[FM20] Iron Curtain - In hindsight everything is 2020 (Released)

[Wolf_pd]

Ah ok, always got the idea that Kosovar players were kept outside the team a bit, as I can't recall any of them from the late 80s, while I could easily name a whole bunch of Slovene, Croat, Bosnian, Serbian or Macedonian players.

[Wolf_pd]

On 20/04/2020 at 20:42, Wolf_pd said:

Small error found during the test which allows for foreign nextgens to pop at Polish teams. Strangely they don't have second nationality Polish as I would have expected, so I need to fix that one.

Turns out there are rules for Polish second division in the edit as well which don't have rules for foreign players.

File removed.

[MBarbaric]

1 ora fa, Wolf_pd ha scritto:

Ah ok, always got the idea that Kosovar players were kept outside the team a bit, as I can't recall any of them from the late 80s, while I could easily name a whole bunch of Slovene, Croat, Bosnian, Serbian or Macedonian players.

there weren't a lot. Vilson Djoni (born in Split but his family was from Kosovo) and Fadil Vokri are only two I can remember.

[Wolf_pd]

Next up: the Bulgarian rules:

There is a bit of a theme going on in the East. :

• No foreginers allowed
• Players cannot be transferred out the country
• No Bosman

The file will be tested soon, but first I concentrate on other country rules, because we are going to have a few that are not completely restricted anymore.

[cel1234]

Players were allowed to leave when they got to the age of 28 but that would be impossible with editor.

[Wolf_pd]

23 minutes ago, cel1234 said:

Players were allowed to leave when they got to the age of 28 but that would be impossible with editor.

For which nation is this? Bulgaria? It is possible btw, with a small sidestep in the editor.

[cel1234]

Wouldn't have a clue about age thing in editor. But most Eastern European countries during the 70s and 80s. Certainly Yugoslavia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Golac

Edited April 21, 2020 by cel1234

[Wolf_pd]

Yeah, Yugoslavia is on my list with that. Poland had age 26 and Romania had no age.

[Wolf_pd]

Just finished building the Spanish rules. In the 1980s only 2 foreign players were allowed in Spain. You would see more than that on teamsheets, but that's because the other (usual South American) players would have (fake...sometimes) Spanish ancestry, with means they were Oriundo and these were allowed despite their foreign passport. Those players were even allowed to play in Spain in a period when Spain didn't allow any foreign players! Nowadays, the South American, Spanish Central American and Portuguese players from the so called Iberosphere can gain the Spanish nationality after two years. I am not sure whether I can change that rule (it is hardcoded maybe?), so the Spanish teams have a slight advantage contracting foreign players, even though the rules only allow for two. Some teams (Real Madrid, Barcelona....) will have to make choices though! 

• No Bosman
• 2 foreign players
• Players are free to move (ok, except for Bosman of course)

 This one took a little longer than hoped, because I was rummaging around getting the East European rules right in the file. That should go faster tomorrow. Hopefully I can finish at least three tomorrow.

[Wolf_pd]

Just finished Albania.

Albania will be added as a complete new competition. My file is based on the file by @Weiry posted in this thread. 

My changes are:

• Different transfer preferences set so no foreign players are transferred into Albania
• Gain nationality and dual nationality changed
• Points for a win set to 2
• Remove Bosman
• Remove Super Cup (only started in 1989)
• Change amount of substitutes
• Set foreign player number to 0
• Also set players not allowed to leave country

File will be tested later and then uploaded.

[Wolf_pd]

Next one done is Italy.

Just like Spain, Italy has a history of not wanting foreign players, except for those with Italian roots and obviously suddenly EVERYONE has Italian roots. For a time no foreign players were allowed, untill that stance was softened in the 80s.

• Foreign player set to 2
• No Bosman

This file is ready for test, but there is one change I need to make still. Problem is that something is nagging there is still a change to make, but I don't know which one it is. Bit annoying, but I will probably remember it later on when I am working on the next file.

And then I remembered, I needed to check if Italy sees San Marino as foreign or not. So that has been set.

[Wolf_pd]

Next one done, after I took a nap this afternoon

Sweden is an easy one. The big difference with most other leagues is that the premier, first and second divsion all use the same rule for foreigners, 3 in this case.

[Wolf_pd]

Next one done: England. The rules that will break English reign

Obviously a lot of English teams will scramble to get a team without all their foreign players. At the same time they will rob Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland of all their talent, because the English competition considers all Brits and the Irish as non-foreign. I am very curious to see what this does for the balance in the game!

• 3 foreign players allowed
• Scotland, Wales, N. Ireland, Scotland, Ireland, Gibraltar and several Caribean islands (and Tonga for some reason) are considered non-foreign

[Reiver]

What will you do about wales? Their league was only founded in 1992, they only had the welsh cup before, kinda like liechstenstein

[Wolf_pd]

For now the Welsh Premier League stays in, but looking into removing it.

[Wolf_pd]

3 hours ago, Reiver said:

What will you do about wales? Their league was only founded in 1992, they only had the welsh cup before, kinda like liechstenstein

 

2 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

For now the Welsh Premier League stays in, but looking into removing it.

To add to this, the way I am setting up the foreigner files, it should be a reasonable quick edit in the Wales file. I would only need to adjust the European Cups afterwards.

[Wolf_pd]

On 21/04/2020 at 22:39, Wolf_pd said:

Just finished building the Spanish rules. In the 1980s only 2 foreign players were allowed in Spain. You would see more than that on teamsheets, but that's because the other (usual South American) players would have (fake...sometimes) Spanish ancestry, with means they were Oriundo and these were allowed despite their foreign passport. Those players were even allowed to play in Spain in a period when Spain didn't allow any foreign players! Nowadays, the South American, Spanish Central American and Portuguese players from the so called Iberosphere can gain the Spanish nationality after two years. I am not sure whether I can change that rule (it is hardcoded maybe?), so the Spanish teams have a slight advantage contracting foreign players, even though the rules only allow for two. Some teams (Real Madrid, Barcelona....) will have to make choices though! 

• No Bosman
• 2 foreign players
• Players are free to move (ok, except for Bosman of course)

 This one took a little longer than hoped, because I was rummaging around getting the East European rules right in the file. That should go faster tomorrow. Hopefully I can finish at least three tomorrow.

Spanish file tested. I found a small error in the European Cups, which is probably a thing because of the basic rules there. Since I am plan to upgrade those this weekend anyway, a quick check this weekend will be enough to see it works.

Also, it seems the second nationality (still?) contains a bug where the most logical second nations aren't created. I was expecting more South American players with a second Spanish nationality than I got. Will check the bug section for that one later, or.... maybe that is because I am working with the 20.1 version of the game (which would mean upgrading a bucket load of files with all kind of possible errors ) . Anyway, something to check.

File removed.

[Wolf_pd]

In the meantime, I have finished Wales. It is a bit of a conundrum and then I am not even mentioning the language. As @Reiver mentioned, Wales did not have a league back in 1988. I have created the files in league form though. The way they are right now, I can remove the league quite easily, but I would have to check what was there before. I would be surprised if there wasn't a sort of local league before that. Anyway, for now, the league stays and if time and mood  permits it will go out.

Wales gets the same rules as England, with 3 points for a win, 3 foreigners and the UK and Ireland region, as well as some (former) British colonies not counting as foreign. It shouldn't impact Wales too hard, it could actually help, except that England comes out robbing all good players, but they are used to that there.....

[Wolf_pd]

Finland has been done (I almost made a mistake here...). 3 foreigners allowed at the two highest levels and surprisingly a lot of transfer activity between Finland and the Soviet Union. I always thought that that would be different.

In the meantime, Bulgaria has been tested. For some reason sometimes a strange nationality pops up and I can't find the reason why that is. There is no link to Bulgaria, no second nationality of Bulgaria, just a player that decides to go to college and convert to communism (??) I will let it rest for now, untill I find a reason for it. Maybe it is part of those second nationalities not being entirely OK in the software.

Edit: I notice that the game expects someone to gain nationality despite me saying it is after 8 years and actual not allowed to have dual nationality. Something hardcoded?

Filed removed

 

[Wolf_pd]

Iceland is done, while Wales is in test. Iceland doesn't have that much special, except that I removed the league cup since that one only started in 1996. It will mean you have a very quick season, with just 22 games and a cup. 3 foreigners for both 1st and 2nd level.

Next one up counts double as it is Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

[Wolf_pd]

And you can notice I am having a good evening, since Switzerland and Liechtenstein are also done. I was expecting to find the Liechtenstein Cup in the Swiss rules, but couldn't find it. That means the substitution rules are not changed. The foreigner rules won't much of an issue as the Liechtenstein teams play in the Swiss competitions, so they are get checked there. To avoid Liechtenstein teams with Liechtensteiner teams being at an advantage, Switzerland considers Liechtensteiner non-foreign and the same applies vice versa. I have to see if there is a way to adjust this in the European Cups as well, as it disadvantages Liechtenstein teams a lot, like it does for mainly the English teams as well.

The test for Wales in the meantime is done. Latest version available in first post.

 

[Spurs08]

9 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

I would be surprised if there wasn't a sort of local league before that.

You are correct. Wales at the time had a messy criss-cross of regional leagues, primarily the Cymru Alliance for northern and central teams and the Welsh Football League for the south. These didn't provide any participants to the European or UEFA Cup, but the Welsh Cup did feature the teams playing in England too and sent the winners to the Cup Winners Cup. Interestingly, it also featured English sides who were near-ish to Wales as well, although they couldn't reach Europe via this route with their place going to the runners-up instead. In 1988 this definitely included Kidderminster as they were runners-up, but I can't find a full list of participants per year; during the decade Hednesford, Worcester City, Hereford, Shrewsbury and Cheltenham all participated however.

[Reiver]

16 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

In the meantime, I have finished Wales. It is a bit of a conundrum and then I am not even mentioning the language. As @Reiver mentioned, Wales did not have a league back in 1988. I have created the files in league form though. The way they are right now, I can remove the league quite easily, but I would have to check what was there before. I would be surprised if there wasn't a sort of local league before that. Anyway, for now, the league stays and if time and mood  permits it will go out.

Wales gets the same rules as England, with 3 points for a win, 3 foreigners and the UK and Ireland region, as well as some (former) British colonies not counting as foreign. It shouldn't impact Wales too hard, it could actually help, except that England comes out robbing all good players, but they are used to that there.....

If I remember correctly there were local welsh leagues as well as welsh teams playing in english leagues, but even the welsh only leagues were just way down in the english league system,

[Wolf_pd]

1 hour ago, Reiver said:

If I remember correctly there were local welsh leagues as well as welsh teams playing in english leagues, but even the welsh only leagues were just way down in the english league system,

True, just a mixture of local leagues from what I have found. Not one that was acknowledged by UEFA as the Wales Premier League. Call it a Wales Beer League

[Wolf_pd]

The Republic of Ireland has been done. Pretty straightforward and I notice the Advanced Rules being a lot smaller here, which means quicker work. Ireland has non-foreign status set for Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England, but other than that not much special to mention.

[Wolf_pd]

Northern Ireland is done as well. Obviously Ireland is set as non-foreign, but there is some garbage in that area with England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Gibraltar appearing 5 times. So cleaned that up as well

3 foreigners and just like with other files I have limited the foreigner number at grassroot levels.

[Wolf_pd]

Holland is finished. It is tempting to set the Eerste Divisie to relegation to be honest  It is a small edit just like Ireland, so quickly done. 3 foreigners in Betaald Voetbal, while below that it is 0.

10 more nations where the competition is in FM. Then I have 7 left from the small nations where I need edited files. On the other hand, their effect is small, so could do without the foreigner rules in the competitions.

[Wolf_pd]

Aaaaaaand Scotland is done. Surprisingly a few differences between Scotland and England, where N. Ireland and Wales look a lot more alike. I considered cutting out the split in the season as well, but that's for later right now. First I want to testrun all those files (that's for next week), while I continue working on the Players file.

Next one up: Belgium

[Wolf_pd]

And things are going so fast that I actually forget to mention Hungary as well. Hungary was a bit of a discussion, because people were allowed out, in limited numbers and usually for pretty good fees, so you know it was not the team profiting from that... But a few foreign players in the Hungarian competition were a bit of a riddle, one Congolese player and one Dutch player. In the end, a Hungarian friend from a racing forum managed to help me out. The Congolese player was in fact a student at an Hungarian university, while the Dutch player was a player that toured with his AMATEUR team in Hungary and was approached after a friendly match. This mirrors the Romanian leagues where officially no foreign players were allowed, but students and amateurs sometimes could play, with obviously amateurs first having to get access to the country.

The resulting rules are

• Players can leave the country at age 30
• No foreign players are allowed officially

So that's 5 edits for today. And if I manage to get Belgium done, that would be great.

[Wolf_pd]

I have put aside Belgium for a while, because it is giving errors in Advanced Rules. Next up will be France and I plan to have them all finished (including a World File) this weekend.

That allows me a good week of testing if needed next week, while working on player data.

And then May will be editing in all International Competitions. A lot of work on the Advanced Rules has given me ideas how to handle and 'upgrade' that.

Slowly I am inching towards the date I had in mind to release and it is all still feasible

 

[soulsaver]

Really looking forward to the release of this. Just curious about one thing. Not suggesting you should or shouldn't it's your build, I'm just interested in your plans. Have you done anything re prize/TV money in the leagues, either reducing or increasing it to be a more level playing field or are you just leaving it as the game default amounts. (Sorry if you have stated this already and I've missed it.)

[Wolf_pd]

2 hours ago, soulsaver said:

Really looking forward to the release of this. Just curious about one thing. Not suggesting you should or shouldn't it's your build, I'm just interested in your plans. Have you done anything re prize/TV money in the leagues, either reducing or increasing it to be a more level playing field or are you just leaving it as the game default amounts. (Sorry if you have stated this already and I've missed it.)

Well, what you're talking about is balancing and that is something I still need to do. It has to be done inside the nations first and possibly also on European level, but there are a lot of factors. Right now I am editing all foreigner rules and you can see the effect, both on national level, but also in the European Cups. If a Swiss and Czechoslovak team are in the semifinals, things are levelling out a bit. And that's before I have been moving players back to their nations.

[Wolf_pd]

I found a little bug in Switzerland where the registration fur EU U21 would allow for an extra foreign player. I am looking into how to change that one exactly.

[Wolf_pd]

The final one for today is France. France has the distinction that all the French colonies are considered non-foreign. In terms of African players, playing in Europe, you will find them in France. I have decided against changing the nations of players like Mbappe and Pogba (although the effect is really interested if you do that), but all these African players will find a way into Europe. That does also mean that they don't suddenly retire due to not being able to find a good club. On the other hand, UEFA doesn't consider them French, so you could end up with half your team being sidelined compared to your Ligue 1 team, oops!

[Wolf_pd]

After a short night we continue with Portugal. Similar to France, Portugal has a habit of allowing former colonies to play as non-foreign in Portugal. That means Angolan, Mozambique, Cape Verde and yes, Brazil players will flock towards the Portuguese competition. Again, UEFA sees things slightly different, so as long as a player doesn't have a Portuguese (second) nationality he will counted towards the foreigner limit in the European Cups. Btw, Timor Leste is NOT on that list, because Timor Leste will be moved back into Indonesia.

It might mean a much higher level for Portugal as wages aren't that much, but chances to play in Europe are just as enticing.

[Wolf_pd]

Next one, Austria. The only thing that surprised me a bit that the Austria doesn't show more links with the Eastern countries. Hungary, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia are around the corner afterall. It can be noticed in the various players in Austria, but you would expected a bit more in transfer behaviour for instance.

That leaves me with Greece, Turkey, Norway, Denmark, Israel and Belgium to do. Finishing this list today might even be possible  But since we have the Monday off I am not in a hurry.

[MBarbaric]

1 ora fa, Wolf_pd ha scritto:

Next one, Austria. The only thing that surprised me a bit that the Austria doesn't show more links with the Eastern countries. Hungary, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia are around the corner afterall. It can be noticed in the various players in Austria, but you would expected a bit more in transfer behaviour for instance.

That leaves me with Greece, Turkey, Norway, Denmark, Israel and Belgium to do. Finishing this list today might even be possible  But since we have the Monday off I am not in a hurry.

here's an interesting article about history of yugo players and international transfers. you'll have to google translate that. sadly, there aren't any references.

http://www.strategija.org/odlasci-fudbalera-u-inostranstvo-kako-je-sve-pocelo/

 

from what I get from common knowledge, yugo players were commonly transferred to Germany, France, Austria, Italy, England, Switzerland and later to Belgium, Turkey, Cyprus and Greece. After some (very short) research, it appears that the third foreigner in English First Division (after Villa and Ardilles who went to Tottenham) was actually a Yugoslav Ivan Golac (from Partizan to Southampton in '78).  

I've attached a research about post war development of football in Socialist Yugoslavia that basically confirms the first link. Plus it is an interesting read about transformation of football as part of transformation of the country. you'll need google translate though.

HZ_1_2016_DKovacic.pdf

Edited April 25, 2020 by MBarbaric

[Wolf_pd]

Thank you, will look at it later today. This Corona brings me back to my baby days, napping during the day.

[Wolf_pd]

2 hours ago, MBarbaric said:

here's an interesting article about history of yugo players and international transfers. you'll have to google translate that. sadly, there aren't any references.

http://www.strategija.org/odlasci-fudbalera-u-inostranstvo-kako-je-sve-pocelo/

 

from what I get from common knowledge, yugo players were commonly transferred to Germany, France, Austria, Italy, England, Switzerland and later to Belgium, Turkey, Cyprus and Greece. After some (very short) research, it appears that the third foreigner in English First Division (after Villa and Ardilles who went to Tottenham) was actually a Yugoslav Ivan Golac (from Partizan to Southampton in '78).  

I've attached a research about post war development of football in Socialist Yugoslavia that basically confirms the first link. Plus it is an interesting read about transformation of football as part of transformation of the country. you'll need google translate though.

HZ_1_2016_DKovacic.pdf 275.88 kB · 1 download

Did I read it correct that former Croatian president Tudman played for Partizan? 

Interesting read alltogether. This is stuff I would never have found on myself.

[Wolf_pd]

Norway is finished. Detailwise not much to mention, other than that 3 foreigners are allowed in both senior and U19 football. I am not entirely sure how that would work in FM, so that's one to look at closely during the test.

Time for some more cafein!

[papechulo]

Just found out about this topic, really interrested in the final result and definitely gonna give this some playtime!

Just curious, when you move players back to their home country, will they be free agents or moved back to their last team they played for in their homecountry?

[Wolf_pd]

14 minutes ago, papechulo said:

Just found out about this topic, really interrested in the final result and definitely gonna give this some playtime!

Just curious, when you move players back to their home country, will they be free agents or moved back to their last team they played for in their homecountry?

Still figuring out the rules I want for that. I have some ideas already worked out and tested those in FM16, so I have a basic idea, but not final yet.

You won't see massive amounts of free agents though. That's a 'last resort'

[Luke Cro]

1 hour ago, Wolf_pd said:

Did I read it correct that former Croatian president Tudman played for Partizan? 

Interesting read alltogether. This is stuff I would never have found on myself.

Tuđman was president of Partizan, but Partizan is actually multi-sport team (football, basketball, etc.). So, I believe he was president of entire club, not just football section.

By the way, I see you are making excellent progress, well done!

I'm curious, how did you make rule that domestic players can not leave country until certain age (just like in Yugoslavia)?

[Wolf_pd]

2 minutes ago, Luke Cro said:

I'm curious, how did you make rule that domestic players can not leave country until certain age (just like in Yugoslavia)?

In a sense the players are free to leave. As a human player you could easily buy any Yugoslav player you wanted as long as you would have room in your team for that.

The trick, which was also used in the FM16 Iron Curtain version is to tell all other countries there are no transfers from Yugoslavia for players between age 14 and 27. It is a bit of trickery, but it works.

I am still looking into the Advanced Rules if I can find a better alternative, but for now that's the solution

[MBarbaric]

3 minuti fa, Luke Cro ha scritto:

Tuđman was president of Partizan, but Partizan is actually multi-sport team (football, basketball, etc.).

this. Tudjman was instituted as the secretary of Partizan Sport Society (?) in '54 as an ambitious colonel. in '58 he became the president of the society and a year later he bacame the youngest general. a moot figure at best  

[Wolf_pd]

12 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

That leaves me with Greece, Turkey, Norway, Denmark, Israel and Belgium to do. Finishing this list today might even be possible  But since we have the Monday off I am not in a hurry.

Almost made it

Greece, Turkey, Norway, Denmark and Israel are finished. I need to take a hard look at Belgium tomorrow

Tomorrow I will also build the file for the rest of the world. And I just realised I forgot to remove Brexit!

And there is still the issue of Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, Faroe Islands, San Marino, Luxembourg, Andorra. If I can't find a good nation file, it will have to be done via that rest of world file. Not that having more than 3 foreign player will really elevate the likes of Malta, Cyprus and Luxembourg. Faroe Islands, San Marino and Andorra will fare just as bad, since they don't gain reputation via their national team in the European and World Qualifiers.

So monday will be testing time while I work on the Soviet people. Hopefully that goes a bit faster than the huge load of Yugoslavia players

[Michael_Myers]

Will also be a graphics file for this database?

[Wolf_pd]

1 hour ago, Michael_Myers said:

Will also be a graphics file for this database?

The least there will be a flag update (obviously), but logos can be done as well.

[MBarbaric]

1 ora fa, Wolf_pd ha scritto:

The least there will be a flag update (obviously), but logos can be done as well.

I have graphics file with all the flags, some competition adboards (mostly international and yugoslavian, poorly done I admit) and most of the logos I did for the initial db, not sure if I had that posted back at the time, but you think it would still work? I imagine club ID's are the same only international teams would need checking. I'd imagine East Germany would be wrong out of the box as I doubt you used Gibraltar to create them, but most of the others should be the same.

[Wolf_pd]

For East Germany I would have to change the IDs but other than that they should work. Unless SI has tinkered with how logos and flags are shown.

I will take a look at the Lincs & Cambs edit Nine_iron did. He got a flag working in FM20.