The role of staff - what direction could/should SI take regarding the interaction with and involvement of none playing staff within FM?

Ched · January 29, 2008

If i remember correctly, this has been brought up in various threads and by assorted users since i have been on these boards. Hence i thought it could be useful to just lump it under one thread under the wonderfully vague umberella heading of:

Staff

So what is there to discuss?

1) Do we have any (employed) coaches in the house? Granted i'm sure SI consult such people, but i was wondering if there was anybody who had been involved in higher level coaching, so they could tell those of us who are ignorant, what level of interaction there was in the chain of manager-coach-player.

The only coaching i've done is trying to teach my 6 aside team to defend effectively, hence any suggestions i give are baced only on assumptions with regard to high level coaching.

Similarly, i don't want any chimp with a coaching badge coming on here telling us how he tought a school team the offside trap - i think the only part of coaching that is relevant is how the manager interacts with his coaches, this game is after all a management sim, not a coaching sim.

Ditto any physios for clubs or assmen if we are blessed enough to have any frequent this forum.

2) Failing that... In the much more likely instance that we have no professional staff on these boards, how do users feel that staff should be incorporated into the game?

As it stands it is my op that the staff seem a bit "tacked-on" and that there appears to be limited interaction between you and them.

3) Anybody overlooked? Have we (or should that be SI) overlooked any staffing position? Again if we could stick to those relevant to managers it would be useful, i know the england squad had a masseuse (sp) but we really don't want to have to hire one every game....

4) Opposition staff. You can scout players and teams in order to see who's a threat, but who's tp say that it isn't due to an exceptional coach? I've never been given a report about an op coach, would this be a useful addition?

5) The oblivion of ritirement. A recent thread brought this up - if a player has not become a coach by 35, then he often retires in the game and is never seen again - should FM use some more HD space and include more non-playing personnel until they decide they don't want to coach? Or should there be an interaction option where a manager may tell a player "get your badges, you aren't goin to get any more playing time"

NB: if i find any threads mentioning things along these lines i'll link them here (or vice versa) as i'm sure a lot of this has been mentioned before - but we all know the search function is sketchy at best.

OK, my thoughts, perhaps the most obvious gap i've seen is physio input during matches.

How many times have we all seen a player with a light injury, and been left wondering, should we play him on, or drag him off???

The amount of times i've dragged a player off to find out he's just cut his nose, or left a player on to find out he has torn something is just laughable.

IRL there would be instant feedback from physio to manager regarding the extent of the injury and what the physio thinks the manager should do (because let's face it, they should know better than we do), in FM we just have to guess based on his condition...

IMO this is the only MAJOR problem with staff as it stands (possibly assman interaction but i'm not sure that's as easily fixed) and the one thing i would love to see fixed in FM09, it's been this way for years, and at no point has it been acceptable.

Point number 2, assman feedback. How many "OMGZ" threads could be avoided by an assman who suggested what was wrong with your tactic??

As with all the above, i'm not sure what sort of feedback they give IRL, but i feel that problems are a bit more apparent IRL as opposed to the limited amount of info we can deduce from the ME.

related thread here although, as with many non-moan related threads, it has unfortunately dropped like a stone.

Final point (for now) is regarding coaches. Surely IRL, they can take a player to one side, and suggest in what way his style of play can be improved? As it currently stands, there is little flexibility within training and coaching to tailor a player as much as i suspect happens IRL.

If i see a player taking 10 chances when he is 2 on 1 with the GK, then i should be able to say to him, look for pass before shot - obviously i would expect a knock on of him dithering a bit more at first while adapting to a change in his play style.

Similarly the amount of shots take from laughable angles is an irritation, that while it does happen irl, a word from a manager or coach, could perhaps talk a player into being less likely to shoot.

Lastly, tracking back, compare joe cole pre-jose, to the joe cole now, the latter is much more defensively active, whilst this can sort of be achieved by re-training to RB or increasing def training, i don't feel that the changes you canmake to a player are significant enough. Obviously a players age and mental stats should be heavily taken into account here as some simply couldn't/wouldn't be willing to change.

Another good thread here regarding the dev of assmen.

Anyway, i think that's enough to start you lot off. Let's hope we get more feedback than many similar threads get.

Cheers

Ched · January 29, 2008