retired_ladylimdiddy

This is an area I hope is the main priority for SI for FM2008 as it's this part of the game that has many people confused and generally p****d off with the game.

It's not necessarily about making the game easier as most people do want the game to be a challenge. It's more about making the match engine less robotic and almost scripted at times. The number of times I score and the opposition immediately fromt he kick off go straight up and have a shot against me is ridiculous its almost 7 times out of 10 it happens, which is why I use the word scripted.

Alot of emphasis has been placed on the need to tweak tactics in this version more or less in every game in order to be successful. Yes IRL managers do change little things from game to game but we seen to have to go almost from one extreme to the other just because some crap team decides to play attacking or defensive against us? this cannot be right.

The main emphasis should be placed upon creating a working tactical system and fitting in the perfect players within the system you have planned. That should be the challenge as IRL.

Now im not saying you should just be able to create a good tactic get the right players and then just win every game, and yes small changes to tactics can be made in certain games to give you that SLIGHT extra chance of winning the game NOT in order to just gain abit of consistancy.

Take Sam Allardyce and what a great job he has done at Bolton. He has acheived this by creating a unique system from most other Premiership teams and brought in the perfect players to suit the system.

The only difference probably between Bolton at home and away is that they may defend a little deeper away from home, thats it. Theres no drastic changes needed for the majority of games and this should be the case on FM especially when you are a big club with a great team.

Also when only watchin key highlights it becomes almost impossible for some people to get it right without hour upon hour to play which some people just don't have.

In summary IMO i think the sliders on the team instructions should make maybe the 20% difference in games in the chance you have of winning, not around 50% which is were it is at the moment.

retired_mhregan02

I was thinking about this (and agree) that the way FM 2007 is currently created it's a paradox. It's meant to be a simulation, where you set a strategy (sometimes high-level, sometimes in the fine details) to help your team win. But, the way things work in-game is almost arcade-like. While not individually controlling of players, you end up needing to Pause the action to issue individual instructions to players or to change the team's mentality in order to be successful. I find all of this button pushing annoying, especially considering how many buttons (read: sliders) there are to adjust.

On one hand, it's great we have been given such a fine-grained level of control. But on the other hand, this is a simulation and IRL while you may occasionally change the team's overall strategy or give individual commands, it shouldn't be necessary to win by pushing buttons. To make matters worse, it's difficult to know which buttons will bring success versus just change things.

Generally, FM 07 suffers from a player needing to micromanage too much to be successful. While on some level it is realistic, it's also very unrealistic in terms of enjoyment and IRL. I would wager those head coaches that are most successful are those that also have successful coaching staff, and in its current form you can't leave much responsibility to your fellow coaches, meaning you have to do all the work.

Different people find different aspects of FM fun- for some it's the Tactics, for some the Scouting, for some the simulations, etc. But, in it's current form you not only need to enjoy EVERY area of the game, but you have to enjoy it on a micro-managing level, which zaps out the fun element. And when you zap fun, that defeats the point of this being a game.

I'm really hopeful that SI will continue to improve FM in the 08 version to address the areas that aren't fun and add in more tools to make being a manager more successful feasible. FM 07 is the first game in the series I've played and generally I'm happy, but it still needs further refinement to be the best soccer simulation out there.

retired_iim so aw3som3

They really need to ditch this ridiculous 'slider' system. Big credit to guys like Cleon and wwfan who have taken the time to philosophise and understand the engine AS IT IS, but the situation whereby one click of mentality can influence a game to such a high degree is frankly absurd.

Big revamp needed, or people will eventually get so hacked off with FM that the emergence of a decent competitor will see sales plummet. Not scaremongering either, I know of many people getting extremely frustrated with the tactical engine.

retired_provrb7

tbh it doesn't have to be as complicated as you guys make it sound. With the right players you could set up quite a simple tactic by setting central defenders to defensive mentality, fullbacks on normal, holding midfielder on normal as well and attacking on the rest. You could easily win the league with Chelsea with those settings anyway

retired_shana2112

Well what do you suggest?

I think the tactics engine is outstanding, and I've only been playing for 1 day and 23 hours according to the counter. IRL the best coaches are more often than not man managers than instruction shouters. If you can influence a player's mentality via slider then I think its a better conduit for recreating a gaffer's life than simply moving around formations until you find some goals.

retired_dillon-aus

I was frustrated at the tactical aspect of the game at the start too. I uninstalled this game 3 times (and reinstalled 3 times of coz) before. But now I start to enjoy it much more.

Having to or being able to counter opponent tactics is actually the main reason I like fm2007. It's like IRL, know your opponent, know your self, counter, and win. Many may say with a team such as chealsea or barca or Man U it should be unneccesary to counter but you can only stick with your own style and win, I find that untrue.

IRL better managers in better teams actually 'micro" their mentalities/tactics/opposition instructions during a match more often than other mangers, they react to changes faster/can see a need for change faster and thus give the opposition less chance of winning, that's what make them better managers. (Btw this is evident in the game too, better teams such as Man U, Barca, Chealse, Lyon change their tactics very frequently during 1 match if they are not winning - and the changes make huge differences too. E.gs of the changes include arrow changes, formation changes, substitutions or player position swaps.)

A RL E.g, in the Man U vs Roma ECC game yesterday, Ferguson did the right "micros" to get a good result with 10 men against an in form Roma. e.g after Scholes was sent off, C Ronaldo became the sole forward, Rooney became a winger and Giggs was in central midfield, this effectively allowed the team to defend well while countering attacked well, netting 1 goal. The Roma manager did the right micros too, most obvious one is to bring on a sub who, b4 Ferguson/Man U figured out a change to counter him, scored straight away. He was also smart to have Totti as the sole forward, and having him assisting and making chances for the midfielders. It was an exceptionally good 'mental soccer game'.

Similarly in the game, as the O.P and many others realise, if you do not keep an eye on the opponent formation or substitutions with highlights mode on "extended" and constally checking "formations", you can not make changes accordingly to effectively react to the opposition change and thus you are likely to have a bad game. When I was a newbie I played lots of games which I did not do any micros in the game when I led 2-0 or more, only finding my self losing or getting a draw instead by the end of the game, especially versing teams with good stats managers. I was frustrated. Now I realise it was me, as a manager, who failed to give updated instructions to the players upon opposition changes, caused the defeat/draw.
I now change my mentalities, bring on subs, make opposition instructions as the AI do these changes, now I win 99% of the games when my team is the 1st to score. I am not yet very good at turning the table around when my team goes a goal or two down yet, but I do do it 60% of the times.

My point is, isn't the above similar to real life? Imagine if the Roma manager didn't bring on a sub and go more attacking, would Man U have lost the game? Or if Ferguson didn't go defensive while counter attacking by keeping both Rooney and C.Ronald on the field after having 10 men, would the score still be 1-2?
Or if Sir Ferguson just tell Man U to stick with 1 style/1 mentality the whole game for every opponent(e.g attack attack attack), Man U would become a relegation candidate in Premier league by now, not potential champion.

retired_mgavlick

I think the emphasis people place on tactic tweaking is less than helpful. Tweaking means to change things ever so slightly to make micro-adjustments to a team's style of play i.e. try to make a forward stay deeper by reducing mentality by 2 and setting FWRs to rarely. This element of tactic design is necessary and often leads to startling breakthroughs, but it is not related to the overall issues many people have. This issue is poorly designed total systems or poorly thought out implementation of the systems thay have. The need for such systems is an absolute necessity for FM07 and the performance you can get by using them correctly forms the basis for my argument against the minor tweaking argument made by the original poster.

As Wolfsong mentioned, it is one hundered percent normal for managers to prepare for a game by deciding on a variety of strategies for various situations. Or it should be. In a recent Guardian article, David James expressed his amazement when, during Trevor Brooking's brief management flirtation, the West Ham team were being instructed on potential opposition threats 5 days before the next game. The example he gives is when Brooking states that Hasselbank likes to run onto looping balls over the defence using his speed and strength to hold off the marking defender. The team began preparing for counter measures to deal with that specific threat well in advance of the game. The fact that James was amazed at this level of preperation and the equally amazing fact that he had never experienced it previously sums up the endemic uselessness of English managers but also offers FM players an idea of the level of thought a quality manager puts into his tactics. We cannot approach the Brooking level of sophistication but we can get as close as possible and by doing so increase our performance level.

My own philosophy of tactic design (explained in detail in TT&F but in a constant process of refinement) is to follow an untweaked mentality framework (currently 13-19 at home and 6-11 away) which I can then customise for a variety of threats. I design an Aggressive, Possession and Cautious system for each mentality framework and switch between them at various stages of the match. Aggressive has a high d-line, more forward runs and higher closing down. Cautious has a lower d-line, only a few players making forward runs and a low closing down defensive system designed to keep 8 men between the ball and the goal. Possession is somewhere in between. I play short, possession based passing for Possession and Aggressive home tactic as I want to make sure my midfield recieves the ball as often as possible. The more cautious home system and the away systems are more direct as I can use direct balls into the channels to quickly counter a more aggressive opposition. If I want to deal with a specific threat I can then use opposition instructions to do so.

By following the in-match stats and watching the AI apporach it becomes reasonably easy to pick the right tactic. Pre-match I use the odds and relative positions in the table to decide on how I think the opposition will play and thus will probably start cautiously against Chelsea at home but aggressively against Watford. Not exactly rocket science. By ten minutes into the match I can see if my system is out performing the opposition's or not. Note, for 90% of home games home advantage ensures the possession or attacking versions will outperform the AI and needs very little adjustment until/if the AI decides to go all out attack to try and get back in the game. By that time you will be 2-0 or 3-0 ahead, or it will be one-nil and you only need to play more defensively for 10 mins or so. In away games you need to be a little more sophisticated and adapt more to the AI as their home advantage will tell if you get things wrong.

Hence, for away games I can switch between the full range of tactical options. A recent promotion battle between my team and QPR followed roughly these lines.

First Half: I assumed QPR would really come at me and thus started with the Away Cautious tactic. Unfortunately, they were playing possession based rather than aggressive football and hitting crosses from mixed rather than byline. My non-FWR wingers failed to put enough pressure on their wide players and thus they hit a few uncontested balls into my penalty area that put my deep d-line under lots of pressure and resulted in a goal. Had the AI been more aggressive they would have been trying to get to the byline and my wingers and FBs would have doubled up on the crosser and dealt with the ball in easily. The match stats also suggested I was being seriously outplayed. I switched to the more possession away tactic to squeeze the play and force a midfield battle. I had a lot of possession but QPR scored again against the run of play. I decided this was just bad luck rather than poor tactics as the match stats had stabilised and were beginning to show my superiority. I stuck with the same tactic and grabbed one back on the stroke of half-time.

Sercond Half: I assumed that QPR, only being a goal to the good, would play in a similar style as they had first half and felt my possession tactic was getting the the better of them. For the first 15 minutes of the second half I had all the possession but they were holding firm. The match commentary then told me they had become more defensive, so I employed my most aggressive home tactic (circa 65 mins). I battered them for 10 mins and finally scored a deserved equaliser. Assuming in advance they would try to maximise their home advantage to grab the win (thus piling men forward and trying to cross from byline rather than mixed), I switched back to the away cautious tactic I had rejected earlier as a draw was a better result for me than them. I also believed I would be more likely to grab a goal on the break than concede an equaliser by doing that. They immediately went 4-2-4, got dragged forward by my low d-line but were unable to get behind my defence and were being hit by counter attack after counter attack. I scored the winner in the 88th minute.

A home scenario is less complex. I was at home against Coventry, 2nd against 11th. I was on a good run of form and they weren't so I assumed correctly they would start defensively and began with my Attacking Home system. 2-0 up at half time in a match I had dominated. The key to the second half is to kill off the game quickly. I assumed they would try and get back into the game and started the second half with my Home Cautious system (deeper d-line, FBs staying back, more direct passing and counter attack checked). They came at me from the off having switched from a 4-4-2 short farrow to a 4-4-2 long farrow. I scored the third after 47 minutes and was amazed when they carried on coming at me (gluttons for punishment). After the fourth, on another counter-attack, they reverted to a defensive formation so I changed back to my starting method, the Attacking Home and put the icing on the cake with a fifth.

At no point in either of these games did I employ a tactic tweak (i.e. one or two small changes). I loaded up pre-designed tactics for specified scenarios. When I was wrong I was punished; when I was right it came off in a big way. I believe that such tactical adjuastment is concurrent with the way quality managers operate in real life. Less sophisticated managers are only able to follow one or two systems (McClaren's caution, Souness's aggression) but the better tacticians have way more options. I don't think my way of playing is particularly ground breaking. All I do try to follow logical decison making processes that I see day in day out in real life football. It is not that hard to replicate such things via the FM match engine. The fact that you can do this is a wonderful defence of its sophistication. The only real difficulty is how quickly you can get punished by doing the wrong thing.

The only thing I can see being really beneficial is having an AssMan explaining what he is seeing to you in-game. However, this has to be reflected in the tactical quality of the AssMan. If he is tactically useless (Tactics 5) the advice he gives you has a 75% chance of being wrong. However, the higher his tactical knowledge the better he can help. I also think we need the option to turn him off if we are comfortable in our own tactical skins.

To conclude, the Shakespearean quote Millie used in an earlier post sums things up more perfectly than I ever could (sorry for stealing it, Millie).


The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves


If we see where we are going wrong rather than how we perceive the match engine to be wrong, then maybe, just maybe, we would be able to do something about it.

retired_ladylimdiddy

Im sorry but this is not "micro-management at all. All he did was shifted a couple of players round when they went to 10 men, pretty obvious thing to do.

I don't have a problem with doing this sort of thing, changing the shape of the team when need to and I don't think anybody else has a problem with this. However this is NOT micro-management, players adapt on the pitch IRL as his players did. They had 10 men, so they got pushed back and ROMA dominated the possesion, that didnt mean he had to start changing mentality etc to combat that, the players adapt on the pitch basically.

retired_iim so aw3som3

Less variables for a start.

Nothing wrong with say a 5-point slider ranging from V.Defensive to V.Attacking, as opposed to a 1-20 range.

It's like I said before: in this game, reducing one player's mentality from say 17 to 15 can make or break a tactic, which is complete nonsense. Reducing it from 15 to 5, yes THAT I could perhaps understand. But the proof is in the pudding; namely, the "Combination of Cleon & wwfan" thread, where the originator testified to an 'ideal' mentality setting for each match. This just isn't realistic, it's pure mathematics and not football.

retired_ladylimdiddy

Basically, there are 2 main things that I would like to see changed for FM2008.

<LI>The sensitivity of the sliders needs lowering slightly, as the impact they can have is just too powerful and unrealistic.

Also I would like to see less notches on the sliders, 20 is just unnecessary and complicates things. Maybe around 5 would be more manageable.

<LI>Player stats need to be alot more important and really the main factor that decides games as IRL.