Something that could ruin this games longevity for me...

I went on a huge high scoring winning streak at home, playing nice attacking football. Then, all of a sudden teams figured it out and I drew at home to Chelsea (26 shots, 6 clear cut), lost 1-0 at home to West Ham (21 shots, 3 clear cut), and lost 3-1 at home to liecester (28 shots, 8 half chances). Now I understand teams figure you out and park the bus, but can every team execute it perfectly like they seem to on here? It seems no matter what team it is, when they decide to park that bus all of a sudden every team is a Chelsea!

Anyway, that's neither here nor there because I know what to do when this happens, and I'm back to winning ways.

Now a resurgent man city had gone on an awesome run after appointing simeone as manager. They were going to give me a run for my money in the league and make it interesting, but now of course every manager has figured them out and suddenly every team has the players to stop them. Now they have won 1 in their last 7, drawing to villa, Swansea, and losing 5-0 to Spurs. And I wonder if their manager will be able to pull them out of it. It seems to be a pattern with big attacking teams, run of wins then run of draws and losses.

This is again going to make the league far to easy every year as the game throws in this pattern of breaking attacking tactics.

Sorry if that's a bit of a ramble but I think it is something that needs looking at. Don't make it not happen, but just make the attacking teams coach as intuitive as the defending teams so they can quickly sort themselves out.

So your tactic is good at attacking when there's space to do so, but falls apart when teams are more defensive. It happens. You'll need to change the gameplan a bit. They haven't figured your tactic out, they're just (naturally) going more defensive against a team that's really doing well. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Im not complaining about my team. I did mention that I know how to fix it, I just control more and keep the ball.

What bothers me is that the AI doesn't seem to know. Which for me will ruin the game as there will be no completion for the league. And I love to play as Arsenal, but I can only usually do 4 or 5 seasons with them as winning is too easy.

It just seems to me AI hasn't improved this year. For example, I brought Reus who was transfer listed, without any competition. Same with lukaku. Same problem as in 2015.

Im not complaining about my team. I did mention that I know how to fix it, I just control more and keep the ball.

What bothers me is that the AI doesn't seem to know. Which for me will ruin the game as there will be no completion for the league. And I love to play as Arsenal, but I can only usually do 4 or 5 seasons with them as winning is too easy.

You haven't mentioned any details around the AI Man City who are struggling. How do you know they're just carrying on without any changes? Teams can suffer these slumps. Look at Chelsea this year.

Since writing this post they have lost 2 more. Home to Liverpool and away to Norwich. Lots of shots and cc chances. 1 win in 9.

It just seems to me AI hasn't improved this year. For example, I brought Reus who was transfer listed, without any competition. Same with lukaku. Same problem as in 2015.

That's a different issue and again, context is needed here. There may be a lot of reasons that AI clubs didn't bid. Lack of money, transfer or wage related. Lack of interest from the player. Lack of interest from clubs as they are happy with what they have. Player doesn't suit the role they're looking for.

etc etc

Reus comes up for sale and you are telling me every major club wouldn't bid? It was a problem last edition. If you bid for them outside of transfer windows you rarely get any competition.

Reus comes up for sale and you are telling me every major club wouldn't bid?

It's just the way it works. You and I would go out of our way to make room in the team for a player like that, but any of the reasons I mentioned may be causing the AI not to bid.

Yes Because the AI is inadequate.

Most, if not all simulated AI are inadequate to varying levels.

We'd all like the AI to be much more adaptive, I know SI share that desire & they have introduced functions that help the AI make changes to their approach but creating simulated AI for NPC's is incredibly difficult which makes perfection a long way off.

Wouldn't one short term solution be difficulty settings? i.e allow people to chose to have a more difficult game, by say allowing the a.i to be able to see PA and certain other hidden attributes? So they buy better players etc.

I know it's not ideal but it would allow people the choice of a more difficult experience. I know I could manage lower teams, and I do after a while but I'd like a nice long challenging game with Arsenal.

PA is pretty much meaningless as a data point, allowing the AI to see or better judge hidden attributes is a good idea & it's worth posting in the wishlist thread.

Have you tried starting with Arsenal as an unknown manager, no experience, etc?

yeah, but it's relative though

the human will ALWAYS outperform the AI, due to actually playing it by something other than pure ability

I still remember my FM12 save, where I was continually told to shove 34yo Darijo Srna into the reserves (or release/sell him) because he was 1/2 star (had around 110CA), yet he was still playing regularly for me and getting 7s (and sat in the top 5 for Premiership assists)

The AI would've done that years ago, yet he was still a first teamer within my side, because he had decent attributes for the position

Likewise Cedric Soares, has been a ripper for the past few FMs - he was a mainstay DR for my FM14 side, yet no other team showed interest due to his 2* rating (despite having 12+ in most attributes)

and good luck coding in a variable AI, it's a monster effort (even for some of the bigger game developers)

generally, the current system works (we've got a weak player in X position, so we'll go out and sign Talented-Player-Y who plays there)

other superstars don't really come into it (so if Messi got placed on the transfer list, the only clubs looking at him are those actually looking for STs with a lot of spare cash, rather than any big club with money)

which is why it's easy to sell your 3-4* players, but end up having to take minimum prices for 1-2* players (because only lower division sides are interested in him)

and then again for youth, the AI doesn't factor in how good he can be, only how he can improve them now

Yeah that's a huge problem, the game had never been able to develops youth players.