This just in: The transfer system IS broken (regardless of the game's iteration)

As an introduction, here is what I have posted yesterday to you. Here is my experiment:

http://www.pictureupload.de/originals/pictures/141210064922_broken1.jpg

http://www.pictureupload.de/originals/pictures/141210064950_broken2.jpg

So all you have to do is offer contracts to your targets on the very same day, and no longer are you restricted by your board's wage budget - you're set to sign whoever is available to you. Obviously I might be getting into trouble with extremes like this. But these are just to prove a point. I'm not exactly sure what I'm more embarassed by - that I haven't been able to discover this myself or that this has apparently been in the game for years without anybody making a fuss about, let alone SI. It may be not a broken transfer mechanism, but it certainly is a rather shockingly easy exploit of said mechanism. No wonder everybody and their mother appear to be lifting their club well past its weight. What is a little less troubling, but it should be an issue nonetheless, is that you can blossom in entire transfer windows via installments or changing entire squads even as a newcomer to the club - the boards in FM are far too forgiving to be true, as are the player morale and squad harmony systems.

Luckily there is an option to not exploit what is so easily exploitable. Yet...

lol I always do this with a free player database. I don't see it as the game being broken though, because you're purposely breaking it. The only problem is when the AI managers do what you did. They tend to go for multiple transfer targets for the same position, then buy all of them.

**** NEWSFLASH ****

News just in ...

... This has been reported 3,901,562 times previously

** END OF TRANSMISSION **

the op is right the transfer system is broken but there are so many threads stating this getting tedious

do what I intend doing I wont be buying FM12 until patch 3 is out

good news that the patch is most likely being released this coming Friday ...

Tevez wants a transfer from Man City and Rooney missed the target in a penalty. SORT IT OUT SI!

good news that the patch is most likely being released this coming Friday ...

Bad news is that this has been in the game forever, and it has never been adressed, apparently. In other words: Why didn't anybody tell me? I could have been playing Champions League football with Luton all along myself!

yes the transfer system is broken but i see nothing wrong with this. you may offer 100 contracts to new players on a day, but you will have to pay ALL their wages at the end which will cripple your club. though i agree that the boards are very forgiving.

Tevez wants a transfer from Man City and Rooney missed the target in a penalty. SORT IT OUT SI!

haha

But in all seriousness, the whole Tevez fiasco was seen coming last year, plus he is known for being unsettled at City (they probably restrict him from seeing is family and force him to practice 24/7)... pretty much everyone at City is unsettled

good news that the patch is most likely being released this coming Friday ...

and you know this how exactly?

and you know this how exactly?

He doesn't he's guessing i would imagine!

I am having some crazy issues with money not leaving my transfer budget, it comes off the bank balance yes, but my budget doesn't change.

THAT is broken.

As an introduction, here is what I have posted yesterday to you. Here is my experiment:

http://www.pictureupload.de/originals/pictures/141210064922_broken1.jpg

http://www.pictureupload.de/originals/pictures/141210064950_broken2.jpg

So all you have to do is offer contracts to your targets on the very same day, and no longer are you restricted by your board's wage budget - you're set to sign whoever is available to you. Obviously I might be getting into trouble with extremes like this. But these are just to prove a point. I'm not exactly sure what I'm more embarassed by - that I haven't been able to discover this myself or that this has apparently been in the game for years without anybody making a fuss about, let alone SI. It may be not a broken transfer mechanism, but it certainly is a rather shockingly easy exploit of said mechanism. No wonder everybody and their mother appear to be lifting their club well past its weight. What is a little less troubling, but it should be an issue nonetheless, is that you can blossom in entire transfer windows via installments or changing entire squads even as a newcomer to the club - the boards in FM are far too forgiving to be true, as are the player morale and squad harmony systems.

Luckily there is an option to not exploit what is so easily exploitable. Yet...

You have been able to do this on every version of the game ever.

If you simply offer all players a contract before the transfers go through then at the time you offer them the contract you still have a spare wage budget so you are able to offer a normal wage, and then they all complete at roughly the same time.

I don't think it would be too hard to fix though. All I would think it would take is for the offered wage to be taken from your wage budget when you offer the contract. Then if the player signs for you then the wage budget stays as it is, but if they reject you then the proposed wage is returned to your budget.

I agree with you that these are flaws. And indeed well known

However, doing this would jeopardize the finances of the club a lot. If you don't win promotion to the EPL soon and stay up there, the club will go broke and you will lose your job.

Overspending this way may make the game easier in the short run and may even be a good business decision, should this enable you to get into the EPL or stay up there with a newly promoted side, but there are also severe downsides to it, so this 'exploit' only works short-term and is certainly not how you can take a L1 team to CL glory.

The true reasons behind unrealistic success of human users are others and I believe that they are kept intentionally, cause if the game was as hard as real life, it would frustrate the hell out of us users and severely harm sales.

These are:

- WAY too easy to keep players

- unrealistically low wage demands for contract renewals

- not enough competition for bargains and young talent

- too easy to sell players for money.

I will certainly not argue that all these should be addressed. One may have a look at them, but if this was all realistic, you would stand no chance to ever bring Millwall into the Champions League in FM anymore and I prefer being able to do that to absolute realism in this area.

Another story is that the exploits you mentioned feel like exploits when using them, so if I used them it would affect the fun I have as much as using a super tactic did and at the same time I don't mind other people who use it and see the need to brag afterwards.

I don't see how this is a flaw, or bug for that matter. The board sets budgets to guide your spending to keep the club in the black, and it is up to you to manage your spending based on these values.

Of course you can overspend easily, so long as you understand that you will likely run your club's finances into the ground. It is understandable then that the board tells you to make wage reduction your primary concern, because they see the trap you're falling into. If you choose to overspend, as has been demonstrated by the OP, then it is your responsibility to raise funds elsewhere to ensure the financial stability of your club. Rest assured, if you fail to do so, the responsibility is entirely yours; you will be getting sacked.

I will say that it can be a bit strange that a board will stop you signing players because you go over your transfer budget, but i've never been told i can't sign a player because i don't have enough of a wage budget, or have never been told i can't renew a players contract because our wage bill is too high. obviously there are wage restrictions put into place when you get too close to your limits but offering key player status normally over-rides this

I don't see how this is a flaw, or bug for that matter. The board sets budgets to guide your spending to keep the club in the black, and it is up to you to manage your spending based on these values.

It ain't. Otherwise there'd be plenty also-rans in any league competing for players just out of their reach. The thing that irks me the most about it all: There's this tremendous amount of detail put into just about any area of the game. Player agents have different personalities you are meant to adopt to, squads are meant to go along well with each other, there are weather effects meant to influence your tactical decisions as well as your team's performance, there is about the only football game match engine running pretty much the entire 90 minutes, heck, you can even develop relationships with any manager or journalist that is being put in the game - and then it all goes HOOPLA within the time it takes to click onto a "get about any player you want" button.

It all may be an exploit you can opt to, er, exploit or not. But it's still about as irritating as seing Millwall compete in the bloody Champions League. And apparently you're not being punished for it in the long-run, as long as you're doing it in a "sensible manner" - whatever that means when doubling a budget beyond its date of expiration - and winning easy promotions by simply fielding the best outfield players on offer you were never meant to be able to sign.

thanks for the heads up, is was never blatantly obvious