Jonthedon26

Tuesday at 15:49

I always assumed that playing position was the the role you have in your current tactic. So if your tactic has ball playing defender then that's playing position, or you can select a different role if you want them to train a different role to the one being used in your tactic.

May 2

36 minutes ago, NineCloudNine said:

There’s a thread right now in the Tactics forum from a new player who can’t make anything work and is on the point of quitting.

The vast majority of players who struggle won’t even make it that far, they’ll just quit and do/play something else.

The regulars here have persevered through multiple FMs, learned to navigate a mindblowingly complex UI, studied Rashidi tutorials on what ‘mentality’ means (clue: it’s not what you’d think it means), learned what to do when players throw tantrums, worked out how to buy all the wonderkids. And so on.

We’re the weird ones.

I trust SI to have a much better grasp of the experience of the playerbase than we do. They have actual data, research, patterns.

If you overachieve it’s because you’ve mastered the game and know all the ways to make it work right.

Well done, you can now /flex on the forums about how easy it all is.

This is spot on!

I have played FM for years and years and years so I know it inside out, I know what I should and shouldn't do and how to deal with certain situations, which I am sure is the same for many experienced FM players. On the other hand, I simply can't get my head around some games that I myself am new to, such as the OOTP baseball series, and Hearts of Iron 4. I am simply terrible at those games and no matter what I have tried I just can't get seem to do well in them and I end up quitting and not playing them.

May 2

6 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

Started to think about, and noticed that I have had hundreds of careers on FM since 2007 and I have never been sacked or underachieved on my saves. With underachieving I mean that you would pick for example a team predicted to finish ninth and end up finishing below that or even relegated. Does this ever happen with human players?

I can't say that I have experienced this. My first save on every version of FM is Birmingham City, and without fail I always get promoted to the Premier League within 2 seasons, and I have never been relegated back down again. The first season in the Premier League is sometimes difficult and a few times I have come close to getting relegated, but in the more recent versions I seem to do really well first season and massively overachieve. This year I got promoted to the Premier League in my second season, and came 8th in the first season in the Premier League. I would actually really enjoy the challenge of getting relegated again.

April 15

On 13/04/2024 at 17:27, El Payaso said:

This is a well-written message which includes also many of my own thoughts about the difficulty.

I'm going to once again use my home country Finland as an example as that is the football that I nowadays know most about. In Finland during the last 20 years or so it has been incredibly hard to strengthen even an established club and for example finding strikers that can score goals has been almost impossible to the domestic teams. They often bring someone from abroad but more often than not those signings end up being flops. It is a real rarity that a striker arriving from abroad scores regularly even though we're not even talking about that high level of football. Also it is fairly common that the real quality of the player is only revealed after a couple of months in the club while on FM you have both in scout reports and later on player report almost instantly a good picture of the level of the player. These make it way harder to actually sign players that turn into flops.

This week I was playing online with a friend of mine who nowadays coaches in the second tier of Finnish football. He had never played FM before and was quite astonished about the tactical side of the game. He took the initial tactical setup and used about 30 seconds with that, proceeded to play games, did incredibly well and at some point was asking me: is this going to be difficult at some and are you at some point supposed to actually create a style of play where you have to put some effort on instructing the players how to play, how to attack and how to defend or is this going to be on autopilot. Then when we had our first fixture against each other and he had to for the first time starting to think things more throughly he was amused when he had no option to tell the team to stop the feeding for my pacey winger who was giving him a lot of trouble. I won that match and he was mainly just saying that in real life he would have plenty of options to instruct the team and tell them exactly what he wants them to do in different scenarios while on FM he felt that there was nothing he could do than just do "something" and hope for the best. In short his opinion was that the tactical side had very little to do with how things work in real life.

I'm also on the same page with many things. Evem though I wouldn't want sliders to be in the game anymore, the tactical side of the game feels way too much of scratching the surface and setting up a system works too much like we are on auto pilot. In the Finnish online save I used 17 seconds to set up a tactic, never really did anything after that, played with extended highlights and won the domestic triple with a team that was predicted to finish seventh.

If you compare my gameplay to what it was on 07 or 08, I have definitely become really lazy with different kind of features. In the past I used to use hours tinkering with tactics and training but these have both become so overwhelming and difficult to control that I am usually just auto piloting with them. Would love to use all the features and putting a lot of effort but as the game doesn't force you to do it or give you an option to really be in control and make a big difference using them, I really don't bother anymore.

Would love it if FM 2025 could change many things in terms of the existing features by making them more in-depth and again possible to make big difference so that players like me would again get interested in using them. And most importantly: give good instructions how to use all the features instead of leaving people guessing and just seeing out what happens.

I agree with a lot that you said here, especially about being lazy with different kind of features. These days, mainly due to lack of available time and I don't have as much interest in FM as I used to, I will set up my tactic, and if it works well that's it, it stays and I literally so nothing with it for a whole season, maybe even a few seasons, besides adjusting the mentality depending on the level of team I am playing. I never tinker with my tactics anymore, I don't use the data hub for anything, and I genuinely feel they aren't needed to be honest, I am always successful managing my team (Birmingham City) and I never really struggle. Could I get the team to perform even better if I tinkered more and used the data hub more etc... possibly, but I can't see how it could get much better.

April 15

Was Kerlon a wonderkid back in the day? He is one that stands out that I haven't seen mentioned yet.

April 9

39 minutes ago, NineCloudNine said:

Positional play, intermediaries, player targets, new game modes, set piece coaches/wizard:

https://www.footballmanager.com/features

Aaaahhh yeah I forgot about those as I don't use any of them haha. I blame my bad memory on my old age!

April 9

16 hours ago, NineCloudNine said:

I am sure there is nothing SI would like more than to have a year without having to create any new features. I'd certainly enjoy it too. But it's a big risk because plenty of those people who claim they're not bothered by new features will then complain that they are being asked to pay again for a game which basically fixes the bugs in the game they bought the year before.

The annual cycle is the curse here. But the alternative is a subscription model and whenever I have suggested that here the idea gets a lot of pushback.

Wasn't that supposed to be this year? I can't actually remember any new features this year, I just remember the main selling point of this years iteration was that it was supposed to be the most polished version to date.

April 8

I went back to FM09 recently and played as Birmingham City in the championship... it was solid haha. They are my team and I play as them for my first (and sometimes only) save on every FM and despite us being absolutely awful in real life for 10 years, on the newer versions I always get promoted to the premier league within 2 seasons and have yet to ever be relegated or sacked. Again as you pointed out I don't know if that is because the game has become easier, or whether I just know what works and what doesn't on FM these days.

April 8

On 28/03/2024 at 18:06, wazzaflow10 said:

14 of the 24 are two goals or fewer. What's the obsession with 1-0 for every match? What a boring game that would be. Might as well go home after one team scores.

Sorry, my comments were very tongue in cheek... I did say to call me old fashioned haha

March 28

4 hours ago, XaW said:

Could you post your tactic? I know the memeworthy "it's your tactics", but it can actually be something there. Seeing as this is my season, and I have one crazy match, a 5-4 win in the cup, but oyher than that, nothing like that.

And yes, I know I'm not scoring much either, but I am recently promoted to this league and I just try to survive!

Call me old fashioned, and sorry for sticking my nose in, but I would say there are quite a few high scoring games in there. Yes there are several 1-0, 0-0 etc but there are also multiple 3-3 draws and 3-2 games. A third of your games have 4 or more goals in them. There aren't really any crazy examples like the original post, but give me a load of George Graham 1-0's week in week out (sorry for those not old enough to get the 1-0 to the Arsenal reference).

March 12

1 hour ago, iker3085 said:

I've set my responsibilities so that my loan manager takes care of loans for young players. The problem is, that he rejects most offers, even if I negotiated and accepted them, for less potential players and basically accepts all 0% wage / 0€ loan fee offers for higher potential players.

Is there anything I'm missing? Any instructions I could give my loan manager to at least only accept bids with a certain wage percentage and loan fee?
What I want is my loan manager to accept more loan offers from lower league teams and, since almost every loan offer comes with 0% wage and 0€ fee, to negotiate loan offers from higher league teams.

At this moment I feel like he is completely useless, most of my 18-21 year old players remain at my club because he rejects all the offers from lower leagues. And if he accepts an offer, than it is basically a free transfer.

I literally get rid of all staff like loan manager, DoF etc as I find them useless and just a waste of money. They all seem pretty poorly implemented in game from my experience, so to keep my sanity I do it all myself.

March 6

I have noticed, for me anyway, that if I scout any position from tactic I tend to get an okay (okay in FM24 terms) amount of scout reports, maybe somewhere between 15-20, but if I pick a specific position from my tactic then I am lucky to get 3 results, even with very broad parameters. It is very very hit and miss.

March 1

On 27/02/2024 at 22:27, phd_angel said:

It would be super cool if FM included some spicey situations (such as bribery, corruption, a little physical altercation, scandals, etc.) but we've been hearing over the years that SI developers have no interest in implementing that type of realism...

This is why Ultimate Soccer Manager 98 is elite!

February 26

On 23/02/2024 at 20:01, -Jef- said:

Undisputed? You're joking right? Game came out completely unplayable that it's probably the only game I've requested a refund for. Clunky controls, graphics are underwhelming, missing boxers etc.

I'm not specifically talking about the state of the games at launch, I am moreso referring to the constant social media posts about what they are doing, updates etc. Whether the game is good or not is another matter completely.

**EDIT**

Having read through some of the comments since my original post regarding dev communication from Hell Let Loose and Undisputed, maybe I was wrong on the Undisputed front. I don't actually own that game (do own and regularly play HLL) I was just basing the communication side on what I am constantly seeing on X (or Twitter as I will forever know it as). Seems like they post a lot of promises that they don't actually follow through on, which is exactly what I don't want SI to do. So yeah, scrap that, I would rather zero communication than false promises.

February 23

4 hours ago, Eoin Maguire said:

Am I the only one that thinks that SIs communication policy is terrible and works in ways other dev teams just don't?

It's the 23rd of February and there has not been a single word on the Winter Update, what they want to change, when will it be out (approx). The last update (only a minor one) was the beginning of December, this game has a 12 month cycle... It really baffles me to how two FMs ago the Winter Update was already out by now and two years later it's the same time and nothing, not even communication.

It just seems to get worse every year at this stage. For the life of me I can't understand why a dev team don't communicate directly to their consumer, it's just "here it is, we did this, see you in 7 months". If anybody can tell me another dev team that works like that then I will be surprised...

Ye it is shockingly bad to be fair. They should take a leaf out of studios for games like Hell Let Loose or Undisputed, they are constantly posting what they are working on, roadmaps, what to expect in upcoming updates etc

February 19

18 hours ago, Matej said:

Ill tell you whats my main problem with FM 24. Its 2 easy.

Ill try to be short in my explanation.

1. i play control possession with high pressing, its my standard formation and tactic, i played like that in last 4-5 FM managers.
2. i started in 3rd divison. i was first. next season i was 2nd in 2nd division, but over 100 points.
3. Now its my first season in First divison. There are at least 8 clubs that have much much better squad with great rotation players. Also around 6 other clubs with better players then mine.

But even when i play against much stronger squads, im better team with many chances. Its crazy.

Some things i do, just to speed up the game : i send Assistent manager to all press c. I don't touch training and i dont touch set pieces. In my life i never opened some article with wonderkinds, what are best formations etc. Btw, all this people on youtube who are earning money to " help" people are frauds if you ask me. Game is easy, they are sellin you the story about great formations. You just need to take default formation control possession or even better gegenpress and you will have great results. I can take any other formation 2, but i dont like them. im sure ill have great results, as long as you stick to high pressing.

I play on Key highlights. I dont even think about opponent and how they play. It doesnt matter.

My point is, Im doin nothin special and im dominating every League i play. Why AI, who has much better squads then me, dont play for example similiar formation and tactic as mine? Do they play high pressing at all? If the game is fair, AI should crush me with their better players.

Im playin 30+ years FM/ CM, i never played so easy version in my life.

I simply dont understand how someone who has lets say 5 years of experiance in FM, can find this game challenging. If you really have problems, send me PM and in 5 minutes ill tell you what to do and you must have good results.

Ill put my formation and tactic. Its nothing special. So please can anyone from SI explain to me and others how im much better then AI controled teams and they have much better squads? i simply dont understand and all i can think is that game is rigged, that game gives much advantage to human player. I have no other explanation.

From what I have seen on here and through my own experiences, if you play high pressing, high tempo tactics with a high defensive line and high line of engagement it is pretty easy to do well with any standard of team.

February 16

20 hours ago, DarJ said:

@batsy23 I've only read the first page so far and while I do agree that sometimes the game can seem like you're finding a meta instead of managing a football team, I still think that other systems work as well. The tactic below is what I'm using at the moment (ignore the players. I also don't know why it says "custom vertical tiki-taka as I didn't touch any of the presets) and I wouldn't call it a meta tactic and it has been working very well so far, the lines are not super high, I'm not using low crossing or high tempo either the only roles that change in some games are the RPM and WB to DLP and WB on support. It's not a plug and play system either because I tried it in a different save I carried over from FM23 with a struggling semi-pro team and it didn't help at all

Isn't this just another example of what is being talked about? Whilst it isn't as extreme as some, it still seems like the most success is had playing positive, counter, counter-press, higher defensive line and trigger press more often.

I play as Birmingham City every version as they are the team I support. On FM23 I managed to get a good 442 wing play formation to work, that involved regrouping and sitting behind the ball. This year I tried the same tactic and it was horrible, so I switched it up (kept the 442 wing play) and had some success, losing in the playoffs first season. Second season I started well and was top by about November but then went on a bit of a slump and I simply couldn't score a goal, kept drawing 0-0. I decided to try the high press and low cross combination and no word of a lie I scored something ridiculous like 19 goals in 4 games, I had to revert back to my old tactic as it seemed way too overpowered, I was crushing teams.

February 15

9 hours ago, ratty2584 said:

I agree that something is wonky in Scouting in FM24. After banging my head against the wall with focuses that didn't update at all I've had some success recently doing a technique i saw on a youtube video.

Basically create the recruitment focuses you want (but make sure you check the box to EXCLUDE results from other focuses so you dont get duplicates), wait for a week or so for the In Progress to populate then manually scan and move the best looking ones from there into a shortlist to manually scout. After that just delete the recruitment focus and repeat as needed (ideally with different scouts selected or different region focuses for new results).

Interesting, will give this a try as well, cheers.

February 14

7 hours ago, metallimuse said:

I mean I don't know the numbers but I don't think half of the championship would be in that narrow window, it will be far more varied in my opinion.

If, from what you are saying, you are looking for ready made players then have your 3 star CA but increase the PA to 4.5. You're still going to get the 3 star players you want but doesn't restrict the search so much. To have only a half a star wiggle room in your search is so specific. That means anyone above that 3.5 star is omitted, why would you do that?

I will give that a try see what comes from it, thanks.

**EDIT** just coming back to this as I have fired up FM this evening. The PA in recruitment focuses is a "minimum", so surely a minimum of 3 and a half star should pick up more than a minimum 4 and a half star, as the 3 and a half star should pick up that level and above, as it's a minimum, right @metallimuse? So 3 star CA and MINIMUM 4 and a half star PA is a narrower search?

February 14

5 minutes ago, metallimuse said:

So your focus is 3 star CA with 3.5 PA? That is very specific player you are looking for.

I agree it is fairly specific, but I want someone who is basically around first team level who is pretty much in their prime. There should be far far more than 2 results for that criteria, in fact I imagine half of the players in the Championship alone fit that criteria for my current squad. I don't play the game as often as most people and only get through about 5 seasons per yearly release, so I don't want to search for a load of 1 star CA with 4 star PA that will be good in several years time, I like to look for people who are first team ready now, and it seems that doesn't generate many results.

February 14

On 12/02/2024 at 17:30, Dagenham_Dave said:

To get the best from recruitment focuses, you need to, you know, actually focus on something. I see so many people just having open wide parameters and expecting hundreds of results. If you're doing that, you're as well just using player search and scouting players individually.

Narrow your search down. Don't just search for players 15-18 without any other focus. Give your scouts instructions on the type of player to look for, otherwise they'll have no clue who to recommend.

I've not had any issues with scouting in this year's game, and this is the method I use.

I have tried all sorts from narrowed down focuses to much broader searches, setting transfer values to leaving the values as open ended, selecting a position, selecting an age range, and basically none of them work.

One current example of a broad search - I have requested a scout search for any position for my tactic, in England, 3 star - 3 and a half stars, ongoing. I am Birmingham City, have some decent scouts, this scout has exceptional knowledge (apparently) of England, and I have had back 2 results all season, one of which is Adam Wharton who I manually scouted. I don't have scouts or analysts on multiple assignments so this is literally their only scouting assignment. I would love someone to explain to me why I am not getting loads of hits on that assignment.

The only assignment I have had multiple results on is scouting for out of contract players, any position from my tactic, across the whole of Europe ongoing, I got 20 recommendations on that. Again I would expect there to be hundreds, but with this years scouting mess I deem 20 to be a success.

February 12

On 10/02/2024 at 18:25, gunnerfan said:

I wish there was a complete guide to the scouting system that was introduced in FM23 that would answer the following:

1. How may scouts do you need to sufficiently cover a country? A region?
2. Once a country or region is selected to be scouted, do you really need to establish a separate recruitment focus for competitions within those nations? For example, I have a recruitment focus for Central Europe, and now I'm getting suggestions that I may want to establish focuses for Croation, Austrian, and Hungarian top divisions. I would think that would be automatic with the region.
3. What is the best way to set up a focus for an established player to fill a specific positional need (CA and PA)? If I set CA at the level I really need (say, 3 stars), I get no results. Too low, and I get flooded with players I can't use.
4. Does the personality of my chief scout really matter (i.e. the way it matters with the HOYD)?

Thanks for any and all replies.

This is a very good post. Scouting currently feels like a completely broken mess to me. I either get no results at all for very basic parameters that you would imagine there should be hundreds of matches, or very few results that keep getting recommended to me over and over again. I often see other teams signing players who are decent from a region I am scouting and I sit there scratching my head as to why they were never in my recommendations. I would go as far as saying I hate the new scouting system, especially as scouting is such a big part of the game.

February 9

4 hours ago, Litmanen 10 said:

Has anyone found a workaround for the scouting issues? I have delegated all the scouting assignments for my chief scout and they have found 'nada' so far. Quite odd when you scout for example La Liga and after more than a month there are 'zero' players found.

I think these kind of massive issues at this point of the year are unforgivable for the developers.

The scouting issue is outrageously bad this year!

February 8

31 minutes ago, Parmie said:

So, I'm Bradford City in the Championship, looking for loans from my senior affiliate Manchester United to help us survive our first season. Shea Lacey fills one of the many holes in our squad and joins on a 6 month loan.

We're out performing expectations and Shea is doing really well. 11 goals, 7 assists and an average rating of 7.02 for his first ever set of senior appearances.

January window comes around and whoops, he disappears on expiry but I think no problem, United have him listed for loan, he even has me as favoured personnel from his first stint. United are happy to loan him back with no wage contribution.

Does he want to rejoin us? no way! There is no other interest in him, he even hopes his loan listing will give him the opportunity to get first team experience. I guess just not with the only club that wants him, where he likes the manager and has already been playing quite well?

This seems as strange as where the club refuses on the basis of wanting to test the player in a new environment although they usually relent on deadline day. I guess there's no real explanation other than a mechanical thing to try to prevent abuse of the loan system in game.

I have noticed this a few times. Managing Birmingham City we start with Drameh on loan, he played loads of games, was happy at the club and performed well, season ended and I tried to extend the loan for another season and he had zero interest. Instead he spent the next season sat rotting in Leeds reserves listed for loan.

January 18

Obviously what people deem as quick or slow is subjective, but my game speed is literally half a star and to me it is absolutely fine. Never wait more than a few seconds between processing through days.

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Posts posted by Jonthedon26