NHL 20 Discussion Thread

[Five Alarm Fire]

Any tips on strategy settings if you're playing with position lock?

I'm not sure if you can edit team strategies in Be-A-Pro, but from what I've learned in 5v5:

Stay away from Overload. This causes players to sit still and away from the puck. I prefer Behind the Net or Crash the Net.

Cycle/Shoot: I like to set this closer to cycle as it forces some puck movement rather than teammates taking terrible shots.

Don't Block/Block. I actually keep this setting closer to don't block, because too many times I'll take a shot and my own guy is in the way. There's definitely a benefit to having a man screening in this game, but I like to lower this when possible. I also suspect that this causes better spacing with AI teammates.

Also, on the power play, stay away from the Umbrella. This causes way too many players sitting on the perimeter in my experience. I like Shooting the best, players close in a bit more and are waiting for the one-timer.


If you want to play with it on your own, here's a full description of all the team strategies:
NHL 19: Complete Team Strategies Guide, Line Strategies Guide, Best Team Strategies - RealSport

 

[Cigar City]

So awful. What's even better is that you KNOW they are going to make no new changes for the next gen and wait a year to make upgrades exactly like they did last time.

Also, yes, PC will never happen. They know the community will make mods that get the Dev team fired because it will show how little work they actually do each year. It's laughable at this point.

"We don't make enough money to make major upgrades each year." Welllll no one is buying every year when you essentially have released the same game for 3 years in a row.

/rant

 

[filip85]

They simply need to turn this franchise for 180 degrees for next gen consoles otherwise their sales will drop even more.

 

[Miri]

The words fail to express how disappointed i am with NHL20.

Not that it was not something unexpected, but somehow, this year i had a glimmer of hope for whatever reason, PC version might be on the cards, at last, Madden getting PC version last year too...

...and maybe cause after last year´s pivot feature being that amateur like play outside on frozen lakes and whatnot, i kinda thought they ran out of BS options how to make the game different compared to the year prior and would be forced to actually make meaningful changes and additions. like finally move to Frostbite. But seems they always find a new low, this time the Pejorative Slured Battle royale...

EA as company really needs to die, cause they really hit the stage, where they are all about maximising the profits and minimizing the costs. While this may be understandable, they are taking it way too far and as a result, quality of their product suffers. It is what happens, when the actual people creating the product and caring for it are just the "regular employees", but the company is otherwise ran by suits and sales people caring just for money, game-production being to them just randomly means to earn those money, but aside of that, no interest, no passion. f*** them, really.

If you have any self-respect and want to actually ever see quality NHL game, you wont buy their dross this year, nor next, nor any other until you actually see some effort on their side.

 

[GodPucker]

WHAT THE F*** is a Battle Royale? lol

 

[Vasilevskiy]

Same old story.

Best thing they could do is burn the game to the ground and start from scratch.

 

[Mikeaveli]

I swear there is a team of 2 or 3 people making this game

 

[unknownbrother]

I've been loving the knee-jerk reactions on here and on social media about the Matthews reveal teaser. Which is not in any way a trailer for the game. It's just a little package of a few throw away things and Matthews footage.

Can everyone just chill the F out until they release the actual official trailer.

 

[Cor]

any changes for Franchise mode ? only mode I play

Trade Finder.
AHL/NHL Coaching Staffs

That's all that is known right now.

 

[Panthaz89]

I know they updated franchise mode a bit but they could work so much more on it if they didn't add the outside park games and while 3v3 is fun it takes time to keep remaking and redoing those modes that could be used on everything else and since I stay away from ultimate team in every sports game for very good reason it might not be enough to make me buy it when it comes out though when 19 came out not too long before it came out they showed off the new scouting system which was pretty great and wasn't listed as one of the features preview last time.

 

[yzerman]

I swear there is a team of 2 or 3 people making this game

Yes and at least 1 is blind

 

[The Iron Goalie]

Really hope we'd see a revamp of the player growth/potential system, but it's not meant to be.

I'd like to see players have 3 potential projections (ie - Floor, Likely, and ceiling), and on top of that, bring back the letter grades for each category, so players can grow to be more unique. Finally add a few more levels of potential accuracy (ie - Very low (15% chance), Low (30%), Med (50%), High (65%), Very High (80%)), and allow players to actually change their potential accuracy based on how well/poorly they're developing.

Next, allow for players to have a main type, and a sub type (Ie - Ovechkin is a Powerforward/Sniper), but also allow for pure types like we have now (Henrik Sedin was a pure playmaker for example). Furthermore, allow players to change types as they develop (Ie - A grinder becoming a Powerforward, or a Sniper becoming a Two-way player), as not all Snipers/Playmakers/Powerforwards in the minors become those players in the NHL.

Here are some examples from the 2019 draft,

Jack Hughes - Sniping/Playmaker. Floor = Top 6 Very high, Likely = Elite High, Ceiling = Franchise Med. Puck Skills = A+, Shooting = B+, Skating = A+, Senses = A, Defense = B, Physicality = C+
Moritz Seider - Two-way/Puck mover. Floor = Top 6 Very high, Likely = Top 4 Med, Ceiling = Top 2 Low. Puck Skills = B, Shooting = B, Skating = A, Senses = B+, Defense = B+, Physicality = B+
Cole Caufield - Sniper. Floor = AHL top 6 Very high, Likely = Top 6 Med, Ceiling = Elite Low. Puck Skills = B+, Shooting = A+, Skating = C+, Senses = B+, Defense = C+, Physicality = C

With theses changes, players won't always develop the same, and should have more variety in their development.

P.S. - With these Changes EA would have to also revamp the player rating system as well....as at the moment elite offensive player MUST have elite defensive stats to break into the high 80's/low 90's overall, so I propose that stats be weighted slightly different. Say stats over 95 are worth twice those in the 90-94 range, and 90+ should be worth 1.5x more than 85-89, so you could have an offensive player with average defensive ability still be in the 86-89 overall range. Very few players should have stats in the 95+ range.

P.S.S - Also, please look at player overalls in general. I think we all want a greater difference between top 6 players, and bot 6 players (ie - 1st liners = 86+, 2nd liners = 80+, 3rd liner = 75+, and 4th liners = 70+ etc).

 

[Hasa92]

They seriously made battle royale for NHL, wtf?

I mean, I'm sure that's fun to play but that was one of their priorities over fixing the game?

New shooting eh, not really necessary but I admit it's nice to have players animations to resemble themselves now as well (Again, this shouldn't be a priority over making a game that A) works and B) plays like actual hockey).

Fix the game, force players to play like actual hockey teams to win games, not glitch it up, not back skate all the time etc. Make the servers and the game stable, no crashing, freezing, glitches, lag etc. Also FPS over graphics with a game fast as this (I admit, the graphics are nice but that's the only thing EA can do right along with scamming consumers).

 

[542365]

People are usually really excited about the new game at this stage, but this year is even more lackluster than normal. Just the most boring and thoughtless changes.

The only big improvement they’ve made to this game recently was allowing 3v3 EASHL. The only reason that’s a great change, though, is because their AI is so incredibly bad that I can’t stand playing with or even against a computer player. If the AI was relatively good we’d be fine playing 5v5.

Maybe they’ll fix some of the garbage glitches in their game at some point. In EASHL if you hack(L2+Triangle) an opponent after the whistle three times the faceoff will go to the other team’s zone for no reason. No penalty or anything, you just get an offensive zone faceoff out of it.

If you’re playing against a team that has an AI skater and you take a penalty against a human, if you quickly take one against the AI only the AI player will get the penalty shot. The human doesn’t get to shoot, and since the AI’s penalty shot success rate is probably about 5%, whereas a decent human player is probably 75%, it only makes sense to force the computer to take the shot.

Dressing room errors that kick you all the way back to the main menu causing you to go through like 7 or 8 different loading screens just to get back to the dressing room to start searching for another game are an absolute plague some days. Borderline unplayable.

The automatic stick lift thing needs to be thrown straight in the garbage. You should have to press the stick lift button in order to lift another player’s stick, not just stand somewhat near them and have the game decide that you’re stealing the puck. That’s garbage.

Guys should poke check at the puck if it’s right in front of you, not the player’s skates. So many unnecessary penalties because my guy refuses to just poke the puck right in front of him.

Can we go back to unlocking celebrations by actually earning them rather than relying on luck from these stupid hockey bags?

Can we please customize our skater’s attributes in EASHL? I know EA is worried about balancing the game or whatever, but if you give everyone the same number of attribute points regardless how many games they’ve played then everyone can create whichever class they want without fear of more experienced players getting an advantage like they used to.

There are so many other huge changes that need to be made, but those are just the starting point.

 

[SUBdrewgANS]

I skipped on NHL19.. looks like I'll be skipping again. Sad.

Bring back GM Connected and I'll be all over the game.

EDIT: Though I am glad that Doc and Eddie are gone. It's sad that, that's the best change they made to the game though.

 

[TriFF51]

I skipped on NHL19.. looks like I'll be skipping again. Sad.

Bring back GM Connected and I'll be all over the game.

EDIT: Though I am glad that Doc and Eddie are gone. It's sad that, that's the best change they made to the game though.

I wish GM Connected was more popular. Having a full league going was amazing. I had bought every NHL since 04 and I havent bought one since they removed it, what? Like 2 or 3 years ago now.

 

[The Crypto Guy]

nvm

 

[Willis88]

Trade Finder.
AHL/NHL Coaching Staffs

That's all that is known right now.

Where's the info about that?

 

[CROCODILE SEATS]

Is their any confirmation of GM Connected? That’s the only reason I’d buy this game full price..

 

[Wats]

Trade Finder.
AHL/NHL Coaching Staffs

That's all that is known right now.

Trade finder is pretty fun to use in NBA 2K.

 

[CutOnDime97]

Trade Finder.
AHL/NHL Coaching Staffs

That's all that is known right now.

Trade finder is a actually a much need addition. So that's something.

 

[CutOnDime97]

Sean Ramjagsingh has talked about a pc version for almost 5 years and it never ends up happening i am surprised people keep believing they are actually considering it.

PC version with Xbox cross-play would be too damn smart of a move for those bozos to consider.

 

[S3rkie]

2nd year in a row I wont buy. This game bottomed out a long time. EA is death to the gaming industry.

 

[ShootIt]

We can still demo the game for 10 hours with EA Access? (X1)
Didn't bother with 19 at all, but may try the demo this year.

 

[Nithoniniel]

You'd think that with ever dwindling sales they might consider doing something different with their development cycle. Flooding the game with a million little game modes that will draw some momentary curiosity before people go back to being underwhelmed by the main modes doesn't seem to be a winner.

Are you telling me you're tired of an AI dman skating circling behind your net, cutting it too close on the close hand and tucking it in behind your goalie for an own goal?

We actually once had the AI do a Laine. I poked the puck loose into the slot and our AI stepped up and put a one-timer straight past his own goalie. Most of the time you get ridiculous things happen you at least understand what it was that might have gone wrong. That one.... I have no idea. That and when the goalie makes a save and automatically throws the puck out to an opponent player, even if he's the only skater in the zone. Lost in OT due to that once.