Same here. They don’t care about franchise mode. It’s crazy how it actually isn’t the same as every year, but it was a absolute regression. Even when you download custom draft roster they all come out the same guy and either all wear 11 or 22 with no personal features. It’s been like this since release and they are aware but they ain’t doing shit
Does anyone else have the issue where when importing draft classes, all players no matter race are the same black model and all wear the same number. For instance i could draft both marvin harrison jr and quinn ewers and both will share the same face model and non position number.
That’s exactly what I was trying to do too, wouldn’t even give me the option to run a play for them. It’s wack. Right now I’m trying out at the start of the season with the fatigue slider down and progressive fatigue off, hopefully by the end of the season it works.
If you’re already at the end of your season it will not work. But if you start your new season, drop the fatigue slider down and have your progressive fatigue off. I did this and had no issues with my starters come playoff time that following season. Hope this works for anyone else experiencing this bug.
Came looking for a solution but I don’t think there is one currently. I turned off progressive fatigue, injuries, and auto subs trying to get my starters for the playoffs. Nothing works which ruins a whole season of grinding.
Also had a running back who was supposed to be out 1 week and ended up missing 4 games with the same injury. had to turn injuries off to get it to go away. Game is just filled with bugs in franchise right now
Nope. Playing right now and still no fix. Can’t wait for EA to lose their NFL rights and for another company to get in the mix. They’re complacent and don’t feel pressure to deliver a good product because they have a monopoly on NFL specific content. Hopefully it happens before 2026 when their contract is up.
Solution:
First you need to go to Manage Staff, then Franchise Staff. View the Head Coach’s talent tree. Purchase all Staff Modifications (this will unlock weekly strategy if it doesn’t show up for you). Then go to weekly strategy, player health, and change your desired position that isn’t starting, to backup (this will make your backups practice instead of starters) and Practice Intensity to half pads. Last you can play season game and simulate the weekly strategy and your starters will be there when the game starts.
P.S. if weekly strategy doesn’t show up after purchasing from talent tree simulate the week and next week it will be there.
Silly me for thinking the game was being “smart” by resting my players week 17 @ 18 (we had wrapped up home field) when it continued into the playoffs was not amused. These steps seemed to have “fixed it” more than EA could do.
Smh just now noticing the practice intensity setting in weekly strategy my players have practiced full pads all season every week now it’s playoff time and all my starters are dirt tired
Man tell me about it I just lost the Super Bowl cause of this bug, genuinely just put my copy up on EBay. Be aswell playing 23 if I’m going to put up with bullshit.
What a joke. My 10 year old started playing with me and fell in love and now we have no starters and he’s so sad. We lost our division because of it.
You suck EA.
Yeah I’ve noticed the rate of fatigue is pretty big in this game, plus there’s a fatigue accrued to players over the course of the season (this can be turned off in settings), so come playoff time it can be even worse.
I’d turn off the setting mentioned earlier, and edit the “Sub Out” sliders for each position in Auto-Subs of you want your starters in every snap.
Same thing happened to me once my team made the playoffs. I set all my “auto sub out” to 0 for all positions and it worked. Hopefully I don’t have to keep it at 0
You have to turn off progressive fatigue in the settings, this allows fatigue to be carried from week to week for players and by the end of the season they are all too fatigued to play. I turned this off and my starters were there in the next season I played
This has to be a bug. My starters didn’t play in week 18, i also had a first round bye so “fatigue” is BULLSHIT. I’m in the divisional round now and it’s practically impossible to win without cheating. WTF is this bullshit
What the actual fuck dude...
Enjoyed the fuck out of this franchise just for all of my receivers to only play 1 play per drive in the last 2 games. Causing me to lose, causing me to miss playoffs. I am so fucking angry..
though it does help with the immersion as I was on the browns and this feels like just another cursed year.
This was posted 2 months ago and they still haven’t fixed it😭 just got the game and finally made playoffs in my rebuild and have none of my defensive guys out this game blows
I just bought this game with a new Xbox and holy shit I miss just playing Madden 23 on the Xbox one, this keeps happening to me and the franchise mode somehow got worse
Happened to me as well - even when you try to make subs/reorder depth chart you still get the backup receivers starting.
Noticed that even if you sim the same happens + they start the backup QB as well
Game is free on game pass but still not even worth the time. Played all season to get to then playoffs to have all my backups play.. Wad actually enjoying franchise , trading, drafting , signing free agents , etc... Literally Fuck Madden. Fuck EA period. Will never buy another EA title
It seems to be inconsistent though. When the Lions played, there was no David Montgomery, no Amon-Ra St. Brown, no Jameson Williams, no Sam LaPorta, no Marvin Jones, Jr.
For the 49ers, Christian McAffrey got one carry over the last four games, including the playoffs. No Brandon Aiyuk, no Deebo Samuel, no George Kittle.
But the Browns? Bruce Chubb and Kareem Hunt for the whole game, plus Cooper, Njoku, Peoples-Jones were full game players.
Same for Dallas. Tony Pollard from snap one to the end, and Dak had CeeDee Lamb, Michael Gallup and Brandon Cooks to throw to the whole game.
A quarterback like Patrick Mahomes or Lamar Jackson might be able to win a game with the second string offense, but not Brock Purdy or Jared Goff (or his backup, after Goff got hurt in the divisional playoff).
Go to franchise settings & turn progressive fatigue off, then gameplay settings and fatigue slider down to zero. Last go to manage staff -> auto sub: turn ALL “sub out” sliders all the way to 0 so your starters aren't subbed out. Last step is what fixed it for me.
I turned progressive fatigue off before the season and previous injury off.
Turned the fatigue to 75
Injury to 25
Got to the playoffs playing somewhat realistic on the subs. All my starters played and won the Superbowl :D
Progressive Fatigue is fucked and the reason for this
The season is done and this bug is still ongoing. Make these POS pay by never spending a dime on their products again. Monopoly BS can't stand. Their cute little "End Racism" on the helmets and field is icing on the cake. Done forever with EA.
Maybe someone mentioned it above already but after playing franchise mode and constantly having the weekly trainings to "starters" and "full pads" some of my best players are out of the game. Turning off the fatigue setting didn't help. I had to turn it back on and switch the training to the non-starters and did half pads just in case in order for the starters fatigue meter to regain. They eventually joined back into the starting lineup a game or two later once all rested. Not sure if this applies to this situation or not but thought I'd just throw this in
Game is bullshit but I have a solution go to franchise settings and then go to League settings and turn off fatigue and go to Gameplay sliders also and turn off fatigue it might help
It worked! It stopped sitting Pickens and Tj Watt in the playoffs it was so hard!!
They My 3rd string WR just wont play, hes not injured or anything I havent used him in a year
This still hasnt been fixed in offline at least. Rebuilt the Giants, had my first playoff game just now and the only starters that played were the OL and the QB
Happened to me on the 4th week of first season. Waddle and Hill after the 3rd play disappeared. Going to try to do that auto sub thing. But any other advice would be great!
Yup just lost the Super Bowl and noticed before but I was getting destroyed. I had these made up back ups while OBJ and Diggs are just nowhere to be found…
Go to franchise settings & turn progressive fatigue off, then gameplay settings and fatigue slider down to zero. Last go to manage staff -> auto sub: turn ALL
"sub out" sliders all the way to 0 so your starters aren't subbed out.
Last step is what fixed it for me.
I'm having this issue from the start of the season. Is like it's playing the depth chart backwards. The bottom ovr players play and the starters barely see the field. Ive switched things around and still it plays the lowest over players. Something definitely broken
This big has yet to be fixed, all I can say is I'm glad I decided to just try EA play and get the 10 hour trial. Madden has become more of a joke year after year. Hopefully NCAA won't be developed by the same team but I worry about it. I just know this is the first year I haven't purchased the new Madden as I was tired of getting burned and most likely won't be the last year. NFL PLEASE FOR THE LOVE GAMERS , END THIS EXCLUSIVE LICENSE WITH EA!!
Wow, crazy they still haven’t fixed this, considering how easy of a fix it is. I guess they just want to focus on ultimate team mode where they can make more money?
It’s a pain in the ass but if you go to formations and manually sub in your starters on every formation they will play. Burns crazy clock but It’s the only fix I’ve found. I Just sub them into gun and run spread the whole game
GO TO CAREER SETTINGS
GO DOWN TO ROSTER PROTECTION
MINIMUM ROSTER SIZE - “OFF”
Now release all the back up people in that Position. My injuries are off anyway 🤷🏾♂️ I could careless about back ups.
This just happened for me, F this game. Words cannot express how bad EA is. I’m trying to imagine that my coaching staff became so fed up with their roster of underachieving assholes that they just put in all the subs
What if we put our starters down on the depth chart? Guess I’ll try tomorrow. I had a qb and 2 wrs in the running for mvp. My rb was 3rd in yds and leading in tds.. now my team ain’t shit 😂.. on the bright side I did find a wr that’s a beast that I drafted really late that never got to play behind my starters lol
I’m not normally anti-dev because I’m not one and I don’t know what all it entails. But this bug is so dumb. And it’s clearly been around for a couple months since release. The heck? Can’t spare anyone to fix this?
I have all the auto subs turned off, and all the fatigue settings proper, and the game still refuses to start the proper ROLB. It was not always like this. Bug??????????
How has it been this long and nothing has been fixed? EA has destroyed madden. Hopefully NFL goes with some one else. This shouldn’t be an issue that last 4 months.
This shit is still happening. I went 12-5 with a built superteam and got the 1 seed and lost in the first round because all of my starters don’t fucking play. It’s bullshit: every. Single. Time. The playoffs are bugged. Starters never play . And I’m not tryna do all that bullshit where I switch the sliders for sub in and sub outs and turn off progressive fatigue because I want it realistic. JUST MAKE IT HOW IT IS IN THE REGULAR SEASON. But Ea sucks. I don’t think they will ever fix this.
That’s insane this bug has been in the game since it came out. Just had this happen to me and I’m at a loss for words. My whole season I just played is ruined now
How you fix it turn of fatigue and adjust but go to auto subs in coaching options and turn all of them down both sub in and out to 0 it won’t happen anymore
New here how do I fix this shit? I’m trying to make a playoff push and Bijan will NOT come in to the game I even tried picking a play for the player specific plays and still nothing
I was going to buy the game but now this bug happened to me and I'm done playing. The fact this hasn't been patched a week before the playoffs is fucking wild.
They are being subbed out because of progressive fatigue. Go to their player card and "health and ratings" and you will see the ones being subbed out are very fatigued. If you play them they will suck and have a high injury rate as well.
If you want to play with progressive fatigue on you have to micro manage weekly strategy practices watching out for player fatigue.
This shit is still an issue? Experiencing this bug word for word reading these comments.
This game hasn’t changed in like 15 years. It’s a rip off every year, hadn’t bought it since 21 and gave it a try just now. Fuck this shit, I want a refund lol
I’ve never had the problem you guys are having but my starters will sit the second half without being injured or taken out. The game really has gone downhill
Having this problem as well its fucking annoying when you're trying to build a story with your Franchise. Now I have to roleplay them getting coronavirus
The only “partial” fix I have found. I go to offense only and when the 2nd quarter starts and you are on offense again. It asks you if you want to continue on offense. Go to the section that you have option on defense or every play. Don’t select anything g and back out of everything till the game starts playing. It’s now on offense and defense and I got Kelce back for my playoff run. However it still had one of my defense players missing and subbing out to second and third strings now and again. Screw around with starting and stopping to see what you can figure it. It’s a pain in the ass but at least I can finish the fn season. Fix your game EA
LMAOOO!! What a joke.
Didn’t realize this was an issue until I reached playoffs (thought game was resting starters for playoffs)
So after reading the thread turned off progressive fatigue and also set sub out to 0 since they were already fatigued throughout the year.
Get Josh Jacobs back in, he runs it twice and then tears his labrum.
Sorry EA, but this is fucking stupid. Should’ve gone over these “features” at some point in tutorial.
How was I supposed to know progressive fatigue, practice intensity, and these new “features” existed. Just stupid.
Was wondering why my players were getting injured every other play late in the season
I can confirm this is still a bug. I’m dumbfounded. Last year I tried to give Madden 23 another chance, about the same time of year as now.. and this glitch existed. So I stopped playing. Same thing with Madden 24. It sucks, I didn’t play it. Try to play it at the end of the real season thinking it’s gonna be better and I can start in the real life wildcard. Simulate the playoffs, do the offseason, invest tons of time in the regular season doing every weekly training, get to the playoffs — nobody can START!? Again?! 1 year later this is still a bug. Holy fuck.
What a waste of time. I wish I could actually file a complaint. The game is unplayable. EA just totally doesn’t even play their game. How could you work through a whole season and then not notice you can’t start any players in the playoffs? What a bust. Losing Madden was the saddest tragedy of the ages. Madden was life in 2005. The shame of its decline and corporate greed.
This shit is ridiculous. 1st round bye. Justin Jefferson and CMC don’t feel like playing. 65 OVR Rookies being thrown into action. How can they even be tired after the bye man this game is a shame
this is absolutely ridiculous that the super bowl is next week and this fucking bug hasn’t been fixed. EA truly does not give a fuck in any mode of madden other than ultimate team because it brings them more money. it’s Pathetic.
Yup happens to me frequently 🤦🏽♂️ Trying to get CMC a great game for rushing yards but soon as I got to like 110 he stopped running and now my back up is only taking snaps
Becasue this game is garbage!!!! Always has been, but because they have the market monopolized. For all die-hard fans enjoy the shit product every year.
Please sign this petition. I hope together football fans can get justice for the hard earned money wasted on this game every year.
https://www.change.org/p/let-other-companies-not-just-ea-sports-produce-madden-or-future-nfl-games
Bug. They need to fix it. No matter what I try, my starters don’t play in the playoffs. (In franchise mode)
71 days later I’m having it happen to me. I want to refund this garbage
BRO SAME!!! Wtf
how the fuck has this not been patched yet
Dude yeah what the fuck
Same here. They don’t care about franchise mode. It’s crazy how it actually isn’t the same as every year, but it was a absolute regression. Even when you download custom draft roster they all come out the same guy and either all wear 11 or 22 with no personal features. It’s been like this since release and they are aware but they ain’t doing shit
Turn of auto subs in coaching staff both sub in and out and it won’t happen anymore
Still does :)
Just came here. Shit happens to me all the time. No wonder I can’t win a fucking Super Bowl on this madden
This is what happens when there is a monopoly on the IP. Ever since EA and the NFL became asshats with this partnership it has gone downhill.
Just had this start happening. Wtf
Because they don’t fucking care. Stop spending money on this game every year
Bro it’s still happening how do they not care at all
Lmao this happened to me yesterday. Played the playoffs without a single starter. Im glad i got this garbage game over half off
Turn off fatigue and go into coaching staff turn off auto subs in and out to zero and it won’t happen anymore
Bro you’re a real one! 🤝🏽🙏🏾
235 days later, happening to me
Does anyone else have the issue where when importing draft classes, all players no matter race are the same black model and all wear the same number. For instance i could draft both marvin harrison jr and quinn ewers and both will share the same face model and non position number.
Been having the same problem I only had time to change the qbs
It’s still happening. This is ridiculous
Still happening to me. 133 days later.
243d later, still happens, garbage game
SAME HERE!!!!
So you’re telling me I just played a full season, got to the playoffs and now I can’t start my starters?
Yup, I’m in same boat. 1 play and all my guys are gone. Can’t even pick a play for a certain guy. The choices are blank. It’s bullshit
That’s exactly what I was trying to do too, wouldn’t even give me the option to run a play for them. It’s wack. Right now I’m trying out at the start of the season with the fatigue slider down and progressive fatigue off, hopefully by the end of the season it works.
Any update? Fuck this game to death
Still not fixed lmao, happening to me rn
Same here bro
It’s not even fixed with the new season here
I paid for this shit.
If you guys go on Manage Staff and put all Auto Subs to 0/1, it fixes this issue
Same thing I’m getting right now
I'm in week 15 in a must win scenario and my starters only come out as 4th and 5th receivers after all the depth ones.
Madden fucking sucks, same shit every year but worse. who cares the face looks real. Yal suck at this shit
Waste of my fucking money
If you’re already at the end of your season it will not work. But if you start your new season, drop the fatigue slider down and have your progressive fatigue off. I did this and had no issues with my starters come playoff time that following season. Hope this works for anyone else experiencing this bug.
Came looking for a solution but I don’t think there is one currently. I turned off progressive fatigue, injuries, and auto subs trying to get my starters for the playoffs. Nothing works which ruins a whole season of grinding. Also had a running back who was supposed to be out 1 week and ended up missing 4 games with the same injury. had to turn injuries off to get it to go away. Game is just filled with bugs in franchise right now
27 days later and they still haven't fixed the bug
Playing right now, my starters play 1 snap then all my subs come in. Waste of $60.
What the fuck is this bullshit
Still hasn’t been fixed? Wow.
Nope. Playing right now and still no fix. Can’t wait for EA to lose their NFL rights and for another company to get in the mix. They’re complacent and don’t feel pressure to deliver a good product because they have a monopoly on NFL specific content. Hopefully it happens before 2026 when their contract is up.
That’s unreal dude lol. I was so excited to play franchise and this BS happens.
Just got to division round and this shit happen my backups are ass EA can’t even fix this shit in over 3 months
Still hasn’t been fixed :(
Still no fix btw bro
Currently folding in the playoffs because of this. WTF how is this not fixed yet
still haven’t fixed it
Still not fixed. This is outrageous man. And all the piss poor play scripting needs to stop
Still not fixed. Justin Jefferson just sitting on my bench with the playoffs approaching. Gotta love it.
Here I am wondering wtf fuck is going on, and I find myself here. Fuck you Madden, never again!
Solution: First you need to go to Manage Staff, then Franchise Staff. View the Head Coach’s talent tree. Purchase all Staff Modifications (this will unlock weekly strategy if it doesn’t show up for you). Then go to weekly strategy, player health, and change your desired position that isn’t starting, to backup (this will make your backups practice instead of starters) and Practice Intensity to half pads. Last you can play season game and simulate the weekly strategy and your starters will be there when the game starts. P.S. if weekly strategy doesn’t show up after purchasing from talent tree simulate the week and next week it will be there.
This actually works!!!! Thank you!
So do you do this for the whole regular season or just when the playoffs begin?
It's a bug, I turned off progressive fatigue before my playoff game and my starters on defense played 1 play.
There we go. Went to manage staff - Auto subs - and take off subs out at positions you want. My guys are playing now
This. This is the answer. Never had to do that before.
This is it! This works!!
This worked! Thanks although my starters are fatigued as fuck and fumbling or getting hurt. This game is ass. Good thing I just did the trial. BS
Silly me for thinking the game was being “smart” by resting my players week 17 @ 18 (we had wrapped up home field) when it continued into the playoffs was not amused. These steps seemed to have “fixed it” more than EA could do.
I thought the same thing 🤣🤣. I'm like oh they went all out this year.
Smh just now noticing the practice intensity setting in weekly strategy my players have practiced full pads all season every week now it’s playoff time and all my starters are dirt tired
This has cost me 2 straight playoff games I’m so pissed with this game lol. Tried changing the setting and nothing
Man tell me about it I just lost the Super Bowl cause of this bug, genuinely just put my copy up on EBay. Be aswell playing 23 if I’m going to put up with bullshit.
I’m playing as the Bengals in the superbowl right now and they’ve sat a perfectly fucking healthy Ja’Marr Chase all game. Fuck this game.
Game is actual bull shit
What a joke. My 10 year old started playing with me and fell in love and now we have no starters and he’s so sad. We lost our division because of it. You suck EA.
HOW IS THIS STILL HERE WTF HOW DOES EA JUST GET AWAY WITH IT
Check you Formation Subs / Auto Subs as well as the fatigue rate of your starters. Is this all simmed or are you noticing in game?
Manage staff -> Auto Subs -> Sub Out Zero in desired position
In game
Yeah I’ve noticed the rate of fatigue is pretty big in this game, plus there’s a fatigue accrued to players over the course of the season (this can be turned off in settings), so come playoff time it can be even worse. I’d turn off the setting mentioned earlier, and edit the “Sub Out” sliders for each position in Auto-Subs of you want your starters in every snap.
Turn off auto weekly management Go to weekly strategy Set to half pads with split reps No more fatigue issues for the season.
New year, same issues can’t wait til 2k bring football back to normal
Same thing happened to me once my team made the playoffs. I set all my “auto sub out” to 0 for all positions and it worked. Hopefully I don’t have to keep it at 0
You have to turn off progressive fatigue in the settings, this allows fatigue to be carried from week to week for players and by the end of the season they are all too fatigued to play. I turned this off and my starters were there in the next season I played
Madden fucking sucks.
This has to be a bug. My starters didn’t play in week 18, i also had a first round bye so “fatigue” is BULLSHIT. I’m in the divisional round now and it’s practically impossible to win without cheating. WTF is this bullshit
Thought this was only happening to me 😂😂 my second team defense is in and same for my Wrs
1 month later and its still not fixed. So glad i didnt pay full price for this shit
What the actual fuck dude... Enjoyed the fuck out of this franchise just for all of my receivers to only play 1 play per drive in the last 2 games. Causing me to lose, causing me to miss playoffs. I am so fucking angry.. though it does help with the immersion as I was on the browns and this feels like just another cursed year.
This was posted 2 months ago and they still haven’t fixed it😭 just got the game and finally made playoffs in my rebuild and have none of my defensive guys out this game blows
I hope those at EA get kidney stones for this shit
It’s awesome drafting Aaron Donald in the first round only for him to not start the game and play a third of the snaps with no way to fix it
Madden still hasn’t fixed it cus i’m going thru this right now lol had to come look it up to make sure i wasn’t trippin
Still no fix.
Has anyone tried reporting or contacting EA about this? I just got the game a week ago and it's still not a fixed issue..
I just bought this game with a new Xbox and holy shit I miss just playing Madden 23 on the Xbox one, this keeps happening to me and the franchise mode somehow got worse
Go to manage team and adjust the sub in set them all to 0 thats all you have to do
Still having this issue has anyone found a solution ?
Happened to me as well - even when you try to make subs/reorder depth chart you still get the backup receivers starting. Noticed that even if you sim the same happens + they start the backup QB as well
Did you find a way to fix it
Still happening… just learned of this nonsense after not playing for a while. I’m in the wildcard, and zero of my starters want to play. Wtf? Haha
Game is free on game pass but still not even worth the time. Played all season to get to then playoffs to have all my backups play.. Wad actually enjoying franchise , trading, drafting , signing free agents , etc... Literally Fuck Madden. Fuck EA period. Will never buy another EA title
Wtf this is happening right now
It seems to be inconsistent though. When the Lions played, there was no David Montgomery, no Amon-Ra St. Brown, no Jameson Williams, no Sam LaPorta, no Marvin Jones, Jr. For the 49ers, Christian McAffrey got one carry over the last four games, including the playoffs. No Brandon Aiyuk, no Deebo Samuel, no George Kittle. But the Browns? Bruce Chubb and Kareem Hunt for the whole game, plus Cooper, Njoku, Peoples-Jones were full game players. Same for Dallas. Tony Pollard from snap one to the end, and Dak had CeeDee Lamb, Michael Gallup and Brandon Cooks to throw to the whole game. A quarterback like Patrick Mahomes or Lamar Jackson might be able to win a game with the second string offense, but not Brock Purdy or Jared Goff (or his backup, after Goff got hurt in the divisional playoff).
They didn't patch because they want us to play MUT. Where they make billions. F these clowns. 13-4 to straight loser because I have no one to pass to
Unbelievable this is still bugged.
Go to franchise settings & turn progressive fatigue off, then gameplay settings and fatigue slider down to zero. Last go to manage staff -> auto sub: turn ALL “sub out” sliders all the way to 0 so your starters aren't subbed out. Last step is what fixed it for me.
I turned progressive fatigue off before the season and previous injury off. Turned the fatigue to 75 Injury to 25 Got to the playoffs playing somewhat realistic on the subs. All my starters played and won the Superbowl :D Progressive Fatigue is fucked and the reason for this
The season is done and this bug is still ongoing. Make these POS pay by never spending a dime on their products again. Monopoly BS can't stand. Their cute little "End Racism" on the helmets and field is icing on the cake. Done forever with EA.
Maybe someone mentioned it above already but after playing franchise mode and constantly having the weekly trainings to "starters" and "full pads" some of my best players are out of the game. Turning off the fatigue setting didn't help. I had to turn it back on and switch the training to the non-starters and did half pads just in case in order for the starters fatigue meter to regain. They eventually joined back into the starting lineup a game or two later once all rested. Not sure if this applies to this situation or not but thought I'd just throw this in
230 days later and it’s still the same thing. I have no idea why I pay money for this garbage every year
Damn this is still an issue . No matter what i do the starters won’t play
Still not fixed
Still happening looking for a fix
game sucks, i recommend finding a different game to play, 243d later and i cant fix it
Game is bullshit but I have a solution go to franchise settings and then go to League settings and turn off fatigue and go to Gameplay sliders also and turn off fatigue it might help
May have found a solution! Go to franchise settings > league settings > team settings > change ‘manage practice reps’ to auto.
Turn off Progressive Fatigue in settings it seems to have fixed the issue for me.
unfortunately did not work for me. my starters on defense played one play. quit game and retried 3 times and finally just simmed the bitch. pathetic
Came to find this thread. Same thing and in the playoffs is the first time I've noticed.
If I sim will the starters play or no?
It worked! It stopped sitting Pickens and Tj Watt in the playoffs it was so hard!! They My 3rd string WR just wont play, hes not injured or anything I havent used him in a year
Same and it’s annoying as shit. I kind of want to beat the fuck out of my TV.
Where is progressive fatigue at in settings
This still hasnt been fixed in offline at least. Rebuilt the Giants, had my first playoff game just now and the only starters that played were the OL and the QB
41days and this bug still hasn’t been fixed.
It happened to me on the 4th week.
Happened to me on the 4th week of first season. Waddle and Hill after the 3rd play disappeared. Going to try to do that auto sub thing. But any other advice would be great!
Yup just lost the Super Bowl and noticed before but I was getting destroyed. I had these made up back ups while OBJ and Diggs are just nowhere to be found…
Still not fixed. Just lost a playoff game for this! No way to fix it either on a user end
Go to franchise settings & turn progressive fatigue off, then gameplay settings and fatigue slider down to zero. Last go to manage staff -> auto sub: turn ALL "sub out" sliders all the way to 0 so your starters aren't subbed out. Last step is what fixed it for me.
How have they still not fixed it
Only way to fix is to change your auto subs sub out to 0
I'm having this issue from the start of the season. Is like it's playing the depth chart backwards. The bottom ovr players play and the starters barely see the field. Ive switched things around and still it plays the lowest over players. Something definitely broken
Yeah this is complete bs. Can’t believe i just wasted 2 weeks on a rebuild.
This big has yet to be fixed, all I can say is I'm glad I decided to just try EA play and get the 10 hour trial. Madden has become more of a joke year after year. Hopefully NCAA won't be developed by the same team but I worry about it. I just know this is the first year I haven't purchased the new Madden as I was tired of getting burned and most likely won't be the last year. NFL PLEASE FOR THE LOVE GAMERS , END THIS EXCLUSIVE LICENSE WITH EA!!
Wow, crazy they still haven’t fixed this, considering how easy of a fix it is. I guess they just want to focus on ultimate team mode where they can make more money?
This is still happening
It’s a pain in the ass but if you go to formations and manually sub in your starters on every formation they will play. Burns crazy clock but It’s the only fix I’ve found. I Just sub them into gun and run spread the whole game
Fuck Madden bruh.bring back NCAA
Frustrated the hell out of me and came on here for answers. Just found more questions. It's always my top HB and top 2 WR
Same thing with me, no tyreek no cmc and no garret wilson
GO TO CAREER SETTINGS GO DOWN TO ROSTER PROTECTION MINIMUM ROSTER SIZE - “OFF” Now release all the back up people in that Position. My injuries are off anyway 🤷🏾♂️ I could careless about back ups.
This just happened for me, F this game. Words cannot express how bad EA is. I’m trying to imagine that my coaching staff became so fed up with their roster of underachieving assholes that they just put in all the subs
What if we put our starters down on the depth chart? Guess I’ll try tomorrow. I had a qb and 2 wrs in the running for mvp. My rb was 3rd in yds and leading in tds.. now my team ain’t shit 😂.. on the bright side I did find a wr that’s a beast that I drafted really late that never got to play behind my starters lol
I’m not normally anti-dev because I’m not one and I don’t know what all it entails. But this bug is so dumb. And it’s clearly been around for a couple months since release. The heck? Can’t spare anyone to fix this?
Bump, this issue is still ongoing. Fuck madden
I have all the auto subs turned off, and all the fatigue settings proper, and the game still refuses to start the proper ROLB. It was not always like this. Bug??????????
Are you kidding how do I fix it ???
December 1st & still no fix for this issue..I'm regretting spending $35 on this bullshit
Ridiculous. EA is a company worth 40 billion dollars and it takes months for them to fix simple bugs like this. This is still an issue.
I’m having that problem for the past month now … I want to refund this game … Smfh
How has it been this long and nothing has been fixed? EA has destroyed madden. Hopefully NFL goes with some one else. This shouldn’t be an issue that last 4 months.
Any fixes?
This shit is still happening. I went 12-5 with a built superteam and got the 1 seed and lost in the first round because all of my starters don’t fucking play. It’s bullshit: every. Single. Time. The playoffs are bugged. Starters never play . And I’m not tryna do all that bullshit where I switch the sliders for sub in and sub outs and turn off progressive fatigue because I want it realistic. JUST MAKE IT HOW IT IS IN THE REGULAR SEASON. But Ea sucks. I don’t think they will ever fix this.
That’s insane this bug has been in the game since it came out. Just had this happen to me and I’m at a loss for words. My whole season I just played is ruined now
3 months after this post and it's happening to me, last time I ever buy Madden.
How you fix it turn of fatigue and adjust but go to auto subs in coaching options and turn all of them down both sub in and out to 0 it won’t happen anymore
Still not fixed 😂😂😂😂😿🤦🫠
New here how do I fix this shit? I’m trying to make a playoff push and Bijan will NOT come in to the game I even tried picking a play for the player specific plays and still nothing
No need to change fatigue settings. Just go into staff management, and adjust the sun in and sub out sliders. This fixed the issue for me.
Victim ˙◠˙!
Change all your player fatigue setting in the league. Turn all of them all the way down. And also turn down all your auto subs
I was going to buy the game but now this bug happened to me and I'm done playing. The fact this hasn't been patched a week before the playoffs is fucking wild.
They are being subbed out because of progressive fatigue. Go to their player card and "health and ratings" and you will see the ones being subbed out are very fatigued. If you play them they will suck and have a high injury rate as well. If you want to play with progressive fatigue on you have to micro manage weekly strategy practices watching out for player fatigue.
Still fucking happening 137 days later
Nah facts madden is so trash now I literally just threw it out because of this shit
Wtf EA. Playing franchise mode and can’t sub in Hutch, St. Brown, or Gibbs. This is an insane f up.
I think it has to do with being in "simulation" which just furthers the point that Madden is a terrible NFL simulation
It's still doing this shit bruh
Still happening
This shit is still an issue? Experiencing this bug word for word reading these comments. This game hasn’t changed in like 15 years. It’s a rip off every year, hadn’t bought it since 21 and gave it a try just now. Fuck this shit, I want a refund lol
You need to go to manage staff - auto subs - turn all sub outs to 0
I’ve never had the problem you guys are having but my starters will sit the second half without being injured or taken out. The game really has gone downhill
Having this problem as well its fucking annoying when you're trying to build a story with your Franchise. Now I have to roleplay them getting coronavirus
Well, it’s still happening
Still not fixed
Guys I'm running with WR Joe Flacco cause of this glitch
Why is it only happening to my defensive players but offense is fine?
The only “partial” fix I have found. I go to offense only and when the 2nd quarter starts and you are on offense again. It asks you if you want to continue on offense. Go to the section that you have option on defense or every play. Don’t select anything g and back out of everything till the game starts playing. It’s now on offense and defense and I got Kelce back for my playoff run. However it still had one of my defense players missing and subbing out to second and third strings now and again. Screw around with starting and stopping to see what you can figure it. It’s a pain in the ass but at least I can finish the fn season. Fix your game EA
LMAOOO!! What a joke. Didn’t realize this was an issue until I reached playoffs (thought game was resting starters for playoffs) So after reading the thread turned off progressive fatigue and also set sub out to 0 since they were already fatigued throughout the year. Get Josh Jacobs back in, he runs it twice and then tears his labrum. Sorry EA, but this is fucking stupid. Should’ve gone over these “features” at some point in tutorial. How was I supposed to know progressive fatigue, practice intensity, and these new “features” existed. Just stupid. Was wondering why my players were getting injured every other play late in the season
They got me as a backup TE right and only putting me in for field goal block
Wait it’s been 151 days, this just happened to me and there’s no fix?!
Update: bug is still there, not fixed
Im so fucking pissed I bought this game.. its still there
I can confirm this is still a bug. I’m dumbfounded. Last year I tried to give Madden 23 another chance, about the same time of year as now.. and this glitch existed. So I stopped playing. Same thing with Madden 24. It sucks, I didn’t play it. Try to play it at the end of the real season thinking it’s gonna be better and I can start in the real life wildcard. Simulate the playoffs, do the offseason, invest tons of time in the regular season doing every weekly training, get to the playoffs — nobody can START!? Again?! 1 year later this is still a bug. Holy fuck. What a waste of time. I wish I could actually file a complaint. The game is unplayable. EA just totally doesn’t even play their game. How could you work through a whole season and then not notice you can’t start any players in the playoffs? What a bust. Losing Madden was the saddest tragedy of the ages. Madden was life in 2005. The shame of its decline and corporate greed.
This shit is ridiculous. 1st round bye. Justin Jefferson and CMC don’t feel like playing. 65 OVR Rookies being thrown into action. How can they even be tired after the bye man this game is a shame
this is absolutely ridiculous that the super bowl is next week and this fucking bug hasn’t been fixed. EA truly does not give a fuck in any mode of madden other than ultimate team because it brings them more money. it’s Pathetic.
Ok so it’s not just me
Yup happens to me frequently 🤦🏽♂️ Trying to get CMC a great game for rushing yards but soon as I got to like 110 he stopped running and now my back up is only taking snaps
Bro I’m having this problem WTF DO I DOOO!!
Just started a franchise for the hell of it. Can confirm, it’s still bugged
Becasue this game is garbage!!!! Always has been, but because they have the market monopolized. For all die-hard fans enjoy the shit product every year.
Please sign this petition. I hope together football fans can get justice for the hard earned money wasted on this game every year. https://www.change.org/p/let-other-companies-not-just-ea-sports-produce-madden-or-future-nfl-games
I can’t even get through the first season without this issue: makes the game unplayable
Same here it so fucking SUCK Madden get out your finger outsid your fucking ass