Fundamental flaw with the match engine

Firstly, I am not posting this in the bugs or tactics forum, because it is neither possible to isolate it to one thing, or to understand it through tactical changes. What I am talking about is the way causation works in the modern match engine. The tactic you employ appears to influence things it absolutely should not. As background to what I am about to say, I have played through a season in the Premier League with Chelsea, using my own tactic, which produced few goals on either end, but that's generally how I wanted it. It is my belief, however, that there is some significant conflict in my tactic, which the ME reacts to by giving me bad results and thus signalling that something in my tactic is failing.

This would be perfectly fine if the bad outcomes were correlated with the flaw in my tactic (e.g. I set D-line too high, get beaten by fast strikers). What I think actually happens is that there are odds for good and bad things happening to you, and a bad tactic adversely affects that calculation. The result for the hardcore FM player, however, is unsatisfactory. I have noticed the following things:

A) Free kicks. Default settings, have Deco and Ballack on the squad, I did not score a single from a direct free kick. I had at least 7 scored against me, including a 93rd minute masterpiece from Nuno Valente. A free kick, while taking into account player morale and fatigue, ultimately comes down to the shooter and goalkeeper's attributes and not my tactical instructions.

B) Hitting the woodwork. I have done this at least 20 times, including 4 in one game. Here I believe the overwhelmingly high attributes of my team get them to situations where they have a shot at scoring, but my crappy tactic is again ensuring that they lose their focus.

C) Late equalisers. Along with the Nuno Valente free kick, I have had about 5 other 1-1 draws where the other team heroically scores in injury time. I understand the concentration attribute plays a big role here, but my backline all have high Concentration and I am also very careful to sub in fresh players when needed.

So, to summarise, I have noticed "luck" or "attribute" events being swung by tactical settings, which should not happen. Free kicks must be down to attributes, while the luck of hitting the post or scoring late in the game should be distributed randomly.

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Let me know what you think about this, it angers me that some unexplained tactic-ME conflict is costing me games, and when I look at the most popular tactics in the tactics forum, those things are extreme (either all-out attack or playing offside trap from inside the opposition half). I don't like this feeling that FM has "one perfect tactic", where essentially you identify exploits in the ME, instead of it being an open system where every manager - should he have the players suitable for it - can run whatever sensible tactic he wants.

So, to summarise, I have noticed "luck" or "attribute" events being swung by tactical settings, which should not happen. Free kicks must be down to attributes, while the luck of hitting the post or scoring late in the game should be distributed randomly.

You've given no evidence that your "luck" has been swung by tactical settings: you've just pointed out that you've been unlucky with direct free kicks. Who's taking them by the way? If you do not set the free kick taker yourself, it is not always the best player who takes them. (My captain always wants to take penalties for instance). Free kicks are, from all that can be seen, based on attributes.

Let me know what you think about this, it angers me that some unexplained tactic-ME conflict is costing me games, and when I look at the most popular tactics in the tactics forum, those things are extreme (either all-out attack or playing offside trap from inside the opposition half). I don't like this feeling that FM has "one perfect tactic", where essentially you identify exploits in the ME, instead of it being an open system where every manager - should he have the players suitable for it - can run whatever sensible tactic he wants.

I've never employed an all-out attack. Those are probably most popular because they produce high-scoring games, which people enjoy. My highest scoring win has been 4-1, once, because I bagged a couple of direct free kicks: my tactics pretty balanced and it works fine.

It seems to me you have a combination of bad luck and bad tactics (no offence - I'm not claiming to be a guru). If people keep scoring against you late on, maybe you need to look at how you can change your tactic to counter the 4-2-4 employed late in the game. There's no use in your team concentrating really hard on doing completely the wrong thing.

If you're not scoring direct free-kicks, get a better free-kick taker.

Oh, and Liverpool have hit the woodwork 20 times this season. Man Utd and Liverpool have both repeatedly earned points in the last few minutes of the game.

I play the offside trap, and so I concede fast-break goals. When I played deeper, I used to concede goals from slower build-up. Because I like experimenting, I can say fairly assuredly that I've tried a great deal of different tactics in the game and never found the ME punishing me at random.

If I was being a dick, I would've just said: it's your tactics! Cliched, but true. Always look to yourself before you blame the ME.

all i can coment on is point 'c'.

just putting subs on does not mean you wont conceed in the final minutes.

you may have to slow down your style of play. you may need to take a striker off and put a DM on. you may need to stop your wingers from making so many forward runs, you may actually NOT need to put on a sub especially if its a defender as trying to get 'into the game' late on when your a defender can be difficult and could cause more problems than you solve.

Maybe you are conceding late goals because once you take the lead you are sitting back too much, allowing the opposition to get on top of you, push your defence too deep, and pressure them into making mistakes, like giving silly free kicks on the edge of the area, which you're then being punished for. Look at your defence's pass completion stats, because if they are driven too deep, and defensive, they will aimlessly punt the ball upfield, and good teams will take advantage with wave after wave of attacks, which you will eventually succumb too.

1. Free kicks- my allocated free kick taker ( attribute 18 for free kicks ) scores 8-10 per season direct from the kick so I dont think this is valid.

2. Hitting the woodwork- frustrating for sure but not out of the ordinary IMO. Try allocating all your strikers to a specific training schedule and concentrate on shooting, with a top coach taking it.

3. Late equalisers- again they happen but you cannot complain if you dont do anything tactically to stop it happening. I use a "close the game out' tactic when winning close to full time and this works a lot more often than it doesnt.

I am not suugesting that the ME is perfect, far from it, but there are several issues that come to mind before examples like this.

Late equalisers are down to YOUR tactics, pure an simple, though I think you are acknowledging that. But I can count on one hand the number of times I concede an equaliser/winner in injury time in a season, so it isn't all down to luck. If you are defending a narrow lead you simply HAVE to alter your tactics in the final 10 mins.

... It is my belief, however, that there is some significant conflict in my tactic, which the ME reacts to by giving me bad results and thus signalling that something in my tactic is failing.

This would be perfectly fine if the bad outcomes were correlated with the flaw in my tactic (e.g. I set D-line too high, get beaten by fast strikers). What I think actually happens is that there are odds for good and bad things happening to you, and a bad tactic adversely affects that calculation. The result for the hardcore FM player, however, is unsatisfactory. ...

I think you are correct, but that you're missing a step which causes the result to appear illogical to you.

The most common tactical problem is players who are not given sufficient options. In other words, if all of their teammates race ahead of them up the pitch (or hang back), the player may not have any open man to pass to. This is especially bad if he has been given "short" passing instructions and a high tempo - "Don't dawdle on the ball, lad, and don't try any pass longer than about fifteen or twenty yards." "But, gaffer, there's nobody within 30 yards of me, every time I get the ball!"

You wind up with a player who, early in the match, experiences lack of success:

1. He tries to shoot from long range, but misses or sees it saved easily.

2. He tries to pass, but its a long pass into coverage easily intercepted by the opposition.

3. He tries to hold the ball up, but has it taken away from him.

4. He tries to dribble, but loses out to the opposition.

His confidence suffers, a little bit.

The next time he has the ball, a similar situation arises, but this time he's already lacking confidence a bit so the result is slightly more likely to be bad for him. His confidence suffers again.

Lather, rinse, repeat, through every minute of every match, and through every match of the season .. and now your players are having trouble motivating themselves, they're having trouble playing confident football to each other, they're feeling the pressure of under-performing, they're struggling to gel and have personal conflicts arising, they're losing confidence in themselves and in their manager ...

And now it makes perfect sense that the bad luck you describe comes about - not because of some hidden "luck" variable, but because you have players trying too hard to fix the situation by themselves rather than through team play: rushing their shots (and banging them off the woodwork) when they had time to place it, passing instead of shooting even when they had a good position, trying to make the perfect free kick rather than putting the shot on target, giving away the turnovers which lead to late equalisers, etc.

If you look at it that way, it starts to make sense .. and that brings it back into your control: you can give team talks that help build confidence; you can design tactics built to give your players more options, or to slow things down, or to help dig in and hold a lead late; you can use the media to place pressure on the other teams rather than on your struggling side; you can sell off the young players which are struggling the most with this scenario and bring in veteran players with the "Professional" personality, high Determination, Team Work, and Work Rate.

Although I agree with Amaroq with most points, I feel it doesn't reflect the real ifnluence of success/unsuccess on the pitch. IRL it's more complicated.

If I set my player to take long shots often and he misses his first 5 attempts, you can say that his confidence will be damaged by that.

However it may be that 2 of the attempts will be narrowly missed, he's 2 shots rattle the woodowrk and 1 will be blocked by defender.

Now, according to game I should say "come on, you can't get it on target" and lower his long shots to "mixed" or "rarely".

But as a IRL manager I'd like to encourage him to try more, because his shots are really dangerous for keeper and he's not missing by a mile, so clearly he's got his target more-less right, so sooner or later he'll struck one to the net so that opp. keeper can't stop it.

It's the question of "what is successful attempt on the pitch?". Because obviously when player gets it all wrong or shots are going 'over foot' or too weak so GK can catch easily, then I'd say that "don't try too much, it's not your day".

But the problem is that I think the game doesn't make a difference between this "almost success" and "totally wrong" attempts.