fm23 still too many old players in squads in future and not enough youth development

[Iggy Hassan]

I've even gone as far as to download a 3rd party skin from a website to try and give fm23 a different 'feel' and I never do that. I'm all for keeping things familiar, but this is too familiar it feels like covid was last year with with the minimal headline features and changes...

[Daveincid]

My observations so far from the current build:

There are definetly big improvements made compared to FM22, which you'll notice sometimes more and sometimes less depending on the db setup.

It's wrong that there is a general issue with national teams getting too old in general. Some are even way too young after 5 years already. 

It mainly affects the biggest Nations (England, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands) along with some other Nations. But in over 30% of all other Nations it's actually the other way around. 

- CA-numbers in general are as stable as never before.

- Player development of U21 players is as good as never before (still issues with smaller nations being OP but overall, pretty solid)

- Older players are finally decreasing at a realistic level (not too quick as in FM21 and not too slow as in FM22)

The issues in Nations like England are there, no matter if you load every league in the game or England-only. This must be solved via reputation-boost for younger players in those Nations. The issue is just much worse when you load only 1 Nation.

So after 2 miserable editions for longterm-saves, FM23 is close to get it right.

 

[Sirotinja]

I wonder why SI doesn't just hire Daveincid to solve half the problems they face every year?

 

 

[priority76]

3 hours ago, Daveincid said:

My observations so far from the current build:

Excellent, sensible, non hysterical post right there.

[DMaster2]

Il 3/11/2022 in 22:15 , priority76 ha scritto:

I really hope so too.  But to abandon all the advances FM23 has made because of this is a bit of an overreaction.

I jumped from 21 to 23 and haven't seen any advances. Recruiting is broken, supporter confidence is broken, the data hub feels pointless (thanks game i don't need you to tell me my defense is leaky if i've took 10 goals in the last 6 games, i need help to fix the issue...), the manager timeline is a joke. And to add salt into injury you can no longer strike deals with 16-17 years old south americans but you have to wait until 18 before they have any interest speaking to you.

 

Basically the only new thing that i'm using is the squad planner. Not much honestly...

If it wasn't for the fact that my fm21 save died with my old hard drive two months ago i'd seriously consider refunding fm23...

[priority76]

24 minutes ago, DMaster2 said:

I jumped from 21 to 23 and haven't seen any advances.

Oh that sucks.  Sorry you're not able to enjoy it.

[Platinum]

On 04/11/2022 at 07:31, Daveincid said:

My observations so far from the current build:

There are definetly big improvements made compared to FM22, which you'll notice sometimes more and sometimes less depending on the db setup.

It's wrong that there is a general issue with national teams getting too old in general. Some are even way too young after 5 years already. 

It mainly affects the biggest Nations (England, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands) along with some other Nations. But in over 30% of all other Nations it's actually the other way around. 

- CA-numbers in general are as stable as never before.

- Player development of U21 players is as good as never before (still issues with smaller nations being OP but overall, pretty solid)

- Older players are finally decreasing at a realistic level (not too quick as in FM21 and not too slow as in FM22)

The issues in Nations like England are there, no matter if you load every league in the game or England-only. This must be solved via reputation-boost for younger players in those Nations. The issue is just much worse when you load only 1 Nation.

So after 2 miserable editions for longterm-saves, FM23 is close to get it right.

 

I think the problem is actually wider than you say here. I simmed until 2030 with only the top  European nations loaded (England, Italy, Spain) including their lower leagues and this time I looked at the clubs in the top divisions in those nations rather than the national teams. In each top league (e.g. the premier league) only about 5 players in the whole league under the age of 24 had a status as a Regular Starter or higher. So not only the national teams that are too old but also the clubs. You see very good players with good reputation (Continental) not getting bought by top clubs or picked by their national team. 

[Daveincid]

Gerade eben schrieb Platinum:

I think the problem is actually wider than you say here. I simmed until 2030 with only the top  European nations loaded (England, Italy, Spain) including their lower leagues and this time I looked at the clubs in the top divisions in those nations rather than the national teams. In each top league (e.g. the premier league) only about 5 players in the whole league under the age of 24 had a status as a Regular Starter or higher. So not only the national teams that are too old but also the clubs. You see very good players with good reputation (Continental) not getting bought by top clubs or picked by their national team. 

Of course it also affects clubs but this would be again a db-issue. If you only load the european top nations, a lot of young players in Nations slightly below (Portugal, Netherlands, Austria, Turkey and so on) won't develop the same (especially their reputation) as when you have the leagues loaded. Those won't be that much in the focus of the big Nations which also leads to a higher average age in the top leagues. As I wrote: If you want the simulation to be as realistic as possible, you need to load a lot of leagues. In my simulations with all leagues loaded, the avg. age in all clubs looks pretty good. (still the top Nations need a boost, as I wrote)

[HoChiKim]

I hope the youth players across the game are better this season as FM22 was the worst I've ever known it.

I load a large db and retain high rep players worldwide then run about 10 nations for a long term save. I always enjoy scouting and recruiting young players but on FM22 after about 10 seasons there seemed to be a real lack of youth talent in my game, I'm hoping FM23 is better for youth talent.

[mikelfc8]

1 hour ago, Daveincid said:

Of course it also affects clubs but this would be again a db-issue. If you only load the european top nations, a lot of young players in Nations slightly below (Portugal, Netherlands, Austria, Turkey and so on) won't develop the same (especially their reputation) as when you have the leagues loaded. Those won't be that much in the focus of the big Nations which also leads to a higher average age in the top leagues. As I wrote: If you want the simulation to be as realistic as possible, you need to load a lot of leagues. In my simulations with all leagues loaded, the avg. age in all clubs looks pretty good. (still the top Nations need a boost, as I wrote)

Isn't this a deeper problem?

Should there be any database setting in the game in which players loaded and/or generated don't develop properly? Idealistic, I know.

And, furthermore, one thing that has always irked me is  - why is there no clear explanation of how the choices you make at set-up effect your long-term game?

Whilst the in-game mechanics can benefit from some mystery in certain areas, surely game set-up should be comprehensively explained.

Questions for SI, not you Dave, love your work to address these issues.

 

Edited November 5, 2022 by mikelfc8

[Platinum]

1 hour ago, Daveincid said:

Of course it also affects clubs but this would be again a db-issue. If you only load the european top nations, a lot of young players in Nations slightly below (Portugal, Netherlands, Austria, Turkey and so on) won't develop the same (especially their reputation) as when you have the leagues loaded. Those won't be that much in the focus of the big Nations which also leads to a higher average age in the top leagues. As I wrote: If you want the simulation to be as realistic as possible, you need to load a lot of leagues. In my simulations with all leagues loaded, the avg. age in all clubs looks pretty good. (still the top Nations need a boost, as I wrote)

When you say its a DB issue do you mean its an issue with the starting DB? The issue occurs with both real players and newgens, so the mechanism that updates the reputation isnt working as intended. SI could change it so that reputation has less of a role when the AI is deciding to buy/playing younger players and its more about CA. In real life teams always play high ability young players with a low rep over older high rep players as they have to think about the future.

 

Edited November 5, 2022 by Platinum

[Daveincid]

vor 18 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

When you say its a DB issue do you mean its an issue with the starting DB?

Yes. This is why I often get different results like other users. If you simulate 30+ years with like 5 playabe nations only you will get a much less balanced gameworld as when you load 30 playable Nations. I don't say the other tests are wrong, they just do not show the whole picture. 
Should the game be better balanced with less loaded leagues? yes
Will it be 1:1 the same as when you load more leagues? Never

vor 18 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

The issue occurs with both real players and newgens, so the mechanism that updates the reputation isnt working as intended.

The reputation-system works completely fine for the majority of all Nations. It mainly has issues in top Nations because it doesn't boost U21-players reputation too much. As explained this is mainly a researcher issue and not a coding issue. There is a significant lack of missing data in the editor for years. I'm repeating myself for almost 2 years now how it can be easily fixed and it seems to remain unheard. But hey, I'll fix it in my first update for FM23, so I'm good  
 

vor 18 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

SI could change it so that reputation has less of a role when the AI is deciding to buy/playing younger players and its more about CA. In real life teams always play high ability young players with a low rep over older high rep players as they have to think about the future.

I don't think that there are major issues with how the AI decides who to buy. Otherwise the game would be completely messed up after 20+ years, which isn't the case at all.

Edited November 5, 2022 by Daveincid

[phnompenhandy]

10 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

But hey, I'll fix it in my first update for FM23, so I'm good  

Thanks for the reminder - I'll definitely wait for your mods before launching my big FM23 save. 

[Platinum]

11 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

It mainly has issues in top Nations because it doesn't boost U21-players reputation too much. As explained this is mainly a researcher issue and not a coding issue

I assume you're talking about the awards not boosting reputation enough? What about the many top players that will never win an award because theres an even better player but should still deserve rep increases? 

11 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

I'm repeating myself for almost 2 years now how it can be easily fixed and it seems to remain unheard

Yeah not sure why they arent listening to this suggestion which will only take less than a minute to fix.

Edited November 5, 2022 by Platinum

[Daveincid]

vor 1 Minute schrieb Platinum:

I assume you're talking about the the awards not boosting reputation enough?

The probem isn't the "enough". The problem is that in some cases it's zero. Out of my head some of the most important awards like europeans golden boy award has no reputation added. The data in england is also pretty bad, so especially in those Nations which urgently need a boost, the data is bad. 

vor 4 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

What about the many top players that will never win an award because theres an even better player but should still deserve rep increased?

This mainly affects players over 21 and at that point, the reputation gain works in 90% of the cases very good due to league apps, titles, national team selection and so on. If you would boost that reputation also you will have the same problem again because once those players are 33+ years old their reputation will be too high. 

vor 6 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

Yeah not sure why they arent listening to this suggestion which will only take less than a minute to fix.

2 minutes I would say, as it affects several awards

[Platinum]

Thanks for explaining what youve seen

6 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

This mainly affects players over 21 and at that point, the reputation gain works in 90% of the cases very good due to league apps, titles, national team selection and so on

Ive noticed that there are only are 1 to 2 players (maximum) under the age of 25 in the national teams for Spain, Italy and England on a small database. I know its a small database but it still seems like reputation is impacting players above the age of 21 in this case or maybe its because not enough players are being developed when usng a small database as you suggested earlier?

[Daveincid]

vor 1 Minute schrieb Platinum:

Thanks for explaining what youve seen

Ive noticed that there are only are 1 to 2 players (maximum) under the age of 25 in the national teams for Spain, Italy and England on a small database. I know its a small database but it still seems like reputation is impacting players above the age of 21 in this case or maybe its because not enough players are being developed when usng a small database as you suggested earlier?

You're welcome!

It doesn't surpize me. As I said, the 3 main issue in big Nations:

1. too low reputation gain for U21 players

2. too low reputation gain for U21 players

3. see point 2

Reputation changes constantly, no matter of the age. The development speed in this years version is no issue at all this year (finally)

[pizzachips]

36 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

Yes. This is why I often get different results like other users. If you simulate 30+ years with like 5 playabe nations only you will get a much less balanced gameworld as when you load 30 playable Nations. I don't say the other tests are wrong, they just do not show the whole picture. 
Should the game be better balanced with less loaded leagues? yes
Will it be 1:1 the same as when you load more leagues? Never

The reputation-system works completely fine for the majority of all Nations. It mainly has issues in top Nations because it doesn't boost U21-players reputation too much. As explained this is mainly a researcher issue and not a coding issue. There is a significant lack of missing data in the editor for years. I'm repeating myself for almost 2 years now how it can be easily fixed and it seems to remain unheard. But hey, I'll fix it in my first update for FM23, so I'm good  
 

I don't think that there are major issues with how the AI decides who to buy. Otherwise the game would be completely messed up after 20+ years, which isn't the case at all.

hey Dave- thanks as always for these helpful and insightful posts

qu- understand the pt on playable leagues, but for those whos systems cant have say more than the main 5 on playable ( eng, fra, spain, germany, italy) if under advanced set up you add players from multiple main countries globally i.e Nigeria, Korea, Argentina, belgium  will this help with the balance as regens will load once the main players leave?

Edited November 5, 2022 by pizzachips
changed database from small to large

[Daveincid]

Gerade eben schrieb pizzachips:

will this help with the balance as regens will load once the main players leave?

In terms of the age-issue in top leagues: No

[Platinum]

2 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

You're welcome!

It doesn't surpize me. As I said, the 3 main issue in big Nations:

1. too low reputation gain for U21 players

2. too low reputation gain for U21 players

3. see point 2

Reputation changes constantly, no matter of the age. The development speed in this years version is no issue at all this year (finally)

So basically you think that once they turn 21 their rep is already so low that the reputation gain they make through league apps etc isnt enough.

Edited November 5, 2022 by Platinum

[pizzachips]

1 minute ago, Daveincid said:

In terms of the age-issue in top leagues: No

sorry my last qu- does it help then with global regen youth generation then i.e provide a more balanced feel?

[Daveincid]

Gerade eben schrieb Platinum:

So basically you think that once they turn 21 there rep is already so low that the reputation gain they make through league apps etc isnt enough.

No, it will get better balanced over the years but the result is that you'll have for example an italian newgen aged 26 with a CA of 160 since he's 20 but with only 1 national team apps because his reputation increased too slow between age 16-21

[Daveincid]

Gerade eben schrieb pizzachips:

sorry my last qu- does it help then with global regen youth generation then i.e provide a more balanced feel?

1. newgen, not regen (trigger)

2. Everyone feels different. I would say yes but that's very individual

[Platinum]

12 minutes ago, Daveincid said:

No, it will get better balanced over the years but the result is that you'll have for example an italian newgen aged 26 with a CA of 160 since he's 20 but with only 1 national team apps because his reputation increased too slow between age 16-21

Yeah I think we are saying the same thing there!

Im guessing the reputation gain is also zero for 2nd and 3rd place in these awards.

[Daveincid]

vor 9 Minuten schrieb Platinum:

Im guessing the reputation gain is also zero for 2nd and 3rd place in these awards.

I don't think so but I'll take a closer look at it

[Mars_Blackmon]

1 hour ago, Daveincid said:

Yes. This is why I often get different results like other users. If you simulate 30+ years with like 5 playabe nations only you will get a much less balanced gameworld as when you load 30 playable Nations. I don't say the other tests are wrong, they just do not show the whole picture. 
Should the game be better balanced with less loaded leagues? yes
Will it be 1:1 the same as when you load more leagues? Never

The reputation-system works completely fine for the majority of all Nations. It mainly has issues in top Nations because it doesn't boost U21-players reputation too much. As explained this is mainly a researcher issue and not a coding issue. There is a significant lack of missing data in the editor for years. I'm repeating myself for almost 2 years now how it can be easily fixed and it seems to remain unheard. But hey, I'll fix it in my first update for FM23, so I'm good  
 

I don't think that there are major issues with how the AI decides who to buy. Otherwise the game would be completely messed up after 20+ years, which isn't the case at all.

I can agree that the database size makes a huge difference unfortunately. For example using your mod while having every league loaded as playable in the game, I didn’t run into any horrible AI squad building issues as far as transfers in FM22. First experience in FM23 with 5 leagues loaded, everything was drastically worse when it came to transfer AI. I’m sure if I loaded all the leagues, it would have been different. Sadly not everyone can play with many leagues loaded and that’s an effect of SI not wanting to raise specs to keep the audience with low spec computers. So they need to find a way to fix this with minimum leagues loaded. Double edge sword.

Edited November 5, 2022 by Mars_Blackmon

[Daveincid]

vor 1 Minute schrieb Mars_Blackmon:

Sadly not everyone can play with many leagues loaded and that’s an effect of SI not wanting to raise specs to keep the audience with low spec computers. Double edge sword.

Kinda different topic but still related.

My question: Is FM really optimized that bad? So if you check single-core performance of a 8yo PC with a current gen, is FM slower as the difference in benchmarks like cpuuserbenchmark.com?

My guess would be that it's actually in line with the overall CPU-improvements. 

The other point would be if there is a technical way to delegate more ingame-processes to more available cores. I think this is one of the area from @EdL? (sorry for tagging you). 

Thinking loud: I've read that AMD had performance issues with their latest gen CPU's and they want to solve it directly with game publishers. Maybe SI could go that route too? So it would be less an optimization of SI but more by AMD/Intel?

[Andy1979]

Why can't si make the game balanced no matter how many leagues,nations you have loaded? I have no clue how easy or hard that would be.

[Teep]

8 minutes ago, Andy1979 said:

Why can't si make the game balanced no matter how many leagues,nations you have loaded? I have no clue how easy or hard that would be.

Not being able to fix it for FM22 and then FM23 shows that it's not something SI cares about, else they would at least have looked at what Daveincid did in his realism pack and improve on it

[TheAwesomeGem]

6 hours ago, Teep said:

Not being able to fix it for FM22 and then FM23 shows that it's not something SI cares about, else they would at least have looked at what Daveincid did in his realism pack and improve on it

It's crazy to realize they don't care about long term save progression. Having not a lot of progression kills the game for me after a couple of seasons. I guess Football Manager is meant to be played for only 3-5 seasons and then switch to a new save.

[mikcheck]

Do you guys also take a look at teams average age? I believe most of them are in 30's?

I still play FM21 and some of the best teams are on 26-27's (long term save) 

Edited November 6, 2022 by mikcheck

[Neil Brock]

16 hours ago, Teep said:

Not being able to fix it for FM22 and then FM23 shows that it's not something SI cares about, else they would at least have looked at what Daveincid did in his realism pack and improve on it

We're constantly looking at feedback within the community, especially that which includes such impressive detail and has considered a number of factors. As Daveincid has said on this very same page, he feels it's improved compared to last years version. We care about every area of the game, it's just we always have to prioritise our resource and make sure any changes (many of which have potential for huge game-wide knock-ons) improve the entire game. 

[Dotsworthy]

On 05/11/2022 at 21:09, Teep said:

Not being able to fix it for FM22 and then FM23 shows that it's not something SI cares about, else they would at least have looked at what Daveincid did in his realism pack and improve on it

To be fair to SI, this was brought up pretty late in FM22's dev cycle, long after the final patch.

10 hours ago, mikcheck said:

Do you guys also take a look at teams average age? I believe most of them are in 30's?

I still play FM21 and some of the best teams are on 26-27's (long term save) 

FM21 doesn't have this issue because older players CA decays more sharply and younger players CA growth is more rapid.

[CFuller]

10 minutes ago, Dotsworthy said:

To be fair to SI, this was brought up pretty late in FM22's dev cycle, long after the final patch.

I didn't get the game until April - halfway through the release cycle - and I only noticed it when I was running some holiday saves like I always do before starting a new career. I'm sure a few reports about youth development were raised before I put mine in, but I'm surprised that nobody else had taken a long, hard look at it.

Which is why it's very important that @Mcfc1894has brought this to light so early in FM23's cycle.

[TheAwesomeGem]

Every season, average age after 2031 increases by 3-5 years in every teams. I see players like Saka, James, Rashford playing up until they are 45 years old and have around 35 apps in Premier League which even Ronaldo cannot get. I don't see how it's a non-issue when AI team building is this bad after 8 seasons. I guess we will have to wait until FM 2024 for this to get balanced out and I will have to switch out playing shorter saves.

[Wolf_pd]

2 hours ago, TheAwesomeGem said:

Every season, average age after 2031 increases by 3-5 years in every teams. I see players like Saka, James, Rashford playing up until they are 45 years old and have around 35 apps in Premier League which even Ronaldo cannot get. I don't see how it's a non-issue when AI team building is this bad after 8 seasons. I guess we will have to wait until FM 2024 for this to get balanced out and I will have to switch out playing shorter saves.

Marcus Rashford is currently 25 years old so in 8 seasons he is 33. Saka is 21 and 29 in 8 seasons. Not entirely sure how you come to them being 45 at that time. Playing at 33-34 and still being a good player isn't out of the ordinary.

Currently most players will retire in the 37-40 age age range. If your save shows differently, please log a bug and SI will look at it.

[KingCanary]

45 minutes ago, Wolf_pd said:

Currently most players will retire in the 37-40 age age range. If your save shows differently, please log a bug and SI will look at it.

I'm not sure that is correct- a quick browse suggest the average age for retirement is 35 and very few players are playing at the top level regularly aged 37-40. Google suggests only 4 players in that age bracket have made an appearance in Premier League this season. 

[Wolf_pd]

18 minutes ago, KingCanary said:

I'm not sure that is correct- a quick browse suggest the average age for retirement is 35 and very few players are playing at the top level regularly aged 37-40. Google suggests only 4 players in that age bracket have made an appearance in Premier League this season. 

For clarification, I am talking about the game, not reallife

[Cobblers]

Age distribution of UEFA Champions League players from 1992–1993 to 2017–2018.

[Cobblers]

Age trend of UEFA Champions League players.

[Cobblers]

Age trend by playing position.

[Cobblers]

Age trend by team performance.

[Cobblers]

The histogram of the age distribution for players included in the study is presented in Figure 1. The age of the players ranges from 16 to 43, with an average of 25.75 ± 4.14 years. A large number of players were observed between 21 and 29 years (>80%). From 29 years an onward, there is a substantial yearly decrease in the number of players. Between the 1992–1993 and 2017–2018 seasons, a significant increase in the players’ average age (>1.6 years) was observed (p < 0.001). However, this increase was not uniform, and two break-points were identified along these seasons, the first one in season 2003–2004 and the second one in season 2013–2014, which can be observed in Figure 2/Image 2 (as posted above).

Feel free to check the published article out at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6360147/.

It would be interesting to find out in FM shares the same trends as demonstrated above.

Edited November 7, 2022 by Cobblers

[Cobblers]

2 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

For clarification, I am talking about the game, not reallife

Which should be represented within the game.

IRL 35 is talked about being the average retirement age, but many of these players will drop down the leagues/teams and not take up high spots in international football/Champions League.

 

Edited November 7, 2022 by Cobblers

[Amarante]

17 hours ago, C0bbl3rs said:

Which should be represented within the game.

IRL 35 is talked about being the average retirement age, but many of these players will drop down the leagues/teams and not take up high spots in international football/Champions League.

 

But Context, teams that are always in the UCL will have players that are within their prime years but there is a big recent trend of players who are playing high level UCL football above 30 the data won't reflect that yet but as your own data is showing the age trend is going further and further up north. 

[Rashidi]

On 05/11/2022 at 22:18, HoChiKim said:

I load a large db and retain high rep players worldwide then run about 10 nations for a long term save.

I have never liked simply adding players. These added players only appear in national squads and because you haven’t loaded their leagues, you basically have a bunch of players just sitting there. Personally I would load whatever leagues I can make playable without adding a load of players who are from nations that are unplayable.

[TheAwesomeGem]

Has this been fixed on the release?

[Zapoleon]

9 hours ago, TheAwesomeGem said:

Has this been fixed on the release?

Highly doubt it. If its to be fixed and that's a big if will probably be in a patch months from now. 

 

[albertocerdeira.4]

En 6/11/2022 a las 14:51, Neil Brock dijo:

We're constantly looking at feedback within the community, especially that which includes such impressive detail and has considered a number of factors. As Daveincid has said on this very same page, he feels it's improved compared to last years version. We care about every area of the game, it's just we always have to prioritise our resource and make sure any changes (many of which have potential for huge game-wide knock-ons) improve the entire game. 

 

For me, and  FOR me there are no excuses acceptable by the SI Team, you have no intention to solve this in a short term basis. The problem with the big teams getting older and older until the original players retire has been for +365 days from now, as well as the problem of full backs uncapable of cross and dribble and wingers with 5 shooting, problem which has been in the game for years.

 

As a developer, if you hadn't solved a problem like this in a year, or more in the case of the atributes of newgens, there is only one option : you don't want to solve the problem.

 

It's so disappointing and I am about to open a topic about my feelings about this, but it feels like you don't care to kill long term saves as you are selling more than ever. 

 

Sorry if I am being unpolite, but as a developer I cannot accept any excuse to not solve a problem in a year

[CFuller]

Has anyone actually bothered running any tests to see if the situation has improved since the full update? Or are we just going to assume it hasn't been fixed?