PPM's destroying the tactical setup

[bleventozturk]

I have a perfectly working 4-1-3-2 tactic with my current team, creating reasonable amount of goals, very solid at the back, overachieving season after season. I had this young left back who was shown as a future star when he was 18. He is 21 now, and he did become a star, or he is about to. He is a solid starter in my team, one of my best 5 players easily. He had 16 pace, 15 accelerations and agility, he is tall as well (for a full back) at 185cm, so he is the perfect beast wingback for me. He was fitting my tactic extremely well, until I finally stopped ignoring my assistant coach's advice and let him learn to 'knock ball past opponents'. With this PPM, he keeps now dribbling the ball down the left flank, majority of the time refusing to pass it to the MC nearest to him. This single handedly destroyed my team's flowing attacking movement!!

1 PPM on 1 player should not affect how a tactic works this much. As a result, now I have to give him the PI 'dribble less' every match, but then still he doesn't play the way he used to play when he had no PPM's

Moreover, now I have to wait like 6 months for him to try to get rid of that PPM, and my assistant thinks it won't happen!

PPM's are just one of the many features in FM that sound bright as an idea, but not implemented properly.

[themadsheep2001]

Why did you teach it to him then? Why change his play style?

Some players have natural ways of playing, which PPM partly help recreate. Much like real life, this can make some players more/less suitable in some situations than others.

[bleventozturk]

Why did you teach it to him then? Why change his play style?

Some players have natural ways of playing, which PPM partly help recreate. Much like real life, this can make some players more/less suitable in some situations than others.

Like I said, the assman kept telling me to do that, and at some point I thought, what the heck, let's see what it will do. Since he has great speed and agility, good dribbling and good technique, it is actually a reasonable suggestion. And the PPM actually made him a little more effective going down the left flank, so it was a good idea for the player. It disrupted my attacking movement though, because the PPM's are way too dominant. It's like he ALWAYS tries to kick the ball and run after it, at every possession.

[Lobaeux4]

I look at it as an opportunity! Now, develop a tactic that suits your "new" player.

I'm guessing these things can happen in real life as well, but the beauty and challenge is to adapt to him, OR make some money off him in the transfer market and develop a new left back.

[bleventozturk]

I look at it as an opportunity! Now, develop a tactic that suits your "new" player.

I'm guessing these things can happen in real life as well, but the beauty and challenge is to adapt to him, OR make some money off him in the transfer market and develop a new left back.

I think I will go with the second option, since I love my balanced, symmetric tactic, and I don't like anything disrupting that symmetry.

It is a shame though that PPM's can't be added and deleted faster. Especially since many of them don't do anything different than some of the PI's. The idea is good, but poorly implemented

[janesy20]

I look at it as an opportunity! Now, develop a tactic that suits your "new" player.

I'm guessing these things can happen in real life as well, but the beauty and challenge is to adapt to him, OR make some money off him in the transfer market and develop a new left back.

Rubbish! If a manager asked me in real life to stop knocking the ball past an opponent I would stop knocking a ball past an opponent immediately! It should not take 6 months to retrain the PPMs, some of the movement ones perhaps...but not dribbling ones.

You can get some enjoyment out of this game if you somehow luckily stumble across a good blend of PPMs, tactics, player instructions but even then it's ruined when it comes to oppositions instructions where it's anyone's guess. But god forbid the exact same has to happen to your second tactic against the better teams...

[Torskus77]

PPM's are great in some ways, but I think the players take them far to literally, even if the player has good decisions. The shoots long PPM is an absolute nightmare, I refuse to sign a player with it now, because they become pretty useless.

I also have a left back in my side that has knocks ball past opponent, although he has pretty decent stats to do so, I agree it kind of knackers up your system,cos he does little else, he has great crossing ability, but it's literally as if he just wants to keep kicking it forward and running straight out the ground :-)

[llama3]

Your player's decision making, your team's creative freedom will all affect a player's use of PPM's.

He may even be using those PPM's literally because those options are so much better in that situation than any other option available.

[Negatrev]

I ONLY use this for players who are in lower risk positions, but without great dribbling skills but with great acceleration. As OP states, it appears to be a little TOO aggressively followed. It IS however very useful in the lower leagues for pacey wide players/strikers who can't dribble

[bleventozturk]

He may even be using those PPM's literally because those options are so much better in that situation than any other option available.

No, not at all. Before my leftback had this PPM, he used to average 70 passes per game. Now he has it, if I don't tell him to dribble less, he finishes the games with around 30-40 passes only, about half of what he used to, because he is trying to use it almost every time he gets the ball close to the sideline. That's how aggressively some PPM's are followed in the ME. My tactical setup works perfectly for short passing system, and one of my MC's and my DMC are almost always available for a pass when my FB's have the ball. It's just now my FB refuses to pass the ball to them, even when they are wide open, and instead he dwells on the ball a little bit, and tries to dribble the ball down the left flank. He always looks for that option first, and only after he realizes the path is completely blocked he passes it to my central midfielders. Sometimes even then he looks confused, and keeps dwelling on the ball, until somebody tackles him. It looks like he is thinking 'damn it, I HAVE TO knock this ball past my opponents, but there are two of them right in front of me, what should I do, god this is so confusing...'. This one PPM completely ruined his role in my system.

Oh, almost forgot. One thing that has improved is his Run stats of course, due to which now he is averaging 0.2-0.3 better than he used to!!! Rubbish implementation of PPM's, and rubbish ratings system

[Cleon]

There is no way the PPM makes the player go from 70 passes to 30-40 not a chance in hell. If you think the PPM is that strong then you don't really understand PPM's at all. Also stop saying something is a rubbish implenatation when the actual fact is you learnt it the player, no-one forced you to do it. It's bad management on your part but you don't seem to acknowledge that are quickly blame anything you can except for yourself, which is the true cause of the issue.

The player is not attempting 30 runs a game which is what the PPM's encourages (knocks past player to take him on using speed). The PPM does not make the player dwell or spend longer on the ball either. What would make him do that is poor decision making, poor work rate, poor team work or a lack of options even though you say the player has them.

[bleventozturk]

There is no way the PPM makes the player go from 70 passes to 30-40 not a chance in hell. If you think the PPM is that strong then you don't really understand PPM's at all. Also stop saying something is a rubbish implenatation when the actual fact is you learnt it the player, no-one forced you to do it. It's bad management on your part but you don't seem to acknowledge that are quickly blame anything you can except for yourself, which is the true cause of the issue.

The player is not attempting 30 runs a game which is what the PPM's encourages (knocks past player to take him on using speed). The PPM does not make the player dwell or spend longer on the ball either. What would make him do that is poor decision making, poor work rate, poor team work or a lack of options even though you say the player has them.

How can you even say this without seeing my matches??? There may be other factors contributing to it, like his decision making being poor, or whatever, but his passing numbers did go from 70 to 30-40. And he does dwell on the ball so much more now. And the only difference is the PPM. Without the PPM, those other factors were still there. Therefore, it is absolutely rubbish that it is happening only because that PPM got added. And the fact that I decided that the player learns that PPM is completely irrelevant. Why would you even bring that up, what is your point? It has nothing to do with what I'm complaining about here. It seems almost like you get offended when somebody criticizes something about the game. I acknowledge that.

[bleventozturk]

Also, as I said earlier, when I chose the 'dribble less' PI, it kind of negates the effect of the PPM, and everything goes back to normal. So, what happens to his poor decision making, poor work rate then, do they disappear? Does he become magically wiser? What happens to the lack of options? The passing options are there, independent of the player's PPM's. With the PPM, however, the player makes different decisions than before though. And as far as I can observe, this particular player always looks to execute his PPM first. Hence my conclusion that some PPM's are too aggressive, become too much of a first choice for players.

[bleventozturk]

ppm's aren't a bad idea but the way they are implemented is quite clumsy. if i have options to learn my team three tactics, i might use one of them most of the time and train desired ppm's for that tactic, but what happens when i load another one which is quite incompatible with ppm's learned? i need to pick completely different squad of 11 players?

Very good point. Some PPM's should not even be in the PPM list. For example, 'knock ball past opponent' can be a PI instead. What makes that a PPM, and 'dribble the ball more' a PI? Likewise, dribbling the ball more also could be a player's PPM. Instead of PPM's, there should be a longer list of PI's maybe. That way we can have flexibility to use all those additional behaviors too. I should be able to ask my player to knock the ball past his opponents. And if doesn't work, in the second half I should be able to tell him 'hey you know what, scratch that, don't try that any more in the second half, because that player in your wing is too fast and agile, it's not working'. Or playing one-two's. Why is it a PPM?? Why can I not ask my players to try one-two's? Why do I have to wait 6 months to see if a player will be successful in doing so?

PPM's imo: Interesting idea, not thoroughly thought, poorly implemented.

[themadsheep2001]

Very good point. Some PPM's should not even be in the PPM list. For example, 'knock ball past opponent' can be a PI instead. What makes that a PPM, and 'dribble the ball more' a PI? Likewise, dribbling the ball more also could be a player's PPM. Instead of PPM's, there should be a longer list of PI's maybe. That way we can have flexibility to use all those additional behaviors too. I should be able to ask my player to knock the ball past his opponents. And if doesn't work, in the second half I should be able to tell him 'hey you know what, scratch that, don't try that any more in the second half, because that player in your wing is too fast and agile, it's not working'. Or playing one-two's. Why is it a PPM?? Why can I not ask my players to try one-two's? Why do I have to wait 6 months to see if a player will be successful in doing so?

PPM's imo: Interesting idea, not thoroughly thought, poorly implemented.

Why should it be a PI, when its obviously a tendency (and thus PPM) some players have (Gareth Bale for example).

You already encourage one two with your style of play.

End of the day, you made a management decision, and it backfired this time, such is management. Just because the assistant manager recommends it doesn't mean you have to do it

[Cleon]

How can you even say this without seeing my matches??? There may be other factors contributing to it, like his decision making being poor, or whatever, but his passing numbers did go from 70 to 30-40. And he does dwell on the ball so much more now. And the only difference is the PPM. Without the PPM, those other factors were still there. Therefore, it is absolutely rubbish that it is happening only because that PPM got added. And the fact that I decided that the player learns that PPM is completely irrelevant. Why would you even bring that up, what is your point? It has nothing to do with what I'm complaining about here. It seems almost like you get offended when somebody criticizes something about the game. I acknowledge that.

Because I know how the PPM works and what it does. I was a beta tester for best part of 20 years so know exactly how things works, I don't need to see your games to know how something works. Just because someone has a PPM does not mean it is used all the time, when and how often its used is down to the players attributes, hence why I said if he does it all the time like you claim then he has **** poor decision making, low teamwork and low workrate. All the PPM does is when the opportunity is there makes him knock the ball past his opponent and then try and run around them to get on the end of the ball. It has nothing at all to do with making the player dwell on the ball more like you claim.

And please don't be silly and say I got offended when I didn't. I pointed out your mistakes in the way you think PPM's work and you was the one who got super defensive not me. Why would I get offended by your comments lol? The game isn't mine and I no longer play the game. I just pointed out the facts that whatever you say about PPM's you have a lack of understanding about them (I agree documentation is poor here though) and at the end of the day you as the manager made an error in teaching the PPM.

Also, as I said earlier, when I chose the 'dribble less' PI, it kind of negates the effect of the PPM, and everything goes back to normal. So, what happens to his poor decision making, poor work rate then, do they disappear? Does he become magically wiser? What happens to the lack of options? The passing options are there, independent of the player's PPM's. With the PPM, however, the player makes different decisions than before though. And as far as I can observe, this particular player always looks to execute his PPM first. Hence my conclusion that some PPM's are too aggressive, become too much of a first choice for players.

He'll still attempt the move regardless of what his PI's are. Once a player has the PPM its more of a tendancy to do it so he'll still do it often if he thinks its the right move regardless of whether you instruct him to do something often or rarely.

I'd love to see PKM's and stats to back up these claims though. Mind uploading them?

this really is a strange response from a moderator. how are we supposed to understand the PPM's? what is explaining them? one line of description? nope, not even that as all we get is the name of the ppm that is supposed to tell us everything. what we understand is coming only from what we can observe in the ME after the PPM got learnt. i do not say anyone should be believed on the word as we are all very biased watching the ME (or even real footy) but saying somethng like this before seeing more info is plain wrong, in my opinion. when it comes from moderator it is even worse.

ppm's aren't a bad idea but the way they are implemented is quite clumsy. if i have options to learn my team three tactics, i might use one of them most of the time and train desired ppm's for that tactic, but what happens when i load another one which is quite incompatible with ppm's learned? i need to pick completely different squad of 11 players?

Firstly I'm not a moderator. Secondly I can appreciate that documentation isn't enough currently for the game. However the OP felt he must know how they work well enough to make claims such as rubbish implementation etc. But I don't need to see his games to know that what he claims about dwelling on the ball etc does not come from learning this PPM. It's something else and not PPM related, I'm 1000000000000% sure of that. At a guess I'd say it was more to do with the shape the opposition is actually playing or how aggressive his fullback is being closed down. But either way its not the PPM that is the cause of this that suddenly makes his fullback see 30-40 less passes a game, its impossible for the PPM to be the reason for this as that is a lot of passes. The odd one might be from him trying to take on his man but not all of them, that would make him trying to attempt 30 runs a game.......yeah sorry that ain't happening despite what's being claimed here.

Very good point. Some PPM's should not even be in the PPM list. For example, 'knock ball past opponent' can be a PI instead. What makes that a PPM, and 'dribble the ball more' a PI? Likewise, dribbling the ball more also could be a player's PPM. Instead of PPM's, there should be a longer list of PI's maybe. That way we can have flexibility to use all those additional behaviors too. I should be able to ask my player to knock the ball past his opponents. And if doesn't work, in the second half I should be able to tell him 'hey you know what, scratch that, don't try that any more in the second half, because that player in your wing is too fast and agile, it's not working'. Or playing one-two's. Why is it a PPM?? Why can I not ask my players to try one-two's? Why do I have to wait 6 months to see if a player will be successful in doing so?

PPM's imo: Interesting idea, not thoroughly thought, poorly implemented.

PPM's should have a bigger impact on the game as they are player tendencies. Currently the impact they have isn't powerful enough (Yes I know you claim different) and they should be better linked to the player and make them stand out more to replicate players styles as most players in the real world have some kind of tendencies and make them different to other players regardless of it being a good/bad thing. PPM's should be more linked to a players personality and be incorporated so that tactics, PPM,s and personality are much better linked together rather than the seperate modules we currently have.

[lam]

A bad plan is one that can not be changed (some Roman tactician said that - at least accordigly Rome II total war ).

Either way, him running a lot with the ball or your fluid passing style being closed down heavilty result in the same thing.... you tactic out of the window.

The ability for a FB/WB to get past the first line of defence is a powerful thing to acheive, ideally you should learn to capitalise on that...... even if it isn't in line with your master plan (not meaning to sound condascending).

If he is dwelling on the ball a lot then you may need more passing options. One/both of your MC's might need to sit a little deeper (no idea where they are currently).

How wide are you playing? I've noticed that FB/WBs running past their opposition tend to do far better with this when they go outside their man, so if you're playing really wide, you might not have left him enough space.

What are his other instructions? Have you asked him to get to the byline to get crosses in? If those are the standing instructions (which I'm going to assume they are as you refer to him as the perfect wingback rather than fullback), then essentially you have told him the following:

1. I'd like you to use your pace and get past your opposition whenever the opportunity presents itself

2. When you have done this I want you to drive to the byline.

3. Once at the byline I want you to cross the ball.

So, assuming you have not changed to many instructions, he is actually doing everything you told him to do. If you liked him passing rather than dribbling or running past his man then you need to consider treating him as such and setting him up as more of a fullback rather than a wingback.

All of the assumptions above are based around the words you have used. You refer to him as a perfect wingback thus I've assumed you have set him up as such. Perhaps you have even set him up as COMPLETE wingback, which also gives him more creative freedom (i think) thus more likely to use his PPM's.

Sounds like you want a fullback rather than a wingback...........

Regards

LAM

[shaunwwfc]

I am no TC genius but I would assume asking your team to play more disciplined would help.

[bleventozturk]

I appreciate some of the feedback I read here, but all of them are missing the point, except cleon's explanations about how the PPM's work (which is exactly what I'm questioning). I'm not trying to find a workaround, and I am certainly not discussing why I asked the player to learn the PPM and who is to blame (which I already clarified, so it is amazing that I'm still getting 'it's your own fault' type of posts ).

Cleon, I appreciate the more detailed feedback about the PPM's, even though I must say I don't understand the (slightly) offensive attitude. FWIW, I've been a beta-tester for many years too, and have played or tested almost every CM/FM version since the first ever one, but I don't think that should conclude that whatever one says is right. Anyway, I played more matches, and things got back to normal with that player, more or less. There is still a little bit of reduction in his average pass per game, but nowhere as severe as from 70 to 40. Therefore, I think the right conclusion is that in those first few matches I played after the player gained that PPM, coincidentally those opponents used a set of OI's (or some kind of tactical setup) that reduced his pass/game drastically, which would maybe still happen even if he didn't have that PPM in those matches. So, in this case, what you said is right I guess

My other point though, which is how the PPM's are implemented, I still find impractical. I kind of like what MBarbaric suggested - that might be a more reasonable implementation. Depending on the attributes, players should slowly develop suitable tendencies, and slowly lose them when attributes start diminishing or shifting. For example, this knocking ball past opponent PPM. Like someone here said, it is a good PPM if the player has great speed and not much of a dribbling skill. When the player gets old and slows down, the tendency to do anything relying on the speed should diminish naturally. We shouldn't have to spend 6 months to wait for the player to un-learn it. And I still think that most of the PPM's in the game should be just additional PI's.

[llama3]

to support this, i believe we all agree that Ryan Giggs at age of 21 and 35 had quite different PPM's

True, although these weren't necessarily "player instructions" - more likely his natural tendancies - as is his tendancy to avoid it now.

[Cleon]

Cleon, I appreciate the more detailed feedback about the PPM's, even though I must say I don't understand the (slightly) offensive attitude. FWIW, I've been a beta-tester for many years too, and have played or tested almost every CM/FM version since the first ever one, but I don't think that should conclude that whatever one says is right

I've had paid work and been privvy to a lot of information about the inner workings of the ME though. Outside of SI there is only about 2 people who know more about how things actually work than myself. That's not being big headed but I've been in a unique situation for years so was able to talk directly to the programmers, be involved with development stuff etc. So while you might not 'think' what I was saying was correct it actually was. I wasn't being offensive either, the problem with forums is everyone takes everything serious and always thinks the worse. You can't express proerly with text as you can't see expression etc. I meant no offence so apologies, if I wanted to be offensive I'd have swore at you or just completely ignored you. Sometimes people mistake hard facts for offence :brock:

I don't think player tendencies should ever be PI's as that isn't what a PPM is supposed to be. They should be better linked to personality and attributes though. So I do partly agree with you on some level

[bleventozturk]

I've had paid work and been privvy to a lot of information about the inner workings of the ME though. Outside of SI there is only about 2 people who know more about how things actually work than myself. That's not being big headed but I've been in a unique situation for years so was able to talk directly to the programmers, be involved with development stuff etc. So while you might not 'think' what I was saying was correct it actually was. I wasn't being offensive either, the problem with forums is everyone takes everything serious and always thinks the worse. You can't express proerly with text as you can't see expression etc. I meant no offence so apologies, if I wanted to be offensive I'd have swore at you or just completely ignored you. Sometimes people mistake hard facts for offence :brock:

I don't think player tendencies should ever be PI's as that isn't what a PPM is supposed to be. They should be better linked to personality and attributes though. So I do partly agree with you on some level

Yes, as I said, in this particular case it looks like you were absolutely right

The reason why I felt like you were being offensive, was that I was thinking I have solid evidence in my hand (my matches) that says just by addition of 1 PPM the whole tactic gets significantly effected, whereas you were completely rejecting that fact, saying it is impossible. When I know something that happened, and somebody says no way it can't happen, it just comes out a little disrespectful, almost like you were telling me that I'm making it up. My response to that had a defensive tone maybe, naturally. Thanks for clarifying that it wasn't your intention, so no need for apologies here

My mistake was that I reached a conclusion after watching a few matches only. Later, after playing many more matches, I happily realized that it was only a coincidence. The AI's instructions probably caused my FB to struggle in finding the open teammate. However, the ME representation may not always look very realistic - in this particular case my FB always had some available teammate, but he just wouldn't pass it to them, for whatever reason. Maybe he was in low form for those few matches, which effected his decision making? I will never be sure.

[llama3]

Peace and Harmony break out in the world again!

[Torskus77]

I've had paid work and been privvy to a lot of information about the inner workings of the ME though. Outside of SI there is only about 2 people who know more about how things actually work than myself. That's not being big headed but I've been in a unique situation for years so was able to talk directly to the programmers, be involved with development stuff etc. So while you might not 'think' what I was saying was correct it actually was. I wasn't being offensive either, the problem with forums is everyone takes everything serious and always thinks the worse. You can't express proerly with text as you can't see expression etc. I meant no offence so apologies, if I wanted to be offensive I'd have swore at you or just completely ignored you. Sometimes people mistake hard facts for offence :brock:

I don't think player tendencies should ever be PI's as that isn't what a PPM is supposed to be. They should be better linked to personality and attributes though. So I do partly agree with you on some level

People have different personalities, that's life, people definitely take text the wrong way. I like Cleon's assertive manner, I don't really mind how people put me right, as long as I get the information I am after :-) I do feel that this version of the game warranted better explanations on things in general, if you bought this game without reading a forum, I think you would take a whole bunch of things in the wrong way. Hopefully this will be rectified for fm15.

[Torskus77]

True, although these weren't necessarily "player instructions" - more likely his natural tendancies - as is his tendancy to avoid it now.

Good, Well world class players adapt their game if they wish to continue in to their late 30s, Giggs, Gerrard, Scholes are just a few examples. PPM's are a great idea, players do have them, and over use them. I remember years back now, watching Gerrard and thinking, just playing a simple pass sometimes would be a good idea, instead of looking for that long ball for Owen ever dam time you get the ball :-) Although this could also have been down to manager instructions a little too.

I think especially with intelligent players, it would be good if you could remould them in to a different kind of player a little easier as they get older, providing they have the correct attributes to do so.

[Amarante]

The problem lies in how certain things are bought across to use users. What we think something is, is not really what it is. SI needs to release a a detailed documentation to explain certain aspects of the game.