FM2011 Editor Advanced Rules Activation and Discussion

[Toronto Blizzard]

I'm not sure actually. I've never had that kind of situation. If I could recreate it here, I'd try some stuff myself, but it hasn't came up yet. Experiment and see what happens.

Maybe make sure that the minimum relegated teams is set to 2 as well?

The main problem I found was that the promotion playoff from MLS-3 (the winner of which would play the bottom team in MLS-2) would get a random MLS team (probably using the team with the highest reputation). What I think the issue might be is that I'm telling the promotion playoff to take the team with a ranking of '0' from the league stage, and the winner of the playoff. But, in the playoff cup fate, I indicate that the playoff cup winner is the champion of the league stage. When setting up the promotion playoff, then, the game looks for the '0' ranked team in the league, which became the playoff winner (due to the cup fates) and then looks at the second requirement (the playoff winner) and finds it to be the same team. Because it's the same team, it puts a random one in its place.

I haven't been able to determine whether this is the case for the other levels where just the regular season and playoff winners are promoted because the season doesn't reset.

I'm going to try clicking "check for early finish" for the league stage in hopes that it will enter the winner of the regular season into the promotion playoff before the playoffs begin and add the second team afterwards.

I've also now qualified the loser of the playoff final for the promotion playoff in hopes that it will be selected if the game considers the regular season and playoff winners to be the same.

[Dave Fairbairn]

For the MLS-3 playoff issue, I suggest that for the "get teams from stage", then set it to 1, then set it for "top position" 0, "bottom position" 1, "max no of teams" 1.

For this, theoretically(tell me if I'm wrong. I haven't tried this), the game should get the team in second in the league as the league qualifier if the playoff winner is the same as the league winner.

You might need to faff around with seeding settings to get it to work 100% right, but give it a try.

[Toronto Blizzard]

Still can't seem to get this to work. I'm going to try leaving the MLS-2/MLS-3 promotion/relegation playoff out for the time being and see if I can get everything else working the way I want it to (because only promotion/relegation between these two divisions has a playoff), and then try to scale that mountain again... I wonder if I should make that MLS-2/MLS-3 promotion/relegation a separate competition...

[Dave Fairbairn]

If you want me to look at it, you could throw it on one of them file sharing sites and I'll take a look at it.

Can't do it today as I'm kinda err... tipsy from my post match drinks, and tomorrow I'll likely be watching TV games with a couple of drinks as well, but I could probably take a look at it on Monday.

[Toronto Blizzard]

If you want me to look at it, you could throw it on one of them file sharing sites and I'll take a look at it.

Can't do it today as I'm kinda err... tipsy from my post match drinks, and tomorrow I'll likely be watching TV games with a couple of drinks as well, but I could probably take a look at it on Monday.

Ha ha! You know the premier league season has begun when...

But, seriously, I'd really appreciate that! I'm just running another test at the moment, but once it's done I'll upload what I have if it's still not working properly.

Cheers!

Here's the link: https://rapidshare.com/files/536535520/Alternate_North_America_v1.36.xml

As a summary/for context, here's what I'm trying to do:

Most divisions - bottom two relegated, regular season champion and playoff champion promoted. If they are the same, the playoff runner-up is promoted.

MLS-2/American Professional Soccer League (APSL) (which I've been calling MLS-3 here for sake of simplification):

APSL regular season winner plays APSL playoff champion in a promotion playoff (as above, if the regular season and playoff winners are the same, the playoff runner-up goes in)

The winner of that promotion playoff plays the bottom team from MLS-2.

I've looked at this so many times and saved/modified so many versions that it's driving me crazy! Hopefully a fresh pair of eyes can make sense of it. The most recent set-up I'm sending you was developed by looking at the South African Premier League, but it may not transfer perfectly.

Again, thanks Dave!!

[JLlo]

I feel your pain T-Blizz lol, I can't tell you how long I've spent trying to get the NACL working!

I've now recreated the NACL copying it exactly how it is in the comps.fmf file but STILL after 1st season only 2 of the correct 4 Mexican teams qualify for the tournament.

Anyone have any ideas as to why it's only qualifying the Mexican Apertura & Closura winners and not the runners-up as well, despite the season summary screen showing the correct 4 teams have qualified?

[Toronto Blizzard]

You're scaring me, JLlo! I haven't even gotten to the NACL yet! I'm finding runners-up hard to deal with, too. Are you using "get runner up from competition" in the "qualified teams" section of the NACL? What teams are getting in instead of the Mexican runners-up?

[JLlo]

That's the problem... 'cos Mexico has an Apertura & Closura... it has 2 winners & 2 runners-up for each season. So if you do 'Get Last Winner' & 'Get Last Runner-up' you only get the winners/runners-up of the Closura.

When you do it the normal way to 'get qualified teams' or 'get registered teams' it selects the Apertura & Closura winners but not runners-up, instead of runners-up it just selects the 2 highest reputation teams (Usually America & Chivas)

[Dave Fairbairn]

For that, what you wanna do, is for each stage, set two fate places. Set these to "Qualify team to competition", set the competition to NACL and league fate to "qualified".

Then, in the qualification rules box below this and set number of places to 2. The stage names don't really matter, as it's just a cosmetic thing.

If this is done for both stages, then basically, what this will do, is it will tell the game that the top 2 from each stage qualify for a different stage, but the fate action in the previous box will change the meaning of that fate to actually qualifying the team to the NACL.

[JLlo]

For that, what you wanna do, is for each stage, set two fate places. Set these to "Qualify team to competition", set the competition to NACL and league fate to "qualified".

Then, in the qualification rules box below this and set number of places to 2. The stage names don't really matter, as it's just a cosmetic thing.

If this is done for both stages, then basically, what this will do, is it will tell the game that the top 2 from each stage qualify for a different stage, but the fate action in the previous box will change the meaning of that fate to actually qualifying the team to the NACL.

Thanks for the reply Dave... but here is the problem... I haven't re-made the Mexican league so I can't change the fate places. It's just the NACL I am editing.

The Mexican league is already setup in game to qualify both winners/runners-up from apertura/closura. But with my edited NACL for some reason after the 1st season it only qualifies the apertura/closura winners and then the 2 teams with highest reputation despite showing the correct 4 qualifiers in the season summary screen. It works fine for the USA qualifiers - every season it qualifies the correct 4 teams.

How should I 'select' these 4 Mexican qualifiers then?

Anymore suggestions Dave?

[Toronto Blizzard]

Thanks for the reply Dave... but here is the problem... I haven't re-made the Mexican league so I can't change the fate places. It's just the NACL I am editing.

The Mexican league is already setup in game to qualify both winners/runners-up from apertura/closura. But with my edited NACL for some reason after the 1st season it only qualifies the apertura/closura winners and then the 2 teams with highest reputation despite showing the correct 4 qualifiers in the season summary screen. It works fine for the USA qualifiers - every season it qualifies the correct 4 teams.

How should I 'select' these 4 Mexican qualifiers then?

Anymore suggestions Dave?

Re-make the Mexican leagues...

I know, not funny.

[JLlo]

Re-make the Mexican leagues...

I know, not funny.

Haha I really don't want to do that. Nothing wrong with the Mexican leagues in game. Just need to find out HOW to 'select' the correct qualifiers as the league does set the correct qualifiers but for some reason I can't get the NACL to select all 4.

[dim13]

Here's the link: https://rapidshare.com/files/536535520/Alternate_North_America_v1.36.xml

Toronto Blizzard:

It appears the download link is only available to RapidShare Pro Users, which isn't free. Could you please re-upload where we could download for free ? Thank you.

[Toronto Blizzard]

Toronto Blizzard:

It appears the download link is only available to RapidShare Pro Users, which isn't free. Could you please re-upload where we could download for free ? Thank you.

Uh oh - sorry about that! I've downloaded for free from there before, so I used RapidShare.

I've now put it on Box.net - http://www.box.net/shared/75orscsnhzyz0k1nlz1q

Thanks for taking a look, dim!!

[Dave Fairbairn]

Maybe the teams get different seedings from coming second or something? Take a look at the default qualifiers for Mexico, and see how their seedings are given. You might need to get qualified teams of 2 different seedings for Mexico.

Yeah, just checked in the editor. Two of the Mexican teams have seeding of 1, and 2 of the Mexican teams have a seeding of 3.

I'd make sure that you set it so the game will get two Mexican 1st seeds and 2 Mexican 3rd seeds.

[Taunton]

Do any of you know if the quota of teams from San Marino in Europe is hard coded?

I play with the San Marino league. They are 22. in the coefficients, but still they only got two european places, one in CL and one Euro league.

Would be nice if San Marino could get more places in Europe when the coeffiecients rise.

[JLlo]

Maybe the teams get different seedings from coming second or something? Take a look at the default qualifiers for Mexico, and see how their seedings are given. You might need to get qualified teams of 2 different seedings for Mexico.

Yeah, just checked in the editor. Two of the Mexican teams have seeding of 1, and 2 of the Mexican teams have a seeding of 3.

I'd make sure that you set it so the game will get two Mexican 1st seeds and 2 Mexican 3rd seeds.

Cheers for the reply again Dave... I have tried that... Tried setting "Get Registered teams for comp & year" with index set to 1 and then another set to 3. Tried it with "Get Qualified teams for comp", set nation as mexico and seeding to 1 and another with seeding to 3. But still after the 1st season only the 2 winners qualify and then the 2 teams with highest reputation.

It's so weird that the season summary shows the correct 4 teams have qualified yet will only select 2 of them and then the 2 teams with highest rep.

Anymore suggestions?

[Veg]

Cheers for the reply again Dave... I have tried that... Tried setting "Get Registered teams for comp & year" with index set to 1 and then another set to 3. Tried it with "Get Qualified teams for comp", set nation as mexico and seeding to 1 and another with seeding to 3. But still after the 1st season only the 2 winners qualify and then the 2 teams with highest reputation.

It's so weird that the season summary shows the correct 4 teams have qualified yet will only select 2 of them and then the 2 teams with highest rep.

Anymore suggestions?

Yes, now I have, and it could help. There is a difference in the Basic Editor and the Advanced Panels. When editing in the Basic editor, the seedings, league and cup positions highest value is 1.In the advanced editor the highest value of seedings, league and cup postions is 0. F.ex when you create rankings in the advanced editor you give the winner rankin 0. The same should be with the seedings. So when you tell the advanced editor to get teams with seedings based on the basic editor seeding 1-3, you should use 0-2 in the advanced editor. This could help, I really hope so. but then again there could be other hardcoded stuff that makes things difficult.

[Dave Fairbairn]

I teken that into account, Veg, as I used the default unedited DB for those seedings. I think it may just be an issue with the Mexican First Division itself with there being nothing we can really do about it.

[Veg]

There probably are issues with the Mexican league, but that seedings, league and cup positions having highest value 0 in the advanced panels is a sure thing. This is easily seen if you open the nam_champions_league.xml (could be downloaded in the first post)file from the comps.fmf. The setup tells the qualifying stage of the NACL to get the qualified teams with seeding 2, and the group stage were it tells the stage to get qualified teams with seeding 0 and then a new command with seeding 1.

[magicmastermind124]

The problem is that the Qualified Teams tab for the Competition is empty - I assume the SI version will include entries for getting registered teams for this year. It will also have the Stage names that are needed. All you can do is try and guess the stage names. They could be 'aper' and 'clau'. What you want to do is use Get Qualified Teams from Stage.

The fact that the teams come up in Season Summary are due to the qualification setting in the Mexican competition files, which say that those teams qualify for those rounds. It is the NACL that is incorrect, not the Mexican leagues.

[Veg]

I'm not sure that get qualified teams from stage is the correct one as the extracted NACL file from the comps.fmf is using get qualified teams, Mexico, seeding 2. I'm doing some testing now and it seems like the way to go is to use the qualified teams tab in the competition setup to get all the 24 teams into the competition and then use the stage to assign the teams. I will finnish the setup later tonight or tomorrow and then tell you what i found out.

[JLlo]

Cheers guys, I appreciate all the input & help.... more minds working on this the better!

I noticed that the same 4 teams that are set to qualify for the NACL from Mexico also qualify for the SuperLiga, even in the original DB. This is actually wrong. Anyway, in the edited DB the 4 teams that are set to qualify for both NACL & SuperLiga in the season summary tab each year qualify for the SuperLiga as stated but only 2 qualify for the NACL. I thought maybe the problem lies here?

So I decided to re-create the SuperLiga and change the qualifiers for the SL but no matter what I do the SL always has the Apertura/Closura winners/runners-up every season. Even when I set it to only get teams from the Mexican 2nd division or to get 'specified team'. It seems for the SL no matter what I set in the 'Qualified Teams' tab of the competition or 'teams' tab for each stage is completely ignored. I also tried setting it to get 4 Canadian teams instead of Mexican but the Mexican teams were still selected.

It's weird that the SL will select the Apertura/Closura winners AND runners-up (even when qualified teams left completely blank) yet the NACL wont. Bizarre.

[dec2k]

Hello again!

I've posted this request over 6 months ago and recieved replies that it is not soluble. After so much time had passed I'd like to ask again: is it somehow possible - via the advanced panel or just regular editor - to make regional divisions vary in the number of teams? I'd like to recreate the regional system in Slovenia which has the following structure:

The first and second league are not regional. The third league is split into West and East. Two teams get relegated from the second league, each to its respectful sub-division.

What I've achieved in the editor so far is, that if those two teams are from the West, they successfully get relegated in the Western division. Consequently, a random team from that Western division automatically fills the "empty" space in the Eastern division. Thus, the number of teams in both divisions remains the same although it should be dissimilar.

So, is it possible to make the leagues vary in the number of teams or is the sole possibility still determining the number of teams in advance? I highly hope someone has found the solution and will be able to share his thoughts!

And the link to the topic where this issue had been discussed more than 6 months ago: *link*

[JLlo]

dec2k... Just a guess as I've never tried this... try setting the maximum number of teams for each regional division to be far greater than the actual number of teams. For instance, if the West has 20 teams currently set number of teams to '20' and then MAX number of teams to for example '30' and same for the East. This may allow for fluctuation. I've no idea if this would work... some of the other guys who have more experience with the advanced panel may be able to help.

[magicmastermind124]

Hello again!

I've posted this request over 6 months ago and recieved replies that it is not soluble. After so much time had passed I'd like to ask again: is it somehow possible - via the advanced panel or just regular editor - to make regional divisions vary in the number of teams? I'd like to recreate the regional system in Slovenia which has the following structure:

What I've achieved in the editor so far is, that if those two teams are from the West, they successfully get relegated in the Western division. Consequently, a random team from that Western division automatically fills the "empty" space in the Eastern division. Thus, the number of teams in both divisions remains the same although it should be dissimilar.

So, is it possible to make the leagues vary in the number of teams or is the sole possibility still determining the number of teams in advance? I highly hope someone has found the solution and will be able to share his thoughts!

And the link to the topic where this issue had been discussed more than 6 months ago: *link*

You can set a division to have a minimum and maximum number of teams instead of a fixed number (using Advanced Rules). If you scroll to the top of this page of the thread you'll see that I discussed this not too long ago with someone who was having problems getting the right number of teams each year.

[lotr]

I'm having problems to get the advanced editor working... I have downloaded the format.rar and unrared the files to C:/Program Files(x86)/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 2011/tools/editor/data. But when I open the editor.exe I can't see the "List" section.

I'm using the 11.3.0 version.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Okay, after faffing around, I found something pretty cool.

If you use the group setting "MLS 2 Conference style", the game will make up the group stage in the way of the MLS old-style format. Not sure how flexible it is, but when I set it to 2 rounds, Scottish Premier with 2 groups(left the teams as they were), it come back with a 32 game schedule where everyone plays each team in their own conference four times(5x4=20), and each team in the other conference twice(6x2=12). This is automatically set up, I didn't have to fool around setting up stages or anything like that.

I'm gonna mess around some more and see what I can come up with from using the other group settings and maybe see if setting more or less rounds with differing numbers of teams will make different results.

[Toronto Blizzard]

Did it assign the clubs to the groups in any particular way?

[Dave Fairbairn]

The conferences were completely wrong, but I never set it to do be geographically drawn, so I have no idea if that maybe caused the Conferences to be wrong.

[Toronto Blizzard]

Hm. I was just curious as to whether it had some automatic way of grouping them, or whether it just chose at random. Sounds like the latter. I've seen that "MLS conference style" setting, but always assumed that it required all sorts of complicated set-up first.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Okay, after a quick investigation, if there aren't any group seeding or regionalisation rules selected, teams will be placed into Conference by unique ID.

Low IDs will be placed in the Eastern Conference while high IDs will placed in the Western Conference.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Okay, experiment 2, failed, but I may be here for a while(friends are all working late shift and there's nothing on TV). Excuse the frequent-ish posting. When I find something worth telling you guys, I'll post it here, mainly so I don't forget, but also to share findings with everyone else. This is the last status update, as it were.

Tried to use this over multiple groups, by adding the first, second and third division teams to make 7 groups of 6, with teams playing everyone from their Conference twice, then everyone else once for a total of 46 matches. Unfortunately it just drawn up the exact same 32 match schedule as last time, only using teams from the first 2 Conferences.

It's pretty rigid, I guess.

[Toronto Blizzard]

I wouldn't be surprised if you could only use it once per division. I think I'll try to experiment with this, too, especially in my lower North American divisions, where, in real life, travel costs across the continent would cripple lower division teams.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Okay, I have managed to get the correct teams into correct Conferences.

Basically, what I had to do was make 2 new competitions in the editor and given Aberdeen, Dundee United, Hearts, Hibs, Motherwell and St Johnstone to that one with the lowest unique ID as secondary division, and given Celtic, Hamilton, Caley, Kilmarnock, Rangers and St Mirren to the one that had the higher unique ID as secondary division.

If you want a look:

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/BwFLvEU09DFAgq2AFD8IMhwswqROh6cFGjxCiyBKn7A?feat=directlink

And an example editor file:

https://rapidshare.com/files/1503716900/Copy_of_testsco.dbc

There's no playoffs or anything like that, but this is just an example how to get the league working.

[Dave Fairbairn]

After more testing, it appears the MLS format will only work with groups of 6. Oh well.

[Made Of Stone]

I'm actually creating my own fantasy MLS update, thus far I have managed to get two conferences working by creating a straight hidden league, then having those results put into the conference stage which has no rounds itself. However I have 12 teams in each conference meaning each team will play 46 league games per season which may be too many. What I wanted to do was an uneven schedule, so that each team plays each other once, with a further round of games against teams in their own conference. However when I tried that on occasions it would throw up fixtures where a team would play home against another twice and vice versa, with seemingly no way of making sure that the venues are reversed. Is there any way I could set up the league like this, only it makes it a major pain in the arse otherwise and can lead to an unfair schedule where you may play more games away from home. If not I think I'll just have to go with a 46 game schedule and expand the season a little.

[JLlo]

One thing I have noticed which I think may put to rest any hope of getting the NACL to have the correct qualifiers:

You can't even use the un-edited NACL if you make any changes to the Canadian Champions Cup. Even if you do something tiny like change the date of 1 fixture in the Canadian Champions Cup the original NACL wont work. Without the original NACL you can't get the correct 4 Mexican teams to qualify. So that is an end to that unfortunately.

I think I am going to leave the USA and North America alone now until FM12 unless anyone manages to overcome the problems I've highlighted on here.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Made of Stone:

There is actually a tickbox for making home and away alternate between stages, I believe it's in the league settings section.

[Made Of Stone]

Made of Stone:

There is actually a tickbox for making home and away alternate between stages, I believe it's in the league settings section.

There's a swap fixture venue option?...However that doesn't seem to be working which is annoying!

[Dave Fairbairn]

Hmm... if that's the case, have you tried setting it for both stages?

Also; got the Dutch-style periods group stage set up, gonna see if I can do anything with it later on.

[Made Of Stone]

I'll give it a go and see, I thought initially I did try that but maybe I was wrong!

[Dave Fairbairn]

Keep in mind, some of the features don't actually work, or are at best buggy. It could just be that is the issue, rather than doing anything wrong.

[Made Of Stone]

Keep in mind, some of the features don't actually work, or are at best buggy. It could just be that is the issue, rather than doing anything wrong.

Yeah ticking both boxes seems to have no effect, not sure what I can do to reduce the schedule now as I am quite set on having all of the expansions teams in there and don't want to lose any.

[Dave Fairbairn]

Hmm... If you don't mind that teams from different conferences won't play each other and that there would be two groups for each conference, you could use the MLS 2 conference style group stage to set up to seperate stages, with each stage being a conference.

What this does, is it makes it so that each team plays the team from their conference twice(22 matches) then each team from their group a further 2 times(10 matches) to make a 32 game schedule.

The MLS 3 conference style group stage could also be used, but I have no idea how this gets worked out. It still must have 12 teams in each stage though. For some reason MLS style stages don't work if there aren't twelve teams exactly in the stage.

[Made Of Stone]

Hmm... If you don't mind that teams from different conferences won't play each other and that there would be two groups for each conference, you could use the MLS 2 conference style group stage to set up to seperate stages, with each stage being a conference.

What this does, is it makes it so that each team plays the team from their conference twice(22 matches) then each team from their group a further 2 times(10 matches) to make a 32 game schedule.

The MLS 3 conference style group stage could also be used, but I have no idea how this gets worked out. It still must have 12 teams in each stage though. For some reason MLS style stages don't work if there aren't twelve teams exactly in the stage.

See what I was initially hoping to do was have teams play sides from their conferences twice with a single round of games against the sides in the opposing conference for a 34 game schedule. Now I guess I could do as you suggest, but I still kinda want every team to face off at least once, but right now my only alternative is the 46 game schedule which could be far too many games!

[Dave Fairbairn]

https://rapidshare.com/files/1503716900/Copy_of_testsco.dbc

Here is an example of how I set a test MLS 2 conference style league up, BTW. The reason I upload this is so you can take a look at how I set it up so that the teams will be in the correct conferences/groups. If you don't do this, the teams will simply be sorted into conference/groups by unique ID.

[Made Of Stone]

https://rapidshare.com/files/1503716900/Copy_of_testsco.dbc

Here is an example of how I set a test MLS 2 conference style league up, BTW. The reason I upload this is so you can take a look at how I set it up so that the teams will be in the correct conferences/groups. If you don't do this, the teams will simply be sorted into conference/groups by unique ID.

Cheers mate, I'll take a look...I've actually got the teams in the correct conferences simply by selecting each team individually and going top to bottom with East teams at the top if that makes sense. However my initial plan was to sort the league regionally so I could have a two tiered MLS with conferences in both divisions, with promotion and relegation into the correct conferences. However that went awry when my Minnesota based club was placed in the incorrect conference and the conferences divisions seemed to be reversed, so East teams played in the West and vice versa. But I'll take a look and see what I can come up with, cheers mate!

[Made Of Stone]

Cheers mate, I'll take a look...I've actually got the teams in the correct conferences simply by selecting each team individually and going top to bottom with East teams at the top if that makes sense. However my initial plan was to sort the league regionally so I could have a two tiered MLS with conferences in both divisions, with promotion and relegation into the correct conferences. However that went awry when my Minnesota based club was placed in the incorrect conference and the conferences divisions seemed to be reversed, so East teams played in the West and vice versa. But I'll take a look and see what I can come up with, cheers mate!

Sadly this seems to have rendered the MLS un-selectable. It reads something like "MLS requires 24 teams, found 0"

[Dave Fairbairn]

You did check how the teams are set, right? They were all set to be in the Scottish Premier, but they have "secondary division" set to their conference.