Volatility came up as a topic again in the MFN-19 forums after Training Camp, so I decided it was time to write a post about volatility and the draft since it seems to be something that rookie players mess up on a lot. (Also, I've been meaning to write this post for a while and just haven't had the time or the motivation. I still don't really have the time, but hey, that four hours of work I have to do tonight will just do itself [or I'll be up to 0200].)

I should also note that I had some horrible drafts in a few leagues recently because I straight up forgot about them and then didn't have the time to set the board like I would like. I also will break from this strategy if the league has a hyper-competitive draft culture (like 75). There my drafts will look somewhat strange in the first three rounds.

The Basics

Let's start with some basics:

Volatility – This attribute isn't in the official game documentation that I'm aware of, but there are plenty of threads about it. (Punisher hook these kind people up with some knowledge.) For our purposes, this attribute determines how likely a player is to move up or down in training camp AND to a lesser degree how far up or down. A high volatility player with a high overall potential will bust much more than he will go up; likewise, a high volatility player that starts with a lower overall potential will boom much more than he will bust.

Initial Training Camp – THIS IS KEY! If you get nothing from this post, understand this: A player that busts (-6 to -10 typical range) in training camp will continue to bust until he falls to his hidden potential. A player that booms in training camp will continue to boom until his hidden potential is met. If you have a player that goes -10 his first camp, HE WILL NOT IMPROVE his second camp. JDB has discussed changing this in the future, but for now, booming and busting is linear.

Presorting Players by Position – One thing I should note. I presort players by the position I will have them play when I set a draft board. I always set my board with best player available in mind and tweak as necessary. So if a RB is listed as a 70 in my weights, but as a 78 WR, he gets sorted as a WR since that is where he will play. I basically look at every single player regardless of whether the player is going to make it to my draft board or not.

The Draft

Keeping the basics in mind, I'm going to explain how I approach the draft. What I'm about to say are not hard and fast rules even for myself, and there are a number of players that are successful with draft that will surely disagree with me. Consider these pointers for starting to set up a board.

First Round
I never want to waste a first round pick, so I start by manually placing all players with >=80 overall potential (my weights) and <=20 volatility on my draft board. (I really don't like to go above 20 vol in the first round, but I will. I will also go as high as 25 in a weak draft at the top.) Only then do I compare the draft board with my roster to determine my key needs and order to take those players. I then shuffle the players with >=90 potential that meet my key needs in my manual list to the top. I typically end up with 5-10 top players. Everyone else I leave in order of best player.

Once I have the 5-10 players with the highest potential and the lowest volatility at the top of my board, then I look at the remaining high potential, high volatility players left on the board. I may at this point add the highest (usually >=95 overall potential) to my draft board under my top picks if the player has decent secondary attributes or can position switch if he busts at his listed position.

Two Examples
WR with the following attributes: Speed, Acceleration, and Ball Carry >=90, Volatility >=80. This guy is a bust candidate. If he busts at WR, though, he could still be an effective running back, especially in my offense that is going to throw the ball a lot. So I would add him to my draft board under my top picks. If his secondary attributes are high enough, I may make him a top pick regardless.

DB with the following attributes: Speed, Acceleration, and Punish >=90 or Speed, Acceleration, and Tackle >=90. Even if such a player has a high volatility rating, he can be useful if he busts or can be a position switch candidate. If he doesn't bust, you have a great all around player.

Second Round
I rarely want to waste a second round pick. But I will start to gamble more in this round. If there is a >=90 overall player still on the board, I will probably put that guy on top of my draft board even if he has a high volatility. The reward is too great to pass up.

In general, though, I do something similar in this round as I do in the first round. I start by resetting my draft board and adding all of the players with a volatility of <=30-50. I don't go above 50 with this round unless it's a position of need. The reason here is that I have seen some 50 volatility players go -4 to -6. I will make exceptions for need players. When we're talking about a player that should be mid-80s overall dropping into the 70s that hurts a lot.

Third and Fourth Round
By the time I get to the third and fourth round, I will draft the best available player to an extent. This means that I will still leave players with extremely high volatility off of my draft board if they don't have good secondary attributes or if they do not meet a position of need. This is where presorting players comes into play.

Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Round
Here's where I completely reverse strategy and start pulling all of the players with <=70 volatility off of my board. The exception here is a player that meets a need that I can get early in the fifth round (I will fight hard for these players, especially those rare CBs with good M2M, Punish, and Speed that fall because they have crappy tackling). The other exception I make is for players playing out of position like a 15 Speed LB with extremely good Strength, Acceleration, Pass Rush, and Rush Defense. That player is a DT. I will draft him all day long and make him a DT. Other than these exceptions, the higher the volatility the better for these rounds.

The Breakdown
My past three drafts in MFN-19, which is the league I probably care about the most since it was the first one I joined, are a good example of how this strategy plays out. These are the current overall scores of the players I took in the first through third rounds of those drafts. These drafts show the consistency I'm looking for in drafting a sustainable team (even if I end up trading some of these players later).

First Round
2023 - N/A
2024 - 93 (30 vol player that fell)
2025 - 84

Second Round
2023 - 84
2024 - 80 (QB so my weights get weird here)
2025 - 88, 82 (two mid-vol OL that did not bust)

Third Round
2023 - 64, 77 (the 64 here is a result of how this league over drafts DBs and my weights changing)
2024 - 77, 82
2025 - 82, 63 (63 is a DB that busted hard)

Thanks so much for this and your posts on attribute weights. For a newbie like me, they have been invaluable.

Nice read Seth..very helpful.

Thanks for what you do,Bro. I know it doesn't go unnoticed.

Part 2: Drafting, Player Potential, and Volatility in 0.4.3

There has been a lot of chatter about bigger busts and not as many booms in drafting in 0.4.3, so it's a good time to reprise this thread.

OK - What changed?

The big change in 0.4.3 is that late round picks (think 5-7) have amplified boom and busts.

Whether a player booms or busts is still random and dependent on Volatility, but the boom or bust will be bigger with these picks. This helps stabilize the draft and leagues because it helps generate more _average_ players since the late round players have lower overall scores. Getting a big boom in these rounds probably means that that player will still never be a full time starter, but he will at least make your team.

About that Volatility thing again...

When you draft a player, you are drafting a player based on their potential - that blue part of their attribute bar. Potential is a commodity. The more potential, the more the player should be worth.

Why not a highly theoretical metaphor to describe this?

Like all commodities, potential comes with a price. Some times your investment in Apple in 2001 sets you up for life. Sometimes you invest in Enron instead and end up resenting your broker. Volatility is the indicator of how big your pay day or resentment will be.

You can think about like this. Each player attribute has a median baseline at the time of creation that is somewhere between their current actual score and their potential score. Volatility tells you how far they will deviate from that median score.

A booming player (+5 overall potential) deviates in a positive direction to such an excessive amount that it exceeds the listed potential. That's why you see 60 potential accuracy QBs becoming 100 accuracy QBs. (Seriously, you should draft every 100 Intelligence QB with 90+ volatility that you see starting in round 4.) Even booming players may never max out any one attribute especially if their starting functional value was so low. It's really hard to go from 20 functional accuracy to 100 to stick with QBs.

Similarly, a bust (-5 overall potential) deviates in a negative direction and causes a potential reset. This is where it's important to remember that your investment was always based on potential and not actual player attributes.

But, but, but ... there are so many more "busts" ...

Yes, there are going to be more busts in a draft than booms. The reason why is because of potential again.

Many important player attributes are static. That means that if you take the value of these attributes that is the minimum value of the player.

Because dynamic attributes are all rolled against Volatility individually, there is a good chance that many of them will not reach their potential and the player's overall score will go down. Depending on how your weights are set up, this fall can appear much worse than it might actually be. (I recently had this happen with a WR in MFN-19 that had 0 Volatility. My first set of weights showed that he had a much worse camp than a set of weights that focused in on his static attributes.)

It's also important to consider where a player was in terms of potential before training camp. A 95 potential player that falls 9 overall points is unfortunate, but he's still an 86 overall player. And should otherwise continue to have a stellar career.

So what about that "boom/bust bonus bump"?

Players that get the boom/bust bonus modification will have their volatility ratings go up. This has been tracked, but as far as I know, it is random what players will get it. Watch your vol rating when drafting. (Also, low Vol late round players are now more attractive to draft.)