I have an online save with multiple people but most of them just copied the tactics here and are using them. It was supposed to be a chill game without using outside help, but they're completely overperforming, so with a bit of search I figured they were using the best tactics available here. I always get battered and while I'm trying to subtly overperform my board demands, they're playing semi finals in the champions league against Real Madrid/City, dominating games with teams that are supposed to barely qualify for europe in the dutch league.
I was wondering if there are specific tactics that counter these two formations? I'm playing the most basic 4-3-3, our players are all around the same level and I always get smashed like 25 shots to 3. Even though these are the best tactics I'm assuming there has to be a way to counter them and be able to beat them, but I can't quite figure out how to. Any help would be greatly appreciated
Hello Long time lurker but made an account since I think I can answer this *somewhat* well albeit unable to give concrete proof of it
First of all, I am in an online save myself and have found myself overperforming regardless of team situation and there's a few core principles to go off of
Firstly, You should be running the set pieces from this website. At minimum the corner attack routines and have a tall striker (if this is first few seasons Lucca/Onoachu/Veerman/Uldricks from most expensive to least but any will suffice and guarantee 15~ corner goals and 30 goals per season. They will also act as the first line of defence for corners and be used as an effective first line of defence against set pieces.) If you're late into your save, just go for anyone with as high Jumping reach as possible a 20-30% of your goals will come from set pieces alone and I'd put BIG money on them running such routines.
Secondly, A basic 4-3-3 will not suffice while I usually am inspired by FMarena tactics its pretty consensus that as long as you run anything "meta" it'll be good, follow the general principles if you don't want to copy a tactic, the regular stuff such as tackle harder+get stuck in,Narrow formations,gegenpressing to the max,Inviting crosses as long as your CBs have high Jumping Reach etc.
The key is mostly following the meta than adapting to your needs and team. ^ In terms of the 4231 I've found the 3-4-3 to be a very effective tactic at quarreling it but the 4-2-4 being quite good against it, again purely circumstantial evidence from around 10~ seasons of online play so cannot give any definitive proof.
Finally, more importantly is your players there have been recent posts about the "most" important stats per position try to follow them per player but primarily fast wingers/fullbacks and tall sts/cbs and you'll be able to compete with any team
Would love to answer more questions or hopefully someone more experienced in the community to provide more feedback.
This is the truly interesting aspect of FM! Not creating 1000 more variations on the same highly unrealistic, formulaic and exploitative approach.
I usually play against 16 teams in a league I've set up myself, using top-ranked meta tactics and some proven tactics I've created myself (all set at balanced mentality, since no tactic that's not meta-esque can compete across home and away if it is not at balanced). 3 teams are sacrificed, and are simply AI (in 50 seasons, no promoted team has ever stuck around for a second season).
So, I think I've more or less solved the problem you've got (since I win the league 2/3 times despite not having the best squad or using fancy set-piece routines - I play with athletic Bilbao). Thing is, there is no simple recipe for success. You will need to become a sophisticated in-game coach, and deploy 5-10 tactics! These should involve 4 main tactics (1 aggressive tactic used exclusively for home games (positive or attacking mentality, with positive usually being the best option), 1 balanced mentality tactic that keeps the ball but does not focus on getting it into the box, 1 outright defensive or very defensive one to be used away from home against tough competition, 1 meta-esque tactic used to simply mirror the opposition when you're unsure about what to do), and further variations on those 4 (varying the extent that you keep the ball or focus on counters, etc). It's wise, moreover, to add a specific tactic to be used late in games when you're down by a goal or two.
At home, the best approach is usually to overload the midfield, and actually play possession football at positive mentality (don't be afraid of channeling play into the middle of the pitch, or trying to get the ball into the box - meta principles do not apply here). A libero (or sometimes two), I think, is a must. Complete wingbacks, I've found, should usually be employed: you want either no wingers at all, or wingers who focus on supporting the midfielders. Again: you need to keep the ball. The meta is lethal at counterattacks. Often, the best approach is a narrow width with roaming wide players. I've found multiple distinct tactics that consistently outperforms the meta at home, and more or less all of them follow this pattern. It is worth keeping in mind, though, that non-meta FM tactics aren't very robust; you need to create a tactic of your own, using the particular set of players you've got, and explore the match engine's parameter space. Just pick the same team you play with online, and start a career with it using the set-up I've described. Then, when you face the most challenging opposition available, you save the game, and play dozens of matches (go on vacation for a day, vary the tactical set-up, repeat). It's important, in my experience, to focus on how the defensive line (including the obligatory libero) interacts with the defensive midfield (or, the most defensive part of the central midfield; there really are workable tactics that do not include defensive mids). You need a platform to work from, so I suggest the following starting point: CWB on attack - BPD on cover, libero on defend, inverted fullback. That's sort of my vanilla set-up, and please note that much stranger combinations can work. Lastly: avoid advanced forwards like the plague (too aggressive, too little creative contribution), and opt for pressing forwards, poachers, target men, complete forwards or (sometimes) false nines.
Away to a really good team possibly superior to your own, the fine details matter a great deal. There is no single tactic that works against all meta tactics: good defensive tactics are non-robust. I've created fine-tuned defensive mentality or very defensive mentality tactics that work for the top 5 meta tactics currently around (but note that "work" here isn't to be interpreted as "routing them 3-0" - you should realistically aim for parity away from home, and an advantage at home). Again, you need to experiment with your own players. A few pointers, though: 1.) again, you should keep the ball, playing out from the back (and often avoiding countering yourself), 2.) you should overload the midfield, as in the home tactic, 3.) you shouldn't drop low, but you shouldn't be pushing your backline forward aggressively either; a standard line usually works best, 4.) some time-wasting should be employed from the start, 5.) it might be necessary to adapt the formation itself somewhat by exchanging an offensive player for a defensive one, 6.) usually, you should avoid having defensive or central mids at defend.
Away to a lesser meta team is sort of where things get most interesting, in the sense that there's no clear-cut best option. It depends on the particular tactic you're up against. Often, a more conservative balanced mentality version of your home tactic is the best option (but note that you should usually switch to a defensive tactic if you go up by 1). I suspect there might be room to experiment with cautious mentality here, but I simply hate it and haven't been able to get it to work properly yet.
Finally: I again emphasise that consistently outperforming meta tactics employed with world-class players requires really active in-game coaching. You need to adapt to the score-line, and even at home it is seldom a good option to simply stick to one particular tactic. You should aim to use all substitutes at strategic points in the game, as well.
What would be really interesting to see is to what extent the meta tactics can be subtly tweaked to reach parity with my home tactics away, as well as to destabilise my defensive formations at home. In a multiplayer game, you'd ideally end up matching each other iteratively, in effect recreating something like the tactical cycles we see in real life.
DarthTrone said: Hello Long time lurker but made an account since I think I can answer this *somewhat* well albeit unable to give concrete proof of it
First of all, I am in an online save myself and have found myself overperforming regardless of team situation and there's a few core principles to go off of
Firstly, You should be running the set pieces from this website. At minimum the corner attack routines and have a tall striker (if this is first few seasons Lucca/Onoachu/Veerman/Uldricks from most expensive to least but any will suffice and guarantee 15~ corner goals and 30 goals per season. They will also act as the first line of defence for corners and be used as an effective first line of defence against set pieces.) If you're late into your save, just go for anyone with as high Jumping reach as possible a 20-30% of your goals will come from set pieces alone and I'd put BIG money on them running such routines.
Secondly, A basic 4-3-3 will not suffice while I usually am inspired by FMarena tactics its pretty consensus that as long as you run anything "meta" it'll be good, follow the general principles if you don't want to copy a tactic, the regular stuff such as tackle harder+get stuck in,Narrow formations,gegenpressing to the max,Inviting crosses as long as your CBs have high Jumping Reach etc.
The key is mostly following the meta than adapting to your needs and team. ^ In terms of the 4231 I've found the 3-4-3 to be a very effective tactic at quarreling it but the 4-2-4 being quite good against it, again purely circumstantial evidence from around 10~ seasons of online play so cannot give any definitive proof.
Finally, more importantly is your players there have been recent posts about the "most" important stats per position try to follow them per player but primarily fast wingers/fullbacks and tall sts/cbs and you'll be able to compete with any team
Would love to answer more questions or hopefully someone more experienced in the community to provide more feedback. Expand
@DarthTrone Do I need to manually select the positions for each player on set pieces or can I delegate this? I'm using the set piece tactics from this site but delegate the player selection to staff? I'm assuming the player with highest jumping reach should be in the A1 position, next highest JR in A2, etc?
I have an online save with multiple people but most of them just copied the tactics here and are using them. It was supposed to be a chill game without using outside help, but they're completely overperforming, so with a bit of search I figured they were using the best tactics available here. I always get battered and while I'm trying to subtly overperform my board demands, they're playing semi finals in the champions league against Real Madrid/City, dominating games with teams that are supposed to barely qualify for europe in the dutch league.
I was wondering if there are specific tactics that counter these two formations? I'm playing the most basic 4-3-3, our players are all around the same level and I always get smashed like 25 shots to 3. Even though these are the best tactics I'm assuming there has to be a way to counter them and be able to beat them, but I can't quite figure out how to. Any help would be greatly appreciated
Hello
Long time lurker but made an account since I think I can answer this *somewhat* well albeit unable to give concrete proof of it
First of all, I am in an online save myself and have found myself overperforming regardless of team situation and there's a few core principles to go off of
Firstly, You should be running the set pieces from this website. At minimum the corner attack routines and have a tall striker (if this is first few seasons Lucca/Onoachu/Veerman/Uldricks from most expensive to least but any will suffice and guarantee 15~ corner goals and 30 goals per season. They will also act as the first line of defence for corners and be used as an effective first line of defence against set pieces.) If you're late into your save, just go for anyone with as high Jumping reach as possible a 20-30% of your goals will come from set pieces alone and I'd put BIG money on them running such routines.
Secondly, A basic 4-3-3 will not suffice while I usually am inspired by FMarena tactics its pretty consensus that as long as you run anything "meta" it'll be good, follow the general principles if you don't want to copy a tactic, the regular stuff such as tackle harder+get stuck in,Narrow formations,gegenpressing to the max,Inviting crosses as long as your CBs have high Jumping Reach etc.
The key is mostly following the meta than adapting to your needs and team. ^ In terms of the 4231 I've found the 3-4-3 to be a very effective tactic at quarreling it but the 4-2-4 being quite good against it, again purely circumstantial evidence from around 10~ seasons of online play so cannot give any definitive proof.
Finally, more importantly is your players there have been recent posts about the "most" important stats per position try to follow them per player but primarily fast wingers/fullbacks and tall sts/cbs and you'll be able to compete with any team
Would love to answer more questions or hopefully someone more experienced in the community to provide more feedback.
This is the truly interesting aspect of FM! Not creating 1000 more variations on the same highly unrealistic, formulaic and exploitative approach.
I usually play against 16 teams in a league I've set up myself, using top-ranked meta tactics and some proven tactics I've created myself (all set at balanced mentality, since no tactic that's not meta-esque can compete across home and away if it is not at balanced). 3 teams are sacrificed, and are simply AI (in 50 seasons, no promoted team has ever stuck around for a second season).
So, I think I've more or less solved the problem you've got (since I win the league 2/3 times despite not having the best squad or using fancy set-piece routines - I play with athletic Bilbao). Thing is, there is no simple recipe for success. You will need to become a sophisticated in-game coach, and deploy 5-10 tactics! These should involve 4 main tactics (1 aggressive tactic used exclusively for home games (positive or attacking mentality, with positive usually being the best option), 1 balanced mentality tactic that keeps the ball but does not focus on getting it into the box, 1 outright defensive or very defensive one to be used away from home against tough competition, 1 meta-esque tactic used to simply mirror the opposition when you're unsure about what to do), and further variations on those 4 (varying the extent that you keep the ball or focus on counters, etc). It's wise, moreover, to add a specific tactic to be used late in games when you're down by a goal or two.
At home, the best approach is usually to overload the midfield, and actually play possession football at positive mentality (don't be afraid of channeling play into the middle of the pitch, or trying to get the ball into the box - meta principles do not apply here). A libero (or sometimes two), I think, is a must. Complete wingbacks, I've found, should usually be employed: you want either no wingers at all, or wingers who focus on supporting the midfielders. Again: you need to keep the ball. The meta is lethal at counterattacks. Often, the best approach is a narrow width with roaming wide players. I've found multiple distinct tactics that consistently outperforms the meta at home, and more or less all of them follow this pattern. It is worth keeping in mind, though, that non-meta FM tactics aren't very robust; you need to create a tactic of your own, using the particular set of players you've got, and explore the match engine's parameter space. Just pick the same team you play with online, and start a career with it using the set-up I've described. Then, when you face the most challenging opposition available, you save the game, and play dozens of matches (go on vacation for a day, vary the tactical set-up, repeat). It's important, in my experience, to focus on how the defensive line (including the obligatory libero) interacts with the defensive midfield (or, the most defensive part of the central midfield; there really are workable tactics that do not include defensive mids). You need a platform to work from, so I suggest the following starting point: CWB on attack - BPD on cover, libero on defend, inverted fullback. That's sort of my vanilla set-up, and please note that much stranger combinations can work. Lastly: avoid advanced forwards like the plague (too aggressive, too little creative contribution), and opt for pressing forwards, poachers, target men, complete forwards or (sometimes) false nines.
Away to a really good team possibly superior to your own, the fine details matter a great deal. There is no single tactic that works against all meta tactics: good defensive tactics are non-robust. I've created fine-tuned defensive mentality or very defensive mentality tactics that work for the top 5 meta tactics currently around (but note that "work" here isn't to be interpreted as "routing them 3-0" - you should realistically aim for parity away from home, and an advantage at home). Again, you need to experiment with your own players. A few pointers, though: 1.) again, you should keep the ball, playing out from the back (and often avoiding countering yourself), 2.) you should overload the midfield, as in the home tactic, 3.) you shouldn't drop low, but you shouldn't be pushing your backline forward aggressively either; a standard line usually works best, 4.) some time-wasting should be employed from the start, 5.) it might be necessary to adapt the formation itself somewhat by exchanging an offensive player for a defensive one, 6.) usually, you should avoid having defensive or central mids at defend.
Away to a lesser meta team is sort of where things get most interesting, in the sense that there's no clear-cut best option. It depends on the particular tactic you're up against. Often, a more conservative balanced mentality version of your home tactic is the best option (but note that you should usually switch to a defensive tactic if you go up by 1). I suspect there might be room to experiment with cautious mentality here, but I simply hate it and haven't been able to get it to work properly yet.
Finally: I again emphasise that consistently outperforming meta tactics employed with world-class players requires really active in-game coaching. You need to adapt to the score-line, and even at home it is seldom a good option to simply stick to one particular tactic. You should aim to use all substitutes at strategic points in the game, as well.
What would be really interesting to see is to what extent the meta tactics can be subtly tweaked to reach parity with my home tactics away, as well as to destabilise my defensive formations at home. In a multiplayer game, you'd ideally end up matching each other iteratively, in effect recreating something like the tactical cycles we see in real life.
DarthTrone said: Hello
Long time lurker but made an account since I think I can answer this *somewhat* well albeit unable to give concrete proof of it
First of all, I am in an online save myself and have found myself overperforming regardless of team situation and there's a few core principles to go off of
Firstly, You should be running the set pieces from this website. At minimum the corner attack routines and have a tall striker (if this is first few seasons Lucca/Onoachu/Veerman/Uldricks from most expensive to least but any will suffice and guarantee 15~ corner goals and 30 goals per season. They will also act as the first line of defence for corners and be used as an effective first line of defence against set pieces.) If you're late into your save, just go for anyone with as high Jumping reach as possible a 20-30% of your goals will come from set pieces alone and I'd put BIG money on them running such routines.
Secondly, A basic 4-3-3 will not suffice while I usually am inspired by FMarena tactics its pretty consensus that as long as you run anything "meta" it'll be good, follow the general principles if you don't want to copy a tactic, the regular stuff such as tackle harder+get stuck in,Narrow formations,gegenpressing to the max,Inviting crosses as long as your CBs have high Jumping Reach etc.
The key is mostly following the meta than adapting to your needs and team. ^ In terms of the 4231 I've found the 3-4-3 to be a very effective tactic at quarreling it but the 4-2-4 being quite good against it, again purely circumstantial evidence from around 10~ seasons of online play so cannot give any definitive proof.
Finally, more importantly is your players there have been recent posts about the "most" important stats per position try to follow them per player but primarily fast wingers/fullbacks and tall sts/cbs and you'll be able to compete with any team
Would love to answer more questions or hopefully someone more experienced in the community to provide more feedback.
@DarthTrone Do I need to manually select the positions for each player on set pieces or can I delegate this? I'm using the set piece tactics from this site but delegate the player selection to staff? I'm assuming the player with highest jumping reach should be in the A1 position, next highest JR in A2, etc?