In the last DevLog, we looked at how you can create your own player character and touched upon coaches. Today I want to explain in more detail how important coaches are, and what role they play in advancing your player's skills (if it isn't obvious already, a crucial one!). The goal for me while designing this was, once again, to find a simple game mechanic that mirrors real world tennis challenges. But, before we dive in, as always, make sure to wishlist Hardcourt Balls to stay on top of upcoming updates and game news!
Before we can talk about coaches, we have to talk about money. Dollars. Ca$h. Moolah. $$$. Because you need some to hire a coach! (Except if you select one as your starting perk, see previous DevLog).
You gain prize money by playing tennis. When you play an Exhibition match, typically you get a small amount of cash even if you lose, and a bigger amount if you win. The exact amount depends on who you play against (strong players will earn you significantly more). The amounts range from just a few hundred bucks to a couple ten thousand bucks per match.
When you start playing Tournaments, you'll start earning significantly more. Just like in the real world, you'll get money for the round you reach in a tournament, with the main purse going to the tournament champion. The amounts depend on each tournament and range from $5000-$10000 for a first round entry (which you'll get even if you lose) into the millions of dollars for the major tournament champions (e.g. Melbourne's champion takes home a whopping $3.5M dollars!)
[As a side note: before you can play in the major tournaments, you'll have to play at least 3 exhibition matches - or win 1 - and you'll have to reach at least into the Quarter Finals round of two of the minor tournaments with any new player]
Once you have enough money, you will be able to hire a coach. But in addition to money, there is another important restriction. You only have a choice between three coaches to hire at any one time. They are randomly generated and refresh automatically only after a completed game; or you can pay money to re-generate three new ones.
Why is this important?
Coaches come with a (randomly) predetermined set of skills that they can teach you. For example, a coach might be able to teach you a Forehand +1 skill and a Serve +1. If you already have reached that level with your player, however, the coach won't be able to teach you anything!
So, you need not only sufficient money to hire a coach, but you also need to find the right one for your current level. And with the choice limited to just three at a time, that might take a while. While initially your main obstacle to finding the right coach will be affording one, as you progress you will find that getting the right mix will become more and more important, and that you will be spending more money on reloading coaches (which, btw, always costs 10% of your total cash).
Quite obviously, the higher skilled coaches are also quite expensive. The cost to hire a coach is randomly generated but in general depends on the number and level of skills they can teach you.
So how do you learn from a coach?
After completing (lose or win) a match (exhibition, tournament, doesn't matter) you will earn a Coach Token (provided you have a coach! If you don't have one, you won't earn a token; which is another reason to start your career with a coach). Each token allows you to roll a dice against the coach's Teaching ability to upgrade one skill. Typically, coaches have a Teaching ability of 9, which means that you need to roll a 9 in order to learn the skill you're rolling for. But a few coaches can have Teaching abilities of 8 or even 7, which means you will be able to learn from them MUCH faster (2x or 3x as fast, on average). These coaches also happen to be very expensive to hire.
As you can see, it can easily take an average of 10 matches to learn a skill from a coach. And once you've learned everything the coach can teach you, you'll need to start over and find and hire another one!
I hope to be able to include Season and Career Modes in the final release version of the game. These will introduce additional player development mechanics, such as fatigue, injuries and aging. But it's too early to talk about this now.
Thanks for following along! If you have any questions, feel free to ask in the Discussion Board.
And don't forget to wishlist and tell your friends about Hardcourt Balls! It makes a huge difference.