[FM2015] USA World Class MLS (8 levels)

[arkitekt]

Oh I got so far in the Winter Cup! Lost at the quarter final stage on penalties after a 7-7 draw on agg against the team that is top in our regular season division. The table was so tight, I went from 8th to 2nd to qualify in two games.

Lets have a good end to the regular season, im 9 points off 1st with 6 games to play.

EDIT

CRAP! It looks like because ive loaded a load of other updates my game is not progressing past the end of January

Im starting up again with the team but with just vanilla leagues loaded now.

[graaa]

Oh I got so far in the Winter Cup! Lost at the quarter final stage on penalties after a 7-7 draw on agg against the team that is top in our regular season division. The table was so tight, I went from 8th to 2nd to qualify in two games.

Lets have a good end to the regular season, im 9 points off 1st with 6 games to play.

EDIT

CRAP! It looks like because ive loaded a load of other updates my game is not progressing past the end of January

Im starting up again with the team but with just vanilla leagues loaded now.

Glad to hear about your exploits, but I'm concerned about the issue you had. What updates did you load into the game? How is is not progressing - is it taking a long time to load or is an error message popping up?

[graaa]

So one of the things I've been working on since yesterday is increasing the number of youth that AI teams get each youth intake.

First of all, I'm talking about the AI teams and not the team you're managing - the game will always give you a large squad of youth candidates to choose from, but for some reason the AI teams in the USA only get around 3-8 youth candidates signed to their team.

I've noticed a big difference in the USA leagues vs the other leagues (English, Italian, etc). The English Premier League teams always accept large numbers of youth each, around 10-15, but the USA teams each accept around half of that.

The reading I've done seems to suggest this is a normal occurrence to control the size of the database to prevent the game from slowing down under the weight of a large number of regens after several years. But I ask: why do the English and Italian and Spanish leagues get twice the number of regens than the USA league? They have U21 and U18 teams nearly twice the size of the USA teams' squads.

The tests I've run suggest it has nothing to do with the club's reputation - even 3 years later when a USA team surpasses the rep of an Italian or English EPL team, the English team gets more regens.

Also, I've tried replacing the Reserves back with a U23 team (the way that the EPL has U18s and U21s I thought might influence their youth intake, see x2 youth teams), but that didn't do anything. (It also revealed another bug in the editor file - the game can't create x2 custom youth team competitions - it can only create x1 youth team and x1 reserve team through the "Reserve League" rules)

It could have something to do with the number of teams in the USA - 588 to be exact - which the game might be spreading regens around to and limiting their number. HOWEVER, even when I have only the top 2 leagues loaded, the number of regens remains low so that suggests it might not even be this.

So I'm just writing this to document my tests into this issue. Results are inconclusive and though it irks me, we might have to accept AI teams getting only 3-8 regens per year for the USA. (Again, the team your managing will be fine and get a full team of candidates). It just doesn't seem right that the English and Italian teams get to have nice full youth teams while the USA ones will only be barely rostered each year. And who knows what implications this will have for the amount of USA players in the game long term.

[Heath Matthias]

I dunno, but I kind of think of the Amateur league as a default "regen generator," as you can sign these players at any time since they have no contracts. So you have a ton of teams in that league generating players every year. If you think of it in real life, it is almost like a high school/college system, but with no age restrictions. My guess for amount of total players is this totally balances out based on the sheer amount of US teams in these leagues.

[graaa]

I dunno, but I kind of think of the Amateur league as a default "regen generator," as you can sign these players at any time since they have no contracts. So you have a ton of teams in that league generating players every year. If you think of it in real life, it is almost like a high school/college system, but with no age restrictions. My guess for amount of total players is this totally balances out based on the sheer amount of US teams in these leagues.

That's a good point. Since there's not really anything can do about it anyway, I suppose it'll have to do like that.

[Rakuten06]

Hey graaa,

Still had a problem, I managed Vermont Voltage to the USASA Northeast Championship, but we still get the lower seed vs Leigh Valley United, so because of that, we are playing at home first in the first leg, is that a bug or?

[graaa]

Hey graaa,

Still had a problem, I managed Vermont Voltage to the USASA Northeast Championship, but we still get the lower seed vs Leigh Valley United, so because of that, we are playing at home first in the first leg, is that a bug or?

I need more information on what the problem is. The USASA championship game should be between the top team from each group. It's a 2-legged game and the team with the better league record plays at home last.

[Rakuten06]

I need more information on what the problem is. The USASA championship game should be between the top team from each group. It's a 2-legged game and the team with the better league record plays at home last.

I mean, MLS A1 Northeast Relegation Game vs Leigh Valley United, not the USASA Championship game, sorry...

[graaa]

I mean, MLS A1 Northeast Relegation Game vs Leigh Valley United, not the USASA Championship game, sorry...

Oh, I see what you're saying. In the A1 relegation game, both USASA teams (the best from each group) play against an A1 team, but which A1 team they play is determined by who won the championship. If your USASA team won the championship, then you'll play the bottom ranked A1 team. If lost, you play the 2nd lowest A1 team. The USASA team always plays home first no matter who it is because the championship just decides how good your A1 opponent is.

[elt]

This is fantastic. I just feel like you did the CWC the wrong way round. Finalists of Bronze should go up to Silver Quarters etc.

Having Gold finish in January seems a bit of a let down for what should be the biggest game of every year bar the world cup final.

Also I think having no U18 players is fine (if you managed to create a proper U18 League system) as it would somewhat simulate college/high school football.

[graaa]

This is fantastic. I just feel like you did the CWC the wrong way round. Finalists of Bronze should go up to Silver Quarters etc.

Having Gold finish in January seems a bit of a let down for what should be the biggest game of every year bar the world cup final.

Also I think having no U18 players is fine (if you managed to create a proper U18 League system) as it would somewhat simulate college/high school football.

I can understand the feeling - Gold is the best so it should be the longest. I'm pretty infatuated with the idea of the WORLD TREBLE though, and doing it the other way around wouldn't allow for that. (I could either have 3 separate tournaments, each equally short and equally seeded, or I could have 3 tiers that run at the same time and still seeded by league position, but if the bronze ends first the teams playing in gold would never get to play in it and win it)

At the same time, the tournament does lack that huge final game quality you would get from the world cup. The last game is the Bronze Final which doesn't seem big because the name "Bronze" implies something with less prestige. Since re-working the whole tournament will be a huge pain in the butt (not to mention I actually did try a couple times since you mentioned it and having it reversed is a great idea but nothing worked initially) I can introduce a 4th cup - the Platinum Trophy where the winners and/or runner ups of the 3 trophy qualify for it somehow and play. It will be the Super Cup that has been missing from this series the whole time.

And yeah, about the U18 players, I'm testing it and it's not that bad. After several years the AI team's ranks do fill out but it will take a long time to reach the depth of an English or Italian team (just take a look at one of their U21 team rosters and see how many youth there are! Very jealous). Again, the player controlled teams should be absolutely normal because you will get a full class of candidates each year, it's just the AI controlled teams that get less for some reason.

[scottmiles]

this doesn't work for me, only 11 MLS teams appeared, any help?

[scottmiles]

figured it out

[graaa]

figured it out

Someone else had this issue but I don't know if I was able to help them - any chance you can post what you did to fix it? Also post what file you're using.

[Uncle_Sam]

Also, I've tried replacing the Reserves back with a U23 team (the way that the EPL has U18s and U21s I thought might influence their youth intake, see x2 youth teams), but that didn't do anything. (It also revealed another bug in the editor file - the game can't create x2 custom youth team competitions - it can only create x1 youth team and x1 reserve team through the "Reserve League" rules)

It could have something to do with the number of teams in the USA - 588 to be exact - which the game might be spreading regens around to and limiting their number. HOWEVER, even when I have only the top 2 leagues loaded, the number of regens remains low so that suggests it might not even be this.

I was able to circumvent the editor issue with a club having two youth teams (U23 and U18) by manually creating the teams at each club. On a file I'm working on I had all the teams from MLS, the NASL, and the USL Pro field U23 teams in the PDL and U18 teams in the USSDA. Obviously it takes time but it does get by the "glitch".

As for the regens issue it's definitely to do with the hard coding of the USA regen system.

[fsquid]

I'm still playing 1.2 since I didn't want to start a new save and I haven't had anything mind boggling yet. Then again, I haven't paid too much attention to my youth teams.

[graaa]

I was able to circumvent the editor issue with a club having two youth teams (U23 and U18) by manually creating the teams at each club. On a file I'm working on I had all the teams from MLS, the NASL, and the USL Pro field U23 teams in the PDL and U18 teams in the USSDA. Obviously it takes time but it does get by the "glitch".

As for the regens issue it's definitely to do with the hard coding of the USA regen system.

Goes to show you can sometimes rig things to work in the editor with enough moxie! That sounds like a cool file Uncle Sam. I've always loved that style of league with B-teams/Youth teams in the lower leagues.

And yeah, the hard coding is definitely the issue - probably still hard coded to suit the old MLS academy structure from the original game.

I'm still playing 1.2 since I didn't want to start a new save and I haven't had anything mind boggling yet. Then again, I haven't paid too much attention to my youth teams.

That is good to hear - since it's been about a week I've decided to finally release this file onto Steam.

[arkitekt]

Again im waiting an age for Jan 31st to complete, let hope it goes through this time

[Uncle_Sam]

Did you have any problems with an error during rules testing that said "Wrong number of teams found for stage 0 of CONCACAF Champions League"?

[graaa]

Again im waiting an age for Jan 31st to complete, let hope it goes through this time

It's not unusual for me (on my slow computer) to wait 10 min for Saturday game days to process (with 10 playable nations loaded and all 8 USA levels). How long are you talking? Over an hour?

Did you have any problems with an error during rules testing that said "Wrong number of teams found for stage 0 of CONCACAF Champions League"?

I'm sure I did way in the beginning... It draws teams from the MLS (ID = 40), the US Open Cup, and the Canadian Championship so if you inactivated any of those competitions it will give you that error. If you add rules to those competitions it *might* also give you that error too, and if memory serves that's why I had to rebuild the NACL with custom rules in mine. At least that way I could fix the errors that come up.

[rcolesworthy]

For the 1.3 with old group stages- is that the one with the limited connectivity in the prelim stages? I just don't want the old version with no connectivity, but would very much like to see a CWC that elt suggested- bronze winners go to silver, and silver to gold. That would be very fun.

[graaa]

For the 1.3 with old group stages- is that the one with the limited connectivity in the prelim stages? I just don't want the old version with no connectivity, but would very much like to see a CWC that elt suggested- bronze winners go to silver, and silver to gold. That would be very fun.

The "1.3 Standard with Former CWC" as I call it is the one with NO connection between the tournaments. Gold stays gold and you'll get eliminated once and for all in it (there is however a group stage!).

1.3 with CWC (either standard or original) has the new format where yes, in the preliminary rounds you have a chance to move up to gold no matter where you start (basically win all your games in the preliminary rounds and you'll do it, with a bronze start making you play more games than silver and etc). Then it's a straight knockout cup style to the very end where losing will not eliminate you automatically (unless you lose in bronze) but instead knock you down a tournament.

[Heath Matthias]

Saw something interesting but don't think it is a bug. One of the AAA teams signed 55 players in the first transfer window! Looked at their roster and they have tons of unregistered players. The other teams in the same league have reasonably sized squads. Found that really odd.. (It was Sioux City I think)

[rcolesworthy]

So here's a little tournament structure I came up with today for the new 3-tier Club World Championship. It has room for 400 teams, and the biggest improvement of all is that the preliminary rounds give teams the opportunity to climb or fall from tier to tier if they win or lose. Once they reach the group stage, they become locked in. That is until the knockout rounds, where the losing teams in the Gold tier qualify for the silver tier, and the losing teams in the silver tier qualify for the bronze tier. This goes on for 2 knockout rounds, before teams are finally locked in for good in the final cup stages (where a loss means leaving the tournament and not moving down a tier).

This picture makes sense to ME, at least, but if you can figure it out let me know what you think of these changes. The only issue with it that I know of is that July is a busy month for a few domestic leagues (Columbia, Brazil, and Nigeria for example), but empty for most of the entire world (except international players). I don't know how this will effect those 3 countries but it probably isn't good to be them.

EDIT: One change I'm debating I should make is adding more teams to the GOLD START seeding in the gold group stage. I can increase it from 16 to 32 and have a similar 64-team group structure to the silver and bronze trophy groups. That would bump things up to 416 teams as well.

(YOU MAY NEED TO ZOOM IN WITH YOUR BROWSER)

Preliminary stage to group stage

group stage to final

Could you possibly post this one if thats possible, or at least post it when you're doing your next update? Seems more fitting to have group stages and a Gold cup final late in the season.

[Joseph R. Cooper]

Yeah, end of every transfer window is going to be hell. I run an absurd amount of leagues and process along just fine, the save file is laughingly large and I scratch my head at why this isn't slower but come the end of a transfer cycle... it takes me like an hour to get through all the loading that happens during deadline day.

Unless you get a popup saying the game crashed, just go for a walk, do some chores, minimize the window and watch something on YouTube, it will come back eventually. Just be prepared to have your night ruined by a transfer window.

[graaa]

Saw something interesting but don't think it is a bug. One of the AAA teams signed 55 players in the first transfer window! Looked at their roster and they have tons of unregistered players. The other teams in the same league have reasonably sized squads. Found that really odd.. (It was Sioux City I think)

Wow, that is odd! I wonder why they would feel the need to do that. Did they have any players when the game started? (Like did you seleect "Add Players to Playable Teams?"

Could you possibly post this one if thats possible, or at least post it when you're doing your next update? Seems more fitting to have group stages and a Gold cup final late in the season.

That's the 1.3 with Former CWC that I posted somewhere up the page (when I announced 1.3) - it's not on the first page. It's a one time release and it has the group stages and late gold cup.

In 1.4 I'm going to be making the Platinum Cup which comes at the very end and it is a 2-stage super cup between the winners of the Gold, Silver, Bronze (or the runner ups if needed). I hope that resolves the whole "gold should come at the end" issue. I wish it could but it just can't if teams are going to be able to do THE WORLD TREBLE (now the world Quadruple).

The alternative way of doing this is is I could just rename them somehow. The real issue is how we view their prestige. The gold is the shortest but it is the ones with the most elite teams. The bronze is the longest but starts with the least elite teams. People forget that the most elite teams get filtered down into bronze, so in a way it ends up being both the longest and with the most elite teams... but named "Bronze". What if I switched Gold and Bronze names? The issue I'd see with that though is it wouldn't seem right for the best team to qualify for Bronze and the worst team to qualify for Gold. I could go with a neutral naming scheme too and just call them: "CWC Level 1" through "CWC Level 3". I don't really know, hence why I hope the platinum cup supercup at the end will make it better.

Yeah, end of every transfer window is going to be hell. I run an absurd amount of leagues and process along just fine, the save file is laughingly large and I scratch my head at why this isn't slower but come the end of a transfer cycle... it takes me like an hour to get through all the loading that happens during deadline day.

Unless you get a popup saying the game crashed, just go for a walk, do some chores, minimize the window and watch something on YouTube, it will come back eventually. Just be prepared to have your night ruined by a transfer window.

lol I'm the same way... Even though it's slowed things down I've put this game in windowed mode and watched entire seasons of shows on NetFlix. My laptop is like 6 years.

[Heath Matthias]

Yeah all teams had players (used load players so all the teams would). It is funny how this is the only team I saw that did this. The rest are normal. Need to keep tabs on what happens to this team. Lots of angry non-played players I assume!

[Rakuten06]

Didn't realize how the youth-only save was a difficult challenge for me in this db you made, graaa, because we got promoted to the 7th tier and once we sign the youth intakes to the youth contracts, I can't play or sign them to part-time non-youth contracts until they're 18, so it made a really good challenge for me once we got injuries... I'm happy that I can still rely on the guys who are still on amateur contracts in the youth squad for now, but again we are currently 8th right now in the 7th tier, so it's not all bad yet

[graaa]

Yeah all teams had players (used load players so all the teams would). It is funny how this is the only team I saw that did this. The rest are normal. Need to keep tabs on what happens to this team. Lots of angry non-played players I assume!

I mean, who would want to move out to IOWA?

Didn't realize how the youth-only save was a difficult challenge for me in this db you made, graaa, because we got promoted to the 7th tier and once we sign the youth intakes to the youth contracts, I can't play or sign them to part-time non-youth contracts until they're 18, so it made a really good challenge for me once we got injuries... I'm happy that I can still rely on the guys who are still on amateur contracts in the youth squad for now, but again we are currently 8th right now in the 7th tier, so it's not all bad yet

Oh snap, I forgot about that. Well, in 1.4 I'm planning on allowing youth contract players to play in senior matches. Sorry about that...

[rcolesworthy]

Wow, that is odd! I wonder why they would feel the need to do that. Did they have any players when the game started? (Like did you seleect "Add Players to Playable Teams?"

That's the 1.3 with Former CWC that I posted somewhere up the page (when I announced 1.3) - it's not on the first page. It's a one time release and it has the group stages and late gold cup.

In 1.4 I'm going to be making the Platinum Cup which comes at the very end and it is a 2-stage super cup between the winners of the Gold, Silver, Bronze (or the runner ups if needed). I hope that resolves the whole "gold should come at the end" issue. I wish it could but it just can't if teams are going to be able to do THE WORLD TREBLE (now the world Quadruple).

The alternative way of doing this is is I could just rename them somehow. The real issue is how we view their prestige. The gold is the shortest but it is the ones with the most elite teams. The bronze is the longest but starts with the least elite teams. People forget that the most elite teams get filtered down into bronze, so in a way it ends up being both the longest and with the most elite teams... but named "Bronze". What if I switched Gold and Bronze names? The issue I'd see with that though is it wouldn't seem right for the best team to qualify for Bronze and the worst team to qualify for Gold. I could go with a neutral naming scheme too and just call them: "CWC Level 1" through "CWC Level 3". I don't really know, hence why I hope the platinum cup supercup at the end will make it better.

lol I'm the same way... Even though it's slowed things down I've put this game in windowed mode and watched entire seasons of shows on NetFlix. My laptop is like 6 years.

Flip names and seedings around so teams that originally got seeded into Bronze went to Gold, Gold to Bronze and flip the names around. Might have to switch the number of teams around for the new (old?) cups but seems like it should be simple.

[Rakuten06]

Well, I am already in the 2nd season, I don't want to start over again, so I'm going to press ahead anyway, graaa

[graaa]

Flip names and seedings around so teams that originally got seeded into Bronze went to Gold, Gold to Bronze and flip the names around. Might have to switch the number of teams around for the new (old?) cups but seems like it should be simple.

But then no World Treble...

If the Bronze were the short tournament then the gold winners wouldn't get to play in it. The bronze cup has to finish last for the gold and silver winners to be able to play.

Well, I am already in the 2nd season, I don't want to start over again, so I'm going to press ahead anyway, graaa

Full steam!

[rcolesworthy]

I get the lure of the world treble, but... Maybe have the bronze finish in March, Silver finish in April, and Gold finish in May/ June? I know that big teams couldn't do the treble, but you could have bronze winners potentially do it if winner of the individual tournaments advance. It just doesn't seem right if the biggest tournament finishes halfway through the season. It just seems like doing that, and then a platinum cup during December in place of the old CWC where the winners of the tournaments, plus the past winner or something like to have 4 teams or more, seems like it makes the most sense. Also, if you want to get super ambitious and it would really crowd the schedule for Europe, Asia and Africa, you could do a simple one leg knockout of the winners of national leagues to have another trophy of importance, so you could get a treble- Gold/Silver/Bronze, Platinum, and then the continental one. But i think continental would crowd the schedule a LOT.

[graaa]

So I've had a few requests to change the CWC in the following ways -

1) Gold Trophy ends in May, not January

2) More teams qualify for gold trophy (like top 3 from the top leagues)

3) Return to group stages

I spent some time plotting it out and I've managed put it down into excel. If I do this, we'll lose a few things.

1) No world Treble (but I do plan on keeping a Platinum Super Cup at the end)

2) No moving between cups (except in preliminary rounds, but only down. Just like UEFA and Euro cup prelims I think. Elimination from any cup after prelims means elimination).

I made a list of the positives and negatives of changing it (in my mind)

Positives

1) More teams can fit (from 416 to 558 to be exact)

2) All trophies go until May

Negatives

1) No more world Treble

I want to know what people think of the changes and whether or not I make this change will come down to raw votes.

Here's a photo of the prelim stages.

256 qualify for gold (and all but 128 will drop. Top 40 countries have 3 seeds into this round)

160 qualify for silver (all of them can drop. Top 9 countries have 2 seeds, rest have 1)

160 qualify for bronze (all of them can drop. All countries have 1 seed)

[rcolesworthy]

So I've had a few requests to change the CWC in the following ways -

1) Gold Trophy ends in May, not January

2) More teams qualify for gold trophy (like top 3 from the top leagues)

3) Return to group stages

I spent some time plotting it out and I've managed put it down into excel. If I do this, we'll lose a few things.

1) No world Treble (but I do plan on keeping a Platinum Super Cup at the end)

2) No moving between cups (except in preliminary rounds, but only down. Just like UEFA and Euro cup prelims I think. Elimination from any cup after prelims means elimination).

I made a list of the positives and negatives of changing it (in my mind)

Positives

1) More teams can fit (from 416 to 558 to be exact)

2) All trophies go until May

Negatives

1) No more world Treble

I want to know what people think of the changes and whether or not I make this change will come down to raw votes.

Here's a photo of the prelim stages.

256 qualify for gold (and all but 128 will drop. Top 40 countries have 3 seeds into this round)

160 qualify for silver (all of them can drop. Top 9 countries have 2 seeds, rest have 1)

160 qualify for bronze (all of them can drop. All countries have 1 seed)

I think you've reached perfection now, as this seems fitting with the platinum cup. I would think some movement up in the prelims would work well, but it seems to be a very minor issue now that top 3 teams from nations can qualify. Also, I think it would be cool to change up how teams are qualified to the cups a slight amount- for example, winners of the FA cup/league cup would get a birth for a certain tier of the world championships, not just based on league performance. However, minor gripes- excellent work. I think you might have reached the end.

[graaa]

I think you've reached perfection now, as this seems fitting with the platinum cup. I would think some movement up in the prelims would work well, but it seems to be a very minor issue now that top 3 teams from nations can qualify. Also, I think it would be cool to change up how teams are qualified to the cups a slight amount- for example, winners of the FA cup/league cup would get a birth for a certain tier of the world championships, not just based on league performance. However, minor gripes- excellent work. I think you might have reached the end.

I like it too - but we have to wait for the votes to come in. I can play with either one and be happy - they are equally loved . I agree, moving up was cool but I seeded way more teams in the gold round than in the silver and bronze to still give more people a chance. All 151 countries that I included will have a gold seed somewhere, whether it's into prelim 1, prelim 2, or the group stage. And yeah, top 3 isn't a bad number for a WORLD GOLD TROPHY. If 4 was enough for the UEFA european trophy, 3 should be plenty for an immensely more prestigious cup (especially if you are getting 2 into Silver and 1 into bronze).

As for the changing where teams get qualified from - I agree but it'll be way too hard to do lol. It would be easier if I didn't run into an issue using the "Get Best Teams from Division" command when applying it to the MLS.

[Heath Matthias]

A small issue I found in the amateur league. If a team doesn't have a location (found this on very few teams but there are some), released players from those teams will sign anywhere in the US. My guess is the game doesn't know how far they are from the signing team so just allows it. Not sure if the AI exploits this but the human player can. When locations are specified for a team only players close by the team they were released from will sign, which is how I think you wanted it to work (and makes the most sense).

[graaa]

A small issue I found in the amateur league. If a team doesn't have a location (found this on very few teams but there are some), released players from those teams will sign anywhere in the US. My guess is the game doesn't know how far they are from the signing team so just allows it. Not sure if the AI exploits this but the human player can. When locations are specified for a team only players close by the team they were released from will sign, which is how I think you wanted it to work (and makes the most sense).

That's a good find - which teams don't have a location? I put work into giving each team a city, stadium, stadium city, and stadium coordinates. I hope I didn't miss any!

EDIT: And do you have a vote for the CWC? I take it from your previous posts you support the group stage model?

[Heath Matthias]

Hmm I know Clearwater SC is one. There seems to be a few more as well. Not that many really so it isn't that big of an issue.

And yeah I really like the group stage cup. Actually trying the other one right now. One thing I DO like is how better teams can move up. For example Arsenal was dominating in Bronze cup, so has moved all the way up to Gold which seems fair to them and weaker competition in Bronze. Just don't like how a Gold team can qualify for silver and bronze. Would rather it all sort out so a weaker team can win Bronze, even if they start out in Gold. Just seems a better way for weaker teams to win things (like the Euro cup in real life)

[graaa]

Hmm I know Clearwater SC is one. There seems to be a few more as well. Not that many really so it isn't that big of an issue.

And yeah I really like the group stage cup. Actually trying the other one right now. One thing I DO like is how better teams can move up. For example Arsenal was dominating in Bronze cup, so has moved all the way up to Gold which seems fair to them and weaker competition in Bronze. Just don't like how a Gold team can qualify for silver and bronze. Would rather it all sort out so a weaker team can win Bronze, even if they start out in Gold. Just seems a better way for weaker teams to win things (like the Euro cup in real life)

Can I ask you what piece of information is missing from Clearwater? (is it the city? Stadium?) I tried looking at it in my editor but I didn't see what you meant by the location being missing.

And about the group stage cup, you'll definitely see more variety with the winners. I'll try to see if I can figure in one shot at moving up.

[graaa]

I managed to plot out a very elegant preliminary system that allows for teams to move up and down before being locked in for the group stage. It's elegant because It only requires 1 preliminary round for each cup. There's also still room for the top 3 teams in the best leagues to qualify for gold

To be completely honest, I've been sneaking around a little bit and editing this into the file just to test it. After running it several years in the editor, I've became quite fond of the diversity of teams that are winning in the cups each year. I've seen your usual teams of course like Bayern and Barcalona, but more often than not I get a team from Belgium, Argentina, Turkey, and Portugal, and I've even seen teams from Japan, Israel, Ukraine, and Columbia get runner up in the Silver and Bronze. I've also added in a 3rd place playoff so you'll really be seeing a lot of flags fly during the ceremonies for each competition.

I added in a platinum cup too - and that brings me to one of my problems (maybe, maybe not). This style of cup really crowds fixture schedule (though I wouldn't go so far as to say congests). For the most part, a team that goes all the way to the final in the CWC and their national cup MAY see a single week of the dreaded triple game (usually a Sat-Mon-Wed pairing). This happens mostly in France where the dumb french cup has something like 12 rounds and crowds the fixtures anyway, and it may happen in the English league depending on certain factors (but not all the time). It should never happen in the American league (because I programmed it obviously! ).

The Platinum Cup can only fit at the very end of the season - it is a 2 game super cup (1st match = Silver Vs. Bronze winner, 2nd = Gold winner vs. last round winner) on the final Wednesday and Saturday of May. That Saturday is usually reserved for the English, German, and French FA cup final but the kind programmers at SI have smartly allowed that match to move forward a couple weeks so that's not the issue. The issue is, on those rare occasions that you take your team all the way to your FA Cup and the CWC, and have to play both Platinum cup matches, there might be a single domestic league game left to be played. I've only seen this on the rarest of rare occasions, but a single domestic league game may be played in the first Wednesday of June. Shocking, I know. But I don't think this is a major issue and it's rare, so I'm going to keep the super cup in there unless there's other issues I didn't see.

I also think I'm going to make this CWC the new standard format. I know people loved the second format with it's woven structure, and no one loved it more than I, but the diversity of winners and the familiarity of a season-long cup makes this superior I think. I do still have the woven format saved, and I'll be more than happy to send the 1.4 version with this format to anyone who asks.

Thanks for reading another one of my long posts - enjoy this picture of my new elegant preliminary round structure.

[fsquid]

I've tried loading up version 1.3 and I can only select league MLS.

[fsquid]

nevermind, I must had screwed something up.

[dim13]

graaa,

Really like the new CWC format (post #491).

Looking forward to this.

[podunkboy]

I like the new format (although it's highly unlikely that I'll have to worry about end-of-season fixture congestion for several decades).

[graaa]

graaa,

Really like the new CWC format (post #491).

Looking forward to this.

Muchas Gracis

I like the new format (although it's highly unlikely that I'll have to worry about end-of-season fixture congestion for several decades).

Lol... when Wichita makes it to the CWC Gold Final make sure you take a screenshot. And at the moment I'm working on alleviating the congestion - shaving out a few teams and reducing the group stage a bit should do it. Won't touch the usual seedings that everyone is used to... the oceania teams will have to take a hit.

[arkitekt]

ill wait till 1.4 come out to take Alaska to the top!

[graaa]

ill wait till 1.4 come out to take Alaska to the top!

You would make President Palin so proud...

[graaa]

Along with that ELEGANT preliminary stage I figured out (it's so dang simple I don't know how I didn't see it earlier...) I've come close to putting the finishing touches on the CWC 3.0 as I'm calling it. Close enough that I can discuss the actual details of it in depth here. Get ready for another long entry!

384 teams from 153 countries all around qualify for the new CWC based on their league position from last year (the USA is the only exception, but I'll go more into that later). The number of seedings a country gets is based mainly on the reputation of their top division, the reputation of their nation, the highest reputation of the clubs inside the top division, and the 'Game Importance" setting used as a tie-breaker on occasion. It is not based on the number of seedings they had in their previous continental cup however in some crazy fashion I end up being within 1 greater or less than what they previously had for most of the countries.

The USA is seeded in the same manner as in 1.3 so skip ahead if you know already how. The winner and runner up of the Prime Cup qualify for gold. The 2 runner-ups of the east/west conference championships play a 1-match game to fill the last gold seed. The loser qualifies for silver. The 4 east/west semi-final runner ups play a 1-match game to decide the final 2 seedings (both bronze in this version).

Now for the structure itself -

Preliminary Rounds

The tournament begins with special preliminary rounds that give teams the opportunity to move up or down a tier (or 2!) based on their performance in this stage. This is to not only give every team in the world a chance to qualify and potentially win the Gold Trophy (even that one North Korea team!), but more importantly it concentrates the better teams at the top and the lesser ones at the bottom in a way that simple domestic league qualification fails to do.

192 teams start in the Bronze Trophy. x3 wins in a row will qualify you for the Gold Trophy, X2 wins in a row will qualify you for silver. X1 win and x1 loss qualifies you for Bronze. Be careful not to lose your first game or you will eliminated!

96 teams start in the Silver Trophy. x2 wins qualify you for the Gold Trophy, x1 win and x1 loss for silver, and a loss on your first game for Bronze. Teams that begin here cannot be eliminated before the group stage but only drop down a tier.

96 more start in the Gold Trophy. x1 win qualifies you for Gold and a loss for Silver. Teams that begin here cannot be eliminated before the group stage but only drop down a tier.

Group Stage and Cup Stage qualification

All 3 tiers have the same structure. 96 teams in each group stage will be split into 16 groups of 6 and play 10 games total against each other at their home venues.

Now here's where it gets interesting. The top teams qualifies for the first cup round automatically. The next 2 must play in a Decider match to qualify. The decider match is a single fixture pitting the 2nd place team against a random 3rd place team from the groups stages. This single game will take place in the host country for the enjoyment of that country's citizens, and neutral venues around the host country are picked to host all 16 decider fixtures among the 32 teams. HOWEVER - if the 2nd place team in the group has 6 points or higher more than the 3rd place team at the end of the group stage, the 2nd place team automatically qualifies for the knockout stage and neither team play in the decider match.

Cup Stage

32 teams play in a knockout cup stage until there are 2 teams remaining. Each round consists of home and away legs just like the preliminary and group stages.

Final and Third Place Playoff

The final and TPP are played at the host nation's national stadium. What more is there to say? Oh right, the winner will qualify for the Platinum Cup which will take place the week after all cups are complete.

Platinum Cup

This is a Super Cup between the 3 winners of the 3 tiers. The Bronze and Silver winners play each other first on Wednesday, then the winner of that match plays vs. the Gold Trophy winner on Saturday. Like with all super cups, it is not held in as high regard as the top tier tournament, the Gold Trophy.

[rcolesworthy]

When would this be released? Could you do it now, or when the update comes?