Grape

It's alright, I'll turn that bad pick into a steal

Honestly more impressive to completely miss on everything so I'll take this as a win

It's alright, I'll turn that bad pick into a steal

It's alright, I'll turn that bad pick into a steal

Honestly more impressive to completely miss on everything so I'll take this as a win

Honestly more impressive to completely miss on everything so I'll take this as a win

@Arce @Tetricide appreciate you both for being absolute legends helping me get compliant and not completely fleecing me to oblivion. Best of luck in the draft!

Honestly more impressive to completely miss on everything so I'll take this as a win

A lot of people hate on the VLHE, some for no reason at all really, except that it’s kind of “trendy” to do so. And while a lot of the hate directed towards the league is irrelevant and done more so as a joke than legitimate disgruntlement, there are valid reasons. One of these reasons revolves around their draft, mainly, the GMs and scouting. Now, I can’t speak for all players, but from what I’ve seen and heard, there are a decent amount of players that have seemingly been passed over by the VHLE GMs and haven’t had any contact with any team in the league, maybe by 1 or 2 teams informally, but for the majority of the league, it’s radio silence. I understand that not every GM has oodles of picks like Vasteras and a lot of players aren’t necessarily in their pick range, but an effort should still be made. It is incredibly disheartening, for new players especially, to receive practically no interest from where their next step to the VHL is. There was a problem with inactives in the league and that’s why the league contracted from eight to six, and while the TPE range that the E inhabits is where most people generally fizzle out, the GMs aren’t doing themselves any favors in maintaining interest. This isn’t a me specific problem. I’ve only been reached out to by 2 teams but I’ve made it pretty clear that I plan on skipping anyways. This is a problem for the whole draft class. Personally, a GM should reach out to every player, whether they’re in your range or not. It shows interest, and it shows that you actually care. From what I’ve seen, the E appears to be filled with GMs that are content with claiming job pay and not much else. Scouting is an integral part of the job. Do it.

A lot of people hate on the VLHE, some for no reason at all really, except that it’s kind of “trendy” to do so. And while a lot of the hate directed towards the league is irrelevant and done more so as a joke than legitimate disgruntlement, there are valid reasons. One of these reasons revolves around their draft, mainly, the GMs and scouting. Now, I can’t speak for all players, but from what I’ve seen and heard, there are a decent amount of players that have seemingly been passed over by the VHLE GMs and haven’t had any contact with any team in the league, maybe by 1 or 2 teams informally, but for the majority of the league, it’s radio silence. I understand that not every GM has oodles of picks like Vasteras and a lot of players aren’t necessarily in their pick range, but an effort should still be made. It is incredibly disheartening, for new players especially, to receive practically no interest from where their next step to the VHL is. There was a problem with inactives in the league and that’s why the league contracted from eight to six, and while the TPE range that the E inhabits is where most people generally fizzle out, the GMs aren’t doing themselves any favors in maintaining interest. This isn’t a me specific problem. I’ve only been reached out to by 2 teams but I’ve made it pretty clear that I plan on skipping anyways. This is a problem for the whole draft class. Personally, a GM should reach out to every player, whether they’re in your range or not. It shows interest, and it shows that you actually care. From what I’ve seen, the E appears to be filled with GMs that are content with claiming job pay and not much else. Scouting is an integral part of the job. Do it.

Before these new (I guess they aren’t that new now) hybrid attributes, everything was pretty much clear cut. Scoring boosted scoring, defense boosted defense, skating boosted, well, I guess that one still does just boost skating. The point is, each stat directly boosted their attribute and nothing else, which would work well on paper. However, there was a slight issue within STHS itself. A meta was found in which players would basically pour TPE into scoring and that would generate oodles of offense. Now, while this meta wasn’t completely unknown, it wasn’t massively abused. That was until Vancouver went on a little run in which they won three straight championships, season 80, 81, and 82. That playoff run was pretty much the nail in the coffin for the past system, and in came the hybrid. Now, while the attributes have changed, STHS still hasn’t. The meta showed how offense is generated, and the hybrid attributes have somewhat neutered that offensive generation, although that was the design. See, the meta made it so that a player focused purely on one offensive stat, that being scoring, and STHS looks at offense in two different ways:
 
1. STHS decides what your player does based on your passing and scoring attributes. Higher pass stat = your player passes. Higher scoring stat = your player shoots. 
 
2. How STHS decides on what your player does is based on the separation of your scoring and passing attributes. To see a noticeable difference in offensive production, there needs to be a 5 level difference between the attributes. If you want to pass more, your passing attribute needs to be 5 levels greater than your scoring attribute for STHS to sim your player that way. The same is true for scoring.
 
See, that separation dictates what your player does; however, when there isn’t a separation, your player does neither. It doesn’t matter if you have 99 scoring and 99 passing, your player will still struggle offensively. So, you’ll pour TPE into slap shot and wrist shot to boost your scoring, right? Well, the issue is is that those stats, at the start, don’t boost as much as the big beautiful desirable stat staring right at you: Offensive Vision. Put 3 levels into Offensive Vision and your attribute goes up a level, compared to having to put 10 levels in either Slap Shot or Wrist Shot to match that. 7 more TPE for each level up till level 70 to increase your scoring level. The ratio remains awful. It only becomes TPE efficient when Slap Shot or Wrist Shot is still under level 70 and Offensive Vision is in the 75-80 range. Early on, especially in the VHLM, it is really hard to put that TPE into something that just is not efficient. 
 
So, you want to generate offense in the VHLM. How are you gonna do it? Well, you have two options: passing or scoring. Passing is a bit easier since there are only two attributes that go into passing, and the actual passing stat is better than Offensive Vision, albeit slightly. With that being said, it is viable to bypass Offensive Vision completely to become a pure playmaker. Now you would want to put some points into Offensive Vision because you want to boost your passing stat the most efficient way possible. Once you gain a strong lead in that attribute, Offensive Vision will only improve your offense, not hinder it. Level 70 is when the first drop-off starts for every stat, and that is where you should start to consider teching into other attributes. Sprinkle in some of the secondary attributes (puck handling, skating, defense), and you have yourself an elite playmaking M player. Just upscale everything for the higher leagues and you will become a top playmaker for every team you’re on. 
 
Scoring is a bit harder to do, since you have to balance both slap shot and wrist shot. In the M, you should put more focus on slap shot than wrist shot, as the secondary attribute in strength is more important than wrist shot’s secondary attribute in penalty shot. Like I mentioned previously, the drop-off for stats is usually at level 70. When it comes to the scoring stat, that changes slightly. Slap shot and wrist shot only become better than Offensive Vision after Offensive Vision reaches level 75. So, you push Offensive Vision to level 75, then focus on Slap Shot. There needs to be roughly a 5 level difference between passing and scoring for STHS to favor one attribute for offensive production, and to reach that, after bringing OV to level 75, is to boost Slap Shot to exactly level 42. That costs you 122 TPE and therefore, in the M, you have 78 more TPE to spend. I would say putting 40-50 of that into Defensive Coverage is wise as that improves both your skating and defense, and defense in STHS helps with your player positioning, both in the offensive and defensive zones, meaning you do offense better. The remaining can go into improving puck handling and skating, and, if you really wanna put up some points, bring slap shot up to 70 and start putting TPE into Wrist Shot. In the higher leagues, just keep scaling up and you’ll do alright. The one thing to look out for, however, is TPE efficiency. You’ll need to put points into OV at some point after to be efficient in growing your scoring attribute. Basically, the order would go:

Level 75 OV -> Level 70 SS and WS -> Level 90 OV -> Level 80 SS and WS -> Level 99 OV -> Level 99 SS and WS.
 
There is one area in which OV, SS, and WS share the same efficiency and with that you can go to any and boost your scoring at the same rate, being OV in the 80-90 level range and SS and WS in the 70-75 level range. A maxed scoring stat will have a 23.76 level difference from passing and will definitely generate a ton of offense. 
 
The hybrid attributes have done an amazing job erasing the old meta and making it so players have to balance attributes in order to create a good player. Make no mistake, though, the meta still does exist. It is just infinitely harder to obtain and many players simply cannot dedicate that much TPE into making it happen. To fully max out your scoring stat will cost you 675 TPE. Firstly, some players don’t even get that much TPE in their career. Secondly, that completely ignores the relevant stats that helped make the build so good in the first place. You still need to pour TPE into defense and skating and puck handling to the point where even 1000+ TPE players would have a somewhat hard time to have a maxed out scoring stat. Thirdly, and lastly, it really just isn’t as good. With the old system, you could boost scoring independently from your passing. The highest you can get scoring without increasing passing is 63.76. That really isn’t much to write home about. Try to emulate the meta all you want, you’ll be good, but not as good. It’s better to just get the separation on the attributes, and focus on making your player you, and not some cookie cutter template.

(1218 words)

Before these new (I guess they aren’t that new now) hybrid attributes, everything was pretty much clear cut. Scoring boosted scoring, defense boosted defense, skating boosted, well, I guess that one still does just boost skating. The point is, each stat directly boosted their attribute and nothing else, which would work well on paper. However, there was a slight issue within STHS itself. A meta was found in which players would basically pour TPE into scoring and that would generate oodles of offense. Now, while this meta wasn’t completely unknown, it wasn’t massively abused. That was until Vancouver went on a little run in which they won three straight championships, season 80, 81, and 82. That playoff run was pretty much the nail in the coffin for the past system, and in came the hybrid. Now, while the attributes have changed, STHS still hasn’t. The meta showed how offense is generated, and the hybrid attributes have somewhat neutered that offensive generation, although that was the design. See, the meta made it so that a player focused purely on one offensive stat, that being scoring, and STHS looks at offense in two different ways:
 
1. STHS decides what your player does based on your passing and scoring attributes. Higher pass stat = your player passes. Higher scoring stat = your player shoots. 
 
2. How STHS decides on what your player does is based on the separation of your scoring and passing attributes. To see a noticeable difference in offensive production, there needs to be a 5 level difference between the attributes. If you want to pass more, your passing attribute needs to be 5 levels greater than your scoring attribute for STHS to sim your player that way. The same is true for scoring.
 
See, that separation dictates what your player does; however, when there isn’t a separation, your player does neither. It doesn’t matter if you have 99 scoring and 99 passing, your player will still struggle offensively. So, you’ll pour TPE into slap shot and wrist shot to boost your scoring, right? Well, the issue is is that those stats, at the start, don’t boost as much as the big beautiful desirable stat staring right at you: Offensive Vision. Put 3 levels into Offensive Vision and your attribute goes up a level, compared to having to put 10 levels in either Slap Shot or Wrist Shot to match that. 7 more TPE for each level up till level 70 to increase your scoring level. The ratio remains awful. It only becomes TPE efficient when Slap Shot or Wrist Shot is still under level 70 and Offensive Vision is in the 75-80 range. Early on, especially in the VHLM, it is really hard to put that TPE into something that just is not efficient. 
 
So, you want to generate offense in the VHLM. How are you gonna do it? Well, you have two options: passing or scoring. Passing is a bit easier since there are only two attributes that go into passing, and the actual passing stat is better than Offensive Vision, albeit slightly. With that being said, it is viable to bypass Offensive Vision completely to become a pure playmaker. Now you would want to put some points into Offensive Vision because you want to boost your passing stat the most efficient way possible. Once you gain a strong lead in that attribute, Offensive Vision will only improve your offense, not hinder it. Level 70 is when the first drop-off starts for every stat, and that is where you should start to consider teching into other attributes. Sprinkle in some of the secondary attributes (puck handling, skating, defense), and you have yourself an elite playmaking M player. Just upscale everything for the higher leagues and you will become a top playmaker for every team you’re on. 
 
Scoring is a bit harder to do, since you have to balance both slap shot and wrist shot. In the M, you should put more focus on slap shot than wrist shot, as the secondary attribute in strength is more important than wrist shot’s secondary attribute in penalty shot. Like I mentioned previously, the drop-off for stats is usually at level 70. When it comes to the scoring stat, that changes slightly. Slap shot and wrist shot only become better than Offensive Vision after Offensive Vision reaches level 75. So, you push Offensive Vision to level 75, then focus on Slap Shot. There needs to be roughly a 5 level difference between passing and scoring for STHS to favor one attribute for offensive production, and to reach that, after bringing OV to level 75, is to boost Slap Shot to exactly level 42. That costs you 122 TPE and therefore, in the M, you have 78 more TPE to spend. I would say putting 40-50 of that into Defensive Coverage is wise as that improves both your skating and defense, and defense in STHS helps with your player positioning, both in the offensive and defensive zones, meaning you do offense better. The remaining can go into improving puck handling and skating, and, if you really wanna put up some points, bring slap shot up to 70 and start putting TPE into Wrist Shot. In the higher leagues, just keep scaling up and you’ll do alright. The one thing to look out for, however, is TPE efficiency. You’ll need to put points into OV at some point after to be efficient in growing your scoring attribute. Basically, the order would go:

Level 75 OV -> Level 70 SS and WS -> Level 90 OV -> Level 80 SS and WS -> Level 99 OV -> Level 99 SS and WS.
 
There is one area in which OV, SS, and WS share the same efficiency and with that you can go to any and boost your scoring at the same rate, being OV in the 80-90 level range and SS and WS in the 70-75 level range. A maxed scoring stat will have a 23.76 level difference from passing and will definitely generate a ton of offense. 
 
The hybrid attributes have done an amazing job erasing the old meta and making it so players have to balance attributes in order to create a good player. Make no mistake, though, the meta still does exist. It is just infinitely harder to obtain and many players simply cannot dedicate that much TPE into making it happen. To fully max out your scoring stat will cost you 675 TPE. Firstly, some players don’t even get that much TPE in their career. Secondly, that completely ignores the relevant stats that helped make the build so good in the first place. You still need to pour TPE into defense and skating and puck handling to the point where even 1000+ TPE players would have a somewhat hard time to have a maxed out scoring stat. Thirdly, and lastly, it really just isn’t as good. With the old system, you could boost scoring independently from your passing. The highest you can get scoring without increasing passing is 63.76. That really isn’t much to write home about. Try to emulate the meta all you want, you’ll be good, but not as good. It’s better to just get the separation on the attributes, and focus on making your player you, and not some cookie cutter template.

(1218 words)

Before these new (I guess they aren’t that new now) hybrid attributes, everything was pretty much clear cut. Scoring boosted scoring, defense boosted defense, skating boosted, well, I guess that one still does just boost skating. The point is, each stat directly boosted their attribute and nothing else, which would work well on paper. However, there was a slight issue within STHS itself. A meta was found in which players would basically pour TPE into scoring and that would generate oodles of offense. Now, while this meta wasn’t completely unknown, it wasn’t massively abused. That was until Vancouver went on a little run in which they won three straight championships, season 80, 81, and 82. That playoff run was pretty much the nail in the coffin for the past system, and in came the hybrid. Now, while the attributes have changed, STHS still hasn’t. The meta showed how offense is generated, and the hybrid attributes have somewhat neutered that offensive generation, although that was the design. See, the meta made it so that a player focused purely on one offensive stat, that being scoring, and STHS looks at offense in two different ways:
 
1. STHS decides what your player does based on your passing and scoring attributes. Higher pass stat = your player passes. Higher scoring stat = your player shoots. 
 
2. How STHS decides on what your player does is based on the separation of your scoring and passing attributes. To see a noticeable difference in offensive production, there needs to be a 5 level difference between the attributes. If you want to pass more, your passing attribute needs to be 5 levels greater than your scoring attribute for STHS to sim your player that way. The same is true for scoring.
 
See, that separation dictates what your player does; however, when there isn’t a separation, your player does neither. It doesn’t matter if you have 99 scoring and 99 passing, your player will still struggle offensively. So, you’ll pour TPE into slap shot and wrist shot to boost your scoring, right? Well, the issue is is that those stats, at the start, don’t boost as much as the big beautiful desirable stat staring right at you: Offensive Vision. Put 3 levels into Offensive Vision and your attribute goes up a level, compared to having to put 10 levels in either Slap Shot or Wrist Shot to match that. 7 more TPE for each level up till level 70 to increase your scoring level. The ratio remains awful. It only becomes TPE efficient when Slap Shot or Wrist Shot is still under level 70 and Offensive Vision is in the 75-80 range. Early on, especially in the VHLM, it is really hard to put that TPE into something that just is not efficient. 
 
So, you want to generate offense in the VHLM. How are you gonna do it? Well, you have two options: passing or scoring. Passing is a bit easier since there are only two attributes that go into passing, and the actual passing stat is better than Offensive Vision, albeit slightly. With that being said, it is viable to bypass Offensive Vision completely to become a pure playmaker. Now you would want to put some points into Offensive Vision because you want to boost your passing stat the most efficient way possible. Once you gain a strong lead in that attribute, Offensive Vision will only improve your offense, not hinder it. Level 70 is when the first drop-off starts for every stat, and that is where you should start to consider teching into other attributes. Sprinkle in some of the secondary attributes (puck handling, skating, defense), and you have yourself an elite playmaking M player. Just upscale everything for the higher leagues and you will become a top playmaker for every team you’re on. 
 
Scoring is a bit harder to do, since you have to balance both slap shot and wrist shot. In the M, you should put more focus on slap shot than wrist shot, as the secondary attribute in strength is more important than wrist shot’s secondary attribute in penalty shot. Like I mentioned previously, the drop-off for stats is usually at level 70. When it comes to the scoring stat, that changes slightly. Slap shot and wrist shot only become better than Offensive Vision after Offensive Vision reaches level 75. So, you push Offensive Vision to level 75, then focus on Slap Shot. There needs to be roughly a 5 level difference between passing and scoring for STHS to favor one attribute for offensive production, and to reach that, after bringing OV to level 75, is to boost Slap Shot to exactly level 42. That costs you 122 TPE and therefore, in the M, you have 78 more TPE to spend. I would say putting 40-50 of that into Defensive Coverage is wise as that improves both your skating and defense, and defense in STHS helps with your player positioning, both in the offensive and defensive zones, meaning you do offense better. The remaining can go into improving puck handling and skating, and, if you really wanna put up some points, bring slap shot up to 70 and start putting TPE into Wrist Shot. In the higher leagues, just keep scaling up and you’ll do alright. The one thing to look out for, however, is TPE efficiency. You’ll need to put points into OV at some point after to be efficient in growing your scoring attribute. Basically, the order would go:

Level 75 OV -> Level 70 SS and WS -> Level 90 OV -> Level 80 SS and WS -> Level 99 OV -> Level 99 SS and WS.
 
There is one area in which OV, SS, and WS share the same efficiency and with that you can go to any and boost your scoring at the same rate, being OV in the 80-90 level range and SS and WS in the 70-75 level range. A maxed scoring stat will have a 23.76 level difference from passing and will definitely generate a ton of offense. 
 
The hybrid attributes have done an amazing job erasing the old meta and making it so players have to balance attributes in order to create a good player. Make no mistake, though, the meta still does exist. It is just infinitely harder to obtain and many players simply cannot dedicate that much TPE into making it happen. To fully max out your scoring stat will cost you 675 TPE. Firstly, some players don’t even get that much TPE in their career. Secondly, that completely ignores the relevant stats that helped make the build so good in the first place. You still need to pour TPE into defense and skating and puck handling to the point where even 1000+ TPE players would have a somewhat hard time to have a maxed out scoring stat. Thirdly, and lastly, it really just isn’t as good. With the old system, you could boost scoring independently from your passing. The highest you can get scoring without increasing passing is 63.76. That really isn’t much to write home about. Try to emulate the meta all you want, you’ll be good, but not as good. It’s better to just get the separation on the attributes, and focus on making your player you, and not some cookie cutter template.

(1218 words)

How did you draft a French player to Team Asia?

Congrats to all the new blood! @Otis Boudreaux Jr I'm so sorry but you've inherited a franchise that can never win.

Yep, you heard that right! We are now hiring not the three GMs we advertised roles for before, but four GMs after the poaching of @samx by the evil Blue overlords.
 
Once again, we'd like to thank @Blazzer, @AJW, @Pifferfish and @samx for their time spent as GMs for LVA, Houston, Philly, and Mexico City, respectively.
 
With that being said, we've got a whole bunch of new (and old) faces to welcome to the VHLM. Please congratulate the following:
 
Las Vegas - @McLovin
Philadelphia - @Lemorse7
Houston - @STZ
Mexico City - @Otis Boudreaux Jr
 
Excited to have a fantastic mix of veterans and first gens to add to the VHLM team! Looking forward to seeing the great job you all do!

The Mexico City curse has now been brought onto two VHL teams. May god have mercy