Game planning and trading are vital aspects of MFN.

New players are not allowed to make any trades for 30 days. Some owners trade better than others, everyone makes poor trades on occasion. Poor decision do not equal cheating.

On the other hand, Game planning totally takes advantage of poor or inexperienced owners. Top-notch game planners do everything they can to take advantage of others; Including is taking advantage of new players and you can do it from day 1, no 30 day wait there!

Owner stability is a big thing with building a good team. Some of us have busted our butts to make a really good team and haven't cheated to get there. Penalizing a team because they made themselves good is just stupid. It's like the way people feel they are entitled to something without putting in the work.

As the game refines it's self your superior play will be leveled by these recent changes. Prepare now! Because a truly great owner will rise up from the ashes of this thread. Or hold on and burn away with it.

Totally agree Bling, and there is no need to "penalize" whatsoever, just simulate.

Since most of us don't have extensive knowledge of the CFL or XFL or other Professional Football Leagues, let's use the NFL as an Example.

Do you never see NFL trades that are lop-sided?

The Cleveland Browns traded with the Atlanta Falcons, effectively giving the Falcons Julio Jones... one of the NFL's Top WRs. So the Browns could select... Phil Taylor. Was that balanced? Was that 'fair'?

There are crappy deals in the NFL every single Season, because Real Life GM's with real life Professional Front Offices still manage to make some glaringly obvious mistakes. I'm not saying Cleveland Brown's Fans are Ron Wolf and could run NFL Teams, but we could have done better than what we've had Since the Return for certain.

Tampa Bay traded Draft Picks for a Coach. Now you can argue it Won them a Super Bowl... but then the team imploded because of the lack of Picks and an inability to bring in New Talent as the Vets retired with their Ring. So they Won on the Short Term, lost on the Long Term.

How about Ricky Williams? Was he worth an Entire Draft, which is what Miami gave up for him? You can argue that when he played he was historic... but just how long did he play for Miami, and how much of an Impact did he bring them? How many Play Offs/Super Bowls did Ricky Williams take Miami to?

Tampa Bay let Steve Young go because he was a Bust. Steve Young is in the HOF and has Super Bowl Rings... some argue him to be the 2nd Best QB in NFL History behind the guy he replaced, Joe Montana.

So it's ironic that you want this to be more like an "NFL Sim", and point to lop-sided Trades as not being like the NFL... when in reality every Season brings us some hatch job of a Trade IN REAL LIFE.

And those are Professionals... who put meals on the table and a keep a roof over their heads doing this.

So do you want Realism or not? Because in the Real World, GM's get fleeced all the time.

Good discussion.

-I think restricting trades wouldn't be the best option.
-I think there does need to be some type of change.

As things currently stand it creates an atmosphere that rewards "gaming" new/inexperienced owners into lopsided trades. That is not fun. MFN is fun. Trying to keep up with other owners who "go out of their way" to "fleece" owners is not fun. Taking advantage of other people.... is not fun. (Maybe it's just me though)

I am very competitive, and like to do well, because of this I pick at the back of all the draft rounds. This is ok. It's kinda fun picking late and searching for some gems. On average I will get less talented players in the later portion of a round than the earlier. This helps to "equalize" things for the new/inexperienced owners to get a little boost on talent over me. This is great for the game. Whats not great for the game is someone with a "good" team like mine, selecting in the top of the draft every year because they can take advantage of someone who just wants to "have fun/play well" and is "tricked" into some trade that makes little sense for their team. This makes the league less competitive/fun at both the top and bottom.
-The bottom because it makes the "bad" teams even more bad.
-The top because it takes a top team, and gives them access to players they have no business drafting.

The best way to compete with this type of team is the old mantra "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em." But again.....this is not fun. The game is meant to be fun. I want to wish the best for my fellow owners, not try to dupe them.
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I like to do trades. Though negotiating a trade can be very difficult, so many times I don't bother.

I think the best fix for all the current trade issues, is to make trade offers "public" knowledge. This would still allow everyone the freedom to build their team however they wish, in fact it would almost give you more freedom, because you would have more information to go off of when trading. This wouldn't force anyone to play the game a certain way, or build their team a specific way, it would only make things transparent for all owners to see. I think this would increase the amount of trades and drastically increase the competitiveness when offering trades. This is not a bad thing, this would make trades much more fun when you can get feedback from 31 other owners instantly. New owners would get way more information to consider when dealing with experienced owners.

-This would greatly reduce the "trade police" criticism we see frequently in the forums, because anyone can offer a better deal to prevent the "new/inexperienced owner" from getting "fleeced".

-The trade bar could immediately be loosened up to allow more trades, because the "free market"(owners out-bidding each others trade offers) will keep trades at "market value" and prevent lopsided ones. Thus the trade bar wouldn't have to enforce "fairness", the league's community would do so inadvertently.

-This is more realistic than I think many people realize. NFL teams have whole staffs that can call and communicate with other team's staffs 24/7. We do not. "Public trade offers" would simulate the hundreds of call/texts being sent around the league during trade season.

-The only owners this would hurt are the one's who try to take advantage of other owners. This would essentially destroy their ability to rip off other owners because their deals would always be less than what other owners would offer.

-I fully support all my trade offers being shown to others. I have nothing to hide. If you can offer a better deal than me, go for it. Maybe that team will give up too much and the deal won't be worth it to me anymore. That's fine.

Trades shouldn't happen in a vacuum. Teams play off of each other when making offers, that's how the NFL works, and it creates a very competitive trade environment. I should be able to offer a better deal then someone else, instead of not knowing someone was available until after the trade. That's not realistic at all. What team would only shop a trade to one other team......NONE! EVER! No team would ever limit themselves in this way, but we all do it everyday here on MFN. Open up the lines of communication! Let's make trades more interactive and create a more fun atmosphere for everyone!

Great Discussion! And I think we all want the same thing; to an extent we are arguing semantics...

I have seen 3 issues with this sim, and 2 of them have been addressed with the new release.

1) Resigning players: It has been too easy to keep a 'Super Team' together. I think that in the NFL (OH NO, he said it!) a really good backup is likely to look to be a starter on a different team when his contract is up. This has been addressed, and that is awesome. (on a side note, I don't like how it is possible to jack up the bonus and offer a 6 year deal to keep the cap down. I think it's taking advantage of the sim and is not realistic. That being said, I've done it and I'm not proud of it.)

2) Gameplanning: I've seen owners win championships by severely restricting the amount of plays they use. One owner used only 3 running plays that he knew would work. Another owner only used 6 defensive plays in total, and 2 of those exclusively on 1st and 2nd down. Both of them won like crazy! Not illegal, but certainly unfair. No coach could do this in the NFL, (OH NO, not again!) I understand this practise also has been addressed.

3) Dudes making terrible trades: I took over a very good team and to my dismay the previous owner had traded away 3 years of 1st and 2nd round picks. 3 YEARS! I figure he knew he was quitting the league so he screwed the future for the next guy. I still have the team, and 4 seasons later I have a very good but VERY OLD team! heh! There has been a lot of talk about guys trading to get 1st rounders, maybe we should focus on the morons giving them away. That is who is wrecking the leagues, not the slow builders who patiently become dominant. And how do we stop that? I like the above comment, and it would certainly promote league interaction, which is healthy and fun. I'm in another simulator (different sport) that has a 'trade committee' of 5 league owners, 3 of which have to accept the trade. It leads to some heated discussions on the boards, but it does stop some lopsided trades...

Well this can happen in MFN if you trade your pick then draft a guy that busts. This trade was only seen as lopsided after Julio Jones "boomed" into the amazing player he is. Phil Taylor had high potential, but he was a bust (along with the other guys they drafted). Not an example of someone being fleeced.



Well unless we add drug testing to MFN... we won't have the same issue the Dolphins did.



Well, Atlanta had a similar experience with Brett Favre. You could say the team made a mistake, but life isn't that simple. Steve Young probably would of never turned out to be the player he was without Bill Walsh(and maybe Montana). And by all accounts Favre would of washed out from partying in Atlanta.



The deals the community is referring to are deals that would never happen in real life. That's why people are upset. Not because an owner gets a bad deal here or there, but because there are some ridiculous deals out there being accepted.

I think that as players get more experienced with game planning, they are able to use their knowledge to build winning teams. I don't see how that translates to taking advantage of other players. Everyone has access to the same info on the forums, is free to ask questions, and can configure their game planning in the same ways.

Which is the point... this is ALSO true of Trades. Everyone has the Forums where we discuss Values of Players, you can learn a lot from the Forums.

How is an Owner who was forced to wait 30 Days to make a Trade, then making an idiotic Trade, any difference from an Owner making an Idiotic Game Plane?

Both had resources available to not make such idiotic decisions, right? In fact, one had 30 Days worth of time to go in and learn some things before clicking buttons and hoping for the best.

I know I jumped in and did exactly that. Thought I was Trading for Reggie White. While the guy was good, he wasn't the player I thought he was. Because I didn't understand the value of Speed on the DL (even for DTs) in the Current Engine. So I over-paid. I'm not mad about this... I had a plan, it was a sound plan. I just didn't know enough about the game to make the plan work, because I targeted the wrong DT to build my Plan around (I also moved two Slow DTs out to DE, in a 34... was going for that old New England 34 WALL where you had 1K Pounds of Beef holding up 5 OL and opening space for the LBs).

Well, that didn't work... so back to the 43... where I now have a DE T-1st in Sacks and on pace to set the League Record.

I learned the hard way, but it benefitted me in the long run. I wasn't taken advantage of, I proposed a deal to get a Player so I could try something. I tried it, didn't like the outcome. I shifted stance, loving the results.

The information is here on the Forums, and there is also Trial and Error. You can lead a horse to water... getting him to drink is another issue.

At least now Owners can see the actual Point Value of the things they are moving, it's just working to get those values in line.

The difference between game planning and trading is that one is unilateral and the other is bilateral. No one else can set your gameplanning for you, so there is no way one player can take advantage of another player in this regard. Whereas, trades have to be offered. This is why I support the 30-day wait period, but no other restrictions on trading.