Thank you @JNT_BA . I bet it would be extra tough with all the new variables introduced. I’m very grateful for the hard work going in from you and the rest of the team working on Rugby '25.
Thanks @JNT_BA. Had a mess around last night and before reading this and found the new ruck system a lot more coherent even without that context, so I think that’s good.
Not sure if there would be much appetite for this other than me, but in lieu of a player career mode, I wonder how easy it would be to implement a player lock on the controller select screen? It would allow a player to play out the game as a specific player and the rest are played by the CPU - pretty sure a few games have offered this previously going back to NBA Live… 2001, I think I first came across it.
Reason I think it’s a cool thing or have, is that it would let you influence the match as a 10, for example, by keeping your position, playmaking and kicking for territory, etc, which in a sport as fast paced and complicated to implement as rugby Union 15s, can simplify things with only one role to focus on. It’d bit more complicated if you want to play prop though, as you’d have to control the whole scrum really, rather than one player in it.
Probably not for Rugby 25 as you know that path forward, but perhaps something for future.
It was already mentioned, but I do think AI box kicking has disappeared completely from gameplay so hopefully that can be fixed.
Really enjoying the update and tweaking the sliders, but definitely need the AI to be able to box kick when pinned deep as it’s too easy to force a turnover in dangerous areas when they simply recycle the ball within the shadow of the goalposts.
7 Likes
Yeah I was hoping for a little more ai behaviour related sliders tbh.. I think giving us the ability to adjust kick frequency in different areas of the pitch would be cool. In a dream world I would love to see team specific sliders or playstyle presets to give the game more variety.
3 Likes
I have a 20 GB patch on Steam ? Yesterday the patch was only 20mb
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The AI turns the ball over wayyy too easily…it makes it hard to play, even at easy difficulty. It really works on my nerves
Can anyone please explain to me how the ruck works - i can’t keep possesion of the ball more than 3 rucks and i don’t know what to do? I have rried everything. I just dont know why the developers made the rucks and mechanics of the game so complicated and without proper tutorials
@JNT_BA please have a look at this (this i feel has been a major issue from day one)
When you just want to play simple running and passing rugby (passing to the backline from a ruck and trying to run with the backline) it just feels unrealistic and frustrating, why? I dont know but what i have realised is when you run with the ball the players closest to you casually walks forwards while the player with the ball sprints (this creates a deep gab between you and the closest supporting player) and once you pass they suddenly sprint and either jump to catch the halk or catch the ball in an akward position - to add onto that the recieving pleyer does not run the same running line or follow the running line as the player with the ball this breakes the flow of the pass and momentum gained from the player running with the ball.
I know this issue will not be fixed since this has been the biggest problem with this game for me since early access days but can you please focus on this area with your next intstalment (if there will be any)
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I think the most important things to work on for the next title has to he passing and tackle animations. They are the things that will make the game look far much more realistic. Running animations could do with some work as well, mabey more shoulder movement when running. Just making the game look and feel better.
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What will the ruck sliders do when they are added? I’m not a fan of the turnover frequency currently. Im also not liking the new push over ruck win where the ball becomes loose on the ground. This should just be available to the 9 I think.
Anyone have any slider settings that have made the ai any more effective? I am nilling the ai every game currently and I’m losing interest
same thing here.
Native language in sliders menu, but I don’t think that it takes 20GB
@Wallie250 yeah the number of turnovers that the AI get is so much higher compared to what I can get.
What I have noticed is that the forwards don’t follow the ball carrier and instead when a tackle happens they start going moving back to set up for the next play. As a result the AI forwards always get to the ruck first as they automatically go to ruck and don’t have to rely on human input to bind to the ruck.
Are you on ps5? I havent seen any update on ps5 today as yet.
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Hey Guys, long time no see.
Saw it was a 20GB update today! So played a few games last night and then more tonight to get a broader view on the changes, before any videos or anything. But thought I would do a long feedback on here, as havnt done one in a while.
Positives.
- Sliders - Love the sliders, glad they are finally in to create a better custom feel for the game.
- Slider profiles - Awesome Idea, the ability to save a set of settings to pick in the difficulty section before a match start is great. If that could be taken further to be able to share Profiles over academy, so as the community fine tunes the settings people can easily download the best setting without manually making all the changes.
- Scrums still working perfectly is really good, picking up with the 9 works well now too… still not getting any passes though is weird
- Personally mostly liking the new changes to ruck. Game feels fast paced, rucks are no longer safe. Feel like you need to get on with the game.
- Jackal ability can now feel smooth, player isolated on a break is really likely to be turned over, meaning you need to stick near support players.
- New animations at rucks is great. Seen my own team driving over a ruck that was already my ball, forcing the ball to pop out of the ruck and making me panic passing before the AI can get on it. AI now pick up the ball with a ruck player if you commit 0 players at the ruck so you are forced to engage (bit of a shame you never get to do this as a player as AI never commit 0)
QoL Suggestions
Would be nice to be able to set up the match settings including difficulty settings as a default somewhere, rather than having to find it before every match
- Add a small lock button to “Base Difficulty” in each section of the sliders. Its quite frustrating to change 30 sliders, and accidentally nudge the analogue stick changing the Base Difficulty from Hard to Medium, and in doing so all the sliders you just changed, change back to default. Maybe the need to press A on Base Difficulty before you are able to move left and right to avoid accidental changes, as you cant possibly remember all your own manual changes to 3 decimal places.
- Allow LB and RB to increase the sliders by 0.001 or 0.010. because the LT RT jumps are large, and the analogue stick tiny nudges can jump by .0150 at a time, and seems some changes are bigger than others, and tricky rto get a small change
- Have seperate sliders for different types of kicks. Running kick from hand, drop goals, grubber, chip kicks, kick to touch from a penalty
(I increased Max General Kick to 1.150 and open play is fun, but now im nailing drop goals from 60m out, and can kick 70m on a kick to touch on a penalty. So if each area of kicking could be changed the best levels could be found for each.)
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Change the buttons at ruck time. B and X are on opposite sides for your thumb to hit. With the game now requiring you to HOLD B in order to add additional players its really tricky to attampt a jackal while also adding support players. But the AI can perform both actions at the same time. Pressing A to remove players can occasionally not remove players, but instead swap which defender you are selecting outside of the ruck entirely as they are both on the same button. Y is an unused button. So suggestion would be to swap
A - Add Player
X - Steal
B - Remove Player
Y - Select a player outside of the ruck for you to act as a defender (when you give up on a ruck you know you will likely lose) I know LB+RB is meant to do that now but rarely works.
X and A are next to each other allowing your thumb to hit both buttons at once. And the way jackaling works in new changes, you need to swap player after tackle anyway for success, so it being on the same A button adds utility as opposed to an opposition contradiction button. -
Interception animations - could it be looked at when interceptions are allowed to happen. AI can grab interceptions mid pass, but my players cant. Scored this great interception length of the field try. I swapped out of the maul to the scrum half, lined up my interception line and iimed my run as the scrum half perfectly, it SHOULD feel like a great try, but looks a bit dumb he doesnt grab it, it bounces off his head and then picks it up to run.
Issues Encountered so Far
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Inconsistency in losing rucks - There is still a partial “logic” flaw in why some rucks are lost. Some times you can hold on to a ruck for 10-15 phases and build an attack. Then sometimes on a ruck where you have 3 people guarding the ruck. The AI is able to add 2 players and for some reason win a turn over multiple seconds after youve secured it before your scrum half gets there. I dont know what the AI is doing to suddenly win a 2 v 3, especially as you cant jackal from that position. In the screenshot below I had all 3 players in first, and was even holding X to hold on to the ball, the AI added 2 players as my scrumhalf arrived, and instandlty turned it over.
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Hands in Ruck Penalty logic - Experiencing a lot of “hands in the ruck penalty”. There is no visual or audio cue to tell you to stop attempting the jackal, like a ref saying “leave it”. And sometimes you just tap X once and you give away a penalty. Might need to be looked at as to WHY the penalty is being blown. I know i could turn down ref scritness settings now, but its a logic issue not a ref strictness issue. I have had multiple Hands in ruck penalties, for the 1st man picking up the ball, with the correct animation. Both screenshots below were penalties, even though there isnt even a ruck.
Passing is loopy - noticed a lot of issues with the passing back to being floaty or players super deep. Slowing down momentum, and AI just winning the collision every time. Tried looking into it and noticed on quite a few of the floaty ones, the ball rotates in the players hand and jitters just before the pass, not sure if thats a cause or a symptom.
Pllayers not picking up bouncing ball to touch - seems to be if its going to bounce in to touch they just watch it go out again, even though this was fixed not long ago.
Ruck Hud isnt true - Turned on the HUD to keep track of whats going on, the bar looks like its reacting to who is winning a ruck at the start. But can for almost no reason go from me winnin 90 / 10 on the bar, to an automatic 0 / 100 and AI gets a turnover out of nowhere even though nothing happenned. Sometimes the Bar jumps to say the AI has won, but if I press pass quickly enough it switches back to a full blue bar to me and im allowed to pass. The bar seems just just do its own thing after 3 seconds, and the outcome of ruck can be random. No ideaif bar is a cause or a visual symptom of issues at ruck time.
On screen prompts never show X or Y anymore - @JNT_BA said in an earlier post about “displays when option is active” . but ive never seen any option flash in all games combined. But if you press them anyway you can win turnovers
AI Double tackle - had quite a few instances where an AI player commits a tackle on your ball carrier, and when you offload the AI breaks out of tackle animation, your offloading players drops like theyve been tackled. And AI runs freely to make a 2nd tackle to new receiver of the ball.
Autosubs breaking the game - Had my number 2 yellow carded (from hands in the ruck too many times, who wouldve guessed). And in the next Lineout for the opposition. The game subbed off my 15 for the 16 replacement hooker. Then Number 2 was moved to 15 position. After the yellow card “sin bin period over” came on screen (which is nice). But then game froze, im guessing it didnt know how to sub him back on as 16 was already on, and it wanted to put 15 on at the same time, but 2 was now in 15 position. All of this was done with NO input from me, the game made all these decisions on its own in the background during cutscenes forcing autosubs.
Pathing issues on losing an AI ruck turnover. Seen about 3 of these, after AI wins a turnover your players bunch behind the ruck. And seem to get stuck on the players on the ground, causing a huge gap in the defensive line for AI to run through as first player picks up the loose ball for them.
Tackled player able to get back to feet with no ruck forming, ball teleporting to hand and carry on running.
Invincible Player after turnover at ruck.
Im also interested in the ability the AI has to shake off tackles. I turned down the effectivness and amount of the Evasion abilities the AI has. But they seem to have an extra ability where you just fall off tackles. They dont perform a side step or a hand off, you make the tackle but they kind of fight through it, or your players grab them on the shoulders and fall off, it can happen on stationary players so isnt to do with momentum. Difficulty doesnt seem to effect it, and it NEVER happens with AI players falling off tackles. But quite often if the AI makes a break, your 15 misses their tackle and they score a try anyway. There doesnt seem to be any build up animation, the AI isnt performing a move, they just shrug you off a tackle.
AI Ability to enter ruck ages before you on higher rated teams. Your players can sometimes just stand there while AI loads 5 effortlessly. Once this happens its a guaranteed turnover, but doesnt happen until your players join. So they stand there building up to 5 players, enter the ruck and instantly lose a turnover, and you also lose 5 defenders. When this happens the (either an animation issue or the AI have the ability to eject 2 players from the contest) the front 3 players drive over a turnover, and players that were in the ruck pick up the ball faster than anyone, so even though they overloaded on the ruck, there is no consequence for the positive of the over commitment. They get the turn over, suck in 3 defenders, pick up the ball faster than normal, and forwards bump of next defender generating a minumum 5m gain (and defenders can get stuck on bodies on the floor) all through playing in a way you cant control. If a player wins a turnover with 5 players, all 5 should be trapped in the animation, meaning you win the ball, but then have less attackers.
- Sill cant pick up the ball with the 9 at a ruck on side camera when playing left to right
Lineout being thrown by hooker at back of the lineout because number 1 is yellow carded. 9 moved into line too.
Ai is still not able to kick the ball off the field to win the game, ball was kicked lightly and caught by another player, I won a turn over and ran the length of the field to score a try and win the game. AI needs to either box kick to touch or pass to pocket and kick out with power to avoid, looks very weird.
On HARD with custom sliders have noticed AI can win lineouts without the scrum half moving. And can even steal Lineouts without scrumhalf moving. Not the worst thing as you arent sure where AI is going to jump. But does look weird when front jumper steals the ball, then throws it backwards over their head 15 feet to the scrum half’s hands.
3 Red Cards is the limit for cards. After that you cannot receive a yellow card or red card for any penalty. 15 high tackles. first 3 were red cards and everything else was just a warning.
Ill post this for now and keep playing, will edit and add as i go.
MD
13 Likes
How come some of the sliders, such as kicking distance, dont work on the hardest difficulty but do work on the hard difficulty?
Hi JNTBA,
Another weird one I have seen a few times once Red Cards are issued to both teams. Line outs thrown from in field ! PS5. Will add a video now to Ticket #46130. Thanks
2 Likes
Big Ant!! Bravo, Bravo, Bravo, never would I have thought that so many changes could of gone in one patch. By far the best update yet. You can now say the rucks system is one of the funnest systems to date. And I am a ruck enthusiast:) Now when you isolate and jackal it feels like such a an acomplishment on defense, defensive and offensive management of the ruck has become a game in itself. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Know having said that there is so polishing needed in the sytem, and looking forward to some ruck sliders to help balance it out. But great start to the new system, Here are some things I noticed with the new improved ruck system.
- Watch the rucking meter and icons as they help you do either a jackal or a pushover
- If you try to jackal while the other team is already is set in the ruck you could be called for hands in the ruck ( would like to see the AI hand in the ruck, have not seen yet on two games on hard. 40 minute games
- On offense as long as your supporting ruck player arrives on time, you can get quick possession by tapping the pass button quickly, or secure the ruck by holding left or right on the left analog stick, many times you can mantain possession with just 1-2 offensive supporting players, the key is to play the ball quickly by pressing the corresponding buttons qucikly to mantain possession, if you wait around or you wait to long for the defense to over load the ruck then you can risk the defense pushing you over. "YOU DO NOT HAVE TO WAIT TO ADD 3-4 PLAYERS ON OFFENSE, most of the time you can mantain possession with only 1-2 supporting players , you just have to make sure to play the ball quickly.
- On offense you can stack the ruck if you need more time to set up the offense, it seems but I am not totally sure, if you do stack the ruck and hold the x on offense you can get a late push over clear out on offense.
- The jackal is all about timing, press x if you arrive before, if you isolate do not bind more then one only press bind 1 0r 2 times then x. If you bind to many by spazzing out on the bind, you may miss the quick jackal.
- On defensive ruck, if you don’t think you have a strong chance at a turnover, only bind 1 or 2 and wait for the right moment when to pile into the ruck. Use the the 1 player. quick jackal attempt instead. That way you have plenty of defenders to defend. But keep an I on the ruck the AI will sometimes remove players from the ruck, you can somtimes exploit this with a adding to the ruck quickly and creating a pushover late in the ruck.
- I think keeping an I on the rucking meter, is huge on anticipating jackals and pushover clear-outs.’
- Overall, I noticed , don’t spam the bind button or jackal button, pick your moments .
I love the direction the rucks are headed, we just need a few more rucking penalties particularly from the AI’s side and some polishing and it can be one of the greatest rugby game rucking system to date.
On another side note, scrums are improved as well, but we still need more scrum infringements and more risk vs reward built into the system.
Thank you Again Big Ant
6 Likes
Finally fun to play this game again after more than 6 months without having touched it, the sliders allow everyone to get close to the gameplay they want, I who love the difficulty it allowed me to Cheeter the AI and finally balanced matches with tightened defensive lines, realistic turnovers, there remains the problem of scrums and foot play that can be further improved, continue this way BA
3 Likes
Hi JNTBA,
I find for PS5 that if you have a Slider at 1010 for high tackle frequency it will basically have you experiencing High Tackles and Red Cards for 3 players each team Ai and User before the end of the first half.
But if I go below 1000 to 990 I might only see 1 High Tackle Incident in a match. Which is the Ai doing one.
I think for me I just wish we got Yellow Cards with tackles going to the base of the neck , shoulder blades. A few are like this. Red cards issued if it goes on the chin or to the face/ head.
It could help stop the matches going to 12 on 12 players or at least not before halftime. I really like the sliders it’s could to have control over these incidents occurring but I think Yellow is needed as a measure for less high tackles
I provided another video tonight to my ticket of a game freeze once a scrum was packing. It was due to both teams having the fullbacks coming off and replacement hookers coming on the field because both teams had multiple players red carded by 30 min mark.
Hi everyone and @JNT_BA I got a 37.69 GB update on Xbox series S anybody know what update this is and what the changes are ?
Same, not sure what it is tho