Team loses Tactic Familiarity on 1st January?

[Dench57]

My team has gone from being 100/100 in all tactics in December to being around 75/100 and even 45/100 in "Tempo" when I continued to the 1st January.

I can't work out whether this is because 3 new players joined me on that day, but only 1 of them is in the first team and the other 2 new signings are 19 and went into my U21s.

Seems stupid and now I'll probably lose my next few games because apparently my team has forgotten my tactics despite there only being 1 new First Team signing.

Anyone else experienced this?

EDIT: If this happened because of 1 new signing, that basically means I can't make any signings in January or I'll risk losing Tactic Familiarity. This can't be right.

[Cleon]

It's down to signing players yes.

[RTHerringbone]

Another reason I'll be using FMC this year - no Tactic Familiarity!

I can understand why Tactic Familiarity takes a big hit after an end of season break, and that is easily boosted up again if you get your training right.

However, for a significant hit to be taken just because you sign a few players is a bit OTT for me.

[Dench57]

Wow. Seems very harsh considering I only signed 1 first team player, and a backup at that. I guess the game calculates it on any new signings at all.

Guess I won't be signing anyone in January again.

[Cleon]

Another reason I'll be using FMC this year - no Tactic Familiarity!

I can understand why Tactic Familiarity takes a big hit after an end of season break, and that is easily boosted up again if you get your training right.

However, for a significant hit to be taken just because you sign a few players is a bit OTT for me.

It's pretty extreme yeah. It makes no sense either because the player can be playing the exact same settings before he moved club yet you still take a hit on it, even though he knows it all.

[mhaffy]

It's pretty extreme yeah. It makes no sense either because the player can be playing the exact same settings before he moved club yet you still take a hit on it, even though he knows it all.

Wondered if there were any plans to tone down the extreme impact of this in the next patch or are we going to have to live with it going forward?

[RTHerringbone]

Wondered if there were any plans to tone down the extreme impact of this in the next patch or are we going to have to live with it going forward?

This is always how it has been, so I wouldn't expect changes in FM14.

I'm actually going to add this in the FM Wishlist thread now, because I wish it wasn't such a bit hit to familiarity as it is just odd.

[mhaffy]

Thanks for adding to FM Wishlist; fingers crossed for FM15.

[Cleon]

It should be removed all together imo and tactics should be part of training full stop. You should always be working on your next opponent rather than the actual formation because each one is different. So having tactic familiarity doesn't really make much sense when you get encouraged to adapt game to game.

[jujigatame]

Tactic familiarity could really stand to be sped up a bit. I'm 6 weeks into my first career in FM14 and despite setting to maximum match training and setting it to "tactics only" I'm only around 60% familiarity.

[ajsr1982]

It should be removed all together imo and tactics should be part of training full stop. You should always be working on your next opponent rather than the actual formation because each one is different. So having tactic familiarity doesn't really make much sense when you get encouraged to adapt game to game.

I'm not too sure about this actually Cleon. Take the example of a team that imposes their tactics on the opposition with almost complete regularity. The obvious example is Barcelona. Now, Barcelona employ a style of play that is defined by the attributes of the players (or vice-versa?) rather than a tactic and a formation, per se. However, my point is that they say 'This is how we play. Try to stop us' rather than coming up with ways to stop the opposition, and that needs to be reflected on some level.

[Cleon]

I'm not too sure about this actually Cleon. Take the example of a team that imposes their tactics on the opposition with almost complete regularity. The obvious example is Barcelona. Now, Barcelona employ a style of play that is defined by the attributes of the players (or vice-versa?) rather than a tactic and a formation, per se. However, my point is that they say 'This is how we play. Try to stop us' rather than coming up with ways to stop the opposition, and that needs to be reflected on some level.

If you believe Barca truly take this approach then imo you are being a bit naive. Barca adapt when playing other teams and do things differently. Do you think they set out the same to play Milan and Ajax?

But anyways, the whole point of training needs to put more focus and link better with tactics rather than treating them as 2 separate things which was my point.

[tyro]

This is actually one of the biggest benefits of FMC. You lose some of the "control" of the full version but on the other hand you have full tactical flexibility as you can change the tactic on a whim if you feel like it.

[ajsr1982]

If you believe Barca truly take this approach then imo you are being a bit naive. Barca adapt when playing other teams and do things differently. Do you think they set out the same to play Milan and Ajax?

But anyways, the whole point of training needs to put more focus and link better with tactics rather than treating them as 2 separate things which was my point.

Yes, I agree with your point about merging training and tactics, absolutely. It's kind of there already in that you can do 'tactics' training I guess, but that's very high level obviously.

However, I don't think you can deny that teams are more familiar with some formations than others, and maybe the proposed training/tactics synergy you're thinking about gets around that, and I'm sure SI can come up with something. I wasn't suggesting Barca throw caution to the wind and play in exactly the same way against all-comers. The shape of their team though, generally, never changes, is what I was getting at (and even then, it's really minor). They might tweak a couple of player roles/instructions of course, and I think the same is actually true of most teams. If you looked at the 20 Premier League teams, you'd be reasonably confident of writing down which formation 15+ of them will play during the next round of games (assuming you watch the Premier League).

[Cleon]

Yes, I agree with your point about merging training and tactics, absolutely. It's kind of there already in that you can do 'tactics' training I guess, but that's very high level obviously.

However, I don't think you can deny that teams are more familiar with some formations than others, and maybe the proposed training/tactics synergy you're thinking about gets around that, and I'm sure SI can come up with something. I wasn't suggesting Barca throw caution to the wind and play in exactly the same way against all-comers. The shape of their team though, generally, never changes, is what I was getting at (and even then, it's really minor). They might tweak a couple of player roles/instructions of course, and I think the same is actually true of most teams. If you looked at the 20 Premier League teams, you'd be reasonably confident of writing down which formation 15+ of them will play during the next round of games (assuming you watch the Premier League).

And no Its kinda not there already at all I think you miss the point

I never said you shouldn't be penalised or be more familiar with certain formations. But in its current form tactic familiarity doesn't work and doesn't make much sense.

You should be able to look at your fixtures then decide what training to do for those games. So for examples the catergories could be;

o Offensive Organisation

o Defensive Organisation

o Transition from Defense to Offence

o Transition from Offence to Defense

It could even be an added option called Team Functions and work along side match/general training. It could focus on;

Attack - Defending - Transition

Depending which one of those you select it would train;

Build up play/scoring - covering and defending space

Then you'd spend the build up working on this via training before the game. You'd still need to learn a tactic at the start of the season but it shouldn't be as severe as it currently is. Especially when you get penalised twice by the game, firstly with tactics familiarity and then team blending.

[ajsr1982]

And no Its kinda not there already at all I think you miss the point

I never said you shouldn't be penalised or be more familiar with certain formations. But in its current form tactic familiarity doesn't work and doesn't make much sense.

Fair enough. From what you wrote I thought you were implying that there was little point in being familiar with a given tactic because you need to ring the changes on a game-to-game basis.

So, what you're saying is that because you need to make changes to adapt to the opposition, the tactical familiarity bar can take what you deem to be an unrealistic hit when moving from a 4-4-2 Control to a 4-4-2 Counter, for example (assuming you haven't learned the 4-4-2 Counter as an alternative)?

[Cleon]

Fair enough. From what you wrote I thought you were implying that there was little point in being familiar with a given tactic because you need to ring the changes on a game-to-game basis.

So, what you're saying is that because you need to make changes to adapt to the opposition, the tactical familiarity bar can take what you deem to be an unrealistic hit when moving from a 4-4-2 Control to a 4-4-2 Counter, for example (assuming you haven't learned the 4-4-2 Counter as an alternative)?

I've edited the post above too.

But yes basically. You can get around it by using 3 tactics which share the same shape but have different settings but this stuff should be whats worked on game to game rather than always being set and causing you to take a hit when you change during the season. It's just not user friendly in its current state. Just because you go from counter to attacking shouldn't mean suddenly everything goes to 50% again and the players don't understand how to play, its silly.

Changing the actual shape should = a drastic change.

Changing tempo/strategy/passing etc should = a minor change.

[ajsr1982]

I've edited the post above too.

But yes basically. You can get around it by using 3 tactics which share the same shape but have different settings but this stuff should be whats worked on game to game rather than always being set and causing you to take a hit when you change during the season. It's just not user friendly in its current state. Just because you go from counter to attacking shouldn't mean suddenly everything goes to 50% again and the players don't understand how to play, its silly.

Agreed, yes. The best example of this is the 4-3-3/4-5-1 formation. There may be times during the game where you're under the cosh and it really is a 4-5-1 with a counter mentality, but then you get on top and it plays out as more of a 4-3-3 with a control mentality. These transitions in play can last for mere minutes. The players instinctively know how and when to do this because they practice it in training.

[Jackrosiemaisie]

I've sold and bought one player in the January window and it's made no impact to my tactic familiarity. Mind you the teams not quite totally fluid with the tactic, but the training's only been on Tactics (very high) since July!

[ZdlR]

Another reason I'll be using FMC this year - no Tactic Familiarity!

I can understand why Tactic Familiarity takes a big hit after an end of season break, and that is easily boosted up again if you get your training right.

However, for a significant hit to be taken just because you sign a few players is a bit OTT for me.

Odd that you say that - I started my first game on FMC just the other day. It's a bit easy (however, I'm playing on Super-Double-Plus-Easy mode by being Barcelona), but it's certainly fun. The fun won't last longer than this season, should I win everything like I'm on course to (zero losses and 4 draws in all competitions by Christmas), but it's filling in while I'm too busy to play the game 'properly'. Not having to worry about tactic familiarity and the media is a nice change and, apparently my tactic is pretty close to unstoppable with the players at my disposal.

[thomit]

This is always how it has been, so I wouldn't expect changes in FM14.

I'm actually going to add this in the FM Wishlist thread now, because I wish it wasn't such a bit hit to familiarity as it is just odd.

I have never seen this happen in FM 12 or 13. (This feature was in FM 12 too, right?) Bought several new players in the January window without tactic familiarity taking a hit at all, in numerous saves. To be honest, I haven't seen familiarity being affected at all when I have signed a new player or two or three, no matter when. Once I have got it all fluid, it have allways stayed that way, untill season's end - provided that I have not made any big changes to the tactics. If the OP is right, and the tactical familiarity decreases when buying a couple of players in January (and so much!), it's news to me.

I think I have noticed some strangeness about tactical familiarity in FM 14 that wasn't there in earlier FM's, and I suspect there's a bug somewhere. Unless SI willingly have changed things a bit, that is. Anyway, it's over the top.