In response to romagnoli's request from last week:
I know that's an absolute fuckton of stuff right there but I do want to go direct to Gary P with something and I doubt I'd get much about this from the EA forums without the previous few pages of back-and-forth we've had here.
There are two things that I think are the most important. One is to address the balance of the benefit of speed, the other is to reduce the effectiveness of constant use of the pressure button. So:
1. Compromise ability at high speed:
- Reduce effective control of the ball when sprint-dribbling. Heavier touches overall, and each touch should vary slightly in weight and angle to be less predictable.
- Reduce accuracy/consistency when attempting actions at high speed. More on this in point 3.
- Momentum: Increase the penalty for sharp changes of direction at high speed. Particularly with the ball, but also (to a slightly lesser degree) without the ball.
- Balance: At full sprint, you are lighter on your feet and easier to tip over.
2. Empower ability at low speed:
- Balance: Improve the natural ability of the dribbler to shield the ball at slow speeds. Intrinsically more robust against challenges at slow speeds. A defender should really need to be 'ball-side' of a slower dribbler to make a succesful tackle, or he'll fail/foul.
- Reinstate the RT-shield that was in the demo, it was more effective than the RT-shield in the full game. You could instigate it when not quite stationary, which made it great when avoiding a tackle, and it seemed better at holding opponents off than the current one.
- When dribbling at slow speeds, slightly increase the frequency of touches on the ball for even easier control. Things like the LT-dragback could be performed slightly quicker too.
3. Emphasise Composure:
(Edit to say: I know there's already a Composure attribute in the database, there's just no tangible evidence whatsoever of it in-game.)
In the penalty-kick system we have a composure bar. I'd like to extend something similar to outfield play.
When a player is composed (green), he's more accurate/better in everything he does. When a player is not composed (red), he suffers an accuracy penalty to his attributes (there should probably be yellow/orange intermediate stages too). This composure meter
would be based primarily on current movement speed, but also the player's Composure attribute, the proximity of opponents... maybe even match context and fatigue. There are plenty of possibilities, but its main function would be to encourage people to not play at maximum speed all the time, and secondly to value space.
So a composed player would be more accurate with shots/passes/etc, more reliable with his touch, even more precise with his tackling. The opposite would be true when not composed. If you figure out that holding sprint turns your composure level red and reduces your end product, you will be less likely to hammer that sprint trigger. It encourages analog tweaking of the trigger and use of the LT instead, to slow it down and gain an accuracy boost.
Communicating this would be, as always, important. Like the penalty-kick composure meter, you could draw something permanently on the HUD on/beneath the name bar. You could even use the
entire name bar as a composure indicator by changing its colour, and do a similar thing with the selection indicator above the player's head (although an issue with local multiplayer there). However it's done, I get to see that if I hold the sprint trigger, my little composure icon/bar goes red. Simples.
A missed shot/pass that failed at low composure could be pointed out as "rushed" in the commentary (although relying on audio is not a great idea). A quick and easy Arena tutorial would help greatly.
Animations, too. A shot/pass/tackle/header anim performed with low composure could be more of a stretching, falling-over kind of effort rather than a steady, balanced strike/whatever.
Ultimately though, it's a pretty fundamental football concept that anyone who has played the sport is familiar with. If you can sufficiently feel it and see it in-game, I reckon it would be easy for anyone to understand without having to
"learn how to play for ten hours before you can suss it out". Most importantly it would help to redress this 1,000mph frantic pace that the game seems to encourage.
4. Remove auto-pressure:
If you mix it up and say there is no pressure button, how will people defend? By jockeying. By valuing their position and their timing. This auto-homing-and-tackle button just has to go, the game is genuinely more enjoyable when the use of it is refused.
- Keep the auto-jockey (presently LT+A) and make it the primary tool for defenders.
- Similarly, Secondary Pressure should be a 'close down only' command. The second player should not commit to the tackle, only jockey and block.
- Attempting a succesful standing tackle should require reasonable timing of the Stand Tackle button... exactly the same as how Slide Tackle already operates. Trying to Stand Tackle from a poor angle should often result in a foul, exactly how Slide Tackle already operates.
- In combination with the Composure feature, players will learn that just staying close to and goal-side of the attacker will benefit them by reducing the attacker's effectiveness.
- Could further empower the defender's ability to shot-block and shoulder-jostle when jockeying, and reduce the ability to do these things when sprinting.
Basically, make defending more about being in position and staying goal-side, rather than about trying to snatch the ball back ASAP like it's a schoolyard game of 'tig'.
5. Multiply the rate/effects of Fatigue
...so that it actually matters at all. Would help reduce all the constant sprinting.
