4-3 vs 3-4 Defense

Choosing your Basic Defense

Basic Defensive Setup

One of the most basic decisions you need to make in Action! PC Football is whether you want to chiefly run a 4-3 or a 3-4 on defense.

I’ve done a bit of reading and YouTube watching on the subject. Frankly, I think the difference between the two defensive systems in general is negligible at best. The extra lineman you get from the 4-3 might help plug the hole if the offense runs, but the extra linebacker could help negate long runs before they even start. On the other hand, that extra lineman could help out with a pass rush — but an extra linebacker means you have one more blitzing option.

So how do you choose?

In-Game Ratings

You can learn some information about which formation likely works best for your team within Action! PC Football itself.

Let’s use the 1978 Pittsburgh Steelers as an example. Once we’ve loaded up the 1978 season, we can look at the team itself by double clicking on it. Click on “Def” on the left-hand side to look at the various defensive formations.

We’ll start out with the 4-3 basic formation:

Now, let’s compare it with the 3-4:

As you can see, there is a very slight difference between the two. The 4-3 gives Pittsburgh a better pass rush by 3 points (and note that I’m not entirely sure what scale those 3 points are based on), and yet the 4-3 pass defense is worse by a single point.

You can play with this before your next game to see the advantages and disadvantages of running each of those defensive formations.

Play Analysis Tool

The absolute most important tool in Action! PC Football is the Play Analysis tool. You can use this tool to determine what offensive and defensive strategies work best. We’ll use it frequently.

You can find it in the “Reports” menu; it’s the 5th option down.

We can use this tool like an interactive scouting report, comparing different offensive play calls to defensive setups to find strengths and weaknesses. This is what it looks like:

As you can see, you can change your results to reflect different game situations, weather situations, and all sorts of things. We won’t worry about those complicating factors for now, however.

Let’s see how Pittsburgh lines up against Houston’s run-happy offense.

First off, let’s see how the basic 4-3 compares with the 3-4, assuming that Earl Campbell is the ball carrier (a pretty smart assumption!):

It looks like Earl will be able to run up the middle all day long against the 4-3, provided that he’s not keyed and that we call a “basic” play. Now let’s see how he would do against the 3-4:

As you can see, there isn’t a huge difference here.

Other things will cause Campbell’s running potential to go down — looking for a run, for example:

However, as far as the 1978 Steelers are concerned, going with the 4-3 really isn’t that much different from the 3-4.

Let’s look at a passing example for some contrast. This time we’ll see what our chances of stopping Dan Fouts and the San Diego Chargers in the air are.

First, the basic 4-3:

And now the 3-4:

You can see a slight difference here. The 4-3 is more prone to the screen pass, while the 3-4 is very slightly less effective against longer passes.

Of course, defending specifically against the pass helps out a bit more:

However, that’s an article for another time.

Conclusion

For most teams, the 4-3 and 3-4 will not be significantly different. You’ll want to check up on your team specifically first, though, just in case.

In some cases, such as my 1980 Cleveland Browns, the 3-4 makes more sense due to personnel issues. The Browns went with the 3-4 in real life due to injuries.

Play around with the Play Analysis tool before you play. It will help you out of many jams.