Reduce the trade limit. Yes or No?

[QS]

I prefer this system. At the top end of the scale, guys would be able to tweak to find the extra 1 or 2 points making it interesting. Realistically for the rest of us hackers it just means a chance to play around with the sides.

If we go back to limited to trades, who's to say even with picking rookies well, that part of it isn't a lottery? We seem to forget 2011/2012 DT was a little easier in that regard as we had GCS and GWS cash cows. Most would have pegged Daniher to be a playing rook yet he is still on the bubble as at round 18.

DT has certainly been more entertaining this year as most coaches are still putting the effort into their sides as opposed to previous years more seemed to be giving up and it became boring. For the record last round I had at least half a team of unique players in my league games, so I'm not sure where this comes from - it's still hard to get everyone you want with injuries and suspensions and in any case I think for the most part this season has been kind injury wise.

 

[CaptScott]

Everyone keeps saying that the teams are too similar... Have you looked at SC teams? I am in the top 1k for SC and have barely moved up or down a spot for weeks. Everyone has pretty much the same team there. I am seeing much different teams in DT as people are able to take a risk and pick up some POD's they think will do well. SC/limited trades does not allow this as you generally always take the safer option.

You know, I think you're right. While most teams seem to look similar (and I have complained such) I have to admit in my 3 leagues over the last two weeks I've probably had around 8-9 pod's in each match.

You've given me food for thought.

 

[Ess_don]

Reckon 30-35 trades.
Find a balance so there is still some element of preserving trades and not going trigger happy, omgSJsuspended1wkTRADE! but also enough for us to play around with our teams throughout the season.

Or if VS wants to maintain 44 trades to appease the less hardcore masses, at least reduce the salary cap so it takes longer to complete teams and should make teams a bit more unique, as coaches cant squeeze in all the "must have" premos and will be bringing them in at different stages in the year.
ie: would be good if every team didnt start with Gaz and Swan but have to painfully make the decision of just picking 1 as they take up a huge chunk of your salary cap.

 

[CaptScott]

Reckon 30-35 trades.
Find a balance so there is still some element of preserving trades and not going trigger happy, omgSJsuspended1wkTRADE! but also enough for us to play around with our teams throughout the season.

Or if VS wants to maintain 44 trades to appease the less hardcore masses, at least reduce the salary cap so it takes longer to complete teams and should make teams a bit more unique, as coaches cant squeeze in all the "must have" premos and will be bringing them in at different stages in the year. ie: would be good if every team didnt start with Gaz and Swan but have to painfully make the decision of just picking 1 as they take up a huge chunk of your salary cap.

That would be perfect, less starting money (or fiddle with magic number/pricing as mentioned earlier) with 44 trades. Makes it more difficult to build a perfect team.

 

[terribleflowers]

^^ yeah agree with that. should be much smaller salary cap. the 2 trades a week thing is cool in that it gives us something to think about each week and gets people to keep logging in at the end of the season but i've been bored for a few weeks now. every week there's 2 people injured or suspended and 2 obvious candidates to get in for them. massive snoozefest. team was way too easy to finish, should take longer. imo it should be rare for teams to actually manage to have 22 of the top 25 players in their team come end of the season, not run of the mill.

 

[Crawb]

Just raise the magic number and make player's prices higher. People were starting with around 13 premiums at the start of the year. Maybe raise the prices to a point where starting only around 11 premiums is possible and some of the luxury trading that I suspect will happen during finals won't happen. 44 trades is good. It was getting to a point where too many trades were being used on injuries last year.

 

[The Jet]

the 44 trades have been a big winner this season. We've been screwed big time a fair bit this season with injures & suspensions.

 

[TheGhostOfJohnBelushi]

I like the trades we have. However I will admit I feel I HAVE to use them each week, even if maybe I didn't need to.

Maybe leave trades as is (is it 44 or 46?) but increase the amount you can use per round.

So... in a shit week, you can use 3 or 4 trades, but just means at some point, you'll run out if you keep doing 2 or more per week.

Those disciplined enough to do 2 per week won't run out, while some may want to hold onto more trades for finals (not uncommon that a bunch of players are rested come round 22/23).

I really like having 2 per week to focus on building my side.

 

[Quazza]

prefer the old way

 

[JDWCE]

I like the trades we have. However I will admit I feel I HAVE to use them each week, even if maybe I didn't need to.

Maybe leave trades as is (is it 44 or 46?) but increase the amount you can use per round.

So... in a shit week, you can use 3 or 4 trades, but just means at some point, you'll run out if you keep doing 2 or more per week.

Those disciplined enough to do 2 per week won't run out, while some may want to hold onto more trades for finals (not uncommon that a bunch of players are rested come round 22/23).

I really like having 2 per week to focus on building my side.

I think with the ease of getting a complete team this year, I don't think increased trades per week is a good idea. Allows the chance to get a complete team even quicker. But I understand the point of covering injuries/suspensions etc

 

[frem23]

To me there is no question that there was so much more strategy with the old system. Trades were precious, and while the top end of town could finish a "complete" team by the end of the year, it was hard work, and many teams could not (many teams thought they had a 'complete' team, but in reality it was simply the best they could do, and there was a gap with the people who managed their team better).

This year is really a bit of a joke. Completing a team was way too easy. I'm guessing the masses who couldn't compete at the top level love it this year, so many teams are already complete and it's just a crapshoot each with with premium vs premium. The reality is that the people marketing DT are not going to market it to the top 1%...they want the masses, so I can't see the number of trades drastically changing.

 

[Butler]

The reality is that the people marketing DT are not going to market it to the top 1%...they want the masses

Spot on. Unfortunately making the game easier = getting more people in which is exactly what they want.

@ those people that are commenting on how similar the teams were last year, at this stage last year there weren't complete teams. Making the right premium selections were a far bigger advantage at this stage last year because not everyone could just bring them in. This year, if a premium starts to perform they are swamped because everyone can easily bring them in.

Of course the lack of variety in the back and forward line has a lot to do with it but how easy it is to trade in players this year doesn't help.

I don't believe we can go back to the old trade cap with the multi byes and more player resting than ever but I do believe it should be made more difficult to complete a team. Unfortunately I think it will be a bit of trial and error over the next few years.

 

[kaisasosai]

All I can say is I am only ranked just inside the top 2000 and my on-field team is predicted to get 2350 points (this is after I had to trade out both hanley and goodes).

The ridiculous thing is that I still have $740,000 in the bank, with every player expected to get a game apart from Bartel on my bench.

I cannot actually spend that much in 1 week on upgrades atm. I think if you have more money than you know what to do with then something isn't working because its never felt this easy before.

The current system is ridiculous.

 

[Blinger]

All I can say is I am only ranked just inside the top 2000 and my on-field team is predicted to get 2350 points (this is after I had to trade out both hanley and goodes).

The ridiculous thing is that I still have $740,000 in the bank, with every player expected to get a game apart from Bartel on my bench.

I cannot actually spend that much in 1 week on upgrades atm. I think if you have more money than you know what to do with then something isn't working because its never felt this easy before.

The current system is ridiculous.

Well maybe if you had of spent more of that money earlier, you might be ranked in the top 500 rather than complaining you cant spend all the extra money you have & be ranked top 2000.

 

[tortoise_24]

Its a definite no from me - I like the 44 trades and want it to stay that way.

Maybe I'm weird, but having a reasonably strong team already, with some spare cash to strengthen it a bit further, adds to the enjoyment. I'm in 3 relatively competitive leagues, and despite having a fairly vanilla side [Robbie Gray and Jordan Lewis are about as "unique" as I get] I still usually have at least 8 players, and up to a dozen, different from each of my opponents each week, so IMHO the sides are no more similar at this time of year than in previous incarnations.

In the next few weeks, as DT finals approach and coaches look for a point of difference, I think we may see more divergence than we would have in previous years, when scarce trades would have been held for injury coverage. At this stage I've traded out Hanley for Ricky Henderson this week [reverse trades - another great innovation] - if I'd had only a few trades left there is no way I would take the punt on a guy with no more than a 4 week history of good scoring behind him, but I'm willing to take the risk this time around, knowing that I can play it safe with an Enright if it goes wrong.

Frankly, the idea of going back to 24 or, GAJ forbid, 20 trades makes me shudder ... and the winners would be riding on luck as much as in a 44 trade environment. Avoid the worst of the carnage and call it good management/patience. If we want it tougher - and personally I'm not fussed if it isn't - I think the better solution would be either that advocated by a few above - up the magic number - or price the "likely" rookies in particular, or rookies in general, more highly at the start of the year, to make guns and rookies a riskier strategy. This year, once again, it was a fail-safe move, even without the Gold Coast, GWS luxury. And, if we get Jesse Hogan and Jack Martin next year at the same prices we got O'Meara and Crouch this year, I can't see it not being that way again. But, hey, I'll happily take them on board at $110k.

 

[Quazza]

Can't help but think come finals time within leagues, it's going to pretty much come down to luck now

 

[JDWCE]

Can't help but think come finals time within leagues, it's going to pretty much come down to luck now

I think this is spot on

 

[kaisasosai]

Well maybe if you had of spent more of that money earlier, you might be ranked in the top 500 rather than complaining you cant spend all the extra money you have & be ranked top 2000.

Absolute garbage. My rank is a reflection of extremely bad luck. I had players who got injured and scored next to nothing. One bad week sent me from rank 550 to 2400.

Ive had over 600k for 3 weeks. Why? Because for 2-3 weeks I have had to do sideways trades to swap out injuries and garbage 'premiums' for players with better scoring ability. Henderson came in 2 weeks ago for Gibbs, Ellis came in last week for Terlich ETC. These were good trades that made me even more money and throwing more cash at more expensive players would have done BUGGER ALL.

Also the only weak link in my current team is Deledio, other than that every other player on the field is in form AND I have people like Cox, Bartel and TMitchel on the bench. How could I have made my team better spending more money?

Ill tell you how - THE ABILITY TO DO MORE THAN 2 FLIPPIN TRADES PER WEEK.

I am annoyed that my astute trading put me in a position of strength but I have no advantage over the hacks who have 50k in the bank.

 

[JDavey]

Absolute garbage. My rank is a reflection of extremely bad luck. I had players who got injured and scored next to nothing. One bad week sent me from rank 550 to 2400.

Ive had over 600k for 3 weeks. Why? Because for 2-3 weeks I have had to do sideways trades to swap out injuries and garbage 'premiums' for players with better scoring ability. Henderson came in 2 weeks ago for Gibbs, Ellis came in last week for Terlich ETC. These were good trades that made me even more money and throwing more cash at more expensive players would have done BUGGER ALL.

Also the only weak link in my current team is Deledio, other than that every other player on the field is in form AND I have people like Cox, Bartel and TMitchel on the bench. How could I have made my team better spending more money?

Ill tell you how - THE ABILITY TO DO MORE THAN 2 FLIPPIN TRADES PER WEEK.

I am annoyed that my astute trading put me in a position of strength but I have no advantage over the hacks who have 50k in the bank.

Within two paragraphs you contradict yourself. I'm sitting at 800 (and have been steadily rising from 2.8k a few weeks ago) and had many injured premos/suspensions, at least 1 a week for about 5 weeks now.

The fact you have so much excess cash shows you've been trading poorly, you should've been getting in premos instead of waiting for rooks to max out (the couple of trades you listed there don't account for 600k in cash), your team is also probably pretty damn poor if you've been forced to hold on to Lids all this time due to a lack of ability to trade him out.


Edit:
On Topic

I prefer this to what we use to have, I found a lot of people were burnt out/lost interest when they ran out of trades and their team still sucked. With that said having two a week has probably been excessive even though I've struggled with injuries and suspensions most of the year. I'd say 34-38 trades is probably the sweet spot.

 

[Hate]

Right now my team is absolutely screwed, still playing three rookies on the field and have emergencies who get practically zero.

I've learnt a lot about DT this year after looking over the BF DT section. Hopefully next year I'll be a lot better than this year and pick the right rookies at the start of the year and adapt a good season strategy. As for the trades though I'm not fussed either way, but after seeing how people pick rookies and research I wouldn't mind for next year the trades be reduced to give it a more realistic and challenge.

 

[Butler]

I prefer this to what we use to have, I found a lot of people were burnt out/lost interest when they ran out of trades and their team still sucked. With that said having two a week has probably been excessive even though I've struggled with injuries and suspensions most of the year. I'd say 34-38 trades is probably the sweet spot.

That's generally their own fault though. It's just poor trade management which is bad DT coaching. So this current system is just rewarding the trigger happy casual DTers rather than the more serious teams. Pleasing the masses.

I think 38 is still too much, It's only 6 trades less than this year. I would probably lean more towards 32-34 trades but it's really just guess work.

A different idea might be to have sort of ability to sell trades. I'm not sure how you would go about working out the sell price of a trade but it might work. The trade conservative coaches get some sort of reward whilst the more casual DTers don't lose interest by running out of trades.

 

[Skystyler]

2 trades a week takes a lot of the skill out of it. In SC I'm down to my last few trades and they're like gold. In DT i'm burning trades like I'm head of recruiting at Carlton FC.

 

[Cynic]

Lower the salary cap, keep the trades. Trading is the best part of DT.

 

[C_Turn]

Lower the salary cap, keep the trades. Trading is the best part of DT.

This.

Same number of trades, lower salary cap so only good coaches end up with a full team of premos.

Best of both worlds because let's be honest everyone loves trading every week

 

[Ess_don]

Frankly, the idea of going back to 24 or, GAJ forbid, 20 trades makes me shudder ... and the winners would be riding on luck as much as in a 44 trade environment. Avoid the worst of the carnage and call it good management/patience. If we want it tougher - and personally I'm not fussed if it isn't - I think the better solution would be either that advocated by a few above - up the magic number - or price the "likely" rookies in particular, or rookies in general, more highly at the start of the year, to make guns and rookies a riskier strategy. This year, once again, it was a fail-safe move, even without the Gold Coast, GWS luxury. And, if we get Jesse Hogan and Jack Martin next year at the same prices we got O'Meara and Crouch this year, I can't see it not being that way again. But, hey, I'll happily take them on board at $110k.

Haha thats gold.

Wouldnt mind having the base price of rookies increased to say ~$200k, will need to cull about 2~3 rookies each time you want to upgrade but will add to strategy and lengthen the time to finish your side off. Mind you, that will be annoying as hell especially if your premo you've saved up your hard earned for turns into a under-performing Bud..I mean dud.

Also if they did reduce the salary cap/increase magic number or whatever, imagine only being able to pick 5-7 premos in your starting side? How good would that be for strategy??
People can choose to stack their mids, spread them around, or whatever.. atm when making your side, its the boring ol lock in the 2-3 "must haves" (eg: this year Goddard, Heppell, Cox, Rocky, etc) in each line and fill in the rest with rooks.

I thoroughly enjoyed having to pick up mid pricers who wouldnt normally be DT relevant in Elite Draft League this year, would love to do the same in normal DT.