Do players attributes mould to role?

To clarify the question. If I continually play a midfielder as a BWM will the roles dominant attributes naturally increase over time or do I have to manually focus training on these areas?

While the decision to use a midfielder as a BMW might be spot on it is not this simple when it comes to his development. When the midfielder was firstly used as a BWM he already had his attributes distibuted in a way that will effect how he will further naturally increase over the time.

Part of a player's development is based on 'match experience' and the rest on his training.

The same if you build your squad for a 1st goalscorer,2nd goalscorer,3rd goalscorer and the players that assist them. Their development depends on match facts they will naturally increase over time and on their training

Sorry to hijack this _thread, but it is sort of the same.

My question is, does training in another position alter how stats may develope? Eg ;say I train a DC as a DM, would that combination give him greater propensity towards developing into a ball playing defender, or would it have no impact at all on developement and just give him another competantcy in another position?

Role has no effect on a player's development or any other area of the game. Roles are merely tools of the tactics creator and are only used by the player. The AI doesn't use roles at all.

Training a player in a new position (or increasing positional familiarity), however, will affect a player's development. Each attribute is weighted for each position based on its importance for that position. This weighting determines both how many ability points it costs to increase that attribute and the likelihood that ability point increases will be "spent" on improving that attribute. Thus, Tackling will take up more ability points for a centreback than it would for a striker, but when a player improves, it is far more likely that the centreback's new ability points will go into Tackling (this is why, for example, strikers don't end up with 20 tackling despite the fact that the attribute has a very low cost for them).

When a player has familiarity in multiple positions, the cost of each attribute will be an average of the various weightings for each position with a player's "natural" positions having the greater overall effect on weighting than positions where a player is not completely natural. So if a player has natural (20) familiarity for centreback and 10 familiarity for DM, the weighting for each attribute will be determined 66% by CB and 33% by DM.

Anyway, to answer your question... yes, since a higher weighting increases the likelihood that an attribute will be improved, retraining a centreback as a DM or CM will increase the likelihood that his passing and ball control attributes will improve.

Thanks HOG, I always assumed it was along those lines and thank-you for the great answer, very well done.

Role has no effect on a player's development or any other area of the game. Roles are merely tools of the tactics creator and are only used by the player. The AI doesn't use roles at all.QUOTE]

I can't believe that this is correct! Different roles require different skill sets, so surely the laws of nature must apply if the player is constantly having to use these skills?

I can't believe that this is correct! Different roles require different skill sets, so surely the laws of nature must apply if the player is constantly having to use these skills?

Positional attribute weightings and training schedules will determine which attributes are raised. Roles have nothing to do with it. The idea of having roles affect player development has been raised before... and it's a good idea... but it's not in the game yet.

That does raise the question: Are attribute increase weightings determined by a weighted average of all the positions a player is able to play, or does the position in which the player actually played control it? For example, consider a player that is a natural central mid (20/20) and a competent defensive midfielder (12/20). He plays all his games at the defensive midfielder position. Will his attribute gains be slanted towards the central midfielder position (since he is twice as capable there as he is at defensive mid), or will it be slanted towards defensive midfielder weightings because he played there exclusively?

It's based on the positions the player is able to play, though playing or not playing a specific position can cause a player to gain/lose familiarity (which alters his specific attribute weightings).

it is important also the coaching staff of the team that has an effect on a player's development

To clarify the question. If I continually play a midfielder as a BWM will the roles dominant attributes naturally increase over time or do I have to manually focus training on these areas?

The simple version is that a player gains CA through match experience and then his training schedule determines the distribution of that CA to his attributes. I.e You have a young striker you've been working into the first team, as he gets match experience he will gain CA, and his training schedule is High in attacking and tactics. That CA that he gains will go the attributes in those training categories first and those areas will see the fastest growth. Other areas will of course still gain attributes, just not as quickly. Keep in mind that every player is different (personality, age, match experience, tutoring, etc) but as a general principle that's how training works. The role he plays in your system has no bearing on his attribute gains (with the slight exception of certain positional weightings that has already been mentioned). That being said you could theoretically retrain any player to play any position, if he has enough CA left to gain.