retired_HAdvocate

I have a feeling that many people have been over-complicating things. I know many of you have found out how to aproach the game, having success and realising that this game actually is the best FM game ever. The match machine does work better than ever before, and the exent of realisism makes this game very challenging. So this forum is just to point out some different issues one must look at before starting a season.

Choosing tactics: This is very important when starting, because many tend to have this attitude that they want to play 'a la Barca' from the get-go and they haven't realised that their team simply hasen´t the potential. You can work in this direction but let's for a minute call this the "Evolution" theory. Maybe you don't want to play a deffensive 4-1-4-1 tactic, but have you considered your game plan: do you want to grind in some results, build a reputataion and start finding players who can actually play a 4-4-2 wing long farrow formation, and "Evolve" into this formation, or will you play wide offensive tactics from day one, take some beatings and and take a longer road to success.
Do you have contradicting intructions in your tactics that eventually fall down and you start having swinging results? Have you given your players to much/little responsibilty? Are they moving as a team, and are they doing what you had in mind before the match? Do you have an attacking plan even though you are deffending, and are you suppling your attackers in the right way?
Choosing tactics must be well thought out but it's not over-complicated. The deffault tactics when simply looking at them have deffensive outlets and offensive outlets. I, personally, will implement a tactic with a Deffensive Midfielder, if I´m managing a wearker side or simply trying to grind in a result.

There have been many people that are about to give up and it's a shame because in all honesty (even though in the beggining I had my doubts) this FM is truly the best one yet. If there are people interrested I'd be willing to go through some steps on tackling the above issues, and 'ginny pig' a bottom 5 side, and a top 8 side. I won't promise mirackles, but some form of stability. Evolving them would eventually be up to you. I´ll post some insites during the weekend, but please remember in no way am I taking credit for these tactics, just simply useing the unofficial Tactic Bible. It's just that now there is so much info in there it might be difficult to sipher through, but please don´t over-complicate this site either. Thanks

GreenRage

Great Post

I agree with you entirely, my problem with 07 was caused by 06. Because I could just download any 06 "super" tactic, plug it into my team and start winning I never learn't a thing.

Because you do have to use your nogging with 07 and think a bit more it seemed an impossible up-hill struggle. By contributing to the forum and reading the bible I am managing to put together a serious run in both the conference and premiership (I run two managers at the same time).

Learning what each slider actually does is a great place to start. As an example, Closing Down is actually only 3 positions, Own Box, Own Half or All over the field. So setting your defenders to the extreme closing down is going to cause a problem as they will leave gaps in the defence as they try and tackle people the midfield should be dealing with. I never realised this, even though its stated in my (cat urine smelling, but thats a different story) manual. I always used to set my defenders to always, hey they are defenders I want them to tackle, now I am wiser.

I'll add my two pence worth to any questions if thats ok with you Loversleaper?

retired_HAdvocate

I would like to start by saying thanks to The Lambs for participating.

I've just been polishing up and trying to find the most practical way of descibing my basic way I would implement a tactic. The numbers I use of course is on the different Sliders in team & Individual Instructions from 1 lowest from the left to 20.

Center Backs: Mentality(6), Creative Freedom(6) Passing(13 or 15), Closing Down one on (Team) and the other on Mixed(11), and Rarely on Forward Runs, Run With Ball, Long Shots, Through balls, and Cross Ball.

3 types of Full Backs:
Attacking Full Back: Mentality(10), Creative Freedom(10), Passing(13 or team), Closing Down(15). Often Forward Runs, Mixed Run With Ball, Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, and Often Cross Balls. Crossing from Mixed.

Normal Full Back: Mentality(8), Creative Freedom(8), Passing(13 or Team), Closing Down(15). Mixed Forward Runs, Mixed Run With Ball, Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, and Often Cross Balls. Crossing from Deep.

Deffensive Full Back: Mentality(6), Creative Freedom(6), Passing(13 or 15), Closing Down(15). Rarely Forward Runs, Rarely Run With Ball, Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, and Often Cross Balls. Cross from Deep.

Deffensive Midfielder: Mentality(6) Creative Freedom(8), Passing(Team), Closing Down(15 or 20). Rarely Forward Runs, Rarely Run With Ball, Mixed Long Shots, Often Through Balls, Rarely Cross Ball.

Attacking Midfielder: Mentality(Team), Creative Freedom(15), Passing(5 or Team), Closing Down(Team). Mixed/Often Forward Runs, Mixed Run With Ball, Mixed Long Shots, Often Through Balls, and Rarely Cross Ball.

2 types of Wingers:
Attacking Winger: Mentality(Team), Creative Freedom(12), Passing(Team), Clossing Down(11). Often Forward Runs, Often Run With Ball, Mixed/Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, and Often Cross Balls. Cross from Mixed or Byline.
Conservative Winger: Mentality(10), Creative Freedom(10), Passing(13 or Team), Closing Down(Team). Mixed Forward Runs, Often/Mixed Run With Ball, Mixed Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, Often Cross Ball. Cross from Mixed.

Two Man Strike Force:
Striker/Target Man: Mentality(Team), Creative Freedom(Team), Passing(13 or Team), Closing Down(15 or 20). Mixed Forward Runs, Mixed/Rarely Run With Ball, Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Cross Balls. Hold Up On Ball.
Forward: Mentality(15), Creative Freedom(15), Passing(5 or Team), Closing Down(Team). Mixed Forward Runs, Often Run With Ball, Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, Mixed Cross Ball. Can Cross from Byline to Target Man (Optional).

One Man Attack:
Striker/Target Man: Mentality(13 in Deffensive formations or Team in Attacking), Creative Freedom(13), Passing(13 or Team), Closing Down(7). Mixed Forward Runs, Mixed/Rarely Run With Ball, Mixed/Rarely Long Shots, Mixed Through Balls, Rarely Cross Ball. Hold Up On Ball.

Now from here you look at your Tactic and place the type of player in his place. Here are Some of the Tactics I would use:

Playball: 4-4-2 Flat back & midfield (Wingers short Farrows). Now we must remember that the team Mentality Slider has 22 notches and not 20 like the rest of the sliders, so if it´s alright with all I'll count them like so: 0 (being Ultra Deffensive) to 21(being All Out Attack).
Teams Instructions: Mentality(13), Creative Freedom(11- means I actually don´t even touch that one), Passing(6), Tempo(6), Width(11), Closing Down(13), Time Waste(6), Deffensive Line(10). Fockus Passing Mixed. Use Playmaker(Attacking Midfielder) and Use Target Man(Striker). Use Two Center Backs- strongest on the leftside who is the one with team closing down, Normal Full Backs, Attacking Wingers, a Deffensive Midfielder(right) and Attacking Midfielder(left), and Striker-Forward conselation(if you can) with mixed Target Man Supply.

The Conservative Playball: Same as above but with only a few changes: Team Mentality(11), Passing(8 or 13), Tempo(8 or 13). Use Deffensive Full Backs and Conservative Wingers. Remember to apply the Counter Attack option.

These are Normal tactics where you start out a little cautious and try a Strength/Strength test with your opposition. Can win you the game or contain it, but I will change to another pre-set tactic which changes my style of play if need be. Remeber in Miserable Weather conditions not to use short passing/slow tempo.

High Pressure Tactic: Also a flat 4-4-2 as above but with Long Farrows on my wingers.
Team Instructions: Mentality(15), Creative Freedom(11), Passing(6), Tempo(6), Width(15), Closing Down(15), Time Waste(6), Deffensive Line(15). Now I use the same player set-up as explained in the Playball Tactic, Except I change the Normall Full Backs into Attacking Full Backs. I Remove the Use Playmaker and the Use Target Man Option and Focus Pass Down Both Flanks.

This is only used when I'm a Comfortable Favorite, or chasing a goal. Can be use Deffensivly also with few changes: Mentality (11), Passing(8 or 13), Tempo(8 or 13), Width(11), Closing Down(13), Deffensive Line(10). Of course using the Deffensive Full Backs, Conservative Wingers, and applying the Counter Attack option.

So please remember these are basics, and using these I get satisfactory results. You can change some things to suit your team, but I feel I rarely need to. It's alot to do with which tactics you need to use and after a (short) while one should be able to see it very easily. There are also a few other tactics I enjoy or need to use such as: 4-1-4-1, or 4-1-2-2-1, and to some extent 4-1-3-2, and the 5-4-1(or the dreaded 3-3-2-1-1). There are probably some few details I have missed like Goal Keepers and how they Distrubute to which tactic or a very important part of the game- Set Pieces, but if it's ok I've written enough for today. Thanks....

retired_cherylvano

I think it's also important to note the effect the individual instructions for opposition players has on your tactic.

I've found that it needs to be used carefully and sparingly, especially the closing down always instruction.

retired_arelie

to be honest ive just about give up on fm07, ive played for many a year, i wouldnt say im the best but id say im pretty good , i created a really good tactic last year and it got grimsby to the champs league final. this year i cant win, try t download tactics it dont work, try to make my own. im in 2012 got grimsby in the championship but fight relegation every year despite my squad whic is really good.

retired_HAdvocate

To Wes_Coulam, as I mentioned earlier I wouldn´t mind trying out the above Tactics with someone (maybe you?) you chose a team and we can ,as an example only, try a team and see what happens. Maybe if you start afresh we could create some senarios that could also invovle good imput from people who has ideas to share. So maybe the problems or no problems that occur can be brought out into the light... I don't know how you feel about this...

retired_Markpdoody

I had the same problem with Wes_Coulam when I switched from 7.0.0 to 7.0.1. Just could not figure it out but I realise I was the problem, I was too lazy. It got difficult for me as I always wanted my team to play nice. I got fed up yet wanted to continue playing but by that time I had Arsenal coming to my home. So I thought to myself this is it, I am going to watch the full game highlights, yes, possibly all 90 minutes of it until I start controlling Arsenal. Game starts, I laid back as if I had all the time in the world and started analizing.

Learned a lot, I was not even watching how my team was playing but was watching Arsenal as my team already has a style to play. So I tweaked a little and killed them off 3-0. I looked at each of thier players to see how there were defending as my problem, I found out was defending and was too attacking. It needs a some patience instead of hoping for automatic mode. You don't have to this all the time because on one match you will find how to basicly set up your tactic and the rest of the season until, of course, you hit a bad patch. Repeat once more and fix it.

:cool:

retired_arelie

I'll give it a go later tonight with my grimsby town team, im 24th in the championship with dieing morale mind though but it cant hurt.

I've tried doing this on extended highlights but had no luck whats the best way to start off (like tactic wise?) would you play your own tactic or just use a default and tweak accordingly?

retired_slayerbing

Don't play with a default they are terrible...asking for trouble there. Make your own and tweak it as you go.

Start with your team instructions and then go from line to line slowly (def,mid,forward).

Remember your set pieces, and delegate players for them. When you do instructions look at the players attributes and work of them too.

retired_HAdvocate

To Wes_C. I don't know anything about teams way out in the future, what coaches you apply, which players you have and it will take alot of posts before I would fully understand what has happened through the years. It seems to me there's alot not right if you have a good team and are bottom, so just assuming you are bottom you are not favorite going into matches. All I need to know is: what is your presumed finishing position in the league (it will tell you in Club Information) and the next 4-5 games I need the Bookmakers Odds in those matches.
I won't go into all details of your squad, but could give some info on what tactic to use, probably a 4-1-4-1. But just give me info I asked for and no more. I´ll post an insite of this tactic later....