Can't play defense, please help

[Leander]

After playing a good amount of games I still cannot play D. Here are my main problems:

1) I follow the cpu player either with or without the d-lock button. The results are as follows:

a) my D works and the cpu player has to pull off a bad shot when the shot clock expires...but although I am standing in
front of him he hits many shots.

b) the cpu player makes some passes and dribbles and I cannot follow him.

c) Derrick Rose had 19 points in the first quarter alone. He drives to the hoop and I cannot do anything. What should I do?
This is 2k's bad collision coding...three of my players are under the hoop and still the cpu player drives through them as
if he was just an inch slim.

d) as I can only follow the cpu player, get called for reaching in and do not get many steals, I call for a double team. But
the cpu player passes out of the double team and gets an open shot.

HOW DO YOU PLAY D? I get 4-7 steals a game but it still sucks that I have to watch the cpu pass and shoot and I cannot do much.

2) Another problem: my offense

I can score in the paint and I can drive to the hoop but this is boring. I can also pull off some isomotion moves but they all lead to a layup in my case. I want to have more open shots but do not get many. It only happens sometimes by chance. I could score big in the paint and with drives but this is boring. I want a good shot selection and nothing one-sided.

[Leander]

Ah, found a good video showing which parts of 2k9 just horribly suck.

phpBB [video]

[Al Ka Pwn]

what camera do you use?

[Leander]

Not my video!

Derek Fisher is insane, both in Live and 2k. He takes so many 3PT shots and hits most of them.

[Leander]

I cannot defend in the post. Double team -> ball is kicked out to the 3pt line. Steal attempt = foul. I can only stand there and watch the cpu score. I cannot even block shots...my hands do not touch the ball. My players are almost non-existent.

[Al Ka Pwn]

what camera do you use to play ingame with?
when I still used the default one from the side I had trouble playing defence too.

[fasz]

there's 3 levels in lock-on D ,close, normal and far guard.

Close is to prevent baller from driving into the paint and press him. ie : if he's on the right, play normal D on his left ,if he try to go to the paint press him by pressing the lock-on D button and UP , the D will stand in front of him . but keep in mind, skilled player can broke your ankles if you stay too close to them. normal/close guard is great against player like Ray Allen .

Far is to keep a great distance with the ball handler and the other players , use it when the baller try to pass the ball to the post player, BUT if you give too much space the baller will shoot it's like an open shot.it's effective with player like Rondo who had a bad shooting skills .
Don't try to steal the ball , the ref will call for reaching foul!

after that if the player drive to the paint, try to take charge , it's really really really effective on fast breaks, but u got to take charge before the both baller's feet leave the ground if not it will be a defensive foul .

if you play off-ball D , use lock-on D button to guard your opponent closely, it's effective against post player or stars players , if you stay close to them , the CPU will not pass the ball .
on post play , if you can't play great D try to block on 2nd choice , like kobe or LBJ did , the best way is to post with the PF and block with the Center

when you double team ,CPU will definitely pass the ball to the open players , so what you got to do is to look where is the open player and take a D close to him BUT if you leave too early your player the CPU will pass to him , so the best way is to wait a lil bit and when you see the double teamed player will pass the ball, try to steal the ball, if it's too late you'll be close to the player and still try to contest the shot.

set plays is the best way to have an open shots ,use screens it's pretty effective too or play off-ball offense take a player and run to an open spots and call for the ball, use R2 or L2 the player will do a body feint

[Spree#8]

a) my D works and the cpu player has to pull off a bad shot when the shot clock expires...but although I am standing in
front of him he hits many shots.

Just standing won't produce good results. When you see that there are for example 3 seconds on the clock left and a cpu player has the ball and is just handling it, you know he's going to take a bad shot in the end of the shotclock. In that situation, always jump to try to block the shooter. Most of the time, it will make him miss the shot. Sometimes you will block him, rarely he will make this shot although your defense.

c) Derrick Rose had 19 points in the first quarter alone. He drives to the hoop and I cannot do anything. What should I do?
This is 2k's bad collision coding...three of my players are under the hoop and still the cpu player drives through them as
if he was just an inch slim.

As Fasz said, taking charge is probably best in that situation.

[Leander]

Fasz Thank you very much. I didn't even know that there are three different d-lock positions. Thanks.

[Leander]

Still no luck.

1st game in my association vs. Minnesota: 106-101 (win)
2nd game vs. Clippers: 97-98 (loss)
3rd game vs. Rockets: 87-141 (LOSS)

What the hell??? I only hit 40% of my shots while the Rockets hit 53%. The game was a joke. I got 0 blocks and have a total of 3 blocks in the season. I! CANNOT! BLOCK! A! SHOT! Sometimes my cpu teammates reject a shot but I haven`t manually blocked a shot in dozens of games yet. I press the button to jump and I do not touch the damn ball. Or I commit a foul.

How should you defend Yao Ming? I am so pissed. Yao Ming had 22 points, 16 rebounds and 3 blocks in 27 minutes of play (I play with 12-minute quarters!). Houston grabbed 19 offensive boards. I could not do anything. Yao kept shooting over me. I tried to double-team him several times but he still shoots over me or passes to somebody at the 3PT line. He had like 10 offensive boards. He is too tall.

How can it be that I usually get close games and then Houston is in some sort of god-mode? Luther Head had 40! points and made 10! three-pointers. The Rockets hit 16/36 from downtown and were 27/29 from the line although the cpu normally shoots about 10 times from the charity stripe.

Is this a hidden easter egg? Luther Head did not even pass much any more...he kept shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting...the cpu team started to make fun of me. Is this really coded this way? Or did it happen by chance? Mutombo started to shake and bake, did crossovers and spin-moves at the 3PT line...passed to Head who made the 3. Mutombo did this twice or even three times. I got so mad...is this All Stars or what the f..? In reality Shaq does some crazy stuff at the All Star game but in 2k9? I could not believe my eyes.

I want to enjoy the game but it gets boring. Yes, I do have problems with my shot selection but it is unbalanced. All players suck but Al Harrington is the only one to run himself free...and it is way too easy to score with him. He makes 70% of his shots. And another boring thing is that I can drive to the hoop each time and get two freethrows.

I had thought that my sliders are great for my style and level but the Rockets game was just a nightmare.

[fasz]

if u can't hit a shot try to change sliders/settings

[Leander]

Well I can in my other games. It was just in the game vs. Houston impossible.

[Spree#8]

Damn! While reading Leander's post I had a feeling that I'm reading a review of the finals against the Rockets in my association which I'm playing now. Overall I think I play pretty good D, but i totally can't stop the Rockets, specially Yao. When he gets the ball, it's all over, trying to defend him is totally senseless. In game 2 he had about 40 points and 20 rebounds (about 15 were offensive) and played on extremely high FG%. So far I have played 3 games and all looked the same. At halftime I have an about 5-point lead (in game 3 it was even 13 points) and extend it till about the half of 3rd quarter. At that moment, the Rockets suddenly become unstoppable monsters and make every shot, even a fade-away 3-pointer with hands of 2 my players on their forehead while I miss everything, even dunks and layups. All Rockets' actions look also the same - Alston/T-Mac/Battier/Artest shoot a three (or Scola from mid-range) and 80% of the time they miss it. Then, although 2 or 3 of my players trying to get the rebound, Yao gets it all the time and dunks it in my face or hits a layup/short range jumper. That's totally unrealistic. Yao isn't such a king of the boards in real life just because he is tall as hell and has long arms. Of course, after like 2 minutes of this, my lead is all gone. I enter the 4th with about 5 point deficit. At the beginning of the 4th, I usually perform a run and tie the score or even take a small lead and then keep up with them until there are about 2 minutes left. Then, the Yao show starts again and there's nothing I can do about it. In game 2 I had a 7-point lead I think before that and finally lost the game by 10. It made me so pissed off that I nearly broke my keyboard. In game 3 there was a little exception, because somehow I managed to still keep up when there was 45 seconds left and I was leading 88-87. Sheed was uncovered on mid-range, so I passed the ball to him, shot and... surprise... he made it! So it's now 90-87. They made a 2-point shot, 90-89. In next possession I missed and they took a timeout, 7 seconds left. I would have lost this game for sure if I hadn't stolen the inbound pass. When it happened, I immediately took a timeout with 5 seconds left, inbounded and just escaped from the Rockets' players until the clock ran out.

So the Rockets lead the series 2-1. In theory, still anything can happen but I don't believe I can win. With Rockets playing like this and Yao being totally unstoppable, those finals are nothing but a huge pain in the ass. Of course, I want the game to be difficult and demanding (as everyone), but not impossible to play. I will be grateful for any tips about defending Yao.

[fasz]

maybe you can set the clutch sliders down to 20 or 10 , I think it will help for those impossible CPU returns

[Leander]

I play without clutch. I had a great game against the Mavs, Crawford scored 30 points, hit 6/8 from downtown. Lee who has shot below 40% in other games had 27 as well. I had a 20 point lead but lost by 1. I got outscored 24-42 in the last quarter. If the cpu gets off a shot in the last seconds I is always a basket. Buzzer beater after buzzer beater. I also did not play well in the last quarter as I had to catch my train and did not concentrate on the game that much.

The blocking animation sometimes goes through the other player and I do not touch the ball. Kind of broken. Nevertheless, I have a timing problem. I jump slightly too late as I am still used to Live 2005. I had my first manual blocks ever though. LOL With Curry? No. Chandler? No. Jamal Crawford blocked four shots. LOL

Maybe my rules were too hard...I used 85 for charging and blocking fouls, 65 for reaching in and 75 for loose balls and shooting fouls. I fouled the cpu very often and also got fouled a lot. I nearly got fouled each time I had the ball and pressed the dual player button. Don't know why. The AI is quite annoying because they always substitute a player after he's commited ONE foul. Star players who commit a foul in the first minutes do not return for a very long time.

[Patr1ck]

The thing I recently learned about offensive boards by the cpu is it is the result of sliders. If you have help defense and fast break coaching sliders too high and you try to manually help rebound with a guard or small forward, your big man will just run away from the basket while the shot is in the air! This is due to him "switching" to guard an open man. This results in an offensive rebound all the time. Also, if you pay attention, you will see alot of missed shots seem to come off the rim towards the offensive rebounder.

Yao is a bitch on the offensive boards in 2k9, but I have done pretty well with the strategy of attacking him on offense and getting him in foul trouble. I recently had Rafer Alston destroy my double digit lead with 3 straight 3 pointers. It was my fault since I backed off him too far.

Leander, what are these sliders at?

Help Defense Strength and Help defense coach profile tendency
Defensive Pressure coach profile
On-Ball defense
Blocking
Contest Shots
Vertical
Passing Lanes

[Leander]

Just had a great game against Orlando and won 107-98. My sliders are almost perfect for the statistics I'd like to get. Only rebounds and assists are too high but I don't think there is a solution to this. The cpu team just shoots so much! They make about 45% of their shots and if I increase their shooting sliders they would score way too many points. All other stats are fine in my opinion. There are no perfect sliders for each and every player but they have to be personalized. I don't play much and don't know all the tactics and strategic plays by heart so I have to enjoy the game on a level other guys on the forum would be bored with.

I do not even need to edit the playbooks as the superstars take the most shots of the cpu team. Howard had over 30 along with 19 boards and 3 blocked shots. Personally, I do not want to cheese but play realistically. I only have around 30 of 100 points per game in the paint.

PDub When my sliders are done I will post them.

I recorded a small video of situations in which I just thought to block a shot but nothing happened. My players jumped but did not get the ball. It seems as if they do not even face the right direction. In Live those would have been blocks for sure.

Please watch the clip I am going to post and comment on it!

[video online soon]

EDIT Here's the video. CLick on high quality and fullscreen. Forgot to disable the controls in the second scene, sorry. As I am using a 3rd party driver for my XBOX controller the slow motion-buttons don't work. They are only very fast. Well, you'll see. Too tired to upload a better video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaL_nMU56rc

[fasz]

i think you don't have the right timing , in your first attempt you jumped to soon , my theorie for blocking shot is like release timing for shots , I think 2K count the block only when your player got his hand higher on top of his jump and just a lil bit after. look on your first attempt, @ 0:09 , turkoglu take his shot you are already in air , if you have wait for a second and jump the block will be good , if you jump to soon the player only make wind with his hand .

and on second attempt , you jumped too late and maybe too much behind the player if you look closely your hand is behind the ball when he try to block the shot .

[Patr1ck]

I rarely get blocks on jumpshots. Most blocks should come from layup attempts and weak inside shots. Here's what I am talking about.

[fasz]

wow dubdub your a beast on shot blocking !!!!
*off topic** I see that you're still playin with LAC ^^ !! maybe a mixtape soon ? :p like old time !!

[Patr1ck]

I'm not really a beast. Those are most of the saved highlights from the ones I did block. There have been many failed attempts in every game I play. Many that made me frustrated like Leander. Shots I thought that should have been blocked. There was even one against the infamous layup that has no collision detection, my hand went right through the ball.
The first clip where DeAndre Jordan blocked two shots on one play just felt awesome. Short story about the Lebron block, he went to the rack to dunk ten straight possessions. I blocked the first 3, he dunked the last 7, lol.

One thing I did to improve my timing was to actually let the cpu go up with a shot by controlling a big man and backing off of a post player so the cpu would pass to him and he would put up a shot. I let many shots go in but I think it improved my timing, especially when trying to manually play help defense.

[Leander]

Nice blocks but I do not have to be as good as you because the Knicks don't have Camby. The Knicks are really lousy shotblockers.

Sometimes the cpu shoots from the corner of the 3PT line. This is some sort of animation issue as I jump right in front of the cpu player but do not block its shot. I think this shot cannot be rejected at all, can it?

PS I loved the blocks from behind in Live 2005. Can they be done in 2k9?

[Patr1ck]

I loved the blocks from behind in Live 2005. Can they be done in 2k9?

Didn't you watch the whole video?

[Leander]

Now I did.

LOL @ double-team action. Kaman and Camby with the block...who got it?

[Patr1ck]

I think Kaman got the block credit. If Kaman didn't, Camby was going to get yammed on. But yeah, 2K9 has similar scenario animations for blocks from behind. They have a much smoother transition than the ones in Live 2005, though. I don't have any timing down, but if you go for it you might get it.