A Real step forward that would turn the game more realistic

I didnt buy footbal manager 2014, and i didnt do it, because i didnt enjoyed the direction the game is going...

the game is becoming less tactical, every new year it seems there are more restriction to what you can do or not...

per example in the Fm13, there was the possiblity to tell the goal keeper to pass to an exact defender in order to start an attacking movement, fm14 doesnt allow that

you have distribution for defense, but not to a particular player...

this is just an example really, i can go further, in the old version of championship manager, there was a much richer way of setting up the tactics... everything seemed dinamic

you had a typical 'overview' and then you had positions of the players distributed by zone with ball and without bal... and this was incredibly rich to create situations

where you could surprise the oponent... even if in that time you could not see what was happening because that was an old game, in terms of tactics was way more rich

than the current version, where you can only setup a resctricted tactic, and then you setup some players orders...

i can say in the current Fm14 version, you cant even setup a decent 3-4-3 diamond formation, because there will be allways gaps in due the facts you cant the player exacly

what you expect from him...

the the 3-4-3 formation, is the one that suffers an extreme transformation between the with ball transition to the without ball, because the defenders with ball behave like full backs, and without ball as central defenders, and the midfielders behave like wingers with ball and full backs without ball, so...

this is just an example really, but other thing that real football has and never seen in any managing game was this...

you can setup tactics, but you cant setup player routines, what are player routines?

have you ever eard about 'model of game'??

you can play a 4-4-2 in infinit kind os play, you can mod a 4-4-2 to be extremly atacking, or to be extremly in posession, you can even make it extremely defensive, and thats

not only about the players orders, its about the routines the players have...

everything in football is about routines, a team without rotines doesnt play well, and the routines must change during the game because when the oponent will null your game...

see this video

this is demonstration of the more usual routines used in the 4-3-3 formation, its not the only way of playing that tactic, like i said there are infinit ways of interpret a formation

it depends on the type of players you have avaliable...

but that is an example of what would be an extreme adiction to a football manager game, tactics are fun, yes, but routines are much further, a good team with great routines

would be able to defeat or compete against a much stronger team with less organization and thats the beauty of this game, not allways the best team wins, because you may have better players but if a more brilliant couch and organized team faces you, they might win...

that is what is missing in current football manager, there are no miracles in this game, you need better players to win, you never win because you have extremly better tactic mostly, so in the current football manager, most of the game sucess is build by having the best players for the best price you can get and struggle to win matches, in other words...

you are not a coach, your mostly a director that buys and sells, your coaching and the affect you can have on a game is reduced...

by adding routines to a tactic, you would turn the game more rich, perhaps the programming would be miserably hard, i dont know (coordenates could help you perhaps) but the ending result would be really a step forward...

other intersting thing there is in Real Life but there is in football manager is that the players atributes are the same for every people eyes...

let me explain: in real life every person have a kind of an image or idea about a certain player... well, i am not gona use Ronaldo or Messi as examples, because everyone

considers them the very best players around... but when it comes to other players, there are allways a certain kind of disparity between what some people think and and what others think...

Let me say, if a player plays against my team and score 3 goals, what i will think? that guy have a very good finishing... while the supporters of his team are dont think that

because the same player was 10 games without scoring... so what happens?

to my vision that player is a 15/20 in finishing... but perhaps for their supports he is just 13/20... you understand where i am going??

YOU NEED TO INTRODUCE DINAMICAL views of players atributes... right now its statical, you now a certain player is 15/20, or 16/20 in finishing and that he will score regulary...

but players form is not allways regular...and instead of just increase or decrease players atributes attached to their age, (young their atributes are weaker, and when his old the atributes start falling... ) you could make the atributes more dinamical...

and even more insteresting... introduce something like this:

every scout manager could have different "vision" of atributes... and the same with your assisting manager, or whatever staf, you also... but not without knowing the player well

and making the atributes changing more regulary... and some players being more "regular" and having less changes in their atributes and others not so much... because they are inconsistent...

in football just like in other sports, also happens certain cases where a player who passed his career unknown in lower divisions suddenly imerges at top level...

right now i recall Ricky Lambert, but also there were other cases like the mighty Jan Koller from check Republic who only came to the top level at his 27/28, some players

only reach their maturity later, in tennis sometimes it happens, some older players only reach real results when one expects, winning or playing gran slam finals (if you know tennis you would understand what i mean...)

but really, what football manager needs its to become the game less predictable, routines to tactics would turn it more intersting... and dinamical atributes attached to the "vision" you could had about a player, and the influence of your assisting manager would also make an extreme influence...

in the recent years, you made a great effort increasing the 3d engine quality, that might help to sell the game better, perhaps most people arent thinkers about football managing

they just want the game to feel pretty and simple to play... but i am telling you, you need to turn football manager more hardcore...

other addiction i remember just right now would be, you dont buy the players directly (like in real life most coaches do), you just ask players with certain atributes

(example: i want a fast player with vision and hability to cross, drible and perform in the postion A, B or C, and then your directing board would seek a number of options and in certain cases let you chose wich option would suit you better)

and this are my ideas, sorry for the long text.

Some interesting points, but I'd disagree: I think the game has become mot tactical in recent years, now that you have to interact in actual tactical terms rather than Slider Manager 2012.

I think we need a lot more and better feedback on how our tactics are (or are not) working, more analysis tools and statistics. I think we still lack some tactical options. But at least now the game is based on genuine tactics.

but football its not about tactics...

its about playing routines, game style model... regular people think about tactics, real coachs dont think about tactics, think about interpretations of the game

in certain moments... check the youtube video

that is what its needed to introduce, a kind of systemetic routines training, that will tell your players to behave in a certain way during the game, that is what is coaching about...

tactics mean nothing, the game in real life is dinamic...

Only read your first point, about the goalkeepers distribution, and it's wrong. You can set them to distribute to a specific player.

I couldn't be bothered reading the entire essay but I'll say this.

On your point about your players acting different in attack and defence in real life. The formation in game is your defensive shape. Basically your rigidity setting tells your players how much they are allowed to change your formation in attack. Your team/player instructions will also alter your defensive shape along with other things. Basically if you set your rigidity to very rigid your team will never change shape from your base formation. So in your example where your wide players act different in different phases is influenced by your setting.

The current tactic system is more realistic in that in teal life you will give your team/individual players verbal instructions and this is replicated in game now. What I would like to see them add is the ability to use diagrams to instruct players as most people in real life visualise things. This would also help us understand what each instruction indicates.

I do understand your routine argument and at higher levels where players are more dedicated these things are common. But in lower leagues they only train one to two times a week and instructions are more important. Especially because these players are generally only good at one aspect of the game. Professional teams will be more adept at muliple aspects and will generally be more adept at switching between 'routines' without needing help from coaches.

Only read your first point, about the goalkeepers distribution, and it's wrong. You can set them to distribute to a specific player.

You can set them to distribute to a specific player, however it doesn't actually work.

You can set them to distribute to a specific player, however it doesn't actually work.

Do you watch the game? Maybe attackers are blocking access to this player.

I couldn't be bothered reading the entire essay but I'll say this.

The current tactic system is more realistic in that in teal life you will give your team/individual players verbal instructions and this is replicated in game now. What I would like to see them add is the ability to use diagrams to instruct players as most people in real life visualise things. This would also help us understand what each instruction indicates.

no its not, because you only give "generic" instructions, you tell a player to "attack more" or the do a certain movement, you dont tell the player to behave in syncronism with

certain team movements...

you dont tell your team to rotate postions or to behave in a certain way when the ball is in possession of a certain player...

all you can do is to tell a player do are generic instructions to individual playes that doesnt affect the way the entire team moves... in other others

in current football manager you have a restricted tactic display and then you tell players to do some things, but doesnt change much, and it doesnt change the way your team play...

I didnt buy footbal manager 2014, and i didnt do it, because i didnt enjoyed the direction the game is going...

the game is becoming less tactical, every new year it seems there are more restriction to what you can do or not...

per example in the Fm13, there was the possiblity to tell the goal keeper to pass to an exact defender in order to start an attacking movement, fm14 doesnt allow that

you have distribution for defense, but not to a particular player...

It's not becoming less tactical, and yes you can do that.

this is just an example really, i can go further, in the old version of championship manager, there was a much richer way of setting up the tactics... everything seemed dinamic

Key word bolded. Having more buttons to press doesn't make something more dynamic.

you had a typical 'overview' and then you had positions of the players distributed by zone with ball and without bal... and this was incredibly rich to create situations

where you could surprise the oponent... even if in that time you could not see what was happening because that was an old game, in terms of tactics was way more rich

than the current version, where you can only setup a resctricted tactic, and then you setup some players orders...

And how much of that actually "worked"? And by that I mean you could implement a plan, and watch it come to fruition? I'll give you a clue, you can't. It was text commentary, so your only "tell" was if you won. Does that mean the players did what you wanted? Who knows.

i can say in the current Fm14 version, you cant even setup a decent 3-4-3 diamond formation, because there will be allways gaps in due the facts you cant the player exacly

what you expect from him...

Yes you can.

the the 3-4-3 formation, is the one that suffers an extreme transformation between the with ball transition to the without ball, because the defenders with ball behave like full backs, and without ball as central defenders, and the midfielders behave like wingers with ball and full backs without ball, so...

this is just an example really, but other thing that real football has and never seen in any managing game was this...

you can setup tactics, but you cant setup player routines, what are player routines?

have you ever eard about 'model of game'??

you can play a 4-4-2 in infinit kind os play, you can mod a 4-4-2 to be extremly atacking, or to be extremly in posession, you can even make it extremely defensive, and thats

not only about the players orders, its about the routines the players have...

everything in football is about routines, a team without rotines doesnt play well, and the routines must change during the game because when the oponent will null your game...

see this video

this is demonstration of the more usual routines used in the 4-3-3 formation, its not the only way of playing that tactic, like i said there are infinit ways of interpret a formation

it depends on the type of players you have avaliable...

but that is an example of what would be an extreme adiction to a football manager game, tactics are fun, yes, but routines are much further, a good team with great routines

would be able to defeat or compete against a much stronger team with less organization and thats the beauty of this game, not allways the best team wins, because you may have better players but if a more brilliant couch and organized team faces you, they might win...

You're certainly painting what sounds like an absolute laugh riot of a game...

that is what is missing in current football manager, there are no miracles in this game, you need better players to win, you never win because you have extremly better tactic mostly, so in the current football manager, most of the game sucess is build by having the best players for the best price you can get and struggle to win matches, in other words...

you are not a coach, your mostly a director that buys and sells, your coaching and the affect you can have on a game is reduced...

by adding routines to a tactic, you would turn the game more rich, perhaps the programming would be miserably hard, i dont know (coordenates could help you perhaps) but the ending result would be really a step forward...

Absolute rubbish, in a sea of rubbish. What you're really saying is that you don't understand the tactic system in FM (no shame, plenty don't) and haven't been successful, so it must not be possible. Take a look at the Careers Forum and you'll see how wrong you are.

other intersting thing there is in Real Life but there is in football manager is that the players atributes are the same for every people eyes...

let me explain: in real life every person have a kind of an image or idea about a certain player... well, i am not gona use Ronaldo or Messi as examples, because everyone

considers them the very best players around... but when it comes to other players, there are allways a certain kind of disparity between what some people think and and what others think...

Christ, it's almost like people have their own opinions...

Let me say, if a player plays against my team and score 3 goals, what i will think?

That he scored three goals presumably...

that guy have a very good finishing... while the supporters of his team are dont think that

because the same player was 10 games without scoring... so what happens?

to my vision that player is a 15/20 in finishing... but perhaps for their supports he is just 13/20... you understand where i am going??

No, I don't. There is more to scoring a goal than finishing, and there is more to the game than top trumps. Sometimes, a player who is a deadly finisher will miss.

YOU NEED TO INTRODUCE DINAMICAL views of players atributes... right now its statical, you now a certain player is 15/20, or 16/20 in finishing and that he will score regulary...

but players form is not allways regular...and instead of just increase or decrease players atributes attached to their age, (young their atributes are weaker, and when his old the atributes start falling... ) you could make the atributes more dinamical...

They already do. It's baffling how wildly you're missing the point. are you playing the same game?

and even more insteresting... introduce something like this:

every scout manager could have different "vision" of atributes... and the same with your assisting manager, or whatever staf, you also... but not without knowing the player well

and making the atributes changing more regulary... and some players being more "regular" and having less changes in their atributes and others not so much... because they are inconsistent...

You already have inconsistency, without the need for this frankly terrible system.

in football just like in other sports, also happens certain cases where a player who passed his career unknown in lower divisions suddenly imerges at top level...

right now i recall Ricky Lambert, but also there were other cases like the mighty Jan Koller from check Republic who only came to the top level at his 27/28, some players

only reach their maturity later, in tennis sometimes it happens, some older players only reach real results when one expects, winning or playing gran slam finals (if you know tennis you would understand what i mean...)

Already happens.

Never has so much been said while simultaneously saying nothing at all...

Ok I get your point now you have summarised it. Less is more . But my point stands about levels of football. I do think this would be something that is hard to implement and is evidenced by the fact that there is little competition in this genre. I do feel the removal of sliders is a step up and the current system is closer to real life in the fact that it is on the right track.

but football its not about tactics...

its about playing routines, game style model... regular people think about tactics, real coachs dont think about tactics, think about interpretations of the game

in certain moments... check the youtube video

Those things you list are tactical. Telling a player what to do, either as an instruction or by training them to naturally respond in a certain way to a certain situation is all tactical. Both are modelled in FM to some degree already; you can tailor a basic tactic with PIs, and you can train players in PPMS, which are in many ways similar to routine behaviour.

The aspects of dynamism are brought to the game by how the manager repsonds to situations, and by how the players are not coded robots who always do the same things regardless of situation. Players can panic, make mistakes, do unusual things, produce wonderous improvisations. The level of flexibility you can have will how you get your teams to play on this game is so large compared with previous incarnations.

Since you say in the opening paragraph that you have not bought the game, then I am unsure exactly how well you can comment on what is wrong with it? You may have some indication from what you have seen or read, but this is nothing compared to first-hand interaction; for starters you are going to be influenced by nobodies preconceotpions but your own in this case. All things written or produced by individuals about FM will contain some bias based on their opinion of the game.

I can say that FM14 has been the best incarnation of this game I have ever played. Everything feels more intuitive, I can do things like 'change x, observe y, conclude z' so much easier on this game than I ever have been able to before. This is down to the way the design of tactics has been changed. Now if you see your defence being cqught in possession you tell them 'more direct passing', or drop someone back to help, rather than change sliders from 15 - 13 for passing, 14-11 for width etc. Tactically this is a massive step forward. I will say that it is also the hardest version of the game I have played, because you have to understand what you are seeing in the ME and translate this into an idea how how to change it. But if you put the effort in, it is worth it.

I do like the idea of limiting the knowledge you can have about a player though, exhanging the fixed number attibute system with some kind of dynamical range that is narrowed as you and your coaches have a better idea of what a player can do. I would be very happy to see this replace the hidden attribute mode we currently have. It would make having scouts actually worth-while.

Your point about the different attributes for different eyes is slightly off in the fact that all players have capabilities. What I think you mean is his attributes could be dynamic to your system. This would be extremely hard to implement and it is up to you to decide. Just as it is in real life.

The point about him having variable attributes is already implemented by his hidden consistency attribute.

I do agree with the no late bloomers problem. Perhaps the players performance should raise his PA as well as his CA. Also if a player is outplaying his attributes at 30 his development should not stall.

I didnt buy footbal manager 2014,

So all your opinions are based on what exactly?

So all your opinions are based on what exactly?

Demo maybe?

I will take care of his last paragraph.

and this are my ideas, sorry for the long text.

We forgive you, but please make it shorter next time.

IMO the game gets more tactical each year and at the moment it's more tactical than the game can explain to us. I hope FM 2015 will give us more feedback about our tactical inputs.

Do you watch the game? Maybe attackers are blocking access to this player.

Yes I do.

Unfortunately this feature/option just does not work as intended.

Yes, hit the nail on the head Sven. There are almost endless options, there is just such a huge learning curve.

It was a huge rish having this extreme tactical overhaul but I think it paid off. Well done SI.

On the late bloomer issue. I think I have a solution.

What if? Players appeared on mediocre teams or lower level teams as regens in his mid to late 20s where he has generated history of for a striker for example playing in League 1 scoring inly a few goals for years then having a breakout season and generating the next season with an upper level CA?

There is actually one point from the OP that has some mileage there - as soon as a player joins on trial, on FM we know each of his attributes to within 5% of their real value (i.e. an integer between 1 - 20). IRL would any manager, scout or supporter be able to gauge someone that quickly, or that well? Maybe - and I can't think of the perfect way to implement this - there should be a period of uncertainty about a player's attributes -

for example: Player X joins on trial. You have a rough idea that he can pick out a pass, so his passing is between 14-18. Creativity? 12-15. Quickness? We can garner that pretty quickly, surely?! Let's do some sprinting sessions.

This year more than any other, I've felt less in control of my team & what they do on the pitch. I want more control back. Moving away from the sliders was a positive & necessary move, but the current tactics screen needs a lot more options than it currently has. I'd be happy for the next game to largely be the same as this years, but to have a whole lot more options on the main tactics screen. This years game feels like I just select the XI and send them out to play.

There is actually one point from the OP that has some mileage there - as soon as a player joins on trial, on FM we know each of his attributes to within 5% of their real value (i.e. an integer between 1 - 20). IRL would any manager, scout or supporter be able to gauge someone that quickly, or that well? Maybe - and I can't think of the perfect way to implement this - there should be a period of uncertainty about a player's attributes -

for example: Player X joins on trial. You have a rough idea that he can pick out a pass, so his passing is between 14-18. Creativity? 12-15. Quickness? We can garner that pretty quickly, surely?! Let's do some sprinting sessions.

Yes, hiwever how they play under your system is much more important than anything else. So the purpose of a trial is to see how a player performs. Not how good he is as a base. The thing that should be approximate is and is very inaccurate for any new players at a club (PA).

Yes, hiwever how they play under your system is much more important than anything else. So the purpose of a trial is to see how a player performs. Not how good he is as a base. The thing that should be approximate is and is very inaccurate for any new players at a club (PA).

You're right that the first snapshot of PA star rating will be inaccurate, but his attributes give away A LOT. Is that not important?

I imagine the hidden stats like adaptability play a part as well. I've had plenty of players who don't play well in the 1st season (never mind in a 4-week trial) but then become mainstays.

Bring on 2015 i say!!!

You're right that the first snapshot of PA star rating will be inaccurate, but his attributes give away A LOT. Is that not important?

I imagine the hidden stats like adaptability play a part as well. I've had plenty of players who don't play well in the 1st season (never mind in a 4-week trial) but then become mainstays.

Good point. Never thought of that. But wouldn't you be testing your trialists relentlessly in order to get a good idea of them?

What they should do is not display all there attributes straight away. So for example if said player only has 5 attributes visible before you bring them in keep it that way and gradually expose the others as you theoretically test them in training. This should be implemented in scouting and not have all attributes visible with just one visit to a training session by scouts.

Although adaptability is to do with settling into other countries I believe.

but football its not about tactics...

its about playing routines, game style model... regular people think about tactics, real coachs dont think about tactics, think about interpretations of the game

in certain moments... check the youtube video

that is what its needed to introduce, a kind of systemetic routines training, that will tell your players to behave in a certain way during the game, that is what is coaching about...

tactics mean nothing, the game in real life is dinamic...

I support Newcastle United. I have to put up with Alan Pardew. Don't try and tell me tactics mean nothing.

you can play a 4-4-2 in infinit kind os play, you can mod a 4-4-2 to be extremly atacking, or to be extremly in posession, you can even make it extremely defensive, and thats

not only about the players orders, its about the routines the players have...

You can do this in FM as well. You can set up a 4-4-2 that sits deep and covers space, then transitions to a 4-6-0 with a False Nine dropping into midfield and a Trequartista drifting wide to link up with wide midfielders pushing up and cutting inside to act as forwards. You can set up a 4-4-2 that presses aggressively in the attacking third with the wide mids pushing up to create a 4-2-4 before transitioning to a 2-2-3-3 with the wingbacks providing width in attack. Alternately, you can just set up a 4-4-2 where players stick to defensive positions, wingers run down the flanks and strikers try to get on the end of crosses. There are countless possibilities if you know how to use the tools available to you.

everything in football is about routines, a team without rotines doesnt play well, and the routines must change during the game because when the oponent will null your game...

Patterns of play in the game are controlled by more abstract instructions, but this does not mean they are not in the game. Moreover, incorporating a kind of "play creator" inside the TC would require an incredible degree of complexity to be implemented realistically. A pattern of play is not a mechanised response by the players but, ideally, informs and guides an intuitive response balanced by the player's experience and dynamic decision making.

that is what is missing in current football manager, there are no miracles in this game,

This is just false. In fact, this forum is littered with people complaining that their superstar club has been upset by a smaller side that scored with only 1 or 2 shots.

you are not a coach, your mostly a director that buys and sells, your coaching and the affect you can have on a game is reduced...

While it's true that much of the meat & potatoes aspects of coaching are abstracted, reflected via player's mental attribute improvements in training, this does not mean tactical decisions are irrelevant in the ME nor does it mean squad selection and man management (two of the most important aspects of team management) are not important.

by adding routines to a tactic, you would turn the game more rich, perhaps the programming would be miserably hard, i dont know (coordenates could help you perhaps) but the ending result would be really a step forward...

Again, they're there mainly in the form of roles which have started to become much more distinct with FM14, as well as the mental attributes of the players. The loss of sliders that you attribute to the game becoming "less tactical" is actually what has enabled SI to add more diversity in player behaviours. In fact, the point you mention about DCs splitting wide in three-at-the-back systems was added (controversially) for FM14.

You are right that adding even more diversity in possible patterns is miserably hard... which is precisely what the ME coding team spends much of their time doing. It's not as easy as simply saying "go here when the ball is there, done," there are countless factors to consider, and with individual players in the game not being actual humans making use of their past experience as footballers, these need to be carefully controlled and balanced with a vast number of possible conditions and exceptions to ensure the mechanisation of a pattern of play doesn't cause players to do stupid things when circumstances don't 100% match the way the pattern was coached on the training pitch (which, in football, is a lot of the time).

Good point. Never thought of that. But wouldn't you be testing your trialists relentlessly in order to get a good idea of them?

What they should do is not display all there attributes straight away. So for example if said player only has 5 attributes visible before you bring them in keep it that way and gradually expose the others as you theoretically test them in training. This should be implemented in scouting and not have all attributes visible with just one visit to a training session by scouts.

Good idea. I'm sticking an amalgamation of our ideas/discussion on the wishlist. Probably already been raised, but...

The hand of god indeed.

What the OP is describing is possible to implement to a certain extent it is just very hard to understand how to instruct your players to do what you want. In reality top quality players need very little game day instruction but this is not implemented in game because the game is not magical and I'm no programmer but I imagine this is very hard to implement.

Good idea. I'm sticking an amalgamation of our ideas/discussion on the wishlist. Probably already been raised, but...

Good ideas abound.

The hand of god indeed.

What the OP is describing is possible to implement to a certain extent it is just very hard to understand how to instruct your players to do what you want. In reality top quality players need very little game day instruction but this is not implemented in game because the game is not magical and I'm no programmer but I imagine this is very hard to implement.

They receive very little game day instruction because, at a club run according to modern coaching principles, the entire week before is spent focusing on drills that model situations the manager expects the team to face in the upcoming match. Professional players are not simply drilled repeatedly in fundamentals as they would be at the youth level. In FM, this is abstracted to your pre-match tactical adjustments (and to some extent, match preparation focus), but it's not the case that managers simply put a system in place at the start of the season and coach every week irrespective how their opponents play. Generally, most managers have core principles of a style of play that inform how players are coached, but this still leaves room for modification and situational training based on the opposition.

They receive very little game day instruction because, at a club run according to modern coaching principles, the entire week before is spent focusing on drills that model situations the manager expects the team to face in the upcoming match. Professional players are not simply drilled repeatedly in fundamentals as they would be at the youth level. In FM, this is abstracted to your pre-match tactical adjustments (and to some extent, match preparation focus), but it's not the case that managers simply put a system in place at the start of the season and coach every week irrespective how their opponents play. Generally, most managers have core principles of a style of play that inform how players are coached, but this still leaves room for modification based on the opposition.

That is what I was getting at. Most coaches still have their own philosophies and try to find players to fit in. You also have three default tactics in game to work on. At a top team I will use which tactic I see fit for upcoming match and tweak a little bit each match. There is also a match training feature don't forget. A professional team gas more time obviously. How many part time and amateur teams have enough time to create weekly tactics/routines?

You certainly claim to know a lot about a game you admit to never have played.

How many part time and amateur teams have enough time to create weekly tactics/routines?

This is indirectly represented via players' tactical attributes. In real life, a youth or amateur team will spend more time training fundamentals, and in FM, their correspondingly lower mental attributes will see them commit more errors and engage in more simplistic patterns reflecting their lack of experience with dealing with plays that "don't go by the book." As a manager, you can try to increase these attributes by setting up training to have a greater emphasis on tactics. Beyond that, you have tactical familiarity representing what happens if you ask players to adopt a significantly different style of play. Top level players can adjust more readily since their tactical attributes are high enough that a lack of tactical familiarity will see them still operating at a reasonable level, whereas at a lower level, deviating too much from your trained style can take the frequency of errors and poor decisions to catastrophic levels.

This is indirectly represented via players' tactical attributes. In real life, a youth or amateur team will spend more time training fundamentals, and in FM, their correspondingly lower mental attributes will see them commit more errors and engage in more simplistic patterns reflecting their lack of experience with dealing with plays that "don't go by the book." As a manager, you can try to increase these attributes by setting up training to have a greater emphasis on tactics. Beyond that, you have tactical familiarity representing what happens if you ask players to adopt a significantly different style of play. Top level players can adjust more readily since their tactical attributes are high enough that a lack of tactical familiarity will see them still operating at a reasonable level, whereas at a lower level, deviating too much from your trained style can take the frequency of errors and poor decisions to catastrophic levels.

Touching on that point, in theory then the best thing for youth to be doing is focusing on tactical training to bring them completely up to speed, and their individual role training will complement that by teaching them their attributes to play the role needed no?

Um riccardo, you said you didn't get FM14 but you go on and say certain things aren't in the game.

How would you know they aren't in the game if you don't have the game?

That makes no sense whatsoever.

This is indirectly represented via players' tactical attributes. In real life, a youth or amateur team will spend more time training fundamentals, and in FM, their correspondingly lower mental attributes will see them commit more errors and engage in more simplistic patterns reflecting their lack of experience with dealing with plays that "don't go by the book." As a manager, you can try to increase these attributes by setting up training to have a greater emphasis on tactics. Beyond that, you have tactical familiarity representing what happens if you ask players to adopt a significantly different style of play. Top level players can adjust more readily since their tactical attributes are high enough that a lack of tactical familiarity will see them still operating at a reasonable level, whereas at a lower level, deviating too much from your trained style can take the frequency of errors and poor decisions to catastrophic levels.

That backs up my point about less match day instructions for pro teams in the fact that those players are more adept at reading opposition and deciding what tactics to employ without relying on coaches.

In reality in real life at least I would give my elite team more contingency plans than a low team. I would also allow my players especially my attackers to think for themselves and create their own contingencies if necessary.

Touching on that point, in theory then the best thing for youth to be doing is focusing on tactical training to bring them completely up to speed, and their individual role training will complement that by teaching them their attributes to play the role needed no?

The thing is their technicals are the easiest to train and mentals increase naturally over time.

To: The Hand of God: You said this; "You can do this in FM as well. You can set up a 4-4-2 that sits deep and covers space, then transitions to a 4-6-0 with a False Nine dropping into midfield and a Trequartista drifting wide to link up with wide midfielders pushing up and cutting inside to act as forwards. You can set up a 4-4-2 that presses aggressively in the attacking third with the wide mids pushing up to create a 4-2-4 before transitioning to a 2-2-3-3 with the wingbacks providing width in attack. Alternately, you can just set up a 4-4-2 where players stick to defensive positions, wingers run down the flanks and strikers try to get on the end of crosses. There are countless possibilities if you know how to use the tools available to you."

Now, what I want to know, even after reading masses of the stuff in the tactic forum, is how do you actually do that (I know not all of us are gifted with football vision) re set up those types of formations to carry out those functions. I am an avid 442 man (62 yearsold and love that formation). For instance could you explain or direct me to an explanation thread on how to set up a 442 that transitions into 460 or even the second example of a 442 that becomes a 424 then a 2233? I would dearly relish being able to carry out those instructions and watch them unfold in my games. It is how to use the tools I guess and I am a fairly basic formations type of person and not sure how to use those tools!

(Sorry if I have slightly hijacked the topic) but it was the OP that got me thinking about other aspects of the game that might benefit from additional functions.

Cheers

K

To: The Hand of God: You said this; "You can do this in FM as well. You can set up a 4-4-2 that sits deep and covers space, then transitions to a 4-6-0 with a False Nine dropping into midfield and a Trequartista drifting wide to link up with wide midfielders pushing up and cutting inside to act as forwards. You can set up a 4-4-2 that presses aggressively in the attacking third with the wide mids pushing up to create a 4-2-4 before transitioning to a 2-2-3-3 with the wingbacks providing width in attack. Alternately, you can just set up a 4-4-2 where players stick to defensive positions, wingers run down the flanks and strikers try to get on the end of crosses. There are countless possibilities if you know how to use the tools available to you."

Now, what I want to know, even after reading masses of the stuff in the tactic forum, is how do you actually do that (I know not all of us are gifted with football vision) re set up those types of formations to carry out those functions. I am an avid 442 man (62 yearsold and love that formation). For instance could you explain or direct me to an explanation thread on how to set up a 442 that transitions into 460 or even the second example of a 442 that becomes a 424 then a 2233? I would dearly relish being able to carry out those instructions and watch them unfold in my games. It is how to use the tools I guess and I am a fairly basic formations type of person and not sure how to use those tools!

(Sorry if I have slightly hijacked the topic) but it was the OP that got me thinking about other aspects of the game that might benefit from additional functions.

Cheers

K

Basically your formation is solely your defensive formation IMO. Your player roles/duties combined with mentality/rigidity and your team/player instruction relevant to attacking and build up will alter your non defensive shape.

Touching on that point, in theory then the best thing for youth to be doing is focusing on tactical training to bring them completely up to speed, and their individual role training will complement that by teaching them their attributes to play the role needed no?

Tactical training goes hand in hand with match experience, and with younger or less experienced players, you do not want to overload them on theory before they've had a chance to put any of it into practice. At the same time, technical and physical training are interrelated since they control what sort of options you actually have the ability to pull off.

In FM (as in real life), you can heavily emphasise tactical training to ensure your players are less prone to error and understand the full range of options available to them, but if you're hindering their technical or physical development to do so, you'll still be limiting the options that they can realistically carry out. At the youth level, you'll often see this pan out in principle when a tactically and technically adept side has been moved to an older age group to find adequate competition. Often, they'll be the better team in terms of basic decisions and ball control, but they are still vulnerable to being steamrolled by opponents who just take advantage of the disparity in physical strength and speed.

Now, what I want to know, even after reading masses of the stuff in the tactic forum, is how do you actually do that (I know not all of us are gifted with football vision) re set up those types of formations to carry out those functions. I am an avid 442 man (62 yearsold and love that formation). For instance could you explain or direct me to an explanation thread on how to set up a 442 that transitions into 460 or even the second example of a 442 that becomes a 424 then a 2233? I would dearly relish being able to carry out those instructions and watch them unfold in my games. It is how to use the tools I guess and I am a fairly basic formations type of person and not sure how to use those tools!

(Sorry if I have slightly hijacked the topic) but it was the OP that got me thinking about other aspects of the game that might benefit from additional functions.

Cheers

K

I can't really go into every detail here, but the key is understanding what the settings actually do in relation to the different phases of play. Formation sets your basic defensive shape while roles, duty and fluidity control how the team shape develops as it transitions into attack. The False Nine and Trequartista roles both give you options for non-traditional strikers who are focused more on supporting build-up play than attacking the box. With that said, a lot of the alterations of shape are automated and simply logical knock-on effects of other settings. For example, having a 4-4-2 press high as a 4-2-4 will result naturally from having a high line combined with aggressive wide midfield roles.

Patterns of play in the game are controlled by more abstract instructions, but this does not mean they are not in the game. Moreover, incorporating a kind of "play creator" inside the TC would require an incredible degree of complexity to be implemented realistically. A pattern of play is not a mechanised response by the players but, ideally, informs and guides an intuitive response balanced by the player's experience and dynamic decision making.

i think is possible to create a pattern of play...

the exact same way a coach setup a training...

in real training.. every player have his functions, he knows exacly the movements he should have on the pitch

who he should pass the ball during the construction time, or building time... etc etc

footbal is about cycles... its a cycle wich is repeated over and over, it starts from the goal keeper, and it

goes to the objective of scoring... during that cycle, players do movements trying to break or win the oponent defensive sistem...

i am not a senior programer, all i only started learning java and C# about year ago, but i think, the same way they can program objects to do common actions allready implemented in the game, they can program objects(players) to do specific movements in specific moments...

http://s28.postimg.org/w6xopvbml/example.png

the players highlighted with Yellow, are the ones in possession...

when certain players are in possession, other players should move into certain positions and do certain actions after receive the ball, real football works like that also, like a "mecanism" its no surprise

that Dutch sucess from the 70s was called mecanical orange, because they introduced a kind of a complex system of play...

i think it can be done... this is just example really, and perhaps because my english is not native i am

not expressing in a more clear way...

Your English is fine but the game can replicate largely what you are craving if you take the time to understand how to manipulate it.

I do however agree with your point about players changing position when certain players have the ball. It can be replicated partly by using the fluidity setting. Plus upper echelon players will do this automatically in game with high off the ball stats in attack and high positioning and decisions in defence. In lower leagues the problem is compounded because players are not as intelligent and need coaching to understand what to do which is of course near impossible in the middle of a game.

the exact same way a coach setup a training...

in real training.. every player have his functions, he knows exacly the movements he should have on the pitch

who he should pass the ball during the construction time, or building time... etc etc

footbal is about cycles... its a cycle wich is repeated over and over, it starts from the goal keeper, and it

goes to the objective of scoring... during that cycle, players do movements trying to break or win the oponent defensive sistem...

Football is much more dynamic than what you seem to be describing here, and in a match, players have to account for numerous contingencies and details that would make mechanising things down to that level of detail either unrealistic or completely impractical for a computer game player. The ME is built on a system of individual decision making that allows players on the pitch to choose from a realistic variety of options that help reflect the dynamic, unpredictable nature of actual play, so it's not just a matter of defining movement patterns and passing decisions, you also have to incorporate every new option into the player AI's means of evaluating the quality of different options in different circumstances to ensure they don't robotically follow the exact structure of a training drill when it would be wholly counterproductive.

With that said, I think you're vastly underestimating the level of complexity at which the game is already working, though given that you haven't actually played the game, that's not too surprising.

Football is much more dynamic than what you seem to be describing here, and in a match, players have to account for numerous contingencies and details that would make mechanising things down to that level of detail either unrealistic or completely impractical for a computer game player. The ME is built on a system of individual decision making that allows players on the pitch to choose from a realistic variety of options that help reflect the dynamic, unpredictable nature of actual play, so it's not just a matter of defining movement patterns and passing decisions, you also have to incorporate every new option into the player AI's means of evaluating the quality of different options in different circumstances to ensure they don't robotically follow the exact structure of a training drill when it would be wholly counterproductive.

With that said, I think you're vastly underestimating the level of complexity at which the game is already working, though given that you haven't actually played the game, that's not too surprising.

You sound like a real life coach to me?

Yes I think the poor graphics fail to interpret how these players are acting much more realistically than in FIFA. Your statement backed my statement about the level of mental attributes of players and lower level players acting more like robots and will take longer to make decisions and these decisions will be more based on coaching rather than their own devices at higher levels of football.

Also having a high decision attribute indicates how quickly he makes decisions IMO not necessarily knowing what is the best decision.

You sound like a real life coach to me?

I take my U5 rec league very seriously.

Lol, they'll be world beaters mate.

Seriously though, maybe you should apply for some real life manager jobs. Remember that guy in Azerbaijan?

I didnt buy footbal manager 2014,

i can say in the current Fm14 version, you cant even setup a decent 3-4-3 diamond formation,

stopped reading after this. try harder OP to bs us.