More realistic financial dealings

Feel free to say that this is a rubbish idea!

IRL a big factor is the financial market and in particular a countries exchange rate and tax bands/rates. However as far as I am aware these are not taken into consideration within FM.

This impacts a club in two ways:

1) when buying a player the current exchange rate will define the real cost of a player to your club so one year 20m euros could cost an English club £18m and the following year it could be £19m. This is true in real life and I think should be reflected in FM. To do this a dynamic currency exchange rate list would need to be kept an a player be listed in the selling club's nations's currency. Then could be converted into your currency when deciding what to bid. A bid would be made in the selling clubs currency and the actual amount you spen (in your own currency) is not set in stone untiul the day you hand over the money. English clubs buying from European clubs have to bbid and but in Euros so it should be in FM.

2) A big factor for a player when deciding where to move to is the tax rate of a country. There has been a lot of comment that the high tax rate in the UK has happered clubs when offering contracts against say a Spanish club who until recently had a much lower tax rate (I belive it is still slightly lower but not a dramatic). So if the two clubs offfer the same wage the player is better off with the Spanish side. This has lead to some clubs offering a contract of x per week after tax therefore negating any changes in the tax rate. Therefore shouldn't FM have tax rates for each country and have them potentially vary as the years pass? And then allow clubs to offer an amount after tax on a contracct.

This would help to make the financial side of FM much more realistic and add another dimension to contract and transfer negotiations. Some may not like it as it may make financials of the game harder but it would be far more realistic. It would be too late to introduce this in FM11 but could be considered for future releases.

What do people think?

Really boring and pointless.

You did ask.

At least you seemed to finish reading it, Robert. I gave up halfway through 1)

Really boring and pointless.

You did ask.

OK. I thought it would add more realism but if others don't agree thats fair enough.

I have voted against this not because it is boring, but because it isn't feasible.

It's not possible for FM to create dynamic exchange rates.. who would govern it? Exchange rates change daily, and SI only release 3 patches per year, usually. This would provide 3 opportunities for the exchange rate to change. It wouldnt be enough to make this idea anywhere near realistic.

Although it would add realism it would make the game rather complicated at times, especially for younger players.

I have voted against this not because it is boring, but because it isn't feasible.

It's not possible for FM to create dynamic exchange rates.. who would govern it? Exchange rates change daily, and SI only release 3 patches per year, usually. This would provide 3 opportunities for the exchange rate to change. It wouldnt be enough to make this idea anywhere near realistic.

Well using patches wouldn't be dynamic they would be fixed hard coded values. To make it dynamic the game itself would have to manage the fluctuations. So it would be an element of AI that would have to change the rates daily (in game) using a set of ranges for each rate. Therefore no stupidly high/low rates would occur but a simulation of RL. I accept that it may penalise a club at some points in the game but at others they would be in a better position. Just like in RL.

Coding wise it is quite a simple algorithm to construct and if I was doing it I wouldn't anticipate it taking very long.

Yeah I'm with Daemon_Rising on this one, just don't think it would be feasible with exchange rates changing daily or in some cases hourly.

The other issue would be when you are starting a game I assume (not 100% sure since I have only played in £) when you start a new game player X would be valued at 20m in whatever currency you played in. To take into account the financial market this player would need to have his value set in one currency in the database and then when you started a new game it would need to calculate their value in the relevant currency. You would also have this problem reloading a save game since the exchange rate would need to be taken into consideration from when you saved the game to when you reloaded the game.

Yeah I'm with Daemon_Rising on this one, just don't think it would be feasible with exchange rates changing daily or in some cases hourly.

The other issue would be when you are starting a game I assume (not 100% sure since I have only played in £) when you start a new game player X would be valued at 20m in whatever currency you played in. To take into account the financial market this player would need to have his value set in one currency in the database and then when you started a new game it would need to calculate their value in the relevant currency. You would also have this problem reloading a save game since the exchange rate would need to be taken into consideration from when you saved the game to when you reloaded the game.

I assume there must be some conversion done already from the values in the database as diferent currencies vary significantly, but like you I have only ever played in £.

I wouldn't suggest using real life currencies as that is unworkable for a number of reasons. Rather have a simulated world where the currencies would fluctuate daily in game. Therefore the AI would control all the alterations.

Well using patches wouldn't be dynamic they would be fixed hard coded values. To make it dynamic the game itself would have to manage the fluctuations. So it would be an element of AI that would have to change the rates daily (in game) using a set of ranges for each rate. Therefore no stupidly high/low rates would occur but a simulation of RL. I accept that it may penalise a club at some points in the game but at others they would be in a better position. Just like in RL.

Coding wise it is quite a simple algorithm to construct and if I was doing it I wouldn't anticipate it taking very long.

I will take your word for it that the coding would be simple, but thats not the issue.

The downfall is that it would be completely random. SI cannot forsee the ups and downs of the currency markets. I'm not ssaying that this is what you are claiming, but think about it. Any coding would be essentially random. All exchange markets in the game would be randomised, and going up and down completely unfairly.

SI strive for realism, and adding fake fluctuations in currency values would be the opposite of what they were trying to do. Your original idea seemed to have some basis to it, as you claimed you wanted things to be more realistic, but seeing as SI can't predict the future, how would this be realistic? You are now suggesting a simulated world of currency values.. this just isnt realistic in any way.

I will take your word for it that the coding would be simple, but thats not the issue.

The downfall is that it would be completely random. SI cannot forsee the ups and downs of the currency markets. I'm not ssaying that this is what you are claiming, but think about it. Any coding would be essentially random. All exchange markets in the game would be randomised, and going up and down completely unfairly.

SI strive for realism, and adding fake fluctuations in currency values would be the opposite of what they were trying to do. Your original idea seemed to have some basis to it, as you claimed you wanted things to be more realistic, but seeing as SI can't predict the future, how would this be realistic? You are now suggesting a simulated world of currency values.. this just isnt realistic in any way.

Although I like the idea of dynamic league reputation that is not realistic in terms of the fluctuations you see in game do not match the fluctuations that will happen in real life. However as long as it is given some sort of basis it is workable. For currencies a historical range would ensure that the fluctuations are only ever in line with the variations seen in RL. But I seem to be on my own with this so it is largely incidental.

lets not have this, would make the game very complicated for many people. you would need a degree in economics to get the hang on this!!!!!

Although I like the idea of dynamic league reputation that is not realistic in terms of the fluctuations you see in game do not match the fluctuations that will happen in real life. However as long as it is given some sort of basis it is workable. For currencies a historical range would ensure that the fluctuations are only ever in line with the variations seen in RL. But I seem to be on my own with this so it is largely incidental.

Problem is that it is actually your idea which has no basis, and SI's idea which does have basis.

Dynamic leagues will not be random values set by SI that go up and down willy nilly. They will be dependant on how well the leagues clubs are doing in European competition. For example, say Ukraines league has a relatively low rep. In previous versions of the game this would always stay the same. However now, if Ukraines clubs start to do well, their league rep doesnt hold them back. Slowly, they can raise the leagues rep. This is a great idea, and has basis to it.

Again, I point back to the fact you are proposing random values with no basis to them, and it will just never be incorporated because SI strive for realism.

First one doesn't have a real need as this influence is very limited in the long run, on a short run (1 year) it can make a difference. But if you add this you should also take into account every possible financial influence: economical crisis, owner/sponsor bankruptancy, monetary devaluations, ...

Similar to the previous point, these tax rates tend to fluctuate, to be correct in your point of view SI would also allow them to change every x years then

Al this just seems a bit out of the league for a Football Manager, would rather see more in debt sponsorship dealing, stadion building & stadion revenues (renting shops, adding mall's, ...) then again this would be more like FIFA Manager which just is another game that loses the main focus: it's a Football Manager

I think this is a good idea, but not one that should be implemented. As people have already said, it would take some processing if not alot but wouldn't add much to the gaming experience. It could make it more realistic, but only if the AI fluctuations follow those of the exchange markets. The brightest economists in the world struggle to do this so i doubt the FM programmers could! eg, in 3 years time the spanish government might be ousted for a more conservative government which lowers taxes and makes spain more attractive. On the other hand, a truly socialist government may be elected and introduce a 60% tax rate for the rich, driving footballers away. Fm could be dynamic and get it totally wrong, making the game less realistic!

Not for me

The second thing might be worth thinking about as tax rates create pretty static competition imbalances between countries which have a consiiderable rl impact but I see no gain to the game whatsoever in including the first one.

I agree it would be more realistic, but wouldn't add much to the gaming experience. It'd take extra processing for rather little gain.

Moreover, I don't really believe the real-life argument that players won't sign for English clubs on account of the tax rate. If only because it's only a theory that seems to be put forward exclusively by pundits, I've never heard a player explicitly saying so (but maybe I've just missed it).

I think we shouldn't try to turn the game something like matrix, a life in computer, other wise the demands will not end. Yet, it will not satisfy us as humans. Then we will desire more life-based and basic things like death, war, global economic crysis, contaigous diseases. I think we should keep this game around only football, not around the things that affects football indirectly.

http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/wenger-weakness-of-pound-affects-us-less

And your idea doesnt have anything to do with this.

In real life, a currency can drop dramatically. However you a proposing a randomised currency fluctuation, which at any time, could hit any nation, and any handful of clubs, all the time, having nothing to do with real life.

IRL we could be going through a stable financial time, yet your idea would be fluctuatiing all over the place and changing markets in the game, that have nothing to do with real life markets. I Don't see why you are pushing for randomised markets.

You do have, and will always have a point that market fluctuations happen, this is true. But you havn't proposed a way for all our save games to keep up do date with Real Life scenario's. All you have proposed is a way to make the game less realistic by pushing for randomised algorythms that do not reflect real life.

How many more real life factors do you want to the game to take into account? Do you want us to take into account whether or not we have a labour or convservative government, and from that work out the policies, and work out which constituencies would be harder hit financially, and which would be able to more afford to pay for a season ticket this year, and thus work out what attendences our clubs should be getting? Seriously how far do you want these guys to go just to improve the game 0.00000000000001%.

Would it really make you that much happier if you managed to buy Aguero for £39million instead of £40million. This isn't really a game defining problem. This isn't a life simulator.