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Off-Season, Trading and Free Agency


TecSpectre

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In the NFTGL we do a good amount of trading and free agency...


 


Before we go into our league off seasons many of us will sit and practice trading to see who can move for who.


 


 


I'm curious if anyone else has spent any real time using this feature of the game and if you've discovered any insights into what makes trades more or less successful.


 


I've gone over a ton of theories that I and others in the NFTGL have come up with , but really it's all just guess work.


 


So I'm curious if anyone else has found anything.


 


 


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What I have noticed a lot is if you use really good teams....you can trade regular players for superstars...for instance I've used the niners a lot and several times over I have traded ssuccessfully all 3 weeks in a row and my examples include

Derrick Moore for Ricky watters...

Alfred williams for Chris doleman...

and Eric Davis for rod woodson...

And add deion in free agency and u will never lose lol...I can almost get any players I want for miami too..idk if it's coincidence or what but I also notice try trading for an offensive player first, then a defense then back to offense...

I've toyed around a lot with trading but a lot of times I would have to say it's random...but I have always had better success when I trade the exact same slotted players on both teams...meaning if u trade a number 3 reciever then find a number 3 u want in return...just my opinion...hope I helped u tec

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Some times I notice I can never trade for a linebacker in 1st trade attempt and idk y but it's very annoying....if I go offense first and it's successful I will go Lb 2nd then maybe dl or db...I have done a lot of resetting trying to get the players I want...I have also noticed that when I get rejected 3 times on 3 different player trades afterwards the free agent pool is loaded....I'm sure that's just random too but it's just things I notice

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I've noticed some of those things as well.


 


I have found the computer almost always does trades itself that are matching positions as you mentioned and have found more success making those trades as well.


 


I've recently come to believe that different carts, for whatever reason, actually process off season moves differently. I've tested this on five copies of the game now and three of those copies have trades go through much more readily, while the other two have trades go through much, much less.


 


I tested this using a list of 23 trades, that I ran concurrently until they happened on each cart. On the carts that allowed trades to go through, I'd get 12-23 trades in the first season of trading... on the other two carts, I'd barely get to 10 of those 23 trades over a 5-6 season testing period (skipping through entire seasons to continue testing on the same platform of seasons)


 


I have found that some players move for each other very easily, despite positioning though. At first, the assumption was that certain players would trade away very easily, but when I would test trading for those players with other people, the success rate was very minimal.


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Man you have invested time and research in this feature...about free agency I read somewhere on this forum a while back where someone asked if u lost any existing FAP

And if the FA pool changed after an entire season and I thought someone said that the points were lost and u had to choose from the same free agents over and over...well I don't know if it's random or what or maybe because I'm playing on cart but when I play a season I have lost left over points but I have seen the FA pool change up that's the only reason it at least keeps me wanting to play another season...

Keeping it interesting...has anyone else seen new FA after a season and trade period?

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New how? Other teams make FA acquisitions as well, but the only players that get added to the game are the HOFers after you win 3 straight SBs.


 


I haven't been able to figure out how to manipulate trades. It's felt random to me. What I do know is that if you don't make any FA acquisitions then it drastically reduces how many the COM teams do. Also, any leftover FA points are always gone. The best way to make more points is to create offensive linemen, max them out, release them and then delete the character. Of course you have to hope that there's an available FA that you want :)


 


In the "not sure" department, COMing all 30 teams also seems to drastically reduce both trades and FA movement. If I am using an emulator I'll sim enough games at the highest speed possible as long as my team makes the playoffs. Then I manually play all the playoff games. It seemed to make a difference.


 


I have no idea what effect COA has on this game. It's the only version that I've hardly ever coached on.


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I have seen what I view as game glitches in the FA section of the game.

 

One time recently I cut a player worth 20 pts, but he was a created player and was only supposed to be worth 10 pts (I have mapped out certain designs for players to calculate FA pt value of created players)... but even though I only then had 10 pts, I could still resign him. I did not test if I could sign him at 10 pts with another team by leaving him in FA though.

 

One time I saw a glitch occur where a player was cut into FA and the player just completely disappeared. The following off-season, a duplicate of another player had been added to FA creating two of the same players on the cart, and removing the now missing character (Rico Mack).

 

Another thing I see more frequently is that some players FA pt values, which are generally a set value that doesn't change, will actually change for one off season where some players values will go up or down 10-20 pts... but then they'll reset the next off season.

 

If you leave ANY teams under skp/com control in the FA and trade section, the comp will make moves for them. They don't show you the FA moves like they do the trades though, And sometimes there are players that get dropped by one team, added by another. and ALL comp/fa teams will go before all MAN teams in FA. For instance, if you are using only the Eagles on Man control, then all NFC central and west teams will get to act in FA before you. But if those teams were Man controlled, then they would go after the eagles in FA.

The other thing I have seen is that the computer (like it is wont to do) will cheat in FA by adding a player of any FA value and dropping another player. I've seen Deion get added to a team and they only drop 1 player to pick him up and that player is no where near as valuable.

 

FA is very manipulable (is that a word?, it didn't get underlined) though, so you can do a lot of player moves and transactions in FA, especially with the use of created players, which I learned from someone else on these forums.

 

Trading is the one thing I haven't really gotten a great grasp on. I have a good feel for how it works... But the variations between carts and the random factor which HAS to exist, really skew the ability to figure it out.

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I know I read somewhere at some point that certain free agents values go up or down depending on the man controlled team. I think it was done like players might do in real life which is amazing considering it was a snes game from 1995 meaning I once wanted to sign Ricky sanders to the 49ers

And he only was 40 FAP...But I also remember being a weaker team like the jags

And his FAP was 50...and this wasn't when I played a season and changed teams and so forth...I'm quite sure I reset it because I usually get bored...so I'm thinking they

Have very good agents in tecmo lol

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  • 3 months later...

Trades are random; it has nothing to do with performance (especially since trading occurs before the season starts). Beware, however, because attempting a trade exposes your own roster to trades from other teams. I have seen, for example, a successful trade of [random scrub] for Reggie White, but in the same trade week some CPU team will give *you* [random scrub] for Barry Sanders. I've also seen two MAN teams attempt a legitimate trade (e.g. Bruce Smith for Neil Smith), with both players requesting the same trade, but the trade is declined (all three weeks), while other quite unrequested trades involving one or both teams take place.

I have also seen all of the 'Greats' and all of the custom players placed onto two teams (i.e. one full of 'Greats,' the other full of customs). The customs were originally spread across some six or seven different teams (though mostly assigned to three), and none were recreated. This remarkable feat was accomplished during a lull in play by myself and my roommate, while a third spent weeks skipping seasons and working trades and free agency. As the 'Greats' are all extremely expensive in FA, and our customs were all significantly improved and expensive themselves, this was truly amazing. This also happened before I acquired a PAR, so given the above regarding trades, you can imagine how difficult it was as trades were usually unsuccessful *and* often backfired.

When it was all done, however, watching the Giants ('Greats'; G-men indeed) face the Cardinals (customs) three times a year was quite the spectacle. Our customs usually lost, but you should've heard us yell at the screen when they didn't call the right plays or utilize our players the way we wanted. Good times.

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pi_hole... the speculation on performances CAN carry into the following season. If you look at a player in season team data, after completing a season, you will see that players who finished high on the rankings pages have trophies on their profile pages.

So the theory is that these trophies could in some way impact trading them.

I do believe that it's completely random... but there are some trades and players that do more easier for specific other players.

In all the testing I have done, I believe that every trade attempt can impact every other trade attempt and the likelihood that they'll go through. I am also finding that some carts DO allow trading to occur more easily than other carts. I have no idea what the reason for that could be. I'm guessing that it might have something to do with cart history. If a cart recently reset due to a bad battery, or had a battery replaced, it might reset something on the cart that makes it either easier or harder to get trades to go through.

I do know though that I can do some trades on one cart and they go through almost 100% of the time and then the same exact trade on another cart will go through under 5% of the time.

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