Gustav

Claiming for the week ending 5/26.

Done!

Check out either, or both, of two different build guides posted in our forum locker room!

SHOULD HAVE SIGNED WITH US GG though, Ottawa still better on paper but we're catching up! #fixthelottery

We kept it close, and our second line is really starting to show they're emerging. I like it. #fixthelottery

What? Asia is selected, and half the team isn't low-TPE inactive? I think there was some sort of "make Gustav lose" conspiracy last season.

Hi @Jacob Girouard and welcome to the VHL! I'm GustavMattias, GM of the Mississauga Hounds, and we could use another forward on our team. I'm looking for active players who are willing to work hard for solid upgrades, and it's possible that you may be what I'm looking for. If this sounds like you, feel free to quote my offer here and say "accepted," and I'll make you a contract offer on the portal! At the moment, you'd be playing on the third line, but there's definite potential to move up the chart if you're active enough. Regardless of where you go, welcome once again, and feel free to contact me with any questions! -Gustav

@InstantRockstar how do you feel about this

Tagging @Cran so he knows where to find this

Hi @Cran! I see you know Rayzor and I hear you're interested in joining our team. I'll offer you a contract on the portal if you'd like to come here, but first you would need to quote this post and say "accepted," just to make it official. Welcome! -Gustav

I didn't even see this one. Another Seattle win. I like it. #fixthelottery

Since you've been doing Moscow's pressers, and I need 5 more questions for my press conference points this week, I'm back for more to help a brother out for next week (don't worry, here's 6). 1. If you had to change Owen May's nationality to anything outside of Europe, the US, or Canada, what would it be? 2. Name some of your favorite teammates in Moscow so far. 3. Moscow has won a few games lately. Has anything changed, or should this have already happened? 4. What's the most interesting thing you've seen in Russia? 5. Would you rather be the starting goalie on a bad team or the backup on a good team? 6. Does Team Europe have a chance at repeating in World Juniors? @FacebookFighter

MALMO--It seemed like all 300,000-plus people in Sweden's third-largest city had joined in the celebration Thursday night, though the rest of the league was left dissatisfied. Within hours of a press release from league headquarters, bars were flooded, the city had lit up in green, and a parade was going over the Oresund Bridge. Why? The Nighthawks had just been awarded the Continental Cup. "Upon recent deliberation, the league has drawn the conclusion that, due to recent circumstances, the superior VHL team can no longer be best measured by their results in the regular season, their survivorship in the playoffs, or a win of a so-called 'championship round'," said the league's latest press release. "The VHL has drawn a unanimous consensus that the Malmo Nighthawks, by virtue of their sick logo, shall hereby be recognized as league champions this season. All further games shall be declared 'unofficial,' as shall the playoffs and finals." The league's unprecedented, unexpected declaration drew criticism from most non-Malmo parts of the league, including multiple players going on the record to once again demand the cup for themselves, and Vancouver GM Keaton Louth tweeting "Oh no not this again" as riots erupted in the city. League officials declined to comment upon request for further information.

Well, it was a good team. We're still not that bad and I'm happy with how we've done so far. #fixthelottery

Can't blame Seattle. As Bana said, they're rebuilding, and I think they'll be powerful in the future with Mars leading the way (assuming Spade isn't dead). Nice win for us, though. #fixthelottery

Now it's fun. Let's do this.

First goal at that too! You've got a bright future. #fixthelottery

21-12 shots, advantage Philly. Nice Rush reference. Surprising how this one turned out, close game and a defensive struggle. #fixthelottery

2309 words, will claim weeks ending 5/19-6/9 if I don't feel like writing media spots for 4 weeks.

GUSTAV'S GUIDE TO BUILDING (Updated for Hybrid Builds) If you're new, welcome to the VHL! If you're not, I have no idea what you're doing here, but thanks for stopping by and I hope you learn something nonetheless. This guide originally served a purpose as a very helpful tool back when our build system was more straightforward, and I've now modified it so that it might be a very helpful tool now that it's less straightforward. For the newbies, I'm going to provide a little bit of context as to why our system works the way it does and how it's changed. *NOTE: MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND THE SECTION BELOW BEFORE MOVING ON!* The VHL runs its sims (and has run its sims since 2007) with the SimonT Hockey Simulator (or STHS for short). This engine provides text-based output for every game, every season, and has mostly served its purpose well in doing so. If you've ever played a "Be a Pro" mode in an NHL (or Madden, or whatever other sporting equivalent), you have already experienced the basic concept of a sim league--you do things, and those things will help you earn points which you can spend to upgrade your player's attributes. For example, STHS has a "Scoring" attribute--earning TPE and spending it on Scoring will make your player better at--you guessed it--scoring (for the super lost, a good breakdown of TPE earning is in this article). And that's the basic premise of STHS. Our sim engine takes in basic player attributes (which will be explained in PART 1 below), and spits out results. It's not that simple, though--until Season 83, one point into Scoring on the VHL website meant one point into Scoring in STHS. That season, though, the system was reworked. Now, we have more attributes to upgrade, and more potential ways to build a player. These attributes aren't fed into STHS--rather, they're translated into the same basic attributes as before, and those attributes are fed into STHS. You might be asking yourself--why do we do it this way? If it's accomplishing the same thing, why do we need to make it more complicated? That's a perfectly valid question, and I would agree that it seems a bit nonsensical for someone new. The answer involves a good dive into league history. Starting around the early S70s, and growing throughout that decade, it became more and more accepted that having a full team of players who separated Scoring and Passing as much as possible would "break" STHS in a way, leading to unrealistic results and forcing teams to follow what became known as the "meta" way of building if they wanted to be good (I present a more detailed breakdown of the situation in this article). By S80, things had gotten way out of hand, and it was clear that something needed to be done about the meta taking over. The new attributes (which I will explain in PART 2 of this article) solve two issues at once: first, it is impossible to separate Scoring and Passing nearly as much as before, and the effects of the meta are significantly diminished, and second, it allows for a little more build diversity--some had complained as well that the attributes offered by STHS weren't enough. As goalie builds were unaffected by the meta, goalie builds remain the same as they were before. Part 1's explanation for goalie builds will be all you need, but you'll need both if you're building a skater. Get it? Got it? Good. If you don't get it, please go back and re-read it--otherwise, you'll probably be very confused as to what's coming up. *A SECOND NOTE: YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND PART 1 TO UNDERSTAND PART 2! THE KNOWLEDGE OF WHAT A GOOD BUILD WAS BEFORE THE SWITCH IS 1000% RELEVANT TO THE KNOWLEDGE OF WHAT A GOOD BUILD IS TODAY!* Without further ado... PART 1: THE "OLD WAY" AND HOW STHS REALLY WORKS What you'll see below is what STHS uses to evaluate its players--if you're a skater, this is different from what you'd see on the portal. Skater attributes: Checking (CK): The higher this stat is, the more hits your player will record. High Checking will also give you lots of penalty minutes, especially in the VHLM, but if you're building a physical player, there's nothing wrong with upgrading this attribute. If you're seeing your penalty minutes fly through the roof, that's just how it is with high Checking. There's no real way to avoid that (see the article linked under Discipline for more info), but it's a trade-off. Whether you upgrade it or not is up to you and can have benefits either way. Fighting (FG): This one is pretty self-explanatory. The more you upgrade Fighting, the more fights your player will get into. Not good for the team, but some people like to upgrade fighting nonetheless for the laughs. Discipline (DI): In theory, this attribute should lower the number of penalties your player takes. In practice, it accomplishes this--but it more or less does so by lowering hits. This is why I said up by Checking that high Checking and high Discipline at the same time is a bad idea. Per this article, in fact, I personally believe that upgrading Discipline at all is meaningless unless your sole objective is to avoid taking penalties--and even then it's only going to have a minor effect. Don't focus on upgrading Discipline at all if you're planning on doing things that will give you higher Checking. Skating (SK): Upgrades to Skating make your player faster and can also help with positioning. In my opinion (and that of most others), skating is an important one to upgrade. Some believe it doesn't do much, but most players that you'll see out there have significant upgrades to Skating. In general, Skating is (as it should be) a primary attribute for skaters, and it's widely considered a standard in any build. Part of the Decision-Making Formula*. Strength (ST): Sounds important, and it is, though at a secondary level. Strength is sort of a "helper" attribute for a whole bunch of stuff: for one, it makes a player harder to knock off the puck (though Puck Handling will also accomplish this), and for another, it makes a player's checking slightly more effective. It also plays a minor part in face-offs and fighting. Mostly, a focus on Strength should be reserved for your player's build after you've already put a good amount of points into it, but once this is the case, upgrades to Strength aren't a bad idea. Even if it's secondary, it's underrated! Though it shouldn't be built up as much as some other stuff, it is worth it. Puck Handling (PH): Underrated and important! Good for just about any build. It is exactly what it sounds like--a player with good Puck Handling will have a hard time losing possession, something more important than most realize in the simulation--go to the play-by-play of any sim and count the turnovers, because you'll find a ton of them. Also helps with tipping the puck to score and stealing the puck in the defensive zone (and I've heard once but not confirmed that it's a little bit helpful for shot blocking as well). If a player has Skating upgraded, Puck Handling should be upgraded as well, more or less evenly with it. Face-offs (FO): A good face-off rating is essential to any center's build, and somewhat far off in the distance for a winger. Being able to get possession right away (especially if your goalie has solid rebound control, which we'll get to later) is imperative, especially in the defensive zone. If you're a winger, don't worry about this one--even though 10 points or so in it might be worth it, it certainly isn't any sort of priority. If you're a center, though, this should be right up there with your primary attributes--maybe not your highest, but not too far behind. Passing (PA): Another "exactly what it sounds like" attribute. The higher this is, the better you'll be at passing the puck. Passing is tricky, because one must be careful to keep it distanced a bit from scoring (which I'll get to in the Decision-Making Formula section). In general, shoot-first players have more success points-wise and are more sought-after by GMs, but playmakers can still be valuable, so don't let that get in the way of building a pass-first player if you'd like to as well! Part of decision-making formula*. Scoring (SC): Yet another "exactly what it sounds like" attribute. The higher this rating is, the better your player will be at, well, scoring. This is helpful and imperative in just about any build but defensive defenseman (where it's ok to upgrade, but should be secondary). Part of the Decision-Making Formula as well*. DEFENSE (DF): Defense is, in my opinion, THE MOST IMPORTANT ATTRIBUTE FOR ANY POSITION OR BUILD. Every player, regardless of what type of player they are, should upgrade their Defense rating to at least 70 in the VHLM. Prior to S83, just about every top player had a DF rating of 99, and getting it to a fairly high point today should be a primary objective in building. Upgrading Defense not only makes your player valuable on both ends of the ice, it also makes a player more likely to track down a loose puck, which is also helpful on both ends of the ice. It will also make your player more adept at intercepting passes, which can lead to some great chances, especially if your player is a forward. I HIGHLY recommend that everyone, regardless of position or build, upgrade defense, and do so significantly. Penalty Shot (PS): This attribute (theoretically) makes your player more successful in both penalty shots and the shootout (with highly limited results in real life). Not too useful, and almost nobody ever upgrades it. Putting even 5 or 10 TPE into it might give you an edge over some goaltenders, but again, keep in mind that this stat isn't all too important. If your player has other needs, address them first. Leadership (LD): There are but a few who think leadership does anything at all. Theoretically, it will help your team's morale and make them more consistent, leading to more wins and more success in general. Whether or not this is actually the case is a matter of debate--a great many are convinced that leadership doesn't do anything, and even if it does have an effect, it's very slight. Upgrade if you'd like, but at your own risk. *Decision-Making Formula: Passing, Scoring, and Skating are all part of the "decision-making formula." Basically, the more you have one of these attributes upgraded, the more likely your player is to choose that course of action when carrying the puck. For example, a player with Scoring upgraded more than Passing or Skating is most likely to shoot the puck, rather than pass to set up a play or attempt to skate to gain better positioning. It's advisable to stagger these stats a bit so your player isn't indecisive--if Scoring is more important to you than Passing, put Scoring at least 10 points ahead (if not more). If Passing is more important than Scoring, put passing about 10 points ahead. In my own personal opinion, Skating doesn't have to be staggered, and can be upgraded just as much as your top preference--common sense dictates that if you're carrying the puck, you will either have to pass or shoot, so in the end, to me, this doesn't make much difference. If you upgrade Skating significantly, however, you'd better also upgrade Puck Handling to make sure you can pass or shoot in the first place. In the end, build the way you want. Not trying to maximize the gap between Scoring and Passing might get you to fall down the draft board a bit, but it's not like you won't be valuable if you build creatively. What's truly important is that you earn consistently, have a good all-around build, and have fun. Now for goalies! You're the lucky ones because this continues to be completely relevant information: Skating (SK): This attribute affects a goaltender's ability to move around, both in the net and out of it, to play pucks, for example. This is an important attribute for goaltenders, though not a top-tier one. Skating, Size, and Agility are the three main "secondary" attributes for goaltenders, though Skating is the one most often left in the lurch as some consider Size or Agility more important than the rest. Size (SZ): Fun fact--although you get to choose your player's height and weight during creation, that information actually has no bearing on your goalie's performance. A goalie can, by official height and weight, be built like Shaq, or like Peter Dinklage, and neither will have any sort of advantage size-wise over the other in the sim. This attribute is actually what makes the difference--the higher a goalie's size rating is, the more area that goalie will cover without even having to move. It is somewhat popularly believed that Size has more of a positive effect than Skating or Agility, and though it is not a primary attribute, some tests in limited capacity have reflected this opinion numerically. Agility (AG): Agility will make your player's movements more natural, making this attribute an overall boost to quickness. It's helpful as a supplement to already-upgraded stats, but isn't a substitute for any of them. It is, like Skating and Size, considered a secondary attribute. Rebound Control* (RB): It doesn't matter what kind of save a goaltender makes--if the puck goes right back out to an opposing player with a wide open net, the outcome won't be very good. A solid Rebound Control upgrade gives a goalie the ability to stop the puck and hold onto it, something of higher importance than most realize. Centers be warned, though--to get the puck out of the defensive zone after the goalie hangs onto it, you'll need to win the face-off, so be sure to upgrade your face-off rating! Style Control* (SC): This attribute is far more important than it sounds on its surface. Upgrades to Style Control will allow your goalie to be a good deal more consistent in the course of a game, maintaining the same style of play throughout. If a goalie doesn't do this, the game can fall apart and get blown wide open, so it's best to have this one taken care of. Hand Speed* (HS): This attribute will increase your goalie's hand speed (no, really). It's also quite important, as anyone who knows hockey even a little bit knows that the glove is one of the most important pieces of equipment a goalie has, being extremely versatile and mobile. Making sure your goalie can use it well is one of the secrets to success as a player. Reaction Time* (RT): While skating and agility help to make sure that your goaltender can move around easily, Reaction Time is what makes sure your goaltender makes a move in the first place, before the puck goes in the net. While Skating and Agility are important, Reaction Time outdoes both. Penalty Shot (PS): This one will improve a goalie's ability in both penalty shot situations and in shootouts, though nothing but. Although it's not the most useful, putting even a little bit into this stat can give a goalie an advantage, as not many skaters upgrade it either. As I said for skaters, though, if you have any needs with your build, address those long before considering upgrading this one. Leadership (LD): See above under skater attributes. Long story short, don't bother. *Primary Attributes - upgrade these four above all else. So, now that you've got all that (and feel free to re-read if necessary!), let's get on with the actual building. PART 2: THE "NEW WAY" AND HOW TO GET YOUR BUILD STARTED For a skater, the following attributes are available for player upgrades on the portal: Remember those attributes from Part 1? This table explains how the new attributes work--if you take Deking from 0 to 1, for example, you will have effectively upgraded Puck Handling (PH) by 0.24 and Defense (DF) by 0.12. So, about 8 points into Deking equates to about 2 points into PH and 1 point into DF. I realize that this is a lot to make sense of for a new player, so here I'm going to provide some sample builds for different play styles. Each build below will be a 200-TPA build, to give you a good target to shoot for in the VHLM. Forwards: 1. The Scorer This build will be based on the following principles: -We want to score! The three attributes that will help us upgrade Scoring are Offensive Vision (OV), Slap Shot (SS), and Wrist Shot (WS). Offensive Vision helps the most, but it also includes upgrades to Passing. Because of this, we'll upgrade Offensive Vision until it starts to cost more to upgrade, and then create a gap between Scoring and Passing with the others. -We also want DF to be high. We don't care about hits, so we'll leave Body Checking (BC) off the table for now and focus on Deking (DK), Stick Checking (PC), and Defensive Coverage (DC). -SK and PH are also important, so it will be important for us to put points into Stickhandling (SH) and Speed (SP). That gets us the following build. Note that Stick Checking in the table is abbreviated to PC (presumably Poke Checking) on the portal: With this build, our primary objective (increasing SC with high OV) has been achieved, with some gap added through SS and WS. Along with this, we've managed to bring DF to 51, SK to 47, and PH to 49--and ST increasing with the others is a nice bonus. Note that we made OV really high here--though it adds to PA at the same rate, it is by far the easiest way to increase SC. 2. The Playmaker Pass-first builds tend to be frowned upon, but the hybrid system makes them more attainable than scoring builds. We'll target this build like so: -Building Passing is easy if we go for high Passing (PA) and Offensive Vision (OV). Slap Shot and Wrist Shot matter a lot less here. -As above, we'll build DF with DK, PC, and DC. We'll also build SK and PH with SH and SP. While it's true that this build leads to lower Scoring, the ability to avoid putting points into SS and WS to build a SC-PA gap allows for those points to be distributed elsewhere--this player has DK, SH, PC, DC, and SP at least 5 above the Scorer build. When translated to STHS attributes, that's 3 higher in DF, 3 higher in PH, and 6 higher in SK. ST takes a hit as it's closely linked to the Scoring attributes, but other than that, this is a more TPE-efficient build (though it could present itself as a bit less desirable than the Scorer anyway). 3. The Two-Way Forward Here, we'll be aiming to build a forward who can play a good defensive game, and can also throw their weight around. Because of this, we'll go for the following: -Our first priority is DF, and we'll build that the same way we did before with DK, PC, and DC--but we'll also add in Body Checking (BC) because we don't mind giving some hits. -If we really want to prioritize hits (and get in some fights), we'd also upgrade Grit (GR). Since BC has a greater effect on Checking than Grit does, Grit isn't practical for a VHLM build, so it won't be shown here--but it's something to keep in mind as TPE gets higher (as upgrading something past 70 will cost more, Grit will be the fastest way to upgrade Checking when BC hits 70). -Strength is also important, so we'll throw points into SS. We'll also upgrade Faceoffs (FO). Even if our player isn't a center, it's a good boost to Strength that has a situational upside. -Because SS is helpful for Strength, a two-way forward would trend more toward a Scorer build with added checking ability than a Playmaker one--but because PA is an efficient upgrade to make, it's perfectly fine and doable either way. As you can see, a physical build tends to sacrifice some progress in the offensive realm because you're just targeting more different things at once. If you want hits to show up on your stat sheet, though, it's what you've got to do! General advice for any forward build: FO is a very good attribute to upgrade if you're a center. With the exception of the Two-Way Forward build, I haven't shown it anywhere, but as you can see there, a little goes a long way. Decide what you'd like to sacrifice for it and make that choice. Defense: 1. The Offensive Build In this league, a defenseman who can score will get a lot of credit for it. Here's how to accomplish that: -Don't forget your position! Defense is still your #1 priority. As explained above, we're going to upgrade DK, PC, and DC to get there. Because Scoring will require a lot of TPE, we'll avoid BC for now and tell ourselves we're going to look into it when we make it up to the VHLE or the VHL and we have more TPE to work with. -OV will remain the most important offensive attribute there is, while we'll build the Scoring-Passing gap with points into SS. WS isn't as desirable here because its secondary attribute isn't what we need as a defender (though if SS eventually hits 70, WS will become the better way to improve Scoring). -As above, SK and PH will be built up with SH and SP. You'll probably see some builds shift more towards the offensive attributes, but I've never been a fan of building defensemen exactly like forwards. This build provides a solid base for every necessary defensive attribute while also giving you some level of Scoring to work with. 2. The Defensive Build Here, we care a bit less about scoring and a lot more about just getting down to the basics and playing defense. We'll reflect that by doing this: -DK, PC, and DC are again your top priorities, but you can think of them as your super-ultra-mega-top priorities. SH and SP will now be your top priorities as well, but imagine the first three in a tier above top. -You can actually get objectively exactly where you want in a hyper-defensive build by doing that much and not touching anything offensive. For the sake of balance, we'll upgrade PA and OV somewhat as they're both very efficient attributes. SS is helpful as well because it's a bonus to Strength, and being a defensive player doesn't mean you can't touch it. -BC is optional (as is GR eventually), depending on what kind of player you want to be, and I'll be throwing some in there just to show that it's a viable option. I won't make this build super physical, but a physical build is more doable here because we're not focusing on SC. Exactly what you'd expect here--we've sacrificed some Scoring ability for some Checking and Defense. You won't be on the point leaderboard, but if hits and blocked shots are your thing, this player will still be exciting to watch! Goaltenders: Sadly, there isn't much build variation for goalies--but there is a lot of simplicity since you're just working with the STHS attributes. The process to building one is simple: -Take your four primary attributes--(Rebound Control (RB), Style Control (SC), Hand Speed (HS), and Reaction Time (RT)) and upgrade those above all else. -Take care to upgrade your secondary attributes (Skating (SK), Size (SZ), and Agility (AG)), though not as strongly. I threw together the following really-basic-but-works-just-fine VHLM build in probably 10 seconds, and you can too: That's not to say you can't mess around with your goalie build, still--at the time of updating this section, my goalie was just about to leave the VHLM! Here is/was his build: One final word, and something I said earlier but which I find important to repeat: build your player in whatever way makes you happy. This guide is not a guaranteed path to success, and you should never be afraid to play around with your player and see what happens. Too many people think they have to build one way or another to have fun in this league, and that's simply not true. Your player's success should always be secondary to the enjoyment you get out of being a part of the community--you can have that enjoyment without success, but if you're not enjoying it, you're going to find it very hard to get good enough to be successful. I hope this helps you--let me know if it does. Build on and have fun!

I'd like to see how the tournament might be improved, as opposed to just scrapped outright and forgotten about. But it's true, right now, it sucks. Let's not do another tournament in the way that we have been doing them.

Julius Freeman was a free agent last season and went 2nd overall in the draft. It's very possible to get up the rankings.

I really wish there were something outside of regular league games that we could get into. Like the brand tournament, but somewhat improved, I guess. I don't care about the tournament in its current state, that's for sure. Maybe cut paychecks in half and make the tournament once per season as opposed to once every two?

3 wins today. Let the wailing and grinding of teeth resume. #fixthelottery

Moose has been exceeding expectations consistently this season. Whatever you're doing, tell me @Toasty