End of Half Logic

[JDB]

One issue I'm still seeing with the game's end of half logic is teams attempting field goals on 1st, 2nd, or 3rd down and still leaving enough time for an ensuing kickoff and one more play to be run by the opposition. Normally teams would either take a few extra shots at the end zone or run the clock down and stopping it with a timeout or a ball spike so that the last play of the half is their field goal attempt (last night's Bills/Rams game gave us a perfect example). Rule of thumb is whenever a field goal is attempted on 1st 2nd or 3rd down, it should ALWAYS be the last play of the half.

[markprior22]

It's pretty bad. What I see is this...team enters opposing territory with 3 min left. Gets to the 20 with a couple minutes left and start calling timeouts. They've got plenty of time to score and are just saving clock to give opponent 1:30 or so to try a drive of their own. Drives me crazy.

[Nightowl_99]

You'd think WS would be embarrassed by such things, but nope. They've shown no interest in addressing these issues.

[brooks_piggott]

Sorry for the trouble. We've updated this code a lot in the past couple of versions but I'll take another look at these specific scenarios.

[JDB]

You'd think WS would be embarrassed by such things, but nope. They've shown no interest in addressing these issues.

I've seen a lot of improvements made in this area over the last few versions when watching games. Honestly I think the only thing that really needs looked at is the AI play call of that final play of the half/game.

[tbrtb]

I'd also like to point out that end of half logic is also not always clear cut IRL. I remember when I played EA's NCAA football series in 12 or 13 that they would have very strange playcalls and timeout usage. And that was after about 15 yrs of development with EA's basically unlimited resources.

Coaches also regularly get criticized for clock mismanagement. Les Miles became famous for it.

As a fellow software developer, I can definitely understand how this situation, that is tricky in real life for actual coaches, would be an EXTREMELY tricky thing to code. Very challenging.

Appreciate the effort Brooks.

[brooks_piggott]

Mostly I just need the reports on the specific scenarios... at that point I can trace through and see where the decision tree is flawed. Most of the cases are covered, but loosely, and they evolve over time, so as we improve decisions in one part of the engine some of the older flows can be tightened up. There are also still elements of randomness and ties to coach profiles, so the scenarios can vary. If you notice oddball scenarios that play out a lot more than what is realistic (like was posted above) let me know as many details as possible and I can continue to dial things in.