Player Development is a sham

[RBKalle]

the player is a teenage wonderkid whose performances are sustained - shouldn't he continue developing? If he is young and continuing to play well, he is going to continue to learn and therefore continue to develop.

Some suggest he shouldn't develop because his potential won't let him develop further. This begs the question - he won't develop because he's reached his limit; he's reached his limit because he's developed well.

If a team had a player who was 17 and was averaging 7.50 consistently in the first-team of the Premier League, in reality he would develop quickly and drastically; in the game he won't if his PA is low.

If you like, I believe there is a reason why so many hero-to-zero players stopped developing, and that is why they flopped - not that they hit their "potential", which is only available in hindsight (and in fact could still be wrong - Giovani dos Santos might, for example, do a "Luca Toni" later-on in life and skyrocket to greater heights).

If you stop developing it's because you've reached your potential...

You can hit the wall at "kickabout where the good ones are those able to trap a ball", at "decent amateur footballer" or at "Freddy Adu level"

Don't forget you can look like a million bucks at 18 and be regarded as a flop at 24 despite not having gotten any worse... It's just about EXPECTATIONS... If you impress at a young age, people will expect you to develop almost exponentially.

Of course in real life it's always going to reach the point where they "flop" instead of flatlining, because sooner than later they'll give up on those who fail to swing into high gear for good.

Want more names?

Cassano... he's still as good (and erratic) as he was at 18... He didn't fulfill his potential and more or less plateaued by the time he was done in Rome.

Denilson (the Betis one). Another case of overhyped youngster who never improved much

D'Alessandro. Same as above...

So, they probably peaked around age 18-20 and then failed to develop further, for whatever reason...

In hindsight their highest CA (hence their effective PA) was reached already at that age and it stayed that way for a decade...

Why can't the OP player be one of them?

[phnompenhandy]

The OP's examples sounds about the level of John O'Shea at Manchester United. In the same squad you have the younger Johnny Evans and perhaps Darron Gibson. They developed early thanks to the club's excellent youth system, but they've flat-lined and are unlikely to improve. Their CA shot up early and hit their moderate PA. Will Chris Smalling reach the level of Evans and stall, or will he develop into the next Rio Ferdinand? No one can say - not even Fergie has peeked at his PA.

[AcidBurn]

Way too many people look at pa and think if a player doesn't have a high pa then he will not turn out world class performances.

I signed a player for my Man City side I knew his pa as I disagreed with it and would usually up it pregame but this time I left it alone. I had milner and de Jong tutor him his determination went up to 18 and his performances rocketed. He scored 20 goals and bagged 20 assists and got fans player of the year. He also averaged 7.97 scored 9 goals in 11 games and got best champion league player. He out performed Sergio Aguero, Edin Dzeko and Carloa Tevez.

This player had a pa of 155 and will not develop stats higher than he has now. He has stalled but what people need to concentrate on is how the player performs not what their pa is.

[Lazaru5]

Way too many people look at pa and think if a player doesn't have a high pa then he will not turn out world class performances.

I signed a player for my Man City side I knew his pa as I disagreed with it and would usually up it pregame but this time I left it alone. I had milner and de Jong tutor him his determination went up to 18 and his performances rocketed. He scored 20 goals and bagged 20 assists and got fans player of the year. He also averaged 7.97 scored 9 goals in 11 games and got best champion league player. He out performed Sergio Aguero, Edin Dzeko and Carloa Tevez.

This player had a pa of 155 and will not develop stats higher than he has now. He has stalled but what people need to concentrate on is how the player performs not what their pa is.

this.

play a player to his strengths and he will regularly turn out top quality performances...

[Seule]

Without fail, I always try and get my hands on Miles Addison when I'm playing with a team in England. His PA is... average, won't spoil it for anyone, but I always sign him, because here is a guy with determination, usually turns out to be a pretty good leader and strong player for a team. Far more valuable to me than say... a defender like Demichelis... supremely talented, but has the concentration of a squashed bug and hence, regularly botches marking assignments, puts the ball in the wrong net... that sort of thing. To the OP... i hope this newfound knowledge hasn't ruined your memories of the game, and whilst I wish you could erase the knowledge, sadly that which is learned cannot be unlearned.

If you play the game without that knowledge, it is still one heck of a challenge, and an enjoyable game. Sadly, now you have a twofold challenge, making a winning team, and overcoming the temptation to peek

And even with the system the way it is, players develop at different rates, injuries can hamper them, some players never wind up as good as they looked when they were younger. Danny Cadamarteri looked fantastic when he first hit the scene as a teenager, never went anywhere. Owen Hargreaves, good player when he's fit... btw, when exactly WAS he fit? Michael Bridges, great for Sunderland and Leeds, has just retired from football... in Australia. There are a LOT of players who look great in their youth, but level out early, there are a lot that never even reach their potential for whatever reason. Seth Johnson?

Current case : Giovani dos Santos. Watch that kid at last years World Cup and you think "there is a star" maybe he is, maybe he isn't time will certainly tell (as will the club he plays for).

Take the game as it is, a GAME, and a bloody good way to spend the next few months til the season starts again. A few months without football when I can right the wrongs of the season past, and see Leeds get back into the Premier League, long before they have another chance to do it in real life.

[Lazaru5]

Without fail, I always try and get my hands on Miles Addison when I'm playing with a team in England. His PA is... average, won't spoil it for anyone, but I always sign him, because here is a guy with determination, usually turns out to be a pretty good leader and strong player for a team. Far more valuable to me than say... a defender like Demichelis... supremely talented, but has the concentration of a squashed bug and hence, regularly botches marking assignments, puts the ball in the wrong net... that sort of thing. To the OP... i hope this newfound knowledge hasn't ruined your memories of the game, and whilst I wish you could erase the knowledge, sadly that which is learned cannot be unlearned.

If you play the game without that knowledge, it is still one heck of a challenge, and an enjoyable game. Sadly, now you have a twofold challenge, making a winning team, and overcoming the temptation to peek

And even with the system the way it is, players develop at different rates, injuries can hamper them, some players never wind up as good as they looked when they were younger. Danny Cadamarteri looked fantastic when he first hit the scene as a teenager, never went anywhere. Owen Hargreaves, good player when he's fit... btw, when exactly WAS he fit? Michael Bridges, great for Sunderland and Leeds, has just retired from football... in Australia. There are a LOT of players who look great in their youth, but level out early, there are a lot that never even reach their potential for whatever reason. Seth Johnson?

Current case : Giovani dos Santos. Watch that kid at last years World Cup and you think "there is a star" maybe he is, maybe he isn't time will certainly tell (as will the club he plays for).

Take the game as it is, a GAME, and a bloody good way to spend the next few months til the season starts again. A few months without football when I can right the wrongs of the season past, and see Leeds get back into the Premier League, long before they have another chance to do it in real life.

I had Miles Addison in FM08... would have signed him in FM10 if he'd have come... (he wouldn't )

The three players you mention, Cads, Hargreaves and Bridges have all suffered injuries that have hampered their development (perhaps not as much so in the case of Hargreaves) - Cads is touted as injury-prone (and boy is he... ) where Bridges suffered a serious injury that once upon a time would have ended his career there and then.. the fact he came back to have any sort of career at all is testament to his determination and the skill of the medical profession these days.

[x42bn6]

Cassano... he's still as good (and erratic) as he was at 18... He didn't fulfill his potential and more or less plateaued by the time he was done in Rome.

Cassano stopped developing because his attitude was shocking, he missed training, he got dropped, he never settled down properly. That he never fulfilled his potential is immaterial - the reason why he didn't develop well is fairly obvious. That he didn't reach his potential is a symptom, not the illness.

Denilson (the Betis one). Another case of overhyped youngster who never improved much

I think you could apply this to the Arsenal player too! I'm not terribly familiar with the Betis one, but I suspect there is a reason why he didn't develop further than he should have.

D'Alessandro. Same as above...

Didn't he struggle to keep up his form for a struggling Portsmouth side, and never recaptured it at Zaragoza either after signing permanently for them?

So, they probably peaked around age 18-20 and then failed to develop further, for whatever reason...

In hindsight their highest CA (hence their effective PA) was reached already at that age and it stayed that way for a decade...

Why can't the OP player be one of them?

Because the OP's player isn't doing anything wrong. He shows no signs of terrible attitude or negative factors like the OP is suggesting. The OP's player is, doing OK - while he isn't performing the best in the world, he's a 17-year-old who broke into the first-team and has continued to improve year-on-year. There is no reason for him to stop learning and developing really. There is perhaps an argument for him not having a skyrocketing level of development, but there is no reason for him to stop developing when he hits some arbitrary limit.

The OP's examples sounds about the level of John O'Shea at Manchester United. In the same squad you have the younger Johnny Evans and perhaps Darron Gibson. They developed early thanks to the club's excellent youth system, but they've flat-lined and are unlikely to improve. Their CA shot up early and hit their moderate PA. Will Chris Smalling reach the level of Evans and stall, or will he develop into the next Rio Ferdinand? No one can say - not even Fergie has peeked at his PA.

Evans hasn't flat-lined - he's had one - one! - bad season, with injuries interleaving his games, and yet has shown good form towards the end of the season. Evans will continue to improve and as long as he puts this season behind him, he should be challenging Smalling again for a first-team place.

Gibson never really had a good level of ability to begin with, and was hardly the most talented of youngsters to come through the ranks in recent years.

That their PA is perhaps low is immaterial. Gibson arguably has little reason to develop, regardless of whether his PA is high or low, since his performances are not consistently good; on the other hand, Evans has had several excellent seasons and one poor one, suggesting this season is a blip, not a wall, and that he still has room to improve. And he will improve - he doesn't turn rubbish at 23/24 because of one bad season. But he should develop regardless of his PA.

[x42bn6]

Way too many people look at pa and think if a player doesn't have a high pa then he will not turn out world class performances.

I signed a player for my Man City side I knew his pa as I disagreed with it and would usually up it pregame but this time I left it alone. I had milner and de Jong tutor him his determination went up to 18 and his performances rocketed. He scored 20 goals and bagged 20 assists and got fans player of the year. He also averaged 7.97 scored 9 goals in 11 games and got best champion league player. He out performed Sergio Aguero, Edin Dzeko and Carloa Tevez.

This player had a pa of 155 and will not develop stats higher than he has now. He has stalled but what people need to concentrate on is how the player performs not what their pa is.

That's a different story altogether since CA and PA are just rough "averages" - you can get a CA 200 player to play pathetically if you play him in the wrong tactics, for example - how a player actually plays is immaterial with regards to his CA, since CA is a rough "average".

The issue is that the OP's player has no reason to stop developing except for some limit that begs the question. Why can't he develop? Because he can't develop. The OP's player has little reason to suddenly stop developing - yet some artificial limit is holding him down.

Players that peak early and flatline have reasons why they flatline - for example, Jeffers never sustained his performances at youth level, and then failed. This isn't the case of the OP - performances have become better and better over time, and his development has been rather good up till now.

[Ackter]

He can't develop any further because he's reached the limits set by his genetics at birth.

[GerdMuller]

I see your frustration, but in truth progress and development don't work like a straight line always going up...

Your newgen is one of those "early peakers" who look like world-beaters in the making but somehow flatline, albeit at good/high level, sooner than expected.

Plenty of names that sort of fit in this category... some had their career going down fast (when better clubs stopped trying with them), some just settled down in a relatively good career but not as great as expected when they were 18...

Van der Vaart, Portillo, Dalla Bona, Montolivo, Aquilani... and pretty much every "new Maradona" or "new Brazilian" youngster who failed to step up his game.

Just because none of those has managed to turn into World Class material (some still have a couple of years left) that doesn't mean they're useless (personally I think Montolivo is, but that's just me...) or that their managers/coaches dropped the ball with their development.

Some guys will never grow an inch after 9th grade, some girls will never grow adult-size boobs (and will likely use BoobRTE to get a boost ), some footballers are as good as they'll ever get a age 20.

And that is exactly what the fixed PA system represents very badly, because in the current systems players basically always improve up to their PA then its over. while IRL those players might play like superstars in their early years and that should be represented in their atts. too. The real problem is that the players cant relly get worse despite of age. The whole system just needed to be way more performance based and less focused on training guys until they reach an imaginary limits.

[AcidBurn]

That's a different story altogether since CA and PA are just rough "averages" - you can get a CA 200 player to play pathetically if you play him in the wrong tactics, for example - how a player actually plays is immaterial with regards to his CA, since CA is a rough "average".

The issue is that the OP's player has no reason to stop developing except for some limit that begs the question. Why can't he develop? Because he can't develop. The OP's player has little reason to suddenly stop developing - yet some artificial limit is holding him down.

Players that peak early and flatline have reasons why they flatline - for example, Jeffers never sustained his performances at youth level, and then failed. This isn't the case of the OP - performances have become better and better over time, and his development has been rather good up till now.

If the op has a player who is performing better then in my opinion he should just keep playing and see how he gets on. A player with a pa of 150 pa can still play brilliantly thats the point people seem to miss on these forums. My player has hit his peak and despite this he will continue to be one of the best players around despite his stats stalling.

There will alway be debate on how players progress in fm but in my opinion people are limited in how good they can become in real life. If they are not then clubs would sign any youngster and turn them into stars.

[TacticalGenius]

Stat distribution + personality > PA.

My back-to-back title winning Athletic Club squad had a average PA well under 150. The stats they did have were well distributed for the roles they performed, and they had hardworking, positive personalities. Too many people just want to see 20's everywhere, when in reality 15's in the right places and the right mentality are more than enough.

[bigdanio]

Well, PA has existed well before FM06.

Sounds like you are annoyed at your ignorance.

[milnerpoint]

My top striker actually has PA of 160, he is prob the most consistant striker in Europe and one of the top scoring regen internationals, PA and CA mean very little, the distribution of attributes are far more important, getting hung up on PA and CA is one of the forums biggest problems.

[aderow]

If the op has a player who is performing better then in my opinion he should just keep playing and see how he gets on. A player with a pa of 150 pa can still play brilliantly thats the point people seem to miss on these forums. My player has hit his peak and despite this he will continue to be one of the best players around despite his stats stalling.

There will alway be debate on how players progress in fm but in my opinion people are limited in how good they can become in real life. If they are not then clubs would sign any youngster and turn them into stars.

I agree with this. I have a right back, who I had pretty much written off when he first showed up on my youth team, who is now 21 and playing like one of the best right backs on the planet even though attribute-wise he doesn't look like he should be. Heck he spent the last season on loan at werder bremen and averaged a 7.6 over the entire season. The lad just seems to play well every time I pick him for a match.

He's really making reconsider who my first team right backs should be.

Stat distribution + personality > PA.

My back-to-back title winning Athletic Club squad had a average PA well under 150. The stats they did have were well distributed for the roles they performed, and they had hardworking, positive personalities. Too many people just want to see 20's everywhere, when in reality 15's in the right places and the right mentality are more than enough.

Perfect example of this is a player named matias alustiza. I got him to score 30 goals with xerez in an FM10 save.

[Bababui]

He can't develop any further because he's reached the limits set by his genetics at birth.

People easily surpass their genetic limitations with performance enhancing drugs.

[Themer]

People easily surpass their genetic limitations with performance enhancing drugs.

And how does that in anyway aid this discussion?

[Bababui]

And how does that in anyway aid this discussion?

Because it shows that there really is no fixed PA ceiling. Also, new advanced training regimens can help a player push past his genetic limitations.

[jcafcwbb]

Does anybody else remember when Lee Sharpe was rated a better prospect than Ryan Giggs.

And what about the debacle that has been Kieron Dyer's career. One of the most gifted players we have produced in the last twenty years but never broke into the big time.

[Jops14]

Well i wouldnt say never, played in the champions league a few times. Which brings me to another striker example. Shola f****** ameobi! Was tipped as being brilliant when he was 20, scoring goals in champs league etc, never had big injuries, but he plateaud, and what was good performances for a 20 year eold, were bad for a 28 year old, he just didnt develop. Another example in midfield, Steve Sidwell, great season at reading, chelsea signed him, dubbed next lampard, nothing, didnt improve at all. And the Denilson example was fantastic, this guy had the world at his feet! by the time he was 24 hed played about 64 times for Brazil, worlds most expensive transfer to Betis in 99 for about £27m or something, yet poor mental abilities meant not only did he peak that young,, he started to decline, and now at 31 i dont think he even has a club.

We all have our limits, im a good sunday league player, im 18, yet, i cant think for the world that if barcelona signed me i would improve that much, because im at the peak of my ability, and im 18, its just how life, and the game works.

[jimmy011087]

look at the Norwich team that have just gone up, bet their PA's were all said to be 110 or so at best but they have 'Holt, Fox, R Martin, Crofts, Tierney' in particular proven better than that.

[BiggusD]

It is strange how every time I and other unfit oldies above 30 play football games against lightning-fast, athletic 18-20 year-olds, we dominate completely. We are much calmer and do much better choices, and know more about the game itself. It is true, though, that some players peak at a young age. I believe those who do just don't learn new things about the game every time they play a match.

[Ackter]

Because it shows that there really is no fixed PA ceiling. Also, new advanced training regimens can help a player push past his genetic limitations.

Unnatural aids in order to surpass genetic limitations - and even then the amount they surpass their limitations is also in itself limited.

[Jops14]

It is strange how every time I and other unfit oldies above 30 play football games against lightning-fast, athletic 18-20 year-olds, we dominate completely. We are much calmer and do much better choices, and know more about the game itself. It is true, though, that some players peak at a young age. I believe those who do just don't learn new things about the game every time they play a match.

Ah personally ive had the opposite experiance, 2 or 3 yards of pace over a fullback works wonders, having said that it depends on the player, i always found i was an "intelligent" player, if someone dropped off me, to avoid being rushed in i just started playing one touch pass and go. Having said that, i played in a team full of 18-24 year olds, and although we got promoted, there were those games where mentally, we just imploded 9and then bad decisions etc start to come in)

[looknohands]

You say you can't affect players' development - but you already have, almost as much as you can - so well done.

Think of Freddy Adu.

A very talented youngster (Say his CA was 110 at 15) unfortunately, he didn't get any better, so his PA now is still at that level.

You mean the player that was a -8 or -9 in PA up until this year? The player whose "unchangeable" PA has suddenly been lowered to 140 or so? Funny how people stubbornly insist that the game have a concrete cap on PA when each database update results in numerous changes to these values that are supposed to be fixed...

[milnerpoint]

You mean the player that was a -8 or -9 in PA up until this year? The player whose "unchangeable" PA has suddenly been lowered to 140 or so? Funny how people stubbornly insist that the game have a concrete cap on PA when each database update results in numerous changes to these values that are supposed to be fixed...

missed the point completely, a researched players PA is an estimate based on the previous season, which is revalued each year, as researchers have no way of predicting the future then it is impossible to get this 100% correct. With regen players FM is god and knows as soon as they appear in the game how good or bad they can be and as such apply a value to this, FM cannot be wrong in that situation as its the only thing with full knowledge of the player.

[Stephanie McMahon's Secret Lover]

I have always thought that PA should really be hidden in the game (including any scout report) and here's why.

IRL the likes of Rooney etc who had "great potential" in the past was down mainly to their current ability and age at the time. Nothing else.

[Lazaru5]

I have always thought that PA should really be hidden in the game (including any scout report) and here's why.

IRL the likes of Rooney etc who had "great potential" in the past was down mainly to their current ability and age at the time. Nothing else.

Exactly. Nobody really knew how good Rooney would become, he could have stagnated at 19 and now be playing in the Championship or had a serious injury at 21 that halted his progress...

In any case, it's not a players CA or PA that counts, it's his performances that count, regardless of how "good" a number says he is he might be rubbish in your team/tactics...

[x42bn6]

He can't develop any further because he's reached the limits set by his genetics at birth.

A player in reality who "peaks" or fails to develop further does so for a reason. In the case of many of the teenage wonderkid flops, it's down to things like not being able to sustain their development at a higher level (Jeffers), not adapting to a foreign league (Samba?), not adapting to pressure (Lamptey), injuries (Kerlon) or just plain overhyped (Kerlon again).

There is no scientific evidence to suggest that we are limited purely by nature, anyway. There is certainly evidence that we have limits - because our "abilities" are finite, not infinite, and assuming our ability measured on a graph is differentiable everywhere, will therefore have a maximum (or maxima).

There is no evidence to suggest that nature is the pure factor in determining limits - we don't even know the limits of our bodies, so it is impossible to know. In addition, as humans evolve, those limits change anyway.

If the op has a player who is performing better then in my opinion he should just keep playing and see how he gets on. A player with a pa of 150 pa can still play brilliantly thats the point people seem to miss on these forums. My player has hit his peak and despite this he will continue to be one of the best players around despite his stats stalling.

People know that CA isn't the whole story. It's just not important to this argument. CA is an "average" representing how "good" a player is. If you like, it is a number indicating how much the player would be worth if you took his ability and liquidated it down into solid gold. He has "145 CA" worth of "ability-gold". That you can get this CA 145 to outperform Lionel Messi in some circumstance is immaterial in the same way that you can make Messi have an average rating of 0.1 if you put him in inappropriate tactics. All it does suggest is that CA 142-148 players, say, are largely equivalent because weightings and rounding mean things aren't perfect, and that CA isn't really designed with an "average scenario" in mind.

The issue lies with the last bit of the sentence - the "stalling" bit. Your player is playing well and is of a relatively-young age. A player that is playing well, learning well and is still fairly-young will, in reality, develop, full-stop. Maybe he won't develop that quickly; maybe he'll skyrocket. My point is that he should continue to develop, and that PA is an issue here.

There will alway be debate on how players progress in fm but in my opinion people are limited in how good they can become in real life. If they are not then clubs would sign any youngster and turn them into stars.

Just because we are limited does not mean that the limit needs to be explicitly modelled.

Imagine this - pick 10 random numbers from 0 to infinity. There will exist a maximum from this set of 10 numbers - it is fairly easy to prove by construction (order numbers in ascending order, pick the last one, then use the monotonically-ascending theorems and prove by contradiction). You can generalise this to any number of numbers rather than 10. It is then fairly easy to show that for any set of n numbers, there exists at least one maximum.

What this means is that if we took a set of all the CA numbers of a player in real life, without PA in the picture, there would exist some maximum somewhere along the line. A limit - without explicitly defining one.

What then becomes the true issue is that this maximum needs to be sensible in the sense that it needs to be balanced to ensure that not every player becomes Lionel Messi.

I've mentioned this many times where you could introduce a talent attribute which determines how easy it is for a player to develop. Maybe once in a blue moon an untalented player will become the next Lionel Messi. What matters is that he does become Messi for a reason (i.e. consistent ratings over 9.0 over the whole season in the first-team of a top league), and that it is rare. But the overwhelming likelihood is that a talented player will develop quicker and is therefore more likely to become the next Messi.

I have always thought that PA should really be hidden in the game (including any scout report) and here's why.

IRL the likes of Rooney etc who had "great potential" in the past was down mainly to their current ability and age at the time. Nothing else.

Not true - plenty of players are very good at youth/reserves level but are only good because they are miles ahead of the opposition, but will never develop well. Liverpool are a testament to this - consistently very good at youth/reserves level because their players are very good, but their record has been very poor (the likes of Kelly are an exception, not the rule).

Rooney would not have become who he was without talent - that he had a good level of ability to begin with and that he was physically very good at 16 is definitely a contributing factor. But his development is down to everything - not just his ability at 16 - otherwise, nearly all Liverpool youngsters in the past 5 years or so would have made it.

[Avelives]

I've mentioned this many times where you could introduce a talent attribute which determines how easy it is for a player to develop. Maybe once in a blue moon an untalented player will become the next Lionel Messi. What matters is that he does become Messi for a reason (i.e. consistent ratings over 9.0 over the whole season in the first-team of a top league), and that it is rare. But the overwhelming likelihood is that a talented player will develop quicker and is therefore more likely to become the next Messi.

But I think thats the point, in real life, true talent (genius if you like) is rare and cannot be taught. All people have a finite level of skill at anything, im pretty good at art, but no matter how long I practiced or under whos tutoring, id never be the next Vincent Van Gogh. I think the current system while not totally realistic is as good as it needs to be. You can take average players with decent stats and through lots of playtime and if they have a good personality they can perform much better than their stats suggest. That already happens, you are to hung up on attributes.

For instance id rather have a an average stat player with professional attitude and high teamwork, than a well above average one with a balanced or negative personality and/or low teamwork.

[x42bn6]

But I think thats the point, in real life, true talent (genius if you like) is rare and cannot be taught. All people have a finite level of skill at anything, im pretty good at art, but no matter how long I practiced or under whos tutoring, id never be the next Vincent Van Gogh.

Van Gogh's natural talent was of course quite high, but who he was was not purely down to his natural talent. He worked pretty hard and learnt a lot of things over the years.

We all have a finite skill at something, but we do not know what those limits are - we don't even understand how the brain works to any worthwhile degree! The notion that nature is the limiting factor has no scientific basis - a few simple cells can develop into a complex organism via evolution, as long as it is nurtured correctly - they don't even have to be of the highest quality. Sometimes mutations are "lucky".

That we have a limit is possible without a physical constraint.

I think the current system while not totally realistic is as good as it needs to be. You can take average players with decent stats and through lots of playtime and if they have a good personality they can perform much better than their stats suggest. That already happens, you are to hung up on attributes.

For instance id rather have a an average stat player with professional attitude and high teamwork, than a well above average one with a balanced or negative personality and/or low teamwork.

Again, it's not the issue of performance - we all know that CA and attributes aren't everything. I've already mentioned above that I can get Messi's rating down to 0.1 for a whole season, for example - CA isn't everything. However, there is a disconnect between reality and the game that a player who should develop and learn in reality simply cannot develop and learn in-game due to some preconceived limit.

[Ackter]

It's a game.

It works.

Get over it.

Stop turning every thread into the same damn argument.

[x42bn6]

It's a game.

It works.

Get over it.

Stop turning every thread into the same damn argument.

It doesn't work, because the OP's player should be developing in reality. Players - or people, in fact - don't stop developing all of a sudden. Yes, sometimes development can be a bit of a slog or you might have to work extra-hard to get a small bit of development (diminishing returns), but the fact is, players don't stop developing.

[robzilla]

It doesn't work, because the OP's player should be developing in reality. Players - or people, in fact - don't stop developing all of a sudden. Yes, sometimes development can be a bit of a slog or you might have to work extra-hard to get a small bit of development (diminishing returns), but the fact is, players don't stop developing.

The fact is though, they do - when they reach their potential.

[i2dark4u]

@robzilla i agree completely. Every player has a ceiling in their ability, some dont even reach it. Any one remember Francis Jeffers? He was tipped by Arsene Wenger to be a "Fox in the Box" the next new thing. Where is he now? In some bookies wasting what talent he had. Moral of the story? You have to take risks on players just like in real life, some times they dont work out...sometimes you find a diamond in the rough like cesc.

[x42bn6]

The fact is though, they do - when they reach their potential.

Is there even such a thing as "potential" in reality? In terms of physical attributes, we don't even understand what our physical limits are, and thanks to evolution, those limits, if they exist, change all the time. We don't know if genetics are indeed the ultimate limit (the nature vs. nurture debate), or whether genetics are merely a pathway that nurture can influence to change our limits (a bit like approaching a fork in the road with two one-way paths - once you go down one road, you can never go back, and both roads lead to different ultimate limits, of which it is debateable which limit is better).

The issue with such an explicit limit is that it begs the question - a player cannot develop further because he has reached a limit, which is the definition of not developing any further. That is a logical fallacy.

I threw out in another thread the notion of "maximum score" for a game, where it was impossible for a game to exceed a certain scoreline, even if you put Almunia in goal and played a 0-0-0-5-5 formation - you will never concede more than some preconceived notion of a limiting scoreline. This is wrong as the game has failed to factor in unusual circumstances. Another notion is: Why don't we have "potential passing" or a "potential attribute" for each attribute? We know an amateur player with passing 1 is never going to get passing 15 - so why don't we have "potential passing"? The reason is simple - we trust the development engine to make sure that it is so overwhelmingly unlikely. Why don't we build an engine that can be entrusted to remove the "speed limiter"? Players will still have a maximum "CA" - we just don't know where it will be or how high it is, but we have a rough idea on where it could be on average and the amount of variation we can expect.

[x42bn6]

@robzilla i agree completely. Every player has a ceiling in their ability, some dont even reach it. Any one remember Francis Jeffers? He was tipped by Arsene Wenger to be a "Fox in the Box" the next new thing. Where is he now? In some bookies wasting what talent he had. Moral of the story? You have to take risks on players just like in real life, some times they dont work out...sometimes you find a diamond in the rough like cesc.

Jeffers failed to develop further as his performances never translated to the first-team. It could have been pressure, attitude or just plain overratedness. However, the point is, there is a reason he didn't develop further and it had little to do with this notion of "potential". If Messi performed like Jeffers at that age, he wouldn't have been Messi today. If a rubbish player played like Jeffers at that age, he wouldn't go anywhere. In other words, "potential" is not always the get-out clause nor answer.

The OP's player is developing well, performing well and is at a relatively young age. This player will quite frankly develop in reality - perhaps not that quickly - but will still develop. Human beings that continue to do well even when the odds keep going against them will continue to learn and overcome these odds. Some might need to work very hard to do this - for some, it might be effortless. But it is possible to continue developing - albeit perhaps at a rate of diminishing returns (in the same way that a child develops much quicker than an adult).

[Avelives]

We all have a finite skill at something, but we do not know what those limits are - we don't even understand how the brain works to any worthwhile degree! The notion that nature is the limiting factor has no scientific basis - a few simple cells can develop into a complex organism via evolution, as long as it is nurtured correctly - they don't even have to be of the highest quality. Sometimes mutations are "lucky".

I think you starting to get a little to deep for a game to be honest. Of course the myriad of influences that go to making a human a human are countless and mind boggling even for modern science to understand, but this is a footie game mate, lets not start being silly.

Its like complaining that in 'RPG game X' I have set preconceived limits to what I can achieve development wise. Thats just a basic premise of computer games, making true random unlimited systems that try to mimic reality in any game genre is just about the most complex thing you can do in game terms cause you have to then build systems that allow for a myriad of eventualities.

[x42bn6]

I think you starting to get a little to deep for a game to be honest. Of course the myriad of influences that go to making a human a human are countless and mind boggling even for modern science to understand, but this is a footie game mate, lets not start being silly.

The whole point of the game is that it is meant to be realistic, and therefore it is worth considering in all honesty. It might not be at the top of the SI to-do list, of course, but surely it is worth thinking about, the biology of player development?

Its like complaining that in 'RPG game X' I have set preconceived limits to what I can achieve development wise. Thats just a basic premise of computer games, making true random unlimited systems that try to mimic reality in any game genre is just about the most complex thing you can do in game terms cause you have to then build systems that allow for a myriad of eventualities.

No model is perfect. But some models are better than others. And it is better models we need to strive for.

Many systems have an infinite number of outcomes. Casino blackjack can potentially bankrupt a casino if some customer keeps winning, for example - yet we all know that casinos don't worry about this as the odds are stacked against their customers, and casinos always have the edge. Brownian motion has an infinite number of outcomes yet can be used in scientific models without worrying about the system blowing up due to extremely large values. Even "certainty" is impossible - in medicine, it is impossible to be 100% certain, yet clincial trials often work at confidence levels of 99.9% or greater and that works for them. An infinite number of possibilities, yet predictable outcomes.

[Ackter]

The whole point of the game is to be fun while simulating reality.

Only in hindsight can potential be judged as wrong - but then how many potentials are right?

It's a game - the game is God. When you start the game, it has limits for each player as every player in real life has limits. Sometimes those limits are wrong when compared to real life after a few years, but who cares?

The game works. It does what it says on the tin and absolute no alternative, including the ones you've put forward, can compete with the results that the current system gives when taken into the context of the actual game experience.

If you don't use cheat tools, every single player in the game has unlimited potential. You don't know when it'll peak.

[snootyjim]

Players will still have a maximum "CA" - we just don't know where it will be or how high it is, but we have a rough idea on where it could be on average and the amount of variation we can expect.

Because it really doesn't matter. If you don't know what the PA of a player is, it's not an issue. It might as well not exist.

Your player stops improving, okay, for one reason or another you've bought a dud. Maybe he has reached his PA. Or maybe he's just got horrible hidden mental stats and won't ever achieve his PA.

If there was no such thing as the scout tools, no-one would care about PA.

The only problem with PA, as far as I'm concerned, is that it's too limiting for current players - I don't see how anybody can determine to any degree of accuracy how good Rafael/Fabio/Morrison/Smalling are going to be, yet courtesy of the way these things are dealt with, most of those have already been assigned a label in the database, sometimes even a very specific PA. But that's not a problem with PA itself - i.e it's no issue for regens - it's an issue of how accurate researchers are told to be with regard to assessing youth ability.

[Ackter]

All set potentials in the database should be replaced with negative numbers.

[Avelives]

The whole point of the game is to be fun while simulating reality.

Only in hindsight can potential be judged as wrong - but then how many potentials are right?

It's a game - the game is God. When you start the game, it has limits for each player as every player in real life has limits. Sometimes those limits are wrong when compared to real life after a few years, but who cares?

The game works. It does what it says on the tin and absolute no alternative, including the ones you've put forward, can compete with the results that the current system gives when taken into the context of the actual game experience.

If you don't use cheat tools, every single player in the game has unlimited potential. You don't know when it'll peak.

Excellent point, I never use cheat tools, never have. So for me when I sign a talented youngster im relying on my scouts knowledge (which is not 20 so its not perfect) and my own albeit pedestrian understanding of the game engine and player stats. If I knew he had a PA of 100 or some terrible mental stat it would, for me, ruin the fun of the game entirely.

In my current Ajax save I just had a newgen who has the tag 'most talented of his generation' at 16 hes already as good as my main striker, but whether he will reach his PA is a total unknown cause I dont know what his PA is or what his hidden Mental stats are.

[looknohands]

The whole point of the game is to be fun while simulating reality.

Too bad it doesn't do this very well.

Only in hindsight can potential be judged as wrong - but then how many potentials are right?

Then why have the computer come up with an arbitrary number that can't be wrong?

It's a game - the game is God. When you start the game, it has limits for each player as every player in real life has limits. Sometimes those limits are wrong when compared to real life after a few years, but who cares?

I do? This insistance on the computer being God and placing set values on players has a negative impact on the game. Case in point: in my current save I have one striker that has been my best player (not to mention the league's best) for the better part of 4 seasons. He's never received a transfer offer from another team. How is this realistic?

The game works. It does what it says on the tin and absolute no alternative, including the ones you've put forward, can compete with the results that the current system gives when taken into the context of the actual game experience.

...and you know this based on what? Because you find little fault with the current system, it's therefor impossible for it to be improved upon?

If you don't use cheat tools, every single player in the game has unlimited potential. You don't know when it'll peak.

Hmm...good to know that my 27 year-old keeper that's been rated by all of my coaches as "unlikely to improve in the future" has unlimited potential.

[milnerpoint]

Jeffers failed to develop further as his performances never translated to the first-team. It could have been pressure, attitude or just plain overratedness. However, the point is, there is a reason he didn't develop further and it had little to do with this notion of "potential". If Messi performed like Jeffers at that age, he wouldn't have been Messi today. If a rubbish player played like Jeffers at that age, he wouldn't go anywhere. In other words, "potential" is not always the get-out clause nor answer.

The OP's player is developing well, performing well and is at a relatively young age. This player will quite frankly develop in reality - perhaps not that quickly - but will still develop. Human beings that continue to do well even when the odds keep going against them will continue to learn and overcome these odds. Some might need to work very hard to do this - for some, it might be effortless. But it is possible to continue developing - albeit perhaps at a rate of diminishing returns (in the same way that a child develops much quicker than an adult).

Who says jeffers did not improve because he hit his PA early? He got as good as he could possible be at a very young age, and never got any better. Even at a young age Jeffers was playing regular first team football for both Everton and Arsenal, with good performances, if he wasnt Arsenal would not have spent £10m on him, he simple had nothing left in him to get any better, is that so hard for you to accept?

The player still has 4 PA points left, so by your argument he will still progress, just at a very very slow rate, so the system works, no?

There are very very few players who EVER max out their PA points in FM, and if they do its usually at the pinnacle of their careers, again that says by your argument that the system works, there is ALWAYS room for a slight improvment except in very very extreme cases.

You turn every thread into this same argument, and no matter how you spin it i still think your wrong.

[milnerpoint]

Then why have the computer come up with an arbitrary number that can't be wrong?

The computer cannot be wrong, it made the players, it knows their genetics, it knows every tiny thing about every player it creates, so it will never be wrong when estimating how good that player can be as it decided how good they could be the instant it creates them.

For all real players, that's decided by a human researcher.

[looknohands]

The computer cannot be wrong, it made the players, it knows their genetics, it knows every tiny thing about every player it creates, so it will never be wrong when estimating how good that player can be as it decided how good they could be the instant it creates them.

For all real players, that's decided by a human researcher.

That would be fine...if the game wasn't trying to simulate a human sport where randomness and guessing are a vital part of the game and what makes it interesting. You're taking something that is entirely dependent upon guesswork and trying to simulate it with something that is set in stone. I'm sorry, but that completely takes away the illusion of "realism" that the game is trying to so hard to replicate.

[Jops14]

With peoples arguments with Jeffers, all you can say is, he did hit is potential, and he developed much quicker than his other peers, consequently at youth level looked phenomenal, but then at a higher level, he didnt improve as he hit is potential, and so looked a bit pants.

[milnerpoint]

That would be fine...if the game wasn't trying to simulate a human sport where randomness and guessing are a vital part of the game and what makes it interesting. You're taking something that is entirely dependent upon guesswork and trying to simulate it with something that is set in stone. I'm sorry, but that completely takes away the illusion of "realism" that the game is trying to so hard to replicate.

There is randomness and guessing unless you use programmes to reveal things you should never have known in the first place. Your not suppose to know PA as a number, but because of FMRTE and GenieScout, programmes not made by SI its possible. If you choose to use these and ruin the guessing part thats your choice, but it is definately there.

At the end of it all you have to look at it this way, when creating newgens/freds/regens whatever you want to call them, FM is god, it knows every little thing there is to know about the players it creates, much like you could argue the real god, or whatevery higher power you may or may not believing, knows every single thing about our potential the minute we are brought into this world. It knows that x player can only be x good and as such it gives them a potential limit, where this system falls down is when the human researchers have to do this for real players, because they are not god, they do not know every single thing about a player and how his career will turn out. Thats why SI update attributes at every possible oppertunity.

[x42bn6]

The whole point of the game is to be fun while simulating reality.

Only in hindsight can potential be judged as wrong - but then how many potentials are right?

A PA value is almost surely wrong. It is not possible to get a PA value correct because the future cannot be predicted. This applies to regens as well, because a human-being is involved in simulating the game.

It's a game - the game is God. When you start the game, it has limits for each player as every player in real life has limits. Sometimes those limits are wrong when compared to real life after a few years, but who cares?

Firstly, the "God" idea is a fallacy because then there is an argument for "potential passing", "potential scorelines" and so on. Imagine the uproar if SI capped the scoreline of games, meaning no matter what, in some cases, you couldn't exceed a certain number of goals, even if two human beings were involved on either side of the match. The God idea implies that the future can be seen, which is incorrect.

Just because a limit exists does not mean that things will explode out of control. If a Golf GTI had a speed limiter on it, and we removed it, it would not suddenly start to win F1 races. A Golf GTI car is still going to be inferior to an F1 car. We just trust that this is the case, otherwise Lewis Hamilton would be driving one of those now.

The game works. It does what it says on the tin and absolute no alternative, including the ones you've put forward, can compete with the results that the current system gives when taken into the context of the actual game experience.

Why don't you think a talent system like I've described here work? Granted it's a bit primitive but since I don't have access to SI's code nor have all the time in the world, it is kind of hard to expand on it.

In addition, it is bizarre you say there is no alternative that can compete with the current system - no model is perfect, therefore every model can be improved-upon.

If you don't use cheat tools, every single player in the game has unlimited potential. You don't know when it'll peak.

"You do not know" is not equivalent to "it won't happen". It is also clearly wrong because a player with PA 1 clearly does not have unlimited potential.

Because it really doesn't matter. If you don't know what the PA of a player is, it's not an issue. It might as well not exist.

Not really - just because we are not meant to know something does not mean that there isn't a problem.

Not that it matters. Everyone has a limit - that it is correct to generate one at the start of a player's career and ignore all future developments (essentially constraining PA generation to initial information, ignoring all future information) is a totally different story.

Your player stops improving, okay, for one reason or another you've bought a dud. Maybe he has reached his PA. Or maybe he's just got horrible hidden mental stats and won't ever achieve his PA.

Players - or people - don't stop developing for no reason. If things become more difficult yet a person continues to show sustained, consistent performances, he will develop, simply because this person has had to develop to more difficult scenarios, essentially learning and thus developing further. Therefore the premise of this argument is incorrect - if a player stops developing, there is a reason. If there is no reason, I argue then a player should continue developing.

If there was no such thing as the scout tools, no-one would care about PA.

The editor?

The only problem with PA, as far as I'm concerned, is that it's too limiting for current players - I don't see how anybody can determine to any degree of accuracy how good Rafael/Fabio/Morrison/Smalling are going to be, yet courtesy of the way these things are dealt with, most of those have already been assigned a label in the database, sometimes even a very specific PA. But that's not a problem with PA itself - i.e it's no issue for regens - it's an issue of how accurate researchers are told to be with regard to assessing youth ability.

There is no point in distinguishing between real players and regens because the issue lies with the fact that a player can stop developing for no reason.

A youngster who averages 10.00 every single game in the Premier League, never missing a match, will develop in reality - even if Stoke try to kill him, or he gets quadruple-marked every match, or players resort to keeping the ball away from him - he still finds a way to get a rating of 10.00. He will continue developing. In-game this is not possible if he is, say, a 60/60 player.

Who says jeffers did not improve because he hit his PA early? He got as good as he could possible be at a very young age, and never got any better. Even at a young age Jeffers was playing regular first team football for both Everton and Arsenal, with good performances, if he wasnt Arsenal would not have spent £10m on him, he simple had nothing left in him to get any better, is that so hard for you to accept?

The same Jeffers regularly derided as a flop and Wenger constantly teased by it by opposition fans? Good performances? Good grief. There is a reason he is mentioned in this thread and that is because he never lived up to his promising appearances as a youngster.

As for the part where you mentioned "Arsenal would not have spent £10m on him", that is probably the worst argument ever put forward - replace Jeffers with Verón, Arsenal with Manchester United and £10m with £28.1m. Nobody is going to use Verón's price tag to justify his "good performances" - those were very few and far between!

He got a few injuries and couldn't displace Henry and Wiltord, didn't he? One of the key requirements for development is that you play first-team football and that you perform - the fact he couldn't get a game ahead of them suggests he was never effective enough to do so. Therefore he misses at least one of these requirements, meaning his development will stagnate. To me, this is the real reason why Jeffers is considered a flop - he couldn't get a lot of first-team football at Arsenal and when he did, he failed to perform. And then his barren streak continued as he fell back down the ranks, reducing his chances of bouncing back up. And to me, this is a sensible explanation on why perhaps Jeffers stopped developing. Absolutely nothing to do with his "potential" or anything.

The player still has 4 PA points left, so by your argument he will still progress, just at a very very slow rate, so the system works, no?

What if the player is 150/150?

There are very very few players who EVER max out their PA points in FM, and if they do its usually at the pinnacle of their careers, again that says by your argument that the system works, there is ALWAYS room for a slight improvment except in very very extreme cases.

I'd argue it's not necessarily very very extreme, but you get the gist of my arguments right there.

You turn every thread into this same argument, and no matter how you spin it i still think your wrong.

Well done Sherlock.

The computer cannot be wrong, it made the players, it knows their genetics,

There is no scientific evidence to suggest we are limited by genetics.

Certainly, genetics make up a large portion of what we are able to do, but there is no scientific evidence to suggest it limits us. Even if it did, we wouldn't know the attributes of the ultimate human being - we don't even know how our brains work!

it knows every tiny thing about every player it creates, so it will never be wrong when estimating how good that player can be as it decided how good they could be the instant it creates them.

The game will know the maximum scoreline of an Arsenal-Manchester United match, let's say it's 30-30 as in no team can score more than 30 goals. Sounds reasonable. Then say two human beings decide to rig the game and Arsenal play 0-0-0-5-5 with Almunia in goal. At 0-30, the Manchester United user quickly finds that Almunia cannot stop saving goals despite the fact he has all the wrong instructions too. So is the computer right here? Of course it's right - because it is impossible to be wrong, assuming the computer is all-knowing. However, to me, this looks almost like a proof by contradiction... Assume the computer is all-knowing, construct a theoretical scenario, conclude with a ridiculous conclusion... Therefore the assumption is wrong.

The game cannot know the future - it simply doesn't. In using PA, it immediately folds all future information into this value, despite the fact the future circumstances can vary quite dramatically to what was folded inside in the first place.

To me, a system that cannot be wrong is incredibly dubious at best, since no designed system is correct.

For all real players, that's decided by a human researcher.

Oddly enough, researchers can be wrong - and the game should be able to compensate for this.

With peoples arguments with Jeffers, all you can say is, he did hit is potential, and he developed much quicker than his other peers, consequently at youth level looked phenomenal, but then at a higher level, he didnt improve as he hit is potential, and so looked a bit pants.

He didn't stop developing because he hit his potential - he stopped developing because he suffered injuries, lost his place in the team and didn't perform. You could argue that this is "potential". Let's say for argument's sake that it was PA 120.

But what if Jeffers succeeded? What if he dethroned Henry and became and Arsenal legend, scoring goals galore and making Henry wet himself and fall into mid-table obscurity in Italy because he couldn't get a game? You wouldn't think his PA was 120 - quite frankly it should be higher.

What does this mean? It simply means that how Jeffers developed at Arsenal should have an impact on his PA. Now this is fairly controversial, since the game is supposedly all-knowing... However, this is exactly what I mean when the game throws up scenarios that are unexpected. The game can't know the future - because it quite frankly can't. Therefore it should stop pretending to know, and focus on doing things - it is more realistic.

There is randomness and guessing unless you use programmes to reveal things you should never have known in the first place. Your not suppose to know PA as a number, but because of FMRTE and GenieScout, programmes not made by SI its possible. If you choose to use these and ruin the guessing part thats your choice, but it is definately there.

What if I use the editor? The inbuilt one.

And like I have said time and time again, just because we shouldn't see something doesn't mean there isn't a problem with it. Men shouldn't enter womens' toilets, but if a man suspects another man, perhaps a pervert, has entered a womens' toilet and has evidence to suggest that he has, then just because this man isn't supposed to see within does not mean that there is no issue within.

At the end of it all you have to look at it this way, when creating newgens/freds/regens whatever you want to call them, FM is god, it knows every little thing there is to know about the players it creates, much like you could argue the real god, or whatevery higher power you may or may not believing, knows every single thing about our potential the minute we are brought into this world. It knows that x player can only be x good and as such it gives them a potential limit, where this system falls down is when the human researchers have to do this for real players, because they are not god, they do not know every single thing about a player and how his career will turn out. Thats why SI update attributes at every possible oppertunity.

Covered above - that it is wrong to assume the game cannot be wrong, since no system is correct. The system can - and is - wrong. So is my suggestion. It just comes down to whether SI should move to a better system or not.