Luck/The winning formulae/too easy

I have been manager of Ajax for 4 years and won every competition I entered except the Champions League and then moved onto Corinthians for a season and a half, during that time I won the league twice and the copa librrtadores. I am now manager of Everton and have played 8 winning 5 drawing 0 and losing 3. When I took over they were in a bad rut and 10th in the league. They are now 7th and 3 points off 5th place. My total career achievemets are played 329 won 250 drawn 55 and lost 34 scoring 655 goals and conceding 210. I have 13 cup wins and 7 league titles in just over 5.5 seasons.

My stategy is that I have always kept morale high by talking to the players and demanding better after each performance. Even when I went to Everton I did not take too long for me to raise the morale of the players from when I arrived as poor and okay to now been very good and superb.

As I have yet to struggle on the game I wondered if:

a) I am lucky and this will run out eventually

b)I have mastered a winning formulae (which I have taken from and developed through the FM series) based on talking to the players. If this is the case I ask do the tactics and formation actually matter? Do you only have to keep the players morale high to win things.

c) The game is too easy.

I wondered what other posters thought based on there experiences. I am keen to know if the only thing you have to master on the game is to keep the morale high or not and if the tactics, selections etc really matter.

High morale doesn't automatically mean a win. You still have to adjust to things in the game to improve your chances of winning.

I don't think the game is too easy. It's all relative. If you play with above average teams you will probably win more than you lose.

Try giving a smaller club, for lack of a better term, a try. Maybe try the Blue Square leagues or League 2 if that isn't to your liking. It will probably be more of a challenge.

Usually the game gets easier as each season passes because the AI don't know how to build teams. The only challenge in long-term save is the rich clubs because they can buy the best players in the world; basically you'll compete against a bunch of Man Cities in the future.

Pick a team with less quality if you want it harder.

It's too easy. I doubt it's just to do with morale. Your tactics and formation are probably better. Think of all that you do that the ai doesn't do. You probably choose a formation to suit the players and the ME not just stick to preset favs. I'm sure you set individual player tactics to suit the player and again the ME (eg no long shots if player is bad at them or more through balls and less crosses if the version of FM rewards this).

The more options/features are added the easier it becomes as the ai either doesn't use them or after a little bit of experience you use it much better than them.

The game should never become easy there are plenty of teams out there to make it a challenge for you

The game should never become easy there are plenty of teams out there to make it a challenge for you

Winning the league with Blackpool might be a challenge but that doesn't change the fact that it's too easy.

Start a LLM game with a Blue Square North/South Team or lowest division in another country. That means attribute masking on, no using the transfer list (purely scouting for players), reputation set to Sunday League Footballer, and no using pre-made tactics/formations/training etc. It makes the game a lot harder and more realistic.

no using the transfer list (purely scouting for players)[---]It makes the game a lot harder and more realistic.

Harder yes, realistic not so much...

Still, I don't see why we should go out of our way in order to have a challenging save...

To be honest playing with Everton should be hard enough to really require a stellar work just to land a CL-spot with good consistency... Instead unless we more or less try to sabotage ourselves just to keep it reasonably competitive...

I do think FM2011 might be a bit easier than previous versions, but it does come down to what team you use. If you play as Ajax, you probably will win everything. Not sure about Corinthians, but there are worse Brazilian teams. So if you want it harder, try starting as a lower league team, or push yourself with one of the challenges from the challenge forum

I was not trying to ask about me using big clubs and am not annoyed that there is no challenge. I actually have enjoyed the games that I played, when I stated at Ajax I joined because they had no manager so I applied and got the job, due to the success Corinthians came in for me, then I deceided to go to Everton. It was there I noticed that as soon as I raised the morale of the players and changed the system of play we stated winning after losing the first two games. So I wondered if morale was the only thing in the game that made you win that was all. I actually think Everton will be challenging to get to be champions of Europe and to win the Premiership. After I have achieved all I can at Everton either through been sacked if I dont achieve anything or throuigh building them into the best premiership team. I aim to go to a championship club like Newcastle and take them up back to Premiership

I've managed to sell a few top players (also with everton) and not replace them so expectations are down to mid table finish. I'm doing the 1000 appearance challenge so playing a 18 year old striker who cost 170k is my way of sabotagin myself.

Feels a bit silly sitting with a 36m pound unused transfer budget but what can you do.

Unless I've been lucky 2 I think its B. I said a few times that it seems teamtalks > players/tactics

Its definately not C as until I figured out B I was struggling a bit.

Harder yes, realistic not so much...

Still, I don't see why we should go out of our way in order to have a challenging save...

To be honest playing with Everton should be hard enough to really require a stellar work just to land a CL-spot with good consistency... Instead unless we more or less try to sabotage ourselves just to keep it reasonably competitive...

I would say it IS more realistic. In real-life a manager is unlikely to have a massive list of everyone up for transfer and then hone in on individuals. He is more likely to rely on scouting assignments - especially in the lower leagues.

It's "B." Team talks are more important than tactics, and in many cases, mental stats are more important than technical stats.

It's "B." Team talks are more important than tactics, and in many cases, mental stats are more important than technical stats.

Completly agree with this, as long as you keep morale high and avoid complacency you are nearly unstoppable on the pitch.

I would say it IS more realistic. In real-life a manager is unlikely to have a massive list of everyone up for transfer and then hone in on individuals. He is more likely to rely on scouting assignments - especially in the lower leagues.

If a regular fan can more or less know who's "on the transfer list", I'm pretty sure a professional manager working at a high level has first-hand knowledge of who's available and who's not...

Agents, DoFs and various types of scouts are in the business for a reason...

This has been discussed plenty of times already, and it's also quite OT, so I won't go there.. I just think it's not good when we have to make it harder for ourselves in convoluted ways just because if played "as it's supposed to be played" the game's too easy

you are playing against the likes of van den bosch and heerenveens, you are expected to win when you have a team(ajax) 4 times stronger than them.

some people....

you are playing against the likes of van den bosch and heerenveens, you are expected to win when you have a team(ajax) 4 times stronger than them.

some people....

If you actually read the posts its not just about managing a top team that is better than the opposition. I have had success at other clubs and wondered if it the game is just down to morale to get results. I actually noticed this more once I took over my last club Everton who where on a 6 game losing streak until they appointed me as manager, I raiesd morale by talking to and critcising players and we have not looked back since as we have now gone on a run of pld 11 won 9 dwn 1 and lost 1 . My question is to get results based on morale aloneas thats all I have done apart from minor tweaks to the tactis. It seems if morale is v good or superb the team seems to win and I wondered if this was for other clubs as well. As you said some people.....lol

If you actually read the posts its not just about managing a top team that is better than the opposition. I have had success at other clubs and wondered if it the game is just down to morale to get results. I actually noticed this more once I took over my last club Everton who where on a 6 game losing streak until they appointed me as manager, I raiesd morale by talking to and critcising players and we have not looked back since as we have now gone on a run of pld 11 won 9 dwn 1 and lost 1 . My question is to get results based on morale aloneas thats all I have done apart from minor tweaks to the tactis. It seems if morale is v good or superb the team seems to win and I wondered if this was for other clubs as well. As you said some people.....lol

its not like everton are a weak team, and you have lost 1 game, and how many of those 11 were against the big sides?

start a game with a team like bari or lecce, finish the first season in the top 7 then i will bow down to you.

its not like everton are a weak team, and you have lost 1 game, and how many of those 11 were against the big sides?

start a game with a team like bari or lecce, finish the first season in the top 7 then i will bow down to you.

Im not interested managing those teams, following my own career just wondered what your thoughts were to the the answer to the question that my post is actually about regarding player morale. Im just curious on what makes the game tick and as it happens the Everton in my game isnt the one you probably know, they are millions of pounds in debt and have finished mid table to bottom half of the table in the last 3 seasons, so in my game they are quite a weak team with regards to where they actually are in the real Premiership at the moment. Some of the results where against big sides Everton 4 - 1 Chelsea (2nd in leagie), Everton 1 - 0 Tottenham (3rd in league), Villa 0 - 2 Everton (5th in league), Man U (supprisingly 1st in league) 1 - 2 Everton and some where against middle sides in the league

If I wanted you to bow down to me I would have mentioned FM2010 game where I took Hull to the Premiership title 10 times in a row, the Champions cup twice along with loads of other cups, but thats another story and one of the reasons I wished to start at bigger clubs in my FM2011 save as I have done the smaller clubs in previous incarnatins of the game. My intention is to go back and do the small clubs later on as I have never managed any of the famous big name players until this version and I wanted to give it a go before I went back to a lower league club later in my career

I've found that even if you don't talk to your players, if you stick at the club long enough most of them will end up liking you in the end anyways, but the answer to your question is that yes i think unless you are masterful tactician, good player interaction is the way to be successful, plus buying the right kind of character is also very important to have the right kind of mix in your team. This is why i love for my team to defend because they all fight for each other and the few chances that we get they will take because the mentality is very good.

Back to back promotions needs good team talks. Get relagated you gave bad ones too often.

I did a little experiment on team talks and I was going to make a thread opn my findings but I got too bored to test it enough, but I did notice that my performance was pretty much effected by which option I picked. Ranging from excellent, to terrible depending on which one I selected.

It also seems my strikers will not score unless they are no less than V good morale.

But maybe he's just good at it? If they make it any harder for 1 guy it's just gunna make it imposible for the other few million out there. Plus he should see if he can emulate his success with the same team and if so gun for the champions league.

High morale doesn't automatically mean a win. You still have to adjust to things in the game to improve your chances of winning.

I don't think the game is too easy. It's all relative. If you play with above average teams you will probably win more than you lose.

Try giving a smaller club, for lack of a better term, a try. Maybe try the Blue Square leagues or League 2 if that isn't to your liking. It will probably be more of a challenge.

This is a very good point Ratboy.... I started in the Northern Premier - 1st Div, got two consecutive promotions and started to think maybe it's a bit too easy but now I'm in the Blue Square North things are quite a bit tougher. The teams are a lot better than in the previous two divisions and I've not got very much money to buy in better players, I bought in a couple of good midfielders and luckily one or two out of my youth squad have turned in to real gems so I'm just about holding my own now. After a nice little run of 4 wins, 1 draw and one loss I've only managed to get up from 8th to 6th, it's a very tight league and I'm finding it a great challange now.