Steaton's 'Total Annihilation' 4231 - v14.3.1 - Finally Nailed It - Plug and Play

First off it took me a lot longer to crack 14.3.1 than I expected, I have had a very good tactic that can win quadruples and is 100% plug and play for quite some time. Now however I have taken it further to create a tactic that exceeds Invincible before the patch.

(The moderators have confirmed that the patch did not change the match engine and have even been so kind as to explain how they know - never the less it was around this time that the Invincible tactic seemed to stop working for me in all my games and so I decided to try to build a new better tactic).

And here are the older versions:

Steaton's Total Annihilation - Tactic

Version1 focuses on retaining possession:

Download Link: http://www.mediafire.com/download/bi4b1sxv13a4ulh/Steaton's_Total_Annihilation.tac

Version2 creates many goals but also leaks goals, so you win but with few few clean sheets:

Download Link: http://www.mediafire.com/download/xiwlltq7zwzvqew/Steaton's_Total_Annihilation_v2.tac

Version 3 (New) - Tested - Better than TA v1, TA v2 or Invincible

Download Link: http://www.mediafire.com/download/83zv4hjbq3ur5e7/Steaton's_TA3.tac

How does it work: Well I've removed pass into space because it improved passing, I have removed retain possession in favour of work ball into box because this results in getting it forward faster but then making the opportunity count. The box to box midfielder is essential because it works with the work baoll into box however on average rating the player won't get credit for his importance in the tactic, don't as some other have advised be tempted to use a DLP becuase this not only decreases the chance to score but also is weaker defensivesly. Play it plug and play for best results.

Remember team management through teams talks, training is no different than normal but if you get it wrong or if your team is not gelled (tactic familiarity less important than player familiarity with teammates - e.g. new players always struggle a bit team talks are vital for them) or dont get fitness / cohesion / tactical training right pre-season then thats a problem otherwise this is a top no cheating tactic that is plug and play.

Results

Goalkeepers

Judge him as usual accoring to having good GK stats.

Here is my keeper, he is a perfectionist with 20 communication skills and therefore now my capitan.

Wingers

I've found that amazing crossers (i.e. 19 or 20) and fast do very well but not sure if it translates that all wingers need good crossing. Cuts inside nice to have too as a PPM.

Here is an example winger that has great stats across the board and consistently over performs, I think his PPMs set him apart, he scores loads and gets loads of assists:

And if you compare him to the competition who I think is probably better stats wise though both are good (you will see I'm setting him to round the keeper because he has the stats for it and Castro has that PPM, agility, composure, balance, pace, dribbling:

And finally here is my highest valued player who I think plays best on the right wing too but since I am oversubscribed there get to play the MC AP. He is not as good as the others his PPMs arent so good for this tactic and he is unsporting personality which maybe has an effect - still he is awesome despite that just not as good as the other two:

Striker

Works with great strikers both fast strikers and target men so go for the best one you can get, but if you happen to be fortunate to get one with top notch Strength, Anticipation, Jumping, Teamwork (movement and power presence) then other things such as technique, finishing, first touch, dribbling, pace, acceleration, agility, balance, composure don't matter so much, he will do what need to be done which is get into the right position to recieve the cross and be powerful enough to be the one who wins the dice roll and bangs it in from close range - only gets one touch so other stats not so important (though of course if he is amazing all round then even better). The fast striker however does get loads of chances to beat the offside trap or to play the AMC in so players that cant jump/heading can still work but they need to be

Train target men with 'gets into opposition area', 'tries first time shots' here is my over achieving target man:

Train fast striker with 'likes to beat the offside trap' PMM Here is my world class fast striker:

Full Backs

You want very attacking and fast full backs with good fitness and can get away with poor ariel ability. Crossing, fast, stamina, marking, positioning and maybe decisions, tackling can be a bit low you get away with a 12 or 14 I think.

Centre Backs

I love to have fast ones with good anticipation, jumping more important than tackiling, and I like the positioning, concentration and most of all marking (though marking can be trained high it one of the few stats that really moves during training).

Box to Box

This is the tough position to fill need to be good off the ball - vital to the tactic balance I tried every other setting and know because the avg rating not show you how important he is to overall tactic. (Getting in the way to force a bad pass or pull a defender out of poisition is not recognised by the engine yet still gives results.

I think stamina is very important here then team working, first touch, pace, anticipation, creativity, work rate, passing - basically hard working, off the ball (but off the ball stat is for the AMC) and good fitness but if you can get some good movement PPMs like arrive late in box then that's a winner or switches ball to other flank can work well too. Not important that they can head the ball as they typically cause all the trouble in front of the typical heading zone.

Attacking Playmaker MC

A great atticking playmaker type on the ball particularly first touch, creativity, passing.

Switches ball to other flank PPM may create goals.

Attacking Playmaker AMC

Off the ball, agility, acceleration, first touch.

Set Pieces

Whoever has the best chance of scoring long shots goes in the attack from deep role current thats my AML.

My fullbacks cant jump so my DC is not marking tall player and instead mark near post.

A Match Analysis

Portmouth v Man City (Premier League)

00:27 The offside trap working:

37:00 Changed ST to support role, as he isnt getting into space as much as we hoped Man City have a lot of players back and are attacking down the flank using thier full backs in an attempt to overload. Anyway we decide to leave the defence to cope but to try to imoprove scoring chances.

39:00 Portmouth ST *GOAL* header from corner attacking near post but it had ping about before being fed back to the winger and the ST had dropped back towards the edge of the area allowing him space to run in and attack the cross.

45:00 Half Time Portsmouth 1 - 0 Man City

50:00 Swaps the right winger out for an additional DC stopper in the centre of defence, we look a touch vulnerable and we have the lead. Plus we don't seem to be able to break down their defence.

63:00 Fast ST on Target Striker off.

76:00 Swaps the AMC direct swap.

90:00 Full time

Here we can see they got 3 clear cuts. Going to analyse these to see if they were really all that dangerous or not, and will take a look at my half chances to see how dangerous they were.

Man City Chances - you will notice they are all long range from the very edge of the area, so whilst each is unlikely to beat keeper there were still a lot of em:

88:00 This was their best, and you will see it's under heavy pressure from defence, the keeper is well positioned and has his stance set ready to save and there isn't really a decent angle that would not be covered by the GK even if placed, a blast to top right corner would have the best chance, that is what he tried and it was east for the GK who saved but did not hold. Anyway certainly not worthy of being considered clear cut. Man city achieved this with a through ball and the winger was already at full pace just just get past the defender and collect it.

The other two were worse very similar, further out, under heaps of pressure and with GK who has plenty of time to ready for the shot.

So what about our half chances, well they both better than the clear cuts but not by much, here is the one that I think slightly edges it. Under heavy pressure across the face of the goal, if accurate could get it in the far post which is what he tries buts ist a yard wide the GK probably couldn't have save an accurate shot but if it was less accurate and not held there are players on back post to finish, still overall not a great chance.

16:00

Right so if we consider the key highlights next, as you can trust the way chances are evaluated, we see that there are 4 key highlights first half for portsmouth in the including the goal and two for man city and in the second half there were none for us and 2 for man city including a really very dangerous shot easily the most promising one of the match and it was for Man City but this wasn't even considered a half chance:

84:00

What I find interesting here is the positioning of my defenders, they seemed doubled up and the guy on the far post is not marked really, it turns out that neither of the full backs are on this first screenshot they are shown in the following 2D see number 9 and 22, we had been piling on pressure around thier area but never really getting a good shot off and they intercepted it as shown and the full backs are way up number 9 and 22. This is one of the dangers of using CWBs I guess, but at this point in time we had 3 DCs as we had brought one on in the 50th.

So the run continues:

What OI and Training should I use?

Note: I don't think these are the most important things to cover first as they are only loosly related to the tactics. However I recommend using:

- No OI instructions.

- Generic training you would use with any team, and pre-match prep depending on opposition and as you do in general.

However if I really wanted to use OI I wouldn't set it on the ST, or AMCs as these instructions are likely pull your DCs out of position and create space for a goal. The spacing of the defensive line is set quite nicely at the moment to deal with most situations better than it should.

I went into more detail on this in my Invincible tactic thread, so go dig through that for some information, it hasn't changed for this tactic really.

What do you mean by PLUG and PLAY?

My tactics are designed to be PLUG and PLAY this means they typically work well more often than other tactics regardless of what players you have and you can start there and specialise and squeeze out that bit extra once you get the core tactic working. The reason they are plug and play is they tend to expose a bias or exploit in the match engine (the line between bias and exploit is fuzzy), they work for all teams including LLM becuase that same bias or flaw exists, nobody put any programming to say if lower league then calculate this chance in a different way, yes the numbers are lower but this is likely offset by the opposition also being lower and the bias or explot remains important thus the tactics still work - make sense?

Any tips on tweaking during the match?

Try to spot the biggest problem and try to come up with one very small focussed change that will help improve it, if you are getting destroyed going full match/comprehensive and slowing it down will give you and your subconcious brain the chance to decide what that one small change should be, which one change can I make that will have the best chance of working (if it works - use it next time you encounter a similar problem).

Another approach is to have 3 variants of your tactics prepared, that you know work in certain situations, this is what I often do, but it isnt resally very successful for me becuae by changing too many things during match - e.g all the tactical settings then I think there is a penalty, sort of making your players confused. However you have been learing these tactics during preparation so maybe one tactics change at the right point in the game will work ok.

Regardless dont make many changes in quick succession.

Steaton, going to try it. Starting a game in portuguese 2º league with Moreirense. Thanks for the tactic.

first match, tactic assimiled 30%

This sounds good so I thought I would give it a quick go.

I picked Leamington in Conference North. Predicted to finish last.

6 games in

I am on classic mode though, although I have tested other tactics with Leamington on classic and never start like this. Is tempting me to start a full save.

Looking forward to the rest of your write up and your take on a possible exploit

Steaton- You are a tactical genius! Your tactic is spot-on.

Can you put the download on sendspace please ? Thanks

The best tactic maker if u ask me

big thx Steaton

Early days but I'm impressed from what I have seen so far.

Opening game, away win Sunderland 0 - 6 Aston Villa.

Then went on to get beat by Chelsea, Arsenal and Man Utd, draw v Liverpool then back to winning ways.

Knocked out Arsenal in the LC too.

Not quite the match engine breaker it's made out to be...

My QPR team, who won the Prem last year, gives up 20 shots, 4 ccc's, 4 half ccc's to Man City, losing 2-0, and suffering three injuries to the Midfield.

Edited - removed this comment for the benefit of wasted words.

Will reserve this spot for an analysis of a game where there are a lot of opposition clear cut chances or we get thumped by an AI tactic. PLEASE send me one I cannot recreate, improve etc without something i can analyse. A pkm file is all you need and the button to create / export a match is in game.

Not quite the match engine breaker it's made out to be...

My QPR team, who won the Prem last year, gives up 20 shots, 4 ccc's, 4 half ccc's to Man City, losing 2-0, and suffering three injuries to the Midfield.

Full fluid?

will give it try now

Great job Steaton! Can't wait to try this one! When will you give more info??

Full fluid?

Yes, I put it on all 3 slots for the pre-season to get it up to full fluid before the season started.

What's your match day training any SS any OI

Training? MP? OI?

Ok, I'm about to test this in my Villa save. Early Feb and sitting 8th in the league. I'm in the final of the LC and 5th round of the FA Cup. Teams been stuttering of late. only managing 4-5 attempts as goal per game. Goals have really dried up! Lets see how it goes ;-)

Just knocked Soton out the FA Cup 2-0. And that scoreline did not do the tactic justice! Despite being only 28% Famil - We had 26 shots on goal! More than I have had in the last 5 games put together! Some on the link up play from the midfield to the attack was sublime. And thats with an average Villa line up! Next test is Everton Away in the league. They are sitting 5th so its a tough ask.

Tactic not working well for me at Real Madrid so far! Played 4 league games so far against Real Betis, Villarreal, Granada and Athletic Bilboa and have only won 2 and drawn 2. Also noticing that the opposition have at least 3-4 clear cut chances against me every game. Not impressed at all so far.

Tactic not working well for me at Real Madrid so far! Played 4 league games so far against Real Betis, Villarreal, Granada and Athletic Bilboa and have only won 2 and drawn 2. Also noticing that the opposition have at least 3-4 clear cut chances against me every game. Not impressed at all so far.

Well you must have bad lousy management and motivational skills then. I've plug this in and played and won 10 games in a row before drawing 1 and then winning another 4 before a loss.

Well you must have bad lousy management and motivational skills then. I've plug this in and played and won 10 games in a row before drawing 1 and then winning another 4 before a loss.

Its just not working so well for me, not so much the results that concern me, its the amount of CCC against that i'm getting.

Got thumped 3-0 away at Everton. 2 of the goals were down to basic errors, and we had 3 disallowed. That and it's only the second game using this tactic.

Beat Leicester 2-0 in the LC Final. Dominated possession and has 20 shots on goal. If nothing else this tactic has got Benteke scoring again! That's 4 in 3 games for him after not scoring for 8 games.

next up is Arsenal away in the FA Cup. Can I ask what tweaks you make in relation to the line up/opposition team formation you make? I'm **** when it comes to trying to spot stuff like that on FM.

Its just not working so well for me, not so much the results that concern me, its the amount of CCC against that i'm getting.

Something, somewhere over your side must be wrong. Because I do not get the 3-4 CCC that you claim to get either every game. It has been defensively solid for me so far. But I am in my third season with a solid gelled team.

I reckon I will start a new save to try and see.

Hi Steaton, match preparations and training?

Hi, i'm brazilian and i've tested this tactic in a few games with citizens and here are the results:

i'll continue with this test and at the season's end, post here, sorry for my english.

EDIT short passing off on team instructions.

Spikester - take a closer look at those CCCs - as it happens I am aware of the CCC number but its mostly stuff that doesnt deservwe to be classified that way - the main prob I have is the number of shots off target - not all CCCs are equal - the criteria for something being a CCC is not something you can rely on - post an example match for analysis please. Also starts of season are always flakey - especially if there are new faces in the team - in my experience its the same for all tactics (though is this one more shaky than others keep a save and replay it to get something to compare too.......I know you cant be bothered.....don't blame you....but I have done it and it seems to make things shaky regardless of tactic - but I'm anal as can be...so post the details and I will do an honest test e.g. save game a decent description...and I will report back with honest results....believe me I'm as likely to drop my own tactic as you are if I find it turns out to be lacking - I will switch back to my proven one and go from there). The Invincible tactic lived long after I dropped it, and I will in an instant take someone else's tactic if it is better than mine.

The key to real consistency in this game is 'stability, stability, stability' and that goes for all tactics, think Alex Ferguson's Man Utd. The team becomes better than the players rather than the other way around, the game is more than a tactic, but a great tactic sure does help.

EDIT: Hopefully you can see in Man City game analysis thst a CCC only meant that they were past the defender at the point of shooting not that they are near the goal or they they have time to place their shot or that the GK is out of position and goal is wide open.

Will post my results with Chelsea soon, so far its been good.

This was my first game using it - against Werder Bremen away, won 2-0

Bremen Schalke

0 Shots 19 shots

0 On target 8 On Target

43% possession 57% possession

Can't post pictures hence having to type it out like that.

Should we change anything between home and away steaton? I always seem to struggle away whenever I use a downloaded or created tactic!

Cheers

Hats off again for Steaton!

Been enjoying your previous tactic alot. Thus far the latest seems to be even better. After winning 6 titles in 6 seasons + 4 CL titles i didnt think you could top that. I guess ive been proven dead wrong.

You truly are the dominant force in the tactic making scene atm.

Heres my results so far, quite good but I am definitely noticing loads of shots off target though

this is the game against madrid we lost 2-0, felt absolutely robbed

Right bit of a blunder with the tactic version that I posted a day or two ago, it was missing some important changes (I'd tweaked it for a specific match and then saved the tweaked version with the 'Nailed It' name, so I apologise for time wasted if it didnt work for you - I think it was a touch less effective and maybe a little bit less consistent - anyway I have changed the name to Total Annihilation which I think better matches the way it plays and have completely deleted all memory of the previous one.

p.s. Yes the tactic I uploaded by mistake was shooting on target around 35-40% which confused me. The tactic should be getting around 50% of shots on target. When you have tested as much as me you see that most tactics have a very consistent set of stats (shape). I show what I mean when I add the results section in top thread shortly.

Cheers steaton will give it a go, top bloke!

Have been using the Invincible all season.

Started with Wrexham in Skrill Premier and now in mid january I have lost my first game in the league 1-2.

I am leading with 14 points.

Will give this a go and see how it produces.

In the Invincible I sometimes was frustrated when a wing got through and instead of trying to pass it to the players in front of goal (at least two) he the blasts it on goal himself from a very sharp angle and usually hits keeper or sidenet.......or completely misses.

Its working a dream. Just had my struggling Rangers side go 5-0 in the first half when we have scored 7 the previous 8 games

yea I have the same problem with Invicible, regarding wingers shooitn, just tried this one.. whats with the heavy touches?

Sorry I cannot figure out what heavy touches are?

Hi Steaton, match preparation tactic only and general balanced training?

Sorry I cannot figure out what heavy touches are?

Heavy touches - bad ball control, first touch of the ball and the damn thing pings away like a ping-pong ball

http://i.imgur.com/rcE79Gf.jpg

I play Arsenal and results aren't satisfying :-)

http://i.imgur.com/rcE79Gf.jpg

I play Arsenal and results aren't satisfying :-)

Looks like you need to download the right tactic - the one called Total Annihiation - Read post #33

Well I have tried out many tactics with my beloved Boro, the good ones take me up to the Premeirship but none , bar one, has managed to keep me there. So regardless how it goes in the first season, the proof of the pudding is next season. Still I'm enjoying it so far. Can't post pictures here for some reason so:-

Ply 10 W 10 D 0 L 0 32-4 (this includes 6 friendlies and 1 cup match) Looking very good so far

Have sold all "old" players with rangers trying to level up with a team full of youngsters! So far it's all good in the hood! No losses (including a cup win away at Aberdeen)!

Hi, Im testing this tatic with Dortmund, I play with Kuba as right IF, do you think is better change his function to Winger? As he has the attributes for this.

Hi, Im testing this tatic with Dortmund, I play with Kuba as right IF, do you think is better change his function to Winger? As he has the attributes for this.

The tactic descriptions are being added, so look back at first post to get some idea of what impact this might have. I can tell you that the IF sits to the inside of the CWB and also has opportunities to take advantage and move into space behind defenders if they are pulled out of position by the ST or less frequently by the AMC. But also the pass out wider to the CWB is important for possession play, as this can be fed back out or in from the wider position and then there is the overloading factor that there arent enough defenders to deal with the wide CWBs and still keep tabs on the IFs. Anyway this kind of stuff I will try to explain in the first post under Tactics Description, please be patient.

just used it against swansea.

wing backs like shooting

capture

At last a tactic that makes me want to play FM again!

Good results and great looking football. THANKS!

Hi Steaton,

I think you've definitely nailed it! I was using your 'Invincibles' tactic for a long time, but it just wasn't doing my relatively powerful Man Utd team credit as I was at times struggling to win where I really should be

I'm now on a rampage to the end of the season with this. Just beat Arsenal 6-0 in the FA Cup Semi and Arsenal have had a very good season. About to play Dortmund in Semi of Champs league and my team (an me) are full of confidence with this tactic in the locker.

Thank you! I'll post an update on the end of the season.

for me "marcelo tweaked" is better