Scouting, scouting knowledge, and AI shenanigans

[JRHaggs]

We've all been there.

You've scouted an interesting player. You've brought him in on a trial. Things look good. Interest from a couple of teams in a division below. No worries.

You offer your trialist a contract. He accepts! Nice.

One continue and 20 in-game minutes later, fifteen teams have offered him a contract, including obviously more reputable teams. Ugh. That sinking feeling...

So what's going on here? Did these teams have scouting info on this fellow or not? If they did, why were they not already interested in him? If they didn't, how did they conclude that it would be worth offering him a deal?

In a particularly irritating/amusing episode, several teams were asking after my GK, who is on low wages considering his ability. Because of the interest being shown, I decided to give this young, obviously superior, Chilean GK (named Pablo Escobar, of all things!) a try. The weird thing is that the teams that were after my GK only made an offer to young Pablo *after* I did. So it *looks* to me like they were unaware of him until I made an offer. They wouldn't have bothered with my guy if they knew about him. But, again, if they didn't know about him, why would they offer him a contract without any scouting info?

Thoughts?

Do AI-managed teams acquire scouting knowledge the same way the player does? I understand that the player's agent might have thrown his name out there, but that wouldn't provide potentially-interested teams with any scouting info, would it? I'm sure there's a reasonable explanation, but it looks like shenanigans to me.

[Mars_Blackmon]

Stories get leaked.

 

i do this to the AI. If I don’t have much info on a guy and I see other bigger clubs or equal clubs interested in him, I’ll try to sign him or scout further if I need that position badly.

[JRHaggs]

43 minutes ago, Mars_Blackmon said:

Stories get leaked.

 

i do this to the AI. If I don’t have much info on a guy and I see other bigger clubs or equal clubs interested in him, I’ll try to sign him or scout further if I need that position badly.

Sure, I get that. I've seen the dreaded "Transfer story leaked" messages many times before. And, of course, when the AI makes a bid for a player I'm interested in, I'm motivated to move more quickly. In the class of cases about which I'm curious, the leak message doesn't pop and there is no notable AI interest prior to player manager action in the market.

An additional detail in the Pablo Escobar episode referred to above is that Colchester made an offer to him a few days before I did. It was only after I made an offer that additional clubs became interested in, and subsequently offered contracts to, this player. The list of interested teams grew by 16 exactly one "continue" after I made an offer. For weeks prior to my offer, only Colchester and Cambridge City, teams in League 1 (I'm a very low rep Kingstonian in the Championship), had shown interest. I accept, of course, that this is just one anecdote, but it's the most recent of many.

I'm not super concerned about losing out on "the next Claudio Bravo"; I'm sure he'll be happy at Everton. Honestly, I don't know why any club that needed a goalkeeper wasn't absolutely drooling over him. I'd just like to understand the nature of the AI behavior that I've described. I'm interested in how the AI acquires scouting knowledge and applies it to its transfer decisions. Simple questions, I guess. In what sense does the AI have to deal with attribute masking? What are "major interest" and "minor interest", and what's the difference to the AI? Why does it *seem* like the AI's interest is particularly responsive to the player manager's actions in the transfer market, even if that's not exactly what's happening?

 

 

[PandaIsland]

7 hours ago, JRHaggs said:

Sure, I get that. I've seen the dreaded "Transfer story leaked" messages many times before. And, of course, when the AI makes a bid for a player I'm interested in, I'm motivated to move more quickly. In the class of cases about which I'm curious, the leak message doesn't pop and there is no notable AI interest prior to player manager action in the market.

An additional detail in the Pablo Escobar episode referred to above is that Colchester made an offer to him a few days before I did. It was only after I made an offer that additional clubs became interested in, and subsequently offered contracts to, this player. The list of interested teams grew by 16 exactly one "continue" after I made an offer. For weeks prior to my offer, only Colchester and Cambridge City, teams in League 1 (I'm a very low rep Kingstonian in the Championship), had shown interest. I accept, of course, that this is just one anecdote, but it's the most recent of many.

I'm not super concerned about losing out on "the next Claudio Bravo"; I'm sure he'll be happy at Everton. Honestly, I don't know why any club that needed a goalkeeper wasn't absolutely drooling over him. I'd just like to understand the nature of the AI behavior that I've described. I'm interested in how the AI acquires scouting knowledge and applies it to its transfer decisions. Simple questions, I guess. In what sense does the AI have to deal with attribute masking? What are "major interest" and "minor interest", and what's the difference to the AI? Why does it *seem* like the AI's interest is particularly responsive to the player manager's actions in the transfer market, even if that's not exactly what's happening?

 

 

I think its just a case of teams saw your interest and have acted quickly to get the deal done, and once a few teams do that more teams see there is a lot of interest in him so they go for him. Example liverpool wanted timo werner and he went to chelsea it came out liverpool didnt even put in a bid for him

[Mike J]

I think human players do the same. I know I do. If I see in transfer rumours or league news that a club has made an offer for a player I'm unfamiliar with I'll often go and check the player out and make my own bid if I'm suitably impressed. Seems like the AI is doing the same thing.

[luka_zg]

Is the scouting bugged? In general focus I put to scout players aged from 18 to 23 years of age. But in my scout reports that comes to my inbox, I have also older players regularly? Scouting for me is so complicated and very unclear how it actually works..

[Mike J]

3 hours ago, luka_zg said:

Is the scouting bugged? In general focus I put to scout players aged from 18 to 23 years of age. But in my scout reports that comes to my inbox, I have also older players regularly? Scouting for me is so complicated and very unclear how it actually works..

Not all scouting reports come from your assignments. Some will come from recruitment analysts and some will come via the recruitment meetings you have during the season. Pay attention to what the report says in the little description you get. If it says something like "after our recent recruitment meeting, I suggest taking a look at..." it's not part of your regular scouting. If they are from your regular assignments maybe log it as a bug.

[PandaIsland]

3 hours ago, luka_zg said:

Is the scouting bugged? In general focus I put to scout players aged from 18 to 23 years of age. But in my scout reports that comes to my inbox, I have also older players regularly? Scouting for me is so complicated and very unclear how it actually works..

When you get your list of e.g 30 players suggestion, these suggestions come from

recruitment team

analyst team

agent offers

other

 

I even have some that are from a agent that are reported by HOYD

[JRHaggs]

Eh. I think I've done a poor job asking questions. I understand that it is presenting bandwagon behavior and that human players will inevitably do this too. I'm not bothered by the way that AI transfer behavior is presented in the game.

I'm just interested in what is actually happening under the hood.

Specifically, I'm interested in the AI's decision making regarding "interest" as displayed in the transfer screen. Even more specifically, I'm interested in understanding why it *seems* like there's such a strong relationship between human manager actions and AI manager actions in the market.

I'm interested in whether the AI acquires scouting knowledge in the same way the human player does. For example, does every AI manager have an actual shortlist (seems plausible)? Does every team "see" a different set of masked or partially-masked attributes until they've fully scouted a player (seems vanishingly unlikely)? Ultimately, this is not about actually playing the game. It's about the black box. It's about how the game manages the innumerable interactions between one module and another, one spreadsheet and another.

There have been a lot of posts about the shortcomings of AI squad building logic. These questions are relevant to many aspects of the game. I've just been inspired to consider and ask about them because of this most recent episode with the young Mr. Escobar.

Once again, this isn't a complaint and it's not about playing the game. It's about what the game is *actually* doing and why.

Sorry if I'm doing a lousy job explaining this? There are a lot of elastic terms that mean one thing when talking about playing the game and another thing when talking about how the game itself works.

 

Edited February 1, 2022 by JRHaggs

[fc.cadoni]

The same tools you have in your disposal; same tools for AI.

AI is faster than you (it was not longer before that AI have won the best chess human player in the world).

Act faster and smarter. You can do it. (AI is driven / wrote by people - educated by people - optimized by people) 

Edited February 2, 2022 by fc.cadoni

[Hovis Dexter]

When you make an offer for a player he's automatically added to your short list. I recall one of the mods (can't remember who) saying that a workaround is to immediately remove the player from the shortlist ... not ideal but it may help.

[XaW]

20 minutes ago, Hovis Dexter said:

When you make an offer for a player he's automatically added to your short list. I recall one of the mods (can't remember who) saying that a workaround is to immediately remove the player from the shortlist ... not ideal but it may help.

I think this is an option in the scouting part of staff responsibilities. So you can chose if this happens or not.

[kentonizking]

I see it as the players 'agent' doing his dark arts behind the scenes, playing clubs off against each other to get the best deal.

I know we occasionally get contacted by agents about better offers or a willingness to renegotiate, but in my mind there is a lot more agenty business going on. Just like in real life sadly.

[JRHaggs]

27 minutes ago, kentonizking said:

I see it as the players 'agent' doing his dark arts behind the scenes, playing clubs off against each other to get the best deal.

I know we occasionally get contacted by agents about better offers or a willingness to renegotiate, but in my mind there is a lot more agenty business going on. Just like in real life sadly.

Yeah. I can superimpose any number of perfectly reasonable narratives on this stuff. Again, I'm not worried about it.

But I *really* want to understand the actual under-the-hood mechanics of this stuff. I want to understand why the the AI appears to react differently to human player actions than it does to other AI actions.

I promise, I really get it that human players do this too. I really get it that it "makes sense" in the context of the game's presentation. No problem at all. Really. (This last bit is not directed at you or anyone in particular kentonizking. But all the answers offered so far are related to how the game is presenting the world it's simulating, rather than what the simulation is doing beneath that veneer.)

[Mars_Blackmon]

1 hour ago, JRHaggs said:

Yeah. I can superimpose any number of perfectly reasonable narratives on this stuff. Again, I'm not worried about it.

But I *really* want to understand the actual under-the-hood mechanics of this stuff. I want to understand why the the AI appears to react differently to human player actions than it does to other AI actions.

I promise, I really get it that human players do this too. I really get it that it "makes sense" in the context of the game's presentation. No problem at all. Really. (This last bit is not directed at you or anyone in particular kentonizking. But all the answers offered so far are related to how the game is presenting the world it's simulating, rather than what the simulation is doing beneath that veneer.)

Idk maybe you’re just complicating things? No one really can answer what goes on under the hood except a dev. However, I’ve seen plenty of times where I was the only club interested in a player after I made a bid so what your experiencing isn’t something that’s constant.