This game feels very inconsistent from player to AI

[craiigman]

Before we start, I know "the AI has the exact same tools as the player" and there is "nothing in the background to give the AI an advantage", and I'm not claiming these to be false. However I'm now nearing the end of my first, very frustrating season, and frankly parts of the game feel broken/inconsistent for the AI and me.

Examples:

1. My full backs don't seem to exist. AI full backs feel overpowered. My full backs, no matter who I use or what role, are either let the opposition players cross/run right by them, or offer nothing going forward. If I play a narrow system, my full backs get obliterated. If the AI play a narrow formation, even when I have a full back and a winger, they still they have no problems dealing with me.

Last game Leeds played a 41212 narrow, WB(A) and WB(S), total of 74 crosses attempted.

2. While we are talking about crosses, here are the last few games:

74, 40, 55, 43, 58, 47, 49, 41

That's the amount attempted. And honestly with that many going in, it's impossible to defend them all, and I'm losing game after game from crosses to target men. Initially I thought I was letting in lots of crossed from playing WB(S) and a defender with 12 heading. So I changed my CB to one with good heading and went to FB(S). Still game after game, cross header goal. I've tried 3 at the back, 5 at the back, nothing.

I try this at the other end, using wingers on both wings, not even close to the same results, in fact their full backs seem to actually work, and their CB's deal with crosses no problem.

Is anyone else finding this?

[sporadicsmiles]

You will not like to hear this, but if you are unable to do something that the AI can do, it is tactical. I'd head over the the tactics forum, post your system and detail your problems, and see if there is any useful feedback you can get.

[craiigman]

Honestly.. 25 assists?

He has 10 passing, 10 vision, 8 crossing.. But the most important stats for assists; flair, dribbling, pace, acceleration.

[rdbayly]

That guy is absolute lightning. He tore me to shreds single handedly last season.

[Sampsiceramos]

While I generally echo the sentiment that you have all the same tools at your disposal as the AI does, and that any issues with your fullbacks are almost certainly tactical/player quality ones, I do have to chuckle heartily at the thought of Adama Traoré ever getting 25 assists. He has to be the real-life footballer with the greatest gap between technical skill and footballing intelligence; the definition of all flash and no end product, he doesn't so much dribble into cul-de-sacs as the hungering void of his lacking football intelligence creates cul-de-sacs wherever he goes.

Perhaps a discussion of how high pace plays out in the ME is warranted if this is reproducible, and not simply a gross statistical outlier - there is certainly no world in which Adama Traoré should be producing like this.

[sporadicsmiles]

7 hours ago, craiigman said:

Honestly.. 25 assists?

He has 10 passing, 10 vision, 8 crossing.. But the most important stats for assists; flair, dribbling, pace, acceleration.

He is your player or the AI? I ask because if he is yours, it would be interesting to know how you deploy him. If he is not, then there is clearly an improvement to be made on how the AI (and the user) can defend against super pacy players. If I was to come up against him, I would be making sure he had as little space as possible to exploit in behind.

However, I suspect he is getting so many assists by being super fast, good at running with the ball and high flair. He can beat fullbacks for pace, and then has time to pick a pass to someone in the center to score, which means his low stats for crossing/passing are less impacting. Whether or not this is the correct way it should be is open to debate.

Anyway, this is an example of one player in one season, so it does not prove anything yet. If this is something common to every player who has stats similar to this, then there is an issue. However, here it could just be a fluke season for him and Middlesbrough. If you have more leagues loaded you could check players of similar attributes (particularly all having excellent pace, acceleration, flair and dribbling) and see what their stats are like. I'll do the same when I can check my save on Saturday, but I am not very far into the first season yet, so the stats probably do not mean anything yet. If you see this always happening for players similar to him, then I'd flag it to SI to look at.

[forameuss]

Is it really that hard to see why he would be getting those assists?  His dribbling and speed will mean he gets into the positions to assist relatively unchallenged.  Higher passing/crossing etc will mean he gets it right more often, but I imagine he's getting a lot of chances to get it right.

From what others have said, he's a player who has this nebulous "no final product".  I'd imagine that's hard to model with the attributes system they have 

[fidelitywars]

7 hours ago, forameuss said:

Is it really that hard to see why he would be getting those assists?  His dribbling and speed will mean he gets into the positions to assist relatively unchallenged.  Higher passing/crossing etc will mean he gets it right more often, but I imagine he's getting a lot of chances to get it right.

From what others have said, he's a player who has this nebulous "no final product".  I'd imagine that's hard to model with the attributes system they have 

Surely players with poor intelligence and poor key creative attributes like passing would have 'no final product?' If not, then what is the point of attributes like vision/decisions/teamwork? If his pace and dribbling alone allow him to shred the engine, then surely the engine needs refining? Pace and directness really shouldn't be enough to turn a player into a creative genius; his attribute profile should surely make him wildly inconsistent and frustrating, not a reliable source of assists.

[HUNT3R]

2 minutes ago, fidelitywars said:

Surely players with poor intelligence and poor key creative attributes like passing would have 'no final product?' If not, then what is the point of attributes like vision/decisions/teamwork? If his pace and dribbling alone allow him to shred the engine, then surely the engine needs refining? Pace and directness really shouldn't be enough to turn a player into a creative genius; his attribute profile should surely make him wildly inconsistent and frustrating, not a reliable source of assists.

If it's ONLY that player, then no, it isn't worth making one general conclusion. He has the pace to beat markers and his balance is good, so crossing shouldn't be too hard. It may not be amazingly accurate, but whether he's doing the job depends on a lot of tactical factors too.

[fidelitywars]

Just now, HUNT3R said:

If it's ONLY that player, then no, it isn't worth making one general conclusion.

Surely it's highly unlikely to be an anomaly? I've not been playing too much following the latest patch as I share many of the frustrations quoted on these boards around long shots/poor creation from midfield/crossing but i'll have a scout around my current file and see if players with profiles like Traoré are tearing it up in general.

[forameuss]

14 minutes ago, fidelitywars said:

Surely players with poor intelligence and poor key creative attributes like passing would have 'no final product?' If not, then what is the point of attributes like vision/decisions/teamwork? If his pace and dribbling alone allow him to shred the engine, then surely the engine needs refining? Pace and directness really shouldn't be enough to turn a player into a creative genius; his attribute profile should surely make him wildly inconsistent and frustrating, not a reliable source of assists.

Absolutely it needs refining.  It always will.  Doesn't change that he has very high values for key attributes, and it's easy to see a logical situation where his ridiculous pace, dribbling and flair would put him in a position to assist far earlier than most defenders chasing him.  Does that give him an unfair advantage within the ME?  Maybe.  

[fidelitywars]

Just now, forameuss said:

Absolutely it needs refining.  It always will.  Doesn't change that he has very high values for key attributes, and it's easy to see a logical situation where his ridiculous pace, dribbling and flair would put him in a position to assist far earlier than most defenders chasing him.  Does that give him an unfair advantage within the ME?  Maybe.  

Those are key attributes for offering an outlet and carrying the ball but not creating chances, I'd argue. Looking at the real life stats, Traoré has 4 assists and 0 goals in 52 appearances in England (he also averages 9(!) passes per game this season...) and I don't think the issue is around how his attributes have been researched; they show him for what he is - world class at 1 thing (running with the ball) but dreadful at more 'concrete' skills like passing/crossing/finishing/spotting a pass. This really shouldn't be allowing him to be so enormously productive in-game.

[forameuss]

17 minutes ago, fidelitywars said:

Those are key attributes for offering an outlet and carrying the ball but not creating chances, I'd argue. Looking at the real life stats, Traoré has 4 assists and 0 goals in 52 appearances in England (he also averages 9(!) passes per game this season...) and I don't think the issue is around how his attributes have been researched; they show him for what he is - world class at 1 thing (running with the ball) but dreadful at more 'concrete' skills like passing/crossing/finishing/spotting a pass. This really shouldn't be allowing him to be so enormously productive in-game.

They're key attributes for getting around the pitch with the ball, which is pretty key to everything at its core.

You're misunderstanding me anyway.  I'm not saying there's nothing wrong.  That would be pointless given the only people that can are SI with their access to the code.  I'm simply suggesting logical things that might explain what is happening.  

[Cap'nRad]

On the Traore thing, I think attributes have always worked like this in fm, so I'm not really surprised. Another good example would be Mkhitaryan who, despite his seemingly poor mentals, regularly scores and assists in very good numbers. These sorts of things show that the sum of attributes is more important than any single one in isolation. I think the problem with Traore (if indeed this isn't an anomaly) is that the researcher didn't really get the attributes right to the point he performs similar to real life. I would argue his crossing, passing, finishing, long shots, technique, and almost all mentals should be 3-4 points lower, but that's up to the researchers. It may be a match engine problem, but I'm leaning more towards the attribute spread being the issue.

[craiigman]

Also in the same season James Vaughan scored 35 goals. The man has 74 total career goals in real life.. 

[Guest El Payaso]

I think that the thing with Adama in the game is highly related to this issue that I have been raising for years without a single reply from SI. IRL teams can defend against great dribblers by doubling up and taking the space away aka engaging with the dribbler even before he gets the ball. It's hard to beat anyone if you don't have speed and you cannot gain speed if there is someone in your back when you receive the ball. That is basically how every team in Premier league try to play against players like Hazard and that is why they make it hard for him to perform no matter how good he is. I would say that due to his physical presence Adama is even more effective dribbler than Hazard is but 52 games and 2 assists in real life tell you a story: he is stoppable and teams are doing that.

From this video you can see that he is a great dribbler and he dribbles a lot but teams are able to defend him harmless. On FM though the fullbacks and wing-backs regularly allow players like him have multiple meters of space when receiving the ball and after that they leave the outside channel open for him to be able to run down the touchline and from full speed and having left the fullback/wing-back behind he can deliver a perfect ball in.

I think that in the previous builds SI had possible the best balance in terms of wide area defending that they have ever had but with the newer builds this flipped totally upside down again. This of course allows centre forwards to score more and players like Cristiano Ronaldo to reach those 'realistic' numbers in goals (well he is now actually scoring too much) but I doubt that this is the right way to do it. 

[Guest El Payaso]

It's funny how they every year mess up this wide area by making it easier to be a successful wide area attacker than defender while irl it's quite frankly the other way around. Like Carragher once said: full backs are mainly failed wingers or centre backs. 

They mainly do this by stripping off the option from full backs to do the basic positioning that irl makes their job so much easier: stick close to the winger and prevent him using his strengths against you. 

It's a bit like if you had some kind of nature simulator and when you encounter a bear you wouldn't have the option to act calm and slowly back away but instead you had to react by panicking or throwing rocks at the bear. 

[Guest El Payaso]

It's funny how they every year mess up this wide area by making it easier to be a successful wide area attacker than defender while irl it's quite frankly the other way around. Like Carragher once said: full backs are mainly failed wingers or centre backs. 

They mainly do this by stripping off the option from full backs to do the basic positioning that irl makes their job so much easier: stick close to the winger and prevent him using his strengths against you. 

It's a bit like if you had some kind of nature simulator and when you encounter a bear you wouldn't have the option to act calm and slowly back away but instead you had to react by panicking or throwing rocks at the bear. 

[RBKalle]

Those stats are a BRUTAL indication of how unbalanced (let's be very polite and magnanimous...) the ME is as far as wide play/defending goes.

 

A player who's basically a track-and-field athlete shouldn't be able to produce 6 goals and 25 assists at a top level if he has below-average technical skills, vision and decision making. Frankly all that makes me wonder why FM has like 30 attributes if, in the end, someone like Adama can do so much only because he's fast.

I'm having serious FM12 flashbacks, where a Conference-level striker can still bang in double-digits goals in EPL and CL if he had enough acceleration and pace.

Then again, I'm not surprised as even in my half-assed save with Samp, my assist leader was Caprari, a striker-turned-winger who wasn't even accomplished as MR... It's basically the law of large numbers at work... Wide play is so prevalent, even UNWILLINGLY, that anyone playing as a winger of sorts can amass so many crossing attempts he'll end up with a decent asisst tally (not to mention the "He didn't mean that!" goals...

It's kinda disheartening...

[Guest El Payaso]

@RBKalle exactly. You can tell for example Moses, Alonso, Hazard, Pedro and Willian today that it's simple: just run along the touchline and find Morata or someone at the far post.   The ME currently in terms of wide play is like watching some Aaron Lennon highlights material from ten years but even a worse player can do the same in half a season than he did during close to ten years with Spurs in real life. 

The sad thing here also is the fact that they had it so well balanced in those previous builds, okay the full back positioning was not right and probably the crosses played in amounts still were on the high side but in general it felt actually challenging to get the wide play working both for us and the AI and this provided more variety in to the engine but it has been now tweaked so that this area is reminding us from the horrors of FM 2015 and 2016. 

Wide play basically was the reason why I stopped playing with Chelsea completely maybe in FM 2014 as you could just dominate world only because you had someone like Willian and Hazard down the flank as they simply are unstoppable in the engines. I think that in this area FM is reminding FIFA/PES too much and highly romanticizing the effects of running with the ball and the players ability to both put in the perfect ball and strikers being so much better moving to connect. 

And at the same time you cannot expect decent shooting ability from players who have been practicing shooting for 20 years or more almost daily. 

[craiigman]

On 11/01/2018 at 23:24, craiigman said:

Honestly.. 25 assists?

He has 10 passing, 10 vision, 8 crossing.. But the most important stats for assists; flair, dribbling, pace, acceleration.

I just loaded a save for this which was 1st April, this screen shot date can be seen. He was on 15 assists 1st April. So means he got 10 in 3 weeks.

I’m going to see what games 

[Guest El Payaso]

23 minutes ago, craiigman said:

I just loaded a save for this which was 1st April, this screen shot date can be seen. He was on 15 assists 1st April. So means he got 10 in 3 weeks.

I’m going to see what games 

You could post some examples in the bugs forum as this is a great example of how unbalanced the wide play can be. 

[craiigman]

2 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

You could post some examples in the bugs forum as this is a great example of how unbalanced the wide play can be. 

It’s proving more difficult than I thought. I have player roles viewable for both sides, but it’s only showing the formation at the end of the game, and Traore doesn’t finish the games.

I can get the .pkm’s, but I’d like to know the role they are using him in myself really.

[Rashidi]

On 1/13/2018 at 00:08, fidelitywars said:

Surely players with poor intelligence and poor key creative attributes like passing would have 'no final product?'

Thats a bit of a strange statement, if you are asserting that the absence of key attributes = no ability to play properly, then it surely must be the managers job to fit him into a system where he makes the least amount of mistakes.

[sporadicsmiles]

On 1/13/2018 at 17:34, RBKalle said:

Those stats are a BRUTAL indication of how unbalanced (let's be very polite and magnanimous...) the ME is as far as wide play/defending goes.

 

A player who's basically a track-and-field athlete shouldn't be able to produce 6 goals and 25 assists at a top level if he has below-average technical skills, vision and decision making. Frankly all that makes me wonder why FM has like 30 attributes if, in the end, someone like Adama can do so much only because he's fast.

I'm having serious FM12 flashbacks, where a Conference-level striker can still bang in double-digits goals in EPL and CL if he had enough acceleration and pace.

Then again, I'm not surprised as even in my half-assed save with Samp, my assist leader was Caprari, a striker-turned-winger who wasn't even accomplished as MR... It's basically the law of large numbers at work... Wide play is so prevalent, even UNWILLINGLY, that anyone playing as a winger of sorts can amass so many crossing attempts he'll end up with a decent asisst tally (not to mention the "He didn't mean that!" goals...

It's kinda disheartening...

You have no idea how the team is playing in order to allow him to play like that, however. You cannot look at a single player in isolation, football is a team game. Clearly he is being afforded the time and space to influence the game, and the tactic is really getting the best out of him.

Like I said before, if this is isolated to just this one player, there is no issue. If every single player with similar traits is playing like that, with no regard for the team he is playing in, then there is a problem.

[RBKalle]

3 ore fa, sporadicsmiles ha scritto:

You have no idea how the team is playing in order to allow him to play like that, however. You cannot look at a single player in isolation, football is a team game. Clearly he is being afforded the time and space to influence the game, and the tactic is really getting the best out of him.

It doesn't matter how the team is playing!

There's no way such a crap player can produce so many goals and assists at that level... FFS, AI managers can't get Messi or Ronaldo to even come close to their usual real-life performances, but suddenly a mediocre player with insane pace can provide 1 assist per game?

The only tactic that could allow him to perform so well would require him literally being IGNORED by the opponents' defensive line, so he can have like 30 seconds by himself with the ball. Which, as flawed as wide play is, it's still not a possibility.

That means there's something deeply wrong with the ME if such a player can perform so well despite being so awful.

 

3 ore fa, sporadicsmiles ha scritto:

Like I said before, if this is isolated to just this one player, there is no issue. If every single player with similar traits is playing like that, with no regard for the team he is playing in, then there is a problem.

Even if it were only one player (which is highly unlikely), it'd still be an issue! Especially because it's not a human-controlled team, so you can discard the "oh, the human manager found an exploit" explaination.

Wide play IS an issue in FM18. To what extent, that'd be for the coders and the testers to find out. Ideally, that'd have been spotted and addressed BEFORE release... Not 3 months into the game's life cycle, which is going to be over by March, meaning we'll end up with a semi-broken game anyway because "we're already working on FM19, sorry".

[forameuss]

21 minutes ago, RBKalle said:

Even if it were only one player (which is highly unlikely), it'd still be an issue! Especially because it's not a human-controlled team, so you can discard the "oh, the human manager found an exploit" explaination.

Wide play IS an issue in FM18. To what extent, that'd be for the coders and the testers to find out. Ideally, that'd have been spotted and addressed BEFORE release... Not 3 months into the game's life cycle, which is going to be over by March, meaning we'll end up with a semi-broken game anyway because "we're already working on FM19, sorry".

What makes you think that it isn't a mix of both?  Just because they haven't "fixed" it doesn't mean they didn't know about it, just as knowing about it doesn't automatically mean there will be a fix for it.

[Guest El Payaso]

4 hours ago, sporadicsmiles said:

You have no idea how the team is playing in order to allow him to play like that, however. You cannot look at a single player in isolation, football is a team game. Clearly he is being afforded the time and space to influence the game, and the tactic is really getting the best out of him.

Like I said before, if this is isolated to just this one player, there is no issue. If every single player with similar traits is playing like that, with no regard for the team he is playing in, then there is a problem.

You can quite easily see by looking at assists charts that this area is dominated by wide players so it's not just one player. I think that Adama's amount of assists and for example the dribbles/game tell you a story. Hopefully SI can notice this too. Yes, this type of wide play makes for example Ronaldo score huge amounts of goals like he probably should but it's most definitely a wrong way to do it as it simply just takes the game further away from real life. It's especially dissatisfying as in the more previous builds wideplay and dribbling were in so much better balance. 

[craiigman]

pkm: https://drive.google.com/open?id=184bA3iUEAbaOozjp6oXvaT5tLTkmWtT2

That seems to be the usual setup for Borough, 4-2-3-1, striker role changes slightly depending on who they play up top.

Here's the games from 1st April to 21st April in which he got 10 assists:

3 assists vs Burton

https://drive.google.com/open?id=128rD3HCgtStsMS6DfTByR5ZfODzMeGqp

3 assists vs Forrest:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1H2ln2QW4q32Ey0_D3BsNJYfLcJdsdDC-

1 vs Sheff Utd:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1v3CXNMin9jzS7rVT6lks3M2TDRdylA7V

2 vs Bristol

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1y3iFdq-hTGP2gem0dlKDNtPop9m9r8Fs

1 vs Derby

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1KFPNlHOZa-xjeJn7vj7K8w2sQdwJuMBy

 

[Neil Brock]

If you could raise this in the ME bugs forum that way our match team can investigate.

Thanks. 

[fidelitywars]

4 hours ago, Rashidi said:

Thats a bit of a strange statement, if you are asserting that the absence of key attributes = no ability to play properly, then it surely must be the managers job to fit him into a system where he makes the least amount of mistakes.

That's exactly the point; the purpose should be to minimise the mistakes made by such an unintelligent player but the engine is making him the key creative outlet - which surely seems worthy of mention/investigation.

And yes, lack of key attributes absolutely should prevent a player from playing properly; that's the purpose of attributes. Players who cannot spot and execute a pass or cross should not be creating chances like Michael Laudrup; if they are then something about the engine is giving them far too many opportunities or physical attributes have a worryingly heavy bias.

[RBKalle]

23 minuti fa, forameuss ha scritto:

What makes you think that it isn't a mix of both?  Just because they haven't "fixed" it doesn't mean they didn't know about it, just as knowing about it doesn't automatically mean there will be a fix for it.

Unfortunately we've been experiencing similar "situations" regarding wide play and/or pace being the be-all-end-all in the ME pretty much since the beginning, 3D engine has only made things even more jarring, as the 2D dots left a lot more to our imagination.

After so many years, I'll go out on a limb and say there are engine's flaws that CAN'T be solved, but only mitigated, often by creating other issues. The blanket is too short, so either way, something is not working properly.
One year wide players can't cross to save their life, one year they can provide more assists than Wayne Gretzky...

[forameuss]

44 minutes ago, RBKalle said:

Unfortunately we've been experiencing similar "situations" regarding wide play and/or pace being the be-all-end-all in the ME pretty much since the beginning, 3D engine has only made things even more jarring, as the 2D dots left a lot more to our imagination.

After so many years, I'll go out on a limb and say there are engine's flaws that CAN'T be solved, but only mitigated, often by creating other issues. The blanket is too short, so either way, something is not working properly.
One year wide players can't cross to save their life, one year they can provide more assists than Wayne Gretzky...

That's likely to be it.  Of course there will be issues that have simply slipped through the net - after all, there's countless combinations of inputs you can fire into the ME, so it's unrealistic and pretty pointless to suggest that they should be covering absolutely every eventuality with their own testing.  But the major ones are probably all known well before any user even gets a chance to start the game.  They'll be the ones that are either unfixeable, or simply too dangerous too lest it expose a hole somewhere else.  If this is one of those cases, it would be nice if that would be communicated, but that's unlikely to happen, even if you put aside the hysterical weeping accusations that SI don't test the game, or are somehow negligent given they can't fix what is probably an incredibly complex issue.

[Dave1990]

Only the fact that they continue to operate strikerless tactics or tactics with 3 strikers, shows that the ME continues to be unrealistic and must be completely revised. The strikers in the game don't play any defensive work,  but casually even if we deploy 3 strikers we don't suffer particularly the lack of 3 players in the defensive phase.
 

[forameuss]

19 minutes ago, Dave1990 said:

Only the fact that they continue to operate strikerless tactics or tactics with 3 strikers, shows that the ME continues to be unrealistic and must be completely revised. The strikers in the game don't play any defensive work,  but casually even if we deploy 3 strikers we don't suffer particularly the lack of 3 players in the defensive phase.
 

Not sure that's strictly true.  I ended up with a surplus of strikers, so played a narrow 4-3-3.  It was brutally good going forward, but defensively it was truly hopeless given we were getting overrun in midfield, leaving fairly regular one-on-ones at the back.  Ended up as top-scorers in the league, and something like the 3rd worst defence, and we get promotion.  Proper Kevin Keegan stuff.

[RBKalle]

1 ora fa, forameuss ha scritto:

That's likely to be it.  Of course there will be issues that have simply slipped through the net - after all, there's countless combinations of inputs you can fire into the ME, so it's unrealistic and pretty pointless to suggest that they should be covering absolutely every eventuality with their own testing.  But the major ones are probably all known well before any user even gets a chance to start the game.  They'll be the ones that are either unfixeable, or simply too dangerous too lest it expose a hole somewhere else.  If this is one of those cases, it would be nice if that would be communicated, but that's unlikely to happen, even if you put aside the hysterical weeping accusations that SI don't test the game, or are somehow negligent given they can't fix what is probably an incredibly complex issue.

 

I don't want to derail the thread, but those issues (pace and wide play) have been around for like a decade already, so I refuse to accept they've slipped through the net or that there's been no time or way to fix them.

I don't doubt the game got tested and the issues are known. But if after 10 iterations we're still debating BASIC factors (and not some obscure, improbably scenario), it means there something deeply wrong with the ME's basic interpretation of some roles/attributes/situations. And the failure to serviceably solve/address that, over at least one ME "rescript" is worrying.

One way or another, acceleration, pace and crossing have always been a pain in the neck for FM'ers. It was a matter or adapting to it, despite the glaring discrepancy between real-life football and what happens in FM world, and adapting our playing strategy accordingly. Or trying to swim against the stream and struggle.

Whether Traoré is an isolate case or not, the worst part is that it's AI v AI... So either the game can exploit itself or there are some combinations that yield completely outlandish and consistent results. Here there are two key problems:

1) Pace+Acceleration (+dribbling) = unstoppable, regardless of how limited the player is technically and mentally
2) Crossing, as shown in other topics, is way too common, albeit erratic and inaccurate. Still, for the law of large numbers, a couple of crosses (out of the insane amount of attempts) will find the intended target and create chances and goals.
2b) Defensive closing down and marking (both zonal and man-to-man) is terrible, thus allowing too much room for crosses, hence point #2.

 

That's not a "what's the difference between Regista and DLP" matter or a "My Trequartista shoots too often/too rarely" problem. It's football 101.

[Dave1990]

4 ore fa, forameuss ha scritto:

Not sure that's strictly true.  I ended up with a surplus of strikers, so played a narrow 4-3-3.  It was brutally good going forward, but defensively it was truly hopeless given we were getting overrun in midfield, leaving fairly regular one-on-ones at the back.  Ended up as top-scorers in the league, and something like the 3rd worst defence, and we get promotion.  Proper Kevin Keegan stuff.

But there are some important things to consider:

1- In reality if someone wants to propose such a tactic, to obtain decent results, must necessarily have an important defensive contribution from at least two strikers. However, this doesn't mean that you will not suffer in the defensive phase.

2- In the game, despite a non-existent defensive phase for the 3 strikers I noticed that anyway you can suffer a very few goals with a tactical system that in theory would be completely unbalanced.

What does this mean? It means that the game, which is defined as a real football simulator, is actually quite an arcade.

[craiigman]

8 hours ago, Neil Brock said:

If you could raise this in the ME bugs forum that way our match team can investigate.

Thanks. 

done

[forameuss]

15 hours ago, Dave1990 said:

But there are some important things to consider:

1- In reality if someone wants to propose such a tactic, to obtain decent results, must necessarily have an important defensive contribution from at least two strikers. However, this doesn't mean that you will not suffer in the defensive phase.

2- In the game, despite a non-existent defensive phase for the 3 strikers I noticed that anyway you can suffer a very few goals with a tactical system that in theory would be completely unbalanced.

What does this mean? It means that the game, which is defined as a real football simulator, is actually quite an arcade.

The game itself is a football simulation, but if you're expecting the match engine to properly match real football, then you're going to be eternally disappointed.  

[Dave1990]

Il 16/1/2018 in 10:26 , forameuss ha scritto:

The game itself is a football simulation, but if you're expecting the match engine to properly match real football, then you're going to be eternally disappointed.  

It is necessary to consider at what level of simulation the game has arrived, and whether it has improved or worsened over the years.

In my opinion it has worsened, considering that to have a successful simulation we need to consider the real data. I'm not saying that the game must be in all respects like a real football, but at least must try to get closer to this. And I'm not talking about the graphic component, but conceptual and statistical.

For example, we have gone from 110/115 km runs on average per game of FM16 (data consistent with reality) to 140/145 km of FM17, something doesn't square... Someone can say that it is irrelevant for the purposes of simulation, as I have already heard. In reality, if a player runs from 2 to 3 km more than normal, it presupposes another type of approach to the game and another type of behavior in the pitch.

We also have a disproportionate number of lost and recovered balls, which are 3 times higher than the reality. This due to many wrong passes and also to many controversial situations, where it often happens to see a player who drags the ball off the field while not being closed down by any opponent. And this is a long-standing problem, but after years it hasn't been minimally corrected.

We can also talk about the behavior of players in situations of closing down, where before you could see a substantial difference from role to role (usually the defensive players were more cautious while those offensive were more ready to close down), now from FM17 are all on the same level, with a behavior like headless chicken that always go to close down the ball carrier and if unhappily the influence's area of a player meets that of more than one player of the opposing team, you can see the beautiful spectacle of a player chased by two or three of our opposing players.

All these things can get tiresome in the long run, especially when instead of seeing improvements there are some worsening.

[forameuss]

Fair enough.  I still stand by the original point that if you're going down into minutaie, you're going to be disappointed, and likely always will.  As soon as you start to think of FM as a game in itself and stop holding the mirror up to it and holding higher standards than necessary, then you'll have a better time with it.

[enigmatic]

tbh A player with 19 pace and acceleration in the lower tiers has always achieved exploit-levels of performance in CM/FM and probably always will do. A player who has 19 pace will pretty much always be quicker than an opponent of 10 pace. A player who has 19 decisions won't always make the best decisions (either IRL, or even more in a simulation which fundamentally isn't as smart at decision-making as real players) and a player with 6 decisions and 8 crossing who gets to the byline on a regular basis will sometimes take the obvious decision to play a technically trivial cutback to the unmarked player standing near the penalty spot. 

Think ElPayaso's point that part of the problem is the AI doesn't press very well is a good one, and that's where the technical and decision making attributes should stand out more. If a Championship fullback tries pressing Hazard to death IRL, Hazard should often skin him or force a free kick due to smart anticipation and deft touch (and being slightly quicker). If he tries pressing Adama Traore, Traore should be likely to rush things and lose the ball, even if he can do some real damage in space.

But of course, fullbacks doesn't press wingers much even when asked to, AI managers seem to be encouraged to tell their players not to close down quick players even if they're dumb quick players, and dribbling in FM is far more about physique (and the dribbling stat or "knocks ball past opponent" so they can use that speed/agility) than deciding exactly when to dribble and how to put an opponent off balance.

[Dave1990]

3 ore fa, forameuss ha scritto:

Fair enough.  I still stand by the original point that if you're going down into minutaie, you're going to be disappointed, and likely always will.  As soon as you start to think of FM as a game in itself and stop holding the mirror up to it and holding higher standards than necessary, then you'll have a better time with it.

It must be said that I have always held the same attitude towards the game and I continue to consider it as such, a game. This means not that I have very high standards, but that the game has changed (getting worse), at least in my opinion. And if after a certain gaming experience we continue to notice the same problems that among other things are perfectly known by the developers, it is logical that the disappointment remains and is certainly not a problem of approach to the game, but something else.

[Guest El Payaso]

3 hours ago, enigmatic said:

Think ElPayaso's point that part of the problem is the AI doesn't press very well is a good one, and that's where the technical and decision making attributes should stand out more. If a Championship fullback tries pressing Hazard to death IRL, Hazard should often skin him or force a free kick due to smart anticipation and deft touch (and being slightly quicker). If he tries pressing Adama Traore, Traore should be likely to rush things and lose the ball, even if he can do some real damage in space.

It's more about positioning than pressing. I remember when I was playing as an amateur and as a full back I could often make the opposition winger barely touch the ball by pure positioning as their midfielders always decided not to pass to him after looking at that option because I always started to shift closer to the winger when they were searching for that option. We can all check that again in real life as Chelsea soon play against Norwich in the FA Cup. In the first leg Norwich did pretty good job defending against the wide players and inside the penalty area and I would be quite certain that again today they will make the performing hard for Chelsea's much better wingers Pedro and Willian.

[RBKalle]

7 ore fa, enigmatic ha scritto:

tbh A player with 19 pace and acceleration in the lower tiers has always achieved exploit-levels of performance in CM/FM and probably always will do. A player who has 19 pace will pretty much always be quicker than an opponent of 10 pace. A player who has 19 decisions won't always make the best decisions (either IRL, or even more in a simulation which fundamentally isn't as smart at decision-making as real players) and a player with 6 decisions and 8 crossing who gets to the byline on a regular basis will sometimes take the obvious decision to play a technically trivial cutback to the unmarked player standing near the penalty spot. 

And here's one of FM's chronic issues that has never been (adequately) solved.

In real life, a smart and technically superior player will inevitably be much more dangerous than a pacey, but "stupid" and banana-footed one. At every level, but the lower you go, the more blatant it'd be in favour of the smart one.

Otherwise LL teams could just sign a bunch of failed sprinters and they'd be ready for the Premier League...

[Guest El Payaso]

 

For me the latest example I posted quite much summarizes the wide play in the ME. Lots of space and a winger having a free road to run into and put in a perfect ball to a player that probably has never scored a goal with his head. It's a goal for my team but was close to quitting the game after scoring that. 

The ME produces so many of these: Bamford scored three from crosses in one game against Millwall who in my opinion have super good penalty area centre backs. 

The quality of the crosses might be nerfed but with the amounts played in they make huge impact in the ME. But apparently this is not an issue for the game developers. Not even when maybe 10% of the goals within the engine make any sense. 

[Naor5563]

8 hours ago, El Payaso said:

 

For me the latest example I posted quite much summarizes the wide play in the ME. Lots of space and a winger having a free road to run into and put in a perfect ball to a player that probably has never scored a goal with his head. It's a goal for my team but was close to quitting the game after scoring that. 

The ME produces so many of these: Bamford scored three from crosses in one game against Millwall who in my opinion have super good penalty area centre backs. 

The quality of the crosses might be nerfed but with the amounts played in they make huge impact in the ME. But apparently this is not an issue for the game developers. Not even when maybe 10% of the goals within the engine make any sense. 

IMO, the whole ME does not seems right. It's starts with shots which been poor, terrible defensive position ( full backs which allowing a lot of easy crosses and defenders who can't defend these crosses or provide normal defensive positioning ) , midfielders allowing too much spaces and not defending well and strikers missing a lot of 1 on 1 chances, physical attributes absolutly overpowered in the ME , etc etc...

I'm not optimistic about this year FM, and actually came back to FM17 which seems a lot better and balanced. As one of the forum members stated, the blanket is too short unfortunately and I don't see the developers able to fix all this issues up to March. 

My mistake is me blindly buying FM every year without checking the demo or read the reviews. Next I'll do a lot of research before I'll put my money into it. 

[Naor5563]

One more thing which need urgent fix is the DC's lunching through balls without meaning to. when playing with two strikers up, DC is just hoof the ball up the field [while trying to defend ] and your striker seems to fully understand the ball direction and start chasing him while the opposite DC just clueless and have no idea what to do [ ''Oh, Look! there is a ball! What is it? What should I do...?''  ]. My DC's are not ball playing, they don't have high passing/vision and I'm not playing on counter attack and still it happen so much and so easily and I have no clue why [ happening for me and against me without any seen reason ].

Players just seem to have no intelligence at all. Like zombies. mostly defensive oriented players.  How the hell FM18 could produce such a downgraded ME like that, I just don't get it. like seriously. Why it took such a huge decline?