Are scouts pointless

Does anyone use the scouts for anything other than getting a valuation on how much they might have to pay to sign a player. For me the scout only give you a report on his CA/PA not wether he is any good for your team. We often see threads with people asking whats best CA or Attributes and most people go with attributes, yet scout reports don't seem to take attributes into account, you can find a striker with great pace,finishing,composure etc but the scouts won't rate him unless his current ability is good, but you could sign him and find he does his job excellently thanks to his attributes in the match engine, and while we are on scouts what's the point in my scouts always telling me dzeko is not as good as torres and never will be, I know that I want to know if the dzeko is better than the guy playing up front with Torres

What are your thoughts people ? Are there any tips or hints that anyone knows for using the scouts effectively

I normally use scout reports so that I know wether the player would be any good or whether he would want to join my club. That's it, but what else are they really for? Seeing if they fit in?Don't know. :/

I find them vital for a few reasons - finding players, revealing attributes, they give an idea of PA and they tell you if a player wants to come to your club and for what price. I don't really listen to them regarding CA though.

The scouts job is not to see whether a player fits in the club or not. You make the team so that is YOUR job.

I wouldn't say they're pointless. I normally use them to reveal their attributes. I don't care too much about the value or the detailed reports. I make up my own mind based on their attributes and their stats.

I know i don't use them to the extent that i can, but i don't want to either.

But they're not pointless, in my opinion.

I just wonder seriously what the point is of the CA at all. It thoroughly confuses the issue when a scout or coach insists that a player ought to be signed at all costs, for example, when his stats seem to be nothing out of the ordinary or when they urge you not to sign someone whose stats are actually better than a lot of your players'. It's almost as though the game is set up to be misleading on purpose sometimes.

Who do you manage?

I manage small clubs, so scouts are essential. If they say they should be signed, it's usually quite clear, THEY SHOULD BE SIGNED. If you managed a bigger club, I could see how you would have players that are better than the ones recommended by scouts.

I use them to see how much potential they reckon the player has, and also how much the club would accept a bid for the player/their wages. Its been improved in this years fm imo, though the scouting assignments need abit of work on them.

I manage small clubs too, Montanaro. Just recently, one of my coaches strongly recommended signing a striker who he said was about the same standard as my current best one. This player had great physical stats apart from jumping (3) but his highest skill stat was 6 (passing), his finishing was 3 and his heading was 2. He had poor composure as well. Even for the BSS, I reckon I would need my head examining if I followed the coach's advice.

I've always felt that the game over valued physical stats as compared to skill.

Quite important IMO, they give me some rough detail about players, ofc it's pointless when you use genie scout etc..

how good of a scout was he Rupal?

I only listen to scouts above 15 JA/JP.

For any scouts under that, I just use them to uncover stats.

He was actually a coach with a JA of 11 and JP of 14. Of course, I know that's not very good but you take what you can get at that level!

I shudder to think how bad the judgements of people with stats LOWER than that are. Needless to say, I did not follow the plonker's advice!

I have had a sudden brainwave! Do you think it would work to find the WORST scout possible and do the opposite of what he said all the time? Hmmm.....................

I find them pretty vital, to be honest. I tend to play one or two games over a number of years, and obviously the longer I play, the larger the % of the database is regens. While I can look at a player's attributes and have a reasonable idea of whether he'd be worth signing, I'll always get a scout report to give me a little more information. I won't always listen to what is said, as obviously there will be players I think are worth signing that my scouts don't rate so much. But I find them particularly useful as far as youth goes. Both sending them on scouting assignments, and specific players. If they say anything less than 'has the potential to be a good player' I disregard the player, as in experience I've found they're not worth signing.

useless at times i have one scout that is 20 - 20 to go and scout palyers i want to scout and the rest scouting different parts of the world and a lot say they will be fairy good and ussaly they become good or even better

i also think this is very annoying, my scouts keep recomending regen strikers with < 7 composure or off the ball, or even both, and then keep saying that young strikers with 14 in finishing, composure and off the ball have no future, i usually have to scout the players myself using filters (i dont use attribute masking).