(S35) Offseason Task

[Michiganonymous]

S34 UW Pass/S35 OT Pass 

Money well-spent.

[Friesen1520]

#7

My experience in this league has been nothing short of phenomenal. I have loved every minute of my time here, and I look forward to the memories I've made with the short amount of time spent. Users like Firstfray, RussDrivesTheBuss, pop pop jangers, and painted have all made me feel super welcome in my first few weeks. While maybe for reasons that shouldn't have been enjoyable, having my GM booted from the ISFL after my first week in the league has made my experience so much more memorable and has felt captivating ever since that moment. Having only spent a couple of weeks in this league, I am overall happy with the start I've made. I've gotten a lot of opportunities to grow as a player and as of right now, I am working to become the first safety taken overall in the upcoming draft. It looks like reports are flip-flopping between Teemo Swift and myself, so I gotta put in all the work I can to make sure I'm seen as a more valuable candidate. As I am currently entering the league draft, I have not gotten a formal experience of being selected, but after getting scouted by Amadan and quickly being taken in by the Kansas City Coyotes, I felt a lot of acceptance and joy in being a member of a team. I look forward to getting to expand upon this feeling once the DSFL draft hits, where I plan to watch the stream and get hyped for all my fellow draft mates, hoping I can go as high as possible. If there was anything I had to suggest, I would personally love an app version for this. I understand the idea of a mobile forum community would be challenging to implement, but especially when I'm on the go, it would be nice to be able to traverse the TPE tasks for convenience's sake.

[317 words]

#25 

In this league, I have gotten the chance to show off my talents as a top prospect Safety. But what would happen if I was not allowed to be a Safety? If I were to select a new position, I would likely find myself becoming either a wide receiver or a cornerback. Something I have always loved doing was just getting out there and running, and these are the two positions I think I would get to do a lot of that. Even though running back quite literally has running in the name, they do not end up getting to run as much as I would like, often going for more than a 4 yard burst every once in a while. Coming into the draft with 80 speed, these are the two positions I find myself having the most success in, and likely the most fun with. With all that said, I don't know if I could ever end up being anything than the Safety I've grown up playing my entire life

[172 words]

#27 

Personally, I think the Austin Copperheads have the best branding in the league. The Copperhead is not only a real snake that it gets its inspiration from, but the colors are very unique and well thought out. The brown copper as the highlight color paired with the soft green that is the color you get from patinaed copper is very original. When copper gets into contact with salt water, you will often find the green color that is recognizable in the Statue of Liberty. Overall, the color choice and mascot of a local animal is a very well thought out brand. In terms of the worst branding, I would have to say that the San Jose SaberCats are the least appealing to me. The logo looks like something out of a superhero comic book rather than a sporting mascot, and the uninspiring dark green and muted gold don't strike a chord in me. If there was any team in need of a rebrand, my suggestion would be to rebrand the San Jose SaberCats.

[173 words]

[br0_0ker]

5. It's time to air my dirty laundry, but sort of hide it deep within the Offseason Task so only the most dedicated users will find it. Maybe it will go unnoticed completely, but this seems a good as time as any to get something off my chest and cash in for some sweet TPE. Back in March of 2020, the famous S22 draft was about to happen, and I was working furiously to make some trades happen to change the community perspective of the team. At the time, I went by the username steelsound and was the the GM for the Chicago Butchers. We were a pretty dumpster fire team, and were running the team as GM's with basically no prior sim or GM experience. The sim engine was pretty favorable to batch simming at the time, so I would spend nights often running 20-30 thousand simulations trying to tweak the team to see if we could get out of out bottom-dwelling existence. By my calculation, there was no way this team was competing for anything other than the 1st overall pick for the entirety of my player's career from the moment I got there, and the team wasn't inspiring a lot of people to want to play there, so something had to change. I thought that if Chicago could pull into a 5-7 win position, putting them solidly in the middle of the conference, players that might otherwise not want to join the Butchers could see themselves being the piece needed to push the team into contention. I was willing to sacrifice a few seasons to do it as well, since our QB at the time was well over 1000 TPE but entering their first season of regression, and our DSFL draftee was a suboptimal earner, reducing his chances of leading the team to the top of the conference. My player was set to start regression in S22, and our star RB and co-GM kept floating the idea in our GM chat about testing FA waters, despite me only having come on recently. With the prospect the team was going to hit another rebuild, I made some drastic trades that I would later hubristically defend in the hopes that the S21 season finish would be enough to swing a bit of league perspective before we lost 3 of our top players to regression/FA and once again were bottom of the conference. I had in the back of my mind as well that around S25 or S26 I would create as QB for the team, which would offset our starter's regression and enable a smoother transition through the rebuild phase. Another intent was to stagger the QB cycles between ourselves and other teams in the league; something I had noticed was a lot of the QB's around the league were going to be replaced near the same time, and teams would be fighting each other for prospects in thin draft class years. If we could stagger ourselves and cement a high earner at the position, we could employ a "zig where others zag" draft approach for seasons to come and take advantage of teams being forced to draft for need at the most important position, while we were set for good. The nail in the coffin was thinking the S22 draft class was large enough that a 1st round pick was inconsequential, more so than the impact in the short term winning would have on our league perspective, while also thinking picks 2-8 could have the same impact as that 1st rounder (looking back at the scouting file I made there are 90 players with 100-200 TPE). I sold out for a few measly percentage points in the winrate column, and the whole thing came crumbling down. The community destroyed the trade and the war room lost all confidence in me. Shortly after, I retired my player and quit the league. In hindsight, it was pretty childish, but my ego wouldn't let go the hours I had committed to testing in the face of community criticism. A couple years later, I am back, hoping to reforge a better reputation for myself, now that I've had time to reflect on where I went wrong and how I could have done better.

[Liter]

7.    
    So far, so great. This league first sparked my interest after seeing a reddit post about, and since joining, I have had nothing but fun (except for when I lost in the Ultimini). I like to do weird stuff on the computer but I've never done anything remotely similar to a simulation football league. Fantasy football is one thing, but this, this is whole other level. Everyone I talk to about this league is super interested in it, I think the only thing holding this league back is exposure. The first thing that got my attention was the create-a-player tool, which is super in depth and awesome. I love the archetypes and how no positions are forgotten about, except for long snapper but who cares. Discord was next which is probably the most important part of the league, I can't imagine the league with it. Getting to know some of my teammates has been really cool, the team discords are definitely one of the highlights of the league. The discord channels are where the celebration (or mourning) takes place, and teams with a bad discord are teams that I don't want to be a part of. The scouting process is also one of favorite parts of being prospect in the ISLF. It feels so cool for teams to be scouting you, the attention makes you feel like a special talent, especially as more and more teams scout you. At first, having to navigate through the website was kind of tricky, and writing all this specially formatted forum posts was super tricky, but once you get the hold of things, it becomes much, much easier. I'm hoping to pick drafted in the first round, but who isn't? I feel like I have to share this experience so I'm trying to recruit some of my relatives because THIS IS AWESOME. 

10.  
      When Fred Edison was younger, he was elite. Not saying he isn't elite now, but when he 10 he was head and shoulders and knees above everyone else, literally. In grade school, Edison measured approximately 6 feet, and 2 inches tall and weighed almost 200 pounds. His father worked at a school for the blind and although he was able to see, Fred Edison was enrolled in the school. Due the student's lack of sight, Fred was often the last one picked when the kids were picking teams, this, however, would be their undoing. In Kickball, Fred averaged 26 home runs per inning, although nobody could see, if they could, they would've been super impressed. Fred Edison should've been hailed as a hero, instead, his greatness went unseen. This ignited a passion inside of Fred, a burning passion to dominate his opponents, this would ultimately lead to what has since been known as "the incident." 
      It was June 12th, the last day of school, only 4 hours remained until the final bell rang. During the weekends, Fred had been refining his upper body strength to become the best at kickball pitching, nobody would be scoring on him anymore, today was the day he showed everyone how powerful he had become. The lunch bell rang and everyone walked with a cane to the cafeteria, they were serving sloppy joes today. Fred didn't enjoy sloppy joes, his hatred of them fueled his anger, and when lunch was over, recess began. It was now 2 hours until the final bell, although some of the blind students wouldn't live to hear it. As the students got into kickball teams, Fred was selected as pitcher because he was the only one that could see where he was throwing. At bat was Greg Haffentool, a lowly runt of the 5th grade, a year older than Fred. 
           
   "We want a pitcher, not a belly-itcher!"  Greg Haffentool taunted, unknowingly uttering his last words.

    Fred Edison then unleashed the mightiest of kickball pitches ever not-seen. The pitch was a bit high, on purpose, however. The sheer speed of the ball was so immensely fast, that upon colliding with the lower torso of Greg, it simply kept going, leaving a kickball-shaped hole where his abdomen had been a millisecond ago. 

   "Strike!" Called the catcher, who, along with everyone else, did not see what had transpired.

   Edison took advantage of this and continued to play as if nothing had happened, recess went on as normal and nobody noticed anything, soon following, he got on a bus and went home and eventually went on to declare for the DSFL draft. They say the remains of Greg Haffentool are still there to this day, just waiting, for someone to actually see them.

[Repgnar]

Tier 2: Short Form Tasks #9 (340+ words)

If I were the commissioner of the International Simulation Football League for a day I would immediately create a Players' Union. This is an idea that I have floated in the past in multiple media formats and have been met with mixed emotions. The old heads, General Managers, and even individuals in the IFSL Head Office shut my talking points down before I even get the word Union out of my mouth. I swear the league is worse than some big box stores that exist out there when it comes to shutting down unions. On the other hand the other rookies and players support the idea of a union ran by players with our interests in mind. At the end of the day the players are the asset that keep this league alive. With a Players' Union established in one day I would also set up a number of protections to ensure that that union can not be dissolved by the commissioner, team owners, or anyone else that doesn't have the best interest of the players in mind. Once I lose my day as a commissioner I would then become active in the Union. The biggest scam I see in the league currently is club dues for training. Contracts are currently set up in a way that players are forced to invest the majority, if not all, of their money right back into training. Can you imagine that? Getting a job that requires you to pay back all of your salary back to your boss and then some? I was floored when my strength and conditioning coach cornered me for my weekly payment. And what am I supposed to do? Go play for the USFL or FCF? Ha! I'm glad that the sport of Football has expanded to an international scene but the league better be careful with how they treat their goods otherwise we're on trajectory for a strike here soon. And we all know what kind of product will be on the field if the stars of this league don't play.


Tier 2: Short Form Tasks #14 (390+ words)

I joined the league after the trade deadline for Season Thirty-four. I had no idea what I was getting into but as I read more and more about the league the more excited I got. I was told by people in the Rookie Discord that I should be picked up off waiver wires within the next 24-48 hours and even had a scout from a team reach out to me to ask some questions. Immediately I felt like this team was going to pick me up. I was invited to their discord and got to see a little bit of how their locker room operated. I considered myself a part of their team and waited for the waiver wire transaction to be processed. But then I saw that another player in my same position was picked up by that team instead of me. Did that mean they went with someone else? I would eventually be added to another team the next morning. I'm glad it ended up that way now that I can look back. While I never got a chance to play with the team that added me I was able to see just how important the locker room experience is for a community like this. At the end of the day you only play so many games a week. The locker room though is something you can interact with on a daily basis. It may sound cliché but I'd rather be in an active locker room with their own traditions, quirks, and goofballs than be on a team that goes undefeated with a dead locker room. Being able to interact with your teammates while you watch the game I think adds a lot to the experience. The team managed to get into the playoffs and played really well. The team came up one short of making it to the Ultimini but I thoroughly enjoyed spending the week or two with them. While I can control the effort I put into my character and progression I cannot control what the sim decides to do on any given day. I plan to keep my efforts at the same level if not higher moving forward into my DSFL Rookie season. The only thing I hope for is a community that was as active and as fun as the Tijuana Luchadores Locker Room.

[Ulaire]

7) I've got to the league to have some form of distraction from IRL stuff, and for sure it actually have been pretty useful for this. Overall it is an interesting and new experience of online entertainment/past-time, especially compared to what I used to, like competitive raiding in World of Warcraft.
My own experience started good with rookie discord, and i like to thank all the people with rookie mentors role there. Their answers to my newbie questions were very helpful for me. And overall atmosphere in the rookie discord and seeing how much people bought in in this league sold it to me. I have to say that i really forgot how to use forums since last time I've seen them, which was like 10 or so years ago, so I needed some help there too.
What i really liked is that league gives you a choice how time consuming you want it to be. Whether you want to become a max earner or just to complete some weekly tasks you still can participate and bring something for your player and team. Also there is not much rush to do things, which allows to choose your own pace. On the other side of this though is no instant gratification to which I surprisingly found i got used to in other games. You have to wait for your tasks to be graded, updates are once a week and not immediate, etc. Its an refreshing experience in our time.
As for my player start I'm quite happy with it, given that i have rather good amount of TPE and think that chosen position and archetype suits my desires. Also, the chance to actually play the games before draft was really fun, even if we lost in playoffs. So i like to thank KCC for picking me up on waivers. [308 words]

16) As a player first of all I bring a pretty good earning rate, which can bee seen from my overall TPE. I full expect to keep up with it, and so to be useful right from the start for the team that drafted me. Also I'm interested in theory-crafting and building my player stats for the most impact for my position. I can be pretty active in the locker room if needed, but overall I will probably pop in from time to time, and wont be the constant presence there. Whether its good or not its up to GMs to decide. I'm a willing learner, so ready to listen to advice of more experienced players. I've even downloaded the sim and giving a try to test some stuff to understand its inner workings better. Have to admit that I'm not sure that I will have enough time for sim testing. So, if you are looking for a dedicated player with interest in theory crafting and other stuff you probably cant be wrong with drafting me. [175 words]

21) I have no experience with DDSPF 16 and only limited experience for DDSPF 21. But here I want to compare it with sim game I have good experience with - Football Manager. It's about what you Americans call soccer for some reason, but overall its the best and the biggest sim game out there. I will compare only stuff that works for game results, as ISFL doesn't really care about extensive contract rules or transfer market. The biggest difference, aside from being different games is in player stats - FM uses 36 stats for players, not counting for age, physical size and hidden stats with cap of 20. DDSPF uses much less stats but has better granularity with cap of 100. I was surprised to see that for example acceleration and speed are lumped in a single stat in DDSPF. As for tactical setup the difference in sport shows really hard, with FM having extensive individual and positional instructions for players, but no playbook naturally. Some of game mentality team instructions are comparable across different sports. The match engine is random in both obviously, with FM not only having dots but also 3D engine, allowing you to become even more frustrated when you watch how your strikers miss easy goals. But overall id guess that we all like sports for its element of luck. I need some more time with DDSPF, but will like to someday write some bigger comparison in media. [240 words]

[CptGoosar]

OT Pass List

[Starboy]

Tier 1, Task 1

The S34 Ultimus Chicago Butchers faced many levels of adversity that got them through a hard-fought battle against the Honolulu Hahalua in overtime. Those challenges began prior to this season though and a full story has been well written by Baron through the history of Chicago from the very beginning to just prior to last season where this team had proven that it was built upon a very homegrown design compared to some other champions made with plenty of big trades or free agent signings. Much like the 2021 World Series Winning Braves or the Philadelphia 76ers there could be a “trust the farm system” or “trust the process” phrase attached to the Butchers that would fit well considering how everything ended up in S34.
Last season this talent was on the edge of greatness with a run of bad luck in the later half of the season that killed any chances at a first-round bye which got them to play the one season wonder Baltimore Hawks, who had been facing a long run of bad luck and in S33 managed to put everything together for a quick playoff run that got them their first Ultimus since S15. Chicago still had hope though even with the retirement of superstars Juan Domine and announcement of Wasrabi Gleel’s final season. The team had called up a young defensive end Greg Strongjaw, the infamous IA puppet master, to replace Gleel and the hype for the following season was reaching a fever pitch.

To begin the next season, Chicago instantly got its revenge on the Hawks with a 29-9 thrashing and provided five sacks, a fumble, and an interception against the hapless Jaroppolo Jr who could not find the endzone. The Butchers took the “death by a thousand paper cuts” route too with Levy Tate scoring five field goals to put the Butchers in the win column to begin the season. The only down game in the first half of the season came from the New Orleans Second Line with a 31-28 loss that had just too many mistakes from an otherwise great performance from both teams. Outside of that game, the Butchers’ defense was suffocating to opponents and was far and away the best defense in the league with a collective team effort keeping teams locked down and that showed throughout the season. Any time the offense could not find the endzone? The defense came out for a big stop to give another chance. The Butchers managed to work with this defensive strength and ended the season as regular season champions at 12-3-1, had the most points scored, allowed the fewest points, had the best rushing defense, and the second-best passing defense. Despite the success, nerves had only risen going into the playoffs.

Their first game of the season started off as bad as a team could perform, almost solidifying that the unlucky Chicago Butchers would once again have a great regular season but fall short of true fame yet again. It was 20-6 with 12:14 left in the game and Berlin kicker Izuku Campbell had scored yet another long kick that seemed to be the final dagger in the Butchers’ Ultimus chances. However, things turned around immediately on the next drive as the Butchers marched down the field to finally score their first playoff touchdown, putting themselves right back in the game. That stiff defense made its appearance as well with a huge stop to give Madison Hayes a chance to score and tie the game a 20 all with 3:40 left. It seemed that time was not on the side of the Butchers as the Fire Salamanders only had to run the clock out and make a couple first downs to end the game and rely on the trustworthy leg of Campbell once again to end it. With 1:40 left, the forty-nine yard attempt by Berlin sailed left and missed the uprights. It was finally time for the Butchers to make history and in eleven plays, Levy Tate made the twenty-three yard kick that put the Butchers into their first Ultimus.

[ctots]

19. If your player had a show starring them, what would the plot be?

If Theo Lariat were the star of a show, it would run a similar plot to that of Ted Lasso, obviously. Our title character, Theo Lariat, is a former rising star in the world of soccer as a college athlete in the United States. Through a series of coincidences, Lariat becomes kicker to a down-and-out football franchise who desperately need an injection of positive energy into the locker room and the organization as a whole. They hired Lariat because they expect him to be an absolute stinker of a kicker. It turns out that he’s actually better than anyone thought, and the team has found a glimmer of hope to cling to. Can Theo help turn the club around? Is there any hope for his new career in the world of football? Will he find an appropriate love interest in his new environment? All of these questions, and many more, will be answered in this dramatic comedy coming to your home television screen this fall on Apple TV.

22. You’re in charge of entertainment for the Ultimus or Ultimini half-time show. What would you do?

Our halftime shows have gotten a little outdated and are in dire need of a direction change. Gone are the days of a halftime show that featured musical artists, dancers, cheerleaders, and pyrotechnics. The spectators showed up to watch football, so they’re going to get to watch football! The Ultimus and Ultimini halftime shows will now feature a single quarter of football played by randomly selected local high school teams. The stark contrast in skill between the pros and the student athletes will help to put into perspective just how talented and capable the players in the championship game really are. The high school teams would gain some notoriety and probably would be given some sort of financial reward for their participation, which would be helpful to growing the quality of the talent pool of players. Sports betting enthusiasts the world over would rejoice at the extra opportunity to get in some extra gambling at this game within the game, too. If there’s anything that drives significant change in sports, it’s gambling. Let’s make this happen.

29. Awards have been a subject of controversy for a while in the league. Tell us your ideas on how awards process can be fixed.

The Awards process as a whole has become a burdensome beast that is largely unmanageable. Forming and dissolving committees to vote and debate on these awards every single season is a huge mental and emotional strain on anyone who is involved enough to care. The only solution that I can see for the awards process is to revamp it in favor of statistics based awards. Throw away all of the existing awards in favor of things like the Colby Jack Award for most passing yards, the Harrison Andrews Award for most interceptions, etc. It’s a much more black and white process that will require no debate or consideration unless there is a statistical tie, in which case you could use other stats to break the tie. Players won’t even be upset that they’re losing out on their chance to win the WRotY award (for example) because there are other equal awards to strive for. Leave the voting, debating, and campaigning for the hall of fame.

30. Affiliate PT from either SHL/PBE/WSBL. The Weeks must match with the timeframe of this UW. And you may only use a max of 1.

SHL Affiliate

[OrbitingDeath]

5 TPE - Task 8 - Award:

The Honolulu Hahalua “We tolerate you being here” Award of the year is going to Cobra Kai. He is not winning hardware on the field, he did not deliver the ultimus to us, hell, we don’t even know if he ever showed up sober at practice. In his career Cobra Kai has remained loyal to the team that drafted him, and for that we needed to give him an award. Not really because we actually needed an award, but more because he didnt shut up about it and how he wants to have more recognition from the team. So here we are trying to find reasons on how we can give an award to this old drunk. During his stay in Hahalua the island has not been a rough shape like this, day in day out Cobra Kai continues to wreak havoc on the island after yet another bar fight.  But he just doesn’t realize it he is the one that is usually in the wrong. But to get back to the subject, we needed to give the guy an award in hopes of not having riots on our island for one day. So we instated a  ‘we tolerate you being here’  award, for his efforts on and off the field, no matter how lousy they have been.  So for putting up with his endless agony and our hopes of finally shutting the guy up, we hope he is proud of being the first recipient of this wonderful award. May his last season of his career be one with as little damage as possible. On the field we already minimized the damage by bringing in more offensive weapons for Zaylren. So Old Man Kai can just continue ‘running’ over the field as a distraction. Enjoy your award Cobra Kai and all the best in your last season of your glorious career.

Words: 311

2.5 TPE - Task 19: TV Show cover art:  

2.5 TPE - Task 30:  SHL Affiliate: https://simulationhockey.com/showthread....pid3205291