Monday Tip-Off: My Roster Mod Philosophies

We’re at midcourt, and the ball is about to go up…it’s Monday Tip-Off! Join me as I begin the week here at the NLSC with my opinions and commentary on basketball gaming topics, as well as tales of the fun I’ve been having on the virtual hardwood. This week, I’m tipping things off by sharing some of my roster mod philosophies.

Sometimes, I feel uneasy about giving modding advice, or commenting on modding-related topics. It’s been a long time since I regularly participated in the hobby, to the point where many people might not even know that I’ve been a modder! I was very active throughout the heyday of NBA Live modding though, and I’ve also dipped my toe into some NBA 2K modding here and there, even releasing a fixed official roster for NBA 2K10. Even though I did eventually become burned out on modding, as I’ve previously admitted, the urge to tinker is still there.

Moreover, I do know what I’m talking about when it comes to our community and creating mods, particularly rosters. I realise that times have changed and there’s always value in exploring new methods and possibilities, but there’s some advice that is evergreen. As Batman once put it on Justice League Unlimited, sometimes the old ways are best; a sentiment echoed in Skyfall many years later! And so, as we consider creating big projects for new games and old favourites alike, I’m sharing some of my roster mod philosophies. They’ve served me well when working on various rosters over the years, and it’s how I’ll approach any projects that I take on moving forward.

Edit everything that you can in-game

When it comes to making a detailed roster mod on PC, external editors are essential. There are some attributes and bio data that we can’t edit in-game, whether it’s a newly created player or an original one. They can also speed up tasks that are possible in-game, such as moving players around. However, I’ll always advise modders to change as much as possible using the in-game customisation functionality. In some cases, it’s actually quicker and less cumbersome to do so, even if it doesn’t appear that way at first glance. More importantly, however, it tends to be much safer. It’s all too easy to corrupt files or make a mess of the data when you try to do too much external editing.

I mentioned moving players around, as it’s a prime example. While some editors do provide robust trade and lineup editing functions, if you must make moves manually, it’s easy to overlook data that needs to be changed in order to fully assign players to a new team. When you trade and sign players or reorder rosters in-game, these values are all updated accordingly. It’s also why I advise creating players within the game, rather than adding them via an external editor. An experienced and careful modder may be able to streamline tasks editing rosters externally, but the safest method is to exhaust what can be done from within the game first, and then mod the file as needed.

Don’t cut corners, but also have “standby” ratings and tendencies

Much like official rosters, attention to detail is what separates a great roster mod from a – let’s say – admirable effort. Therefore, you don’t want to cut corners, or copy and paste when you’re assigning ratings, tendencies, and other attributes. You want to aim for accuracy across the board, from lineups to ratings to bio data. It may sound like a pedantic detail, but even making sure that players are wearing the right accessories goes a long way! People will notice it, and will appreciate that you’ve gone to the trouble of striving for that level of detail and authenticity. Learn a game’s ratings system, do your research, and put in the time and effort to create a polished mod.

With that being said, there isn’t always a ton of data or a large sample size to work from. College and foreign league stats are also more of a rough guide than anything, since they don’t necessarily translate into the same numbers in the NBA. Therefore, it’s good to have some “standby” or ballpark ratings and tendencies that at least suit a player’s style and role on the team. For example, while working on NBA Live rosters back in the day, I had some standard ranges of benchwarmer stamina, hardiness, and primacy ratings that were suitable for their very limited roles. Don’t be lazy of course, but it’s useful to have some standard generic ratings for scrubs at the end of benches.

Work with the original ratings system as much as possible

This may be controversial, as roster modders have devised their own formulas for ratings that produce positive results on the virtual hardwood. However, you do need to be wary of the wider effect of drastically altering the ratings, because games will use them in other ways. Individual ratings are more important than Overall Ratings when it comes to on-court performance, but Overall Ratings factor into trades in franchise modes. If those figures vary too much between players who should have similar value, then making deals will be tougher. As such, while your roster may be up to date and finely-tuned for great gameplay, it won’t be suitable for franchise play.

In a similar vein, rookies will be generated according to the game’s original ratings formula, thus they’ll be mismatched with players in your roster mod. A custom Draft Class can alleviate this, but if one isn’t available – or the game you’re modding doesn’t have them – generated rookies will be a problem. Likewise, players must have a dunk rating of 80 or more to be used in the dunk contest in NBA Live 2005-08. If no player qualifies, then gamers can’t use that mode, and the game can’t select participants for the contest in Dynasty. If nothing else, there’s value in fudging ratings here and there so that your heavily-altered roster accounts for a game’s sim engine and mechanics.

It’s not just about what you want

So, you may read the previous paragraphs and say “So what? I don’t play the Dunk Contest or Dynasty, so it doesn’t matter if my ratings tweaks cause issues there”. And that’s fair enough, but the people who are going to be using your roster mod might not feel the same way! It’s important to have a vision and think outside the box, so I’m not suggesting that you never go against the grain if you can make it work. To be blunt however, I will say that a roster mod that doesn’t consider the aforementioned issues is not a particularly well-thought out one, and you’re probably going to get your share of complaints. After all, gamers will want to use your roster in their favourite modes!

A disclaimer that your roster mod isn’t universally compatible might save them some frustration, but it’s still going to be disappointing for people who are interested in it. And so, while I won’t tell anyone to flat out compromise their vision, I will strongly advise any roster modders to consider the preferences and needs of their fellow hoops gamers, because they’re your audience and they have certain expectations that you’ll want to meet. This is why I included tweaked versions of my roster updates for NBA Live 2001 and 2003, even though they did cause some issues and I was sceptical of their overall impact on gameplay. It’s not just about what you want, or how you play.

Accept feedback, but take it with a grain of salt

An NBA roster, whether it’s a current season update or retro mod, is going to contain somewhere between 400 and 500 players depending on the year and the game. That’s a lot of ratings to keep track of, and I know firsthand how easy it is to overlook some players here and there. That’s why it’s beneficial to be open to feedback about rosters, because the hardcore basketball fans who play with them will notice when a player’s performance or tendencies are off. Once again, depending on the game’s mechanics and AI, you may be limited in how much realism you can achieve despite your best efforts. Still, it’s a good idea to listen when people have suggestions and concerns.

At the same time, not all feedback is equally useful, or well-reasoned. The classic example I always refer to here is when I was working on a roster update for NBA Live 06 PC, and a couple of Los Angeles Lakers fans insisted that Smush Parker’s ratings needed to go “up, up, up!”; a bold stance that the late Kobe Bryant certainly wouldn’t have agreed with! The point is that even when you listen to feedback and suggestions, don’t just acquiesce or implement any specific changes without further thought and research. The key is to be detail-oriented and know what you’re doing with ratings and tendencies, but if someone has a suggestion, at least look into it.

Placeholders are better than an unreleased roster mod

Once I began including player faces and other art updates in my current rosters for NBA Live on PC, I was grateful to have some enthusiastic contributors who could provide what I wasn’t able to make myself. To that end, if you go back through some of those rosters for NBA Live 2005-08, you’ll find some training camp cast-offs in the Free Agents Pool that have their own detailed face and a proper portrait! While that’s cool, I did realise that it’s unwise to hold back the release of a roster if you don’t have a proper face for someone whose place in the league is extremely tenuous, and likely won’t be seeing many minutes even if they do make it to the opening night roster.

With that in mind, I began using more placeholders in my public releases, especially when modders began to move on and there were fewer people working on new faces. Because those placeholders used the same file names that a proper update would have, they could easily be replaced as soon as one was released. A public release that can improve as more people put their hands up to contribute work that replaces any of the temporary assets is much better than a project that never sees the light of day because you insist on perfection. If V1.0 can be immaculate, then more power to you, but don’t let a roster mod go unreleased just because its art updates are “only” about 95% done.

Pick a roster mod project that you can be passionate about

I’ve learned this the hard way. As Dee and I have discussed on the NLSC Podcast, he correctly identified that my inability to finish a current season roster for NBA 2K11 came down to my lack of passion for today’s NBA. There were other factors, sure, but if I’d truly been passionate about playing NBA 2K11 with current rosters, I’d have found the time and made the necessary effort to push through. I didn’t, and so it stands as a perfect example of how passion for and interest in a roster mod’s concept is vital. To echo a point that Dee has made, had I been working on some kind of retro season or classic teams mod for NBA 2K11, I would’ve more than likely finished the roster.

Unfortunately, there are no guarantees here. You can formulate an idea for a roster mod that you really like, but a lack of free time, an overwhelming workload, or a lack of support and interest – or indeed, a combination of the three – can still ultimately derail the project. Nevertheless, you’ll still maximise your chances of finishing a roster project when you’re genuinely enthusiastic about it. I can attest to it being extremely difficult to create a project that was solely for the benefit of the community, because I wasn’t keen on it myself. As selfless as it may be to work on such projects, you must always choose a roster mod that you want to make. Otherwise, it’ll be a real slog!

Simplify the installation process however you can

Back in the early days of our community, when we were still the NBA Live Series Center, many of us were – and I say this with love and affection – geeky PC gamers. If you were playing basketball games on PC back in the mid 90s, you had to know a thing or two about getting around in DOS, troubleshooting hardware compatibility, and maybe even creating a boot disk or two! I’m not saying that everyone was an expert computer user, but there was far less hand-holding from the UI back then. If you were the kind of person who was inclined to jump on the internet and look for game mods and editors, chances are you at least had intermediate computer literacy.

Over the years, it became necessary to simplify the process of installing mods as much as we possibly could, because not everyone wanted to mess around just to use a custom roster or add a new face to the game. Fortunately the games have helped us out on occasion with some native custom art support, but there’s still the matter of placing roster and art files in the right folder. Installation routines can be helpful, but they can also easily misplace files. If you can provide an archive with folders that users can extract to a specified location they can paste into the search box, so much the better. Not everyone has the patience or knowhow to fiddle and troubleshoot.

Keep your roster mod free for all

Look, it’s been many years since I was regularly releasing rosters, or mods of any kind. However, I’ve been around this community for a long time, and released a ton of work in my day. Furthermore, I’ve seen some incredible work from a host of talented people over the years. I fully appreciate the time and effort that goes into a big roster mod, as well as other updates. Even so, I’ll never support charging for mods. Beyond the legal ramifications, I can’t get behind demanding money for work that so many skilled modders have released for free in years gone by. I don’t care that there are more ways to monetise online content these days. I’ll never see it as the done thing!

After all, are you going to share that money with the people who provide art updates, which take a roster mod from a minimalist project to an impressive total conversion? Are you going to compensate the people who created the tools and tutorials that have allowed you to create your roster? Are you going to compensate the players whose likenesses you’re using, the publishers for the use of their intellectual property, or the sites and services where you host and promote your work? Most modders don’t, so spare me the cries of how you “deserve” to be paid for your time! By all means throw a tip jar link out there, but my philosophy is that all mods should be freely available.

These are my roster mod philosophies in a nutshell. I’m not suggesting that it’s a sure-fire recipe for success, or that there aren’t other ways of creating rosters (though I do stand by keeping all mods free for everyone). However, I’ve found this approach has allowed me get invested in projects from start to finish, avoid technical mishaps, and produce work that has been largely well-received. As always, there’s a discussion to be had here, and I’m sure that other modders also have ideas that are likewise worth considering. If you were to ask for my advice on how to get started in roster modding however, this is what has worked for me since my earliest forays into the hobby.

The post Monday Tip-Off: My Roster Mod Philosophies appeared first on NLSC.