Duller said: Maybe i can get better attacking managers? Could it influence? Expand
If you had 20 shots and opponent had 2, then you won tactically. It just means your players didn't do a good job. Either they don't have the right mentality for the job, getting complacent, nervous or anything like that, or maybe you just had a bad day on the office. It happens every now and then, there is no way to avoid that even with the best tactic. If you are still scoring more points than them per match, it's fine.
Duller said: Hey ZaZ, im currently in an online save with Arsenal. I usually win comfortably against npc, but against humans normally my players miss a lot lot of chances. I didnt focus much on the finishing of the players i bought. What can i do? Expand
Don't worry, you will also miss a lot of chances even with players with 20 of finishing. I've lost count of how many times I failed to win because my strikers missed 30 shots 1v1 during the match, sometimes even without goalkeeper. For some reason, strikers with low finishing usually perform around the same or even better, probably because they have more of other attributes which allow them to get the ball in a better position to score, or maybe get less nervous in a 1v1 situation. I would go for fast players instead of good finishers.
About humans, it's normal for them to be harder than AI, since their tactics are usually better than the pre-made ones that the AI use. As long as you are winning more than your opponents, it's fine even if you are only hitting 1% of the shots. Just remember that no tactic can win 100% of the matches.
bwig said: awesome. yea the morale stays high. i made it with oxford city to the first league and am 3rd right now . Do u think the effect of not setting up "quickness" to every individual has a big impact (as in not developping)? Because rn i have a bad run of injures (4-5 players with 6+ weeks) and they all complain about the heavy training workload. I kept it with your "let them whine" but what could i improve if it doesn´t get better? At "rest" section everything to half intensity? using your in season weeks.
what do u actually mean by "light training"? Did i miss something or is it the general training schedule which is itself relatively light? Expand
I usually use the in-season training on normal intensity and rarely have more than 3 long injuries. However, it may happen if your players are made of glass, meaning high injury proneness, low natural fitness and/or low stamina (tired players have higher chance to get injuried). You should also keep an eye in fatigue (at medical tab), resting players when that starts to build up, as well as trying to keep condition and match fitness high.
About light training, I mean changing training schedules to lots of rest and recovery sessions to get them in condition to the next match. Instead of doing that, I prefer to rest only the ones that are tired (right click -> training -> rest) and keep general training untouched. I usually do that to anyone that won't get over 90% before next match.
TactocTestor said: Yeah so I'm thinking about mixing between the two. Match preparation for knockout rounds only and normal training for league games because this tactic is op enough that I don't need match preps to run away in the league. Expand
It sounds reasonable. Just remember you can always rest players individually if they have two matches too close, instead of using light training for the entire team.
First of all i wanted to thank you for that dedication and effort u put into this amazing game. This tactic is incredible and i´ve been playing a lot with it (2D extended Highlights).
I have some questions tho. I tested IWB with left foot on the right side and it seems to have better results. Do u support that or would u still go with left left / right right?
Second question would be, how is it that especially with weaker teams at the beginning of the season u literally smash everyone and everything and from game day 6/7 it starts going down and games get quite a struggle. Is it because players get tired (I´m not the greatest rotator for the obv reasons that the second 11 is way worse in a small club)?
Thanks in advance for your answers and once again thank you for being our virtual Pep!
Best from Berlin! Expand
Thanks for the compliment, but I just did lots of tests and posted the one that went right. It's not like I'm Guardiola or Klopp.
About your first question, it doesn't matter much because they rarely cross or shoot. IWB with same foot as side will have an easier time to pass the ball to wingers, while those with opposite foot will have an easier time to pass the ball to the center. If your opponent is more vulnerable in one of those positions, then it will make a difference, else, the tactic is pretty balanced in the attacking routes.
About weaker teams, it might be because opponents look down on you and play complacent, and after a couple of matches your team feels the pressure for overachieving. It can also be because your team gets tired, or even because they get complacent after winning too much in a row. I often get some 5 or 6 runs without winning, even with strong team against weak teams, but as long as I win in the end, it's fine. Just make sure to keep the morale high, complimenting/warning trainings and matches, because bad morale has a huge effect in your chance to win.
TactocTestor said: Quite curious on how effective a purely match prep training schedule would buff team results honestly. I mean I guess it has to have some effects on matches, but it's just that no one has done a concrete test on this before? Expand
It's hard to measure for several reasons. More efficient training for attribute gain gives higher chance of injuries, more fatigue and worse condition before matches, as well as less happiness. You can fix that with rotation and a balanced squad, but it might cause problem in some parts of the season.
On the other hand, to get the best of your players during the current season, you need match preparation (attack movement, defensive positioning, teamwork and set pieces), resting and happiness/cohesion training. Those are not very affected by double intensity.
One option that could be optimal would be interchanging full day of rest, double intensity attribute training and normal intensity match preparation, but there is no way to set intensity automatically for different days, meaning it would be too much work to do manually.
keadude said: I'd say from my experience Pace is everything. Acceleration is important but Pace is the vital stat. If they don't have good pace they aren't for this tactic, also a player with 10 or 11 pace but 14-15 acceleration isn't going to cut it.
Pace is all about how fast they are. Acceleration is about how quickly a player can hit their top speed. Expand
It was tested here and they seem to be equally important. However, the test was for the whole team and not for positions individualy. It's harder to assess for each position because difference in results get less significant.
joncoughlan said: Hi just wanted to say thank you for this tactic.Won the league and Carabao Cup in my first season with Wolves.Best tactic I've used.I tried to have plenty of pace and acceleration in all my team and it made a huge difference. Expand
bountyhunter said: so basicly all i need is fast players? any prefferd move that can help here? my wingers often going inside the box and shoots insted of doing wide cross Expand
With fast players you are gonna easily win everything. It's also a good idea to have some stats like dribble for wingers, vision for central midfielders, jumping reach for defenders and so on, but the most important is to have fast players.
About moves, they are not exactly important, but try to get those that overlap with their roles. For example, move into channels to shadow strikers and central midfielder, get forward and dribble more for wingers, hold position for defensive midfielder and defenders, and so on.
bountyhunter said: @ZaZ mate can you help me understand the players sutiable to roles? lets say ss will depay and vlasic will be good pick? wingers will boga and Ünder will do good? im cunfused. 10q anyway. Expand
Usually I go for fast players, with 14+ in Pace and Acceleration. All the players you said are fast, so they would do well. MBappé will still be better than them, but that doesn't mean they aren't good.
thepunisher23 said: hello prutton, what do you recommend for training intensity scheduling for the pre-season and in-season Expand
I usually put double intensity during pre-season for players in the green, and normal during in-season.
Just to make it clear, I didn't do any tests for these training schedules, I don't know if they increase much the chance of winning. That's a task for @Mark, to get 4 or 5 different schedules and see how they compare for weak and strong teams, considering points per game, attribute gain, fatigue, happiness and other things. However, it's not exactly easy to test such thing.
TactocTestor said: This tactic is very good offensively but somehow I'm still not scoring any goals from corners after 15 matches. It's really strange because with zaz I can still score a few here and there but 0 after 15 is really underwhelming. Expand
That's weird. I tested his corner routine on Blue before and the results were pretty similar. The best routine was from @Egraam, scoring around 14-15 goals a season, while Void's routine was scoring close to 11. I can't understand why you are scoring 0 goals from corners, are you sure you are not playing with a team of midgets without jumping reach?
I wanted to check the possibility, but it's a failure. No more tactics with two defenders. I wish I could make a 3-5-2 work, but I'm having a hard time to get something good there. They are either too leaky or too harmless.
Lapidus said: I don't think 'ideal' is an appropriate word to describe the conditions in the testing. I'd say 'equal' and 'consistent' are more appropriate words to describe the conditions in the testing.
Yes, the players have their morale and conditions maximized and frozen but that's true not only for the human controlled teams in the testing league but that's true, also, for the AI teams in the testing league. All teams in the testing league have players with the same level of the morale and conditions and that doesn't change from match to match so the morale and condition factors are eliminated from the calculation of the match result.
In the testing league you don't win matches due having better morale or better condition or better players, it's all about having a better tactic and that's why testing tactics that way is significantly more accurate than testing during a normal gameplay where you can have better players, higher morale and better conditions than your opponent. Expand
You are completely right. If it's the same for all sides, then it has no effect in the calculations. In normal gameplay, you usually have better of those stats than the opponent (with a good team), meaning you would even have an advantage. I was thinking only about those stats as "less mistakes per match", but it's the same for all sides.
P.S.: I guess instead of "ideal", "equal" or "consistent", it could be described as "tactic as isolated variable".
famulor said: Ideal conditions is a funny thing tho. It wont represent 95% of the players using the tactics so it isnt something you should lean on too much. Expand
I would say an above average player would play in perfect conditions pretty often. Test here assumes the following things: - Maximum morale. You can usually keep morale very high just by complimenting/warning in trainings and matches, and a good tactic will help keep morale high by winning often. - Maximum condition. Very easy to do in weeks with only one match, but requires some resting and rotation when you play more than once a week. - Maximum cohesion and familiarity. You should naturally reach this with time during the season. - Injuried players are "healed" after match. Hardest part to avoid, but can be fixed with some squad building. - Capable players for all positions. This should be the goal for any squad building, anyway.
As you can see, the conditions are not unatainable at all. If I remember correctly, other tests like FM-Base also do most of these things, except they have less players and different teams (one with CA 160 and one with CA 140), while FM-Arena uses two teams with the same players (to get more matches per season). FM-Base also lets assistant manager pick the team, while FM-Arena picks players manually.
Both Phoenix and Blue were tested there in previous tests, getting good results with CA 160 team, but bad results with CA 140 teams. That doesn't mean Phoenix and Blue are bad with weaker teams, since many people have successfully won everything with weak teams using these tactics, even in the first season. I won the premier league with a team of CA ~110, for example (Leamington). It probably just means the weak team is not suited to those tactics, maybe because it lacks some player for specific positions, maybe because assistant manager can't pick well, or any other reason caused by the test configuration.
If you don't have those perfect conditions, like playing with low morale, low condition, low cohesion and familiarity, more injuries (meaning using reserves more often), as well as worse players and maybe not capable players for all positions, then your tactic oscilate way more, with players doing more mistakes. This means more tests will be needed and results might vary a bit, but scores wouldn't change too much since more than half the matches should be played in nearly perfect conditions.
Like @ta2199 said, DLP works more as a transition role. If you check their stats, they usually have the most passes in the entire match, but rarelly any assists, kicks or dribbles. They don't give the final assist, but often give the pass before the assist. That's why it's important for them to have Hold Position, so they are always available to receive the ball and pass around from that central position. DLP and DM allow Hold Position, so they both work well in this system. Regista and RPM, on the other hand, have Roam From Position, working better in a like of two. The other positions, as well as DLP and DM in defend duty, are usually more defense oriented, not doing many passes to positions that can lead to those final assists.
If you had 20 shots and opponent had 2, then you won tactically. It just means your players didn't do a good job. Either they don't have the right mentality for the job, getting complacent, nervous or anything like that, or maybe you just had a bad day on the office. It happens every now and then, there is no way to avoid that even with the best tactic. If you are still scoring more points than them per match, it's fine.
Welcome to Football Manager!
Don't worry, you will also miss a lot of chances even with players with 20 of finishing. I've lost count of how many times I failed to win because my strikers missed 30 shots 1v1 during the match, sometimes even without goalkeeper. For some reason, strikers with low finishing usually perform around the same or even better, probably because they have more of other attributes which allow them to get the ball in a better position to score, or maybe get less nervous in a 1v1 situation. I would go for fast players instead of good finishers.
About humans, it's normal for them to be harder than AI, since their tactics are usually better than the pre-made ones that the AI use. As long as you are winning more than your opponents, it's fine even if you are only hitting 1% of the shots. Just remember that no tactic can win 100% of the matches.
what do u actually mean by "light training"? Did i miss something or is it the general training schedule which is itself relatively light?
I usually use the in-season training on normal intensity and rarely have more than 3 long injuries. However, it may happen if your players are made of glass, meaning high injury proneness, low natural fitness and/or low stamina (tired players have higher chance to get injuried). You should also keep an eye in fatigue (at medical tab), resting players when that starts to build up, as well as trying to keep condition and match fitness high.
About light training, I mean changing training schedules to lots of rest and recovery sessions to get them in condition to the next match. Instead of doing that, I prefer to rest only the ones that are tired (right click -> training -> rest) and keep general training untouched. I usually do that to anyone that won't get over 90% before next match.
It sounds reasonable. Just remember you can always rest players individually if they have two matches too close, instead of using light training for the entire team.
bwig said: Hey ZaZ!
First of all i wanted to thank you for that dedication and effort u put into this amazing game. This tactic is incredible and i´ve been playing a lot with it (2D extended Highlights).
I have some questions tho. I tested IWB with left foot on the right side and it seems to have better results. Do u support that or would u still go with left left / right right?
Second question would be, how is it that especially with weaker teams at the beginning of the season u literally smash everyone and everything and from game day 6/7 it starts going down and games get quite a struggle. Is it because players get tired (I´m not the greatest rotator for the obv reasons that the second 11 is way worse in a small club)?
Thanks in advance for your answers and once again thank you for being our virtual Pep!
Best from Berlin!
Thanks for the compliment, but I just did lots of tests and posted the one that went right. It's not like I'm Guardiola or Klopp.
About your first question, it doesn't matter much because they rarely cross or shoot. IWB with same foot as side will have an easier time to pass the ball to wingers, while those with opposite foot will have an easier time to pass the ball to the center. If your opponent is more vulnerable in one of those positions, then it will make a difference, else, the tactic is pretty balanced in the attacking routes.
About weaker teams, it might be because opponents look down on you and play complacent, and after a couple of matches your team feels the pressure for overachieving. It can also be because your team gets tired, or even because they get complacent after winning too much in a row. I often get some 5 or 6 runs without winning, even with strong team against weak teams, but as long as I win in the end, it's fine. Just make sure to keep the morale high, complimenting/warning trainings and matches, because bad morale has a huge effect in your chance to win.
It's hard to measure for several reasons. More efficient training for attribute gain gives higher chance of injuries, more fatigue and worse condition before matches, as well as less happiness. You can fix that with rotation and a balanced squad, but it might cause problem in some parts of the season.
On the other hand, to get the best of your players during the current season, you need match preparation (attack movement, defensive positioning, teamwork and set pieces), resting and happiness/cohesion training. Those are not very affected by double intensity.
One option that could be optimal would be interchanging full day of rest, double intensity attribute training and normal intensity match preparation, but there is no way to set intensity automatically for different days, meaning it would be too much work to do manually.
Pace is all about how fast they are. Acceleration is about how quickly a player can hit their top speed.
It was tested here and they seem to be equally important. However, the test was for the whole team and not for positions individualy. It's harder to assess for each position because difference in results get less significant.
joncoughlan said: Hi just wanted to say thank you for this tactic.Won the league and Carabao Cup in my first season with Wolves.Best tactic I've used.I tried to have plenty of pace and acceleration in all my team and it made a huge difference.
Thank you! I'm glad it worked well for you.
any prefferd move that can help here? my wingers often going inside the box and shoots insted of doing wide cross
With fast players you are gonna easily win everything. It's also a good idea to have some stats like dribble for wingers, vision for central midfielders, jumping reach for defenders and so on, but the most important is to have fast players.
About moves, they are not exactly important, but try to get those that overlap with their roles. For example, move into channels to shadow strikers and central midfielder, get forward and dribble more for wingers, hold position for defensive midfielder and defenders, and so on.
lets say ss will depay and vlasic will be good pick? wingers will boga and Ünder will do good?
im cunfused. 10q anyway.
Usually I go for fast players, with 14+ in Pace and Acceleration. All the players you said are fast, so they would do well. MBappé will still be better than them, but that doesn't mean they aren't good.
I usually put double intensity during pre-season for players in the green, and normal during in-season.
Just to make it clear, I didn't do any tests for these training schedules, I don't know if they increase much the chance of winning. That's a task for @Mark, to get 4 or 5 different schedules and see how they compare for weak and strong teams, considering points per game, attribute gain, fatigue, happiness and other things. However, it's not exactly easy to test such thing.
That's weird. I tested his corner routine on Blue before and the results were pretty similar. The best routine was from @Egraam, scoring around 14-15 goals a season, while Void's routine was scoring close to 11. I can't understand why you are scoring 0 goals from corners, are you sure you are not playing with a team of midgets without jumping reach?
Just input it as per the pictures
What was your method for calculating the weighting of each attribute for these positions?
Yes, but don't expect it to be in the 7's on the table. I'm just hoping to get close to 6.5 with those tactics, or get some insight to others.
I think it can be improved, but not enough to be worth investing time. That's why I will move to another formation instead.
I wanted to check the possibility, but it's a failure. No more tactics with two defenders. I wish I could make a 3-5-2 work, but I'm having a hard time to get something good there. They are either too leaky or too harmless.
Let me know in the comments how it performed for you!
Yes, the players have their morale and conditions maximized and frozen but that's true not only for the human controlled teams in the testing league but that's true, also, for the AI teams in the testing league. All teams in the testing league have players with the same level of the morale and conditions and that doesn't change from match to match so the morale and condition factors are eliminated from the calculation of the match result.
In the testing league you don't win matches due having better morale or better condition or better players, it's all about having a better tactic and that's why testing tactics that way is significantly more accurate than testing during a normal gameplay where you can have better players, higher morale and better conditions than your opponent.
You are completely right. If it's the same for all sides, then it has no effect in the calculations. In normal gameplay, you usually have better of those stats than the opponent (with a good team), meaning you would even have an advantage. I was thinking only about those stats as "less mistakes per match", but it's the same for all sides.
P.S.: I guess instead of "ideal", "equal" or "consistent", it could be described as "tactic as isolated variable".
I would say an above average player would play in perfect conditions pretty often. Test here assumes the following things:
- Maximum morale. You can usually keep morale very high just by complimenting/warning in trainings and matches, and a good tactic will help keep morale high by winning often.
- Maximum condition. Very easy to do in weeks with only one match, but requires some resting and rotation when you play more than once a week.
- Maximum cohesion and familiarity. You should naturally reach this with time during the season.
- Injuried players are "healed" after match. Hardest part to avoid, but can be fixed with some squad building.
- Capable players for all positions. This should be the goal for any squad building, anyway.
As you can see, the conditions are not unatainable at all. If I remember correctly, other tests like FM-Base also do most of these things, except they have less players and different teams (one with CA 160 and one with CA 140), while FM-Arena uses two teams with the same players (to get more matches per season). FM-Base also lets assistant manager pick the team, while FM-Arena picks players manually.
Both Phoenix and Blue were tested there in previous tests, getting good results with CA 160 team, but bad results with CA 140 teams. That doesn't mean Phoenix and Blue are bad with weaker teams, since many people have successfully won everything with weak teams using these tactics, even in the first season. I won the premier league with a team of CA ~110, for example (Leamington). It probably just means the weak team is not suited to those tactics, maybe because it lacks some player for specific positions, maybe because assistant manager can't pick well, or any other reason caused by the test configuration.
If you don't have those perfect conditions, like playing with low morale, low condition, low cohesion and familiarity, more injuries (meaning using reserves more often), as well as worse players and maybe not capable players for all positions, then your tactic oscilate way more, with players doing more mistakes. This means more tests will be needed and results might vary a bit, but scores wouldn't change too much since more than half the matches should be played in nearly perfect conditions.