Introduction

Draft Day Sports Pro Football (DDSPF) and Draft Day Sports College Football (DDSCF) are games published by Wolverine Studios (https://www.wolverinestudios.com)

The games are American Football based and have multiple modes, including single player and online supported multiplayer.

Requirements

• Windows 64-bit PC Only
• 1920 x 1080 minimum display resolution required
• 128MB RAM minimum
• 750MB Hard Drive space minimum
• Mac users – The game will not run on a Mac natively. You would need to install Windows via a program such as Parallels for the game to work
• Steam deck users – The game is not supported on a Steam deck device

User Guide

This guide is built to assist starting players. The document will evolve over time as more information is added. There is much more information about game specifics in our Wolverine Studios Knowledge Base. See https://wolverinestudios.freshdesk.com/a/solutions for more information.

*Note: This document covers both Pro Football and College Football as the engines for both games are relatively similar. Features specific to one game will be labeled appropriately. For example, there will be a section on Free Agency that only applies to the Pro Game, and a section on Recruiting that only applies to the College Game. 

Support

If you have questions or topics that you would like to see covered or improved, please contact the staff via the Forum, Discord, or Support.

Wolverine Studios: https://www.wolverinestudios.com

Forum: https://www.draftdaysports.com/board/index.php

Discord: https://discord.gg/VQjxADCkyy

Support: https://wolverinestudios.freshdesk.com/support/home

Getting Started

First Time Users: It’s recommended to start in Sandbox mode, select a league name, and leave the rest of the settings on default until you learn more about the game. The default settings work well and generate league results in line with the current state of real-life college and pro football.

Modes

Sandbox – Everything is unlocked. Use this mode if you want to have full control of a league. You can take control of multiple teams or let the CPU/AI control all the teams.

Career – Choose a team and create either a Head Coach (DDSCF) or General Manager (DDSPF). Your actions are available for the selected team only. Contracts may be extended each season, or you may choose to select offers from other teams to continue your career. If you have a bad season your team may choose to terminate your contract, and you’ll have to select a new team to continue.

Multiplayer – Similar to a sandbox league, you act as a commissioner and are responsible for publishing your league to a server. You assign owners to individual teams and allow them to publish their team settings. (FTP Server Required)

Road to MVP (DDSPF) – Mode where you play as a single player. You are in control of several aspects of the player’s career, including who they play for, what contracts they sign, how to train, etc.

Create a League

To create a league the first step is to select a mode. After the mode is selected there will be a screen with multiple settings to choose from. For the most part the key settings are the only ones you need to begin a season. The rest of the settings are for setting up very specific scenarios such as starting with mods, starting with custom or historical rosters, or using custom financial settings.

Key Settings:

• League Name – Name for your league
• League Starting Year – Year that the league calendar starts in
• League Format – Controls the league structure for conferences, divisions, and teams
• Playoff Mode – Controls options for end of season playoffs

Game Menu

After a league is loaded, the game menu can be accessed using the button with the three horizontal lines in the top left of the screen.

• Back to Main Menu – Goes back to the initial game menu screen
• Load League – Loads a new league
• Save League – Saves the current league, you can change the name if desired
• Settings
  1. Toggle Sound – Turns game sounds on/off
  2. Set Theme – Default (windows setting), Light or Dark
  3. Toggle Link Color (DDSPF) – Changes the default link color to white
  4. Reset Zoom – Resets the current zoom level of the screens
• League Configuration – Opens the League Options page to change configuration options
• Help – Opens the main help screen
• Credits – Opens a credits page
• Quit Game – Exits the game without saving

Navigation Menu

The navigation menu is along the left side of the screen and provides access to both team related screens as well as league related screens.

• Menu Icon – Opens the Game Menu
• Stage/Date Display – Displays the current date and stage of the loaded league
• Advance – Completes the current stage of the game
• Play/Sim – Opens the Game List screen so you can sim games, weeks, or entire seasons
• Teams Menu – Opens up a screen to change the team that you’re currently viewing

Team Section

• GM/Head Coach – Shows the current coach or GM of the current team
• Team Office – Loads the team office screen
• Inbox – Opens the email inbox of the current team
• Sign Staff – Opens the staff signing screen
• Recruit Players (DDSCF) - Opens the recruiting screen for your team
• Scout Draft (DDSPF) – Opens the scout draft screen
• Sign Free Agent (DDSPF) – Opens the in-season sign free agent screen
• Trade Players (DDSPF) – Opens the trade dialog
• Icons are shortcuts to other tabs on the team screen (rosters, depth chart, etc.)

The League section contains links to various league information screens (Media, Standings, etc.)

The footer contains links to game results and information that rotate as weeks complete.

Play/Sim Menu

The Play/Sim button brings you to the Weekly Schedule where you have various options for playing or simulating games.

• Play Game: If a game features a human owned team, then the “Play Game” option lights up. This opens the play game screen where you are the coach and can call plays, call timeouts, set rosters, etc. The “Play Game” screen will show the action on the field as plays are called.
• Sim Game: This simulates the game by the CPU
• Sim Week: This simulates the current week
• Sim Season: Sims the season up to the playoffs or bowl games.
• Sim Playoffs: Sims the current playoff round
• Watch Game: This shows a replay of any completed game in a visual presentation
• Show Score: Toggles showing the score for that game if hide scores is enabled
• Matchup: Shows a matchup between the teams
• Box score: Opens a dialog that shows the box score, play-by-play, and game analysis

To “Play Game” and call plays one of the teams in the matchup must be set to human owned and not be run by the CPU.

Team Functions

Team Dashboard/Team Office

This screen contains options for exporting data, submitting league news, and login/export team for multiplayer leagues.

You can also find a quick view of the current team status, standings, news, and more all summarized in different sections of the screen.

Staff

The staff screen shows all the current coaching staff. You can promote fire staff members, promote certain coaches if openings arise, as well as view profiles for the various positions. There are staff hiring stages where you can attempt to hire coaches away from other teams or find unemployed coaches to offer contracts to. During these stages you can find this screen from a link on the left nav menu.

Roster

The roster screen allows you to see your current roster using multiple different views. Check the box next to a player to view the current roster actions for that player, such as adding to a trade block (PF), releasing a player, or moving between different squads (PF). There is also an Auto Roster button that will update rosters and set up initial depth charts for your players.

Stats

The stats screen shows multiple views of dozens of statistics for your team and players

Depth

The depth chart screen has the functionality to build personnel packages to be used in various game scenarios. By default, each team will have a Default Package and Backup Package. The Backup Package is the personnel grouping that gets used if your team is ahead or behind by your team threshold set in strategy.

You can create new packages, set the depth chart based on coach preferences, or copy from other packages. Use the Formation View to see how your depth chart applies to different formations. Use the Quick View roster to display your current roster to make it easier to assign depth chart slots.

The depth chart has 3 slots per position. The game chooses a slot based on the current energy of the player. If a player is tired the game will move to slot 2, then slot 3. If players are assigned to multiple positions and multiple slots and are already assigned to the lineup the AI will use the next available slot.

Depth Chart packages are used later in the strategy screens and are set for each formation and then Run/Pass for offense or Short/Long for defense.

Strategy

Play Calling

Use the Play Calling view to set your play caller and then desired playbook for each scenario. You also set Run/Pass weight for the offense and Blitz Weight for the defense. These are weights and *not* strict percentages. Setting the run/pass weight to 100 will set the highest allowed pass chance based on your league settings. Similar behavior exists for blitzing… setting to 100 is just a weight, and not a percentage. If the league is set to be 40/60 split of run/pass, then setting your weight to 100 would make your team pass approximately 60% of the time.

The weights on the play calling screen are just one component that is considered. The game engine will combine internal logic, league settings, current scenario, current down and distance, coach preferences, and other strategy settings to determine which play to call or whether to blitz.

Game Plan

Game plans are set on this screen for both Offense and Defense. By default, the Head Coach will set the game plan. Use Create New to unlock the options and set your own game plan. Game plans contain many options for setting the level of aggression, game focus, game preparation, and other preferences. Substitution logic is where you change what point threshold your backup packages will be used. You also set the Energy levels for substitution using your depth chart package slots.

Energy Min is the point at which your player will be pulled from the game. The Energy Max is the point they must recover to before they are put back in the lineup. Each position drains energy at different rates.

Formations

The formation screen allows you to set your desired depth chart package for each formation. You also set your desired backup package to be used when the point threshold is reached.

Play Analysis

This screen shows different summaries of your plays throughout the season. You can see performance by play type, by down, or by formation. The left side is offense, and the right side is aggregated defense.

Custom Playbook

The custom playbook screen is where you create your own playbooks to be used on the play calling screen. By default, there will be existing coach playbooks. But you can create your own and import/export playbooks as well. Each playbook has minimum play thresholds you must meet for the playbook to be valid. If the game encounters an invalid playbook during a game, it will not be used so be sure the playbook shows as “Valid: Yes” before using it.

There is also an option to Manage Custom Plays. This leads to a play creator screen, where you create your own plays to be used in games. To create a new play, you set formation, type and other properties on the left. The middle section shows the positions for the formation and allows you to set the actions for each. Action 1 for offensive players may be motion, which allows you to set Action 2. Target is a percentage set for the ball carrier in a run, or the targeted receiver in a pass and must add up to 100%. The right section shows a visual summary of the play.

Training

Training schedules are where you can create different training regimens, customized to positions or players. You can also set coach focuses for specific players which will give other interactions throughout the season.

You can create as many training schedules as you want, allowing for a great deal of micromanaging.

By default, all players will be assigned to a default schedule. You can either change the settings on the default schedule and leave the players there, or just ignore it, and the players will use it as is. The default schedule will be a balanced schedule, that makes sure players get a decent amount of training across the board, and prevents the most negative side effects, such as regression or fatigue/complaining.

After you have created a schedule and set its settings, you can assign as many players as you want to it. Observe that a player cannot *not* be on a schedule, so if you delete a schedule that still has players assigned, those players will be moved to a default schedule. If a player is injured, he will not train - you don’t need to take him off a schedule or create a lighter schedule - the game will just let him sit out that training session.

The maximum total of the 4 aspects you can assign is 25 points. However, if you assign too little to a given aspect, your players may regress. If you get close to 25 in total, you run the risk of injuries, and depending on their personalities players may start to complain and lose morale (the effects of which may propagate and yield further negative effects). Typically, we recommend a schedule of 18-22 points, with no rating lower than 4, which will largely avoid negative effects.

• Position Drills: This aspect focuses on the skills necessary for the player’s position. So even while QBs and LBs do not have use for the same skills, you can put them on the same schedule, and the game will make sure they train the relevant skills for their position.
• Athletic Training: This aspect focuses on developing the athleticism of players, mainly the Speed and Agility ratings.
• Physical Training: This aspect focuses on developing the physical shape of the players, mainly the Strength and Stamina ratings.
• Game Tape
   Having players watch game tape and do mental reps on plays helps them prepare for upcoming games and develop their Intelligence.

Schedule

The schedule screen shows the current schedule and results for your team. In CF the schedule screen also allows you to offer games for non-conference matchups. In single player the matchups will automatically be accepted if the opponent can fit it into their season. In multi-player, both teams must include the matchup for it to be scheduled.

History

The team history tab allows you to see various statistics and past season results.

Team Config

The team configuration screen has many options for each team. This is where you can change the team’s name, stadium information, team colors, and team logos.

The Team Config screen contains the checkbox for CPU/AI Run? Which will put the team on CPU control, or on human control.

Recruit Players (DDSCF)

Recruiting players happens throughout the season. After each week you’ll go into the recruiting tab of your team and view your current recruit dashboard. The dashboard screen contains information about scholarships remaining, budget, targets, commits, news, pipelines and data.

DELEGATE RECRUITING can be turned on if you want the AI to perform recruiting actions. You can turn it off if you wish to control the actions.

Scholarships
Each recruiting season you will have free scholarships to offer to recruits. The amount depends on your roster size and how many players will graduate after the season. In order to sign a player, you must offer him a scholarship. There are several actions you can take that will increase the player level of interest in your school. Even if they have a high interest they will not sign unless you’ve made them a scholarship offer. This means that before a sim, you should make sure to have offered out all your scholarships, so as to not waste recruiting resources. You can always remove an offer and give it to a different recruit later.

After reviewing the dashboard information you’ll go into View Recruits to perform weekly recruiting tasks. The View Recruits screen contains the list of all the available recruits and their status. You can add them as a target to your list from this screen. The recruiting actions are listed under the Actions view (Select View à Actions). From the actions view you’re able to spend your recruiting money on tasks.

Actions

• Interview: Interview targets to unlock personality information about a recruit. Additionally, interviews reveal if the player has any special traits. This will help assess their overall interest in your school and whether they are a good fit for recruitment.
• Contact: Send information to recruit, either by mail or email, instance messages, etc. Low impact, but keeps them interested.
• Phone Call: Schedules a phone call or video conference call with the recruit. Medium impact, will increase interest if successful.
• Home Visit: Meet with the recruit in-person at their home or school. High impact, will drive a large increase interest if successful. Limit of 6 per recruit.
• Official Visit: Invite the recruit and their family to campus for meetings and evaluations. Very High impact, will drive the largest increase interest if successful. Limit of 1 per recruit.
• Scholarship: Offers a recruit a scholarship. You can keep track of how many scholarships you have left in the top bar.
• Hidden: If you give up on a recruit and do not want him to appear on your lists anymore, check the Hidden box and he will be moved to the hidden list. You can access the hidden list from the drop downs.

The recruit’s personality will determine how much the various recruiting actions increase their interest. For example, players who have high close to home values will prefer schools close to their high school. But high prestige schools also carry a lot of weight and may overcome personal desires. Higher rated recruits (4-5 stars) will prefer high prestige schools by default.

Pipelines also give natural recruiting benefits for players in those states. Pipelines are assigned to coaches at creation, but they also can be added over time if a coach has a particular good rate of commits from a particular state.

 Tip: Check for any local or nearby recruits and target them early in the season to see if you can get some early commits. You may be able to get a higher rated recruit than expected just due to them wanting to stay local. Also pay attention to your recruiting pipelines for potential targets.

Scout Draft (DDSPF)

The scout draft screen shows a list of all current players in the next draft. There will be scouting points available during the Scouting phase. The scouting actions are evaluated after the Scouting phase ends, as well as after the last pick of each Draft Round. After the draft starts you will be able to go back into the scout draft screen to view the results of your scout actions and assign new actions for the next phase. Each action provides different sets of information about a recruit.

• Interview (HC): Unlocks personality and trait information about the player
• Ask College Teammates (Scout): Provides social type information about a player
• Work Out (Trainer): Provides information about physical skills of a player (Str, Agi, End)
• Ask College Coaches (GM): Provides team related personality information
• Watch Tape (Position Coach): Provides additional information about position skills

Sign Free Agent (DDSPF)

Allows you to sign a free agent from the current available players. Click on a player row and select Sign to Active Roster or Sign to Practice Squad to add that player for the league minimum for their position.

Trade Players (DDSPF)

The trade console shows two teams with their draft picks and current roster. In Career mode your team is locked into the left side. Trade offers are evaluated by the CPU and may not be accepted. In sandbox or multi-player modes trades are automatically accepted and pushed through.

Player Functions

Players will have links from their names to the Player Screen. There are various tabs available to view information about the player.

• Top Actions: The top right of the player screen will have actions such as adding to your watch list and editing the player if you have access to do so.
• Profile: Contains Ratings and Skills. For DDSPF there will also be contract information and actions to take for the player.
• Bio: Contains additional information such as biography, status, assessments, and actions like changing position and changing jersey numbers. This screen also contains Mentoring actions where you can attempt to have your player mentor another player on the team. Not every player can be a mentor. Look for veterans with 10+ years of experience, role model traits, and smart/high intelligence players.
• Stats: Shows multiple views of the stats accumulated by the player
• Performance: Shows a current season view of the current performances by the player and coaching grades for those performances along with some analytics.
• Contract (DDSPF): Shows the current contract of the player, their desired extension starting point, and an Offer Extension screen to submit extensions to the player. The suggested minimum contract is just a starting point. Actual values they’ll accept vary widely depending on their relationship with the team, the team’s status, and their personality and traits.
• Analysis: Shows a screen depiction of various stats and approximate field locations.
• History: Displays a filterable list of all the historical events logged for the player
• Records: Contains all the records currently kept by the player
• Progression: Displays a progression line chart of their rating changes over time. Also has a log of recent rating change events that happen during the season.

Player Ratings

Player Ratings

• Strength - Key attribute for making tackles, breaking tackles, holding blocks and breaking through blocks. Influences chance to force/avoid fumbles.
• Agility - Key attribute for dodges/cutting when running with the ball. Affects tackling. Influences catches/interceptions. Affects ability to adjust in blocking.
• Arm - QB key Attribute for getting a ball to a receiver. Higher Arm means more completions. Factors more on long throws.
• Intelligence - Key attribute for awareness on the field. Helps QBs assess and react to blitzes, pull down throws, throw ball away to avoid sacks, avoid interceptions. Allow ballcarriers to find holes and react to defenders’ movements. Key for defenders to assess run vs pass and adjust behavior, accordingly, especially getting out of coverage in reaction to run plays. Helps tackling by anticipating ballcarrier movement. Affects interceptions. Affects ability to adjust in blocking.
• Accuracy - QB accuracy with his throws. Increases completion pct and lowers interception rate. Factors more on short throws.
• Tackling - Defensive attribute for bringing down a ball carrier.
• Speed - Key attribute for ALL players.
• Hands - Key attribute for making catches and interceptions. Affects hand placement in blocking. Reduces fumbles.
• Pass Blocking – Increases successful pass blocks.
• Run Blocking – Increases successful run blocks.
• Endurance - Key attribute for all players. Higher endurance players can stay on the field longer. Factors in injuries and ability to avoid performance drop late in games.
• Kick Distance - For kickers this affects FG pct at longer distances. For Punters this affects punt distance.
• Kick Accuracy - For kickers this affects FG pct. For Punters this affects killing the ball inside the 20.
• Overall – Overall rating is a summarization of the player ratings and skills. It is a single number for roughly how good the player is. However, to fully optimize a roster, users are encouraged to find specialists in various ratings that match their needs and not just rely on the overall rating.

Player Personality

• Leadership – Allows player to improve the team’s morale. Motivates players to play better. Quells locker room mumbling. Players will lead by example, for instance, by standing tall in the pocket and taking a hit or fighting for that extra yard.
• Work Ethic – Affects training success
• Competitiveness – How hard the player plays during the game. Affects morale when winning or losing. Affects performance in crunch time. Contested catches (both defense and offense). Affects training success.
• Team Player – Plays to win and less for accolades. It affects how well players gel as a team, thereby improving performance.
• Sportsmanship – Player’s attitude towards the other team. Affects penalties.
• Disposition – Temperament of the player, good locker room influencer, also affects penalties. Minor effect on the development of young players.
• Morale – Affects player temperament and performance. Winning games and winning awards both improve morale. Losing, not starting or getting injured and such can detract from morale. If morale gets low enough the player is more likely to affect the locker room negatively.
• Values Money – A high score means the player values more financial aspects
• Values Security – Prefers longer term contracts
• Values Loyalty – Tends to stay with one team and give hometown discounts
• Values Winning – Prefers teams that have recent and long-term winning programs
• Values Close to Home – Prefers teams that are local
• Values Market Size – Prefers high prestige teams or high fan base teams

Player Skills

Player skills are assigned to various positions. Some players may excel at a single position, but many will have skill ratings in several. The skill rating provides information on how well the player knows the position. A player with a low skill rating under 30-40 can play the position but may make mistakes and won’t be optimal. Players over 50 are relatively competent and can play the position decently. Players in the 80-100 range know everything they need to know and will occasionally make above average plays due to their high skill level. The skill level serves dual purposes… to reward high level players, and to nerf low level players playing out of position.

Skill is a complementary part of the game. Users should prioritize RATINGS. A player with 50 skill and 99 strength is much more valuable than a player with 99 skill and 50 strength

Game Stages

• Begin Season: Starts new season. This stage is when any off-season updates to your league configuration should be made. This includes any league format changes or expansion/contraction. Make these changes before advancing past the Begin Season stage.
• Creation Draft (DDSPF): The creation draft is the time to seed the league with initial players. Click ADVANCE on the top left to open the draft screen.
• Offseason Draft (DDSPF): Annual draft stage. Click ADVANCE on the top left to open the draft screen.
• End Season: End of season stage. Click ADVANCE in the top left to advance to the next season
• End of Year Awards: Displays end of year awards. Click ADVANCE on the top left to open the award screen
• Free Agency Stages (DDSPF): Click ADVANCE on the top left to open the free agency screen.
• Playoffs: Click PLAY/SIM in the top left to open the schedule screen, and then click on Playoffs to view the playoff bracket.
• Preseason: Click PLAY/SIM in the top left to open the schedule screen and sim the games. Before simming games ensure that your team(s) have a chance to set their rosters, lineups, and strategy.
• Pro Bowl/Senior Bowl: Click ADVANCE in the top left to open the screen and sim the game.
• Regular Season: Click PLAY/SIM on the top left to open the schedule screen and sim the games.
• Scouting (DDSPF): Make sure your team(s) have their initial scouting completed. Then click ADVANCE to proceed with the scouting results.
• Staff Signing: Open the Sign Staff screen to make offers for new coaches. Then click ADVANCE to proceed to the next stage and view the results of your offers.
• RFA Stages (DDSPF): RFA Stage 1 is when you have an opportunity to sign restricted free agents with 3 years of experience. Their current team can match the offers or allow the player to sign the new contract and receive the tendered draft pick as compensation. RFA Stage 2 is when restricted free agents have been given offers and teams can match. If tenders are not matched the player will assume the new contract with draft pick compensation going to the previous team. Click ADVANCE to proceed to the next stage.
• Training Camps: Make sure to click on your team(s) training section to assign players to appropriate training schedules. Training occurs throughout the year, but the big gains (and losses) occur during camp! Click ADVANCE to view results and proceed to the next stage.
• Spring Games (DDSCF): Click ADVANCE to sim the spring games.
• Signing Day (DDSCF): Click ADVANCE to complete the Signing Day stage and view the results.
• Redshirt (DDSCF): This is the last stage to tag players that have played less than 4 games in the season with a Redshirt designation. View your team roster and set player redshirt before clicking on ADVANCE to process this stage.