A starting note, this post describes an undeveloped thought, though pretty detailed. That means I have a plan that’s not coded yet, and therefore not tested to see if it creates unbalanced statistics.
I got the idea about traits primarily from an online soccer league named XpertEleven. Some of you may have heard of Hat Trick, and while they might have the same feature, I wouldn’t know, so the inspiration is from XpertEleven.
In XpertEleven, players are only given one rating.. 1-10, so to give their players a little more “personality”, I assum, they’ve added traits such as “Goal Thief”, “Injury Prone”, “Smack Talker”, “Natural Leader” etc.
Even though a 90 Scoring might indicate a sniper in SHS, I felt that I at least wanted to test the idea of a “Sniper”-trait. As for Injury prone, this is something I’ve always preferred to an “injury” rating between 1-100. The same goes for some interesting things such as “Irritating” (Sean Avery), “Fighter” rather than a Fight Willingness and/or a Fight skill. Also, Leadership as a trait appeals to me more than a rating.
So.. I’m enlisting anyone who reads this blog to help me come up with traits and a small description of how they could be used.
Here are a few I’ve come up with:
Sniper
Players with this ability/trait have a natural ability to spot an opening. When approaching a goalie, the world almost slows down, and they feel like they have all the time in the world to select where to shoot. While a 90-scorer will have a very accurate shot, a 50-scorer with the sniper trait might not beat the former in an accuracy contest, he might still outscore him come game-time.
Injury Prone
An acquired trait. This player plays a very physical game, seriously affecting his body’s ability to regenerate after injuries. Because of this, he runs a higher risk of getting injured. While a player might start without the trait, there’s always a chance of gaining this would he get injured during a game.
Hard Hitter
This player dishes out harder hits than regular players, which have a tendency to increase the chance of an injury for the target.
Born Leader
Having guys like this on the team will help everyone, especially the younger players, and especially in situations when the team is faltering. Unfortunately, having leaders’ whos’ personalities clash might cause disturbances in the locker room.
Pest
A player who’s got the trait “Pest” is someone you love to have on your team, but hate playing against. In situations where he’s called for a penalty, there’s a chance he’ll talk someone in to come with him. Someone from the other team that is. Sometimes, he might even get an opposing player to “lose it”, and without getting a 2-minute rest himself, gives his team a power play opportunity.
Inspired by EA’s NHL-series, we’ve given goalies ratings in “Glove”, “Blocker”, “Stick”, “Kick”, “Fivehole”, “Rebounds”, “Endurance”, and “Lateral Movement”. But try nailing those skills based on statistics.
