Team-Talks: Time for a revamp?

Amaroq · February 13, 2008

I'm not satisfied with the current Team Talks mechanic.

I feel like its a "Guess the right answer" mechanic, and after having a couple team-talks blow up in my face - was that 0-9 hammering really necessary to make the point? - it still feels that way in FM'08.

One of the reasons I've been unhappy is that I don't feel it addresses the sorts of things my managers would tell me before matches .. and I don't think I ever "took it wrong", no matter what my manager said.

Rarely do the options I'm presented with really express what I want to say, as a manager.

Some of the team-talks that I can give have an impact at odds with my interpretation of the team-talk - the way I imagine delivering the team-talk. That sort of ambiguity makes the impact of the team-talk feel random.

Worse, some of the talks that seem to have a fairly innocuous phrasing have very large impacts.

I'd like to see an update to this are for FM'09 or FM'10 which addresses all of those areas.

* * * * *

Let me outline what I think the current mechanic is:

There are five choices presented to you, from a possible list of about ten, and they directly impact three emotional variables for your players:

<LI> Pressure - you can make a player more relaxed with talks like "Enjoy the game", or make him feel more pressure with talks like "I expect a win".

<LI> Motivation - you can make a player more motivated, or you can leave them demotivated.

<LI> Morale - you can give a player's spirits a lift, or you can make him unhappy / angry with you.

The feedback often tells you this, pretty much directly: "Looked happy, seemed demotivated".

Unfortunately, it feels all too easy to "Miss" and have your team-talk backfire on you - and that's very frustrating when it happens. See, for example, Best ... game ... ever !! - a "reasonable" team-talk blew up in his face, with very negative results.

That's offset by a feeling that every now and then you "get it right" and your team storms back from 0-2 down at the half to win 4-2...

... but that has its downside when an AI manager says exactly the right thing at halftime, and you don't feel like there's any way you can counteract it.

* * * * *

What I would like to see is a system with a lot more gentle "positive" impact options, and a lot less "whammy" results.

I'd also like to see an area which "expands" on the talk - maybe putting it into a two-sentence form, and/or describing the likely effects of it.

The idea I had was, why not have team-talks that feed directly into players' mental attributes? To couch it in "gamey" terms, you might almost have talks that give each player a 1- or 2- point attribute boost in specific mental attributes, as a result of what you told them.

In this scheme, team-talk options might be:

<LI> Work Hard

- Pre: I want to see you guys work hard for each other

- HT: We've got to work harder in the second half

- Full (W/D): Your hard work paid off

- Full (L): We've got to work harder next game

Impact: increased Work Rate

<LI> Play together

- Pre: I want you guys to play together as a team today

- HT: We've got to play more as a team in the second half

- Full (W/D): You guys worked well together today

- Full (L): We've got to stick together as a team

Impact: increased Team Work

<LI> Hold your shape

- Pre: Remember, I want you guys to hold your shape today.

- HT: We've got to hold our shape better in the second half.

- Full (0/1 goal conceded): You held your shape well today.

- Full (2+ goals allowed): We've got to hold our defensive shape better.

Impact: increased Positioning

<LI> Give each other options

- Pre: I want to see you guys moving well, giving each other options today.

- HT: We've got to have better movement in the second half. Give each other options!

- Full (2+ goals scored): The way you guys moved for each other really paid off today.

- Full (0/1 goal scored): We've got to have better off the ball movement.

Impact: increased Off The Ball

<LI> Less Mistakes

- Pre: I want to see you guys take care of the ball today. We can't afford to make mental mistakes.

- HT: We've got to make better decisions in the second half. Mistakes are killing us.

- Full (W/D): We made good decisions today, and avoided mistakes.

- Full (L): We've got to make better decisions and take care of the ball

Impact: increased Decisions

<LI> Concentrate

- Pre: I want you to stay focused today.

- HT: We've got to stay better focused in the second half.

- Full (W/D): Way to keep your concentration lads.

- Full (L): We've got to keep our concentration better.

Impact: increased Concentration

<LI> Be More Aggressive

- Pre: We've got to come out aggressive today. It's going to be a real scrap.

- HT: We've got to be more aggressive in the second half.

- Full (W/D): Our aggressive outlook really paid off today.

- Full (L): We just have to be more aggressive.

Impact: increased Aggressiveness

<LI> Who Wants It More?

- Pre: A game like this is all about will. Who wants it more?

- HT: We can win this. We just have to want it more than they do.

- Full (W/D): Your determination really paid off in the second half.

- Full (L): We can't quit on a game when we're behind.

Impact: increased Determination

These could be woven in amongst the existing options: we'd still want a way to praise and criticize players, of course. We need a way to relax nervous players before a big match, or get them fired up for a big performance. We'd still want a high-risk high-reward "Kick the boot at them" option at half-time and full-time, of course.

I'm not saying to do away with those - and obviously, some of these might be situational, e.g., the Determination full-time option wouldn't apply for a game we led 3-0 at halftime, so it simply wouldn't be presented.

Now, one aspect of the current complexity which works is that the same team-talk doesn't work the same on all players; I know its a bit controversial, but I'd want most of these to work for most players most of the time. The idea is that they're low-risk, low-reward options.

Still, each of these talks could have some personalities or situations that they don't work for - for example, a player in conflict with one of the other players on the pitch might react negatively to the "Play together". A player with poor Teamwork might selfishly ignore the "Give each other options" team-talk. A not-Brave player might have trouble overcoming his fear to be more Aggressive.

It would also require an "Effect gets nerfed if overused" mechanic; otherwise we'd just ask our goalkeeper to Concentrate every match.

* * * * *

I'd also like to see our personality as expressed in our team-talks play a bigger part in the game.

I'd like to feel like personalities other than "cheerful and encouraging" had a chance of succeeding: the perfectionist "its never good enough" persona, the "put the fear of god into them" persona, the "professor" persona (minimal emotion shown), and the "gruff, rarely praises you" persona should all be viable strategies, as long as we're consistent.

Of course, different player personalities should want different ones - but looking at real coaches and managers, those seem to be the key types that are "missing" from our current scheme.

Important to this, however: we need to be able to criticize our players after a win. I know that that doesn't make a lot of sense on the surface, but I've heard plenty of interviews with real players (multiple sports) where a critique after a sloppy win was crucial for their development.

In FM, that approach doesn't really work - so many players react negatively to criticism that its tough to dish out.

Lastly, manager personality could even feed in to player development. For example, if I prefer Determined, Aggressive play and I express that by using those team-talk options fairly frequently, my youth might develop to be more Determined and Aggressive than they would otherwise.

A different manager, who focused on Teamwork and Moving For Each Other might be rewarded with players who gradually increase their Team Work and Off the Ball, while a third who favoured Concentration and good Decisions might be rewarded in those areas.

* * * * *

The final area which I'd want to see improved is the feedback section.

First, I'd reserve the "Didn't Seem To Be Listening" result for players who have lost confidence in their manager as shown in a Slight or Major concern - or players who had a specific negative reaction to the specific team-talk given, as in the examples I gave five paragraphs above.

Second, I'd supplement the feedback with a few more options, to make the "Nothing specific noted" much more rare. I'm not sure what all the options should be - but maybe something to touch on how the player played as a result. For example, if a guy was on a 6 at halftime, and after my team talk, he scored two goals and raised himself to an 8 .. that's not "Nothing specific noted", that's "Played much better in 2nd half."

Finally, I'd add some e-mails from the Assistant about our team-talks, if we're consistently making the same mistake - in the current scheme, for example, "Not giving the players enough credit", maybe my Assistant would warn me about it before its become a major concern for half my squad! There are plenty of other spots, too, if my team talks are never negative, and the consequence of that is that the team is becoming complacent, my Assistant might tell me that also.

* * * * *

We've had the existing team-talk mechanism for three versions, now.

I think its time for an overhaul.

What do you guys think?

Amaroq · February 13, 2008