herne79

You're not doing anything wrong because the lines, regardless of colour, are meaningless. As you yourself say "roles which I would expect to work ok (results and performances suggest they do)". The performance is what's important, not some line that lacks context or fails to take into consideration how your system is performing. imo one of the worst implemented "features" of recent years.

A few things here. 1) There is no substitute for trying it out and seeing what’s good / what’s bad during matches. People can give you all kinds of advice and different opinions but at the end of the day if your tactic gets results that’s all that matters. Understanding how it works of course is a different matter. That being said: 2) Personally I wouldn’t set up my player’s roles like that. I like variety in attack (with the same roles down both flanks you wouldn’t get it, albeit with a little variety due to different player’s attributes) and both flanks with all 4 players given an attack duty could lead you to being very exposed to counter attacks. 3) I’d also want to pay attention to how player roles combine with player attributes/Traits. For example, giving a Wingback (default player instruction to get forward often) an attack duty will make him very forward thinking. Now combine that with a player who may have the Trait to get forward often and suddenly you have a player who probably isn’t very defence minded. It’s also of note that the Overlap instruction makes your wingbacks even more forward thinking. Now there’s wrong with that so long as you are aware of the potential issue and you have a plan B to address the problem if it occurs. 4) The tactic is just one side of the coin. The players are the flip side. What I mean by that is the tactic asks your players to do certain things but it’s the player’s own abilities (attributes and Traits) that enable them to actually carry out your instructions to any degree of competence. So here you are asking your players to play in a gegenpress (ie., high intensity) style - are they actually capable of doing that week in week out? Do they have the physical and mental capacity to maintain such a style and recover well between matches? I know you’re new to the game and I’m probably getting a little ahead of myself here as I’m touching on more advanced mechanics. I mentioned in your other thread that starting small and building from there can be a good beginner strategy whereas here you seem to be jumping in the deep end somewhat. Nothing wrong with that, just be prepared for old soaks like me to start confusing you with talk of variety, combinations and plan Bs .

Sound bites to attract clicks. In a nutshell there are different ways to play the game. Some people just want to “win” and they’ll employ any means to do so, even using “broken” tactics which might exploit certain weaknesses in the game. Nothing wrong with that at all, that’s how some find enjoyment and good luck to them. Others find enjoyment by being truer to perhaps the “spirit” of the game if I can term it like that - trying to play the game in a more realistic manner that might better reflect how real life football might play out. So instead of trying to exploit the game, they’ll try to find ways to exploit the opposition team, much like a real life coach might perhaps do. Success can be achieved by either means although I’d suggest the former is perhaps easier than the latter. Really it’s all about how each person finds enjoyment which is a personal choice, thus no way is “better” than the other. However, as you are looking for a more authentic experience then avoiding exploitative strategies is probably what you are looking for. I’d suggest one of two ways to get started with tactics: 1) Keep it simple. Start with a basic formation, zero team or player instructions and just pick some roles that you think sound good from the in game descriptions and which might perhaps suit your players once you’ve studied them a little. Watch a couple of matches and see how your players move. Change some roles and see what differences you notice after a couple more games. If it helps, watch in 2D rather than 3D or adjust cameras angles in match. Note - using player instructions in this scenario are only really to help you achieve a certain style of play (such as possession football or counter attacking football) and/or to address certain issues which might crop up in game. These strategies can start to get a little more advanced so for now I’d recommend steering clear until you feel you have a decent grasp on what the player roles do. There are plenty of tactical guides pinned to the top of the forum or pretty much anything written by @Cleon are good starting points for that. 2) Using the in game default tactics. A valid way of starting out as they give you an introduction to various styles of play. However if trying to learn tactics this can lead to confusion as it’s not always clear which instruction is doing what. It can be better to start from nothing and build your own system rather than starting with a fully blown system and trying to figure out how it works. Again however some people will take to it like a duck to water.

It could mean that yes. It’s possible to create tactics which can exploit certain weaknesses in the AI and/or Match Engine. However these don’t always last for long as SI can plug such holes. On the other hand a broken tactic could also mean someone is simply struggling to get results and looking for help.

I wouldn’t bother. Not because of some CA issue but realistically who at a low league level plays with 2 feet? As an aside, I’ve never bothered about developing a player’s weaker foot anyway, regardless of playing level. Messi seems quite happy with just one foot so if it’s good enough for him…

That’s not how it works. In game, a player cannot develop their weaker foot beyond average (10) unless their starting point is already beyond that. Thus only players who have been set as such in the current database by a researcher or newgens who are “born” with it can hope to develop their weaker foot to any great extent. Because of that, “eating up CA” isn’t actually as egregious as people think. Going from 1-20 would indeed take up a lot of CA, but the weak foot can’t develop like that in game. btw learning the Trait doesn’t develop the weaker foot, thus it doesn’t impact CA directly. It merely gives the player the ability to develop their weaker foot only once the Trait learning has successfully completed.

Nowhere near enough to worry about.

Trying to learn how the ME works is not relevant. Understand football, not the ME. Then consider how tactics work in combination with player attributes. The demo is perfectly fine for experimenting with tactics and players 👍.

Obviously I'm not going to flick through all of your posts lol however just from the first couple of pages of your activity you: Play as Man Utd (nothing wrong with that, different levels of team have different pressures); You offer advice on how to bypass offers in order to cancel transfers; You're "99%" successful in getting young players to sack their agents if they come to you asking for a pay rise after breaking into the first team; You like to stack older players with good personalities just to use them as tutors; Apparently Determination doesn't matter. I wonder what else you do. I'm really not trying to pick on you here but can't you see how some of the things you do in game aren't actually in the spirit of the game and such unrealistic inputs are helping to make things easier for you? Yes there are most certainly some aspects of the game which have room for improvement (AI squad building for example) but you can't just point the finger of blame at the game when you're exploiting certain aspects of it.

I have several games in my library that don't. For example, World of Warcraft, Euro Truck Simulator and Motorsport Manager to name just 3. Anyway, as you find the game so easy, what would be far more valuable for the devs (and perhaps others who don't find it as easy) would be if you and others like you detail exactly how you play the game rather than just "still easy like FM22". Constructive feedback like that could actually be very useful. For example, do you play the game in a realistic manner? Do you simply load up the latest OP tactic and have at it? What style of football do you tend to use? Do you holiday seasons or past each match? Do you use an instant result mod? How do you deal and interact with your players? How do you treat the transfer market? How do you watch and manage matches? What aspects do you delegate to your staff? How do you set up your games (leagues loaded, attributes on/off, manager's badges etc)? Just a few examples, there are plenty of other aspects. I'm not asking you to answer me here, merely saying that perhaps some constructive feedback in terms of what you do and how you play the game might be valuable.

Scroll down the forum a little bit and you’ll find a current thread all about exactly what you are looking for (“The Art of Possession…”) 👍.

Actually in FM terms it doesn’t. I think this is where the confusion may be coming from. It’s perfectly possible in FM to set up a very high percentage possession system but very low shots, let alone goals. Players will indeed keep possession merely for the sake of it without any other purpose because that is what the tactical instructions are effectively telling them to do. What Cleon is driving at is by relaxing some of those tactical instructions (and thus the ridiculously high possession numbers) our players will start to have an actual purpose other than just keeping the ball: ie., patiently attacking the opposition, high possession numbers, having more shots and scoring more goals. I’ve made possession heavy systems where I’ll get well in excess of 70% possession but the number of chances created I can count on the fingers of one hand and actually score a goal once in a blue moon, which is utterly pointless. Players kick the ball around with little or no thought to attacking because that’s what their instructions tell them to do. So I change some TIs, alter a role or three and the result? Lower (although still 60%+) possession but much more attacking intent and goals. So the “facts” are as Cleon is saying - set up a possession tactic too far and it’ll be pointless because the tactical instructions will essentially tell your team to keep possession for possession’s sake. Therefore don’t aim for quite such high possession numbers (although still dominate possession) to give our teams much better attacking intentions 👍.

Lots of SI quotes around mentioning training vs match time at a relevant level for under 18s and 18s and over, below is one where two different SI staff mention it. As far as I’m aware it’s still relevant and haven’t seen any changes from SI. If you’re testing that perhaps give you a starting point and something to compare results against 👍. The speed at which players develop appears to have changed but that’s a different subject. https://community.sigames.com/forums/topic/465429-i-dont-think-player-development-is-realistic/

Do you have a link to an SI quote on this change? It always used to be that whilst both training and playing matches at a relevant level were important, training took precedence for under 18s and matches at a relevant level took precedence for 18s and over.

Git . I'm on the edge of memory here but I have a feeling that once upon a time the HB was (incorrectly) flagged as a playmaker role, although possibly only for AI teams? That role's been so bugged over the years you lose track but once upon a time I'm sure I saw someone from SI say it had now been (correctly) unflagged. But yeh, especially given who has played the role irl, it's always been a kind of pseudo-playmaker. Something to experiment with perhaps. Who knows, I may actually come to like it . Anyway back on topic, I can see how these principles could play out with other formations. I can imagine the SV role being particularly deadly.

A good change to better reflect reality. Just a bit odd it wasn’t communicated and seems to be hidden away. Anyway, the original article is probably the single most impactful article I ever read here and got the most from. Great to see it updated 👌. Interesting to see the RPM role being used, a somewhat under appreciated role I think but useful for helping bring the ball out of defence and driving forward. And a quick mention of the Half Back - a role I’ve always thoroughly detested - you’re using that purely from a replication perspective or primarily to give you the passing options and movement you’re looking for? (Knowing you I guess primarily the latter but a probably a bit of both). Personally I’ll use anything but an HB so perhaps I should put my biases to one side and revisit the role (yikes ).

Apart from the Spanish, imo one of the most underutilised and underappreciated traits .

So in the main, players at large clubs in the top leagues achieved a high CA whereas players who are at smaller clubs in lower ranked leagues didn't. Bearing in mind that match time at a relevant level is important for player development, this seems about right. There are well documented issues with player development but I don't think this experiment shows it very well.

The problem with these videos isn’t with the amount of work that goes into them, the lack of info in game, or not even really about someone’s lack of understanding of the game. It’s about drawing conclusions without verifying with SI before publishing. As soon as you start making your unverified conclusions public with “evidence” (lol) which appears to back it up, people believe it. And that’s a problem because the myth then snowballs and spreads, even if you later back track and change your opinion. This is not the first time it’s happened either. And if we all know there’s a lack of in game description, don’t make assumptions about what something does without checking what it actually does before you make a video about it.

Please don’t. Your conclusions are fundamentally flawed and you create myths which damage the community. If you really want to help the community rather than just grow your channel with click bait, send your results to SI for them to verify BEFORE releasing videos. Of course you then wouldn’t actually release any videos as SI debunking your claims wouldn’t make for very good content. You (and other YouTubers) need to understand that the game is based on realism. As soon as you start using the game in unrealistic ways, such as messing around with height/jumping reach, using unnatural training programs or using in game reports unrealistically, you run a big risk of seeing unexpected results. That’s not the game being flawed (as you and others tend to tell the world), that’s your inputs or data use being flawed. SI are always open to receiving data - they even encourage users to stress test the system and send them the data. So by all means do that. Just stop drawing conclusions unless SI have actually verified something.

The AI never figures your tactics out. This however is true. The AI is perfectly capable of playing more aggressively or passively as the match plays out. But that is very different to figuring out your tactics 👍.

Only if they need it.

Leave General Training to your assistant and youth team managers. They're actually pretty good at this. Set Individual Training yourself. Set once for each player (a little tedious to set up but once done it's done) then check once every 6-12 months. Set each player's training based on attributes: don't worry if you end up training your Box to Box Midfielder (for example) as a Carrilero - you aren't actually training roles, you are training a set of attributes. Mentoring groups are used to pass on personality and/or Traits so don't use highly influential players with bad personalities / low determination / dodgy Traits in groups with young players. Check your training groups to make sure attackers are training with attackers and so on. That's basically it. Training and playing matches at a relevant level are important for player development, with training taking precedence for players under the age of 18 and match time taking precedence for 18+ players. If you want to loan out a player to help their development, make sure they get plenty of match time when you negotiate the deal (regular starter or better). You can get much more involved with training but the above is relatively simple and pretty effective.

This type of "analysis" does the community no good at all - in fact it actually harms the community because this is exactly how myths are born which quickly turn into "fact". Analysis is undertaken which gets backed up by fancy looking spreadsheets and sets of data which appear to confirm the conclusions which are drawn. Their viewers then see this, agree, confirmation bias kicks in and hey presto a new myth is born. Now I'm all for users stress testing the game. But what would be much better to see would be the data being given to SI with a comment along the lines of "this seems odd, please look into it", without conclusions being drawn. Perhaps with a follow up video once SI have looked into things. But then feedback which debunks their videos don't tend to sit well with these youtubers . Best thing to do is ignore them but unfortunately people get suckered in - and that's the real issue here.

Junior Coaching and Youth Recruitment (and Youth Facilities) all have a roughly equal affect on the CA and PA of newgens. Link to SI post. That above link also explains what they mean .