Non-League to Legend Challenge

[lollujo]

Hi all

Some of you may have seen last year's Non-League to Legend on my YouTube channel - it's coming back this year once the full game's out, and this time I'm challenging my subscribers to play along with me. Full details are in this video, but I'll also be updating this thread from time to time, and invite anyone interested in taking part to do the same.

The Aim

To start out at the geographically closest club to your front door in the lowest playable league in your country, and reach the top of the Hall of Fame. 

The Rules

A Non-League to Legend save is played with my interpretation of traditional LLM rules, as follows:

• You must start in the lowest playable league in your country, at the geographically closest club to your front door
• Every decision you make in the save should be based on what you would do if it were all real. So you can, and probably should, look to move clubs to progress your career - no one becomes manager of Gainsborough Trinity with a plan to win the Champions League with them, it's a stepping stone to a better job, and that's how it should be treated in game
• If a club offers you more money to go and manage them, and they're within a geographical distance that makes the switch realistic based on the money you're being offered, then you need a very solid, realism based reason, not to take the job. Equally, if you get sacked in England and the next job you're offered is in Argentina for £300 a week, then you probably can't accept, because would you realistically move all that way for that kind of money?
• You've got bills to pay - you shouldn't be resigning from clubs unless you've got another job lined up, ever. Unless you're already so rich from previous jobs that things like this no longer matter to you
• Within those guidelines, you can move around the world as you wish, although realistically it won't be until you're a fairly high profile manager who can command a lot of money - getting sacked doesn't mean game over, it means it's time to look for a new job
• You should only sign players identified by your scouts, coaches, or in game news reports - i.e. those you'd be realistically expected to know about. We don't touch the player search screen in a Non-League to Legend save. And we especially don't touch the staff search screen - staff should be signed using the job centre or your director of football - the game is so heavily based on the quality of your scouts that it loses realism if you cherry pick all the scouts with 20 judging ability while you're still in non-league
• Tactics and training should be your own creations - downloaded tactics aren't realistic, you should learn how to get results through trial and error. As far as training goes, if you don't understand how to do it, figure it out through trial and error or leave it to your assistant manager
• When you start the game, your manager stats should be set by ticking the box for most appropriate for your club, which as you're starting at the bottom, should be pretty low!

FAQs

Can I upload my save to YouTube?

Yes - in fact, I encourage it, and I'll be putting a playlist on my channel that collects together all the Non-League to Legend first episodes I can find so they're easy to access all in one place. Make sure you include Non-League to Legend in your series name, and send me a link, either on here, on YouTube, on via Twitter/Facebook

I live in the US/Wales/Australia - how can I get involved?

If your country only has one playable league, still pick the team closest to your front door and follow the rest of the rules - if you're in one of those countries, you'll probably need to go abroad to be competitive in the continental competitions you need to be winning to top the hall of fame, so make that your short term goal - do well enough in your league to get noticed by a club in a major league, and move up from there.

How many leagues should I load? How big should my database be?

As many and as big as your PC will allow. The more players in your database, and the more countries you have loaded, the better your game will be in the long term. As a rough rule of thumb, I'd want to have a minimum of England, Spain, Germany, Brazil and Argentina loaded, with a large database, but if your PC won't allow that, then do what's best for your save.

Can I use the editor to add more playable leagues?

I always avoid the editor completely. Once you've dipped into the editor once, no matter what your intentions, it's pretty hard to convince people you're not in there all the time. For your Non-League to Legend save, stick to the vanilla leagues that come in the box. And it should go without saying that use of in-game editors isn't allowed.

 

I'll add to the FAQ as more questions come up, those are the main ones that came up in the comments on the video. 

Good luck  

[VV Bal op de Lat]

You have got yourself a follower for this series, sir (not new though, have been following your youtube adventures for the past -almost a- year. Still considering if I'll join the challenge or start something for my own though. Anyways, goodluck with yours!

[makovn]

so inspired by lollujo obviously i decided to start my own Non-League to Legend save

 i live in Omer, Israel which is a small town near Be`er Sheva in the game there is down to the second tier or liga leumit the actual closest team to my house is Hapoel Be`er Sheva but because they are the best team in israel (in my opinion)

i went with one of the closest ( i think second closest) to my house which is actualy based in jerusalem.

meet me (the soon to be great) Nir Makov

and my first club

and our (large ) squad

i will update after pre season and if there is anything you want to see just ask

 

[makovn]

just finished pre-season and and it went quiet well

won the h fictional league against 3 israeli top flight teams and had very good results. was disappointed to lose to Maccabi Jaffa but you win some you lose some and other pre-season results give us reasons for optimism.

the wins against Bnei Yehuda and Hapoel Ra`anana were very pleasing and very surprising. the game against Hapoel Ra`anana was our best at pre-season and we showed very good signs.

a very close game but we were quite clinical and got a surprising result. if we play like that all ear i think we can challenge for promotion

transfers

brought two foreign strikers in for free, one is the brasilian Arlan Olinda and the other is a portuguese talent Flavio Silva. one out,  Yonatan Zada wasn't gonna start anyway and we could do with the money.

i don`t predict anymore transfers in but if i am offered anyone intresting that might change. i do have a large squad but not many quality so i am not planing on selling anyone but if a good offer comes in who knows

 

season aims:

 challenge for promotion\ top 6

get a national A license 

a good cup run

season preview:

i think we can definitely do better than tenth so let prove me right.

 

 

[fabreth]

No one playing this? Perhaps because it's seen as easier than other challenges?

I might join in with a few changes if you don't mind. Since the nearest squad to me is Alessandria, who would be one of the candidates for promotion, maybe I'll start unemployed and then accept a job only from a team from north-west Italy. And I'll lower the manager stats, at least the player experience, to be more realistic with myself(so..the lowest).