The Meta

[Plate 386]

The Meta

It's clear that there's a meta in terms of builds in the VHL. High scoring, high defense and high puck handling. Doesn't matter who you are. You always get those three as high as possible. Having more points is fun. There's no secret as to why most people do it.

 

Using the categories they have in the NHL games for players, I'm going to attempt to recreate them by saying the three highest attributes that should be invested in when attempting to create that kind of player. Then share my thoughts on those that are most interesting. And before you even say anything, yes scoring does lead to more assists. But this is purely for playstyle purposes. A playmaker will generally pass first before looking to take a shot. 

 

Forwards

Sniper: SK, PH, SC

Playmaker: SK, PH, PA

Two Way: PH, FO, PA, DF

Power: CK, ST, SC

Grinder: CK, ST, DF

Enforcer: CK, FG, ST

 

Defense

Two Way: ST, PA, SC

Offensive: SK, PH, SC

Defensive: CK, ST, DF

 

For me, the two way forward is something that really peaks my interest. It's also the only playstyle that has four attributes that should be invested in, because if you're a center two way forward you should be investing heavily into faceoffs. As a two way forward, your primary role is to is to play as a third defenseman on the team, and also set up your higher scoring forwards in the offensive zone. These kinds of players are exactly what a team needs to win championships. As with the current meta, there's no shortage of offensive high scoring forwards. Any team would be lucky to have one of these players on their roster

 

A power forward would also be really fun to make. You'll notice that a power forward and grinder are almost the same thing. The difference being a grinder plays a more defensive role of attrition, while a power forward still focuses on the offensive zone. And there are really good players of those playstyles that have had fantastic careers. Both in the VHL and the NHL. It would be nice to see the VHL get spruced up a little bit with build ideas and different viable combinations.

 

My Take on the Meta

You'll notice that I didn't even bring up goalies. I didn't forget about them. It's just that with goalies you have four stats to put into and then you're basically done. I don't mind having a high scoring meta. And all of our limitations are done with the STHS engine, which don't get me wrong, I'm really glad we have access to. Otherwise this league would not be possible in its current form. There will always be that lingering idea of having their own sim engine created. 

 

I'll probably be making a power forward as my next player.

Edited August 12, 2020 by Plate

[Beaviss 4,958]

1 hour ago, Plate said:

There will always be that lingering idea of having their own sim engine created. 

 

We have looked into it but unfortunately its too expensive and out of our scope unless its done in house.

[Plate 386]

Yeah it would cost a fortune to make it happen unless you had someone from inside do it.

[Devise 4,475]

2 hours ago, Beaviss said:

 

We have looked into it but unfortunately its too expensive and out of our scope unless its done in house.

 

I mean if we paid in house for it but at a rate that would be affordable to us; and we added maybe a couple of names on top of @Will and @Josh, I'm kinda curious...what we could do. It's a sim engine so it's not like we are talking about a project that's going to be the easiest thing to accomplish, otherwise it'd be huge. But yeah...I'm really curious what the war room table for that looks like if Blue just sat down and said "okay how would we really go about making this happen in house." 

 

This was an enjoyable read though. The meta being what it is, and for how long it is probably is the VHL's most longstanding outdated aspect. But because of the love for the record books; the comparisons to different era's and just honoring how long we've been standing we have stuck with a sim system that has pretty much kept some form of this meta in tact for as long as I've been here. With a larger user base and more league parity off/on we have seen more people experiment just for the fun of it which is always fresh. But it often coming entirely because so many people have built players inside of the meta for so long that doing something different is really the draw I think speaks to where our meta is at. It's rough because at the same time I can already see the arguments forming to suggest that the meta is a big part of league stability, and it's tough to disagree with that point. 

 

It's kind of how I felt about the portal before it was implemented. I think that some sort of sim engine change is an inevitably the longer this league goes on. However it's likely more a question of when, and if there is a strong enough catalyst as to a why that'll push enough of the member base and people in charge to get there. With so many other large and small tweaks going on and us continuing to evolve the state of the portal, even the idea of switching sims as a project is just such a daunting larger thing that is going to take so much testing. For a league that has focused so much on stability a big shift like that just isn't something we can really afford to just head dive into and hope for the best. 

 

[Plate 386]

2 minutes ago, Devise said:

The meta being what it is, and for how long it is probably is the VHL's most longstanding outdated aspect.

I think it's because of the limitations between the attributes of your player. All defensive aspects of the game are put into "Defense", then all the shooting and power statistics are put into "scoring", all the stick handling and dangles are put into "puck handling". Breaking it up into a system that let people chose to affect more aspects of their game I think will make people feel better about the customization of their player. 

 

People will always find the best way to do something. Giving people more ways to have a good player I think is better than railroading it to one or two builds in the leauge. Just my opinion. STHS is way better than anything else on the market. 

[Will 4,662]

12 hours ago, Devise said:

I mean if we paid in house for it but at a rate that would be affordable to us; and we added maybe a couple of names on top of @Will and @Josh, I'm kinda curious...what we could do. It's a sim engine so it's not like we are talking about a project that's going to be the easiest thing to accomplish, otherwise it'd be huge. But yeah...I'm really curious what the war room table for that looks like if Blue just sat down and said "okay how would we really go about making this happen in house." 

 

 

Its hard to say.. it's a really complex project making a sim engine. I don't have much experience in that kind of area so I'm not the one to say the feasibility of it but according to the STHS site it took him 800+ hours to develop version 1.0.0 of STHS and by the time he finished V2 (the one we use) he was over 2000 hours. And this was after he was on the dev team for a different sim engine so he already had a head start. Now, there's a ton of features in STHS that we don't use or need (i.e. finances, arenas, ect) and STHS is written in an archaic language so that would cut that down.. i'd imagine we'd only need the simplest thing - something capable of storing our players/attributes, ways of assigning those players to teams, making a schedule, accepting lines and simming games. 

 

But unfortunately simming games is obviously the most complicated part, and for all its problems its probably questionable at best whether that part could be done better than STHS without actually paying a developer.