First want to say enjoy playing ‘23 and all below is just my wish list ideas for fun if ‘24 game (and beyond) was in some alternate universe were it was made just with my preferences in mind.
Top Wish List Items: Items I think if addressed to help make the game better in my own personal opinion and are somewhat realistic short-term improvements (unlike the bottom of the list).
1) Reset Morale: Currently in DDS PF ‘23, a player’s morale doesn’t change when a player gets to a new team. While there are some exceptions, like a player that is traded but still upset with the contract maybe, but mostly I think of morale should reset to a default value when a player goes to a new team. Especially via free agency when that player chose to sign with that team.
2) Draft Contracts: Game has settings for salary by pick but does not allow you to set the length of contracts by draft pick. Currently, in the game, you can have a 1st round pick given one length of the contract, and the very next pick given a different length of the contract. It doesn’t seem to make much sense to me.
3) Defensive Adjustment to Offensive Personnel: It seems as though the game currently doesn't have any ability to allow the defense to anticipate run vs pass plays, based on the offensive personnel. At present, GMs can easily manipulate the formations screen to orchestrate their offenses with specific personnel for run or pass plays. This needs a tweak in my opinion. For just one example of many, teams will have 5 offensive linemen who have good pass block skills (but terrible run block grades) who play on passing plays and an entirely different group of O-line players with opposite skill sets that play only on run plays and this is all easy to do in game and not much defense can do to take advantage. Or team may have a QB that is good at passing on pass plays and a QB that is good at running that comes in for run plays. This obviously would be a terrible strategy in real football as the defense would know if it’s run or pass every time. Or alternatively, the game could be tweaked to mandate offense personnel setup based on situations instead of run/pass, akin to how it works for the defense. Right now this is a huge hole in how users use this game as people play 11 pass specialists on pass plays and sometimes an entirely different group of 11 for run plays.
5) Improve FG logic: Right now, there are still a lot of instances of teams kicking FGs down by more than 3 points in last few minutes in games when it’s like 4th and 1 on the 30 where it makes no sense to kick a FG. Maybe could make sense more since if it is like 4th and 15 maybe but you would always go for it on 4th and 1 if a FG doesn’t even tie it or take the lead. Why kick a FG on 4th and 1 if you are still behind a point even if you make it when the chances of making it aren’t all that much higher than making a 4th and 1. Would be great to have more strategy settings on this though in general to have coach/GM impact this strategy specifically
6) Inside runs: Outside runs are the only real effective strategy for the most part in the running game. Also, deep passing is still a bit overpowering in some cases. Overall the most effective strategies seem to reward the big run (outside) and big pass (long pass) maybe a bit too heavy. Long term I think the game will reach peak gameplay when teams can be successful running multiple offensive types ans schems IF they have the right personnel to run it and no one play type is superior but understandably tough to reach that goal
7) More scramble yards for QBs: Of Justin Fields 1,000 rushing yards in real life, roughly 50% were from scramble yards. In DDS Pro Football, most QB rushing is achieved through design runs. While design runs is an area of the game in ‘23 that has improved greatly from ‘22, I think the next area to improve is the scramble logic and frequency (if set in game-planning & QB skill). And give defenses gameplan ability to slow down a running QB (with the downside of giving up more in the passing game potentially). Dual-threat QBs are a huge part of football both on offense and defense.
Long-term Wish List: Below is more big-picture wish list items for just how I personally envision a great sim football game. I want depth and want to face the same challenges and overcome the same obstacles that organizations face when attempting to ascend to the top of the league's mountain and do everything they can to stay there.
1) More Varied Progression / Regression: I would love much more varied regression and progression player to player tied to a potential rating (visible) but still hard to predict. Right now players slowly gain ratings until they hit 30 and then slowly regress in 99% of cases. There is some variance but not a lot. In real life guys sometime will decline very early while other players stay good into their 30s. Players could be great one season, and out of the league a couple of years later either due to regressed athletic ability and/or injuries. Or struggle their first couple of seasons but develop quickly after and go on to be a Pro Bowler. What makes building rosters challenging and fun is unpredictability. It shouldn’t be completely random (for example players with good intangibles and work ethic and health are more likely to have longer careers, etc or tied to potential ratings) but need more excitement in how teams evolve. Also if add more varied progression, could have more lifelike things like contract holdouts where players demand new contracts, etc. Also because players have such long careers and continue to get faster and better all through their late 20s, it’s very challenging to keep league roster talent balanced without making drafts not have much depth of talent (very little turnover). I know NBA 2k has each player in the game with unique ages set for when they hit their peak and when they start regression. Some players hit their peak super early (say 24) so really don’t improve at all once they get in the league and some take longer to hit their peak. Some start regression at 26 while others don’t regress much until 33. This type of individual career path of development would help.
2) Improved Draft Scouting: I think scouting is ok, but room for improvement. I'm not a big fan of the current all-or-nothing scouting option for draft prospects (either you scout them fully by checking a box or you basically don't scout them at all). Not sure the best answer but a more strategic system that allows you to scout some guys 50%-70% with less accuracy. And if you want to put all your eggs in one basket and scout a guy to 100%, it should cost a ton to do so. In-season scouting would be great for this as well and create more in-season excitement for the draft vs waiting until the scouting phase to know anything about players. Separately, would be great if there was a way to scout potential / future development in players. If there was some sort of "potential" rating that was scoutable, it could add some strategy to the draft. Do you take the player with a C+ OVR rating and B- Potential rating in round 3 or the D- OVR player that you have as an A potential rating. It shouldn’t at all be a guarantee at all that players reach their potential rating (just a scouted estimate) but right now seems like players develop way too similar too each other. Not many bust (guys that just don’t develop at all or even regress early) and gems in draft (guys that develop crazy fast). The Gems should be rare but would be fun to have a 68 OVR WR that develops into 88 OVR WR in just a few seasons. Last note, projected rounds and coach grades are very accurate making the draft pretty easy at the top. The top ten projected picks are usually always the best picks with very little error. Would be great to allow the option to get rid of the projected pick order provided and let GMs come up with own order. Or have less detailed projects and put more good picks projected very late to make scouting more fun to try to find the late gems.
3) Evolve Fog of War settings further: This should be an option on league setup as I understand this isn’t for everyone, but I would greatly appreciate an option that allows you to have a scouting department that not only scouts draft prospects but also responsible for drafting every player in the league. Every rating in the game would be tied to your scout's views. How certain you are of a player's ratings would depend on how much that player has played and how good your scout is that you hired. A 5th round pick that is halfway through his rookie year and has played 8 snaps is going to have much less accurate ratings than an 8-year starting veteran LB.
4) In-Season Free Agency Change: Right now game uses a claim system for in-season free agency. Would love to have a more typical $ bid system as you see in the off-season even in-season. Maybe have a setting so players below a certain overall threshold still can be claimed for league minimum but the rest of the players can sign 1-year deals for the team that offers the most money.
5) More Commish Tools: For those running online leagues, it’d help commissioners greatly to have the ability to do the following: For one, when a GM leaves the league, the commissioner has to go into delete all their custom strategies and playbooks so the next team has a clean slate. Would be great to do this with one click (some GMs have 20+ playbooks and gameplans and takes a long time to clear). Also, would be great to have the ability to quickly move players from team to team. If a player is in free agency and commish needs to move to a team, there’s no easy way currently that I know of to assign to a team. Also would be great to have the ability to edit draft order more and even manually add comp picks by commish. Right now if you run a draft lottery, you have to fix the draft via trades. Also would be great to add the ability to add compensation draft picks at the end of rounds. Maybe as a tool to reward GMs for activity or other things.
6) Ability to retain $ in Trades: The ability for a team to retain money on a contract would be great. Or allowing NFL-style guaranteed / non-guaranteed contracts set up so that guaranteed contract money can’t be traded away in trades would work too.
7) Incorporate Roster Chemistry: Teams that consistently maintain the same set of players in positions over multiple seasons should receive a boost. This would make trading much more realistic. If a new QB is introduced to a team, it should take time to build the same chemistry as someone who has been with the team and coached for a longer period. Similarly, mid-game injuries that bring new players onto the field could affect more than just the skill rating differences between the starting and incoming players. This would also help issue #1 with teams that rotate personnel too aggressively would be hurt.
8) Improved Coaching: Really not sure of the exact answer here but coaching is such an important part of real football but feels like mostly a limited factor in game currently. Playbooks feel like just a large collection of plays and doesn't seem like coaches have an identity or system they run to match to personnel to run that system. With improved coaching, I think Leagus could better get away from running things with custom playbooks and let leagues run with coach only (even for user) and be more of a true GM only.
9) Roster Structure: Roster structure is still living in the days of the early 2000's. Defensively, 4–3 defensive ends and 3–4 outside linebackers would get their proper designation as Edge rushers while strictly off-ball linebackers would all fall under a singular Linebackers moniker. And then lastly, free and strong safeties would be consolidated into one Safety category as well. 4-3 DT and 3-4 DE and DTs are mostly considered interior defenders. Pro Football Focus for example classifies defensive positions only as interior defenders, edge defenders, Linebackers, Cornerback, and safties. It's frustrating to have a FS that has no idea how to play SS in game. Or a 270 lb LB that plays a more edge rusher in a 335 or 3-4 system that has no idea how to play DE if goes to a 4-3 or Nickel system.
10) Better Injury System: Health and injuries are a huge part of football. Especially related to long-term contracts and drafts. Outside of assigning the player tag of “Injury Prone”, there’s no real injury risk to assess on players. Would be great if players have specific health risk grades that change as their career goes along. Would make the draft much more real to take into account health assessment grading on players as well. Would be great to have an option in game-planning for the week were you can sometimes choose if you want to play a player listed as questionable or sit him that week. If you play him though he may be at risk of either not playing as effectively or risk of reinjuring himself depending on the injury. Also could use a separate setting (low, medium, high) for short-term and long-term injuries. I avoid turning injuries too high because QB injuries are already high but if QB injuries were tuned down some, would love to play the game on a high setting (especially for short-term injuries)
