Want something to play on your Android or iOS device while waiting for NBA games to resume during this All-Star break? NBA General Manager 2016, which comes to us courtesy of From the Bench Games, was just updated ahead of the actual NBA’s All-Star break, and it allows you to play as any one of the NBA’s 30 teams. You can buy or bid for players, improve your lineup, and compete with thousands of other general managers around the world, either in quick games or in tournaments. And speaking of the All-Star break, the game’s new update introduces the All-Star Week special event, which should be a great way for players to earn some sweet prizes. And if you’re wondering about the authenticity of the teams and players, this game features all 30 teams, almost all of the current players in today’s NBA such as Stephen Curry, LeBron James, and many others, as well as some legends such as Bill Russell and Jerry West.
Being the general manager of an NBA team is a high-stakes proposition in real life; bad trades, bad signings, and/or bad drafts could cost you your job as an NBA GM in the real world. And while you won’t exactly lose your job if you don’t do well in this game, we’re here to help you be the best general manager you could be in this game through our complete NBA General Manager 2016 strategy guide.
1. Your Choice Of Team Doesn’t Matter Much
Based on what we’ve seen, it doesn’t matter if you go for a powerful team in real life like the Golden State Warriors or a team that’s doing wretched in the real NBA like the Philadelphia 76ers. While the Warriors, of course, will start with higher-rated players than the Sixers, you’ll still have an easy go at things in the early stages of the game even if you opt for a bad team.
2. Never Expect A 100 Percent Accurate Lineup Either
In relation to the above team, don’t expect your chosen team to have a 100 percent accurate lineup. For example, when I played as the Sixers, I had some of the team’s top real-life players, including Robert Covington and Jahlil Okafor. However, Okafor, who is doing quite well in the actual NBA, was my lowest-rated player. Likewise, my “Sixers” also had the likes of Bradley Beal (Wizards) and Lou Williams (Lakers), as well as some others who are playing elsewhere in the real world. As you’ll have a chance to buy or bid for players from other teams in the actual NBA, it wouldn’t really matter much, especially once you’re deep into the game.
3. Follow Your Personal Assistant’s Tasks
Your Personal Assistant will pop up soon after you choose your team, and her job is basically to serve up some quests for you to complete. These quests, if you can call them that, will reward you with stars, which are what the game uses as a basis when you are leveling up. They also keep you moving in the right direction in terms of the things you need to do to improve your team, so if your Personal Assistant has some quests lined up, go accomplish them.
The Personal Assistant will also give you daily tasks, which reward you with a lot of cash for accomplishing certain things, e.g. winning a certain number of games, completing a certain number of jobs, etc.
4. If You Have To Buy Something, Buy The Starter Pack
Once again, we’re not the type to suggest you go overboard with real-money purchases in NBA General Manager 2016. In fact, it would be best if you accomplish as much as you can without having to part with your hard-earned cash. But if you have to pay for something in the game, we suggest buying the starter pack, as it’s available at a huge discount if you’re a first-time player. Normally in the neighborhood of about $20, you can get it for less than $5 as a special discount for first-time players, and that’s going to get you a “surprise player” (more often than not, he’ll be better than anyone on your initial lineup), as well as a ton of cash (the main currency) and coins (the premium currency) for you to buy players with.
5. About Your Lineup
There are only three positions in NBA General Manager 2016 – center, forward, and guard. The game’s simple like that, as it doesn’t make designations between small or power forward or shooting or point guard, and you don’t have hybrid positions like forward/center or guard/forward. In other words, you cannot start Andrew Bogut of the Warriors at forward, for instance, because he’s listed in the game as a center. Or, to use a better example, the Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounpo plays guard and forward in real life, but can only be played as a guard in NBA GM 2016.
Now, that we’ve gotten that basic point out of the way, let’s get to the meat of the matter – you should always check your lineup to make sure your highest-rated Center, your two highest-rated Forwards, and your two highest-rated Guards are in the starting lineup. You also have a 6th man, which would be your sixth highest-rated player, regardless of position. To make things quicker, you can always hit the star button on the upper right hand corner of the lineup screen so that your computer coach can set the recommended lineup for you, though we’ve observed it doesn’t always select the best bench.
There will be some cases where you shouldn’t have poorly-rated players inactive, and we’ll get to that next. But before playing a game or entering a tournament, you want to have your top twelve players ready for game time.
6. Focus On Improving Your Better (Or Best) Players
Go to the Team menu and Improve Player so that you can spend some cash and some time to improve your players and level them up. Only players who are in the inactive list can be improved, and the cost and time to do so would increase progressively as you level them up. We would suggest temporarily switching your better players to the inactive list so you can improve them; this can be done by waiting for a few minutes if they’re in the first few levels, but not if they’re sufficiently leveled up. Lower-rated players can also be improved while you’re playing the game; you want to have a solid bench to back up your starters, after all.
So what’s to do if you’ve got players who are at such a high level that they take hours for the leveling up process to complete? It’s simple – just switch them to inactive before you go to bed, and improve them accordingly. When you wake up, they’ll be ready to go, with their rating and level both increased.
7. Check Your Opponents Before Playing A Quick Game
Playing a quick game could earn you stars for a win, and, if it’s among your daily tasks, could earn you money if you win a certain number of games in a day. However, if you lose a game, you lose some of your money, so you have to take care when choosing your opponents. Typically, it’s a safe bet to choose players of a lower level, though the determining factor seems to be their Player on Fire. If their Player on Fire has a higher or similar rating than your best player, there’s a good chance that they’ll win, so it’s those players whom you want to avoid. Remember, you’re playing to win, and playing for stars in this game!
8. Take Part In The Tournaments
The game has regular and special tournaments, with regular tournaments available every day; these would require you to beat all other NBA teams in a series of games against players who are controlling those teams, with the quality of opponents getting progressively harder. Then you’ve got special tournaments, which are available for a limited period of time, but with the quality of opponents much tougher to begin with. Both types of tournament are a great way for you to earn more currency and other goodies, though it goes without saying that the special tournaments are the ones with the best rewards for you.
9. Compete In The Special Events
Special events, such as the ongoing All-Star Week event, are also a great way to earn currency, new players, and power-ups. You’ll be given a limited number of days to rise up in the rankings, and for each round, you’ll have five choices of opponents; choose three of those opponents to complete the round. Again, going back to our tip about quick games, you want to choose the opponents who are ranked lower than you; you’ll get a perfect 10 points if you beat all three rivals in a round, and more bonus points if you go on a winning streak; you can get another 10, for instance, if you’ve carried out a five-game winning streak between rounds.
The rewards get better as your ranking/grade go up, but merely taking part in the special events does guarantee you some rewards. Just don’t expect them to be any good.
10. How To Succeed In Player Auctions
The Trades button gives you the option to buy a player now, or to buy a player in an auction. The auction system allows you to keep bidding on a player until the time expires, and once you reach the last 60 seconds, the bidding won’t end until nobody else bids within a 60-second timeframe. That could lead to some serious, serious bidding wars, and that could drive the prices up really high. So with that in mind, it’s recommended that you only bid for players you can definitely afford, preferably those in the 200 range or lower if you’re just starting out in the game. You don’t want to overspend in a bidding war, so play the bidding game prudently.
11. About The Buy Now Option
Like you can in auction sites, you can buy a player without having to go through the bidding process, though that’s going to cost you coins. As it could take quite a while to add to your coins in the game, we suggest saving up your coins and accumulating them as you go along, before you buy a highly-rated player through the Buy Now option.
12. Hire Progressively Better Coaches
The benefit of hiring a better, higher-level coach is that they can coach and improve higher-rated players, as well as allow you to improve more players at the same time. Make sure you’re regularly replacing your coach with a better one as you go along, though you should also keep in mind that your coach’s capabilities should always be in line with your best players’ levels.
13. Assign Players To Jobs
Each team has a list of activities, or jobs, that can be done in the Franchise tab, such as speaking to young talents at the University or having a new kit presentation at the Conference Hall. Assigning players costs you some energy and takes some time, but if you do this on a regular basis, you could steadily earn stars and currency as you keep leveling up the buildings. You can also hire a better Marketing Director to allow for more money in your bank and more simultaneous jobs for your players.
14. What Do The Power-Ups Do?
Power-ups can be purchased at the store for cash or coins, and they essentially give your team temporary buffs that are good for a certain number of games. These buffs can be applied to all players of a specific position, and as far as choosing power-ups go, we suggest buying one per position with cash, if you can afford it. There are power-ups that can be bought with coins, but as we said above, it’s best if you save your coins for the Buy Now option in the Trades tab.
15. Connect Your Game To Facebook For Bonus Coins
Last, but not the least, we strongly advise you to connect your game to Facebook in order to definitely save your progress in the game. Not only will you be rewarded with ten bonus coins for doing so, you’ll be able to save your progress in the game even if you have to change from one device to another.
In addition, you can also add your email for 20 bonus coins, and sign up for a From the Bench (FTB) account for 70 bonus coins. Better yet, both options also allow you to save your game progress.
This is the end of Level Winner’s exclusive strategy guide for NBA General Manager 2016. Hope you’ve enjoyed our detailed guide and learned a couple of things, so you can become a successful general manager in the game.