+3 ISFL Affiliation

Victor Helstrom  - Wood


A. Obviously, to me, the FHM era is worth more to me as I have never been able to play in the STHS era. Though the parity is not as good as it used to be, it is nice to have more skill required in setting up and running a team.
B. Yes, these teams would of been in the final four once again. These teams have a history of gaming the system and really understand what is needed to have a successful team in the simulation hockey league. There is no reason to believe they would of not made it again.
C. I would 100% relocate Hamilton to Columbus, Ohio. The Columbus city deserves a team in the Simulation Hockey League as we are well deserving of another hockey team. This would fill a void in the midwest and give the city the recognition it deserves. Not to mention there are a huge number of members of the Simulation Hockey League that live in Columbus.
D. To me, the easy answer here is all the 2K+ players that were not on the big 4 teams. On top of that, the way it is going, there will be no change. If I was a member of this prestigious club, I would do everything I could to join one of those teams. At this point, it is the only way to get a cup in the Simulation Hockey League.

Yes, parity is an issue in the league. I believe there are a number of things Head Office can do to combat this. I believe that the first step is to upgrade to Franchise Hockey Manager 8 so that the setting can be used to prevent people from changing the commissioner password, thus preventing sim testing. This would cause general managers to actually watch the games to see what worked and did not work. And it would make wholesale changes impossible in the game without a huge amount of risk. Second, to reinforce the idea, I would create a rule that if anyone brings proof that a team or person is attempting to get around this system, the person should have to defend themselves against the appeals committee and if found guilty, receive an automatic ban for 6 months. The person that found the cheater should be rewarded in some way (preferably discreetly) in a huge manner. That way it prevents people from trying to break the rules and rewards anyone who helps to keep the spirit of the league. This league is about having fun and should not be about test simming for hours on end to find the best tactics.

As a current member of the San Francisco Pride, I can feel that our time to restart is slowly coming. Maybe not a full scale rebuild but at least a mini rebuild. Some of the high tier players will soon enter a harsh regression and it may not be possible to replace their talent in a meaningful amount of time. Hopefully, this new regression scale helps in the long run, but the growing pains will still be there. All this being said, with the lack of new talent in the league, the bigger question is when do we compress the league size to handle the draft classes of less than 40 a class. Right now, the second round is essentially going to be useless as all the players that are active will be long gone by then. I for one hope that the recruitment team does a great job with a new head and we are not heading down the path of a dying league with people going back to work and no longer wanted to exist in these leagues in their free time.