retired_marcias

My main game is with Werder Bremen and Fiorentina so whilst they are big clubs they are certainly not amongst the top echelon who should expect to be winning constantly in Europe. Fiorentina only finished 6th in Serie A last season whilst Werder Bremen flirted with 7th place before I dragged them back up to 2nd, some 20 points behind champions Bayern Munich.

At that level not being able to get to grips with defending properly is quite noticeable

As for what to change when, I have to admit I have no idea what happens with opposition instructions if you create some mess of conflicting instructions in your own player's instructions and the opposition player instructions - probably your players just get confused and make mistakes. Personally I very rarely set opposition player instructions unless there is a player I consider especially weak or inexperienced who I want to make sure we close down or generally force into making mistakes.

Generally I will change team instructions beased on what I want to see change in the flow of the game whereas I often change individual player instructions if I want to respond to something the AI is doing. I watch most of Bremen's games in full match mode so I can get quite a good view of what is happening, although I still fail to fix what is wrong quite often!

deantibbetts

Yes and it's a learning curve i.e. I started FM08 using Man Utd and that's how I learnt what worked etc. No I manage a variety of teams from VFB Stuttgart to East Fife and Glentoran to Spurs. I have no coaching experience at all.

I never ever ever set opposition instructions and I never change my tactics mid match. I have a home tactic and an away tactic, no matter who i'm playing I use one of these tactics. Changing your tactics, IMO, harms your teams tactical abilities. FM recognises how used to a tactic a player/team is so changing it can have adverse effects, because the players don't have enough time to get used to it.

The example is when I take over a new club I use my trusted tactics, but the team doesn't necesarily play very well using them for the first 5/6 games. They gradually get used to them and by mid season your team will be playing exactly the way you want them to play and now that they are used to that tactic they will play like that forever. Constantly chopping and changing, or tweaking as it seems to be called, means the players never have a set tactic.

retired_marcias

I'm not totally convinced by that...I make plenty of tweaks to tactics mid-game and it doesn't seem to have a big adverse effect. I start with the same tactic every game (well, slightly different slider settings + counter-attacking for away games), but will often pile on more forward arrows or crank up mentality or tempo or take tempo down or whatever during the match to unsettle my opponents or to try to exploit different things.

Plus if you keep a rigid tactic opponents learn it as well as your own players!

deantibbetts

I take your point re: opposition learning it, but I vary my starting line up so it might act as a tactical change. I play a narrow 4-2-3-1, sometimes I have two of the 3 AMC's as skillfull players with pace and sometimes I play strikers breaking into the box, sometimes I play an MR who is more solid. I think the consistency of tactic is aided by the variation in starting 11 style. Either that or sometime soon i'm about to be found out

firefighterhilf

The AI isn't perfect and does not always do everything right. Different managers have different success and the quality of a manger can have a big impact on an AI teams performance.

This works both ways, a new manager can improve a team or completely destroy them. This is very well demonstarted in Kipfizh's excellent AI experiment. In there you get a real feel for what attrbutes affect a managers performances and how a good manger can make all the difference, as can a poor one.

And like others have said, I rarely get beaten by poor opposition so this is entirely down to how you play the game. I also rarely see a team make a miraculous recovery against me after half time. It does happen on some occasions but rarely enough for it to be realistic.

I'd like to see managers having more personality, and more individuality, but there's not a problem that I can see with AI managers being too good.

matty49

The FM manual states that you shouldn't change your tactics alot. It confuses the players when you use several tactics during a match, i.e. from 4-4-2 to 4-5-1 to 3-5-2 to 3-4-3 and maybe back to 4-4-2.

This is quite obvious a paradox to what 'glamdring' experiences. Maybe it depends on the quality of the teams and that the player of top European clubs can manage these changes in formations and tactics better that ordinary player. I guess it speaks for itself. Have you 'glamdring' noticed that this ability to absorb these changes is different among the players of Werder Bremen and East Fife ?

deantibbetts

I don't think Glamdring changes his tactics quite so drastically so it maybe doesn't affect his game so much. Other users on these forums say about making changes every couple of minutes during the game to counteract certain things, that would be a drastic change and so affect the players.