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Tecmo Bowl "what if..."


Tecmo-Mad-Brad

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Been brain storming a little on the ramifications of a few changes. Not endorsing or suggesting for a rom hack as i love the original TB as is, but creating discussion and thought.

SF with Roger Craigs run to the top(instead of the bottom).

Well, this single handed change would practically nullify 5 big time top DE's (along with a couple TOLB's) from the game plan. Dent, Manley, Doleman, Rulon Jones, and Leonard Marshall all get wiped out of the defensive scheme altogether. Then you pretty much cancel out Wilbut Marshall, and Carl banks as well. You can be those guys...but I hope your diving skills are tip top that game, or you will get destroyed. It also nullifies the top DB's...and thats where all the speed from that position comes from.

Craig running to the top forces the you to choose a bottom DE/OLB. I don't consider Mann, or Long big time play-makers of the game but they would become pivotal players that would be used to slow down SF...and i don't think they would a do a very good job or it.

Of the stand out Bottom OLB's, you only have LT, and Duane Bickett who is more than a marginal player. Of course with the standard Jerry Rice CPU overage scheme which calls for the bottom OLB...you WOULD NOT be able to use those guys or you would further harm the cause! Leaves you having to choose a player from the bottom DE position(with rice already nullified) and leaving the top option of Mike Wilson and Russ Francis WIDE OPEN.

I think this would be even a greater advancement then giving Bo 2 run plays. Both offense would be pretty unstoppable, but there really wouldn't be any way to scheme with coverages to slow down SF. At least with coverages you can put LA in a tough spot on pass plays.

Edited by Tecmo-Mad-Brad
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Miami with a better passing playbook. (The images here apparently are not hosted anymore. I'll have to find new ones).

Thanks to thunder Dan's lazer rocket arm the plays in place seem to work alright. However pass 1 and 2 do leave a deal to be desired.

plays-MIA.gif

Obviously pass 1 is a clunker. Pass 2 is alright but with CPU coverage on the deep guy, the TE/WR park too close together.

The remedy could easily be the 2 pass plays Indy uses. What makes those plays so awesome is the separation across the field from 1 target to the next. Even though Trudeau has a horrible arm, that playbook will stack up against anyone including the New York's D.

plays-IND.gif

Crisp wroutes with a good chunk of real estate separating everyone. Add in Marino's strong arm and they destroy defenses left and right.

other options might be to give Miami the Cleveland WR routes. Again, nearly indefensible when you call something else. Guys spread out all over.

plays-CLE.gif

Really take your pick of either set of pass 1 & 2 and Miami really becomes a MONSTER in this game.

Some could say to give Miami the same plays SF runs, however SF has elite athletes in Rice and Craig. Miami doesn't have a real burner catching the ball. Regardless of how it gets shaken up by adding a play from any team, Miami has room for improvement.

Edited by Tecmo-Mad-Brad
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Coming up we'll analyze the ramifications of tweaking Denver's passing attack a little. Its a solid offense as is(with a kick ass ground game and blocking schemes), but a slight change could make that into an unstoppable force as well. That air attack can be schemed for and nuetralized quite easily. open the passing attack a little and this team might possess an offense in the discussion with the absolutel best on the game. Not kidding with that statement.

Teams that are pretty much perfect "as is", in terms of the playbooks include Cleveland, and Indy.

Chicago and Dallas benefit from a solid run game and pass the test with me. Dallas more-so when QB running is allowed. :D

NY's offense is decidedly moribund at times, but often they just need a couple field goals or 1 TD to win.

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Guess i havent ever really considered that idea much with Craig having 2 run plays. Mainly because I like the few variances of the 2 teams that have 3 passing plays.

That Would make SF pretty dang dynamic and give a opposing DC a big time headache. SF's pass 1 and 3 are really good. Pass 2 leaves something to be desired though. It might depend on which one you pull....BUT with Craig running both ways, the defense has to focus on more Craig run calls. Currently I only need to call Craig's run play like once or twice a game and can key on pass 1. Perhaps SF becomes more deadly in the air.

Same could be said for Miami with 2 run plays. Marino and Montana were meant to throw and throw often, and they would be harder to stop.

Ive always believed there was some sort of rhyme and reason to how the playbooks were created for each team...that withstanding the 3 glitch teams. And over the years as we discovered the pass coverage schemes and the run calls on defense that short circuit the run blocking schemes, I started to think Tecmo Bowl was perfect as is.

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SF with Roger Craigs run to the top(instead of the bottom).

I'm reasonably sure that with just that change SF doesn't just become the best team, they become easily the best team. And I say that as the biggest NYG guy there is. SF would just murder teams with a topside run. They already can barely be stopped and with that change almost everyone loses out on using their best defender. The SF vs. NYG match-up suddenly goes from almost exactly dead heat to SF as the clear favourite.

Brad is probably right when he says this would have a bigger effect then 2 Bo running plays.

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Miami with a better passing playbook.

Miami with better pass plays would be carving teams up. Just carving them. If they had IND's passes, that's pretty much it. They are scoring unless you string together some playpicks on defense. Of course with Miami the charm is that if you can play perfect quarterback the other team can't stop you, so you gotta ask yourself can you play perfect?

Even defenses like SF and CHI that just pretty much own MIA would be powerless to contain a Marino led Indy pass play attack.

MIA with Indy pass plays are probably the 4th best team behind the NYG/SF/CHI super powers. Their offense would be #1, but they still wouldn't have much on defense no matter how big a "beast" John "The Beast" Offerdhal is.

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  • 2 months later...

After getting acclimated to Canadian "no QB running" style.... yes SF would fucking destroy men, women, and children if SF had a run to the top.

Means Mike Wilson has a hey-day and opens up the playbook for Jerry rice to go crazy when teams relent from their pass 1 crusades on defense.

Edited by Tecmo-Mad-Brad
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  • 1 month later...
What if Chicgago had a 3-4 defense instead of a 4-3. You could actually use Mike Singletry without worrying about being blocked. That would put Chicago's defense almost as good as New Yorks, right?

Great point! Let the debate begin! The 3-4 defense would be a little bit of an upgrade for Chicago overall from one opponent to the next. As for Singletary being a top MLB in a 3-4 defense, the run blocking schemes (on offense) vary from team to team. By calling a run play (on defense with the offense calling the other run play), Karl Mecklenburg/Fredd Young (Elite top MLBs for example) are not blocked at all vs many teams. See the list to know what teams this works against here ---> http://www.tecmobowl-vs-rbi.com/tecmo-run-defense.html

So Singletary as a Top Middle LB would be more useful, as you can scheme around him not being blocked on the majority of run plays...and then set him loose in pass coverage all game. You could scheme with Singletary effectively vs CLE, IND, MIA, DEN, SEA, MIN, WSH.

There is sort of a caveat to the change though....Steve McMichael (bottom DT 4-3) currently goes unblocked on run plays vs NYG, DAL, CLE, IND, & LA and hes pretty close to Singletary in terms of attributes. Overall i think the change to a 4-3 with more Singletary is better overall against the field. Also McMichael is still sort of a bottom side defender, and Singletary lets you patrol immediately from the middle of the field....so position advantage goes to Singletary. 3-4 means ther are 2 more teams you can effectively scheme against.

The MAJOR problem here is that Steve McMichael in the 4-3(currently) is so critical to them matching up with the Giants and you would lose that...as he is the defender that goes unblocked vs NY's run plays. We have the Bears ranked 3rd, and they already own everyone under them in the current 4-3 alignment. It's McMichael that really helps them lock down the Giants offense.

So all you're doing by giving Chicago a 3-4 defense is making them a bit better against teams they pretty much beat most of the time anyways, and take away their best scheme vs the Giants where they really need to get a shut out to win that game. I'm going to have to say I gotta stay with the 4-3 for Chicago.

Edited by Tecmo-Mad-Brad
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Hmm...Chicago 4-3 defense. My gut reaction was yeah that'd make them better but like Brad pointed out there it doesn't do much for them against some teams and actually hurts against teams like NYG and DAL. It probably helps them overall but not by any big amount. It wouldn't move them from #3 behind NYG and SF, but it probably just puts them another step ahead of the rest of the pack.

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Hmm...Chicago 4-3 defense. My gut reaction was yeah that'd make them better but like Brad pointed out there it doesn't do much for them against some teams and actually hurts against teams like NYG and DAL. It probably helps them overall but not by any big amount. It wouldn't move them from #3 behind NYG and SF, but it probably just puts them another step ahead of the rest of the pack.

I know your website is terribly outdated in some parts, but in all the references I find there doesn't seem to be a single one that puts SF above Chigago. Did you just change your mind because Derek whupped your asses in the world championships?

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I know your website is terribly outdated in some parts, but in all the references I find there doesn't seem to be a single one that puts SF above Chigago. Did you just change your mind because Derek whupped your asses in the world championships?

Yes it is outdated but San Fran's been the 2nd best team for a long time in my mind (2+ years). In fact they are closer to being #1 then they are to being #3. Head to head against the Giants they have the edge. It's almost a rock-paper-scissor thing where SF>NYG, NYG>CHI, CHI>SF although that last one is really more like a coin toss but for analogy purposes it'll do.

NYG, SF, CHI, CLE, IND, DEN, SEA, MIA, DAL would be my current ratings. Disregarding the gimmick teams LA, WSH, MIN.

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  • 3 years later...

Yes it is outdated but San Fran's been the 2nd best team for a long time in my mind (2+ years). In fact they are closer to being #1 then they are to being #3. Head to head against the Giants they have the edge. It's almost a rock-paper-scissor thing where SF>NYG, NYG>CHI, CHI>SF although that last one is really more like a coin toss but for analogy purposes it'll do.

NYG, SF, CHI, CLE, IND, DEN, SEA, MIA, DAL would be my current ratings. Disregarding the gimmick teams LA, WSH, MIN.

Bo Knows and I have hashed this over recently. I still put NY as #1 and SF as #2. I think NY/SF is pretty much dead even for the most part. However against the rest of the field, LT and the Giants Defense is the deciding factor as NY will win more games overall than SF. SF is more likely to slip up vs a Denver or Seattle type team than NY is. I gotta take that into major consideration.

As for the NY, SF, CHI rock-paper-scissors analogy its pretty good.....CHI imo is pretty equal with SF against the field as well, but SF imo holds a slight H2H edge on CHI, and certainly is a better overall match-up vs NY than the Bears are. SF's offense is the far greater challenge for NY's defense. Chicago's defense is the slightly greater challenge for NY's offense. Put everything together and it all tilts in SF's favor.

I've recently put the Colts ahead of the Browns recently as well. CLE and IND are pretty similar vs the field. CLE holds a decent head to head edge though, but IND really has quite a bit more match-up mojo vs NYG, SF, CHI and that's the main difference for me. CLE is really outgunned in those games.

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Pulling this from a different thread......

Change the direction of their run plays for Minnesota & Washington. Minnesota's run play would now go to the bottom, and the WR run play to the top. Basically this forces the defender into using a top DB(to not be blocked on either run play) or else a top DE/OLB at minimum, and then opens up pass 2 for the Vikings. Minnesota would have a reliable pass play resulting in a lot of dump offs to Darrin Nelson. Based off the pass coverages, Pass 2 for the Vikes all of a sudden becomes very useful, as it would work comparably to SF's pass 2. Lots of 3rd and shorts for MIN. They have a shot to really compete here, but all the fast DE's will shut down Darrin Nelson trying to run the ball...so there is a bit of a trade off.

WSH benefits a lot with Timmy Smith's run play to the top...because that basically neutralizes all the good top DE's and DB's. The passing game will still be hard for WSH as Williams would have a small window to throw into on pass 2 vs a bottom outside LB. A lot of good defenders gets neutralized now with vs Smith. Richard Dent, Ronnie Lott, Chris Doleman/Joey Browner, Rulon Jones....all these guys become liabilities to an extent and that helps out Washington overall.

Overall MIN's pass plays are much better than WSH, and WSH doesn't have to face all those great top DE's. Bound to help those teams pull off a few more wins. Both MIN and WSH have great defenses as well, and WSH has a really good punter.

To keep the Raiders traditional with a change, my thought is to give Allen the run play to the top, and Bo can take Allen's run to the bottom. Probably doesn't change much, but puts Bo in the passing game a little. With Bo's speed he may be a bit of a force vs the fast top side DE's and top outside LBs. Especially from the top hash mark. I'd really need to see it in motion though to really gauge just how well it would work.

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