retired_hope

Id like to start a little debate about how you decide how your team are going to play. I believe there are a number of factors and wanted to know what everyone else thinks.

Football Philosopy
Classic example would be the difference between Mourinho and Ferguson in real life and FM. Most people consider Man Utd to be much more of a flair team than Chelsea who have utilise the power of Drogba as there main outlet.

In FM Fergsons tactical attrbutes are
<UL TYPE=SQUARE>
<LI>Attacking 15
<LI>Flamboyancy 16
<LI>Tempo 16
<LI>Width 18
<LI>Directness 5
</UL>

Whilst Mourhinho's
<UL TYPE=SQUARE>
<LI>Attacking 13
<LI>Flamboyancy 6
<LI>Tempo 10
<LI>Width 19
<LI>Directness 10
</UL>

Now in the AI Behaviour thread I would hope most of those involved would agree that managers will start like this.

Factors to consider

If I can tell generally how attacking, passing style, tempo, marking, pressing and can work out D-Line within 5 mins of the game surely I should be able to work out the best way to play against it.

I don't use Opposition Instructions because I don't know what is the correct thing to do. I think I should.

There is the level of understanding between players to consider, this is not just personally but tactical. If I keep changing tactics then they will never settle into a solid unit.

Can you use the media to get a manager to play different against you?

[B]The Point[B]

My point is if you can tell how the AI are going to play though scout reports and the managers page then what do you do?

Do you change your style of play to counter theirs or do you stick to what your philosopy? and what do people do in real life?

retired_Nit2Winit

personally leroy. If my scout tells me that a team often play conterattacking football, while keeping the ball on the ground, there are things i take into consideration.
Firstly, I am a firm believer that you should never play counter-attack against counter-attack. For some reason anytime i do, my players seem to get complacent towards the end (80-90+ minutes), and during a set-piece usually i get hit on the counter-attack, and bang...the games lost.
I worked out though, that if a team plays counter-attack, go with a normal playing style while focusing play down the centre.
In regards to the other team keeping the play along the ground, i believe that playing direct passing often helps them playing there natural passing game.

Just my own opinion, i would like to see if it works in someone elses game and not just my own.

retired_hope

I don't want to mention it again but I ignore anything the scout says about mentality e.g defensive CA.

See here for my reason

retired_Nit2Winit

so what exactly do you use the scout for?

retired_hope

Everything else is valid. Formation tempo, passing style. Individual players etc. It's only the attacking trend which is not working.

I can also tell the managers marking style and pressing from his manager screen. This builds up quite a pretty picture.

retired_hope

I take back passing style. This also appears to degrade over time to the shortest of short.

waterwolf

personally i dont use the scout at all. half the time he never scouts the team anyway, and sometimes the AI will play differently in the game anyway

i tend to keep things the same, then if somethin is going wrong, i'll alter it during the game, say every 15-20 mins. ive found before that if i altered my tactics to what the scout report says then it back fired on me. so i like to keep everythin how it is to start with. if it aint broke, dont fix it

retired_chesco

I also get most of the info needed from the scout and manager profile page. I then choose which of my four pre-set instructions to use and decide my approach to how I will play the game. This generally means what Width and Tempo I will use.

However I start every game with the the width and tempo sliders in the middle only changing them after the first ten minutes of the game. I have found this to be more effective than setting it pre-match.

retired_kstaley

I tend to not use the scout report atall.
The idea from Cleon`s Sheff Utd superb thread that you just play oppersite to what the scout tells you the opposition will play like, really anoys me.
You buy and train specific players to play nice short,slow,possesion football,and just because the opposition play like that you suddenly have to LUMP it foward to your 2 small,fast,superb tecnique fowards to combat them!!
How can this be realistic!

Just my 2 cents!!

retired_hope

Unfortunately after a while all AI teams will play short passing with negative tactics. The biggest bug in the game. Cleon's approach is interesting, although I do not believe this approach is the reason for his success. My view is that constantly changing style is a bad thing to do.