Training and Development Testing by TFF

[Totalfootballfan]

Hi guys,

I'll be using this thread to share my experience about the training in FM and when I have free time I'll be adding more stuff into the opening post.

I want to start with some training concept that I find is important for understanding how the training works.

 

Here's Bournemouth starting elven that will be used in the following test.

 

I edited the players and did following:

- I set their Age to "20" in order exclude any declining of their CA(Current Ability) due to their Age

- I edited their PA(Potential Ability) to match their CA in order to prevent the CA from increasing

- I edited their Professionalism and Ambition to "20" in order they'll be able to keep their CA at the maximum of their PA

 

 

Also, I edit Bournemouth training facilities to 20 and I edited the coaches to have "5 stars" rating for all training categories

 

 

The general training was set this way:

 

So as you can see at the screenshot above the team should do "Quickness" training all the time until the end of the season.

 

"Quickness" training improves only Acceleration, Agility and Pace attributes.

 

 

The Individual Training for all players was set this way 1) Position/Role/Duty - "Playing Position" 2) Additional Focus - "Quickness" 3) Intensity Level - "Double Intensity"

 

So through out the General Training and Individual Training the team only trains Acceleration, Agility and Pace attributes and that's all.

 

 

Let's simulate the season see what we get at the end of the season.

At the end of the season the CA and PA of the players didn't changed and it stayed the same as at the beginning of the season CA = PA.

 

But what did happened with the players' attributes?

 

 

 

 

As it can be seen at the screenshots above all players got improvement of Acceleration, Pace and Agility but some other attributes randomly decreased and please notice that the players' CA(Current Ability) didn't change and it stayed the same as it was at the begging of the season.

So the test shows that nothing is free  and it's possible to get a rapid boost of some attributes but if CA don't increase some other attributes will decline because CA determines the total amount of ability points that a player has to spend on his attributes and abilities so if some attribute has improved but the CA hasn't increased then some other attribute must decrease.

 

Let's take Raheem Sterling, he's still quite young 24 years old but he's almost reached his PA (174CA/180PA) so if we try rapidly increase his Finishing or Technique or Decisions or Strength or any other attribute then highly likely it'll cause some other important attributes declining because he's reached about 96% of his PA and any further CA gains is a very hard for him because the closer the CA of a player to his maximum PA, the harder to making a further CA gain.

 

 

As you can see a heavy focus training on few attributes isn't always the best idea because you might get an rapid increase of these attributes but the same time some other important attributes might decline.

Here's some other example. Let's say you want to improve the Finishing, Dribbling, Passing, Decision, Acceleration and Pace of your strikers so trying to do that with using only an Additional Focus training might not be the best idea because to train these attributes you need to use many different focuses and for example, when you use "Shooting" for the additional focus then it trains "Finishing" but "Acceleration" and "Pace" might decline and when you use "Quickness" then it train "Acceleration" and "Pace" but "Finishing" might decline and so on.

So when it's important to improve more than 1 or 2 attributes then you need to plan how to design 3 areas: the general training, the role training and the additional focus training. For example, some attributes could be trained through the general training and some attributes could be trained through the role training and some attributes could be trained through the additional focus so it'll guaranty that as many of the important attributes as possible are protected from declining.

 

As I said from time to time(when I have free time) I'll try to update this thread and add more useful stuff about the training into it. 

     

 

 

[Totalfootballfan]

TEST #1

 

Here's another an interesting test.

What if we don't set any individual training at all and for the general training set only "Overall" training session.

"Overall" training develops all attributes.

Let's set the CA of all players to 150 and PA to 200 and see if they still develop.

The general training looks like this (only "Overall" all the time):

 

 

And the Individual Training of every player looks like this(it trains only the playing  position):

 

 

 

 

 

Here's the CA and PA of the players at the begging of the season:

 

 

 

And here's CA and PA of the players at the end of the season:

 

 

 

 

As you can see at the screenshot above the players still developed very well and got a very solid CA increase even without any Individual training at all and only with "Overall" training for the General Training but their CA gains were allocation very general so the attackers got their "Tackling" and "Positioning" attributes increased and the defenders got their "Finishing" and "Long Shots" attributes increased and that happened because we didn't do any development direction at all, not through out the general training not through the Individual Training. 

 

 

 

 

 

TEST #2

 

I made another interesting test to see if there's any difference in the development rate when a player train a different role/duty from his role/duty in the tactic

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the begging of the season:

 

The players are set to train their roles/duties in the tactic :

 

 

 

Here's their CA/PA at the end of the season as it can be seen at the screenshot below all players in summary gain +155 CA:

 

 

Now let's test if there's a difference when the players train a different roles/duties from their roles/duties in the tactic:

 

 

 

Here's their CA/PA at the end of the season as it can be seen at the screenshot below all players in summary gain +145 CA:

 

 

 

Conclusion:

+155CA vs +145CA, it's only about 7% difference so it would be safe to assume that there's almost no difference for the development rate when a player train a different role/duty from his role/duty in the tactic 

 

 

 

 

 

TEST #3

Double Intensity vs Normal Intensity ( without setting the Additional Focus and Role Training )

 

The general training was set to "Training Style - Balanced"

 

Players CA/PA at the begging of the season:

 

 

Normal Intensity training for all players:

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the end of the season, all players is summary gained +166CA:

 

 

Double Intensity training for all players:

 

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the end of the season, all players is summary gained +170CA:

 

 

Conclusion:

+165CA vs +170CA, it's only about 3% difference so it looks if you don't set the additional training focus and role training the Intensity Level doesn't have any significant impact on the development rate. 

 

[HanziZoloman]

Crazyman! Nice science 

[zemaniano85]

@Totalfootballfan I see your point.

Definetely what you are showing is very obvious and make all sense. Now, the point should be this, by your tests I can understand that, if I want tailor my team as I like, I could use focus sessions in general training and focus individual training, to mould the players as I want and like. But the role training I believe is more focused on the role he'll be playing on matches, and the development will get faster in that direction if he plays the role assigned in the the training. I had this experience by the way. I I play a player in a role that he is not training for, he'll not play and train at best, (it does make sense since the new training system is correlated to the tactic and matches). So there is choice for anyone who want any kind of development, the key is to match all togheter what you want for you team. I mean, is not the case train a player in PF if he'll play in AF in game, I'm not saying that he won't develop or is useless, but is not the best you can get out doing like that. And also is by my experience playing the game I drawn this. Unless you play him in that position he'll get the best of it. It is all connected. 

[Totalfootballfan]

14 minutes ago, zemaniano85 said:

Now, the point should be this, by your tests I can understand that, if I want tailor my team as I like, I could use focus sessions in general training and focus individual training, to mould the players as I want and like. 

Of course, you can use all 3 tools available (the general training, the role focus and the additional focus) at the same time to develop your players 

 

14 minutes ago, zemaniano85 said:

But the role training I believe is more focused on the role he'll be playing on matches, and the development will get faster in that direction if he plays the role assigned in the the training. I had this experience by the way. I I play a player in a role that he is not training for, he'll not play and train at best, (it does make sense since the new training system is correlated to the tactic and matches). So there is choice for anyone who want any kind of development, the key is to match all togheter what you want for you team. I mean, is not the case train a player in PF if he'll play in AF in game, I'm not saying that he won't develop or is useless, but is not the best you can get out doing like that. And also is by my experience playing the game I drawn this. Unless you play him in that position he'll get the best of it. It is all connected. 

I can say that I've tired training different roles from the role a player played in the tactic and didn't notice any significant difference in the development rate and in the CA gains, they were almost equal so I'd say it's safe to use different roles

[zemaniano85]

3 minutes ago, Totalfootballfan said:

I can say that I've tired training different roles from the role a player played in the tactic and didn't notice any significant difference in the development rate and in the CA gains, they were almost equal so I'd say it's safe to use different roles

By my experience, I trained a winger on support a 2 star player, and sticked him in that role always, he got all the key attributes up, and obviously to compensate, decreased the ones not important for that role, and that was in a season. You get also a message in the inbox, informing you that the player is well suited now for that role. This is to maximise the whole thing, but nevertheless you can still train him in another role and play him something else, but I didn't get all that better results. All this happened by just playing not testing. 

[Totalfootballfan]

I've added another test to the OP

 

 

3 hours ago, Totalfootballfan said:

 

I made another interesting test to see if there's any difference in the development rate when a player train a different role/duty from his role/duty in the tactic

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the begging of the season:

 

The players are set to train their roles/duties in the tactic :

 

 

 

Here's their CA/PA at the end of the season as it can be seen at the screenshot below all players in summary gain +155 CA:

 

 

Now let's test if there's a difference when the players train a different roles/duties from their roles/duties in the tactic:

 

 

 

Here's their CA/PA at the end of the season as it can be seen at the screenshot below all players in summary gain +145 CA:

 

 

Conclusion:

+155CA vs +145CA, it's only about 7% difference so it would be safe to assume that there's almost no difference for the development rate when a player train a different role/duty from his role/duty in the tactic 

 

 

[zemaniano85]

12 minutes ago, Totalfootballfan said:

I've added another test to the OP

 

 

 

In fact is not the rate of training the difference but how and where you want the development go. 

[zemaniano85]

For the sake of the test, if you can do a test same as above and make sure the players plays in the roles he trains. Just out of curiosity. @Totalfootballfan

[Totalfootballfan]

5 minutes ago, zemaniano85 said:

For the sake of the test, if you can do a test same as above and make sure the players plays in the roles he trains. Just out of curiosity. @Totalfootballfan

Mate, I'm not sure that I understand you could you elaborate what you mean

I did 2 tests when the players trained their roles/duties in the tactic and when the players trained a different roles/duties from their roles/duties in the tactic and there was only about 7% difference in the CA gains at the end of the season and I'd say it could be just randomness so I think it's safe to assume there's no any significant difference 

[zemaniano85]

Not problem mate, you are the man!! Thanks for sharing

[Rain Man]

Hi @Totalfootballfan, is training intensity having any effect on development regardless of individual training.

For example say we don't set any individual training and player is training only with general training or role/duty. In this case is training intensity still have any effect or is it just changing individual attribute boost increase?

If it has significant boost to general training, how much does it effect (only regarding intensity). Another thing to test can be injury risk correlation with intensity. So that we can decide if it is worth using a high intensity or not.

Also I'm sending you a PM to ask for another test, which is not related with this topic so it might be appropriate to ask via private.

[Totalfootballfan]

12 minutes ago, Rain Man said:

Hi @Totalfootballfan, is training intensity having any effect on development regardless of individual training.

For example say we don't set any individual training and player is training only with general training or role/duty. In this case is training intensity still have any effect or is it just changing individual attribute boost increase?

If it has significant boost to general training, how much does it effect (only regarding intensity). Another thing to test can be injury risk correlation with intensity. So that we can decide if it is worth using a high intensity or not.

Hi,

Yes, I've tested it and I'll post the result of the test soon

[santy001]

I would have to ask what's the aim of this thread in some ways @Totalfootballfan I'm willing to concede that as a researcher & long time player I have a lot of knowledge but I'm not seeing anything that would really influence a decision about training. The redistribution of CA is something fairly obvious & covered by many people at many times over many years. The rest has small margins in difference with no consistency. CA gained across the whole squad isn't really a true reflection considering the other impacts on development in game, even with the elements you have normalised. The normalisation you've imposed on attributes also creates a question over how this would work in an actual save for an average player.

Is this supposed to be a work in progress and you're going to offer up some conclusions and a TFF season schedule in the future and people need to sit and hold tight? You've gone straight into testing which while useful for people who wish to follow the logic you apply, isn't resulting in anything tangible a player can use in their own game yet. 

Maybe some players will feel different, I'm writing from a privileged position as I opened with. It just seems a bit light on the details that help someone get further improvements with their squad over to just leaving it with the staff. With my moderator cap on, I'm looking at this and thinking at this stage "is this just a waste of forum-goers time" because its claiming to be a guide. Yet there's no guide. No suggestion of how you should set your team training up in a real save environment.

Edit:

In fact, at this stage I've renamed the thread to testing since you don't have a guide to hand yet.

[Totalfootballfan]

Guys, I've added another test to the OP.

4 hours ago, Rain Man said:

Hi @Totalfootballfan, is training intensity having any effect on development regardless of individual training.

For example say we don't set any individual training and player is training only with general training or role/duty. In this case is training intensity still have any effect or is it just changing individual attribute boost increase?

If it has significant boost to general training, how much does it effect (only regarding intensity). Another thing to test can be injury risk correlation with intensity. So that we can decide if it is worth using a high intensity or not.

I've added the test to the OP.

 

 

 

 

 

15 hours ago, Totalfootballfan said:

 

TEST #3

Double Intensity vs Normal Intensity ( without setting the Additional Focus and Role Training )

 

The general training was set to "Training Style - Balanced"

 

Players CA/PA at the begging of the season:

 

 

Normal Intensity training for all players:

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the end of the season, all players is summary gained +166CA:

 

 

Double Intensity training for all players:

 

 

Here's the players' CA/PA at the end of the season, all players is summary gained +170CA:

 

 

Conclusion:

+165CA vs +170CA, it's only about 3% difference so it looks if you don't set the additional training focus and role training the Intensity Level doesn't have any significant impact on the development rate. 

 

 

 

[Totalfootballfan]

23 minutes ago, santy001 said:

In fact, at this stage I've renamed the thread to testing since you don't have a guide to hand yet.

Sure, mate. I don't mind at all.

 

23 minutes ago, santy001 said:

Maybe some players will feel different, I'm writing from a privileged position as I opened with. It just seems a bit light on the details that help someone get further improvements with their squad over to just leaving it with the staff. With my moderator cap on, I'm looking at this and thinking at this stage "is this just a waste of forum-goers time" because its claiming to be a guide. Yet there's no guide. No suggestion of how you should set your team training up in a real save environment.

As you right said it's work in progress, I'm going to add a lot of different stuff but at the first I want to shed some light on the way the training works or it's better to say how I think the training work 

[cunik maxiumus]

Hey TFF.

Your findings seem conclusive with i guess "official" guide https://www.guidetofm.com/players/ability

What i find a little bit dodgy is that attribute cost that a player must "pay" in it's CA is determined by the player role.

So if you take a striker and start training him as defender, his is going to value tackling as more expensive attribute and it would cost more to increase tackling since his training in defender role now, as it would normally cost him if he was training as a striker.

So in other words it would seem that you would want to exploit it somehow. You should convince the game that your striker is actually a defender, while training his finishing through focus and through sessions so he increases it more easily for less CA.

But then again how would it work since every attribute that player has has already been paid for by his 'CA' so if you start a striker on a defender training his 'CA' should actually change almost instantly since now he is supposed to be a defender and has a lot of finishing which should cost very little of CA for defender.. etc.

 

It's all super confusing.

 

Also what i find confusing is why some players develop and some don't. And i don't mean that some have different ambition, and professionalism. I mean i have in-game editor and i can see that player is 20yrs old has 165PA while his CA is 130. And he has cca 10 professionalism and ambition. Didn't have any major injuries, has good playing time in the first team but just stagnates. While other similar players seem to grow.

There are so many questions...

Is increase from 9 -> 10 in tackling as expensive as from 19 -> 20.

Can any player train any attribute. for instance if given 100ca/pa player and train him from age 15 to 25 in speed, can he go from 5 to 20 in pace in acceleration ( and decrease everything else).

Is going from 100 to 101 CA as hard as going from 150 to 151 CA. Does PA play a role in it. Does coaching player a role in it? For instance if i have 1 star coaches can my guy of 50CA and 70PA  go from 50 to 51CA.  Can a guy under same coaches progress from 150 to 151 CA given he has 200PA?

How does age play a role in it. (the official guide seem to mention late bloomers) but there doesn't seem to be hidden attribute in the game that would govern at which age some one should "bloom").

Does a league make a difference? Can a player reach his 180PA in first Columbian division the same as in premier league? Or it doesn't matter he just needs to trigger his "played 60 minutes in first team in first league quota".

Does coach suggestions like "needs to work on becoming more consistent if he is to develop" or "needs to work on his decisions to progress further" mean anything. Or is attribute progression somehow tied with each other.

So much is unknown :|

[Gazza’s Pint]

Really interesting, but I wonder what the actual effect of double intensity is compared to normal and half, if you set general training to balanced and all individual roles to the players.Not sure if you ever tried this, but would be interesting to see what value you get from the different intensities compared to the fitness and fatigue levels of your squad. 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Gazza’s Pint