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I have three main points here.

Point 1:
ID=SB
The "best" combo for the engine. It is just the way, how the engine was set up and is intended to run.

Point 2:
ID > SB
The main target here is to defend the opponent and take away the high % shooting spot. With ID you force your opponent to take worse shots and SB is just the secondary option to block or alter the shot.

Point 3:
SB > ID
I call this a "trap C". You lower your ID intentionally to open up a mismatch. The engine will shift towards this big and run more actions against him. As soon as the opponent takes the shot, the high SB kicks in and you stop him.
The crucial point here is, how far can you lower ID. If it is too low, the opponent will outplay you and take high % shots. Or your big fouls a lot.
From what I know about the game engine, ID should be in the range of the offense skills of your opponent.
So if you play against IS 23, ID 20 and SB 20+ would be my target.
Maximum 3 skills between your ID and the opponents IS.
SB can be 23 or 24, what you want and the capspace allows you to train.

If you run a IS+ID+RB PF with a trap C, you can set up a shift. The C has just to look like the better mismatch


When I build and and analysed Haek, the better he got, the more the engine tried to evade him. The big besides him got more and more actions to defend and had more blocks.
In Utopia I am building some trap Cs currently...

Yes, this is correct indeed.
But I prefer using low SB players with high defense ( is this better for defending the opponent from scoring? )

Yes, this is correct indeed.
But I prefer using low SB players with high defense ( is this better for defending the opponent from scoring? )

Higher ID is better for defending the opponent. Let us make a scenario with made up numbers.

Without a defender the attacker would have a success rate of 70%.

Now you defend him in the paint. ID will lower this 70% to 55%. You increase your ID and it drops ro 45%. And so on.
At some point the drop rate will be almost non existent, because your ID is so overwhelming.
So the attacker has now 42% as a success rate. Your player decreasesd it thanks to his ID down from 70%. It attacker decides to take the shot. Now SB kicks in. Without a good/high SB the attacker can still score with a good %. If SB is high, it will just alter or block (% drops to 0%) the shot.

What is better for you and your team, only you can tell ;) I think it is just a way of playing this game. You prefer ID>>SB and I like SB>ID.

Thanks very much!
Totally understood.
Actually I like ID more because I don't want to use those weeks to train SB, rather than other skills

When I build and and analysed Haek, the better he got, the more the engine tried to evade him. The big besides him got more and more actions to defend and had more blocks.

So if I understand correctly, since haek was the initial target of the engine (let's say in the first 15 minutes), opponent got more shots against him, resulting in shotblocks , after that the opponent's coach shifted the shots to your other big guy who made shotblocks on his own even though his SB was not high? or because haek helped him alter the shots because he was constantly improving in SB & engine tried to avoid him after a 15 minutes time out for example?

I'm trying to understand the timeline/scenario of your other bigs increasing their shotblocks even though their SB was much lower than their ID

When I build and and analysed Haek, the better he got, the more the engine tried to evade him. The big besides him got more and more actions to defend and had more blocks.

So if I understand correctly, since haek was the initial target of the engine (let's say in the first 15 minutes), opponent got more shots against him, resulting in shotblocks , after that the opponent's coach shifted the shots to your other big guy who made shotblocks on his own even though his SB was not high? or because haek helped him alter the shots because he was constantly improving in SB & engine tried to avoid him after a 15 minutes time out for example?

I'm trying to understand the timeline/scenario of your other bigs increasing their shotblocks even though their SB was much lower than their ID

It is more a general topic and not bound to the first minutes.

Your oppenent starts his play. They run the offense and search for a high % shooting spot.
Haek took away such spots. The other big was compaired to him the better option.
Example:
Against Haek you would have 20% of success, against the other one 40%. So you try it against the other one.

In the end Haek had ID18 and SB19, my PF had ID13 and SB14 and was the weak spot in the paint.

When both were more or less at the same level, both had around 10 defended shots per game.
With ID16 and SB16, Haek had around 13 defended shots per game. The PF dropped to 6.
But with ID18 and SB19 Haek dropped to 7 defended shots per game and the PF went up to almost 15.
It ended even with the point, that two different bigs from me, won the #1 worldwide in blocks at the end of a season. But non of them was Haek.

The offense saw two mismatches.
One against Haek, which was good for me and one against the PF, which was "good" for the opponent.

I am sure, if my PF had ID13 and SB16+ at that time, he would be a better blocker and get more blocks.

Maximum 3 skills between your ID and the opponents IS.

Since 3 is the max differential, if you can't get to within 3 are you better off tanking that skill? If most of your opponents have 22+ IS, if you can't have 19 ID, are you better off tanking ID and focusing on OD/IS/RB/SB?

No. You will give up even more. Within the 3 skills you have the biggest impact. Ever up is getting your player better and better. One skill depends on the other ( e.g. SB on ID and OD). If you tank one, you will harm other skills or actions.

I saw some table saying that one is more PG/SG centered and the second one is more SG/SF centered, but I do not remember which was which.

As someone who used Motion in the past, I would find the answer to this and the following questions.

1) How much the offense shifts when one of the guards or the SF is the better scorer
2) The effect of the opponent's defense on the offense (weak spots and mismatches, PF/C taking more shots)
3) At what point secondaries on PF/C have diminishing returns

Last edited by Big Dogs at 9/17/2023 11:39:24 PM