AI Experiment: Players vs Money vs Infrastructure

Hello everyone, and welcome to this AI experiment!

The idea behind this experiment is to test which is the most powerful factor for success:

Players, Money, or Infrastructure?

To do this, 3 brand spanking new teams will be created and all placed in The Conference National (Or, Blue Square Premier). Each team will have the same base statistics and factors, such as the same Chairman statistics, same reputation, etc. However each club will have its own anomalous factor, and this is how we can test which is the most powerful factor for success!

Club 1 will have brilliant players, but hardly any money and a poor club infrastructure.

Club 2 will have a lot of money, but poor base players and a poor club infrastructure.

Club 3 will have a brilliant infrastructure (Stadium, facilities, staff, fanbase) but will have hardly any money, and poor base players.

For more detailed and in depth analysis of how this experiment will work, and how the database has been set up, please read further!

Any contributions and suggestions are welcome. Enjoy

Daemon

The Set Up:

Why are you running this experiment?

Well, there always seems to come a certain time when playing FM that I get fed up of managing, and I have always loved

tweaking with the Database, and giving real clubs extreme factors and seeing how they manage with these new factors.

Kipfizh's Bandits experiment was also a real influence, and made me think "what if I put these extreme factors into newly created teams?"

So then I started to think, what are the 3 main factors that I would like to see challenge eachother, and I decided upon the

3 cornerstones of a club; players, money, and infrastructure. This experiment is a test to see which is the most powerful factor,

and which will bring more success?

A Fair Test:

Upon first glance, it seems apparent that the real advantage lies with Club 3, at least in the long term. Money dwindles. Players come and go. But if your club infrastructure is sound, then surely long term success is a given? So I started to think "How can I make this a fair test? How can I make each club factor fair?"

First of all, Club 2 will be given a little bit more money than we may have imagined. £1billion to be precise. Now, using the FM editor to give them funds, the amount is always set back automatically by the game, due to the clubs reputation being low, however, if we use FMM, we can set the clubs finances at £1billion with no problem, and see how they manage for the duration of the experiment. I was initially against using FMM, but it seems the only way to give Club 2 high finances.

So Club 2 and 3 should be on quite an even keal, but what about Club 1?

Well, Club 1 will have a set up of players as follows:

12 world class 27 year olds

12 world class 21 year olds

18 wonderkinds aged 15.

This gives club 1 a constant, steady source of players over the years, and seeing as this is Club 1s only advantage, it seems fair. After all, the only advantage that Club 1 have is players, so we may as well give them alot of players, and see how they do.

The Loyalty Factor

From running previous experiments, a problem which has always ocurred is the problem of loyalty with created persons.

Even when a players loyalty and ambition statistic are exactly the same, ambition always wins out, and the player invariably moves on.

So to add extra player loyalty, we can set each players 'preferred club' to the club they are currently at. This should help

the player to stay longer, which actually makes the test fairer for club 1.

This is how the loyalty in the clubs will work:

Please note that this is an explination of loyalty, and not a complete rundown of how each club will work. That can be found, in detail, further on in the thread

Club 1

12 world class 27 year olds - all have ambition and loyalty statistic of 16, and all have CLub 1 as their preferred club, to a factor of 100

12 world class 21 year olds - all have ambition and loyalty statistic of 16, however only half of them have club 1 as their preferred club. The other 6 have no Club relationships at all.

18 wonderkinds aged 15. - all have ambition and loyalty statistic of 16. Again, only half have CLub 1 as preferred club. The other 9 have no club relatinships.

Club 2

No Staff, and only 8 base players. None of the players have any preffered clubs.

Club 3

Club 3 have a Manager, AssMan, 9 coaches, 4 scouts, and 2 Physios, all of which are at the top of their field. The Manager, AssMan, and 4 coaches all have Club 3 as their preffered club. 2 scouts and 1 physio also have this statistic.

Club 3 also have 8 base players, none of which have any preffered clubs.

Summary and Explinations

I have tried to add realism, in that the younger a player is, the less chance he will have of "loving" the club, and they may have more ambition/dreams at a younger age, rather than staying at one club.

I have tried to give preferred clubs to only half the persons. For example, half of Club 3s staff prefer club 3, but the other half have no such preference. The test here is to see whether loyalty is affected by having a club as your preffered club, or will ambition still win out in the end for these superstar players and wonderkids?

I decided not to give any prefered clubs to any of the 'Base Players'. This is because these players really only exist to get the ball rolling, so to speak. They are not important factors of this test in the long term, and they only exist to give Club 2 and 3 a very basic start to a squad, of which they can then build the squad around. The test here is to see who will build the best squad, will it be Club 2, with no staff or manager, or will it be Club 3, with top class Manager and coaches?

Setting up the Database

I will be running this experiment using FM08, so the database will run from the 07-08 season. While this may seem a little dated to some people, I am simply not a fan of FM09 and no longer have my copy. I don't see it as too much of a problem, as over a long period of time, things are bound to change in the game world, so it shouldn't matter.

In this particular database, it should be noted that I have tweaked a couple of the teams, for realisms sake. Man City have been given a huge financial boost, top tier managers have all been moved to their actualy and current club, and one or two big real-world transfers have been added into the game.

I used random name generators on the internet to create names for staff and players, as well as using one or two of your names, for those of you who requested yesterday

The 3 Clubs will be based in and around Greater Manchester. Well, I'm biassed!

Club rundown:

Here is a rundown of each newly created club, and their vitals stats!

Note: All Chairman have exactly the same statistics, and only the names vary.

Each Chairman is CA-200, PA-200, and Chairman stats are: Business: 20, Interference: 15, Patience: 20, Resources: 20

Each Chariman also loves their club to the factor of 100

Club 1: Cheadle Hulme

Reputation: 2000

Stadium: Cheadle Park - Capacity 6000

Average Attendance: 3000 Minimum: 1500 Maximum:8000

Balance: 200,000

Transfer Budget: 20,000

Training: 4 Youth Setup: 4

Chairman: Bob Talbot

Backroom Staff: None

Players:

Nick Pollard -Striker

Simon Morgan -Striker

Robert Clark -AMC

Zachary Clements -AMLC

Ian Hunter -AMRC

Connor Hudson -DM

Alexander Green -DR/RWB

Matthew Hartley -DL/LWB

Ethan Dobson -CB

Sebastian Davis -CB

James Rowe -GK

Josh Wilkinson -DRLC, DM, AMRLC, Striker

All have CA-200 and PA-200, and are all English, aged 27.

Owen Brooks -Striker -England

Bradley Crawford -Striker -Wales

Mohammed Hazazi -AMC -Saudi Arabia

Youssef Ali -AML -U.A.E.

Fabrice Zita -AMR -Gabon

Robert Kulala -DM -Liberia

Markus Kalonas -DRC -Lithuania

Costel Costea -DC -Romania

Nemanja Mravac -DC -Bosnia & Herz

Wilfred Zoundi -DL/LWB -Burkina Faso

Constantinos Okkas -GK _cyprus

Sam Cwiklinski -DLC, DM, AMLC -England

All have CA-150 and PA-200, all are aged 21 from varying nations.

David Daviau -Striker -France

Liam Ferguson -Striker -England

Jody FLint -Striker -Sweden

Luke Nicholls -AMRLC -England

Darren Gillmartin -AMRC -Croatia

Alex Barkley -AMRC -England

Michito Fujioka -AMLC -Japan

Dean Andrews -AMC -Northern Ireland

Patryk Rutkowski -AMC -Poland

Peter Townsend -DM -England

Izsak Siposs -DM -Hungary

Spencer Hopkins -DRL -England

Matthew Barnes -DR/RWB -England

Landolfo Zetticci -DLC -Italy

Ralph Vogt -DC -Germany

Benjamin Metcalfe -DC -England

Toby Rogers -GK -England

Jack Rudd -GK -Trinidad & Tobago

All have CA-100 and PA-200, all are aged 15 from varying nations.

Club 2: Wythenshawe Wanderers

Reputation: 2000

Stadium: Roundthorn Park - Capacity 6000

Average Attendance: 3000 Minimum: 1500 Maximum:8000

Balance: £1000,000,000

Transfer Budget: £75,000,000

Training: 4 Youth Setup: 4

Chairman: Bob Dobson

Backroom Staff: None

Players:

Player 1 GK CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 2 DRLC CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 3 AMRL CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 4 AMC CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 5 DM CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 6 DRLC CA-80, PA-100 age 27

Player 7 Striker CA-80, PA-100 age 27

Player 8 Striker CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Club 3: Salford Daemons

Reputation: 2000

Stadium: Salford Stadium - Capacity 102,500

Average Attendance: 100,000 Minimum: 92,500 Maximum: 180,000

Balance: 200,000

Transfer Budget: 20,000

Training: 20 Youth Setup: 20 Youth Academy: Yes

Chairman: Bob Coates

Backroom Staff:

Manager: Jacob Lord CA-200 PA-200

Ass Man: Jack Willis CA-200 PA-200

Coaches: Joe Hobbs CA-200 PA-200

Harry Spencer CA-200 PA-200

John Parker CA-200 PA-200

Morgan ROgers CA-200 PA-200

Luke Byrne CA-200 PA-200

Fitness Coach: Edward Hudson CA-200 PA-200

GK Coach: Nathan Cook CA-200 PA-200

Youth Coach: Alex Vaughan CA-200 PA-200

Scouts: Michel Sidney CA-200 PA-200

Luiz Oliveira CA-200 PA-200

Pat Pritchard CA-200 PA-200

Archie Shaw CA-200 PA-200

Physios: Morgan Abbot CA-200 PA-200

Zach Humphries CA-200 PA-200

Players:

Player 1 GK CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 2 DRLC CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 3 AMRL CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 4 AMC CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 5 DM CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Player 6 DRLC CA-80, PA-100 age 27

Player 7 Striker CA-80, PA-100 age 27

Player 8 Striker CA-60, PA-90 age 27

Great idea

Almost there!

Well, well. I added myself as manager of The Cook Islands, in the hope that I would be allowed a shortlist, but it seems as if I am not allowed one. Oh well!

The game is up and running, with the English League being ran all the way to Blue Square North/South, and the top 2 leagues for Italy and Spain being ran.

Detail level is set to high for all top leagues, as well as high detail level for our league, The Blue Square Premier.

A few tweaks are required before I can go on holiday just yet. Unfortunately the game resets Wythenshawe Wanderers funds to a 'more realistic' level, so I have had to alter that with FMM. Another thing I have had to alter with FMM, is the superstar player wages, which were up to £85,000 per week! I don't know why this was occuring, as I had set all wages very low in the editor. But these have been tweaked, and I am almost ready to go on holiday.

A slight setback, as I have to reload and set up again, because international managers can't have shortlists!

Pre season reports and predictions should be coming up soon, as well as the first updates over the coming days.

Get your predictions in soon

This looks real good. It looks like you have put a lot of effort into the opening posts. I will defiantly be reading.

Yeah I'm very interested in this too. Great Opening Posts!

Looking forward to following this. Good idea and it will be interesting to see how it develops.

Shame about the Manchester area, oh well. Only thought if its a Man Utd thing shouldn't the area be in Asia;)

Looks like an awesome idea

Season Preview

Cheadle Hulme

Cheadle Hulme are a lucky club. At their desposal, they have an assortment of the worlds finest football players, all in their prime, willing to put their hearts on their sleeves for the club. 12 Loyal and trusty 27 year olds, all of whom are the best in the world in their role.

Not only this, but the club has a whole host of youth players, just ready to fill the boots of the older lads. Mind you, not all of these younger lads are quite so loyal as their trusted counterparts in the first team, so it remains to be seen how they will serve the club in the future.

Cheadle Hulmes' other worry is that they have no manager, or any backroom staff. How will these super-players fair without guidance on the pitch in the early days?

The club also have a very modest bank balance, and not much in the way of a stadium, or facilities. Will the club be tempted to sell any of its superstars in return for the cash to help them build a successful framework?

Wythenshawe Wanderers.

Bob Dobson is a man on a mission. Where he amassed his fortune from, nobody knows. In the seedy underground of Wythenshawe, anything is possible. The self made billionaire has taken his favourite club up to the The Blue Square Premier, but he hasn't made any friends along the way. The club are still poorly ran, and they currently have no manager or backroom staff. Mr. Dobson has somehow managed to scrape together 8 players for the upcoming season, but they are nothing short of average.

The only thing Mr. Dobson has is cash. But he has alot of it. He has pumped his lifes fortune, £1billion, into The Wanderers, and he dreams of future glory....

Salford Daemons.

The Salford Daemons are the perfect example of how any top club should organise itself. The finest training facilities and youth academy in the world, and the finest backroom staff to boot. Jacob Lord, one of the greatest managers in the game is attempting to rise through the ranks with his team, with the full backing of his board, and with the support of the greatest coaching team ever assembled.

Jacob Lord's only problem is that The Daemons have virtually no money, and virtually no players, spare 8 average players drafted in at short notice to make up the numbers. But the Chairman, Bob Coates, is a patient man. He knows in time, with the excellent support of the Daemons fans, that ticket sales will forever be high, and he hopes his club can slowly but surely build the necessary funds needed to compete in the League System, and go on to greater glory.

Early predictions

With an incredible squad, I expect Cheadle Hulme to beat everybody in their wake, and probably win every single league game about 14 or 15 nil. Sods law, they won't win every game though, so I'm going for 44 wins, 1 draw, 1 loss. I also expect them to do well in the cups, their squad is just far too good. Could they even win the FA Cup? Probably not, but they might put on a good show...

Wythenshawe Wanderers are going to be quite unpredictable. They have poor players and I expect them to struggle in their first seasons. However, the Wanderers obviously have the money to sign players. Much will depend on who they manage to sign, considering they don't have the guidance of a manager yet. I see them finishing mid table, but who knows, some crazy signings could bring them success...

The Daemons have bad players, and also don't have the financial muscle to improve their squad much, and so I can really see them struggling. They will probably finish in the lower half of the table, and may even be fighting off relegation. This season will be all about staying in the division theyre in, and gathering together their gate reciepts to amass a small fortune at the club. They have the infrastructure to make it big, provided their poor squad can help them in the short term. Their short term goals will be to rely on that amazing coaching set up to get the most out of their poor players...

This is really great Daemon! Kutgw

Im supporting Team 3

im supporing team 1 beacuse im in it

Season Start

League Table

Our 3 teams replace Farsley, Droylesdon, and Salisbury in the Blue Square Premier. No games played so far!

Info Screens:

Cheadle Hulme

Wythenshawe Wanderers

Salford Daemons

There's not a whole lot more to report on at this stage, except to show you this treat of a first fixture (check out the bottom fixture!)

The World Rich List looks like this. No surprise who is top! And I guess Salford Daemons are ranked so high because of the value of all of their facilities together.

So, I will be going on holiday for a short time, until Sept 1st 2007, which will be the date of my first update. This will mark the end of the transfer window, and we can see if Cheadle Hulme have managed to avoid selling any of their players. We can also see if any of the teams have managed to make any signings, and we can see how the table looks after a couple of games!

I missed out on this because I forgot to put my name.

Still, it looks great and I will follow (and support team 3).

Will you report on promoted future stars for the clubs?

I imagine team 1 will have instant success, but it will be short-lived as all their players will leave very quickly. Team 2 won't be able to attract any decent players so will make slow progress. Team 3 for relegation perhaps?

Cheadle Hulme will take an early lead by winning the BSN with ease, and probably the BSP if they keep some of the wonderkids. The players will leave at the earliest possible opportunity (even if they were unambitious a move to top division football would be tempting, and the offers won't take long to come in). The money they get from early promotions won't be enough to make them a serious force in League 2, however, so their rise through the divisions will be halted fairly early.

Assuming they sign enough players to survive which isn't difficult with money and an average reputation for the level they play at, the other teams will do fine (provided that Salford Daemons are at least half filling their stadium despite the low level - otherwise the costs of maintaining a virtually empty stadium will send them into administration in the first season). With a big fanbase, Salford's cashflow will probably help them do better over the longer term, as season ticket sales should provide more than enough transfer budget to help them through the lower levels.

England will win more international competitions than usual...

Update 1

September 2007

After 6 games, the league table looks interesting. Despite having a squad of the worlds best players, Cheadle Hulme are struggling somewhat, and are currently lying in 5th place. It seems the lack of managerial guidance at the club has had a short term impact on the team. They do have a manager drafted in, but it seems he is not of the calibre to manage these superstars. Cheadle Hulme drew their first game 1-1 with Wythenshawe Wanderers, then lost 2-1 to Altrincham, and drew 1-1 again with Kidderminster. They did however, manage to turn around this poor early form with 3 wins on the bounce, winning 2-1 against Exeter, and 4-0 against Histon and Stafford.

There is one very interesting thing going on in Cheadles games. If we take a look at the statistics in their games, they seem to always have a huge percentage of the ball in each game they play, whether they win, lose or draw. Click Here to see how they lost to Altrincham despite having 72% of the ball. They usually have between 70% and 80% of the ball each game, but are struggling to turn possession into goals and victories. But maybe that early blip is behind them.

A quick glance at the table and at Cheadle Hulmes games immediately tells you that the big players aren't quite performing as well as they can. If we take a quick look at their squad we can see that the only superstar currently playing like a superstar is Nick Pollard,who has picked up 6 goals in 4 games. I can only guess that a poor coaching set up means that they are not getting the most out of their players. We will be keeping our eye on players like this as and when they are doing something interesting, but I dont think we need to screenshot every single one!

Wythenshawe Wanderers are performing surprisingly well. They have made 5 signings and are sitting pretty in 6th place, with the same points as Cheadle Hulme.

The Daemons are really struggling, and they sit in 21st place, in the relegation zone. This is quite surprising, as they did start with the same squad as the Wanderers, and they should have the manager and coaches to get the most out of these players. They did also manage to make 3 signings, but they aren't having the desired impact.

Cheadle Hulmes Super-Players are remaining loyal, as are their wonderkids, but there are numerous news reports in my inbox of some youngsters refusing to sign new contracts with Cheadle Hulme. None have left as of yet, but a handful of them are showing signs of becoming unhappy.

In world news, Man city signed Barazite, Nasri, Kallstrom and Palacio, and are currently sitting top of the Premiership after 5 games. An update on the World Rich List shows us that the positions are still the same, but Man City and Wythenshawe Wanderers financial stats have mellowed slightly.

Next Update: January 2008

good update and just wonding can i have a screenshot of my player

Great experiment! I predict that Wythenshawe Wanderers shall emerge winner in the long run. They have the money to spend but we'll see. Thanks for your thorough and truly gripping coverage...

Good update, I'm starting to get hooked into this already...

Hi everyone. Thanks for the responses so far. I'm currently working on the next update.

fergysafc, this is especially for you: Liam Ferguson. Not bad for a 14 year old!

I could tell by looking at the screenie of the Cheadle Hulme - Altricham game that you are not running it in full detail (otherwise you should be able to see the tactics of the teams) - that explains why Cheadle Hulme didn't destroy the opposition - when you don't run in full detail only reputation of the team matters.

Hi everyone. Thanks for the responses so far. I'm currently working on the next update.

fergysafc, this is especially for you: Liam Ferguson. Not bad for a 14 year old!

only if i was like that irl

and 12 goals in 15

and capped for england u19

I could tell by looking at the screenie of the Cheadle Hulme - Altricham game that you are not running it in full detail (otherwise you should be able to see the tactics of the teams) - that explains why Cheadle Hulme didn't destroy the opposition - when you don't run in full detail only reputation of the team matters.

Actually, the game is in full detail, and this problem is something I am exploring in my current update. I have been constantly checking to see whether the game is on full detail, and it is, and these low scoring results have been surprising me as much as you, but every time I check the game is on full detail.

In my current update, you will be able to see how Cheadle are now winning by huge scorelines, but it took them a while to get going. I'm not a computing expert, so I don;t know why this was the case, but as my update explains, I can only put it down to a bug, a glitch, maybe the DB having trouble handling extreme scenarios?

Cmon Team 1

I'm sorry Daemon but I'm pretty sure that game was not in full detail. If you just selected "england - all" in the detail screen, you should check the league by league detail in the right side, because, for some weird reason, even if you select full detail in a country, the lower league of the country (in this case the blue square divisions), as well as the reserves and the youth leagues will stay in "no" detail, unless you individually pick to change that. If you do not believe in me, you should check that when you actually watch the match, a team like Cheadle would win massive all the time, when playing against blue square opposition.

The fact that "Formations" was not a selectable option on the match screen, proves it was not run in full detail. Anyone can try and check that -> full detail is selected - "formations" shows up in match screen; no detail is selected - "formations" does not show up in the match screen.

Thankyou Lance, you are actually correct. I had selected full detail, but as I check back now, for some reason it is no longer on full detail. I will re-select full detail, and continue the holiday game!

Will be interesting to see if it affects things. But it should be much more realistic on full detail, as this is what I originally intended. Glad we nipped that one in the bud sooner rather than later!

Update 2

September-December 2007

The in game date is now Jan 1st 2008, which gives me chance to analyse whats been going on since September.

Blue Square Premier League Table. This once again makes for interesting viewing. 25 games in, and Cheadle Hulme are 1st, Wanderers are 2nd, and the Daemons are in 14th.

Cheadle Hulme have had a very interesing run of results. Things have really started to pick up, with a series of emphatic wins. As Lance101 pointed out, this is a problem with not running the league in Full Detail. I had intended to run this league in Full Detail, and was pretty sure I had done this, but its obvious that I perhaps didn't select it properly, or it somehow reverted. Either way, December time, I made sure we carried on this experiment in full detail, the way it was indended to run! And things changed for the better for Cheadle, as they started getting the results that we had all expected!

Of particular note is Cheadles 18-0 victory over Canvey Island in the FA Cup 1st Round, and a 13-0 victory over Altrincham in the league. You may remember Nick Pollard from a previous post; he has scored 26 in 25, but he has been outshone by fellow striker Simon Morgan, who has scored 30 goals in 21 games!

Salford Daemons also seemed to have picked up form around the same time as Cheadle. One obvious fault of mine is not making sure that we were in full detail. But we are now, so it will be interesting to see how this experiment continues to go! I hope this hasn't ruined anyones experience!

As we can see from their squad list, it is Players 7 and 8 who are racking up the goals for the Daemons right now. Niether player is particularly great, so perhaps we are finally seeing the fruits of the labour from that world class coaching set up? Something is motivating players 7 and 8 to glory! Their good form has come at a good time in the season, and the Daemons have risen from relegation battlers into mid table obscurity! Go Daemons.

The Wanderers are plodding along as normal, and like a German machine, they just keep grinding out those results, and they have maintained 2nd place in the league. I know most of you are asking... how have they done it? Well.....

If we look at their backroom staff, we can start to see why. All that money has been able to bring them a little bit of joy in terms of staffing, and as we look down the list we can see some familiar faces; Alan Irvine is manager, Pako Ayestaran is Assistant Manager, and Tony Whelan is a coach.

With Pako Ayestaran as Assistant Manager, the Wanderers have been able to identify and snap up alot of Spanish free transfers. Their new look team looks like a Spanish pub team. Do they have pub sides in Spain? Maybe they have 'tapas bar' teams, who knows? Well credit to them, theyre doing very well, and are only just behind Cheadle Hulme.

In World News, Zlatan Ibrahimovic won the European Player of the Year award. Man City continue to light up the Premiership, sitting at the top of the pile after 19 games, with 46 points. Chelsea have 43 points. And then, hold on, in order of league position, it's Spurs, Reading, Portsmouth, Blackburn, Newcastle... Arsenal-8th, Man United-9th, and Liverpool-11th. It's a very strange season indeed in the top flight.

Surprisingly enough, Capello has not spotted any of the superstar English players, and none have been drafted into the England set up. But the foreign players in Cheadles squad all seem to be making their way in international football. News items continue to flood in of Cheadles players being unhappy with recent contract offers. Could this upcoming transfer window be the end for them?

Next Update: End of January transfer window

Good updates so far. It seems like Cheadle Hulme are getting better as the season goes. I expect them to get promoted. I don't think the other 2 will for a few years yet.

You were already getting some drubbings by Cheadle in the FA cup before december, because the FA cup was already in full detail - if you simply choose "england - all" in the detail menu, the fa cup would have been selected to full detail. The results are interesting... I think Cheadle will lose all their players like the bandits... after that I think team 3 is, on the long run, destined to be the better one.

How is your experiment going, Daemon Rising?

It's going terribly. The game save just will not load, it appears to load and then FM keeps crashing once it appears to have loaded. I don't have any back ups, either.

I don't have this problem with any of my other save games though.

I am currently deciding whether to start the experiment from scratch or whether to tweak it, make it more in depth, and re-start from there.

I'm sorry to everyone who was enjoying this, it's a shame as I was enjoying it too, but I do aim to be back with a new one!

Appologies, Daemon.

I'm sorry that you are having hard times when it comes to the experiment. I sincerely hope that you can overcome these problems the least annoying way. Anyway, if you need to start with a new one, do it in full detail. These experiments are so addicting and I'm loving them, especially your 'storytelling'. Please don't abort it just yet...

Perhaps start from the beginning again, but don't report just yet, go into holiday mode for a couple of seasons just to make sure it all runs smoothly. Then run it again from the beginning, and perhaps use the 3 file rolling autosave.

I am going to attempt a new database. Only thing is, Jody Flint is running a similar thing to what I wanted to run!

However, his is a sign up, and mine is not, although we may be using similar factors for the experiment. I also plan on creating my factors "in the extreme", so hopefully they will both run as very different experiments!

Thanks for your patience guys, I hope to back soon.

Important Information

Restarting the Database

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the experiment. As you will have gathered, the first one didn't quite go to plan, and so we start once again with a bigger, better improved version of the experiment. I hope you all enjoy! Here's a rundown of how the new experiment will work:

6 teams will now be battling out to see who can be the most successful, and we will be testing 6 areas to see which will bring most success to the club. Here are a list of the clubs and their field of expertise:

The Old Pro's - 12 players, all aged 27, who are the most skilled footballers in the world. They have no ambition to play for bigger clubs, and are loyal and devoted to their teams cause. They hate a selection of the worlds top clubs, and their only misison is to see The Old Pro's rise through the football league. But they know they are aging fast, so it remains to be seen how far their legs will carry their club, and how their club will fair when they have to retire.

The Wonderkids - The Wonderkids have the greatest youth academy and set up in the world, and they have good training facilities to be able to train these youngsters. On their playing staff, they currently have 12 21 year olds, and 18 under 15s, who all have the potential to be the greatest player in the world. Their 21 year old players love the club, and are very loyal, and they too dislike a selection of the worlds top clubs. The idea behind this is that it would be unfair on the game world to allow all the top clubs in the world to simply snap up these players and continue to dominate, it would ruin the experiment somehwat.

These kids do have a little bit more ambition than the old Pros, so they may have more desire to move on from their club, but their club will always have a good turn out of quality young players. Their under 15 team also have limitless potential, and a love for the club. But they have not yet grown a distaste for bigger clubs around Europe. They may be harder to hold on to, but at least The Wonderkids have a good Youth Academy for now.

Wythenshawe Wanderers - The Wanderers are back, and nothing has changed, apart from their kit. They are the richest club in the world, but have no players or staff, and extremely basic facilities.

Salford Academical - Salford have a philosophy that you can get anywhere with a dedicated backroom staff and great training facilities. They have the worlds greatest managers, coaches, and scouts, as well as top training facilities. They currently have no squad, but they have 5 talented scouts with an eye for a bargain, and they also have excellent coaches who get the best out of their squad.

Cheadle Hulme - Cheadle Hulme also have no players, or staff, and very basic facilities. They also have little cash, however they have a 90,000 seater stadium, and a great support. They average 67,000 a game, and at the least they bring in 30,000 a game. This brilliant and ever increasing support brings in a steady cash flow for the team, but they will have to be patient before they build up a fortune.

The Daemons - The Daemons have nothing apart from their name. Their reputation comes before them. Reputation is set to 10,000, but they too have no players or staff, and extremely basic facilities. Will reputation alone bring them success?

So to sum up, this is a battle of:

Initial Playing Staff vs

Youth Setup vs

Money vs

Coaching & Training vs

Support & Stadium vs

Reputation

Why has the database changed?

Firstly, I needed to restart the experiment due to the game save crashing. However, it also become apparent after just one season running the experiment that it was obvious where the power was. The team with all the facilities, all the staff, and all the support were miles ahead in terms of future potential, and although the other 2 team had advantages of their own, it would still have been unfair. Another problem was that the playing staff of the World Class team simply got snapped up by big clubs.

So now, after hours of painstaking database work, we have a much more detailed experiment. The 12 Super-Players have low ambition and high loyalty stats built in, as well as a dislike for a wide selection of the worlds top clubs, in order to even the scores a little.

The only other team to start with playing staff, are the wonderkids. They have alot more players than the Old Pro's. These players are loyal, but less so than their older cousins, and they are slightly more ambitious. But they should still have some resistance to join bigger clubs immediately.

All 6 will Start in the Blue Square Premier. Although I could put them in the BS North and South, there is always a danger of them being relegated from the game, so all 6 will start in the BS Premier, and will battle it out from there!

The DB is very close to being completed, so hang tight. It would be great to see peoples predictions in a much more even playing field!

Daemon.

I like this more with those 6 teams, good idea. Most interested in The Daemons.

Even more interesting then the original experiment..

Great changes. This will be even better.

I agree, this will be much more fun!

We should be ready to roll pretty soon

I just love seeing how clubs build a character for themselves with bare building blocks.. its great fun!

unlucky bout the first experiment, but a great improvement for the 2nd one, be interesting to see which team comes out on top now, as only 2 teams get go up into league 2

I'm liking the look of this, even more teams should provide even more entertainment

Top stuff - I really like experiments that detail exactly what they're going to do comprehensively, from the start - will be following this one with interest!

My predictions, for what they're worth:

The Old Pro's - Will have an awesome first season, and should win the BSP as their players are at their peak. Most will probably leave after one season, although for decent enough prices for them to be able to buy a League Two squad. Those players may go to the likes of Newcastle/Spurs, or go abroad, improving those sides. Their lack of ambition means they won't mind not being in the top four clubs. Long run, I suspect League Two will be the club's level, and after 3-4 seasons, they will be fairly static.

The Wonderkids - Assuming these players have a decent starting CA, they'll probably finish in the playoffs, although I'd suspect they could lose out to the Wanderers there. They'll be strong for two seasons, as a few starlets will stay for a second year (probably the ones that play the least in the first year), and should be in League Two by the time all their kids have departed. Long term, their training and youth setup should help them progress very slowly, and they may end up in the Championship after twenty years or so. They will probably stagnate though.

Wythenshawe Wanderers - A few million wouldn't make much of a difference, as all it takes is for one manager to waste it and you've got a bog standard club. But one billion is another story - they've got enough money to propel themselves up the leagues AND sort out their infrastructure as they go. If it weren't for the Old Pros, they'd be my favourites for the league, but I'll tip them to go up via the playoffs, and then overtake the Old Pros after their players leave next summer. Premiership within 15 years, and the first to win a major trophy (probably the League Cup). Eventually, they should be a top half Premiership team, and how many trophies they win will depend largely on the quality of their board by that point (which may have changed).

Salford Academical - The manager and coaches should make them a success in the short term, probably making the playoffs but falling to superior opposition there. Promotion in the second or third season beckons, but I don't think they'll be able to rise quickly enough to keep their talented staff. They may make it to League One within 5 seasons, but stop there, and eventually find that to be their level.

Cheadle Hulme - One thing FM has done in the last few incarnations is make home form good when your crowd is huge and fanatical, so long term, I think Cheadle will be a huge success. Missing out on promotion in the first season, they're a good bet for season two, and should work steadily up the leagues from there, eventually becoming a Premiership side after around 18-20 years. The Wanderers may beat them to a major trophy, but I don't think they'll be a million miles behind.

The Daemons - Probably the weakest of the six, the Daemons will have great things predicted of them, but while players might be happy to join a club of their stature, they haven't the finances to afford them. After two seasons, their reputation will normalise and the media will go back to writing about another club. Their reputation might survive just long enough to get one promotion, after some of the other new clubs, perhaps in season three, but after that, League Two/BSP is probably their level.

Season 1:

(BSP)

Promoted: Old Pros (automatically), Wanderers (playoffs)

Playoff Losers: Cheadle, Salford, Wonderkids

Mid table: Daemons

Season 2:

(League Two)

Promoted: Wanderers (automatically)

Mid table: Old Pros

(BSP)

Promoted: Salford (automatically), Cheadle (playoffs)

Playoff Losers: Wonderkids

Mid table: Daemons

Actually, having done a two season prediction, if the Wonderkids fail to go up in season one, they'll probably struggle to go up in seasons two.

Good luck with the experiment!

New Season Start

We start the game off in 2007, but all clubs have been updated to their current leagues as of today. This time, we are running in full detail from the very start. Some major world transfers and mangerial moves have been edited to give the upper league slightly more realism, although we will be focussing on the lower leagues at the start of the experiment.

Remember, our 6 teams are:

Cheadle Hulme - Stadium & Support

Salford Academical - Training facilities & excellent backroom staff

Wythenshawe Wanderers - Money

Daemons - Reputation

Old Pro's - Superstar Playing squad

Wonderkids - Excellent Youth facilities, plus brilliant young players with potential.

First update will be very soon!