The Addition of Dutch Lower Leagues (HELP thread)

[krlenjushka]

No i just wanna check data

[Slabbekoorn]

Small update, I didn’t have much time this weekend but I’ll give a update nonetheless. I’ve sorted each existing Dutch lower league club into newly created divisions, I’ve added each existing club to the newly created Districtsbekers as a second division. Now I’m working with Krlujenska to add the missing Tweede Klasse clubs.

Eredivise – Eerste klasse is already finished, I’ll add Tweede Klasse after the clubs are added. Then I’m going to collect all Derde to Vijfde Klasse clubs which is going to be a lot of work. After that I’ll add them to the game and create the Derde to the Vijfde Klasse. Then every team is in the game and I can continue finishing the Disctrictsbekers.

[Winski]

Thanks for the update. That sounds great! This will be really fantastic to play with

[Tobcoach]

In real life, there could be an interesting development concerning the "Jong"-teams.

Rumour has it that in due course those teams will be removed from Tweede Divisie and lower. In the Eerste Divisie 4 "Jong"-teams would remain.

Plan is that the "Jong"-teams get a separate competition, and that the champion will play against the worst "Jong"-team of the Eerste Divisie for a place in that division next year. And that the champion of the Tweede Divisie would play a play-off with the worst A-teram of the Eerste Divisie for a place in that division next year.

This would be hell to recreate in FM! How on earth can you attach that "Jong"-competition next to the Tweede Divisie (would be the same tier) and make sure that the right teams play in the right divisions? Something for the die-hard editors to figure out.

Edited December 7, 2017 by Tobcoach

[Slabbekoorn]

On 7-12-2017 at 12:24, Tobcoach said:

In real life, there could be an interesting development concerning the "Jong"-teams.

Rumour has it that in due course those teams will be removed from Tweede Divisie and lower. In the Eerste Divisie 4 "Jong"-teams would remain.

Plan is that the "Jong"-teams get a separate competition, and that the champion will play against the worst "Jong"-team of the Eerste Divisie for a place in that division next year. And that the champion of the Tweede Divisie would play a play-off with the worst A-teram of the Eerste Divisie for a place in that division next year.

This would be hell to recreate in FM! How on earth can you attach that "Jong"-competition next to the Tweede Divisie (would be the same tier) and make sure that the right teams play in the right divisions? Something for the die-hard editors to figure out.

Well I have already thought of a solution but I haven't created it yet. What if we create 2 extra stages in the JL so 3 total, 4 if you add the periods.

Stage 0 is a basic stage with all teams like it is now but we remove relegation spot. But set min relegation to 0, max to 2. Create stage 1 as the periods. 

Then stage 2 where we ignore B-teams and get all teams from division. In total 16 teams, last team relegates (also use set other league fate back to stage 0). Set rounds to 0, tick "create fixtures" and untick the second box. Also set in stage 0 or 1 that results are also set in stage 2 like in the Dutch periods.

Then stage 3 we choose a league of 4 teams with a playoff spot at the end. Draw only B-teams. The rest is kinda the same as stage 2.

Then the trick comes that in the Tweede Divisie we seperate the stages (or creating a parent division, place the 2e Divisie as child competition and Beloftem Eredisie as another) into B-teams and first teams from the start. The normal stage is like the normal Tweede divisie but don't draw B-teams. The second stage/competition is a stage only for B-teams and create a B league next to the Tweede Divisie. This is where the reserves duke it out. Set top team to playoff.

Then the playoff can be located in either competition. But probably also in the JL as stage 5.

Edited December 13, 2017 by Slabbekoorn

[Slabbekoorn]

Another small update, I've found a way to draw reserve teams like the game does in default but now when I set custom competitions. I'll explain later but technically what I do is under teams "draw qualified teams from end of list" then in the division below (it draws automatically each year so no promotion and relegatiom) I do the exact same but add an ignore teams."qualified end of list" max 8. So it draws reserves automatically. No more annoying stage setting for me.

 

This way I can create the Reserve Hoofdklasse -Reserve Derde Klasse (Zaterdag en Zondag) for each district using my Districtbekers as secondary division to draw teams from. And then I have more control on the leagues instead of last years installment. It also saves me a lot of time.

[Slabbekoorn]

I'm going to try and make a league like you suggested @Tobcoach. I know that it is possible as long as stage 0 of the JL has 20 teams and I can probably seperate B-teams from first-teams in other stages. From there it is possible to qualify teams for different relegation playoff stages.

[Slabbekoorn]

I get it working step by step. First I made the default league 0 stage for Jupiler League. Then a stage 1 where I seperate B-teams in a group and first teams in a group. Then I added Tweede Divisie and told them to draw first teams only. Now I created a playoff which draws teams from seperate JL stage 1 groups and seperate Tweede Divisie/Beloften Eredivisie division level. Now I only have to add the promotion/relegation rules to the JL, Tweede Divisie, Beloften Eredivisie and set league fate actions in the 2 seperate playoffs.

[Tobcoach]

Good work! Just curious: is this for FM17 or FM18?

[Slabbekoorn]

FM18

I ran into some trouble yesterday so I reloaded the file to a back up, found my error while editing there. I have to say the file is a mess with all the team drawing but it is working. I don't even know where to start explaining what I did but if I don't I'll forget it myself. I got the file now verified and running. I'll let my pc run for a few hours see if it does what it has to do and then I'll post the file with explanations.

The downside though is that it has to draw existing B-teams out of existing leagues and I have no clue how to make it more dynamic if lower league clubs want to have their B-team included when they're promoted. 

[Slabbekoorn]

Does someone know how to make screenshots in the game to post it here?

I also thought of a way to make it more dynamic. What if I make Beloften Eredivisie stage 0 draw all the B-teams in the world (well only of Holland ofcourse), let  them play no games and hide that stage. Then make a stage 1 with 16 teams that draws division teams (so all B-teams) based on reputation, and exclude Tweede Divisie and below teams. I can also make groups that group 1 will be Beloften Eredivisie, group 2 can be Beloften Eerste divisie. All drawn by team reputation. And then I continue like I did before.

This way if for example Den Bosch relegates to Tweede Divisie then because of exclusion of Tweede Divisie B-teams it will automatically not draw the team next year in stage 1 of Beloften Eredivisie/Eerste divisie anymore. It would be in stage 0 but stage 0 is hidden and useless. And if Achilles 29 promotes then the B-team will be drawn again.

[Wolf_pd]

Windowed mode it is print screen for me (FM17 that is).

[Slabbekoorn]

Thanks Wolf.

I've also messed around with the editor some time to see if I could fix the problem I couldn't last year and this time I fixed the Districtbeker - KNVB Beker qualification problem. I'll explain it later with images. So now I can create Districtbekers, make all the quarter finalists qualify for the first qualifying round of the KNVB-Beker so I'm happy I finally figured it out.

[Wazakii]

Great work man! 

Any progress update? 

[Slabbekoorn]

Yeah still busy with adding the clubs. Tiresome work. But I have figured out everything else though although I haven't created it yet. After I added the clubs then I'll do as much as I can in the basic editor and then I'll go to the advanced editor. I reckon I'll get the least amount of trouble though.

[Slabbekoorn]

Small update, and I need your help on thinking of something.

I edited the existing Holland files, had to do some tricks in xml but this is the only way I can keep European playoffs. So Eredivisie is automatically done, but I changed the prize money to the correct prize money. JL is also done and I changed the prize money. Then below the JL I have the Beloftencompetitie. That one is running like it is now, in 2018-2019 I changed it to the KNVB's proposal (http://www.rtvdrenthe.nl/nieuws/123482/KNVB-schetst-nieuw-plan-een-beloftencompetitie-met-FC-Emmen ) which basically is a 9/9 group regional split, best 5 teams go into a top 10 champions playoff, rest of the teams (4 in each) go to a bottom 8 playoff.

Then from 2019-2020 I added the other  eight B-teams back to the Beloftencompetitie (Jong Sparta/Twente/Vitesse etc.)  and I added promotion/relegation playoff between the worst JL B-team and the Beloftencompetitie champions playoff winner.

Now the thing is I do not know what the plans are going to be, so I have to guess it from now. So I'm going for a regional split A/B/C with 8/9/9 team. With a preliminairy until december with 2 rounds and then a champions playoff with 10 teams, a mid playoff of 8 teams and bottom playoff of 8 teams. I'm hoping that everyone is ok with that?

Luckily though I already added the Nike Eredivisie/Eerste Divisie with champion/mid/bottom playoff, Nike Cup under 19 and Supercup under 19 with all real life rules and that is working perfectly. So now I have to think of the Beloftencompetitie. Then I'll add the Tweede Divisie and Derde Divisie. I haven't added all teams of the entire country yet but I'm compiling all the data.

[Slabbekoorn]

I have already thought of a good way. I'll do 8/9/9 group for b-teams from 2019/2020 onwards. Then 2 rounds until december. From january a 10/8/8 champion/mid/bottom split with also 2 rounds. Winner of champion playoff goes to playoff with worst Jupiler League and can win a spot for JL. I have chosen so many reserve games because KNVB wants to give a proper alternative for B-teams to develop youth players. And with this setup they have a minimum of 14/16 games in preliminairy and 18/14 games in champions/mid/bottom playoff so that's 28/34 games in a season which comes close to what Tweede Divisie/Derde Divisie/Hoofdklasse have to offer.

I'll post pictures of how Dutch u19 is working now in an hour to show you how it looks and I'll create these reserve league in the meantime.

[Slabbekoorn]

Nike Eredivisie Under 19

Like in real life, it starts with 14 teams and all play one round against eachother.

Nike Eredivisie Preliminairy start


Nike Eredivisie Preliminairy finished


The top 8 teams qualify for the Champions Playoff, the bottom 6 go to Eerste Divisie Under 19 Champions playoff wth the best 4 of the Eerste Divisie Under 19 Preliminairy Round.

Nike Eredivisie Champions Playoff start


Nike Eredivisie Champions Playoff end


Nike Cup u19

The Nike Cup has a preliminairy round in August and the following rounds are played from january and onward. The winner of the last years Nike Eredivisie u19 and the Nike Cup u19 don't have to play the preliminairy like in real life and they join the Eight Final in january. The same goes for 4 random teams. 

Nike Cup Preliminairy Round

 

As you can see Ajax under 19 got a bye because they won the 2016/2017 Nike Eredivisie u19, Ajax u19 also won the Nike Cup u19 2016/2017 so instead PSV under 19 finished second in the league and plays in the Nike Supercup u19 so they're also excluded from the Nike Cup u19 Preliminairy round. The other 4 teams are drawn randomly.

Nike Cup end


Nike Supercup Under 19

The Nike Supercup is played at the same day as the Nike Cup's Preliminairy Round.



So that's how the u19's are done. I haven't shown the Eerste Divise u19 but otherwise it'll be a bit too much to post now.

[Winski]

It is looking great!! Can't wait to play with it.

What I don't understand is the following: you are saying that the winner of the Beloftencompetitie can evantually win a JL ticket. But are those rules your own? Because IRL only the winner of the Tweede Divisie can promote to the JL. Or am I misunderstanding your explanation?

Any thoughts about a release date? 

 

[Slabbekoorn]

9 hours ago, Winski said:

It is looking great!! Can't wait to play with it.

What I don't understand is the following: you are saying that the winner of the Beloftencompetitie can evantually win a JL ticket. But are those rules your own? Because IRL only the winner of the Tweede Divisie can promote to the JL. Or am I misunderstanding your explanation?

Any thoughts about a release date? 

 

I'll release the version I have now pretty soon. Which is just Eredivisie/JL for now unfortunately. But a lot of work was put in realism, youth and reserve. 

The promotion between Beloftencompetitie/JL is my own as of now. But it is based on the column of Valentijn Driessen of de Telegraaf of 1 december 2017 that it is based on the rumours that go around about the plans of the KNVB (because of the amateurs beloften joining amateur leagues was stopped in the summer). And because amateur clubs are protesting against B-teams, and nobody wants to promote from Tweede Divisie to the JL so the Jong/B-team/reserve teams are only welcome in the JL and no normal club wants to promote (well aside from the now bankrupt Achilles 29 and ASV de Dijk). The KNVB is going to release their new plans around May this year I think so it isn't all crystal clear but one thing is for sure and that is that the Dutch reserves are going to change anyways. So what I did was take there plans for 2018/2019 and added another group so that the 8 returning teams fit in.

So I have normal rules for 2017-2018 and the KNVB Beker Beloften is included. Then in 2018-2019 FC Emmen reported that the reserves are expanding from 16 to 18 teams, split in 2 groups of 9 (regional) and the top 5 play a champions playoff in the spring (bottom 4 a different playoff). Then from the year 2019/2020 and onwards is when I make the new rumoured KNVB plans in effect which is a semi-closed JL, no B-teams in amateur leagues and set in Beloften who can promote to JL but they have to play a 2-leg playoff against worst placed B-team of the JL. I used a lot of hidden stages so that's how I can draw these specific teams and luckily for everyone, the file is very stable and it does not crash.

Edited February 12, 2018 by Slabbekoorn

[Winski]

But that also means that you cannot promote from an amateur league to the JL in your file?

[Slabbekoorn]

@Winski I haven't added the Tweede Divisie and amateur promotion as of yet but amateurs can get promoted to the Jupiler League easily when I will add it and I can add that in under an hour. I just meant to say that I found a way to seperate B-teams from First teams to regulate a specific B-team promotion/relegation.

[Winski]

3 hours ago, Slabbekoorn said:

@Winski I haven't added the Tweede Divisie and amateur promotion as of yet but amateurs can get promoted to the Jupiler League easily when I will add it and I can add that in under an hour. I just meant to say that I found a way to seperate B-teams from First teams to regulate a specific B-team promotion/relegation.

Aaaah, now I understand. Keep up the good work!! Great to see your effort of making such a realistic Dutch football structure. 

[Slabbekoorn]

I've decided to add the Tweede and Derde Divisie plus Reserve Hoofdklassen and Tweede/Derde Divisie u19 for the upcoming release. B-teams are in the pyramid until the season 2019-2020 starts, I can't let them get promoted or relegated in the years between because the editor and the game can't process that. And unfortunately the editor verifying has complications with the file even though the file is perfectly fine. It's just one of the flaws of the editor.

[Slabbekoorn]

I have found a way into some next level puzzling. I don't know why I always end up in such puzzles but I have found the way to let B-teams promote and relegate in between Tweede Divisie/Derde Divisie/Hoofdklasse and then remove them and let them be added to beloftencompetitie.

Essentially what I do is remove the Tweede/Derde Divisie etc from regular pyramid using "domestic other division" until "end year" 2018 then from "start year"2019 and onwards I add them as a "domestic division" and when drawing teams I use "get all teams from division" and tick the box "exclude B-teams".

Then in the B-team page change the division to "Tweede Divisie" and as secondary division I chose "Beloftencompetitie". Normally it is the other way around but for some reason the secondary has priority when choosing teams.

And then I can make multiple stages in the year before I add Tweede Divisie back where I use the same to exclude B-teams, combine it with "don't add stage if not enough teams" and then I can create a set of custom rules that activate if there are 0 B-teams, 1, 2, 3, or 4 (etc.) then link that using "requirements" to activate league stages so that I can specify how many teams I want promoted to Tweede Divisie. Then the year 2019 when it is added again I remove the B-teams and then Tweede Divisie had 18 teams and Derde Divisie aswell with no B-teams anymore and promotion/relegation has happened in the meantime and now they can promote to JL while the B-teams are into the Beloften next to Tweede Divisie and can win a promotion spot for JL aswell.

I probably lost everyone on the way now, but tl;dr: I can let a normal competition with B-teams promoting/relegating happen in amateur leagues, then remove them from 2019-2020 onwards with Tweede Divisie and Derde Divisie number of teams staying normal (so extra promoting teams to fill up the exiting B-teams at the end of the 2018-2019 competitions).

[Winski]

Haha, you really lost me here, but keep up the great work! Good to hear that you've found a solution for it. Can't wait to test your file!

[Slabbekoorn]

The editor also lost me though because I wrecked my file.

So I postponed the Tweede Divisie for a while and now I've just finished straightening out prize money. I looked into annual reports of Jupiler League clubs and through Sparta's I found that they got 1.200.000 euros more for qualifying for Eredivisie then prize/tv money in JL. In JL they got their prize money + one dutch period champion money (which is 75.000 euro).  So when you calculate that with the last place of Eredivisie prize/tv money which is 1.700.000, deduct the numbers and I found out JL clubs only get ~500.000 euro prize/tv money in JL.

So once I got that in, and once I got the Eredivisie listening to me (at the cost of the European places playoff) now the right prize money is handed out to every club and it looks quite realistic after simulating for a couple of years. JL don't hand out a lot of money and that's good news.

[BMNJohn]

1 hour ago, Slabbekoorn said:

(at the cost of the European places playoff)

To be perfectly honest with you, and even if it isn't realistic, good riddance.

[franss]

Beste @Slabbekoorn, is jou bestand al ergens te spelen... ik kan niet wachten, eerlijk gezegd!

Edited March 21, 2018 by franss

[Slabbekoorn]

@franss No it is nowhere to be played as of yet. I recently distributed all existing clubs into each division and I'm now collecting all the remaining dutch clubs from 2e klasse to the 5e klasse. In the meantime I figured out evertything except for 2 things for the file, both linked to b-teams/2nd teams.

Because there are a lot of 2nd teams in the entire Dutch structure (like AFC 1 sunday in the Tweede Divisie and AFC 1 saturday in the Hoofdklasse, named AFC 2 in the game). The main problem is that it is giving problems with the regional divisions. Because most of the time the first team is a saturday club and the 2nd team is a sunday club. That means regional divisions are impossible to set for both clubs.

I can't really make them seperate clubs because AFC 1 sunday and AFC 1 saturday share the same youth setup and everything. But making it a reserveteam is also weird with regional divisions. I'm thinking of changing them into B-clubs like in Spain but I don't really know yet.

The second problem I'm having is that in order for every club to get their b-team promoted to the other B-teams would require me to add extra reserve teams manually to the Beloftencompetitie otherwise when you promote a 5e klasse club to Eredivisie your reserve team will be useless.

[franss]

@SlabbekoornThank you for the great response. it sounds so good and thorough. It all sounds so good. Will you please keep us updated on how you advance? And if you ned some one to test it, just let me know. And can't you just consider the AFC's as two different clubs? Because in that case you can use the sundaty and the satyurday version seperately... (whlie I write this I'm thinking that this is such a simple solution, that I cant imagine you have thought that over already...:-)
 

 

[Slabbekoorn]

On 21-3-2018 at 23:34, franss said:

@SlabbekoornThank you for the great response. it sounds so good and thorough. It all sounds so good. Will you please keep us updated on how you advance? And if you ned some one to test it, just let me know. And can't you just consider the AFC's as two different clubs? Because in that case you can use the sundaty and the satyurday version seperately... (whlie I write this I'm thinking that this is such a simple solution, that I cant imagine you have thought that over already...:-)
 

 

Yeah I had thought about it, but I was guessing that making them a seperate club and add them back as a B-club would be annoying when you chose to play that club in-game while you promote to the Jupiler League (and Eredivisie hopefully). Although maybe I should just go further like you said. Maybe just make it a permanent affiliated club. Because if in real life, in our example, AFC from the Tweede Divisie (AFC sunday) would go pro then in Holland they'd make a limited liability company (either a stichting or BV) and AFC saturday would be their amateur club. Like Ajax and Ajax Amateurs, Feyenoord and SC Feyenoord, PSV and PSV/av, sc Heerenveen and vv Heerenveen, N.E.C. and N.E.C. Amateurs, FC Volendam and RKAV Volendam, SBV Excelsior and SC Excelsior etc. I should choose just one main club and the other can't get promoted from the Tweede Divisie to the JL.

[Dan Druff]

@Slabbekoorn 

 

Thanks for all the effort you put into this file!

Quite funny, I stumbled upon this thread for the first time just after I posted my Nederland file 2 days ago.

As much as I like  editing, I always stay clear off the advance Editor as it's much to complicated for me.

Anyway, what might be of interest for you, I´ve just run a test with  zaterdag teams of  VV Sint Bavo, Oostzaanse FC and FC Winterswijk   as affiliate B-Teams  (Always Amateur) for 3 1/2 years .They all started in their respective Vierde Kasse Zaterdag competitions and got promoted in unison three times each.........

 

[BMNJohn]

On 23/03/2018 at 18:31, Slabbekoorn said:

Yeah I had thought about it, but I was guessing that making them a seperate club and add them back as a B-club would be annoying when you chose to play that club in-game while you promote to the Jupiler League (and Eredivisie hopefully). Although maybe I should just go further like you said. Maybe just make it a permanent affiliated club. Because if in real life, in our example, AFC from the Tweede Divisie (AFC sunday) would go pro then in Holland they'd make a limited liability company (either a stichting or BV) and AFC saturday would be their amateur club. Like Ajax and Ajax Amateurs, Feyenoord and SC Feyenoord, PSV and PSV/av, sc Heerenveen and vv Heerenveen, N.E.C. and N.E.C. Amateurs, FC Volendam and RKAV Volendam, SBV Excelsior and SC Excelsior etc. I should choose just one main club and the other can't get promoted from the Tweede Divisie to the JL.

I suppose you haven't had any time to work on this anymore.

[Jorgen]

Will there be a lower league Dutch pyramid for FM18?

[BMNJohn]

I have taken the 2017 database and updated it for my personal use in FM18. If you've read this thread, that database went as low as the Eerste Divisie, the 6th level. The right teams are in the right groups for season 2017/2018, and all teams have a Districtsbeker group assigned to them. However there are a few issues/differences that someone may be willing to address, here's the list:

• The season update day has been moved from July 7th to July 1st, to match the opening of the transfer window.
• Reserves/U19s leagues have been replaced by the simplest system possible, to offer an opportunity for every team to have reserves/U19s leagues. However if you want to add your Jong team in the Eerste divisie, be my guest...
• Eerste Divisie and Hoofdklasse periods did not work, therefore I removed them to avoid confusion. I'm not quite sure why it doesn't work, but I wasn't the one who set this up so...
• As an addendum to the above, Derde Divisie periods have been copied from @claassen's Dutch db. Merci à lui. However the AI addresses expectations for it poorly: I was expected to win the league, and despite leading comfortably the board distrusted me because I was "only in course to play the Playoffs". I didn't face sacking, and won the league thereafter anyway. But if your board has a Patience of 1, it might be problematic.
• There are three straight promotion/relegation spots between the Tweede Divisie and the Jupiler league. the vanilla db has exactly one. Considering the Dutch love for periods and playoffs for anything and everything, this is obviously highly unrealistic...
• There is no European Places Playoffs in the Eredivise, only because I very selfishly dislike that ;
• I've modified one date in the calendar of the Jupiler league: a matchday was forced on the 26th and 28th of August in the vanilla db. I've changed that to the 25th and 28th to avoid playing two matches in two days.
• I highly doubt there's enough spots in the Districtsbeker to accommodate every team. As such, I've taken the decision to allow no B/Jong team in the Districtsbekers; even though through my inexistent knowledge of Dutch, it seems that in real life B/Jong teams do play in the Districtsbeker.
• Tweede Divisie teams and Derde Divisie teams are all Semi-Pro. I'm unaware of how it is in real life, but as there were some amateurs teams in the 3rd division, it was basically very difficult to play with the amount of player poaching left and right you were subjected to.

Anyway and as I've mentioned, this was a personal file I did only because I had waited for a year to play in the Netherlands. It's not perfect, so you know where you put your feet. And if you want to modify it, be my guest: I didn't even do most of it anyway, so I'm no more legitimate than you are to modify this database.

EDIT: You might have noticed, but even the vanilla db has few oddities here and there. My rule of thumb is that the farther you are from England, the worse the accuracy. For example, the Jupiler league is supposed to play even on international match days. However, it's also set to check for clashes with all competitions, which would include international matches obviously. So, is it one (play even during international breaks) or the other (do not play during international breaks)? I have no idea.

 

Dutch db 2018.fmf

Edited September 14, 2018 by BMNJohn

[BMNJohn]

Not sure if a bump is worth it, but anyway.

I tried verifying "my" (that sounds pretentious) FM18 version of the database in FM20, by making the necessary accommodations: switching the Derde Divisie from 18 to 17 teams, putting all teams in the right divisions with the information I have (SoccerWay lists teams until Eerste Klasse), removing every Person change from the database to avoid potential conflicting histories, etc. Then comes the time to try to verify it... and I had "forgotten" the joys of deal with the Editor: I'm getting a completely unrelated error, from a completely unrelated competition that was not tempered with in anyway, that prevents me from verifying even one division level at all. On top of that, the complaint the Editor has about that competition is invalid since I went to verify the error, and there is the correct amount of teams in that competition as far as I can tell.

There are still failed changes and unknown records that cannot be altered nor removed because Editor reasons (like missing derbies that were manually created but disappeared because why not). That said, assuming that since there's very few changes to the advanced rules themselves, I assume that the rules should work anyway. That said, it doesn't mean that the data for each individual club is accurate, nor I would assume the data for each person is accurate, nor is the competition history accurate for competitions that were created manually back in FM17/18.

Aside from that, the database would be "playable" (as in, "it works without errors or conflicts) if the Expectations issue addressing the Periods system that I had mentioned a few years ago could be solved. It's an issue where the AI board assumes incorrectly that because you have won a Period and therefore qualified for the Playoffs, you are not matching their expectations of winning the league. It probably has to do with Ranking Level Priority and Ranking Levels Info, but I have no idea on how to make it work.

The rules are still not up to date: there's no playoffs to designate the second promotion spot from the Tweede Divisie (D2) to the Eerste Divisie (D3) the way it is in real life. There's still no European Places Playoff either. I still don't like it. Regardless of this, I'm not sure how doable it is to make them from scratch. I'm pretty sure that the "vanilla" rules require some hard-coded rules for the European Places Playoff to happen.

Anyway, if you want to check it out, be my guest.

Derde Divisie 17 teams.fmf

[BMNJohn]

Quick note: while the above file works fine in general use, none of the competitions write their history. Whoopsie.

[baasblack]

here the dutch database till 2de klasse amateur

Nederland Compleet.fmf

[BMNJohn]

@Wolf_pd Could use some help to find a parameter: I've made adjustments in the Nation's rule, league rules and Reserves/U19s rules to accommodate for the fact that the Derde Divisie has 17 teams per league. That said, the Editor tells me that the Derde Divisie still expects 36 teams; I don't know where to where to change that.

League & Data Updates.fmf

[Wolf_pd]

Why exactly the 17 teams, any reason for that? Seems silly to me.

[BMNJohn]

5 minutes ago, Wolf_pd said:

Why exactly the 17 teams, any reason for that? Seems silly to me.

That's because it's like that IRL. It used to be 18 teams, it is no longer is the case. Technically I could avoid the head scratching and just add another team to make it 18 anyway, but that's not how it is.

Maybe it's the cup rules that are creating a conflict as they maybe expect 36 teams. The cup rules are pretty rigid IIRC, I'll check it out. EDIT: It isn't. Have to keep searching.

Edited March 27, 2020 by BMNJohn

[Wolf_pd]

11 minutes ago, BMNJohn said:

That's because it's like that IRL. It used to be 18 teams, it is no longer is the case. Technically I could avoid the head scratching and just add another team to make it 18 anyway, but that's not how it is.

Maybe it's the cup rules that are creating a conflict as they maybe expect 36 teams. The cup rules are pretty rigid IIRC, I'll check it out. EDIT: It isn't. Have to keep searching.

I meant, why did they do the 17 teams in reallife? It is a strange number. Have been looking at the file and the obvious spots are all OK. The only thing I found, when I reverted to Basic Rules to have a check, was that in basic rules they were set at 18. But that shouldn't be a problem if you change that in Advanced.

[BMNJohn]

6 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

I meant, why did they do the 17 teams in reallife? It is a strange number. Have been looking at the file and the obvious spots are all OK. The only thing I found, when I reverted to Basic Rules to have a check, was that in basic rules they were set at 18. But that shouldn't be a problem if you change that in Advanced.

Found it. https://www.voetbal247.nl/knvb-krimpt-derde-divisies-in-naar-17-clubs/
Using Google Translate, apparently Vitesse and Groningen no longer field their Jong teams in the pyramid, and the Association couldn't find substitutes even though ADO Den Haag offered to field a Jong club. I have no idea whether there would have been 18 clubs next season, and now the current pandemic makes the answer even less obvious. I'm probably going to run 18 teams if I can't find why the Editor is being so picky, but I would rather figure out the issue. The Editor doesn't even try to verify any league, it just stubbornly says that there are 34 instead of 36 teams in Derde Divisie.

EDIT: Trying to add 18 teams to each child division... and the Editor has now moved the goalposts.

 

EDIT: Found it. The "Valid Years" field asked for 18 teams. I don't even know why this field is enabled.

Now I have a different issue: I cannot tell the Eredivisie nor the Eerste Divisie (D2) not to use a file that issues their rules. The field is grayed, and I cannot change the Mode of the competition (for example, such as "Fixed Format Rules" or "Flexible Format Rules"). That option simply doesn't exist.

Here you can find it...

...And here you cannot.

I think this is why the Eredivisie cannot finish in time due to not having created all of its stages. Obviously it hasn't since there's no European Places Playoff.

EDIT2: I removed and/or edited those lines from the .xml file since the Editor wasn't too useful, but the Eredeivisie still doesn't create all stages. I guess I have to simulate a file to see what it means. It's always the playoffs anyway. In all honesty, I wasn't expecting a file that used to work (albeit in older versions) to simply not work for obscure reasons. It makes it extremely hard to diagnose.

The highest bit of irony is that if I revert to Basic rules, it validates just fine. The Period system obviously disappears in the process, as well as all the Amateur cups and modifications made to the KVNB Beker...

Edited March 27, 2020 by BMNJohn

[BMNJohn]

After a while, I managed to get most things working. I used Claassen's db from last season as a base for corrections. The European places playoff is back. I think I also fixed the Periods system: in the rules, it looks just like the "official" Periods from the SI vanilla db, and I hope it fixes the issue with expectations.
I engineered a different system of promotion/relegation between the Tweeded Divisie (D3)  and the Eerste Divisie (D2): there are two straight relegation spots, and I've created a playoff system on top of that. The 17th, 18th of D2 and four teams (excluding the top two places) from D3 will play a playoff to determine the last two places. Therefore there will be at least two relegations from D2 but with the possibility of having up to four relegations. The four promotion playoff spots in D3 are determined by a Periods system: there are four periods of nine games each, and the winner of each period (skipping teams who already are qualified/promoted) will qualify for the promotion playoffs. I am perfectly aware that this isn't how the promotion and relegation works between D2 and D3 IRL. But for the sake of having fluidity in the league system as well as having a Periods system in D3 that's useful for something and having a more playable database overall, I think it's a good compromise.

Remains is re-creating (well, copy/paste) the cups. I hope the underlying District system still works. I will drop here my current progress. I hope I'll be done before April 1st.

EDIT number umpteenth: When an issue disappears, another creeps in. Sometimes things that used to work self destruct; there's still quite a bit of work to do. Eerste Klasse used to work, then it decided it was unplayable. I noticed it was set to "Inactive" for some reason. I removed that, and now it obviously doesn't validate anymore.

 

EDIT number umpteenth + n: Solved. Again. There were conflicting entries in the database that had the same names, and therefore were difficult to notice.

EDIT #umpteenth + n + x: I've added the amateur cups. The Editor refuses to validate the relegation rules for the Eerste Divisie. They are incredibly complex, and the Editor doesn't even return consistent answers. That said, I haven't touched them and they were correct before and even had validated in the past, so I know they work even if the Editor doesn't validate them. Therefore, I'm going to ignore that error.

To be fair, the Editor sometimes spits that error when trying to validate other leagues. Then you try to validate again and it works just fine. As such, the Editor returning errors is no real guarantee that there actually is an error. Oh, and switching to Flexible Format Rules doesn't help a lot. Sometimes it validates, sometimes it doesn't.

The last thing I need to check is an issue in the Periods for the Derde Divisie. Despite putting the right number of matches for each Period, the end of the third and last period of the Derde Divisie doesn't match the last league matchday... despite that working for every other league where I've made the exact same modification.

Here the last period ends on April 6th...

.

...But the league ends on the 4th of May.

I've added the file once more. Next time I'll update and if I find the issue, I'll make a new post instead.

 

KNVB_Beks.fmf

Edited March 29, 2020 by BMNJohn

[BMNJohn]

I tried to wrap my head around it a bit more, but I think (and I am not sure) that the offset between the league schedule and the periods schedule is due to having "Odd Team Out Who Doesn't Play on a Matchday is Given a Win" enabled. Which is a necessary to have the league finish on time. The real question is why it creates such a dramatic effect only for the Derde Divisie and its very odd 17 teams per league.

Aside from that, one thing that could be added is another tie-breaker for the league system and periods system. When you only have "Goal Difference" and "Goals For", there still is quite often teams on the same record within a period. The league has a tie-break playoff match thing if such a thing happen at the end of a season, but this is not a very realistic proposition for the periods. I'll check if there are other tie-breakers used IRL, and if I can find them I will include them.

[BMNJohn]

I've added tie-breakers for the league based on the Eredivisie's Wikipedia page. However in the case of periods, most of the tie-breaking options are unpractical if not unfair, so I've picked the option to use the Discipline Record with 3 points for red cards and 1 point for yellows. It's not ideal and could still see some randomized rankings, but it's better than nothing. There also is a simplified Reserves/U19s systems so that teams who don't have a Reserves team in the league system like say, Ajax, aren't too severely penalized. I don't think there's much to add, the database should be functional and playable.

You can load the .xml file straight into FM, I've made the necessary modifications in the file to "trick" FM into loading it. That said, if you're not tired of asking the Editor to validate the data over and over again until it works, there's also a .fmf file that wasn't artificially validated.

 

Edited April 1, 2020 by BMNJohn
Mistakes were made.

[BMNJohn]

I've made a pretty big mistake with the last post in the number of teams in certain rounds of some of the Districtsbeker. I was careless. I've fixed that, and removed my previous upload. Obviously the Editor being as it is, it didn't report the error, but still doesn't want to validate the leagues unless you spam the "Test" button.

Additionally, there are two vanity changes: Netherlands' new season update day is July 1st, to match the opening of the transfer window. But more importantly, the nation no longer has a National Stadium for a very vain reason: if you happen to become a huge club, you might get the honour of hosting NT matches at your stadium... if you're even able to have a stadium that's in any way comparable to the Johan Cruijff ArenA or De Kuip. The latter change is easily removable.

@Wolf_pd: You were wondering on how to keep Saturday and Sunday teams apart. Claassen has made separate promotion and relegation rules and playoffs for Saturday and Sunday teams. For example, Hoofdklasse Zontag A (D5) teams can only promote to Derde Divisie Zontag (D4), or relegate to one of the Eerste Klasse Zontag groups (D6). That said, I don't think there's a rule on where a Eerste Divisie (D2) team falling down the rankings would land. I suppose you would have to track every team and add a secondary division to them, probably at the Derde Divisie level. They game would still likely make changes anyway to keep the number of teams per group consistent if say, three Sunday and one Saturday team would relegate from the Tweede Divisie (D3)... But that's another topic.

Netherlands July 1st.zip

[Wolf_pd]

Ah, ok, that way. A sort of regional division.

[BMNJohn]

I've made a modification regarding the Fixture Priority of the KNVB Beker voor Amateurs to prevent players from going on holidays after the league is over. I've made similar changes to the relegation/promotion playoffs. I've also noticed that the Beker voor Amateurs doesn't exist anymore, therefore the update comes in two versions: either the Beker exists... or it does not, since it's way easier to delete something than create it. I kept implying revision X/Y/Z would be the very definitive edition; I hope this time it's really the case.

Netherlands D6.zip

Edited April 3, 2020 by BMNJohn