tempo as the situation above shows.

I think it's a good thing to maybe focus on for the next game version but maybe we can get something to limit the impact for the next 9/10 months?

[Robmeister89]

For what it’s worth, I think this was the same in PF20. It seems there’s no logic from what I can tell to run a hurry up offense in PF20 or PF21 (or I just can’t figure out how to get my teams to do it). I’d assume not a quick fix but something to improve with future versions / years.

This.

But I do wonder if there is something that could addressed as a patch to at least limit the clock issues in the last 2 mins of a half. Especially when a team is aggressive and fast tempo as the situation above shows.

I think it's a good thing to maybe focus on for the next game version but maybe we can get something to limit the impact for the next 9/10 months?

I think this should be patched for the reason you mentioned above... We won't get another game for 8 or so months... Why should we be forced to live with these kind of issues in a fairly new game? My online league has yet to play a single down on PF21, I can't imagine doing so with such awful clock management either.

[Cleasby]

For what it’s worth, I think this was the same in PF20. It seems there’s no logic from what I can tell to run a hurry up offense in PF20 or PF21 (or I just can’t figure out how to get my teams to do it). I’d assume not a quick fix but something to improve with future versions / years.

This.

But I do wonder if there is something that could addressed as a patch to at least limit the clock issues in the last 2 mins of a half. Especially when a team is aggressive and fast tempo as the situation above shows.

I think it's a good thing to maybe focus on for the next game version but maybe we can get something to limit the impact for the next 9/10 months?

I think this should be patched for the reason you mentioned above... We won't get another game for 8 or so months... Why should we be forced to live with these kind of issues in a fairly new game? My online league has yet to play a single down on PF21, I can't imagine doing so with such awful clock management either.

I agree. Simply saying above that a complex rework should be a focus in ddspf22 but maybe the issue can't be limited in a patch for the current end of clock code.

[Cleasby]

So we had another one to add to evidence that end of half logic needs a rework.

Here the Lions are up by a touchdown against the Packers. Packer end of game play by play looks like this:



Looks odd that the Packers wasted 54 seconds and ran only one play when down? Surely they would at least quickly run 2 plays to try and go for it?

Well turns out the game play goes like this.

1. 1st and 10 the packer run a pass play. Ignoring the fact their is a WR open in the backfield Rodgers (a 90+ IQ player) proceeds to scramble and stay in bounds wasting the rest of the gameclock.









Now I can understand that there might be a situation that the QB might not see a wide open reciever even if he is one of the league premier QB's with a top 3 IQ, he may be under pressure or be blind to that part of the field after a check down. But for the QB not to recognise the clock situation and either a. chuck the ball out of bounds, b. force the ball into the end zone, or c. try a short under pass to get a first down does not make much sense. Now even if we say it the unlikely even that the QB scrambles for some small yard gain as he did, maybe he just saw a gap, the Packers had two timeouts left, there is no way the full time to check a pass opening and scramble should take the full 54 plus seconds off the clock. The average length of a single play from snap is 4 seconds in american football, appreciate that scrambling in this situation is a bit more, but even if we are ultra conservative the play should be no longer than 30 seconds, allowing for plenty of time to call a timeout and get another 1/2 plays in.

We all really enjoy this game and spend far too much time gameplanning and playing against other human GM's. We are really encouraged by how much progress the game takes version to version and we are fully supportive of this and can see how much passion the dev team puts into each version. The gameplay will never be perfect, even football manager and all its funding and iteration still has gaps. But I really encourage the dev team to look at end of game situations in this current version as well as end of half decision making. It is clear that this needs to be reviewed and enhanced as it is begining to stand out against the rest of the gamplay.

[Cleasby]

Just to add there should be no reason why Rodgers spikes the ball when the team has 2 timeouts aswell.

[zac]

As discussed above, I think this play is a perfect example of late-game clock code that seems to use up way too much time per play for a team that should be in a hurry-up offense. I don't see how a game with ideal logic has 1 play run with 54 seconds remaining with two time-outs. If Rodgers tried to spike it at the end, that is another player logic issue as to why try to spike it with seconds remaining if you have 2 time-outs in your pocket.

Overall, I really enjoy playing this game. But in efforts to raise awareness of issues that could use some attention, I think the above-noted issues rank high on many people's list. The end of games are often the most exciting time in a football game so it's frustrating to not watch your team operate a 2-minute offense remotely close to expectations.

[peterk1]

I mentioned this in a an earlier thread that touched on the same issues although in less detail.
I would encourage the devs to take a quick look at Pro Strategy Football to see what they did there for end of half options in a non real-time game. They got it absolutely perfectly and the last 2 mins of each half feel like little chess games.

Also, if this area of the game is improved, please don't forget players who like to call their own games.
Let us control things like

o spikes
o hurry ups
o trying to get out of bounds/stay in bounds
o on defense - defending the sidelines more than the middle
o allow us to manage the clock so we can run a single play (usually the FG try) before time runs out.

ourselves. Let us know what the snap time will be for a hurry up/spike before we commit to those.

Still love the game, but I think excitement level of watching/playing games would go up quite a bit if end of half play was better.

[Cleasby]

Ok so another example of odd clock management to add to the evidence pile.

So in this game the Lions vs the Colts the game is tied towards the end of the 2nd half. Lions drive down the field on a deep play and set-up at minimum a FG attempt.

But what is odd is the decision to call a timeout with 21 seconds left to kick the field goal. Surely if the coach wants to settle for the FG attempt he calls the timeout with no time to go thus preventing the chance the Colts could return?
I could understand if the timeout was called with 21 seconds left if the Lions decided to try a few attempts at the endzone. As the team had its full 3 timeouts remaining.

here is the play by play



Here is the in game pictures





I think this again highlights the logic for end of half is not quite right. In the situation above 2 things should happen.

1. The Lions call a timeout with less than 5 seconds to go to take the FG attempt and get the lead to prevent the colts from returning.

2. The timeout is called at 21 seconds to allow the offence to try a afew plays to make the endzone or to get in better field position.