Open letter to SI: The Realism or Without Arrows

[Mitja]

also, are you trying to say that using arrowed formations which are used by only one manager in the game - human, isn't cheating?...that formula 1 game example?

how can AI cope with such 'crazy arrowed' formations? not your problem? but why you want to cheat than?

ME (AI) sucks becouse it can't use arrows as we can? what kinf of football sim would than this game turn into?

are arrows realistic tactical tool?

[Cougar2010]

We read about this on a previous page.

My position without ball is DC

My position with ball is WBR

http://community.sigames.com/showpost.php?p=1800363&postcount=90

You only play one position on the pitch.

Above you are DC who drifts right & forward when you have possession, nothing more.

[Majkee]

This is where I think you are misunderstanding.

Arrows have never instructed a player where to run, they simply tell the player to play a different position, mainly when you have the ball.

From your example above as I understand it:

A) Team gets ball and match engine then treats LB as a FL.

B) Player is out of position and therefore using his physical stats attempts to regain position (FL) as quickly as possible.

C) If he receives the ball along the way its a fluke which confuses the match engine as it doesn't expect the player to be in that position (Maybe ML) and it tries to follow the instructions as best it can.

D) Player is in the FL position when team loses ball, match engine suddenly treats player as a LB again and he attempts to regain position using physical stats. Again this can lead to confusion over who the player should be closing down tackling etc.

Can someone confirms that? Because I have not been using long farrows ever, so I do not know about that anomaly. Only few and short b/sarrows have been used by me and it was not so obvious, what have you been claiming.

[Mitja]

I think that there are no cheaters in this thread - why to mention cheaters? We are discussing tactical awareness not cheating. It is about discussion what is/was or will be able to do in tactics in ME compared to real world football and real tactics. I am not fully convinced about removing arrows especially wide ones (sarrows) because there were not enogh relevant arguments against removing sarrows. If we are talking to play with width, I want to control width movement of my players too. Not only their fwd or bkd runs.

I will judge when I play demo, if it was good idea to remove all kind of arrows.

for me using any arrowed formation which isn't used by AI was cheating. i'm asking all you here, how many of you were playing with defoult formations only (442 without/with arrows to AW or WF.... )? from fm09 there won't be any 'arrowed cheaters' anymore.

as for width and moving to the flank, we should have simple instruction tickbox 'move to left flank more often'. all these instruction or PPM's shouldn be seen as absoulte instruction but more like tendency - 'more often'. arrows were absoulute instruction, player couldn't make a decison to come deep, move centraly, into the box... he just followed that positional instruction. now his movement will be much more flexible, he'll move freely under your instructions and his style read again what wwfan wrote about their beheviour and movement...

isn't arrowless ME giving more freedom to your players really?? and less to you...just the way it should be, hehe...

[MerlinGM]

are arrows realistic tactical tool?

Yes, arrows - realistic tactical tool. You never saw the coach on TV, drawing arrows on the board?

[shevelevee]

also, are you trying to say that using arrowed formations which are used by only one manager in the game - human, isn't cheating?...that formula 1 game example?

how can AI cope with such 'crazy arrowed' formations? not your problem? but why you want to cheat than?

ME (AI) sucks becouse it can't use arrows as we can? what kinf of football sim would than this game turn into?

are arrows realistic tactical tool?

Read first post once again. If Si can't add in ME more factors, wich will limited arrows' influence on result - this is not problem of arrows. If ME decide that DL can run to FR and back during 90 minutes without any losing in condition or in morale, or when ME decide that DL can come back from FR to DL position faster than ball - it's ME problem, not arrows

I agree that 100% cheater tactics are with arrows, but (!!!!) (i will say this in third time) - if Si will tune ME and take into account all our posts - it will be better than take into account your stupid aggression.

One from "anti-arrows" named us "dimwits", another named us "cheaters", third say: "people that haven't even used the new engine"

And this is clear list of your arguments?)) Sorry, i don't wanna talk with man, who is full of aggression)))

[shevelevee]

also, Mitja, please, read all topic, not only your magnificiant posts.

You can see that we know about cheaters arrows, but we are talking about improving methods

http://community.sigames.com/showpost.php?p=1800985&postcount=135

[bigdunk]

Yes, arrows - realistic tactical tool. You never saw the coach on TV, drawing arrows on the board?

Drawing arrows is not unrealistic. What the arrows do, as they currently are used in FM2008, is unrealistic.

[RockyBalboa]

That's an illogical instruction for starters. You want a player to go from MC to MR/AMR where you already have a player. It's either PPM hugs touchline (should have a drifts wide PPM in FM09 which suits better) or it's swap position with AMR/MR

How do you know he's playing with a MR or AMR?

He might be playing 5-3-2 with 3 MC's. And he wants Gerrard to exploit the space on the right wing while attacking. It's not illogical at all.

[Mitja]

Yes, arrows - realistic tactical tool. You never saw the coach on TV, drawing arrows on the board?

than you can surelly put more than just one arrow on him? like, I want you to move sometimes here and sometimes there, when the ball is there I want you even here... all I want to say is arrows only restricted player's movement freedom. they were saying I want you only here and no-where else. I know I wouldn't limit my players' like that....

[Neb]

I've had an idea about tactics and so as not to clutter this thread I've started another thread

-> http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php?t=51020

Its assigning some PPMs to the tactics instead of the person. As the player learns the tactic he learns the PPM eventually adopting the PPM as his own. obviously the more adaptable or young the player is the quicker he learns.

To me it would clear up peoples issues with removing the arrows and I personally think it would add another dimension to the game.

basically, in your tactic you have 'hugs line' assigned to the wide players, the winger starts to hug the line the more and more he trains and uses the formation. eventually he has 'hugs the line' on his positions screen.

'runs down the left wing' on a AM position equals an arrow to the winger position

'hugs the line' on a AMLC means he goes wide

'plays with his back at goal' on a striker means he should be the target man

etc

etc

etc.

It would allow a manager to put his influence on a tactic which in turn could influence a player. make the player 'enjoys the way the team plays' or 'annoyed the manager insists in playing him out of position' etc.

I feel it'd be quite rewarding seeing a young player you sold continue to play the way you taught him to play in his youth...

[shevelevee]

Drawing arrows is not unrealistic. What the arrows do, as they currently are used in FM2008, is unrealistic.

That's why SI can't remove arrows from FM09. They must tune ME better and absolutely deny using arrows as cheating methods, but they must keep arrows in game.

[Mitja]

also, Mitja, please, read all topic, not only your magnificiant posts.

You can see that we know about cheaters arrows, but we are talking about improving methods

http://community.sigames.com/showpost.php?p=1800985&postcount=135

I had many hot discussions on this board but I never insulted people like you or one of your mates have, wwfan.

I read the whole thread.

[RockyBalboa]

This being the 164th post........

Maybe SI can post a reply and clear things up a bit. And can maybe comfort us with how the solved things in FM09, or will solve thing I should say.

[Super Bladesman]

That's why SI can't remove arrows from FM09. They must tune ME better and absolutely deny using arrows as cheating methods, but they must keep arrows in game.

You're going up a blind alley there - they HAVE removed arrows, and they won't be coming back. They've chosen to take a different, and more realistic, approach to the ME. What we need to see is what has been added in their place, and if nothing has, how we work with that. Almost all the scenarios raised so far, that are realistic in a football sense, can be worked around in FML certainly.

And once we get to actually see the ME in action, I'm sure we'll quickly come up with new tactics and workarounds to get realistic results.

[shevelevee]

I had many hot discussions on this board but I never insulted people like you or one of your mates have, wwfan.

I read the whole thread.

I doubt. If you've read all topic, you'll see all ideas about keeping arrows in Fm, but reject their negative effect on ME.

[Mitja]

Read first post once again. If Si can't add in ME more factors, wich will limited arrows' influence on result - this is not problem of arrows. If ME decide that DL can run to FR and back during 90 minutes without any losing in condition or in morale, or when ME decide that DL can come back from FR to DL position faster than ball - it's ME problem, not arrows

I agree that 100% cheater tactics are with arrows, but (!!!!) (i will say this in third time) - if Si will tune ME and take into account all our posts - it will be better than take into account your stupid aggression.

One from "anti-arrows" named us "dimwits", another named us "cheaters", third say: "people that haven't even used the new engine"

And this is clear list of your arguments?)) Sorry, i don't wanna talk with man, who is full of aggression)))

lol it was cheaters <- that's the difference

yeah I know, I can be agressive but so was your opening post, without even demo being out.

I agree with some of your ideas but mostly I see moaning about arrows being removed. that's not constructive. arrows weren't ment to be what they have bacome and that's why they were removed.

[shevelevee]

OMG, if you believe, that without arows ME will be more realictic - you're wrong. I said why many times in this thread.

[Majkee]

You only play one position on the pitch.

Above you are DC who drifts right & forward when you have possession, nothing more.

Agreed. One position and personal tactical instructions.

[SmurfDude]

OMG, if you believe, that without arows ME will be more realictic - you're wrong. I said why many times in this thread.

What on earth are you babbling on about? You haven't even played FM09 and yet you talk as if you have thoroughly reviewed it. Get a grip

[Cougar2010]

@ shevelevee

Are you actually reading all the posts??

The arrows that a manager would use on a chalkboard IRL DO NOT have the same effect on the players as those in FM do.

They tell the match engine in FM something different to what a manager in RL is telling his players.

I thought I actually read somewhere that once you have set your instructions arrows appear on the position screen to represent your instructions but I could be wrong.

[shevelevee]

so was your opening post, without even demo being out.

And what we can see in demo? there will be no arrows. There will be nothing new in tactic screen. That's enough for me.

[shevelevee]

maybe it's a problem with my poor English, but you don't understand me.

Small example, may be it will help.

Corners in 8.02 was a great cheat. What we must to do with them?

a)Tune corners, because we know, where are all problems

b) delete corners, because corners in 8.02 is not like corners IRL.

What's your choise?

[Mitja]

And what we can see in demo? there will be no arrows. There will be nothing new in tactic screen. That's enough for me.

I'm really sorry for you. but give it a try. there's nothing to loose.

[MerlinGM]

And once we get to actually see the ME in action, I'm sure we'll quickly come up with new tactics and workarounds to get realistic results.

"Realistic results" it is not equal "realistic ME". Realistic results it is possible to achieve even a way random definition of result to a match.

The basic direction of development FM - achievements is realistic realistic methods. And removing of arrows is not entered in this direction in any way.

[jayahr]

Yes, because I'm known for my lack of tactical thought. Famous for it in fact.

Tactical control has improved. Fundamentally so. The ME plays better. Far, far better. It is absolutely possible to have a dynamic 4-3-3 to 4-5-1 switch within the same tactic.

The arrows were removed because they hurt the ME. Nothing to do with simplifying or dumbing down the game. Simply to make it come more in line with how football is played and looks in the real world.

If you believe for one moment the arrowless ME should factor in to your decision about not buying the game, then you are taking the worries of people who haven't played with the arrowless ME over the massively positive feedback of the majority of users who have played with it for the last 9 months. Hmm, who would I listen to?

Don't get me wrong. I didn't mean to criticize you by any means. I know you as a very constructive and knowledgable poster on here and indeed your answer has actually helped to reassure me a bit.

My issue was that you are the one who has to do that job in here, because there is uncertainty about the tactical options in the game. It has become known that one thing has been taken out and obviously this causes uncertainty about whether and how SI are planning to make up for that? Will we have less options? How else will we be able to create a comparable tactic?

As this issue is so sensible I would expect SI to post a statement about this a bit earlier than at the release of the demo to deal with the many users who have not seen the new engine yet.

Not knowing anything about it, I was/am just afraid that SI might now start to take "features" out of the game just like EA did with so many of its games.

The way it is in FM08 is perfectly fine for me and not using some downloaded super tactic (I'm not even aware whether there is one) but making moderate use of arrows, such change makes me wonder if I get stripped-down in my option because of other people's exploits of flaws in the match engine.

I just want this change to be understandable to me and SI are the guys who should be able to get the message across best and not leave it to eloquent forum regulars (and usually I'm really not one of those 'official statement please' in caps whiners).

[Mitja]

maybe it's a problem with my poor English, but you don't understand me.

Small example, may be it will help.

Corners in 8.02 was a great cheat. What we must to do with them?

a)Tune corners, because we know, where are all problems

b) delete corners, because corners in 8.02 is not like corners IRL.

What's your choise?

yeah, a defently. removing the arrows I see as tuning, not deleting.

[Cougar2010]

Thats a totally different example shevelevee and doesn't help.

For the record you do A, tune them.

[MerlinGM]

than you can surelly put more than just one arrow on him? like, I want you to move sometimes here and sometimes there, when the ball is there I want you even here... all I want to say is arrows only restricted player's movement freedom. they were saying I want you only here and no-where else. I know I wouldn't limit my players' like that....

Yes, arrows demand processing or replacement with adequate decisions. But removing of arrows is not processing and it not the adequate decision of a problem.

[Mitja]

Don't get me wrong. I didn't mean to criticize you by any means. I know you as a very constructive and knowledgable poster on here and indeed your answer has actually helped to reassure me a bit.

My issue was that you are the one who has to do that job in here, because there is uncertainty about the tactical options in the game. It has become known that one thing has been taken out and obviously this causes uncertainty about whether and how SI are planning to make up for that? Will we have less options? How else will we be able to create a comparable tactic?

As this issue is so sensible I would expect SI to post a statement about this a bit earlier than at the release of the demo to deal with the many users who have not seen the new engine yet.

Not knowing anything about it, I was/am just afraid that SI might now start to take "features" out of the game just like EA did with so many of its games.

The way it is in FM08 is perfectly fine for me and not using some downloaded super tactic (I'm not even aware whether there is one) but making moderate use of arrows, such change makes me wonder if I get stripped-down in my option because of other people's exploits of flaws in the match engine.

I just want this change to be understandable to me and SI are the guys who should be able to get the message across best and not leave it to eloquent forum regulars (and usually I'm really not one of those 'official statement please' in caps whiners).

read that wwfan's long post again. you won't get better answer. i find particulary interesting him describing player's movement and behaviour. by removing the arrows players will have more freedom of movement, not less.

[shevelevee]

ok, i've checked my poll

a)Tune corner instructions, because we know, where are all problems

b) delete corner instructions, because corners in 8.02 is not like corners IRL. Now player and ME will decide what to do, not you. You can only set "on the far post" "on the near post" "short option"

What's your choice?

[SCIAG]

Would somebody please explain what the replacement for arrows is? The one that allow us to play football like it "plays and looks in real life"?

[Mitja]

ok, i've checked my poll

a)Tune corner instructions, because we know, where are all problems

b) delete corner instructions, because corners in 8.02 is not like corners IRL. Now player and ME will decide what to do, not you. You can only set "on the far post" "on the near post" "short option"

What's your choice?

this will be my last post now

by removing arrows players movement and the whole ME will be better. i believe it not becouse wwfan or paulc said it but becouse i didn't hear not one single bad thought about it from various people who played FML. not just 5 or 10 of them. i'm hard to convience and i don't take things for granted but i'm sure for this...

i partly agree with you and you have some valid points but also i think they made the best decision at currrent time. still you'll be able to replace arrows with FRuns, FrRoles, CF... but you won't be able to make your full back a striker, with just one right click. and that's fine for me.

[Cougar2010]

Would somebody please explain what the replacement for arrows is? The one that allow us to play football like it "plays and looks in real life"?

The individual player instructions alongside team instructions.

Obviously the current ones (FM08) would need some minor additions or changes but these I expect.

[Majkee]

maybe it's a problem with my poor English, but you don't understand me.

Small example, may be it will help.

Corners in 8.02 was a great cheat. What we must to do with them?

a)Tune corners, because we know, where are all problems

b) delete corners, because corners in 8.02 is not like corners IRL.

What's your choise?

I understand you and you have your right.

From my point of view, it will be better to restrict arrows from beeing cheat, set up properly condition etc., but I also admit that if they decided to take it away from FM09, ok I will adapt, but tune up tactical settings (now or in patch) close to reality.

That is relevant to corners too. Avoid cheating possbilities, tune up tactical settings, add further more (width movement, PPMs etc.) and we will see, it will be acceptable.

[SCIAG]

The individual player instructions alongside team instructions.

Obviously the current ones (FM08) would need some minor additions or changes but these I expect.

Yeah, I was kind of hoping someone who had played Live's BETA might be able to shread some light on what the minor additions would be.

[Raniel3]

First of all, I was sceptical about arrows being removed, but I've been convinced by the posts of several guys here.

At the start I feared "Oh no arrows! How am I going to get my Fiorentina working?? Mutu can no longer play as he plays in reality (which is linger on the wing, and then cut inside with the ball and shoot, or run into free space to get a ball played into his run, but never cross (as he's right foot) )" You can compare it to C. Ronaldo, who plays also with high creative freedom and cuts inside or shoots or runs into space when he wants, but he is not a real "winger" even if he "starts" on the wings like Mutu.

Well, until now I made Mutu being a AML with the diagonal arrow to the striker position. But in fact, it did'nt work at all. As soon as I was having the ball, he walked into the striker position and did not get a single ball as there was too much distance between him and the midfield.

So I think the removal of arrows is a good thing IF the players are now intelligent enough to use their strengths (which is a right-footed player on the left wing, who is fast and can shoot, and has crosses set to "rarely", to cut inside and shoot, pass or run).

However I fear that the players are not intelligent enough to do that, and so there will be some things that can't be done in tactical sense because the other tactical options interfere with each other in some way (because there are not enough in numbers and / or they are not precise enough).

Because of that I hope that the "Drift Left ------ Hold Position ------- Drift Right" slider can be introduced, without having the same problems as the arrows.

Another thing that is important for me is the REMOVAL OF PPMs:

We must be able to tell players to NOT do some PPMs anymore. Eg. if I play a player in three different positions over several years, and made him so to have the PPMs (run to the left wing, run to the right wing, run to the centre, and cut inside) that would definetely be a huge problem, because so in fact he will do what he wants whereever I play him. And also I want to tell a player "Damn DON'T TAKE LONG SHOTS NO MORE, you can't hit an open barn door !!!" (a player who has obviously a PPM for long shots).

So I think this must be implemented in the same way as the "Train PPMs" thing

[Negatrev]

I don't know how many of the people complaining about losing the arrows have actually played without them (In FML Beta).

I found throughout my playing with different tactics that it is much more versatile know than it has been in the past.

My big credits are the narrow 4-2-2-2 and 'The Bomb' in GW8.

A previous poster mentioned they wanted a ML to play AMC in attack. My 4-2-2-2 was basically exactly that.

The 2 AMC's would attack from behind the strikers but had the correct settings (in width, mentality and closing down) so that if a FB attacked, mostly they would move wide to cover them. The only time this didn't happen was if they were caught too far from the FB after losing possesion (which happens just as much with arrows). But instead of having an MC move wide to cover the FB and then the AMC arriving wide later on (being useless since the FB is marked now) with the way tactics work now, he instead just slots in to cover the opposing MC that my MC left open.

Football is now a game about running the same set play over and over. American football DOES suit arrows as it is all about one move (albeit changed every play). Football is much more organic and you need to learn how to set up your general style of play instead.

Once you actually experiment with the new system you'll find you can do pretty much anything you want to. You just need to understand how it now works.

*Puts on fire retardent outfit ready for the flaming*

[Neb]

Another thing that is important for me is the REMOVAL OF PPMs:

We must be able to tell players to NOT do some PPMs anymore. Eg. if I play a player in three different positions over several years, and made him so to have the PPMs (run to the left wing, run to the right wing, run to the centre, and cut inside) that would definetely be a huge problem, because so in fact he will do what he wants whereever I play him. And also I want to tell a player "Damn DON'T TAKE LONG SHOTS NO MORE, you can't hit an open barn door !!!" (a player who has obviously a PPM for long shots).

So I think this must be implemented in the same way as the "Train PPMs" thing

If SI do the PPMs thing through tactics and not training, you could set your individual instructions (which also should train the PPM in the first place!) and the control of all the other PPMs would be down to creative freedom.

Make the freedom slider for everything else not specified. So 'run to the right wing' would be on the individual instruction, creative freedom set to 0 he player would still run to the right wing but wouldn't shoot as often, or attempt to play killer balls etc...

[Ediocy]

I have been a long time CM/FM gamer (since CM 2), first time poster however. And what a thread to make my first post in hehe.

After dredging through all the posts by both proponents and opponents for the removal of the Arrows, I think I can hazard an observation that there is a shared understanding that all along, the Arrows have been performing unintended roles within the match engine. They are not a representation of instructions to players on how to make their runs as we gamers commonly perceive them to be. Instead, Arrows caused the match engine to assign two positions to one single player concurrently, depending on possession of play.

Now since both camps have agreed on this, the next issue raised is instead, why remove Arrows completely from the game instead of reworking the match engine and make Arrows work as they should intuitively?

To me, this is not a simple matter of right or wrong. Having Arrows or not having Arrows matter little to the realism of the match engine, and that is what a vast majority of us FM fans crave. We want a close to accurate simulation of the real life phenomenon that is football.

If SI had wanted to leave the Arrows in and rework their match engine, alright. If however SI can achieve accurate simulation but wants to do it without Arrows, why insist on retaining those unnecessary lines on your screens? Just adapt and get used to not seeing arrows, because your ingame experience will not be any poorer without them.

Questions have been raised about how to convey specific positional instructions to your players (e.g. wanting central midfielder to drift right and bomb the right flank in attacks) and suitable answers have already been provided and some have suggested that there should/will be additional individual settings that we can configure to set up more complicated positional instructions. We should leave it at that I believe. Asking any more seems ridiculous at best to me, like for example, wanting your central defender to play as a forward whenever your side has the ball.

Consider this particular situation. So this central defender has to start at the back of your formation and the moment your side receives possession, he sprints forwards to attempt to support the attack. However upon reaching the forward line, your side loses the ball and

he immediately sprints towards your goal to attempt to foil the opposing attack. Is this person a central defender that doubles up as a forward, or more like a midfielder, supporting both defense and attack? If you want to set up such instructions for your central defender, the more realistic option could be to play him in midfield, give him a high defensive mentality and set forward runs to often, instead of wanting Arrows to be some sort of miracle instruction.

For the minority who are used to utilising Arrows as a means of overloading the opponent AI and now are hesitant on losing their edge against the computer, perhaps a game that attempts to emulate real life football management is not for you after all. In real life, football is certainly no arcade game where there are work-arounds in the system that you can exploit.

Thanks for reading, cheers!

[robzilla]

:confused:

So what can be said about the center defenders, who under similar conditions tire about as much as the ones on the flanges covering about twice as much distance in a match? What about the difference in condition between the players who run forward and the ones who don't?

I'm juvenile.

[Super Bladesman]

I have been a long time CM/FM gamer (since CM 2), first time poster however. And what a thread to make my first post in hehe.

After dredging through all the posts by both proponents and opponents for the removal of the Arrows, I think I can hazard an observation that there is a shared understanding that all along, the Arrows have been performing unintended roles within the match engine. They are not a representation of instructions to players on how to make their runs as we gamers commonly perceive them to be. Instead, Arrows caused the match engine to assign two positions to one single player concurrently, depending on possession of play.

Now since both camps have agreed on this, the next issue raised is instead, why remove Arrows completely from the game instead of reworking the match engine and make Arrows work as they should intuitively?

To me, this is not a simple matter of right or wrong. Having Arrows or not having Arrows matter little to the realism of the match engine, and that is what a vast majority of us FM fans crave. We want a close to accurate simulation of the real life phenomenon that is football.

If SI had wanted to leave the Arrows in and rework their match engine, alright. If however SI can achieve accurate simulation but wants to do it without Arrows, why insist on retaining those unnecessary lines on your screens? Just adapt and get used to not seeing arrows, because your ingame experience will not be any poorer without them.

Questions have been raised about how to convey specific positional instructions to your players (e.g. wanting central midfielder to drift right and bomb the right flank in attacks) and suitable answers have already been provided and some have suggested that there should/will be additional individual settings that we can configure to set up more complicated positional instructions. We should leave it at that I believe. Asking any more seems ridiculous at best to me, like for example, wanting your central defender to play as a forward whenever your side has the ball.

Consider this particular situation. So this central defender has to start at the back of your formation and the moment your side receives possession, he sprints forwards to attempt to support the attack. However upon reaching the forward line, your side loses the ball and

he immediately sprints towards your goal to attempt to foil the opposing attack. Is this person a central defender that doubles up as a forward, or more like a midfielder, supporting both defense and attack? If you want to set up such instructions for your central defender, the more realistic option could be to play him in midfield, give him a high defensive mentality and set forward runs to often, instead of wanting Arrows to be some sort of miracle instruction.

For the minority who are used to utilising Arrows as a means of overloading the opponent AI and now are hesitant on losing their edge against the computer, perhaps a game that attempts to emulate real life football management is not for you after all. In real life, football is certainly no arcade game where there are work-arounds in the system that you can exploit.

Thanks for reading, cheers!

What a first post - welcome to the forum!

[Ediocy]

In matters unrelated to the actual subject matter, does anyone else find the original poster's tone in most of his posts in this thread to be somewhat disconcerting? Or is it just me?

I am not sure if I am allowed to be so frank in my criticism on these boards, but it does leave a slightly sour taste in my mouth.

P.S. Thanks for the welcome Super Bladesman!

[Jimbokav1971]

It must just be me, (and possibly the fact that English is not the original posters first language), but I haven't got a clue what he's on about:confused:.

Sounds like arrows are a thing of the past, (based on FM09 using the FML match engine), and I'm only reading betweeen the lines because I haven't seen FML yet, but is this really another thread having a pop at FM09 before it is even released:rolleyes:?

Please feel free to explan to me what I have missed If I have grabbed the wrong end of the stick.

[Ediocy]

It must just be me, (and possibly the fact that English is not the original posters first language), but I haven't got a clue what he's on about:confused:.

Sounds like arrows are a thing of the past, (based on FM09 using the FML match engine), and I'm only reading betweeen the lines because I haven't seen FML yet, but is this really another thread having a pop at FM09 before it is even released:rolleyes:?

Please feel free to explan to me what I have missed If I have grabbed the wrong end of the stick.

Hopefully I have not grabbed said end of the stick as well, but if I am not mistaken, the original poster has indeed acknowledged that Arrows in their current form create unrealistic ingame match plays, however he wishes for SI to work on improving the realism of the match engine without removing the Arrows. This is because without Arrows, he believes that there will be a loss in the complexity of tactics whereby one can encourage players to drift from their normal positions to other positions through the course of a match.

What some posters have suggested is that the lack of Arrows will not hinder such positional instructions, merely making the tactics more realistic by eliminating those outlandish and impractical instructions that have no place in the real world. Practical instructions have been preserved through the use of individual instruction sliders and will not be impaired by the removal of Arrows.

However it seems to me that the original poster is adamant about clinging onto his Arrows. At least that is what I perceive.

[Mitja]

In matters unrelated to the actual subject matter, does anyone else find the original poster's tone in most of his posts in this thread to be somewhat disconcerting? Or is it just me?

I am not sure if I am allowed to be so frank in my criticism on these boards, but it does leave a slightly sour taste in my mouth.

P.S. Thanks for the welcome Super Bladesman!

welcome a board. good post and i'm glad you're at the right camp. oh

[drunkpunk]

I'm looking forward to the removal of arrows and I've been using them (not in a stupid, overload the AI sense) since I started playing the game back in around about 96. It's really going to be odd to see a screen with arrows (apart from the new ones). I've tended to make use of diagonal (or curved in FM08) arrows for a couple of years now and I relish the challenge of them not being there in 09. In previous games before FM08 I was a bit of a lazy tactician and just used to sent up a pretty generic formation with the odd arrow and some tweaking of the sliders. In FM08 I decided I'd change my way of playing and really thought hard about the tactical systems I employed (perhaps no where near as much as some people do, but a lot more than I had done) and I found the game far more enjoyable. I actually played the game a lot more than I expected, usually I got bored after a couple of seasons and started a new game. Now I'm in 2016 and only just starting to get bored (due in part to the regens). The idea of having to think more about what I want my players to do appeals more than just throwing a load of arrows about.

[peter-evo]

Hopefully I have not grabbed said end of the stick as well, but if I am not mistaken, the original poster has indeed acknowledged that Arrows in their current form create unrealistic ingame match plays, however he wishes for SI to work on improving the realism of the match engine without removing the Arrows. This is because without Arrows, he believes that there will be a loss in the complexity of tactics whereby one can encourage players to drift from their normal positions to other positions through the course of a match.

What some posters have suggested is that the lack of Arrows will not hinder such positional instructions, merely making the tactics more realistic by eliminating those outlandish and impractical instructions that have no place in the real world. Practical instructions have been preserved through the use of individual instruction sliders and will not be impaired by the removal of Arrows.

However it seems to me that the original poster is adamant about clinging onto his Arrows. At least that is what I perceive.

Another good post and your english is to be admired.

Now, Im going to bring up what the original poster said earlier in this thread about the corner exploit and should SI delete corners because of the exploit. Not only is this argument not very well thought out, but you are missing a key difference in corners and the arrows.

Know yet?

Its that SI can watch videos of corners over and over again, watch how teams set up, what impact certain players positions influence others, they can implement this just by watching these videos

Now with the arrows; SI can not see or hear instructions that are given to players in the dressing room. Therefore, they cannot accurately recreate what influence these arrows have on players at this moment in time. If they can not reflect what the arrows are doing in an accurate and easy to understand manner, then they must be removed and the introduction of other, more understandable tactical options should be included. Now I have not seen the FM Live Match Engine, but the way it has been talked about by the regular posters on these forums shows to me that that engine is great.

If it is great, then there is no reason whatsoever that they don't use this engine or something very similar in Football Manager 2009!

[Ackter]

To clarify - an AML with an arrow to FC did NOT make the player cut in with the ball.

All this did was turn him into a striker when in possession.

[VMX]

Completely agree with Ediocy.

As I explained in my long post up there, arrows don't work as they should.

Firstly because they don't allow you to achieve what you would expect from them (i.e.: make your player run in a particular direction, NOT adopt a new role/position).

Secondly, because that 'unusual' behavior that can annoy you for being unable to accomplish what you want, can also be intentionally exploited by others to create 'special' tactics and to make their team 'overperform' unrealistically. As this is a simulation, we do want it to be as realistic as possible.

And third, because the way arrows work now, they're obviously interfeering with team instructions. As I said, what happens if you draw an arrow from the defense to the striker position, and at the same time set 'ultra-defensive' mentality to that player? When do team instructions apply? Only in his original position, in the 'arrowed' one, or in both of them? Or do defensive instructions work while he's in his 'more defensive' position and attacking ones only when he's in his 'more attacking' position? This is a complete mess that's probably impossible to evaluate even if you watch the full match, and we shouldn't be arguing between us about this I believe.

What we should do is just discuss the best possible solution.

- They arrows could be improved so that they work as they should (maybe being 'runs' rather than 'position changes').

- Or they could be "shortened" so that you can only specify small movements to the positions next to the original one, or even inside the same 'sector' of the original position. Individual instructions would do the rest.

- Or they could be completely replaced by individual instructions, which would require SI to add quite a bunch of them. And some of them would probably need to be specific for each position (you could tell your AMR to 'cut in' frequently, but not your DC). Only disadvantage about this would be that tactics would not look so pretty without arrows C'mon, admit it: we all feel like 'pro' coaches when we design our tactics drawing some arrows here and there while feeling the Benítez/Mourinho spirit

What do you think?