Shindigs

Got that Vegas connection in the VHFL as Thunder is another alumni. And unless Bo decides to fall off a cliff again, he's looking pretty solid for the Bek. I picked Thunder for it since if Bo wins I get 1 TPE from winning the award, so might as well stack the odds by picking another more-or-less guaranteed top 5 assists dman.

This was exactly why I put the High Roller award in as a thing. So knowing it had the intended effect is great to hear. Overall the whole thing was a nice read. It can be hard to really see what impact you do/don't have on your players as a GM. So getting to see what the journey was like through your eyes was really interesting. It was great having you with the Aces too and we got oh so close to that cup, but not close enough. Wish you the second best of luck (to ensure you lose to Chicago) in the VHL with Vancouver together with all the other Vegas alumni on that roster. Of the 7 players mentioned in the Vegas High Roller HOF, 4 of them are on that team.

"The man" is trying to silence the TRUTH yet again. Lemme get my tin foil hat. More seriously though they do all branch after that, it's just the starting core is kinda the same no matter. Which helps you just "get the points in" then give you plenty of time to decide which direction you want to take it. Without feeling like your day 1 decisions locked you into something you regret.

I mean if we're being pedantic you don't even need 3 different builds, as no matter which you pick for the VHLM you'll start with approximately 30 DC, 30 PC and 30 OV in that order. And still be able to build into a league leading player of either type while also fitting inside any and all competent VHLE builds and beyond. There's a reason every player who wanted build advice on Vegas started 30/30/30. It's not perfect 100% min maxed, but it's super easy advice to give and it works incredibly well, as a 30/30/30 90 TPE player will have more or less comparable performance to a 150-200 TPE player with a questionable build.

Been a joy getting to know you and working with your on your player's development. And as far as questionable off-ice antics goes. Bo being the biggest sellout in pro sports history (except maybe Shaq) with his Clue Glue™ endorsements could certainly count as questionable.

Cliché as it is, stupid questions are free, stupid mistakes are not. It's been great seeing you keep growing and getting the success you've earned with the work you've put in.

This does sound more familiar. Hope you get better soon.

Only 3 months?

I mean I am technically a first gen, so I could just write this about myself and my own experience. But that would be pretty boring, all things considered. Most because with where I am in the league right now I don't really "feel" like a first gen anymore. I barely have since my first season or two, honestly. So I'll instead focus on some of the more memorable experiences I've had working with other first gens. In more or less chronological order. S81 Storylines The first major experiences I had with first gens was on S81 Team Clue in the JST. Where our team had members like @eagle_3450 who had just joined and didn't know how to earn TPE yet, and now he's on London. So I suppose his career has been all downhill from there #blameDil (unlucky). But also @LanerDUSTwho later went on to win a cup with Vegas with me as GM. So that was a fun little storyline. The biggest rollercoaster of emotions from that team however, was easily @ToooSaucey. I decided to leave a goalie for last in my draft strategy and he was my choice. A user with a tonne of potential that simply hadn't been taught how to do anything, but was a great member and great at making graphics. I proceeded to teach him the ways and he transitioned into max earning and being a beast, but not too long after he changed jobs. Meaning that he lost his work PC that he had Photoshop on, and was working hellish hours while also attending college at the same time. Meaning he simply didn't have any time for the VHL anymore. But he was the first member to show me that doing what lead to most my success with Vegas was actually possible, and that with some personal touch, a lot of members have it in them to earn a whole lot more than they currently are. S82 Storylines The season after I picked up my gig as AGM under @FrostBeard in Beardislava. Where I continued to work with first gens, most notably @Scurvy who I still talk to regularly about build stuff and just general career planning for depreciation and such. A great guy, and the user behind the player who is the reason Bo Johansson will never be considered for "biggest steal" in the S82 draft. As this absolute legend fell all the way to 26th OA in that draft, despite being the most successful dman in that draft so far, and one of the highest TPE players in the class. I had hoped to draft him in the JST too, but barely missed out. So being able to draft him with Frosty in Bratislava was great, and I've been so happy for all the success he's had in Warsaw. Which speaking of Warsaw, @dlamb basically just looked at Bratislava's draft S82 and said "yoink, mine now!" by draft the same 2 players we did by also picking up @Girts who was the other more-or-less first gen I worked with in Bratislava. Now I believe Girts has been a member on the site for a very, very long time. But this player was his first. Though I could be misremembering that. Either way, as a forum only player (at least at the time) we had quite the PM thread going. Ending at around 120 messages IIRC. Great guy and again someone that's so deserving of the massive success his player is finally starting to see. He's been cursed with some of the worst S% numbers I've ever seen on a well built player during the earlier parts of his career. So it's about time that monkey came off his shoulder. S83/84 Storylines That brings us to my Vegas GM era and all the players I worked with. Standouts include @Blakemac22 who stepped up big time for us in the VHLM and picked up his earning a lot to make his way to the VHL proper. @TopTiddee2 who we drafted in the 3rd round only to have him go on and become our AGM as well as a max earner for basically all of his time with Vegas. IRL has gotten much busier for him since and his earning has suffered as a result. But hopefully thing will smooth out and he'll get back to the kind of earning he's shown himself capable of. Fellow Vegas alumni of that same draft class @RileyL is someone that really went above and beyond having also been picked in the 3rd round, with the very next pick. Never a max earner, but possibly one of the most consistent earners I've ever worked with. Those 10 capped a week are as close to a given as it can get, and bonus uncapped opportunities will see Riley do PTs to claim them as well. A massive pickup for Calgary in that draft and looking forward to seeing what arguably the best Power Forward the VHLM has seen in the Hybrid era will do at the VHL level. S85 Storylines And from my final class with Vegas we have another couple legend that stand out. @VattghernCZ a player who was much overlooked in the draft. Letting me pick him up in the 4th round (partially because his player name doesn't really inspire trust) only to quickly transition into max earning and looking like he's going to be an absolute legend for Vancouver at the VHL level as soon as next season. A great guy in the LR and a bit of a Wann Kerr on the ice. The other standout first gen from that same class, who I picked in the 2nd round due to the massive dman shortage that season is @Bobcat who for a while was more or less max earning, but primarily does Welfare+. Nowhere near as explosive in his earning as Vattghern has been, but still a rock solid and quite consistent earner that makes good use of FZ for some extra TPE income. Like just about all successful Vegas players from my period at the helm, he's also ended up on Vancouver. Because @Frank losing to Vegas in the finals gave such PTSD he's just decided to draft all our players. "If you can't beat the join them" in full effect, basically. As much as it annoys me that Bo will end up playing against a team that's built primarily on my old players from Vegas. It's still good that they ended up in a good spot, since Frank is a great GM and there's very few places I'd rather see them go, realistically. Unaffiliated, But still awesome Now there are also some other first gens I've ended up having a lot of impact on despite not having them ever play on my team. @Thunder I've obviously shared a LR with somewhat since I was around Vegas LR even before I was GM there, at the same time he played there. But mostly it's him being @Scurvy's IRL friend that lead to him coming to me for a lot of help with various things throughout his career. And he's a great guy, so I've thoroughly enjoyed helping him out with all those things. The other standout in this category is @aimkin who I just barely failed to draft, as they went to SSK 3 picks before where I was going to take them. We had a really good draft interview and clicked so I just kept helping them as if they were on my team throughout that pretty rough SSK season, and though our DMing has calmed down of late. We still talk every now and again, especially when they have questions about how something works. Or end up with a particularly evil trivia question. Another great person who I wish nothing but the best for (despite how impossible playing for London makes that). Those other cool people (and Cole) Now there have been a lot of other impactful first gens around me #blamecole comes to mind, Lean the Frog and "fake" first gen Jacob. Since he kind of had a glow up with his 2nd player to the point he's like a whole different member now (multi confirmed). But in all those cases they have just been legend in the own right, I haven't really had any part in it. Other than spurring some of them on to earn more, not actively, but just by setting a high target that at least one of them has mentioned setting their goal as trying to catch Bo. Which I mean I'll take it, if I can passively help motivate others without even doing anything. That's a win/win in my book. Even though Jacob is annoyingly close to me in projected career TPE. Which may mean that if Bo sets the TPE career record, and he most likely will, then Jacob may very well take it the season after. That'd be kind of a bummer, but it is what it is. And besides, OD will probably just take it with The Frenchman a few seasons later anyways, since he has max carryover+ideal recreate time to go with also fully max earning. I probably also forgot someone, and if I did it's a 50/50 if it's cause my memory is shit or because I didn't realize you were a first gen to begin with. Either way, I've hit 1500 words now. So I'm done and no one else is getting included, sorry! 1500+ Words Claiming for 3 weeks

Which we also used #blamecole to explain.

Always interesting trying out new things. But I feel like you failed to really tie the psychadelic theme of the background into the rest of the graphic. You did use some method to apply that color to the render to make it somewhat gel with it. But I just feel like the color scheme of the Kingston jersey just has so little in common with both the Reapers and the background that it becomes a bit incohesive regardless. The way you could have tied back into it is the text. But honestly that text just gives me late 90s screensaver vibes. Which to be fair is a pretty psychadelic throwback to get, but not sure it really is what you'd want to go for. Rating: 6.9/10 (Because reasons)

Triller touched on most the things I would. I do like the graphic overall, nice clean style. Which I pretty much always appreciate. But the thing that kind of detracts a fair bit from that clean style for me is that you presumably didn't have access to the full size Mexico logo and had to blow up a smaller one, leading to some pretty unsightly artifacts on the BG logo. Now I'm guessing the reason for this is that the post that *should* have the full size Mexico logo has had the hosting on the logo time out. However the logo is still in the original reveal post here. It's not a full size 2.5k like the other logos. But big enough to work with at 1k resolution at least. Rating: 6.9/10 (because I have to add a numerical rating, but don't want to. So you get a meme one)

1. 14000 at least. Teekirque does what he wants. 2. Sitting on the bench until the forwards get done doing their thing. 3. Clue Glue™ brand gear only. Obviously. 4. Hockey Documentaries about Bo Johansson. 5. The power to rig sims by changing the fan color of Bek's computer. 6. DAVID, as you might expect.

After mostly consistent elite play from Bo Johansson to start the season he had managed to create a quite cozy 5 or so assist and dman point lead despite having games in hand on the players behind him. But after some questionable games that gap has now been closed to nothing. Because Bo has had quite a few 0 point games (and even nearly some 0 point sims) of late. And it's showing it finally caught up with Chicago in the results this last sim. Seeing the team go 0-3 in disappointing fashion, as they only really outshot opponents in one of those games. So blaming goalie RNG isn't really in the cards for it. Hopefully this isn't a sign that Bo is going to keep doing what he does every single season and fall off a cliff for the entirety of the 2nd half of the season. Because quite frankly, it's getting old. So fingers crossed that theme week will spark that fire again and Bo and the rest of the Phoenix rise from the ashes to get back on pace to challenge derphorse for that 1st seed.

I will create/modify a set of let's say 12 emotes for your team's LR. So if you want the :ded: emote wearing a Moscow jersey? I got you, or :FatF: wearing a Vegas jersey? Also got you. As long as it's feasible to do and won't get either party banned for breaking the CoC I'll whip it up. Not all have to be claimed at once, but it can be done as needed over a longer period of time at your convenience.

Spoilers: Everyone is getting Clue Glue™ products.

I could just go into the BOG thread and see what we decided on. But I'm not in the mood.

The claim for Biography is 10 uncapped in the portal, isn't it supposed to be 8?

Bo-Ingvar Johansson Defenseman Sweden 6'6" - 205lbs Now I've touched upon Bo-Ingvar Johansson (which is his full name) and his life before hockey in both his junior review and his prospect scouting report. But it was mostly just in passing, with the focus being more on what he did in juniors in Sweden and how he was a late bloomer. Starting out as nothing but a pretty average looking defensive defenseman, only to bloom into what he is today. But there was a lot more to it than that. How did a young Bo-Ingvar come to get into hockey in the first place? What was his family support like? Was he a good student, or did all his brains go onto the ice? All will be answered, hopefully, in this Biography. Bo first joined his hometown team at the tender age of 4 years old. But how did this come to happen? Well as a young child Bo quickly made a strong connection in daycare with another boy by the name of Martin. Martin was what you'd at the time probably refer to as "slow" these days. That wouldn't fly, but it was clear he had learning disabilities as well as quite massive social struggles. But Bo just clicked with the playfulness and made sure he always had a spot at playtime with the "cool kids" as due to his natural charm and leadership Bo was very central to that group. As it turns out, it would be Martin's dad. Someone very invested in the local hockey team as the younger brother was the starting goalie in the junior team. Who would suggest that Bo try coming along to a practice with the kids group there. As Bo's father was a long-time hockey fan. He was totally on board with this and so that's how Bo's hockey career started. Wearing double socks in a pair of oversized skates, going around the ice holding two cones for balance. Not the most exciting of starts to a career. But it was how it all began. Hockey kept being a large part of the Johansson family's life from that point on. His sister and mother never really got into it, attending maybe 2-3 games total in all of Bo's years playing before the VHL. But his dad ended up taking on multiple roles for the team. Both as their administrator and as the equipment manager for the team. Meaning that hockey became a strong bonding experience for the two of them. As really both were equally invested in the team and its success. As i touched on in the junior review, I believe it was, Bo wasn't a standout in his youth though. And the only reason he get into one of the sports schools and could play hockey there was more due to his scholastic achievements than anything he did on the ice. He usually struggled to care about schoolwork, finding most of it pointless busywork. But despite that ended up in the Top 5 of his class when he left his hometown school at age 15 to move to the sports school in another city. Living alone for the first time at the tender age of soon-to-be 16. Certainly not an uncommon thing in Sweden for athletes by any stretch, but still a large change in his life. As an avid home cook, even from a very early age, Bo quite liked life on his own. Like most kids moving away from home that early he did struggled a bit with keeping up with laundry and cleaning his apartment. Living that bachelor life. But at least he ate well. Though over time he adapted and by the time he was 18 and getting ready to head to the VHLM for his first games with the Miami Marauders, he was very much used to all that living on his own meant. Making the massive change of jumping the pond seem a lot less terrifying than it otherwise might have. So clearly Bo had pretty good support and a relatively normal upbringing by Swedish standards. But surely hockey wasn't all he did? Well, I've already mentioned his love of cooking. With him having taken over cooking all dinners every other week as his mom was commuting and having to come home and go straight to cooking was wearing on her. Causing Bo to ask if it was okay if he took over dinner every other week (with his dad doing the other week) by the age of 12. Which I think sums up Bo's personality a lot. He's all about helping, as can be seen on the ice from his pass first mentality to his leadership. The other big passion that he shared with his older sister was gaming. You see growing up in small town Sweden there are only really 5 things to do: Sports, Gaming, Drinking, Bumping Uglies and Fighting. Now Bo didn't do #3 on account of trying to focus on sports, which meant by default there wasn't much of #4 and none of #5 which means the only other thing left to do was gaming. So there you have it, the formerly gentle, now not so gentle, giant Bo-Ingvar Johansson's Biography.

Shh

As usual, another completely reasonable James Teekirque/DAVID graphic. Yours are always a fun time and this is no different. A little bit more could be done with it by just adding small details like pricing/barcode/etc. to complete the magazine look. Possibly adding a subtle drop shadow to the text to just give a bit more depth and help readability. But overall, just a fun graphic highlighting what's going on in DAVID these days.

A cool and different idea, always fun to see slightly different graphics being made. As the barrage of sigs does get pretty samey no matter how well made they are. But clearly the main attraction of this graphic is that you kept with the graphic designer tradition of adding easter eggs. This time in the form of a classic, adding 69 as part of the numbers being used, while also making the cost of the ticket 24 Euros, which is clearly just 42 the meaning of life, the universe and everything, backwards. Now if we dig deeper and add up all the numbers of the bar code they add up to 35, but wait there are two 2's so we subtract the 2nd 2 making it 33. And Wann Kerr was drafted 33rd overall to Vegas. Clearly 100% intended and proof that Vattghern is a master of the subtle easter eggs. Not just me making up random shit.

1. It's probably been fuelled by the (not a drug) Clue Glue™ product that your GM seems to have infinite amounts of for some mysterious reason. 2. It's as much of a boost as having access to infinite amounts of Clue Thirst™ in the LR. It's what Hockey players crave, after all. 3. Abass is the GOAT. Elite two-way play all day every day. Vegas legend and probably also a Clue Flakes™ enjoyer. "They're NOT Drugs!" 4. Not getting drafted by Helstinki. Since Clue Glue™ is banned in Finland. 5. Clue Glue™ mostly. 6. I mean since I'm already buying a 4x5 this season. That's impossible. So would have to be a Full Doubles week most likely. Now, if they had Clue Glue™ products in the store, my answer would obviously be different. But they don't cause they're trying to keep us poor.

No we're not singing a Disturbed song, sorry. But it seems like no matter where you are in the sim league world right now, everyone is sick. Doesn't seem to really matter if you're in Canada, the US or Sweden. Just viruses, the flu and all manner of awful going on all over the place. And seems most people are needing weeks (if not a month or more) to kick it. So whatever it is, it sure is being a pain to deal with. Thankfully this sickness does not appear to have made it into the VHL team Locker Rooms at least. Though with how the teams in the basement are playing, maybe they are playing through a bug? Who knows? Malmö going all in last season seem to be going about as well as was expected, Helstinki are in fact Hella stinky, Toronto is playing like it's the 1st round of the NHL playoffs and Riga Reign are working on re-branding as the Riga Ree. Just ahead of them LAS are trying to avoid falling to LASt place in NA and after that I'm done with bad puns and wordplay for now. Mostly cause I've certainly hit 150 words by now.

So as is pretty much standard by now, Bo is getting off to a hot start. Though in the last 4 games he's been without points in two of them. Is the this starts of the equally standard falling off a cliff that Bo tends to spend the rest of the season doing? Hopefully not, as I'd quite like for him to start actually getting some consistency in his game. And considering the somewhat atrocious S% he's still sitting on. If anything he's probably scoring less points than he should with the level of play he's been at so far in the season. It's way too early to tell what effect Bo actually being captain in the sim and investing into LD is having on Chicago, but I think most of us can agree that Chicago are doing a fair bit better than we'd expect a team with with bots to do. Is this because LD actually does something? Or is it because the players we do have are just cracked? A very valid questions that we don't know the answer to. One interesting thing to note though is that although both Scotty Sundin and The Board Game Clue On Skates have high FO skills, they aren't runaway league leading by any stretch, in fact Scotty has mid 70s going up against mostly 80+ Centers on other first lines. Yet both of them are glued to the top of the FO% leaderboards, is this due to the LD ice tilt? Or are they just built different for some unknown reason? Another unknown, but certainly an interesting thing to look at. Since FO% is one of the most contained stats. Where it's just a straight 1v1 without any real outside factors. That's also measured in a very granular manner that's not particularly prone to variance due to the massive samples sizes we get with STHS just taking faceoffs on repeat. Maybe having at least one high LD player set as C in STHS is the future of the VHL, maybe it's just some fluke early results. I guess only time will tell, and other players' willingness to try it out as well. Part of why I wanted to test it out is that I feel like although Jonathan Ori himself hasn't exactly been lights out for his TPE. The players who have played alongside him have usually overperformed with career years. And a Seattle roster that wasn't that inspiring did very well with him on the team. No idea if they had him set as C in the sim or not though. And Simon has confirmed that setting that actually does have game impact, now if it does in our version of the engine is another question entirely. But at least the placebo effect has been nice so far. Because when you're the LD player set as captain, even in games where your player does absolutely nothing. You can at least go "Well at least he's helping make everyone else perform slightly better", which is some nice copium to have access to. Oh and in closing, if Bo fails to get Assist per Game this season, I'm going to #blamecole!