I just may be stupid or did I sleep thru something. Is the play "overuse" penalty no longer in effect?

no kidding, it is something desperately needed!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Remember, defensively, the overuse penalty only applies to blitz plays.

Aaahhhh. Gotcha. Thanks. Still, is a pile of stinky steamy poo when another squad has basically (99.9%) run only one base defensive play for an entire season

I'm sure you can gameplan around that one play.

I always found the abusers the easiest opponents. Less things I had to keep an eye out for.

If this is in regard to IoT in 79, there is a post in USFL about how to beat the 46. I haven't updated it recently, but it has some ideas.

Would like to see minimums for play selection and use, similar to roster requirements, the Ai steps in when the min or max is reached.

Except what are min and max in terms of defense? The fact of the matter is that defensive overuse needs to be scrapped ... period. The only reason that overuse is a thing is that certain defenses used to dominate the offensive line: Nickel Strong CB Blitz Double LB Blitz, 4-3 Double LB Blitz, etc.

Now, QBs recognize the blitz almost immediately and throw the ball. Seriously, blitz plays produce very few sacks, and when they do produce sacks it's against Long Passing plays that are going to get sacked by most defenses with a strong defensive line anyway (but please keep running the Waggle against the 46 Heavy 2 Deep everyone).

The reason for defensive overuse therefore isn't valid anymore.

The blitzing needs to be a little stronger sure but I don't see what defensive overuse has to do with it. In football if you consistently run one defensive play it usually results in the offense raining TDs. I like the defensive overuse I just wish you could cap how many times a play is called to avoid triggering it.

I think this is an over simplified way of looking at it. In the NFL, you have schemes, and you run plays within that scheme. For example, a few years ago the Seattle Seahawks ran the Cover 3 an absurd number of times >50% of their defensive snaps were in that scheme.

You simply do not have that variation in MFN. So you have to think of each play as an entire scheme and how that scheme matches up against specific offensive plays, and then what matters most is personnel.

The reason that blitzing has to do with overuse is that pre-4.2, you could run the 4-3 Double LB blitz every down, against all sets and generate 200 sacks a season and limit teams to < 50 yards rushing.