The 3-4 is based on having defensive linemen to take up blocks and double teams to let your LBs make plays. So we want guys with the highest blockshed possible along the defensive front and speed in the LB corps to run the field and make plays.

Place players in the position I have them. The lineup has been optimized to run the 3-4 scheme. If you have exotic blitzes that drop linemen into coverage, adjust the depth chart accordingly. You don’t want Damon Harrison in coverage.

LE Dan Williams 84 overall DT (Tank Carradine 78 overall as backup to sub in nickel 2-4-5 to pass rush. 96 power move is money)

RE Brandon Williams 84 overall DT (Chandler Jones 82 overall as backup to sub in nickel 2-4-5 and passing situations. 95 power move is great)

DT Damon Harrison 83 overall

LOLB Anthony Barr 84 overall – Great Pass rusher and user defender. If you end up dropping your LOLB into coverage quite often, you might want to look for someone with better zone coverage.

MLB – (USER) Nate Askew (25 coins from EA marketplace) or Telvin Smith 83 overall

MLB – Kwon Alexander – Speed to get to the edge on tosses and blockshed to stuff runs. Play rec is a little low.

ROLB – Jadeveon Clowney 84 overall – Speed and power moves, just like Barr on the other side.

I would not suggest basing you scheme on man coverage with gold players. But it is good to mix it in to confuse the opponent. I am basing these recommendations on you playing zone cover 2,3, or 4 80% of the time.

CB – Ladarius Gunter 84 overall. Tall, decent speed, zone coverage and the second best blockshed for gold corners which is very important with the amount of outside runs this year.

CB – Darius Slay 81 overall – Tall, fast, okay zone. I heard that he plays above his overall.

CB – Quinten Rollins 84 overall – Good blockshed and tackle for an inside corner. Also his zone coverage is pretty good.

CB – Bradley Roby 81 overall – Usually a man specialist because I like to call cover 2 man in long passing downs.

FS – Dwight Lowery 84 overall – Good speed, zone and play rec. Ideal for a deep defender.  (Jimmy Ward if you run a lot of man)

SS – Nate Allen or Ron Parker both 84 overall. You can’t go wrong with either of these playmakers. I’ve heard great things about both.

QB 1. Matt Stafford or Marcus Mariota depending on if you scramble a lot or not. Johnny Manziel’s 84 is the best but he’s a little pricey
RB   1. Reggie Bush 77 overall (pass catcher)
2. Shane Vereen 78 overall (pass catcher)
3. Dri Archer (screens and tosses)
4. Chris Ivory TOTW for inside runs and short yardage
FB    1. James Casey 75 overall
WR   1. Amari Cooper 91 Overall (because he plays like a 95 for 20k) Dorial Green-Beckham 83 overall until you can afford Amari.
2. Malcom Floyd 84 overall – 96 release, 93 CIT, 86 route running
3. Keenan Allen 83 overall – 95 route running
4. 81 overall John Brown 96 speed should not be messed with.
5. Tavon Austin 75 overall – 95 speed for drags and beating man coverage with speed. Sub in when you need speed. Also should be your kick and punt returner.
6. TOTW James Jones
TE    1. Ladarius Green 92 speed. Nuff said. Or put in 75 Tavon Austin for maximum cheese
2. Jordan Cameron 84 overall Good speed and route running for TE
3. Austin Seferian-Jenkins 83 overall Football Outsiders
LT    1. Kelvin Beachum – 96 pass block. Bad run block but sub in LT #2 if you have issues and want to run the ball.
2. King Dunlap 81 Overall
LG    1. Gabe Jackson 84 overall Football outsiders – 93 pass block. Awareness and agility is low. If he isn’t working, look at Rodger Saffold who is high in both but has less pass block.
C      1. Rodney Hudson 84 overall. 89 pass block with 82 awareness. Try 83 overall Hroniss Grasu football outsiders card if you want to gamble with lower awareness but higher pass block.
RG    1. Larry Warford 80 overall. 95 pass block with 81 awareness.
RT    1. Lane Johnson – High agility will help keep up with speed rushers. Watch for his low IQ though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W3k10lr4HA

Sponsor: Bartle’s Taxonomy of player types, where I got the idea for this video and am using it as a baseline.

The 7 types of Madden players are Achievers, Traffickers, Explorers, Socializers, Killers, Dreamers and Solitarians.

Achievers – MUT master completionists, or the ones who like to see their name at the top of the leaderboard or be the first to complete a set or challenge, They get their joy from hard challenges and overcoming them. They’re the ones that want to get the highest overall cards on their squad and achieve the maximum rating for their squad overall. Madden doesn’t have a one to one relationship with Magic for obvious reasons but the guys who want the highest overalls are known as Timmy’s in that game. It doesn’t fit perfectly but we’ll go with it.

Traffickers – the auction house guru, basically the guys who sit on the auction house looking for cards they can make a profit on. So if you sell your guy a little low, they’ll buy them then re-list higher. The middle men of MUT. Our Facebook, our Amazon, Wal-Mart and Wall Street. They don’t create anything, but they provide a service of market liquidity. Basically always ensuring there will be a buyer for any card priced lower than market rate. Our stock brokers looking to squeeze every ounce of juice from the market. Whereas the real stock market has very low transaction fees, the 10% in MUT means they are destroying a lot of coins to get some for themselves. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with that. I do it too.

Explorers – The guys who like to find things like discovering ways to make coins, new nanos, new money plays or complex routes to beat defenses or on the flip side of it to shut down offenses. In magic terms this player would be Johnny – the player that likes to win with their own scheme. Like the guy who comes out in formations in no ebooks. A win with his own creation is better than a win with what everyone else is doing. His enjoyment of the game is making it his own. His win rate isn’t as high as it could be but the fact that he beat you with something original is very satisfying to him and actually really impressive to the rest of us too.

The Solitarians – Solos only player – There are a few reasons why a player will only play solos in MUT. One is they get nervous playing online and have ladder anxiety. So they grind solos to have fun with the game of football and creating their custom team.

Secondly, they just like playing against the CPU and want the achievement of getting new players and playing against an opponent who won’t use money plays and can be beaten relatively easily. They don’t like losing, they don’t like cheese or lag or the other frustrations that come with head to head.

Thirdly, solos pay much better than head to head. And they don’t want to spend money so they grind for coins through solos. They can watch netflix or TV and grind to afford their favorite players.

Socializers – People there for the game’s community, the ones on message boards, youtube, twitch. They like the game because of the community surrounding it and will share their knowledge and absorb other’s knowledge. These are the guys in clans on muthead or anyone on the MUT Subreddit because we’re all one family there. You subscribe to gutfoxx and I love you for it.

Killers – These are the guys that want to assert dominance mainly through other’s suffering, knowing people on the other side of the connection are cursing. These are the people who run nanos, money schemes, the ones who put winning above all else. This isn’t just head to head, it could be the auction house guru who corners the market on a card so they can inflate the price as seen popularly on Reddit earlier this year with BCA Russell Wilson. These are the ones who might de-rank to rookie just to destroy new players and not necessarily for the badges as they claim, these are the taunters and trash talkers you hear on the mic. In magic this is Spike – all he cares about is winning. Will cheese. A purely competitive gamer, doesn’t care about the names on the cards. Only their stats and will optimize their lineup to do best at their few plays. For example he’ll get the fastest player on defense at DE for the nano. Spike will look up nanos on youtube, run schemes they found the top players having success with. Will exploit everything possible all in the name of the win. Because that’s what they enjoy most, winning.

Dreamers – The people who still play connected franchise – A relic of an older age stubbornly in his rut, this man stays true to the building of a franchise through a mode that’s been slashed and burned more than the rainforests in the Amazon. They either dream of days gone by with good franchise modes or maybe they are the younger generations coming of age wanting to represent their team as a GM or coach and build it up not realizing the many features they’ve missed over the years, features that have been added in then taken out, all of them lost in time like tears in rain. Oh to be a kid in 2005 when franchise mode was decent. It’s stagnated almost completely since in the last decade even after the absorption of the NFL head coach dev team in 09. Which destroyed a great product to make Madden’s connected franchise supposedly better but in the end changed nothing. But these Dreamers want to roll play either as player themselves making the NFL or leading a team in the league. They are fantazisers. But often crushed by reality that Madden just doesn’t cater to their wants and needs of an immersive storyline and engaging RPG elements outside of adding to your attributes. So dream on dreamers. I applaud your continued efforts to enjoy yourself in Madden.

That’s the 7 types of Madden players, Achievers, Traffickers, Explorers, Solitarians, Socializers, Killers, Dreamers. But you might ask yourself, why does all of the names end with -er except the Solitarians. Well isn’t it obvious, they stand alone.

But what type of player are you? I’m an explorer, socializer and trafficker