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[ebergeron]

Hi,

I just want to introduce myself, my name is Eric Bergeron and I am with the Web Sim Hockey team. I will keep you informed about what's new with our game and answer any question you may have.

First, here are some basic information about who we are and what we do:

It began as an ambitious personal project in 2005. However, Web Sim Hockey quickly grew to become a reference in online hockey manager games in North America, especially in Canada, where we come from.

Officially launched in July 2009, the site has gained more and more stability and features over time as well as an ever-growing user base, which makes it today a vast hockey playground to share with thousands of other armchair GMs.

Last march, we launched a brand new version 2.0 of our game, which included massive upgrades and will allow us to continue to improve the game for years to come.

Along with the launch, we also announced our new partnership with the NHLPA, making us the only officially licensed online hockey manager out there. They recognized our passion and years of hard work, which now allows us to use the player pictures for an much improved feel of authenticity.


The goal of the game

You are put in the seat of the general manager (GM) of a professional hockey team. Your ultimate goal? Get the highest honors and be designated as one of the best managers in Web Sim Hockey.

To do so, you have to put together the greatest hockey team possible using draft picks, trades, and signing free agents.

You manage your team(s) on a daily basis, monitoring results and making the necessary changes to lineups, strategies, and game plans. You also oversee the team’s finances, arena, investments, team payroll, etc.

You do all this in a wide range of available league modes, such as Retro NHL, Fictional or Real NHL player sets, with over 20 customizable league rules that are voted or pre-selected by the league owner.

Each league is made of 12 or 24 GMs, no more, no less. You can play in as many league as you want, there is no limit.

A few facts and stats

- 500+ active leagues
- 10,000+ teams managed every dayy
- 99% renewal rate (league coming back season after season)
- Game of the year 2012, as voted on OnlineSportManagers.com.
- Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, uses the simulator for their Sports Administration Program (Business of hockey course) as well as other schools in Quebec.
- Ability to import existing leagues from other simulators such as EHM, FHM, STHL, etc. We provide an excel file and the league owner assigns the players, coaches and draft picks to their team.

Our Community

There's alot going on in the community, whether it's on the forums, our facebook-like news feed, our embedded chat system or GM standings, there is always someone to talk to or something to read.

Each GM has attributes and statuses that ranks them in various fashions:

- Hockey attribute: The team owner sets a hockey objective for the season and you get a note on 100 depending on your results.
- Finance attribute: The owner evaluates your performance to bring in as much income as possible through Finance investments, arena management and payroll budget.
- Social status: We evaluate your social interactions with your peers: Messages/comments posted, news article written, etc.
- Participation status: In percentage, we track how each GM participates: % Of valid lineups, % of trade offers responded within 48hrs, % of daily connection, etc.
- Experience status: Gain experience points each time one of your team plays a game.
- Reputation status: Earn reputation points when you reach a milestone by winning a badge but beware as you can also loose points if you do not behave properly (being expelled of a league, quitting a league without notice, etc).

There is also a brand new Mentorship group of GMs that is always available to answer questions for anyone who is new to the game. You can talk with them directly for any tip you may need.

If you have a more intricate question, our team will answer your question with the utmost respect and efficiency.

How to start playing?

There are two main ways to play the game:

1- As a GM of a team in a brand new league (19.95$ for the first season, total of about 8 months of play including a 26 rounds player draft, and 14.95$ for the following seasons.)
2- As an Interim GM of an existing league (Free of charge for the current season, which means anything between a few days/week and a few months of play)

In both cases, you can be in as many leagues as you want, but no more than one team per league of course.

It's easy to manage a team thanks to our News Feed that keeps you informed and leads you to all the actions that needs your attention.

You could join one or two leagues as an Interim GMs and then if you like it, try the full experience and set your own franchise from the ground up.


Thanks to the HF Boards community for allowing us to be here and I hope you will enjoy our game,

Cheers!

Eric Bergeron
[email protected]
www.websimhockey.com

Click to read more...

 

[ebergeron]

A FLEXIBLE ONLINE SIMULATION EXPERIENCE

Since our first Virtual Player Evolution league went online back in 2007, we have allowed many different types of game play, to accommodate as many people as possible.

First things first, no matter the league you play in, it will always be one of two possible player evolution:

VIRTUAL EVOLUTION

- Player attributes are re-evaluated twice a year: once at mid-season and once at the end of the season.
- The evolution is based only on known factors. Each player has a Potential that they should reach under normal circumstances at the age of 30.

- Player evolution does not take performance (real or virtual) into account.

- This mode allows you to have better control over your team as it's possible to determine in advance how good your player will become. The "Potential" attribute represents players' overall at age 30.

REAL EVOLUTION

- Player attributes are re-evaluated once at the end of the season.
- Player attribute evolution is only based on their real performances in the NHL.
- At the end of a Web Sim Hockey season, the attributes are updated using the statistics from the last two seasons (the percentage varies depending on the league rule).
- Any league using this mode will need to wait until the end of the current season before being able to continue with their next season (except with Retro leagues).

Moreover, every league can start with a Player set of their choosing. We are very flexible in that regard. Here is a list of player sets that we have so far (more will come):

- NHL 1983-84 to today
- Fictive player sets
- KHL set (soon available)
- NHL oldies 1928
- Others, on demand, user created or not

You can take a look at our player attributes for each of those sets by going at this page: http://websimhockey.com/?u=/Community/AttributesCentral. Just look for "NHL Players 12-13 (WebSim)".

We generate the players attributes ourselves, after every NHL season, more or less a week after the regular season is over. The attributes are ALWAYS generated using complex formulas, with a wide array of statistics: goals, assists, points, +/-, PIM, time on ice, turnovers (for/against), blocked shots, etc. There is no manipulation of the attributes on a player by player basis.

NHL PROSPECTS

In addition to the players with attributes, we also have a PROSPECTS concept. By definition, a player is considered a prospect on Web Sim Hockey if he meets all of those criterias:

- He was drafted in the past 3 NHL Entry Drafts
- He was drafted in the 1st or 2nd round only
- He never played more than 39 games in one full NHL season

Our leagues can enable the prospect feature by voting for or against it when the league starts. If they vote for it, then GMs can draft up to 2 prospects during the initial draft. They can draft more prospects in the off-season drafts.

A prospect converts to a player with attributes when he has played 40 games or more in the NHL during a full season. They are available to be added in every league only once a year: in april when we do our player attributes file.

LEAGUES WITH NHL ROSTERS

Start your league by drafting a complete NHL team with their full roster. If you would do that today, you would draft among the 30 NHL teams and end up with their current players (with the latest trades and acquisitions), but also with their prospects already in your team. The rest of the game is exactly the same, except for the fact that there is no player draft in the first season.

 

[ebergeron]

What’s new with Web Sim Hockey 2.0? Loads!

- Pictures of real players thanks to our licensing agreement with the NHLPA
- Completely revamped interface
- Additional people, who make up the GM’s entourage (team owner, assistant-coach, doctor, etc.), give you important information and your objectives
- News feed to help you better manage all of your leagues
- New multi-league chat system
- Badges you can earn thanks to your accomplishments
- Inter-league GM rankings
- GM Hockey and Finance attributes to better evaluate your skills
- GM status to monitor your involvement with your team(s): Experience, Reputation, Social, and Participation
- New multi-league messaging system
- And much (much!) more!

 

[ebergeron]

Our Player Sets Concept:

 

[ebergeron]

Screenshots (Sorry for the length of this message):

Interim GM Position available + Default view on 1980x1080.

Your Finance Situation with the owner

Earn different badges as you progress

Web Sim Journal: Every important news about your league

Top Scorer page

Every GM has his own personal page with useful information and stats

Sending messages to anyone from your leagues or among your friends is very easy, as well as communicating with our support team.

Pre-game report

Create your own custom league and choose a player set

News Feed with information on all your leagues in real-time!

 

[HanSolo]

Owner: Fat guy
Trade: Getzlaf+Nash+Hodgson+1st round for Malkin+Krejci
Players: Neal is Selanne. So is Eberle, Giroux, Pacioretty, Tavares, Karlsson, Schenn and other...but not Malkin.

I'm sold.

 

[ebergeron]

Anyone who would like to manage a team, now is a good time! There are 9 teams looking for an Interim GM:

8 teams for USHL who is just starting their off-season draft, after replacement will be found. One team is also available in the CCHL league.

League: USHL
Commissioner: MATTHEW TIETZ
Trade Committee: MATTHEW BOLTON, MATT GRAINDA, JASON TIESSEN, ANDY ROLLING

Season: 2012-2013 (3rd)
Player Evolution: Real
Player Set: NHL PLAYERS 2013 (WEBSIM)
STEP: POST-SEASON DRAFT


* UPDATE: This league found all GMs they needed.

 

[ebergeron]

Every year when the regular season is over we release a full set of NHL players attributes.

The attributes are generated using 100% of the players stats of the current season, using complex formulas that are fair to all players. With so many stats available today, it is much easier to create attributes that represent every player accurately.


Click here to Download NHL Player set

Information about our methodology:

Attributes creation

A player must play a minimum of games during his NHL season to be added to the player set. The number of games varies depending on the following scenarios and is equally the same for both real and virtual player evolution mode.

New players
Rookie or veteran, a player who*was not*in the previous NHL player set must play a minimum of*40 games*to be created and added to the new player set. The minimum is*15 games*for a goalie (26 and 10 games respectively because of the lockout this year).

Existing players
A player who is already in the previous NHL player set must play a minimum of*15 games*to be created and added to the new player set. The minimum is*5 games*for a goalie. (8 games instead of 15 because of the lockout for this year only)

The statistics used to create the attributes are listed below:

Players

Durability: Games played
Stamina: Minutes played
Discipline: Penalty minutes
Strength: Height + Weight/Height ratio
Intensity:*Body checks, Blocked shots, Takeaways & Giveaways
Speed: Weight, Height & Shots/game
Finesse: Points/Game & Speed
Hockey Sense: Points/Game & +/-
Faceoffs: *Faceoff %
Passing: Assists/Game
Shooting: Goals/Game
Defense: Blocked shots/Game, +-, Takeaways & Giveaways, PK Time on ice*
Leadership: Captain/Assistant & Experience
Experience: Games played (career)
Potential: Expected overall at the age of 30, calculated using*the actual overall and player age.
Overall: Average of all attributes (some exceptions apply)
Fighting: Major penalties

Goalies

Durability: Games played
Stamina: Shots received and Durability
Discipline: Penalty minutes
Strength: Height & Weight
Intensity: Wins & Minutes played
Speed: Goal against average
Stick handling (finesse): Win %
Hockey sense: Shutouts, Intensity, Speed, Stick Handling & Saves
Passing: Goals, Assists and Hockey Sense
Shot block (saves): Save %
Leadership: Captain,*Age & Expérience
Experience: Games played (career)
Potential: Expected overall at the age of 30, calculated from the actual overall and player age.
Overall: Average of all attributes (some exceptions apply)

 

[ebergeron]

League NASHL is looking for 6 interim GMs for a full season!

First come, first served.

 

[alko]

look very nice.

BUT..... Its not for free. Sorry, without me.

 

[ebergeron]

look very nice.

BUT..... Its not for free. Sorry, without me.

Thanks for taking the time to post on this topic, it's good to see that it got your curiosity.

You say it is not free, that is true if you wish to have your own team for many years and build it with a full 26 rounds player draft, choose your city, head coach, etc.

But you can play for free as an interim GM in as many leagues as you want, one team per league maximum. But you could easily manage 5 to 10 teams at the same time, at no charge.

The only thing is that the longest you can play for free with one team is one season.

As long as you take care of those teams and manage them properly, your reputation in the community will be good.

Now, why do we charge 19.95$ for your first season (6-8months of play) and 14.95$ for renewals?

We strongly believe in Pay to Play rather than Pay to win or Free for all. Here is why:

- It ensures a better (and greatly needed for a game like this) user engagement.

- Every GM has the same tools, the same options and features.

- It focuses the game on quality rather than quantity. It's better to have 500 healthy leagues than 2000 leagues in bad shape.

- It allows us to offer a great GM support service, as well as a continuous development of the game. If it was not for pay to play, the game would never be where it's at right now. The project would most likely be dead in the water or with alot of bugs, nobody working on it full time, etc. Right now we are a team of 5 working full time on the game, making sure you get the best there is from us.

You have nothing to lose in coming over and trying the game. The only thing now is that there is a very limited number of available English teams. They come and go very quickly.

What we need now is for people to get to know us better, because once they do, our statistics show that they stay with us and enjoy the game. We like to think of ourselves as the hockey facebook. It started small in Quebec, then grew very big in a few years and it is now ready to reach the anglophone world.

Here's a few stats:

Total leagues: 536
League that started with NHL roster: 41
Retro leagues: 71
12-Team leagues: 116
24-Team leagues: 420
French Leagues: 486
English Leagues: 50 You guys can do better than that
Real Player Evolution leagues: 213
Virtual Player Evolution leagues: 323

Healthy leagues:

Leagues with 5+ available teams: 9.14%
Leagues with 2 to 4 available teams: 21.64%
Leagues with 1 available team: 14.55%
Leagues with no available team: 54.66%

Almost 91% of our leagues have less than 4 teams available.

If we take only the 50 english leagues, then the stats are much more impressive, because there are alot of people who would like to play the game at the moment but Free teams are quickly taken.

At this current time, there are only 7 available teams looking for interim GM across all 50 anglophone leagues.

We are at a point where people need to make that jump in and try it. What is there to loose?

If you decide to try a new league and pay for it, we will refund your money back within 60 days if you are not happy with the game.

I hope these information will help,

 

[alko]

Thanks for taking the time to post on this topic, it's good to see that it got your curiosity.

You have my curiosity, that is correct.

1. When i want to play one season for free? what should i do?
2. And what paying options do you offer? Lets say, im from Slovakia.

 

[ebergeron]

You have my curiosity, that is correct.

1. When i want to play one season for free? what should i do?

To play for free, you must join a league as Interim GM.

1. Create your GM account
2. You will be redirected to your news feed. Take the time to read the information given by your staff and most importantly, make sure to complete the tutorials that are proposed to you. They are basic tutorials that will help you find your way on the site.

3. Follow the instructions on the image below to find a league looking for Interim GMs, directly from your news feed.

You have my curiosity, that is correct.

2. And what paying options do you offer? Lets say, im from Slovakia

All payments are made using Paypal. You don't need to own a paypal account, you are redirected to paypal where you can make the payment with your credit card. Once payment is made, you are redirected to our site with your updated payment status.

Otherwise we also accept checks but since you're from Slovakia, Paypal would probably best .

 

[Market Street Heroes]

One issue appears to be that there are too many leagues (in the pay section). You have a smattering of leagues with 3-6 GM's waiting months to HOPEFULLY fill the rest of the spots. Most people don't want to pay $20 to join a league and have to wait 3 months to start playing.

You should consolidate them. Or better yet, do not allow people to create public leagues. You and your staff should create 3-4 leagues with different paramaters (virtual / real / old timers / etc...) and then wait for those to fill up. When one fills up , create another with the same parameters.

Just my opinion though.

 

[ebergeron]

One issue appears to be that there are too many leagues (in the pay section). You have a smattering of leagues with 3-6 GM's waiting months to HOPEFULLY fill the rest of the spots. Most people don't want to pay $20 to join a league and have to wait 3 months to start playing.

You should consolidate them. Or better yet, do not allow people to create public leagues. You and your staff should create 3-4 leagues with different paramaters (virtual / real / old timers / etc...) and then wait for those to fill up. When one fills up , create another with the same parameters.

Just my opinion though.

It's funny that you are saying this because we are just about to go through an overhaul of that section and it will be just like you just said.

There will be 2 leagues created automatically, one for each player evolution mode. Those leagues will be only 12 GMs so they will fill up quickly.

They will be the best option if you want to start in a new league rapidly.

Private leagues will remain available as they are, 100% customizable, but the league owner will have the option to use a password or not. BEfore, they used "public" leagues if they wanted a league that's opened to all.

That didnt work out too well because like you said, people are spreaded out through too many leagues.

This will be fixed, and thanks for reporting it.

 

[Market Street Heroes]

It's funny that you are saying this because we are just about to go through an overhaul of that section and it will be just like you just said.

There will be 2 leagues created automatically, one for each player evolution mode. Those leagues will be only 12 GMs so they will fill up quickly.

They will be the best option if you want to start in a new league rapidly.

Private leagues will remain available as they are, 100% customizable, but the league owner will have the option to use a password or not. BEfore, they used "public" leagues if they wanted a league that's opened to all.

That didnt work out too well because like you said, people are spreaded out through too many leagues.

This will be fixed, and thanks for reporting it.

Great. The game looks fun, it just sucks that I'm waiting on 3 more GM's til the league i'm in can start

 

[ebergeron]

It will start anytime now.. it's usually much faster to find the last 3 GMs.

 

[Market Street Heroes]

My league is having some troubles with the draft. A couple people have auto draft on and it's not selecting the players in their auto draft queue. Thus the rest of the league sits around and waits for 48 hours

 

[ebergeron]

My league is having some troubles with the draft. A couple people have auto draft on and it's not selecting the players in their auto draft queue. Thus the rest of the league sits around and waits for 48 hours

They must make sure to select the round their list is associated to.

Also, in order for the automated draft to work, a draft schedule needs to be in place.

The league commissioner can attempt to contact the GM who is blocking the draft but once you have a draft schedule in place, that shouldn't be a problem anymore.

If your league is experiencing any issue or if you have any question, you can open a support ticket at the message page.

Good luck with your draft!

 

[ebergeron]

League Import

You're reading this topic, thinking it might be nice to have your existing simulated league on websimhockey?

Whether it's on EHM, FHL, STHS or any other simulator, we can import your team rosters already assigned to the right GMs, including:

- Players from our current NHL set
- Head coaches
- Cities
- Prospects (drafted in 1st or 2nd round of the past 3 NHL drafts)

We are very flexible in what you can do, including:

- Ability to start from scratch with a full player draft (26 rounds)
- Use an import file and do a short draft (2, 4, 6 rounds per example)
- Import your players but sign new coaches
- Start with NHL lineups, etc

If you have anything specific you would like, ask us and we might as well do it if we can.

The cost?

At this point you probably know that we are a pay to play platform, but we do have a promotion that is ongoing:

Import your existing league to Web Sim Hockey (24 or 12 teams) for FREE for the first season.

So you get a full 6-8 months season at no charge for the whole league. You can find out if you like the sim or not but so far, every league that transfered over has never looked back.

Why transfer to websim?

The Leagues that transfer to websim are doing it mainly because it is so simple to play the game because every action is done directly on the site, saving alot of valuable time to focus on managing their team.

It's definitely a turn key solution, with all kinds of customizable league rules, commissioner tools and gm support, you are in good hands

Feel free to ask if you have any question, here or privately.

Thanks!

 

[ebergeron]

Many teams are now available and looking for an Interim GM (at no charge) for a full season!

To join in, you can follow the instructions included in the link below (the image is showing in a previous post of mine).

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/7168487/Newsletter/instructions_interim_en_p.jpg

 

[ebergeron]

All positions are filled now and have been for a few days. Thanks to those who joined!

What it means is that all our 50+ anglophone leagues are currently full.

Today we did a site update that included the following:

- Arena Management: You can now create groups of teams to setup your ticket costs for the season. When playing home, the costs will be automatically set to the group your opponent is in. Check it out at GM Office > Arena page.

- New WSH Quick Start leagues! 12-Team leagues, one for each evo type, with default rules. Only 9.99$ to join, 50% off the regular price. That means around 1.50$ per month to play since a full season is about 6-8 months.

If you read this post and would like to start with your own team, the new discounted 12-team leagues are your best bet to start as soon as possible.

Or else, there are always more experienced GMs looking for GMs to join their private league. You can ask to join these leagues by sending a request to the league owner, from the League Central page.

 

[ebergeron]

Teams are available again, as many leagues end their season at this time of year.

That means you can join a league just in time for the off-season draft and free agents signing.

One of the leagues looking for gms is the MRHL, a great retro league that started in 1983, now intering our 6th season already. I have been in this league myself since the very start with the NHL 83-84 player set. There are 2 simulations per day, one at 10am and one at 10pm ET.

Player attributes for this league change every season, following their real career they had.

That means a player like Brett Hull would be quite average for a few years and then bloom to stardom just like he did in the NHL. This mode is called Retro Real Player Evolution and is quite unique in its genre.

Other standard leagues are looking for Interim GMs as well (no charge for the current season), so come take a look: first come, first serve and they don't stay available for too long.

Seeya in the MRHL!

 

[ebergeron]

Quick Start WSH Leagues status:

Virtual Evo: 11 GMs found, only 1 needed.
Real Evo: 6 GMs found, only 6 needed.

To join, click "GM of a new team" filter on the bottom left.

City draft and elections will begin as soon as 12 GMs have joined, followed by a full 26-round online player draft.

A quick start league is open to all, no password required, and is offered at a reduced cost of 9.99$ for the first season (around 6-8month of daily management).

 

[ebergeron]

The Waiting, by comedian Kevin Raphael.