State of Theme Teams (Raiders)

It feels like this years Madden has been inconsistent with the release of theme team players. Early in the year, the Jags TT was really strong but that made sense since the Jags were off to a hot start and the Travis Hunter card was really good. 

Over the last month, it feels like a handful of teams are getting pumped with multiple cards every promo while every other TT is left to maybe one filler card. The raiders TT is getting at least one champion card every promo, so many LTDs, and a bunch of filler cards. The Raiders TT is by far the best team in the game and makes many TTs irrelevant. If you want to be competitive, then Raiders TT is the only way to have a good team. 

Just super annoyed half the theme teams aren’t receiving any new cards while they continue to pump the raiders with new cards every other day. It just feels like EA is trying to force people to run these super expensive theme teams in order to win games at a high level, completely nullifying the benefit that theme teams have had the last few years, which is a way to have a competitive team for far cheaper than a non TT.

Raiders and 49ers tend to be loaded every year...both of those teams have a ton of great players that have put on those uniforms at some point. I don't think EA releases cards to ensure each team is fairly represented...I would guess they do it to drive sales...and those sales tend to be driven by big names (which again...Raiders and 49ers have a ton to choose from every year).

Valintats said:

It feels like this years Madden has been inconsistent with the release of theme team players. Early in the year, the Jags TT was really strong but that made sense since the Jags were off to a hot start and the Travis Hunter card was really good. 

Over the last month, it feels like a handful of teams are getting pumped with multiple cards every promo while every other TT is left to maybe one filler card. The raiders TT is getting at least one champion card every promo, so many LTDs, and a bunch of filler cards. The Raiders TT is by far the best team in the game and makes many TTs irrelevant. If you want to be competitive, then Raiders TT is the only way to have a good team. 

Just super annoyed half the theme teams aren’t receiving any new cards while they continue to pump the raiders with new cards every other day. It just feels like EA is trying to force people to run these super expensive theme teams in order to win games at a high level, completely nullifying the benefit that theme teams have had the last few years, which is a way to have a competitive team for far cheaper than a non TT.

Don’t think for a moment having a stacked Raiders theme team is enough to save you from being glitched to death by cheap blitzes, cheesy speed bursts, and ultra-non football nonsense that achieves outsized results because physics does not exist in this game.

von11 said:

Raiders and 49ers tend to be loaded every year...both of those teams have a ton of great players that have put on those uniforms at some point. I don't think EA releases cards to ensure each team is fairly represented...I would guess they do it to drive sales...and those sales tend to be driven by big names (which again...Raiders and 49ers have a ton to choose from every year).

It would be very easy to analyze a spreadsheet or chart depicting players and their teams and identify a way to release items in a balanced way. EA doesn’t have to cover every position group evenly; in fact, it shouldn’t. But EA is probably leaving money on the table because some gamers will refuse to engage with [x] team contact rather than their favorite team’s content.

They can do better than they have.

phatalerror said:

It would be very easy to analyze a spreadsheet or chart depicting players and their teams and identify a way to release items in a balanced way. EA doesn’t have to cover every position group evenly; in fact, it shouldn’t. But EA is probably leaving money on the table because some gamers will refuse to engage with [x] team contact rather than their favorite team’s content.

They can do better than they have.

Oh I agree it would be easy...but I'll use my favorite team as an example...Vikings.  There are a handful of good cards that come out for them during the year, but the majority of those cards also help numerous other TTs and thus draw money from the community.  I think a couple years ago we got a Tarkington card (Vikings was not his only team...he also played for the Giants), but it was not a popular card...so...doubtful money was made by EA.  They release Moss every year (as they should as he was great)...but...look at the TTs that card fits on.  Cunningham is another one that will probably come out...and again...other TTs.  What about Chuck Foreman?  Nope...Smith comes out every year...and...not a popular card (because the card isn't good...the game is built around speed and the card is slow (and the player in real life is also slow).  So my guess is EA is about profit and not fair.  I don't think it's because they (or even us who play) like the Raiders or 49ers more then say the Vikings...its because they (Raiders and 49ers) have had a ton more good players come through then the Vikings.  My TT (and I suspect many others out there) are made up of cards with all 32 team chems...and they never played for the Vikings, but I sure put them in that purple and gold and take my speed bump.  I'm not saying you are wrong, I'm just looking at it from another perspective and I always remind myself that EA doesn't care about how I feel nearly as much as they care about how much they can make (I could be wrong...I hope I am).

The main issue is just how mandatory Theme Teams are with the speed boosts combined with the uneven speed scaling.

https://mutleaks.github.io/XXVPlus1/

The difference between 85-90 speed is the same as 90-92 so running around with guys who are 89 base speed without speed boosts is a complete waste. It's also really annoying that the promo boosts go away since losing +2 speed is going to make guys like Dawkins / Chancellor substantially worse in a week if you don't have their tt.

For as long as I can recall in MUT, there will always be unbalanced TT (with the raiders in the top tier most years).  However, it seemed like the EA economic model in years past would be to change the top TT every week weeks to drain coins by encouraging people switching to the new top TT.  It seems like they have now switched to a model where they feel the only way to drive pack sales is to let people add to their Raiders TT.

von11 said:

Oh I agree it would be easy...but I'll use my favorite team as an example...Vikings.  There are a handful of good cards that come out for them during the year, but the majority of those cards also help numerous other TTs and thus draw money from the community.  I think a couple years ago we got a Tarkington card (Vikings was not his only team...he also played for the Giants), but it was not a popular card...so...doubtful money was made by EA.  They release Moss every year (as they should as he was great)...but...look at the TTs that card fits on.  Cunningham is another one that will probably come out...and again...other TTs.  What about Chuck Foreman?  Nope...Smith comes out every year...and...not a popular card (because the card isn't good...the game is built around speed and the card is slow (and the player in real life is also slow).  So my guess is EA is about profit and not fair.  I don't think it's because they (or even us who play) like the Raiders or 49ers more then say the Vikings...its because they (Raiders and 49ers) have had a ton more good players come through then the Vikings.  My TT (and I suspect many others out there) are made up of cards with all 32 team chems...and they never played for the Vikings, but I sure put them in that purple and gold and take my speed bump.  I'm not saying you are wrong, I'm just looking at it from another perspective and I always remind myself that EA doesn't care about how I feel nearly as much as they care about how much they can make (I could be wrong...I hope I am).

I totally agree with you about some TTs just having better and more marketable players than other teams and how 9ers and Raiders have a lot of big names and good madden cards. But this doesn’t excuse the constant supply of filler raiders cards (Devin white and the like 15 low MF cards) while other teams like my Packers (solid TT every year) are struggling to get one card a promo and the Packers TT is better than most. Rod Woodson, Dickerson, etc make sense and I can’t complain about them getting cards but I can complain when the raiders get the best cards and still get numerous other cards every promo

Valintats said:

I totally agree with you about some TTs just having better and more marketable players than other teams and how 9ers and Raiders have a lot of big names and good madden cards. But this doesn’t excuse the constant supply of filler raiders cards (Devin white and the like 15 low MF cards) while other teams like my Packers (solid TT every year) are struggling to get one card a promo and the Packers TT is better than most. Rod Woodson, Dickerson, etc make sense and I can’t complain about them getting cards but I can complain when the raiders get the best cards and still get numerous other cards every promo

Great point on the lower over "filler" cards...I agree 100% with you. I was only looking at it from the Big Name higher ovr point, but what you noted is on point.