Does SI have any intensions to make the AI more competitive in transfers?

AI managers have a serious lack of noticing and transfering young talents. Because of this it is way too easy to sign the best young players and start winning everything within 2-3 seasons, with any team in premiere. That's no fun, unless you are 7 years old.

Will SI EVER improve this in the game?

To be honest, I've seen a lot of AI clubs buying very prudently in the transfer market. Developing youngsters and bringing them through in this version, some teams do perform badly in the transfer market with youngsters especially but then every club does. Liverpool are as bad at developing/buying young players as they seem to be in real life, whereas Man Utd are doing it quite well.

Chelsea have also done quite a decent job of it, not a lot of clubs buy them at 16/17 but rather 20/21 from the teams that took them that far, but its often how it works in real life, because the vast majority of 16/17 year olds a club gets don't make the grade.

I have never played too long, but I just read in another thread that in somebodies game, in about 2030, some big teams like ManUtd, Tottenham were in 3rd division, with 400 million in the bank. That's a proof that AI teams are managed very unrealisticaly.

After so many versions of the game I'm not that optimistic that the transfer market will ever be up to a ''realistic'' standard. Especially, as mentioned it's just awful after a few seasons.

After so many versions of the game I'm not that optimistic that the transfer market will ever be up to a ''realistic'' standard. Especially, as mentioned it's just awful after a few seasons.

I was only making the same point earlier in another thread, this simply has to be fixed. In my opinion it's the biggest issue with the game. The first few seasons are difficult but then once all the young talents you've signed develop you notice that your rivals have not signed any young prospects, often not signing anyone at all or instead signing over the hill players with high reps. It results in the game become too easy, unrealistic and boring after a few seasons.

don't buy young talent then!!

I don't understand why they can't / don't fix it. I would expect the match engine improvements to be far more difficult to achieve. So, I can accept imperfections in match engine, but not transfer market. It takes all the fun out of otherwise great game.

I was only making the same point earlier in another thread, this simply has to be fixed. In my opinion it's the biggest issue with the game. The first few seasons are difficult but then once all the young talents you've signed develop you notice that your rivals have not signed any young prospects, often not signing anyone at all or instead signing over the hill players with high reps. It results in the game become too easy, unrealistic and boring after a few seasons.

That is the most spot on statement regarding the transfer system. I have often thought that.

In my current save I'm in 2023 and I've 8 world class players in my team, the oldest of them being 28. Nearly all the AI teams ( Premiership )

have a majority of 1st team players over 33, anywhere between 5 and 9 players, it's simply absurd that this is the case

Anybody heard any word from SI on improving this in 3rd patch?

From what I can tell in my game...

Man City are the only club who really go for it in the transfer windows - only what they do is throw £20/30mil at anyone who gets an average score of 7 or above.

The other clubs seem content to stick with what they've got until they get too old to compete or just chase proven players on the cusp of decline.

From what I can tell in my game...

Man City are the only club who really go for it in the transfer windows - only what they do is throw £20/30mil at anyone who gets an average score of 7 or above.

The other clubs seem content to stick with what they've got until they get too old to compete or just chase proven players on the cusp of decline.

That's (most of the time) the case in my game too!

Can AI managers see the 'potential talent' of players like we do?

Anybody heard any word from SI on improving this in 3rd patch?

This needs more work than can be done in a patch. Remember this years transfer code was re-written from scratch.

This needs more work than can be done in a patch. Remember this years transfer code was re-written from scratch.

Yes, I know, but it just needs to be tweaked, to make AI managers more aware of what is going on in the world!!

To me it seems that sometimes AI ignores a lot of players who are putting up good performances but probably don't have the best potential. In one of my games, Peter Thompson scored 46 goals in 40 league games for Stockport (I think they were in League 2 at the time). He had a few teams interested in him, but no one bought him. That just seems unbelievable.. if someone was such a prolific scorer, some teams would try to buy him.

I remember in FM06, when my teams were rolling, a few weaker players had inflated ratings, they still sold for big money. Granted they couldn't perform outside my particular system, but that does happens in real world. Kinda miss those days.

I have seen teams buy talent that would make Ronaldinho stand in the corner and cry. So they may not buy ALL the talent, but they pick up the ones they need afaik.

To the original title question.

If they did improve the people who either are good at finding a great bargain or people who are genuinely good at the game would find it more of a challenge. However the people that play it for a bit of fun would probably complain like hell on here and get very bored of the game

I wrote something about this yesterday. It bugs me that the top clubs aren't continually looking to improve their team, whilst I'm pretty much cherry picking the best young talent for relatively little $$$$'s.

http://community.sigames.com/showpost.php?p=2760532&postcount=149

I haven't been so far in my game to have a personal opinion on this. I do wonder though, do you guys think that buying talent is too hard for the AI or maybe too easy for the human manger? Or both?

It's better than last year by far so the answer to "will they ever improve?" is clearly yes. It's complicated, getting lines of code to think like humans and apply instinct like we do. Don't forget the AI managers can't "see" attributes the way we do - it's mostly to do with reputation (which I agree should be changed - perhaps some form of additional AI scouting).

As for patch 9.3.0 SI have said a number of times that transfers are constantly under review and where possible changes will be made. Don't expect anything too radical for a patch, though.

Perhaps the AI managers should have some sort of review each season, looking at each squad position in relation to their favoured formation, compare this to their club rep and board expectations/budget, and act according to this.

Perhaps the AI managers should have some sort of review each season, looking at each squad position in relation to their favoured formation, compare this to their club rep and board expectations/budget, and act according to this.

That's a very good suggestion. In my current campaign (which I'll abandon when I patch up) I blatently 'cheated' by creating a super-team of the best players playing in the EPL. The clubs I poached the key players from (mostly the 'Big 4') never replaced them even though I deposited (through the editor) the value of the players in their transfer funds. Thus the likes of Liverpool and Man Utd still have a first-team squad half-full of their reserves even with 200M+ quid in their accounts.

This difference everybody is talking happens because people use ingame editors or genie to see potencial of young players, therefore spotting them right away.

If you don't use the editors there's a good chance you can only spot them once they've developed, specially if you play with hidden atributtes. And probably won't buy them for cheap aswell.

The game is made with balance in this area but aditional tools and utilities from community tend to change this balance.

What i say is: stop using those features and the long term game will be much more balanced. Use your scouts instead of editors.

No answers from SI.

This difference everybody is talking happens because people use ingame editors or genie to see potencial of young players, therefore spotting them right away.

If you don't use the editors there's a good chance you can only spot them once they've developed, specially if you play with hidden atributtes. And probably won't buy them for cheap aswell.

The game is made with balance in this area but aditional tools and utilities from community tend to change this balance.

What i say is: stop using those features and the long term game will be much more balanced. Use your scouts instead of editors.

No, it happens all the time whether you do this or not. Since I got FM09 I haven't used any cheat tools, and you still get teams not replacing players when they are sold, or buying players for whom they already have a plethora of options.

In my 2014 save Man U still have Ferdinand and Vidic at CB. Ferdinand is now nothing more than an average Prem player and I dropped him from my England team. IRL when he starts playing like this he'll be replaced and flogged to Hull or Wigan.

And Man City continue to buy 3-4-5 left wingers/strikers, while keeping only Wright-Phillips and Ireland for the right (and Ireland isn't much of a winger).

The only teams that really seem to have any balace are the "lesser" ones, the West Broms and Wigans, but these too can be improved.

Like I said, I think it's to do with reputation of clubs/players. Rio Ferdinand's rep doesn't decrease fast enough for Man U to consider selling him or dropping him, and since the AI manager cannot "see" his dropping attributes the way I can, he keeps his place.

No, it happens all the time whether you do this or not. Since I got FM09 I haven't used any cheat tools, and you still get teams not replacing players when they are sold, or buying players for whom they already have a plethora of options.

In my 2014 save Man U still have Ferdinand and Vidic at CB. Ferdinand is now nothing more than an average Prem player and I dropped him from my England team. IRL when he starts playing like this he'll be replaced and flogged to Hull or Wigan.

And Man City continue to buy 3-4-5 left wingers/strikers, while keeping only Wright-Phillips and Ireland for the right (and Ireland isn't much of a winger).

The only teams that really seem to have any balace are the "lesser" ones, the West Broms and Wigans, but these too can be improved.

Like I said, I think it's to do with reputation of clubs/players. Rio Ferdinand's rep doesn't decrease fast enough for Man U to consider selling him or dropping him, and since the AI manager cannot "see" his dropping attributes the way I can, he keeps his place.

Wow, is that true? I didn't know the AI managers cannot see the players' attributes? Why not for gods sake???

What about their scouts? I'm managing Leeds, and in my 3rd season my scouts found me these 2 players, who are 17-18 years old, have 3 star current ability, one of them has 6 star potential ability and the other one 7. They are already good enough to play in my team, and I know they will be kicking ass in 2-3 years. I didn't cheat, didn't use any cheat tool, I just used my scouts. Why can't AI managers use their scouts the way we use? I don't believe it would be too difficult to implement.

As I always say, SI needs to focus on the parts of the game that really matter, and not spend most of their time on adding useless bells and whistles to the game.

This difference everybody is talking happens because people use ingame editors or genie to see potencial of young players, therefore spotting them right away.

If you don't use the editors there's a good chance you can only spot them once they've developed, specially if you play with hidden atributtes. And probably won't buy them for cheap aswell.

The game is made with balance in this area but aditional tools and utilities from community tend to change this balance.

What i say is: stop using those features and the long term game will be much more balanced. Use your scouts instead of editors.

Completely untrue, I have never used an in game editor for instance and figure out who the best young players are by judging their attributes and through scout reports.

The AI does indeed place too much importance on reputation in terms of buying and keeping players but I'm not sure if it's entirely based on this. It would be completely unrealistic and I would be surprised if this is the case.

What I don't understand is that AI teams seemed fairly good at acquiring talent and young players with potential in FM07, but it seems to have slipped back again in this version.

Any confirmation that the transfer AI ability will receive a bit of a boost in the upcoming patch would be more than welcome!

Wow, is that true? I didn't know the AI managers cannot see the players' attributes? Why not for gods sake???

What about their scouts? I'm managing Leeds, and in my 3rd season my scouts found me these 2 players, who are 17-18 years old, have 3 star current ability, one of them has 6 star potential ability and the other one 7. They are already good enough to play in my team, and I know they will be kicking ass in 2-3 years. I didn't cheat, didn't use any cheat tool, I just used my scouts. Why can't AI managers use their scouts the way we use? I don't believe it would be too difficult to implement.

As I always say, SI needs to focus on the parts of the game that really matter, and not spend most of their time on adding useless bells and whistles to the game.

The scouts issue might have something to it. I rarely manage a top level team (usually in Lower Leagues), but I recently took over Everton in about 2015. Even though the board would allow them to have 11 scouts, they only had two employed. Both of their scout attributes were around the 10-12 range, and both only had knowledge of England. Teams in the Blue Square had scouts that were way better. So why aren't top teams employing staff that is appropriate for their level, and why aren't they employing them in the numbers they are allowed?

Same is true for other staff positions as well. When I took over Everton they had an average Assistant Manager, 1 poor coach, 1 decent GK coach, 2 good fitness coaches, 6(what!?) youth coaches, 2 awful physios, and 2 poor scouts. So out of the 15 staff employed, only the two fitness coaches seemed about right, and even they weren't amazing, probably Championship level coaches.