Fed up with AI compensation

I am really Fed Up with the AI trying to make the game more realistic.

I am playing Sunderland and could set up a very nice team as of the start of season 2. I was dominating the league and 10 matches from the end I had 7 points bonus on everybody. I was not playing my first team in the UEFA cup in order to keep a fresh team in the leaugue. An then it started:

In 5 of the last games I had a last minute goal against me. (Sometimes a fantastic 30 yarder from a player with LS 8 or 9).

In 6 of the games, the "miracle keeper" was there again.

I must have been broken the world record post hitting, bar hitting and offside goals in 10 games.

I had scored 12 goals from corners untill then (Turner). From then on, i didn't manage to score one more corner goal. The opposition defence could not stop Turner but everytime on the post, the bar, just over, saved from the line or unbelievable saves.

Last match a draw was enough. I missed a penalty (Cardozo!) hit the woodwork four times, Souza missed a header before open goal from 1 yard and Liverpool scored on a corner in min 89.

In the meantime Man City won all last competition games (winning FA Cup as well and going to semis in ECC, always playing its best team without suffering from fatigue), including 0-2 away from Arsenal on the last day and they took the premier league with one point.

It seems clear to me that AI just decided that winning the league with Sunderland in season 2 is not "realistic" enough and that "action" had to be taken.

In the meantime, i have loaded an old savegame and replayed the last 8 games, scoring goals and winning normally (without changing tactics or teamtalk approach) but there is no excitement anymore as replaying ruins the fun for me.

The AI doesn't cheat. The AI has no opinion on whether Sunderland can or can not win the Premier league.

By running the game again you have proved this. You have proved justw hat people will answer you with; that you were unlucky.

Or even the dreaded statement. It's your tactics, mate.

Wasn't it clear from that it was anything but his tactics?

It might have been bad luck, it might have been something else and at least it seems to how show very random winning or losing in this game is.

The game wants you to keep playing so it will create challenges. You'd get bored winning with league with Sunderland.

I don't know. If tactics were the issue, i would not have created much more chances than my opponent. And after replaying the savegame, i applied the same tactics. I really have the feeling that the luck factor is much to important. Luck can decide 3 or 4 games on a season, in FM it is much more. I have the feeling that AI is manipulating the luck factor to compensate realism.

Wasn't it clear from that it was anything but his tactics?

It might have been bad luck, it might have been something else and at least it seems to how show very random winning or losing in this game is.

NO it wasn't clear. It was clear that the OP didn't perform at the end of the season how he performed at the start. He didn't really mention his tactics, so how do we know he didn't mess with something he shouldn't have.

I'd also class team talks and media comments in with his tactics because they';d have a bearing on his performance.

At the end of the day he is assuming a computer had it in for him, and Sunderland, and decided he shouldn't win a league. Computer programming is advancing but they can't do that yet.

Wasn't it clear from that it was anything but his tactics?

It might have been bad luck, it might have been something else and at least it seems to how show very random winning or losing in this game is.

It was clear from his post only that nothing could be ruled out, as he gave us no information on how he set up his team, how he changed tactics during any game (if he did), how he handled press conferences, how he handled OIs or how he handled team talks. Those are the five biggest issues in how it is decided the game will go.

I would suggest that from the way he's phrased his post that the OP is suffering somewhat form confirmation bias. This in no way is a slur on the OP as every person suffers from the same problem, and it can only ever be mitigated not stopped.

These forums are full of people who have won the league with Sunderland - you can do it first season if you're really good.

Given that you reloaded your game, and won and didn't suffer any misfortune, it's pretty obvious not that "the AI decided to cheat you" but that you had a lot of bad luck on one save, which completely failed to re-appear when you re-loaded (almost as if your bad luck had NOTHING to do with the AI's opinion of your league position's realism).

Bad luck can happen, and teams can go through slumps. The AI gets the same issues to deal with as you, and if you play as a crap team, you can often have games where your keeper is super, or where your CM slots one home from range against superior teams - it's just that the majority of people are the better team going into almost any game, and so they never get the flipside of the coin.

Once you've played a bit of FM, you can empathise with those managers (Wenger, Benitez, Ferguson, Mourinho, Warnock etc.) who always blame the refs, or the pitch, or the linesman or the weather.

Sometimes you lose matches you deserve to win, and there's nothing you should have done differently.