the end is upon us

This will be 1 of my final posts due to FML being cancelled :(

Lend Me Your Eyes

A hot topic in both the Subscribers forum & the Moderator forum at the moment is the state of the current match engine & the tactics people are currently using, With 1 side saying this match engine is total rubbish & the other saying it is people's tactics that are the cause of the problems. Reading between the lines it does come across that a number of flaws have been ironed out during the last match engine patch & it is making a lot of tactics that used these flaws look quite unstable, Which in turn is annoying a number of users.

Now i wouldn't class myself as an expert on tactics, But the ones i have previously thrown together have normally done me proud at all levels, I have tended to build my tactics around the players i have got at my disposal at senior level (based on their stats) & also how i would like them to play football. This tactic is then used at all the youth levels so that the players i hope to bring through from u17 to my senior side have the right stats when they hit 20/21 years of age.

So going off the replies being given on the forums i thought it might be wise to pm my current setting's to WWFAN & see what he thought needed improving & what i was doing wrong. As this tactic was OK 85% of the time, but when it was bad it was really bad if you understand my meaning i do get a lesson in footballing terms.

These are the settings i was using & sent to WWFAN

Philosophy - Balanced

Match Strategy - Attacking

Passing - Shorter

Creative Freedom - Default

Closing Down - Press More

Tackling - Default

Marking - Default

Crossing - Default

Roaming - Default

Defensive line - 10

Width - 12

Tempo - 12

Time Wasting - Default

Passing Focus - Down Both Flanks

Counter Attack - No

Play Offside - Yes

Primary Play maker - FLC

GK - Def Role - Sweeper Keeper- all default

RB - Sup Role - Passing 6 - Rest Default

LB - Sup Role - Passing 6 - Rest Default

DLC - Def Role - Mentality 8 - Rest Default

DRC - Def Role - Mentality 8 - Ball Playing DC - Rest Default

MCL - Def Role - Mentality 8 - Ball Winning Mid - Rest Default

MCR - Sup Role - Deep Lying Play maker - Passing 6 - Rest Default

AMR - Att Role - Inside Forward - Mentality 18 - Passing 6 - No Long Shots - Rest Default

AML - Att Role - Inside Forward - Mentality 18 - Passing 6 - No Long Shots - Rest Default

FLC - Att Role - Trequarista - Mentality 20 - Passing 6 - No Long Shots - Rest Default

FRC - Sup Role - Complete Forward - No Long Shots - Rest Default

Shouts - Retain Possession, Pass To Feet, Run At Defence, Look For Overlap & Get Stuck In

And the reply i got from him, RE:HEY

I'd be wary of using such short passing on FB's, Especially if you are using AML/R's. You are limiting their passing options, Which might lead to the DC's getting caught in possession when the FB's pass centrally as there is nobody else in range.

Would be wary of reducing passing for a play maker or TQ. Whole logic of their central passing settings is that it allows them to play any type of pass, Not just short simple ones.

Likewise, I'd be wary of the TQ having no long shots as a default setting. He should pop up in open spaces quite often and might well score a few from distance if he has the right attributes.

Retain possession is a useless shout if passing and temp is set manually, Needs them to be on default to have an effect.

Your mentality splits are terrible, Should never be a gap of 10-12 in mentality in the team, You are basically telling the attack that the strategy is aggressive and the defence that it is cautious. Which will cause disconnect, Keep mentality close together to ensure a cohesive performance,

Defensive line is far too low for a high pressing strategy, Width should probably be default so you give your wingers more space to move into as they cut inside. A manually set tempo stops you from being able to adjust tempo to the conditions.

Can see there being an issue with passing between midfield and attack unless the complete forward is phenomenal at finding deep space, With the short passing and a front line rushing up field, It will be difficult for the midfield to pick out their man without somebody disobeying instructions

Shouting strategies should be focusing on conditions, Opposition type and player attributes rather than being generic shouts you like to use i.e wet pitch = more direct passing, Very dry and hot = shorter passing, Against a narrow formation = play narrower to choke the middle in defence and exploit the flanks to gain 2 on 1 advantages in attack, look for overlap can be a good shout on a chewed up pitch as it keeps a lot of players just outside the box where the ground is better.

Apart from that it is all good

Remember we've been working hard on making the match engine respond to the logic of the tactic creator, Which is all based on real life football logic. If you think about how football tactics are constructed in real life and what managers do to cope with different questions, You will do well.

Good Luck

Richard

Which does give me plenty of things to think about, Which in reality does take me away from my thinking on my tactical setups going forward. Back to the chalk board HEHE. I am sure i won't be the only person basing their tactical knowledge on previous versions of FM, Where 1 tactic conquered all & you really didn't need to think about things, Just click continue & let things trudge along. This new version of the match engine is actually a challenge to master, Something people will need to do to make things work on the pitch as they want them to, Otherwise they will get beaten & eventually leave FML saying everything but themselves is wrong & that we should revert things back to match engine xxxx.

So going off the above, 1 tactic doesn't fit all scenario's these days, You need to adapt to what is going on around you, The 1 tactic fits all approach that a lot of us have ingrained into our subconscious needs wiping from your memory, As this throw back to the FM series of yesteryear is what is causing all your issues and will all need to get past this change and embrace these new options, out with the old & in with the new sorta thing :)

Working out what works & what doesn't will take time & plenty of patience, You will need to watch the games, Reacting to the in game needs as a real life manager would do & possibly analysing the full match to work out where it all goes wrong, I am away now back to the class room to work out properly what each shout does in regards to the match engine & maybe think about how i go about things tactic wise, So far i am thinking of 5 tactics all based on the same formation.

Defensive setup to defend when I'm trying to close games out

Balanced setup to start games whilst working out what is required on the pitch

Attacking setup for when i need that all important goal

Counter attack setup for when i go a goal up & expect the opposition to attack me, Which should leave gaps in their defence.

Possession setup for when they loose a player & i need to keep the ball to tire out them more before going in for the kill.

So wish me luck while i work my way through all this & hopefully once Ive got it nailed i may give you all a little snippet of my findings :)

P.S. i have made some alterations to the above settings, as i don't want to give you an easy option to beat me in any of my 3 current game worlds

The World Cup

Something that seems very popular at the moment is the loan world cup, Which is an interim fix while we wait for the code to be added for International football inside FML, I think by now most gameworlds have run it at least once by now & with it brought a lot of good out from within the gameworld community. It is a brilliant way of getting the community interacting with one another & does bring people together who may not of even spoken to one another without this comp/event.

The build up during pre season keeps users logging in at a time most take a break from fml & with it building up all week to the main event it does add quite a lot of chat & banter inside the game. It all starts off with the auctioning off of the nations using a mixture of live auctions & private bidding all run by the mod team, Obviously this is quite time consuming for the mods who are sorting this out, But the positives do out way the negatives currently due to the amount of people taking part.

Once the auctions are over & its down to actually getting players in, Is where this begins to fail in my opinion. This is down to the amount of players that are currently not accessible for a number of different reasons.

The player hasn't been at his current club 28 days.

The player's contract will end before the loan length required will permit.

The Manager will not accept the loan offer.

The Player is already loaned out.

Of course in real life not all players can be called up for a number of reasons, But how often do you see a full starting 11 missing for an International side ? This is my only grumblings in what is realistically the flagship event inside FML at the moment & i do hope it is S.I's next addition to the game. As i feel they should be able to code a lot of this to take the work load away from the mod team & also take away the risk of the players being released by a moderator rather than cancelling the loan & returning the player to his original club.

So for me we really do need these options when running these events going forward.....

A proper auction system allowing the bids on nations using the in game reward points.

A way of assigning the nation won to a user once the auction has ended.

An International comp setting to stop the players being used in official games.

The ability to call up any player for your squad with a limit of 22 players maximum.

Caps won to show on the players profiles.

There may be things i have missed, but these basic options will make it more accessible to everyone & hopefully allow more to take part. So please S.I. pull your fingers out & get this sorted out.

Where do i go wrong

So after days & weeks of threatening to update this blog & several post it notes later i have finally set enough time aside to put notes into words. I very much doubt people even bother to check the link these days due to my sporadic posting's, But what the hell i do this more for myself than anyone else !!!! I personally feel the game itself is quite solid if unspectacular at the moment, But it has all gone quiet in most gameworlds, The lack of in game chatter/banter/abuse coupled with the lack of info from S.I. towers doesn't bode well for the future, I'm sure this won't be the case as there will be updates & announcements by S.I. which should have a knock on effect in game. I would guess that once 1.7 is finally announced as ready to patch to all the live gameworld's S.I. will send it to everyone on the FML mailing list, similar to how they recently re-invigorated a number of users with a mail shot mentioning their in game finances. If it all goes well I'm sure this quiet rest period will soon be forgotten as everyone gets more involved all over again. I do feel thought that not the source code of the game is stable it is time S.I. started adding in some of the extras that have been requested for as long ago as i can remember. Hopefully these things will sort out one of the biggest complaints being bandied around at the moment, The lack of things to do, I do read the forums but rarely reply these days, As to be totally honest most of them come across as people whining without actually offering a solution to the actual issue. The only post not of this vein was 1 i read this week by a forum user called StewartDowning1 who does at least offer something that S.I. could consider & look at. But even if all the things suggested where added by S.I. I'm certain it would upset some users as i have seen numerous times, What 1 person would love another user hates. So no doubt there will be a number of forums posts in the future slating S.I. & their total lack of consideration for everyone involved. This is most likely down to how passionate most of us are about FML/football in general. Anyhow my ramblings are done until i get round to letting you know how I'm fairing in game & before anyone asks , YES i do have some notes already :)