NCAA Football Recruiting Guide/FAQ ver. 1.30
Created, edited, and maintained by Evil Dave (David Bernardo)
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To quickly navigate this FAQ, use your browser's 'Find' function (Ctrl+F in
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Version History:
v0.25 - The beginning. Framework, first few sections finished.
v0.50 - More sections finished. Halfway complete.
v0.75 - Nearing release version. Two sections remaining to finish.
v0.95 - Only minor touch-ups, general editing left. Release imminent.
v1.00 - Finally finished. Submitted to GameFAQs 11/06/2005.
v1.05 - First minor revisions done. Added a FAQ and some other information.
v1.10 - Added some more information.
v1.15 - Minor edits, added a FAQ.
v1.20 - More grammatical changes, and added another couple of FAQs.
v1.25 - Added more information and a FAQ.
v1.30 - Grammatical edits, rewrote Position Changes section, and added a FAQ.
Maintaining a Dynasty in the NCAA Football games has long been one of my
favorite videogame pastimes. The challenge of bringing a middle-of-the-road
university up to the level of national powerhouses is something that, as a
college football fan, I find very entertaining. One of the most important ways
to do this in the NCAA Football games (as in the real world) is by recruiting
well.
Through plenty of trial and experimentation, I have found methods that allow
me to consistently bring in extremely talented recruiting classes with nearly
any school. Given the dearth of recruiting information available for this
year's version of NCAA Football on GameFAQs, I feel that I should share my
techniques with everyone who is interested.
This FAQ will focus on the recruiting portion of NCAA Football 06's Dynasty
Mode. I will break down every aspect of both the in-season and offseason
recruiting periods, and will offer my hints and tips on making sure you get
the best possible recruiting classes for your school. This FAQ will *not*
cover any other aspects of the Dynasty Mode. I just do not have the time
necessary to create a full-fledged Dynasty FAQ, and so all areas of the game
outside of recruiting will only be referenced as they pertain to the
recruiting itself.
I also should remind everyone that this guide will not serve as a substitute
to your team winning games. It will certainly help you acquire the best
players you possibly can, but you will still need to actually win games for
your program (and concordantly, the quality of your recruits) to improve
overall. Recruiting, as important as it may be, will never guarantee results
on the field!
Right now, you're probably asking yourself, "Just what in the heck is this
crazy recruiting thing?" Well, I'll tell you: recruiting is the method that
universities use to fill their quota of athletic scholarships for any sport
that offers them. The basic premise here, from the perspective that you will
be taking (that of the university) is one of supply and demand: the better the
players you try to bring in, the harder it is to get them. This means that you
have to do certain things to increase your chances of getting those players.
Since other schools are directly competing with you for those recruits, _how_
you recruit becomes almost as important as _who_ you recruit. Your job, should
you choose to accept it, is to find the best available players, and then try
to convince them that attending your school is the best option for them.
3b) Recruiting in NCAA Football 06 [bde]
NCAA Football, being a videogame, cannot portray the recruiting effort in a
100% accurate manner. This meant that some creativity was necessary on the
part of Tiburon, the game's developer. The end result of their efforts is a
setup that, while not entirely realistic, gives a good feel for the process,
and is both easy to pick up and difficult to master.
So, how did they do it? The term that I feel best defines recruiting in the
game is 'points.' No, not points you score on the field; the points that I'm
referring to are, of course, your recruiting budget. Yes, that's right; one
of the main challenges of recruiting in NCAA Football is managing a budget.
That's not to say that everything is all a numbers game. Your primary tool for
attracting your targeted players is the 'pitch.' This is basically your
selling point, or what you will tell these players to convince them to attend
your university. Since this is a game, there are only six pitches, and you
must choose which one to give to each recruit. The goal with these is to give
the player a pitch that he likes, thus putting your school in the lead to sign
him.
The third factor in NCAA Football's recruiting that you must learn to handle
is timing. There are two separate periods during which you will be able to
pursue players, and each period is additionally broken up into individual
weeks. You must navigate these time frames, trying to ensure that important
events occur at important times (or, more often, as soon as possible).
These three dynamics, and how they interact, present the brunt of the
challenge in NCAA Football's recruiting. There are other, less important
things to understand as well, which I'll discuss in a bit.
Athlete - A player who does not have a particular position that they are going
to play at the collegiate level. Recruiting one of these players
(their position abbreviation is 'ATH') means that you must choose
which position to play them at.
Commit - When a recruit accepts a university's scholarship offer, it is said
that they have committed to attend that school.
DNQ - An acronym for 'Did Not Qualify.' Used when a player does not meet the
NCAA eligibility standards to play for an athletic team. In this game,
denotes a player who did not sign with any school during the Offseason
recruiting period and thus will not play for any team in the upcoming
season.
Pipeline - A state/territory that has provided your school with at least three
enrolled recruits within the past two years. While the benefits of
these seem fleeting, occasionally players from a Pipeline State are
more likely to have interest in attending your school.
Pitch - Your choice of argument to each player. Essentially, this is the angle
you are taking in trying to explain why that player should choose to
attend your school. There are six of these:
Program Prestige - Your program's importance and tradition. Your pitch
is that this player should choose your school
because of its storied past and national
recognition.
Location - Where your school is located, nationally. Your
pitch is that this player should choose your
school because of how close it is to their home.
Playing Time - The amount of time a player will be on the field.
Your pitch is that this player should choose your
school because of how much time they will play as a
Freshman.
Coaching Style - The type of plays you typically call during your
games. Your pitch is that this player should choose
your school because the plays you call fit well
with what they can do as a player.
Coach Prestige - Your personal importance as a coach. Your pitch is
that this player should choose your school because
of how impressive you have been as a coach.
Academics - Your school's academic standing. Your pitch is that
this player should choose your school because of
the good education that they may receive.
Ratings - Your recruit's statistics for each ability. These translate into the
numbers that determine their overall rating. Here is what each
correlates to:
40 Time: Speed (Spd)
Field Awareness: Awareness (Awr)
Vertical: Jumping (Jmp)
Hands: Catching (Cth)
Bench Press: Strength (Str)
Squat: Break Tackle (Btk) and Run Blocking (Rbk) in offensive
players; Tackling (Tak) in defensive players
Arm Strength: Throwing Power (Thp)
Throw Accuracy: Throwing Accuracy (Tha)
Leg Strength: Kicking Power (Kpw)
Kick Accuracy: Kicking Accuracy (Kac)
Potential: That player's potential for improvement
Discipline: That player's self-discipline
Please note that Potential and Discipline are not measured stats,
and are only noticeable when either going through training in the
offseason or when disciplining that player (respectively).
Scholarship - An offer given by universities to pay a student's tuition if the
student attends their school. In athletics, scholarships are
given to athletes in exchange for the athlete playing for the
university's athletics teams.
Scout - To test a player to see what his physical abilities are. You can spend
budgeted points to scout a prospect during the offseason recruiting
period, thus revealing the most accurate stat ratings for the recruit.
Stars - The preliminary determination of how talented a player each recruit
is. Each recruit is assigned a number of stars, with more stars
indicating a higher-rating. There are only a limited number of
maximum-rated (5*) players, and so these recruits receive the most
interest from teams, and are called Blue-Chip.
Verbal - When a player gives a non-binding verbal commitment to a university.
These are, at times, broken by the players who give them.
Visits - When a player tours a school's facilities. These can be both
unofficial and official, although each recruit may take only three
official visits.
Since In-Season and Offseason recruiting are so different, each aspect of
strategy that changes between the two will be noted.
5a) Your Team's Budget [bef]
Before even beginning Offseason recruiting, you must set your school's budget
for the following season. This determines how many points you have to work
with in the following recruiting period, so the budget you set needs to focus
on your team's priorities. There are, in my experience, three types of
situations you will find your team in during each offseason, and I have come
up with three corresponding budgets that will help your team through each.
Situation One is the most common situation. In this state of affairs, your
team has graduated a fair amount of starters and key players, but you also
return a good portion of these players as well. Given the split need between
filling holes and training your current players to get better, it's best to
split your budget evenly as well. My budget in years like this is kept at 40%
recruiting, 40% training, 20% discipline.
Situation Two is one of the extremes that you can experience. In years like
this, your team graduates or loses early to the NFL almost all of your
starters and key contributors, leaving you with a largely inexperienced group
of returning players. Your needs here are clearly in the talent department,
and recruiting should be a priority when you decide your budget. For seasons
like this, I set my budget at 60% recruiting, 20% training, 20% discipline.
Situation Three is the polar opposite of Situation Two. With seasons of this
type, you return most of your players (including nearly all of your starters).
Given the lack of need for immediate help here, your budget's focus should
definitely be on training your current players. Situation Three years for me
result in a budget of 20% recruiting, 60% training, 20% discipline.
Please note that the percentage I use for discipline every year, 20%, is for a
team that has good overall discipline, with few suspensions necessary. If your
team has more of a discipline problem, you will likely need to take points
from another area to cover the deficit.
5b) Players to Target [bfg]
Choosing which players to pursue is the first thing you will do in either
phase of recruiting, and therefore it is the best area to start with.
To start out, figure out which positions need help the most (the Team Overview
screen, viewable by holding down the Circle button, is helpful in sorting out
your roster). For any position where you need immediate help, you should
target several players. If you are solid at most or all positions for next
season, you should then focus on positions where you have more upperclassmen
(Juniors) than lowerclassmen (Freshmen and Sophomores). If given the choice
within the restrictions, always opt for Top 50 players over others at the same
position; this is due to the fact that, more often than not, the position
rankings are an accurate indicator of each recruit's ability.
Another way to differentiate between players with the same star ranking is
their stats; the stats given are only approximate, but certain ones like
Awareness are good indicators of how good a player's stats will ultimately
turn out. In general, you should look for players whose stats are balanced
between all areas that contribute to the player's overall rating.
You should always try to pick players who fit your playing scheme; for
example, if you run the ball more often, you should try to get more HBs and
strong OLs, whereas in a passing offense you will need better WRs and smarter,
more technically sound OLs. Figure out what players fit your play calling
style, and target them over others who might not.
There are also a couple things you should not do when selecting players to
recruit, either In-Season or in the Offseason. Never, ever, EVER (I can't
stress this enough) pursue too many players at the same position. Not only
does this cut down the field of people you can go for at other spots; should
you successfully recruit all or most of these players, you will be left with
a significant number of talented backups at that one position, meaning that
you are susceptible to players transferring. Besides, it's not very realistic
for a team to sign a half-dozen players at one position, despite the
computer's tendency to do just that.
Discipline is another factor that should be considered when recruiting. When
choosing between players, it is beneficial to pursue players with 'excellent'
discipline over those with 'poor' discipline, but it isn't essential. In fact,
if you run your team wisely, you can get by with a team comprised entirely of
'poor' discipline players, so never rule out a prospect just because he has
bad discipline.
Potential is another aspect that should be on your mind when targetting,
although on a much smaller level than discipline. In fact, the only real use
for potential is in differentiating between two recruits who are otherwise
very similar; if one has a higher potential rating, that's the one you should
make your primary focus. Potential ratings are somewhat misleading - you never
really know how any player will progress during offseason training, regardless
of their rating - so you should only use them as a tiebreaker.
You should also never allow a position of need to go unfilled by a recruit.
Even a 1* recruit is going to be better than a walk-on, so once you get
towards the end of Offseason recruiting, make sure that you've covered every
empty position where you are below the minimum.
IN-SEASON - Since you are allowed to choose who you pursue in In-Season
recruiting, there is an open window to abuse the system, and recruit players
who would not be feasible in the real world (such as a 2* prestige team only
pursuing 5* players). Due to this, I've decided to implement my own
restrictions, which you are free to use or ignore. Either way, here they are:
6* prestige: If your program is at 6* for prestige, there are no
restrictions.
5* prestige: If your program is at 5* for prestige, there are no
restrictions.
4* prestige: If your program is at 4* for prestige, you may only pursue 5*
recruits who are from local states/territories, or from
Pipeline States. There are no restrictions on 4* recruits.
3* Prestige: If your program is at 3* for prestige, you may only pursue 5*
recruits if they are from your home state. You may only pursue
4* recruits who are from local states/territories, or from
Pipeline states. There are no restrictions on 3* recruits.
2* Prestige: If your program is at 2* for prestige, you may not pursue 5*
recruits. You may only pursue 4* recruits from local states/
territories, or from Pipeline States, up to a maximum of three
players. There are no restrictions on 3* recruits.
1* Prestige: If your program is at 1* for prestige, you may not pursue 5*
or 4* recruits. You may only pursue 3* recruits who are from
local states/territories, or from Pipeline States. If there are
not enough local 3* recruits to fill the 12-player quota, you
may pursue any 4* players from your home state, or from any
Pipeline States, until the quota has been filled.
**Another method for recruiting during this period has been brought to my
attention by GameFAQs user PSmurf88. His method involves initially targeting
only a few players, rather than the maximum of twelve, thus allowing you to
spend many more points per player. In my opinion, this strategy is best suited
for situations where you only have a few scholarships to fill for the
following season, and you want to focus as narrowly as possible on the best
players to fill those spots. I can't recommend using this method regularly,
though, as you would be severely limiting your pool of potential signees.
OFFSEASON - Your options are limited here, since (unlike In-Season recruiting)
all players who are interested in your school are pre-determined. This means
that you'll have to put more effort into finding those players, which is the
main challenge of Offseason recruiting. For more information on gauging
interest, see section 5d, Determining Interest.
Once you know who is interested, the same rules as from In-Season recruiting
apply here. To recap, those were: focus on need positions, recruit players who
will fit your playcalling style, and make sure to fill every roster spot if
you can.
Since you'll be recruiting more than just 3* and above players in this period,
it's more important to know which players are better than their contemporaries
with the same star ranking. Make sure you're checking position ranking and
stats before deciding between two players of the same rating.
Scouting is one of the most important ways to figure out who to pursue during
Offseason recruiting. Once you scout a player, you get accurate measurements
for all his statistics - *very* important when you choose between similar
players at the same position. Make sure that, if you have some points to
spend, you spend them on scouting; this will help you see whose stats are
actually better, and will give you a better chance of finding a steal or two.
For more information on scouting, see section 5c, Spending Points.
5c) Spending Points [bgh]
Now for the budgeting. Points are different between In-Season and Offseason,
so each period will be discussed separately.
IN-SEASON - You are given 100 points to divvy up between your twelve targets.
The key to spending these is to avoid spreading yourself too thin; after all,
"If you chase two hares, you will catch neither."
Once you're in Week 2, each of your twelve targets will show their list of
eight interested schools, and you will be able to allocate points to those you
choose. Given my experiences, these are the averages I have come up with for
where your school will be on the players' lists:
These are only the averages from my past experiences, so understand that your
players could turn out significantly different. Anyway, once you know your
initial standing in every target's list, you can begin to divide up your
points between them. If you're ready for another chart, here's how I divide up
my 100 points:
1 or 2 on initial list: 15 points
3, 4, or 5 on initial list: 10 points
6 on initial list: 5 points
7, or 8 on initial list: 0 points
Obviously, you're going to want to put more points towards players who are
highly interested in attending your school, so fifteen is a good amount to
start out with for those highly interested recruits. For anyone who has your
school in slots 3-5, you still have plenty of time to move up, so ten points
is a good placeholder for the time being. Finally, anyone who has your school
lower than spot 5 is more than likely not going to move you up their list, so
only spend minimal (or no) points on these players.
Now, in the following weeks, players will move you up and down their lists.
You should respond accordingly to this movement, taking points away from
players who have moved out of reach, and adding them to players who have your
school on the rise. Make sure to check every week to allocate any points that
returned to your pool from recruits who have dropped you from their list.
There is another important item to note on allocating points. Throughout the
season, as you pursue your targeted players, you will casually make pitches to
them. You have no control over which pitches are given, or when, and you are
not guaranteed that all (or even any) of the different pitched will be used;
however, whatever pitches do end up being given become very important during
the rest of the recruiting process. The results of whatever pitches you were
able to give will show up on the Pitch Feedback list, which you can view by
holding Circle at the Prospect Info screen. If you find that one of the
pitches was elicited a positive response, then you should immediately increase
the amount of points you have allocated to that player to 15-20. Only about
25% of the players you recruit In-Season will respond positively to one of
your pitches, and so when you get one, it's important to try your hardest to
bring them into the fold. Of course, if the player lowers you on their list
even after you've got their attention with the right pitch, you should still
drop their points as you would normally.
OFFSEASON - There are two separate ways to spend points in Offseason
recruiting: scouting and scholarship offers. How you use the two will be the
key to your success in Offseason recruiting. Regardless of how you use them,
though, if you have points free for any given week, just make sure that you
*do*.
You can choose to scout any player, at the cost of recruiting points, by
pressing Select at the Prospect Info screen. When you scout a player, you will
immediately notice that you get accurate measurements of that player's stats.
This is the primary function of the Scout feature; for a sacrifice of a few
points, you get an accurate look at a player's stats.
That isn't the Scout feature's only use, though. When you scout a player, the
game acts as though you offered that player a scholarship, with the Program
Prestige pitch. This hidden benefit - which is likely a glitch - serves as a
sort of 'temporary scholarship' that allows you to keep your interest from a
recruit high without actually offering that player a scholarship. This helps
in situations where you have a few more players whom you want to sign than
scholarships open; by scouting those players that you haven't offered, you can
essentially keep their interest in your school high for a couple of weeks,
until a scholarship opens up.
Scholarships are your school's enticement to recruits. In order to offer a
recruit a scholarship, you press the X button at the Prospect Info screen,
choose an amount of points from the menu, and then press the start button. Of
course, unlike In-Season recruiting, you can't simply choose who you want to
pursue out of all the available prospects; here, *you* have to go out of your
way to find the players who are interested in your school!
There are two basic rules that you should almost always stick to when it comes
to actually offering scholarships out. These two 'Golden Rules' are gospel for
me when I go through offseason recruiting, and they will help you maximize the
results you get from your recruiting points.
The first rule, and the one that you should never violate, is this:
"Never, ever offer a scholarship to any player that hasn't indicated interest
in your school."
This rule is by far the most important one about Offseason recruiting, because
it will save you lots of recruiting points each year. Once you know how to
differentiate between interested and uninterested players, there is never any
reason to waste points on the uninterested ones. (For reference, I will cover
how to determine who is interested in your team later on in the guide.)
The second rule, which is subject to a few exceptions, is this:
"Never, ever spend more than the minimum amount of points on any scholarship
to a player for whom you have not found a pitch that interests them."
This is another good way to cut down on wasted recruiting points between each
week. Using only the minimum amount of points per week will allow you to
experiment with all of the different pitches at a minimal cost, which gives
you freedom to pursue other recruits beyond those who have a clear interest in
your school.
Figuring out when to spend more than the minimum is easy as well. By now, it
should be obvious that, once a recruit has taken a liking to one of your
pitches, you should raise the amount of points allocated for that recruit.
Raising the amount of points for a recruit should ramp up his interest (if
your school has the inherent appeal mentioned earlier), and so you should put
as many points into these players as you can afford each week. Putting the
maximum amount allowed is only recommended in the case of players whom you
strongly want, since it is very costly to do.
While a successful pitch is generally the only reason to increase the points
you are spending on a player, there are two common exceptions to rule number
two:
a) A very talented player, whom you would seem unlikely to sign, indicates
interest in your school (through the methods I will cover in a bit), and
you want to push your team into his top choices.
b) Your team is neck-and-neck with another school in recruiting a certain
player, but you haven't found a pitch that the player likes.
In either of these cases, it is not unreasonable to raise the amount of points
expended each week on the targeted player, so long as they have the inherent
interest to your program. These are rare exceptions, however, and should only
be used if the player involved is one who you particularly want to land, since
they involve spending points daringly.
5d) Determining Interest [bhi]
This section, it should be easy to see, only pertains to Offseason recruiting.
So, how do you figure out who is interested? It's actually more complex than
it will seem at first. A good example of this is the interest bar; while it
seems helpful, it is, in fact, _not_ a good indicator of whether or not a
recruit is interested in signing with your team. Whether or not a player is
interested in attending your school is 'built-in' to the player when they are
generated by the game. No matter how high their interest bar is, if they do
not have their attraction built in, you will never sign them.
That's okay, though, because figuring out who will be interested is simple,
once you know what to look for. There are two ways to figure out whether or
not your school has that inherent enticement to a player:
a) The player has your school in their top five list. This is noted by a green
circle that appears next to the player's name in the list of prospects, and
is the easiest way to tell.
b) After week 1 of recruiting has passed, the player's interest in your school
has either increased (if you have scouted the player) or decreased (if you
had done nothing with the player).
That's it. If a player does not fit within either category A or B, there is no
chance that you will sign them, regardless of how many points you throw at
them. Using these two simple categories, you can quickly narrow the field of
potential recruits down to only those you have a chance of signing. From
there, you can easily prioritize between recruits, and come up with your
weekly budgets.
5e) Choosing a Pitch [bij]
With six different pitches to choose from, there are plenty of potential
combinations to throw at your recruits. Luckily for you, though, there are
ways of figuring out which pitch is likely to get a positive response from
your targeted players.
Each player generated by the game has a specific pitch that appeals to them.
Your job in recruiting is to figure out that pitch, and then push it to them
until they decide to sign with your university. The pitch system works as a
six-pronged process of elimination, with each unsuccessful pitch bringing you
1/6 closer to the correct one.
There can be a method to the madness, however, if you use a bit of common
sense when choosing your pitches. Each player that you pursue should be will
have one or two of the six pitches that should be the most likely to appeal to
them. By making educated guesses based on which of the pitches the player
should be interested in, you can greatly increase your chances of finding the
correct choice sooner.
The following is a quick description of the type of player most likely to
respond positively (and negatively) to each pitch:
Program Prestige - If your team has a prestige rating of 3* or higher, this
is a fairly safe pitch to give; however, if your target
is being recruited by higher-prestige schools, the pitch
may end up as a negative.
Location - If a player is from a town close to your school ('close'
is defined by a player who costs six points or less to
scout, with farther distances indicated by higher costs
to scout), this pitch is safe to give; however, if your
target is being recruited by schools closer to their
home, the pitch may end up as a negative.
Playing Time - If your targeted player will likely end up as the starter
at their position, this pitch is safe to give; however,
since overall ratings are not uniform between players
with the same star rating, you can never be 100% sure
that the pitch is correct. Also, if you are recruiting
two players at the same position with this pitch, and one
commits before the other, the pitch may turn into a
negative for the other.
Coaching Style - If your play calling style would give your targeted
player a lot of playing time, this pitch is a good one to
use; however, you need to be certain that your play call
style does correspond with the player's position. If you
play all of your team's games, you can change your play
call sliders (under Coach Options --> Strategy) to
reflect the style of game you like to play; this seems to
help land Coaching Style recruits, especially when the
Defensive Aggression slider is set to very aggressive.
Coach Prestige - If you have a coach prestige rating of 3* or higher, this
is a fairly safe pitch to give; however, if your target
is being recruited by higher-prestige coaches, the pitch
may end up as a negative. Similar to Program Prestige.
Academics - A new pitch for NCAA Football 06, and a big wildcard.
Basically, there is little way to know if a player will
be interested by this pitch, so it's best to leave until
all other logical options have been exhausted. If your
school has a high Academic Prestige rating, there is a
higher chance of this being the correct pitch.
There will, of course, be situations where multiple pitches have a strong
possibility of being correct for a specific recruit. With players like this,
you should use your best judgment to select the pitch that you think is best.
A good gauge of the player's interests is the player's list of schools; check
to see if they are all close to the player's hometown, or if they are all
high-prestige schools, or if they are all run- or pass-heavy offenses or
aggressive defenses. With some practice, you will be able to make very good
educated guesses as to the predilections of your recruits.
Of course, no pitch is guaranteed to work on any player, regardless of how
well the pitch would seem to suit their interests. Sometimes, a player's
preferred pitch will be completely out of the ordinary, and you may not figure
it out until it's too late. Using common sense when selecting a pitch is a
very solid way to do so, but it is hardly foolproof.
5f) Official Visits [bjk]
This section will cover an In-Season recruiting only feature.
Official visits are where you will gain the vast majority of your In-Season
commitments. The formula is simple: win, and pitch what the recruit wants to
hear, and the player is very likely to give you a pledge to join right then
and there.
Once a recruit has narrowed his field of suitors down to three, he will
schedule an Official Visit to each of the three teams. As soon as you see that
one of your targets is scheduling visits, make sure that you sign him up to
come to your campus as soon as possible. The key with scheduling visits is to
make them all as soon as possible, because you want your team to be the one to
beat for the player's services.
As mentioned in the Spending Points section above, you will casually offer
random pitches to all of your targeted players for the duration of their
interest in your school. Once a player's Official Visit rolls around, you must
choose a pitch to give them while they're on campus. Getting the pitch right
isn't the only part of the equation, though; after all, the player is also
there to see your team play a home game.
Here are the odds that I have calculated for different scenarios on Official
Visits:
Win Game + Correct Pitch + #1 Team on List: 90% Commit, 10% Soft Verbal
Win Game + Correct Pitch + #2/3 Team on List: 50% commit, 25% Soft Verbal
Win Game + Incorrect Pitch + #1 on List: 66% Commit, 34% Soft Verbal
Win Game + Incorrect Pitch + #2/3 Team on List: 25% commit, 25% Soft Verbal
Lose Game + Correct Pitch + #1 Team on List: 33% Commit, 50% Soft Verbal
Lose Game + Correct Pitch + #2/3 Team on List: 0% Commit, 25% Soft Verbal
Lose Game + Incorrect Pitch + #1 Team on List: 10% Commit, 25% Soft Verbal
Lose Game + Incorrect Pitch + #2/3 Team on List: 0% Commit, 0% Soft Verbal
So, as you can see from my experiences, the most important aspect to getting a
commitment is winning the game. Winning by blowout seems to help a bit, as
does beating a favored opponent or rival, but the win is the key. If you can
get the trifecta of positives, you are extremely likely to land your recruit.
Players who give a Soft Verbal commitment are, in my experience, only 25%
likely to end up signing with your school. Unfortunately, there is little way
to tell whether a player is going to end up with your school after they give a
Soft Verbal, so you will just have to wait out their other visits (and hope
that their other target schools lose!).
One final note on the Official Visit process. It is greatly to your benefit
to schedule a patsy team for any bye week you may have during weeks 7-13 of
the season. If you do this, you have an easy team to beat up on during a
potential visiting weekend from a targeted player. While this may not seem
very sportsmanlike, it is still a realistic approach, especially if you have a
tough conference schedule surrounding the patsy.
5g) Position Changes [bkl]
While position changes occur separately from recruiting on the offseason
calendar, it's important to bring them up now, because they may affect your
targets during recruiting.
Unlike in NCAA Football 2005, there is now a forced stat penalty on position
changes for non-Athletes; no longer can you expect your 3rd-string MLB to
become a 90 overall LE upon changing his position, or your 1* TE to be a 5*
FB. This is both a good and bad thing; while you don't get the ridiculous
stat increases anymore, you do get a closer approxmiation of reality, which
most Dynasty fans certainly appreciate. Regardless, you now have to focus a
bit more energy on recruiting each position, although in some cases you can
still use a smart position change to supplement your recruiting class.
For those who aren't familiar with position changes, there are several player
positions that translate well into other positions when changed. Obviously,
you won't get any humongous stat increases anymore, but if you find your team
in one of the following situations, you may as well try out a position switch,
to see if it helps:
1) TE-->FB - If you can't get any 3* or better FBs, but you have an
abundance of TEs, you can switch a good blocking TE of 3*
or above to FB, and they will usually stay within 2-4 points
of their overall rating at TE.
2) LB-->DE - If you can't get any 3* or better DEs, but you have an
abundance of LBs, you can switch a quick, strong LB of 3* or
above to DE, and they will usually stay within 2-4 points of
their overall rating at LB.
3) MLB-->OLB - If you can't get any 3* or better OLBs, but you have an
abundance of MLBs, you can switch a fast, strong MLB of 3*
or above to OLB, and they will usually stay within 2-4 points
of their overall rating at MLB.
4) LB-->SS - If you can't get any 3* or better SSs, but you have an
abundance of LBs, you can switch a very fast LB of 3* or
above to SS, and they will usually stay within 2-6 points of
their overall rating at LB.
5) WR-->CB - If you can't get any 3* or better CBs, but you have an
abundance of WRs, you can switch a fast WR of 3* or above to
CB, and they will sometimes stay within 2-6 points of their
overall rating at WR.
Please note that these may not work in reverse. They are also not the only
position switches that could be beneficial; once you've got your team to the
position changes screen, try out different players at different positions to
see if you can get any improvements. For all you know, that 6th-string WR may
be a great CB, so don't hesitate to check them out!
ATHLETES - These players are the great enigmas of recruiting. Of course, you
now know that each athlete you recruit will need to be assigned a position
in the offseason. You can assign these players to any position you choose, but
they will likely have one or two positions where their ovr rating will be
highest. This means that when pursuing an ATH, you need to be vigilant of
their stats, in order to correctly predict where they will be fit when you get
them on the field.
Scouting ATH prospects is extremely key. Once you have an accurate picture of
their measurements in each statistical area, you can compare them side-by-side
to players at each position where their body type is likely to play. For
example, if you're pursuing a 6'1", 190 lb ATH, you will want to compare their
speed, strength, and hands to those of recruits at HB, WR, CB, SS, and FS. If
the ATH's attributes measure up to those of the top recruits at one of those
positions, you can bet that they'll end up with a highest overall rating when
played at that position. Doing this with each ATH you pursue allows you to
weed out players who will likely end up at positions that you do not need help
at, which saves you scholarships and roster space.
One thing to pay attention to when doing your comparisons is the information
included on the recruit's stat page. If the stats show a position-specific
attribute, then that player is much more likely to be highest rated at that
position. This usually occurs with ATHs who will end up at QB or K.
On a side note, every ATH's star rating seems to have little to no correlation
to how good their ovr rating will be when you assign them a position. In fact,
it is entirely possible that a 1* ATH who you signed as an afterthought may
end up with a higher rating than the 4* in the Top 100 Prospects list! Of
course, there is no guaranteed method of predicting when this may happen, so
you will need to depend a bit on luck. Studying and comparing stats may help
you a bit.
Aa a result, my rule for dealing with ATHs is to always pursue them when you
can spare the scholarship, so long as they appear to be capable of playing a
position that you're recruiting at anyway. This means any ATH, not just 4* or
5* ones. In the end, even if you end up with a dud once in a while, it's good
policy to recruit based on the potential for greatness.
This section will give you a specific calendar to follow for each of the two
recruiting periods. My goal for it is to simplify everything into a very easy
format, so that everyone can follow it.
6a) In-Season Recruiting [blm]
PRESEASON:
-- First and foremost, go to Coach Options-->Coach Strategy, and turn
'Recruiting Assistance' to off; you definitely do *not* want the computer
making any decisions for you! Once you turn it off, it will remain off
permanently.
-- Now, your first order of business is targeting players. You can choose
twelve players, and since you likely will not get all of them, you had better
choose well. So, who do you choose? See section 5b, Players to Target (search
[bfg]) for more in-depth information.
-- If you're planning to schedule a patsy team for any open week you have
between Weeks 7-13, now is the time to do so. Should you choose to do this, it
will help you quite a bit when it comes time for Official Visits. See section
5f, Official Visits (search [bjk]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 2:
-- You've made contact with your recruits, and have their initial lists of
eight. Now's the time for you to divide up your 100 points between them for
the first time, and then go out and play some good football to impress them.
See section 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]) for more in-depth information.
WEEKS 3-7:
-- These weeks should be spent redistributing any points that are returned to
your pool from players that drop you off their lists. Be sure to increase
points on any player for whom you find a pitch that works. See section 5c,
Spending Points (search [bgh]) for more in-depth information.
WEEKS 8-13:
-- Most official visits take place during this time, so keep an eye out for
any player who trims his list down to three teams. Make sure you schedule
visits as soon as possible, and try to make sure you get the pitch right when
they come to town. See section 5f, Official Visits (search [bjk]) for more
in-depth information.
WEEKS 14-15:
-- Any player who hasn't committed to a team yet will do so during there last
two weeks, so be sure to put lots of points into whomever you have left to
pursue. See sections 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]) and 5f, Official
Visits (search [bjk]) for more in-depth information.
CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP WEEK:
-- By now, everyone will have committed to a team. Hopefully, you've already
gathered an impressive group of players to bring into Offseason recruiting.
6b) Offseason Recruiting [bmn]
BUDGET WEEK:
-- When setting a budget, be sure to make one that will effectively prepare
your team for the upcoming season. This means putting more points into your
recruiting budget if you have a lot of holes to fill, or into training if you
return most of your key players. See section 5a, Your Team's Budget (search
[bef]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 1:
-- This week, you should focus on two things: offering minimum-point
scholarships to any players on the Interested Prospects list who you want to
sign, and spending the rest of your recruiting points for the week on
scouting. Make sure to scout any player in the Top 100 overall prospects list
whose interest bar is part full (but doesn't have you in their top five list),
and any talented player in your home state in the same situation. See sections
5b, Players to Target (search [bfg]), 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]), and
5d, Determining Interest (search [bhi]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 2:
-- Your attention this week should be concentrated on increasing the points on
the scholarships of any players who liked your pitch from last week, and
searching for players who are interested in your school to fill up the rest of
your scholarships. Remember to look for players whose interest has increased
or decreased from the past week, and not to waste points on any player who
hasn't moved you up or down (and doesn't have you in their top five). Also, if
you run out of scholarships, remember to use the Scout trick to gain a few
extra players' attention. See sections 5b, Players to Target (search [bfg]),
5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]), and 5d, Determining Interest (search
[bhi]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 3:
-- Keep increasing points on the scholarships of anyone who has liked a pitch
of yours. If you lose a player, immediately fill his scholarship with another
player. There's no point in leaving a scholarship open, unless your team is
already over 70 players (which is unlikely). See sections 5b, Players to
Target (search [bfg]), 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]), and 5d, Determining
Interest (search [bhi]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 4:
-- You're getting towards the end of recruiting, so keep your scholarships
full. By now, if some of your targeted players seem like they won't sign with
you, it's best to cut your losses, and try to grab another player. Make sure
you've got at least every position of need filled, and that any big talents
remaining are being heavily pursued. See sections 5b, Players to Target
(search [bfg]), 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]), and 5d, Determining
Interest (search [bhi]) for more in-depth information.
WEEK 5:
-- This is the last week of recruiting for this season, so there's no holding
back with the points. For any players that you want badly, go ahead and spend
as many points as you can on them, although do so reasonably if you have other
players that you're pursuing as well. My experience has shown that, if you're
going to offer scholarships to any players whom you had not previously
targeted, the only shot you have at signing them is if they already have you
at #1 on their list, so offer accordingly. Otherwise, try to ensure that any
positions of need are filled in recruiting, since a walk-on will invariably be
worse than any recruit you can get. See sections 5b, Players to Target (search
[bfg]), 5c, Spending Points (search [bgh]), and 5d, Determining Interest
(search [bhi]) for more in-depth information.
POSITION CHANGES:
-- Assign any ATH players you recruited a position, making sure to try them at
every spot to see which one best suits them; however, don't be afraid to put
them at a spot other than their best if you already have a lot of depth there.
Be sure to also check if any players who are buried on your depth chart can
help out at a different position. See section 5g, Position Changes (search
[bkl]) for more in-depth information.
1. Who the heck are you, and why did you write this FAQ?
-- I am a longtime fan of the Madden and NCAA Football series, who has been
waiting for an opportunity to share my expertise in FAQ form for some time. I
recently found the time to sit down and write this thing, so I took it and ran
with it.
You may also see me in the NCAA Football forums, discussing the current
college football climate, or around the forums of whatever game I may be
playing at the time.
Since this *is* my first FAQ, I appreciate any constructive criticism that you
all have for me. My contact information is in section 2, so feel free to drop
me a line - just please use proper grammar and spelling, for my sanity's sake.
2. Where can I get the names for the players for my rosters?
-- Okay, I know this doesn't have anything to do with recruiting. I figure, I
might as well answer this one, since the NCAA Football 06 message board sees
this question asked about once a day. Here are the ways you can get the names
for your roster file:
a) PSXSports.com and several other websites (whom I do not have the URLs
for) offer complete I-A and I-AA roster files for either download,
receipt by mail, or purchase on a new memory card. I use DT's rosters
from PSXSports.com, and I feel that they are the best available.
b) A search for 'NCAA Football Roster' on eBay will net you many different
sellers who will perform much the same service that you can get from
DT's website, although you must bid to receive them.
c) You can, if you have the time and the patience, manually input the names
by checking every team's official roster on their athletics website. A
Google search should bring you to each team's page.
There. Now, if anyone asks me this question, I will invoke a voodoo curse upon
your family.
3. Player XYZ has his interest bar 90% full, but no matter how hard I recruit
him, he won't sign! Please help me!
-- Don't pursue him. He's not going to sign with you, because the game created
him without any interest in signing with your team - despite what that stupid
bar shows.
4. How do you know? What makes you so darn sure?
-- Hours and hours and hours of my life spent recruiting in this game.
5. Why should I restrict my In-Season recruiting? I like getting lots of 5*
players.
-- Personally, I prefer a more realistic experience. If you don't want to
follow my restrictions, feel free not to. My strategies should still help you,
regardless.
6. How do you raise your school's Academic Prestige rating?
-- There is no guaranteed method to raising or maintaining your school's
Academic Prestige rating; there are, however, certain things you can do to
ensure that your school is always in a good position to do so.
The most established way to help out your academic rating is to recruit only
players with above-average discipline and high GPAs. This should ensure that
you rarely have to mete out any academic suspensions when you play through the
season, in addition to its effects on your NCAA interest. It has also been
suggested that kicking academic troublemakers off of your team (by cutting
them during the offseason) will have the same results; again, this makes
sense, since it will definitely prevent some discipline problems during the
season.
These methods aren't by any means guaranteed to work. Personally, I've never
seen or heard of anyone who has had their Academic Prestige increase by more
than one star during a dynasty, and even a one star gain is fairly rare. My
best advice is to always choose the smarter, better disciplined player over a
lesserso one during recruiting.
7. 'How far up on the bar should I set my aggressiveness for my defense on the
sliders in coaching strategy? Also, what percentage of run/pass should I set
the bar at on defense to lure recruits?' (from cleonard _at_ gac _dot_ edu)
-- Both of those questions depend on whether or not you actually play all of
your games. If you do, then the Coaching Strategy bars don't mean anything,
since you're calling the plays yourself in games. Those bars are only
necessary if you simulate games.
If you do play all of your games, set your bar fully towards aggressive, and
move the Run/Pass bar to whichever side you want to recruit players for (set
it more towards Pass to interest DBs and Pass Rusher DLs, or set it more
towards Run to interest LBs and Rub Stopper DLs).
If you simulate all of your games, the Run/Pass and Aggression sliders will
determine your play calling during the simulations, and so you should set them
to whatever style you would like your team to play as. Whatever settings you
choose, they will still influence the recruits as previously stated.
8. 'Do you have any stat conversions?' (from qflash _at_ gmail _dot_ com)
-- Nope. And I don't plan on sitting down and trying to figure them out,
either. After recruiting for a while, you should be able to get a general feel
for what numbers correlate to what stats, so I don't think that a full chart
is really necessary. Just remember that unless you've scouted a player, the
displayed stats won't be entirely accurate.
9. 'My friends and I finished (a) season and I finished #1 for the first
time ... For some reason, I had no 5-star athletes that showed interest. Is
there a reason for this?' (from qflash _at_ gmail _dot_ com)
Winning the National Championship is not a guarantee of getting 5* recruits.
You need to be competitive for a BCS game for several years consecutively, and
to have your Program Prestige at 5* or 6*, in order to attract multiple 5*
prospects. Even if you do meet those requirements, if you come from a smaller
school (such as UConn, whom I use in Dynasty), you won't attract more than a
few 5* prospects until you've really established yourself as a national
powerhouse.
Why did Tiburon change this aspect of recruiting? I would guess that they felt
it should be harder to attract recruits when you're building up a lesser-known
program. Whether or not this is realistic is debatable, but it does serve as a
good way to ensure that you keep your team's on-field performance consistent
in order to stay as a nationally recognized program.
My suggestion is to make sure that you follow my method of pursuing interested
players during Offseason recruiting, just to make sure that you aren't passing
over a 5* player with interest in your program. Never assume that a player who
doesn't start out interested isn't interested until you're sure of it.
10. 'Does the success of your program in Dynasty Mode have any affect on the
quality or quantity of recruits from your state the computer generates each
season?' (from user 'winrich81' on the NCAA Football 06 message board)
Unfortunately, no. The general ratio of players/state you see in Season 1 is
going to be the same in Season 30. The ratings of each player are randomly
assigned when the player is created, without regard to the player's location;
of course, the more recruits there are in a given state, the more likely the
chances of there being better prospects there.
11. '...any tips on getting underclassmen to stay with your team or is it
mostly luck?' (from mystikal_420 _at_ hotmail _dot_ com_)
Unfortunately, only luck will help you convince your underclassmen to stay in
school. Once an underclassman is determined by the game to be listed on the
Players Leaving list, they are assigned a final choice on going pro, as well
as a set of parameters for determining when their final decision will be
shown. There is no way to change these, and there really aren't any ways to
effectively predict what any given player's answer will be, despite the
presence of that useless staying/leaving bar. To put it simply, once you get
to the Players Leaving stage of the offseason, it's just a matter of going
through the motions to see which players will stay.
For example, let's say player X wants to turn pro with one year of eligibility
remaining. Once the game determines that he will be included on the Players
Leaving list, it assigns him some parameters (for this example, let's say that
he will need to be convinced three times), and it assigns him a final decision
(again, let's say that he will turn pro). You decide that you want X back, so
you use the Talk Player Into Staying command to do so. His parameters state
that after three tries of being convinced, his final decision - in this case,
to turn pro - will be shown, and so you can no longer try to convince him.
Each player will have his own set of parameters, and there is no way of
knowing what they will be.
Now, I have a problem with the way the game determines players who leave
early. The game simply has anyone who produced good stats during the previous
season try to turn pro, while in reality, college production is in no way a
clear indicator of pro potential. The end result of this difference is that a
large percentage of the players who leave early have no chance of making it
into the Draft Class file that can be exported into Madden, effectively ending
their careers early for no good reason. Therefore, I usually take my own
measures to counteract the high number of players leaving early.
I save my Dynasty right after the National Championship game, but before
advancing to the offseason. I'll then go through to Players Leaving, and if
there is a high number of underclassmen leaving school early (from all
schools, not just mine) who will not make the cut into the Draft Class, I will
reset my PS2, and go through the process again. This tactic may seem
unrealistic to some, but I feel that it is the only way to effectively
negate the lazy programming on Tiburon's part, and thus the best way to ensure
more realistic Draft Classes in Madden.
For the record, the top 12-15 players by overall rating at each position are
the only ones who will make it into each Draft Class; anyone below there fits
my description of a player who should have stayed in school.
Thanks go out to the following, in no particular order:
Tiburon/EA Sports, GameFAQs, DT at PSXSports.com, Sony, everyone on the NCAA
Football 06 message boards, everyone who has written in with suggestions or
information, and the UConn Huskies, for getting good at just the right time to
make me into a college football fan.
Thanks also go out to the following people, for submitting information that
led to revisions in this guide:
-dvangorp _at_ uga _dot_ edu (for notes on Academic Prestige and the Squat
statistic in recruits)
This FAQ may be not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal,
private use. It may not be placed on any web site other than GameFAQs, or
otherwise distributed publicly, without advance written permission from the
author. Use of this guide on any other web site or as a part of any public
display is strictly prohibited, and a violation of copyright.
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