Should FM be just as much about squad building as tactics for difficulty?

[jcafcwbb]

To explain this point I will talk about the real life difficulty in football.

My club AFC Wimbledon. We brought through three decent Academy players Ayoub Assal, Jack Rudoni and Jack Currie. In the 21/22 season we were doing okay in L1 till we received an offer for Ollie Palmer and as we could not compete with Wrexham on wages we sold him. He was focal to our tactics, we couldn't replace him and we went down. In the 22/23 season we doing okay in L2 then Assal's release fee was met, he was the new focal point of our attack, we couldn't replace him and had a bad second half of the season. We also lost Jack Rudoni to Huddersfield and will probably lose Jack Currie this transfer window.

We saw Leicester win the league then lose their best two players. West Ham have lost Declan Rice and probably Pacqueta this window. And Kane has gone to Bayern. Grealish went to Man City. 

I see a lot of threads about realism and difficulty in the game but surely the one that most mimics real life is that unless you are a wealthy club you will lose your best players and have to constantly rebuild. I know that realistic transfers will kill the 6th tier to Champions League winners save so would it be something that would add a touch of difficulty above getting the tactics right. And do not get me started on a 3rd tier or below club having the resources to find a 17 year old wonderkid from Peru - which would never happen in real life,

I seem to very rarely get offers for my players even though we are performing well and they are some of the highest rated in the division. I think I have seen before that AI transfers are not the best. 

[Brasilia88]

Couldn't agree more!

 

The reason why this doesn't happen is that the AI only looks at PA.

Meaning that your best player might just be YOUR best player and nothing more than that. 

The same can be said about the entire transfer system which miraculously has every single team that's interested offer the same amount for your player. 

[busngabb]

The transfer market in the game is just broken. It's almost impossible to sell anyone and your players more often than not reject offers even when you do get them, even loans. I signed a young player and he asked to be loaned out as part of his negotiations. I offered him for loan and he got three offers, Valencia, Porto and Alkmaar. He had no interest in Alkmaar and Porto as he wanted Valencia, so I accept their offer. He rejects it and is now unhappy as the transfer window closed and he thinks I didn't do enough to loan him out. [Smacks face with mouse repeatedly]. It's like this trying to get rid of dead wood from your squad as well, even players unregistered and told they're not wanted won't move, even on loan.

Signing players on the other hand is ridiculously easy. You're an unknown manager who wants to sign Schelderup, Moukoko, Endrick, Scott, Diomande, Olise and Garancho in the same season although the club doesn't have anyone older than 27 and the future transfer debt is already fatal? Sure, go right ahead, no problem at all.

I think this all feeds back in to the difficulty levels question. The tactics side of the game is pretty good I think, but the nuances to be good at the game go way above most people's heads, mine included. So most players of the game either download someone else's tactics that are proven to work, or just upgrade their squad unreaslistically easily and overpower it that way. If we made transfers realistic, i.e harder to convince your club to sign players, needing to have balance in the squad and in the transfer activity in a window, finding it harder to attract players and making clubs more aggressive in unsettling and signing your players, there's a danger it becomes depressing. Some would love that, the realism would be right up their street and achievements made would feel amazing. However, for most it would excrutiating. How do you cater for both without difficulty levels?

 

[Feddo]

I would love if there was an option to set the level of difficulty like you have in Fifa (or any other skill game). And then at the highest level you could have a realistic transfer system.

Not the way I would play it though, not that good at it. Even after all those years 😅