JEinchy
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Posts posted by JEinchy
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I will say, I think this ME is far more fun than the previous one, if only because it can get really insane sometimes. Like this match I just played:
My keeper came away with a 9.0 rating despite making a mistake for one of their goals!
Granted, this doesn't happen that often (at least in my save it hasn't) but I'm pretty sure this game should have ended about 7-7 and only the slightly off finishing in this version prevented that. As it was, I won 4-2, having played with 10 men for the final 20 minutes.
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Putting aside the issue of 1v1 conversion rates in this ME, I feel it's worth pointing out the other factors which influence chance conversion besides tactics.
First, you've got contextual factors. Is your striker under pressure when he takes the shot? Does he have good composure and finishing ability? Is there a PPM effecting how he finishes (Rounds Keeper, Shoots With Power, Places Shots, etc.)? From what angle is he shooting? Not all 1v1s are equal. Most situations actually favour the goalkeeper rather than the striker.
Then, you've got personal factors. How motivated is the striker? How confident is he? If he's missed a few chances, he might be lacking a bit of belief in front of goal, which will be reflected in his morale and body language. There's also pressure, which can come from the importance of the match and how you've spoken to him during team talks. This is where knowing how your players tick really comes in handy. Some players react well to criticism and the assertive/aggressive tones, but others may need more encouragement. I've found being sympathetic after games where the ball just won't go in to be effective in keeping morale high in the squad without putting too much pressure on them for the next game. Equally, sometimes saying nothing can be good, too.
Finally, there's training. Practising attacking movement before game can grant a small boost in all related attributes, which may help get at least one of those chances in the net.
I get the frustration and the temptation to blame it on the ME, but note that you lost a game 7-1 to a team that "only" made 4 CCCs. If the AI can do it, you should be able to as well. If 1v1s aren't going it for you, I suggest looking at ways to create other types of chances. In reality, goals are more commonly scored from crosses and cut-backs and the diamond formation can facilitate that with its emphasis on the attacking full-backs. I think changing up your striker roles could help, too. The AF and PFa are very similar, so could be making the same type of movement (presumably, in behind opposition back lines to feed off a long ball), which doesn't help you create a variety of goalscoring chances.
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Post-patch, my striker, the infallible Luuk De Jong, has scored 8 and assisted 6 in his last 9 games. Impressive stuff, considering he scored 11 times over the entirety of a season pre-patch.
I still need to play more games to draw more definite conclusions, but the most notable thing so far has been the dramatic increase in CCCs per game. My team went from an average of about 1 per game to suddenly hitting 3-5 per game. They even managed 8 against a weaker team. After eight games, my team are third in the division for Chances Created, with 31, but are still, crucially, behind Real Madrid (43) and Barcelona (41). More tellingly, my team is leading the way for shot conversion, with 13% of shots going in. I don't know how that tallies with reality but I think it's reflective of my tactics not overpowering the AI yet still seeing good success so far.
As for how these chances are being generated: yes, a lot of them are coming from balls over the defence leading to a 1v1. My gut feeling is this type of chance has become too frequent in games, and that's only exacerbating the perceived problems with conversion rates. There could be all sorts of reasons for this: maybe the defenders aren't reacting quick enough to cover, maybe the opposition are being punished for being too attacking, or maybe the accuracy of the pass is too high - or a combination of all these factors. Balls over the top aren't a problem, per se, but I do see remarkably few of them send a striker into the channels or out wide, which would give defences a chance to recover, and instead see a lot of them putting the striker clean through on goal. Still, I need a bigger sample size before flagging this is an issue.
Beside that, I'm actually content with the ME now. I've seen a variety of goals. Off the top of my head: my right inside forward took on two players and placed one in the bottom corner; my left winger carried the ball up the pitch and played a through pass to my striker to convert - and I'm not lying, I assure you - a 1v1 chance; crosses being headed in by a striker or winger coming in at the back pot; corners; penalties; a lovely counter attack where my left winger played a though pass to the striker, who held up it and fed a late run from my right inside forward who then converted; and cut-backs to a late arriving central midfield. Funnily enough, I haven't seen many screamers yet. The opposition have scored some interesting goals against me, as well, so it's not all going my way.
Outside of the ME, I'm happy to report the board are now being a lot more reasonable in their assessment of me, but I'm a little iffy on AI transfers. It's only been a couple of windows, but I'm seeing some questionable purchases and will be keeping an eye out to see if it's a consistent problem, or if me disabling first window activity has just made everyone temporarily nuts. I was able to bin off 11 players though, which was nice.
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I still need to explore this more, but I get the impression the individual mentality for players has a big impact on their behaviour and is something people overlook, including myself, until recently.
I'm playing as Sevilla in my second season and still don't have high quality attackers. Most of my attackers have 15 or less in their key attributes. The real quality is in midfield, with a handful of great playmakers. So to extract the most out of this squad, I decided to play a more universal style that relies on teamwork rather than individual brilliance, and came up with this:
GKd, WBs (both sides), CBd (both CBs), DMs, Mezs, APa, IFs, Ws, CFs
Mentality: Positive
No in possession TIs, counter/counter press/distribute to cbs and full backs in transition, lower line of engagement out of possession.
It's not amazing, but all of a sudden, I started seeing good movement, through passes, and a lot less wastage. The IFs has been a key player, often being the most aggressive of the front three, even on his support duty. When I went in to his PIs, his mentality was Very Attacking. On the other side, the Winger on support was only Positive - he only became Very Attacking on an attack duty.
So, without playing on the extreme mentalities and no attack duties in the frontline, I still had a player on Very Attacking. Now imagine if I was playing on Attacking/Very Attacking, with a bunch of attack duties on top?
Basically, the players would play wildly. This either breaks the game because the AI can't cope, or it results in a lot of shots, dribbling and poor passing that goes nowhere. In other words, a lot of excess.
This year, it feels like you have to apply more checks and balances if you're playing on the higher mentalities. Because when it says Very Attacking, it really means that.
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I'm finding boards on this version to be very weird.
I'm trying to sell a 32-year-old midfield who can't move anymore, and have bids of £1.8m accepted. A day later, I get a bunch messages saying the move has been blocked by the board because they think we can sell him for more. How much? For £2m. A measly extra £200k. And of course, this is a non-negotiable position.
The oddest thing about it all is that I had just sold off a bunch of players for less than they value, and not once did the board intervene.
This happened moments after my bid for Luca Pellegrini was blocked because he wasn't Spanish, even though signing Spanish player is only "favoured" in the club vision and I had just signed a Turk and Brazilian.
To say nothing of being given a low grade for league performance despite getting a club record number of wins and points.
I love Club Vision as an idea but its implementation so far has been wacky.
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28 minutes ago, Dagenham_Dave said:
Given that I, and many others, are not having those issues, then you could argue it is, at least partly, your tactical approach.
I'm not saying there isn't issues in that area, but it's not an easy fix to appease everyone.
I'm not suggesting it is. But surely you can understand the frustration involved in watching games, seeing players in good positions to score or influence games, yet rarely receive the ball for unknown reasons. I'd be delighted if my tactics were the issue, but I'm mostly convinced they're not, so I feel powerless.
If it's a case of a specific or esoteric combination of instructions that'd make things better, then that's not very intuitive, in my opinion. As someone else pointed out, you really shouldn't have to tell an attacking full-back to stay back more, or heavily restrict his actions in other ways, just to extract the most basic level of decision making from him, especially if he's a good player. And seemingly no amount of tinkering can convince my midfielders to attempt a progressive pass through the middle when the opportunity arises, rather than attempt a switch to the flanks to a player who might not even be in space.
The telling thing for me is that I can go down to the tactics forum, and see plenty of people posting about sensible, logical tactical set-ups because they're having identical problems.
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1 minute ago, Dagenham_Dave said:
This is the core root of the issue we have today. In years gone by, people didn't really care about the imperfections of older versions (of which there were far more than there is now), they just wanted to manage their team and have fun with the game.
It's a different beast now.
One look at some of the threads on here, at the time and effort taken by people to find out how many yellow cards Team A has had in real life compared to the equivalent in game, and screaming blue murder if it's a few out. That never used to be a thing. People are becoming obsessed by the game replicating real life to the nth degree, and it's making them actively hate the game. We now have people playing this who aren't playing to enjoy it, they're playing it to notice every imperfection, every crease, every little bug, and then whine about it on the internet. And this snowballs to what we have now. People crying that a game - that has record numbers playing it - is 'unplayable' and 'broken'.
Which brings me back to the point earlier in the thread. If you're reading this, and this describes YOU, then it really is time you found something else to occupy your spare time, because it's really not healthy.
I'd disagree. Every year, for as long as I've been a member of these forums, has seen complaints about the game being "unplayable" or "broken" for various reasons. I've never seen a FM release that didn't provoke debates about the state of the Match Engine. If it seems worse now, then it's likely because the game genuinely has more problems people are recognising, rather than it being a case of people being innately more prone to complaining.
I won't speak for others, but for me, the biggest impediment to enjoying FM20 is that it's current ME renders certain playing styles ineffective. The appeal of the game is building a team in my image and feeling ownership over my tactics, whereas at the moment I'm having to play around the ME issues while being in constant doubt about whether my tactics are good or not. I'm winning a lot, but my team doesn't score a lot, so is it my tactical approach or the well-documented lack of striker movement, central play and cutbacks? It's defensively solid, but is that because I've built a good defence, or because the same issues inflict the AI as well? For these reasons, I'm not playing the game at the moment. I have other stuff I can play. Others don't, so I can understand them taking their frustrations to these forums. Nitpicking things like yellow cards is a byproduct of that frustration.
FM has made great strides in improving defensive and transitional play. The introduction of the three phases in the tactics creator was a much needed layer of sophistication. However, my impression based on FM19 and now FM20 is that the attacking play hasn't caught up yet. Maybe it'll just be a matter of time, but we can't pretend this isn't a significant problem, especially as FM20 was advertised with "improved attacking play" as a key feature and this is clearly not being delivered.
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Guess I'm bucking the trend a little by not using super-aggressive pressing. I've been playing around with space compression to draw opposing teams out and hurting them in transition, as opposed to my more usual approach of camping in the opposition half until there's an opening.
Not that I think the current ME is amazing (yet). My team is ranked fairly low in chances created and my top scorer is my left midfielder. Better forward movement and forward play would make this a more prolific approach but for now it's functional and getting the results.
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At a glance, I feel its too aggressive without the ball. Attacking mentality already sets the defensive line and pressing urgency higher, so adding even more urgent pressing, plus counter-pressing and higher defensive/LOE may result in your team losing shape very easily while also being vulnerable to balls over the top. The right hand side in particular, with Bellerin on an attack duty + his Gets Forward Whenever Possible trait, looks vulnerable. It might be worth checking your team analysis to see if the opposition are exploiting that side. It might not be such an issue at home against defensive teams but in away games against teams more willing to be positive and attack, you are leaving them a lot of space to use.
With the ball, Be More Expressive seems redundant because of the Attacking mentality and the roles you've selected. The Ball Playing Defenders, the Roaming Playmaker and the Inverted Winger already play with a lot of creative freedom, the Mezzala will roam and attack regardless, and you have three attack duties in the frontline which will encourage them to play with more creative freedom as well. In addition, Attacking mentality encourages your team to play more width, so I'm not sure the Focus Play Down Left/Right are necessary. Perhaps this is just my preference, but I think those instructions are best used in specific instances where you're trying to exploit the opposition, or when you're trying to create an overload on one side. You're essentially asking your team to only attack through the flanks and neglect the centre, which can make you a more predictable side. I'm also not sure Underlap Left/Right will work too well when your wingers are being asked to play narrower, on top of having roles that encourage them to dribble inside. The space for the underlap simply isn't there, so you're asking your team to wait for a run that might not even happen. Overlapping runs from your fullbacks seems a more natural fit.
Looking at your away tactic, one reason you could be struggling to create is the combination of Cautious mentality and the TIs shorter passing and lower tempo. Cautious already reduces tempo by default, because it's encouraging your team to take less risks and take better care of possession. Shorter passing also reduces your team's tempo, just by its very nature; players are looking for nearby options and will wait for teammates to move closer to each other. In effect, your team is playing far too slowly, which doesn't help your wide players. Neither is the Very Narrow attacking width in conjunction with the IF and IW. To get the most out of your wingers, you need to create as many 1v1s against the opposition defenders as possible and I don't think your instructions are allowing that to happen. It seems they're keeping the ball and allowing the opposition to regroup while play is funnelled into the middle, where there are more bodies. Even if you tell the team to focus play down the flanks, your wide players will dribble inside as per their roles.
So, there are a few things you could try:
1. Let your roles do the work. A popular suggestion on here is to reduce the amount of TIs you use, and for good reason. When something isn't working, it's harder to assess where and why when you have so many instructions interacting with one another. I think you could drop Focus Play Down Left/Right, Underlap Left/Right, Be More Expressive and Narrow/Very Narrow without losing anything. The roles you've selected look fine, so see how they get on without all the extra fluff. If something seems off, then tinker with them. Getting the right combination of roles is half the battle when creating a good tactic.
2. For your away tactic, remove Shorter Passing, Lower Tempo and Work Ball Into Box. This may harm your possession numbers, but it will encourage your team to play a bit more direct and get the ball up to the attackers when there's space to be exploited. I would also suggest setting attacking width to standard. If you're countering the opposition, chances are the space will be out wide, behind the full backs, so you'll want your players to in a position to exploit that.
3. Have a look at the analysis page to identify how the opposition are scoring their goals against you. If they're scoring from one side a lot, then you'll need to adjust your roles to shut down that flank. If they're scoring from balls over the top, then you'll have to adjust your defensive line.
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Last year, I had a save going with Southend United and actually found the immense wealth of the PL a hurdle I couldn't overcome. Although I had a lot of money to spend and put together a good team, the big clubs - Arsenal, United, City and Liverpool mainly; for some reason Chelsea and Spurs didn't keep up with the others - amassed so much talent the gap remained consistently big. Even with my team getting up to 5th, I found competing with those teams very challenging and hit something of a glass ceiling, which is a different kind of frustration and not something I would say "ruined" the experience. This is something that's sort of unique to the PL and not something I would have experienced managing in Spain, Italy or Germany who don't have so many mega rich clubs.
To be honest, though, picking a big PL side has always been "easy mode" in any FM. As has been pointed out, the appeal of FM is its customisation. If the PL is too easy, then you can simply manage in a different league where the finances aren't so ludicrous. Failing that, you could play around with the editor and do whatever you like.
Also, I feel the introduction of Club Vision has the potential for greater challenges.
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I've been playing around with Milan and have noticed a few small things.
Most match reports will mention the ref checking VAR, even if the incident isn't controversial. While refs do check VAR for everything in real life, the game doesn't need to mention it as often as it does. Perhaps it's placed a little too high on the relevant events list.
I applaud SI's dedication to realism by having VAR come up in every press conference, annoying as it is.
More seriously, press conference questions do irritate eventually due to the repetitive wording and, at times, sheer irrelevancy of the question. I want to single out new question about "player x surely having the attributes to succeed against team y", because in a single presser, I got the exact same question about three separate players, and in every instance, I struggled to think of a scenario where I would disagree. These were interspersed with the usual questions about other teams that having nothing to do with the one I'm managing, my opinion on the transfer listing of some random player, and so on.
Generally, I think the lack of recognised narratives in the FM world make press conferences as mundane as they are. In reality, there's always a story, legitimate or otherwise, that is mentioned during press conferences whereas in game there's very little like that, besides the "spat with opposition manager" thing that crops up out of nowhere every now and then. I don't know how to implement this sort of thing, but maybe more questions about specific events from a previous match, how the team is playing, how individual players are doing, etc. could help add more variety. They could even pull from the game's excellent analysis and stat tracking e.g. "player x has only played y minutes this season, is he part of your plans this season?", which could then lead to something like "fans are concerned x player isn't playing, what do you think" and so on.
I briefly played around with having the DoF control all transfer activity and contract renewals. He gave Bonnaventura and Calhanoglu new deals, but then, weeks later, sent me a message claiming neither player justified their salary and advising me to do something about it. More confusingly, he gave them both "important player" status, despite neither being first choice for me all season long. It seems the game gave them a contract based on their CA and reputation, while more contextual factors such as playing time weren't a part of the equation. I'm aware asking the AI to make such sophisticated decisions is a big ask, but I thought I'd point it out. Another thing I noticed was that despite the agreed club vision being a preference for signing u23 players, the DoF's recommended targets for January were all 30 years old or older. Given the DoF plays a large part in defining club vision in real life, I feel there needs to be better synergy between that and his delegated responsibilities.
As for the match engine, I have nothing major to add that hasn't already been discussed. I'd only like to point out that crossing is working very well for me and the majority of my goals have been headers; some of which have been from the edge of the box or from weird angles. My tactic is designed to do this, but I thought it was interesting given there were observations about a lack of crossing. 12 of my last 24 assists have been crosses.
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Nothing about your tactic screams "exploit" to me. It uses aggressive roles but they are being mitigated by the Balanced mentality.
I think, and this is only based on my observation, urgent pressing and counter-press are too effective in this beta. I'm using the same approach with Milan and, while not overacheiving, I have lost only once.
It seems preventing the oppostion full backs from those problematic switches and stopping their defenders hitting balls over the top really limits the ways the AI can hurt you.
You mentioned your great defensive record. This is likely why. Even during a lucky season, a team of Southampton's level should be vulnerable against better opposition playing in such a way.
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1 hour ago, Mitja said:
I don't get it how can anybody defend such defending. Look what MCs do and what then centre back decides to do.
The MCs get attracted to the same player and leave the space for my midfielder to use. The CB charges out because somebody has to close that player down.
It looks worse than it is because of the size of the space, but let's not pretend we haven't seen this exact scenario occur in real life, even at the top level. Nor is this necessarily a case of "bad ME", because for all I know they played with a BWM and a stopper with more urgent pressing and that influenced their behaviour.
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11 hours ago, optimusprimal82 said:
Was going to write "I felt like I was reading one of my own blurbs given the correlation between findings - great post!" but then realised I'd be inadvertently patting myself on the back at the same time which goes heavily against my "self-praise is no recommendation" mantra!
Instead I'll just add that I agree wholeheartedly & that if you have any examples, I've got a big, ridiculous long-winded post that talks specifically about the issue with AML/AMRs you're more than welcome to add to - just asked if it's still relevant in the beta forum or if I should get it moved/recreate - or if you have a new post/thread active, equally I'll happily throw any findings in there too.
Sadly at this stage in 19's life I doubt we'll see a massive improvement in the wingers as I imagine it's a colossal change; understandable but personally makes me sad as it's always been my favourite position (I have to play with wingers is my mantra!) - if they can't fix this year have asked if we can have a concession until 20 drops with perhaps the PIs removed from the AML/AMR's to see if we can at least try and circumvent the issues (the way they hug the FB's I doubt it but surely worth a try?) in the interim - guys have obviously been rushed off their feet so haven't heard back, but call me an idiot/optimist/optimusist, I'll sit here with my fingers still crossed until I hear none of it is possible!
If they want more examples, I'll be happy to add some.
For the sake of balance, I'll post something good from the ME:
It's from a throw-in, but West Ham's midfield is bunched together on one side. My three midfielders (Torreira, Guendouzi and Ozil) work the ball between themselves, until Ozil (playing in central midfield as an AP(s)) moves into the yawning space in front of West Ham's backline. Balbuena, West Ham's left sided CB, moves out to close him down. When he does, Aubameyang, who I have playing as an AML inside forward (A), moves into the space (you can see him walk across the line before making the run). Then Ozil, with his 19 passing, 19 vision and tries killer balls often PPI plays the perfect pass and we score.
I love this goal because there's a logic to everything. West Ham are tilted because of the set-piece situation. Ozil finds the space because he's a highly intelligent player. Balbuena steps out his defensive line because there's no midfield in front of him, so he has to. Aubameyang finds the space because he has great off the ball movement.
Unfortunately, this is the only goal of this type that I've seen all season long. Instead, a lot my chances tend to come from moves like this one:
This isn't a bad move at all. The AMR (Inside Forward (S)) offers himself as a passing option, as I want him to. The right back (Full Back (S)) makes a great run that goes unnoticed, and his movement throughout is good. Ozil plays a superb pass to find him, he plays a good cross and the header from Aubameyang is just wide.
However, pay attention to the movement of my striker (DLF(S)) and my left sided attacker (Winger (A)) throughout the move. Neither make any effort to detach themselves from their marker. The striker doesn't show for the ball or make any move down the sides of the CBs. The winger doesn't behave like a winger would. I would expect him to be closer to the left side of the penalty box, either dragging the right back with him, or finding space because the right back doesn't go with him. Instead, he seems to move with the right back, as if he's marking him instead of the other way around.
If you pause the move at 33 seconds, you can see where the big problem is. Ozil here can open his body out and move into the space to his left. Then, one of the two forwards on that side can move into the big space, while the other moves into the vacated space. It would have been a very basic move for top players to make, but neither forward moves. The striker moves into an offside position while the winger doesn't move. I could be wrong, but because the movement isn't there, Ozil has no choice but to play the ball to the right back instead. After all, the right back is the only one actually moving into space.
Here, the roles of two of my forwards aren't behaving as I'd expect them to. They're behaving in a very similar way, despite having very different roles on the pitch.
The conflicting behaviour is interesting. In the first example, the forwards make good runs when the space opens up in front of them. In the second example, the space isn't available in front of them, but they ignore the space behind them. This goes hand in hand with the very forward thinking nature of attacking play in FM. Something like a forward taking one or two steps backwards or sideways to open up space - the type of movement that is very important for unlocking deep defences in reality - seems quite rare.
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- Popular Post
I've logged a lot of hours into FM19 and think that it's not that far away from being a great game. At the same time, I've found FM19 to be dull. It's beatable, and even challenging in some parts, but playing through it has felt like a slog, especially when I've managed a top side - and this is coming from someone who isn't even that good at the game (I can put together a coherent tactic and win things, but I don't achieve the outstanding results that some can).
The ME issues are well documented, but they're worth repeating because it's such a vital part of the experience. There are three major issues that have already been posted in the bugs forum that, in combination with each other, make for a very repetitive playing experience:
- The behaviour of players in the AML/AMR slots. Whether I use a winger or inside forward, anyone I select here plays the same way. The AML/AMR seem to be tethered to the opposition full backs, so if the opposition are using narrow full backs (which, if you play as a top side, they will in nearly every game) they follow them inside. My team ends up with three forwards standing in the penalty area, effectively taking themselves out of the game. This has significant knock-on effects for the behaviour of the other players. For instance, any midfielder in possession near the edge of the box will be unable to play the ball forward, and will therefore either play laterally to anyone in space (usually an advancing full back) or shoot because he has no options. This happens in real life and can be the result of my tactical set-up, but when it happens regardless of player role selection, it gets frustrating very quickly. This issue has put me off the AML/AMR positions. Instead, I now prefer the more customisable ML/MR positions because there's greater variation in how they behave. However, this leads to two more issues: 1) the overwhelming majority of wide players available in game cannot play ML/MR without retraining and 2) the overwhelming majority of AI managers play formations with an AML and AMR. The former isn't necessarily the biggest problem (it's inconvenient but the option is there) but the latter is, as I've seen high-quality wide players have little effect on the game world. I feel that if the movement of the AML/AMR is improved, it would allow for greater attacking variation.
- It's not that AML/AMR are entirely useless, though. They're great for scoring at the back post. This tends to result from the extreme narrowness of the back four, even when using the Defend Wider TI. I see a lot of goals where a full back plays an deep cross to the back post to a wide player standing in acres of space, who can just put it in with ease. The full-backs don't seem to track the run or detach from the centre backs in an effort to get to the ball. Again, there are plenty of instances of this in real life, but in real life most defenders make the effort to try and defend the situation and if they can't, it's usually because they've been occupied by another attacker. In FM19, defenders seem determined to hold their positions even when there are obvious threats to mark. Variable defensive positioning, both good and bad, is what leads to greater goal variation but the fact that it's extremely difficult to draw a full back out of position to open up the space down the sides of the CBs contributes to the overall dullness of the ME.
- Strikers aren't useless, either. My striker has 24 goals. He scores tap-ins, rebounds, headers from close range, pens, and the odd long-shot - all things that I certainly want him to do. However, he, and a lot of AI attackers, doesn't get many opportunities to score what I'd call routine goals - that is, goals from the centre of the penalty area after being on the end of a cross, cut-back or through ball. Players in wide positions never cut the ball back or play a low, driven cross. In my experience, they always seem to blast it to the back post, regardless of whatever instructions I give them to do otherwise. A lot of the time, the striker, who is waiting in space for a pass, is cut out entirely because the cross is almost always hit beyond him. In FM18, I had a lot fun and success with a 4141 that used two very pacey and technical wingers to drive crosses and cutbacks to a striker or late-arriving midfielder. The width of my attack stretched opposition defences and opened up the space between CB and FB for a through pass. This type of play no longer seems possible in FM19. The gaps don't appear in defence and attackers don't use the ball in a smart way.
I appreciate that it's a giant balancing act. I also think it's great the defending is stronger in this game. The ability to dictate my team's defensive style using the Out of Possession and In Transition parts of the tactics creator is very much welcome and a step in the right direction. At the same time, it feels like the attacking side of the game has lagged behind. I know from playing the public beta that SI are working hard at correcting the balance, which is why I said earlier that the game isn't far away from being great.
Away from the ME, there are a few things that bother me and detract from the experience.
- Tactical briefings. Not a new feature, but one I've never found any use for and hence have never used. It might be realistic, but it's irritating to have to respond to a message about this before every game when I don't even use the feature. Simply making it a non-urgent message would go a long way to solving this issue.
- Similarly, being reminded several times that I need to register my squad for competitions is annoying. If I've registered all the players I want to before the transfer deadline and have made no further signings, I do not need to be reminded with an urgent message that the registration window is about to close right after the transfer deadline. Every season, I have to confirm my squad list on at least two separate occasions in the summer and then the winter. One should suffice.
- Press conferences and tunnel interviews. Not their existence, nor the repetitive nature of the questions. No, it's the relevancy of some of the questions. I once had a reporter approach me in the tunnel asking my opinion about a manager for a team I wasn't playing putting a player on the transfer list. I'll be managing a top side and get asked about a mid-table team who is underachieving, or what I think about their manager being under pressure. It's really tedious.
- Assistant manager feedback. To be frank: it's rubbish. It wouldn't even be helpful for people new to the game. An opposition player could be a 6.3 rating, smash in a screamer, then be on a 8.0 rating and your assistant will be telling you that the player is "pulling the strings" or "really controlling things out there". No, he's not doing any of that; he was having a poor game and then scored a screamer. Yet if you follow his advice, you'd bend your tactic out of shape for every such occurrence. My assistant kept telling me that Joe Gomez was an "accomplished crosser of the ball" - Gomez has a crossing stat of 8. He's also completely wishy-washy about passing. We could be dominating the ball with mixed passing and he'd tell me we should play it shorter. We could be making chances with short passing and he'd tell me we should be more direct. While it's all ignorable, there's potential for this feature to point out things I have missed or should be aware of. As it is, it hasn't been at all useful since its introduction.
- Player interactions. I've banged this drum enough, but it's no less frustrating to not even be 10 games into the season and have players with the Rotation squad status complain about lack of playing time and then throw a tantrum when you tell them that the season is long and they'll get their chance eventually.
- Playing ratings. It's bizarre to me that you can play a great game without scoring and not get a single player above a 6.9, but if you fluke a game with three scrappy goals everyone will be 7.5+. Why does my midfielder who has created a bunch of chances that been missed not get a boost in rating? Why does an under performing player get a massive boost in his rating for scoring a screamer, free-kick or penalty? This doesn't feel as closely tied to the actions of the players as it should. It's too closely linked to major events.
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I've decided that I hate the player interaction system.
It's not a new feature by any means and I know why it has to be there, but my big problem with it is that the game gives you no feedback on what choices would be good or bad, so it feels like a complete shot in the dark as to whether you'll get a desirable outcome or not.
As an example, I'll outline a scenario I just experienced.
I'm playing as Southend United during the 2023/24 season. We've been in the Premier League for four years and finished 6th, 6th, 6th and 8th. I've got a 20-year-old forward with huge potential who's a key part of the team, and we've just received a £50m bid from Manchester City for him. His agent makes it clear that he wants to go and there's little chance I can convince him to stay, so I accept the offer. A few days later, the player leaves. Two days before the deal happens, we sign his replacement. As far as I'm concerned, the whole thing is sorted.
Apparently not. One of the team leaders (according to the dynamics) is upset about the sale. I have a chat with him. I tell him the deal was too good to turn down. He disagrees, which is fine, but I want to examine the wording of this:
Player: You can't put a price on what *Player Sold* offered us as a team, this was a mistake and you know it.
This guy's personality is Balanced. He's "media friendly". I don't expect a balanced, media friendly guy to be this confrontational, especially after addressing him in a calm manner. As the player, I'm already fearing a tantrum and that I've "lost" the conversation because nothing short of complete acquiescing to his opinion will diffuse this. As the manager, I don't think I've made the wrong decision, so naturally I'll defend myself. I tell him to forget about it, that no player is bigger than the team, etc. He responds:
Player: You can be as dismissive as you want, I'm not backing down here.
My options from here on are to apologise, try to diplomatically diffuse the tension, or play the big scary authority card. I didn't want to go to either extreme, so I went for what seemed to be the safe choice and tell him to move on because what's done is done.
Player: We're getting nowhere with this so I'm going to leave it there, you have dealt with this terribly though.
Well, great, that's useful. The feedback I'm getting here is that I made three wrong choices and got the worst outcome. The problem with that was that the game, at no point, communicated no advice on what the "right" choices would be. How should I talk to him? What does he want to/not want to hear? In real life you would obviously know the player the better and can make these decisions easier, but in game personality amounts to a single word description. What is a "balanced" personality? How do you deal with those type of personalities? And so on.
To muddle this further, when I go into the player's happiness page, he has "Feels the manager deserves even more support from the dressing room" listen in the positives. Yet he's just gone and complained to everyone because of one bad conversation!
So there are two big issues for me. The first is the randomness of every conversation. I'm not looking to be correct every time, but there's not information in the game that I can use to inform my conversation choices. The second is the language, which is often times unnecessarily confrontational and is used by all players, regardless of personality.
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I've completed two seasons with Southend United and would rank my experience as "mixed". It's been enjoyable, but there have been a number of puzzling occurrences that have tarnished the experience somewhat. This is mostly to do with the game world and the ME.
To start with, I've always liked the variation of FM's world. It's cool that some teams can do better/worse than real life because it throws up some interesting scenarios (for example, Fulham have suffered two straight relegations to League One on my save, and players like Seri and Anguissa are still there). On the other hand, clubs and players who should, by all accounts, be good end up being strangely not good. For the past few editions, the team that seems to suffer the most from this is Manchester City - or anyone managed by Pep Guardiola.
It's one the weirdest paradoxes that the most successful real life manager ends up being not-so-successful in most of my saves. In my first season, City finished fourth, well off Champions Liverpool, despite adding Sergej Milinkovic-Savic (who looks an amazing player) to their squad. Guardiola was duly sacked. He then rocks up at Tottenham, of all places. Still doesn't get close to the league. In the third season, Tottenham go on to sign Arthur from Barcelona for £89m, despite not being anywhere close to Barcelona's level. What's going on?
Unfortunately, this isn't the first instance of bizarre AI squad building. Manchester United signed Mauro Icardi for £95m in January of the first season. Despite having Icardi and Lukaku (two of the game's best forwards), they then spent £105m on Harry Kane. Then, in the third season, they spent £150m on Paulo Dybala. That last one is a little less egregious because United were Champions and Dybala can play multiple positions, but it still seems weird that the AI thought that, after signing Icardi and Kane, United needed yet another forward. Meanwhile, the best defensive reinforcement they could manage was Callum Chambers for £50m. On the other side of Manchester, City sign Romagnoli for £89m a season after they spent £75m on Milan Skriniar. In London, Chelsea have transfer listed Samuel Umtiti, who they signed for £75m from Barcelona in the first season. Again, somehow.
The prices aren't so much the issue here, but the names certainly are. The game isn't wrong in thinking that Chelsea might need a centre back, but why Umtiti, why would Barcelona sell and why would the player move? The answer would be because Barcelona's and Chelsea's reputations are similar and the move isn't considered a step down by the game's metrics. Likewise with Juventus > Manchester United and even Barcelona > Tottenham. There doesn't appear to be enough nuance there that would make these moves more logical. It's also interesting how the AI's logic for squad building is to go "need more depth" > "sign best available player in position that needs depth". Hence City signing two more world class centre backs despite already having two world class centre backs.
On the flip side, despite money being thrown around like crazy, selling players you actually want to sell remains a challenge. I've constantly had to offer out my unwanted players at a very reduced price just to get someone to buy them. More often than not, I get the dreaded "club x doesn't see transfer as viable currently", which is frustratingly vague, as it doesn't tell me what I need to do to make the transfer possible. Asking the player to speak to clubs doesn't seem to do anything, either.
So, back to poor old Pep. I have a theory that the reason he seems to do so poorly in these games is because, as of late, the ME hasn't favoured sides who try to play with high possession and with through passes. Most goals seem to come from crosses. At Southend, I play a 4-2-3-1 with my best and most creative player in the AM slot, and with "Pass Into Space" active. Yet very rarely do I see him thread a through pass for my striker to run onto, despite their being opportunities for him to do. More often than not, he'll play the ball out wide instead, who will then proceed to loop the ball into the box (even if I ask to cross low instead). I've sworn off the Inside Forward roles because of this issue. In a test save with Arsenal, I had Mkhitaryan dribbling inside, beating players for fun, only to opt for 25-yard pot shots instead of slipping a ball through to my striker or opposite winger who have made runs for him. So I can't help but wonder if the same happens to any Guardiola team, which typically lines-up in a 4-3-3 with Inside Forwards, and that's why they don't win as often as they should.
It's frustrating because it limits how I can build my team. Last year, I had tremendous success with a 4-1-4-1, playing with two out and out wingers crossing from a centre forward. I did that because trying to play any other way didn't seem to work. This year, it seems to be the same again. It works the other way, too. Every goal I concede comes from a cross, as my defenders seem incapable of marking someone, and the smallest of players can win headers. I play against some great attacking teams yet never have to worry about a through pass, at all.
There is one annoying exception: the straight ball over the top. I don't play with a high line yet have seen turnovers routinely punished by a punt over my defenders' heads that lands magnetically onto a opposition striker's foot.
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Less a stupid question, more a general advice question.
I just came up against a team playing 5-2DM-2-1-0 and really struggled to make good chances. My team started on Standard/Very Fluid, but I dropped it to Standard/Fluid and stopped closing down to try and draw them out and create more verticality. Didn't really work. I tried using maximum width as well, but if anything it made us less dangerous.
So how would you go about breaking down such a set-up?
FWIW, this is a diagram of the shape:
GK
RB - CB - CB - CB - LB
DM - DM
RM ----------------- LM
AM
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An issue I just had, and this has been around for a while now, is players complaining about not getting first team football ten games into a season. I was playing at Arsenal and was only in October, but had Nacho Monreal, Mohamed Elneny, Francis Coquelin, Danny Welbeck and Olivier Giroud all complain about not getting enough games even though I was using all of them as part of a rotation system. Some of them have "First Team" status, so I get why it happens, but that brings me to the second part of this issue: the player conversations. It's still at a stage where it feels like the manager can never win without a) making a promise that can't be kept or b) upsetting the player.
In the second case, it's even worse this year because of the Dynamics system. I told Coquelin that he'd get his chance during the season, but he wasn't happy. I then get a message about his team mates being upset about how I've treated him, only to discover he's in the main social group, so a good 75% of my squad were threatening to mutiny because I couldn't promise him first team football. I had to have a meeting with a squad and promise all of them that I'd play him just so I wouldn't upset all of them. It was all the funnier when Alexis Sanchez tells me he's looking forward to playing with him.
So I'm really not sure about this feature. On the one hand, it's an extra layer of realism and adds a more human touch to the squad, which is fine. But on the other hand, it makes an already frustrating player happiness/interaction system even trickier to negotiate, because now there's an ever present threat of annoying everyone if you happen to upset just one player.
I should also point out that I barely gave any team talks because despite having max reputation, none of my players were interested in listening to me. Even after 10 games unbeaten, nobody listened.
On the whole, I can see there's a good game here, but there are so many little annoying things that drag it down. The problems with the UI have been brought up many times by now and don't need to be repeated again, but I will say that it bothers me a lot that the in-match tactics menu has a horizontal pitch instead of a vertical one. Also, I almost thought Opposition Instructions had been taken out the game until I spotted them in a tiny section in the bottom right corner of the screen. The ME was fine. I have no major complaints about it and appreciated the fact that I could build a solid defence. The one issue I had was the fact that every match I played had crosses that forced keepers into giving away corners, complete with the message "Player X didn't meant that!". Perhaps it's not high on the priority list, but this has been in at least the last three or four editions of the ME and it's annoying to see it still around.
Speaking of things that are still around, assistant manager feedback is still useless. I don't need a message telling me my side is struggling to retain possession when I've got a nice big stat bar with that information on it. Likewise, telling me my side is struggling to create chances in a match is redundant when I can see the shot numbers broken down in clear cut chances, half chances, blocked, etc. If the assistant wants to give me info, make it something useful like suggesting a change in team instructions or a player role. I was also disappointed that the in game explanations about what Mentality/Team Shape/Player Roles do wasn't changed to better explain the effects on the pitch.
To finish this off with more positive feedback: the medical centre is an excellent addition. Receiving pre-game reports on which players are at high risk of injury is extremely useful and helped me manage fitness a lot better. I liked the anaylsis squares on the tactics screen and thought they were a simple way of communicating where the holes in my set-up could be. The relationship lines are also nice, in that they're a visual way of showing me if certain players weren't finding each other.
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This isn't a stupid question per se, but I've a feeling the answer is obvious and I'm just not spotting it.
The AMC in my 4-2-3-1 isn't effecting games nearly as much as he should. I've got Ozil and Cazorla - couldn't ask for better no. 10s - but their average rating regularly falls below 7, and they don't seem to play many key passes. This is my current set-up:
Mentality: Control
Team Shape: Fluid
Team Instructions: Retain Possession, Shorter Passing, Play Out Of Defence, Push Higher Up, Close Down More
The obvious thing is that there are no attacking roles, but at the moment this set-up is doing a good of penning the opposition in their penalty area and generating 20+ shots a game, though most of them end up being blocked inside the penalty area. It keeps a good defensive shape, so I'm not bothered about that. We're unbeaten in the league after 13 games, and have won all 5 of our CL matches.
I want the AMC to be a creator, so what should I change? Should I put one of the IFs or the striker on an attack duty? Change the role of the AMC? Try an attacking mentality? I'm interested in seeing what people think.
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This is less me asking a stupid question and more asking for an opinion, but what is the exact purpose of the LCM and RCM in a 4-3-1-2 formation? It's a formation I want to make more use of, but I'm never quite sure what role those positions should be playing.
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Would you mind deleting this thread, please? Save game cannot be loaded, unfortunately.
http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/291445-Move-aside-Barcelona.
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That's an... odd adjective to describe a player in good form. Is the reason why he plays so well is because he makes everybody else drunk?
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Short, simple and straight to the point. I hope the kid is a good sportsman and model professional...
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Quickfire Questions and Answers Thread (Tactic and Training Questions Only)
in Tactics, Training & Strategies Discussion
Posted
One thing I've been doing recently is praise players for training well. Usually, anyone with a training rating of 8.00+ gets some praise every couple of months.
I've noticed this can improve their Work Rate, but does it improve other stats, too? I was pretty sure it used to increase Determination, but I haven't seen this happen on this year's game.