German 3-Liga and Reserves - How does that work?

[realtimeFM]

Hello all,

I've just finished my second season in FM13, where I've been managing Borussia Dortmund for the last twelve months. In the first season in-game (I was at Wigan Athletic), so 2012-13, Dortmund II (an U23 / reserves team of sorts) were in 3-Liga, the third-tier German division, beating Schalke II to the title.

When I took over in May 2013, I was asked whether I'd like my U19 side to continue playing competitive football, but had no such question about Dortmund II (whom I don't manage - just make players available). Schalke II also weren't in the division for 2013-14. The game has set-up the sides for the 2014-15 season, and there are no Reserve sides in the division at all now.

How does it work? I was genuinely hoping Dortmund II would be able to have a competitive season, save me having to arrange 20+ individual friendlies.

Thanks in advance!

Gray, realtimeFM.net

[realtimeFM]

Thanks for the response, Alex.

In the 2013-14 season they didn't have any matches arranged for them by the game, I manually set-up friendlies for them throughout the season, a couple of months at a time.

Question was mainly about how does the game decide who is in 3-Liga (a division I have selected as active), and why Dortmund II and Schalke II weren't in it for the 2013-14 season after finishing as the top two in 2012-13.

[realtimeFM]

Cheers Alex. I'll take a look at the squad stats again come October and see if anyone's played at all.

[gb2003]

Hi guys,

is this issue fixed in fm 2015?

How big is the chance that a team, who promoted from Regionaliga to 1.Bundesliga have later a reserve team?

My experience is that the team never get a reserve team when the 2. team is not in tier 4 from the start.

regards

gb2003

[Some Guy!]

Is there any mechanism by which a German II team can have it's reputation increased in game? I've played a number of games where I had insanely strong II teams (to the point that they would be a match for at least half the teams in the first division at one point), yet they were unable to secure promotion to a playable league, seemingly because they had a static, terrible, reputation.

[mark1985]

Is there any mechanism by which a German II team can have it's reputation increased in game? I've played a number of games where I had insanely strong II teams (to the point that they would be a match for at least half the teams in the first division at one point), yet they were unable to secure promotion to a playable league, seemingly because they had a static, terrible, reputation.

I always wondered this as had the same issue at Austria Vienna. Hoping it's been improved this time round as Managing Melilla in Spain and hope I can get to the stage where Melilla B can get into the playable leagues. Is the rep of the B Team linked to the first Team does anyone know?

[Some Guy!]

I always wondered this as had the same issue at Austria Vienna. Hoping it's been improved this time round as Managing Melilla in Spain and hope I can get to the stage where Melilla B can get into the playable leagues. Is the rep of the B Team linked to the first Team does anyone know?

Doesn't appear to be. Just seems static when not in playable leagues.

[mark1985]

The reputation score for B & II teams can change as the game progresses however any changes tend to be smaller than they would be for a senior side & they are somewhat limited by the main club reputation.

Ok, so for arguments sake say I made Melilla (currently in the Spanish 3rd tier) into the new Barcelona, dominated Spain and Europe every year, had a really strong B team, what would be the realistic chances of my B team (currently in the 4th tier, one tier below the lowest playable league) getting promotion to a playable Division?

[Some Guy!]

Just to confirm, has anything be changed in this regard since around FM13, where it really did seem utterly futile. I had seen my FSV Frankfurt side become the strongest side in the World, my II team would happily maul teams during preseason tours, and pretty much every player had average ratings for the generated league matches (for the non-playable league) well in excess of 8. Despite this their reputation remained exactly the same, and they were never promoted, even when I tried to "cheat" the system and replayed the day it was generated (about ~12-15 seasons in). They were forever stuck in that nonplayable league (one of the German regional leagues, the highest non-playable leagues).

[Some Guy!]

I believe it is less likely that a II will be promoted to the Third division in Germany, this is to reflect real life.

Bayern II have not returned to the Third division since they were relegated in 2011 & the highly regarded Schalke development system has failed to produce a team that has been capable of securing promotion from Regionaliga West.

It's rare irl so it is therefore rare in FM.

I have however seen plenty of other II teams get promoted, ones my side could walk over 5-0 or more quite happily. Again, it seems that the effect of the quality of the team (even the generate ratings) is quite minimal and it comes large down to the larger reputation II teams (for the II teams) at the start.

For that particular save I paid particular attention to the stats the game was producing, and one season the II team produced a casual 150+ goals across the squad that season, having conceded no more than 20, along with the previous mentioned 8+ average ratings for most players. Surely if a side like that aren't being promoted there is a very serious issue, and one I brought up at the time. To be completely honest I only started playing in Germany again this version as I thought that after the discussions then that the issue would have been resolved by now.

As discussed in the bugs forum, it would at least be a tolerable issue if I could edit (with the in game editor) the II teams reputation to help them be promoted, but that appears to not be able to be done, though that thread has been marked as "reviewed", so maybe that might help.

[mark1985]

I can understand B teams not being promoted in Austria as there are only 2 playable divisions, and even the 2 Viennese clubs B teams are only in the 3rd Tier, but in Spain, Barcelona B are in the 2nd tier and in the 3rd tier, there are no less than 19 teams out of 80 (so almost 25%) 3rd tier teams that are B teams. So it is pretty realisitc that a B team would get promoted to Spains 3rd tier. The 20 teams range from Real Madrids B team to Cordoba's B team. Of course, I do not expect my B team to be anywhere near as good as Barcas (for a good few decades at least) but surely if I increase my rep to such an extent through consistant and long term sucess, would be be plauable maybe 15/20 seasons down the line to see Melilla's B team somewherein the 3rd tier? To me it would seem unrealistic in this case for them NOT to be promoted...

[Some Guy!]

Reputation & random chances are the factors that decide teams to be promoted from the inactive leagues, especially when the inactive league is not playable without the use of a custom league edit.

You might want to consider using a custom league file to activate the 4th or even 5th tiers of the German pyramid as this will remove the reputation bias & allow for teams to promoted on sporting merit.

Cool, so I'll just delete this save and forget that all the discussions I had 2 odd years back fell on deaf ears, despite them seeming quite constructive at the time (the best part is that it seems that all the threads I posted between 2008 and 2013 appear to not exist anymore, have they been archived at all?).

Surely, surely after all this time something can be done to right this error through a patch for this game rather than just having the same issues reoccur and go yet again ignored, especially when there's an in game editor that mysteriously lacks the ability to edit German II teams reputations.

[hluraven]

Cool, so I'll just delete this save and forget that all the discussions I had 2 odd years back fell on deaf ears, despite them seeming quite constructive at the time (the best part is that it seems that all the threads I posted between 2008 and 2013 appear to not exist anymore, have they been archived at all?).

Surely, surely after all this time something can be done to right this error through a patch for this game rather than just having the same issues reoccur and go yet again ignored, especially when there's an in game editor that mysteriously lacks the ability to edit German II teams reputations.

So even though you're an expert and the same issues recur, you chose not to start with tier 4/5 active, even though you know that would solve the problem? Best blame someone else though, you can't have done anything wrong.

[milnerpoint]

Yeah its a pretty poor post, Alex has been willingly discussing the issue with you and there is an option out there that would solve your problem.

People wonder why dev's are not that active in here, this is why.

[Some Guy!]

Based on the feedback provided by the research team & real life history we are happy with the frequency of II teams being promoted to the 3rd tier, if you get to a point where you feel that your II team should be in contention for promotion then we can take a look if you're willing to upload a copy of your save, the desired save point would be just before season update day.

As a side note there is no need for the sarcasm, I'm trying to offer some help so the tone & language in your post is not appreciated.

The frequency of their promotion has never been the issue. It's the way that these II teams are stuck in some weird limbo of reputation that is, has and has for the longest time been the issue. An issue that has been brought up, ignored and even you seem to be missing here. To be completely honest I'm equally unappreciative of your tone, as you seem to be completely passing off what is a serious issue, which has been logged in the past (on the bug forum, as well as discussed in general discussion, both many times) and not even approaching it at this point (going to an irrelevant side point).

To repeat, I got to the point of feeling that it was comical the team wasn't promoted back in FM13, discussed it on the bug forums, these discussions at the time seemed very productive, the issue was logged and it appears nothing was done about it. What more am I expected to do? The problem is pretty clear, these teams are given a virtually static reputation, and the reputation seems to be the main factor in promotion. Even teams that are literally scoring 150 to 30 odd conceded (based on generated player stats) don't get promoted. For whatever reason these teams are given no mechanism by which to have their reputation increased, even after all those discussions in the past.

At this point in time I have yet again gone to the bug forums about it, and it is yet again logged as an issue, this time noting that a potential official bandaid would be to patch the in-game editor to actually allow II-team reputations to be edited (as they can't at this point).

As for my "tone", if one sarcastic comment in response to being in effect told "why don't you just delete your game" is "unappreciated" how do you think having logged issues ignored for years feels? I'm unappreciative of being told that deleting my game and turning to modding is the only solution currently available for a serious bug that's been logged on here for years that can be offered by SI staff.

So even though you're an expert and the same issues recur, you chose not to start with tier 4/5 active, even though you know that would solve the problem? Best blame someone else though, you can't have done anything wrong.

2 years ago I had some very productive discussions in the bug forums, and the suggestion at the time was that it was being looked at. I was under the impression that after 2 years such issues, which by this point are well noted would be dealt with, but instead it seems they just giggled and moved on, which I must say is absolutely baffling at this point. This is not a new, unknown issue. This is an old, well known issue that has been explained, discussed and brought up time and time again, and to be blunt, it seems they just aren't taking it seriously.

As a side note, I personally I avoid editor files as I know they can and do cause issues in game at time, and I prefer to have any issues I face be ones caused by the game as it's sold, rather than by any editor files used. This is an issue, and a bandaid "but modding" comment doesn't change that.

Yeah its a pretty poor post, Alex has been willingly discussing the issue with you and there is an option out there that would solve your problem.

People wonder why dev's are not that active in here, this is why.

A poor post? It's been two years since this issue was logged, and it seems that literally nothing was done about it. It's been at least 3 since the first time I brought it up on here, and I've seen references of it going back further than that.

So what you're saying though is one comment in response to being told to restart my save is the reason the devs aren't on here..? Interesting concept...

[Some Guy!]

In terms of its impact on gameplay & the wider issue of game balance this is not a serious issue, there is little to no difference in player development if your II team is in the 3rd or 4th tier so it will not be holding back any players that are part of your II team.

I can see that it could be seen as a frustrating issue if you believe that player development dramatically improves in an active division but this is not the case, if anything the fact that the game is assigning an unrealistic number of goals to your II team is probably the bigger issue & one that is worth further investigation while another consideration is whether the players who are being assigned such high match statistics should be happy being stuck in the II team or should they be pressuring you to promote them to the senior squad or let them leave to a club who will offer them senior team football.

As with all potential issue context is everything which is why I would be keen to get a look at your save file when you next get to season update day.

Having the team in a playable league actually allows them to be available for the II-team while part of the first team squad, which is both convenient and helps avoid the whole "why have I been dropped" issue that can occur with some whingy players. There's also a greater sense of control and input in a II-team in a playable league, and it can add something to the experience. Player development though hasn't really been the issue (as mentioned before, a team which scored 150 goals and conceded 30 one season, largely from my academy).

As for "unrealistic number of goals", it was a ridiculous team, the following season most of them were first team players (a changing of the guard occurred that season) and the primary goal scorer went on to be the Champions League golden boot the season after, having been the German golden boot the first season in the first team. That's part of the issue though, a team that was far too good to even be a third tier team, let alone fail to get promoted. Again though, that was all FM13.

I have since changed computers, and I don't think I have any backups of my saves from FM13, though I could have a look.

Again, my worry here is that it appears the issues of the past haven't been fixed. Is there any reason that II-team reputations are still set are virtually static? Again, if there is more of a mechanism to allow team performance (by generated stats) to affect promotion chances, this problem mightn't be as bad, but as II-teams for smaller sides are rated so poorly in the starting database, they're just stuck in limbo as things stand.

[Some Guy!]

From what I understand other than making senior players available for the II team (that's unrealistic btw & not something the AI will do) the main issues that you have are about perception & immersion rather than any gameplay mechanics, am I correct?

Unrealistic to make senior players available for the II team? Really? Pretty much any football club I've ever kept that close an eye on uses them or behind close door friendlies to keep their senior players currently not playing (or currently coming back from injury) fit. That is a very standard practice to my knowledge. It's also worth noting that not having games directly mentioned for the II-team leads to some issues of dealing with player availability, that is, reserve players who might need to be called up to the first team may end up having "played" in one of these generated fixtures, leading to poor condition.

It's a problem with the game not working as it should. If I've spent time and effort to build a II-team to get promoted, and they are physically and artificially stopped from doing so due to them being unable to change reputation, then that is an issue. When that issue is one that has been brought to the developers attention on multiple occasions, and has previously been discussed with them in what seemed a positive manner, only to be completely ignored, then that is a serious issue.

Surely a fix for this can be produced for this FM, if not a proper one, then even a bandaid such as adding II-team reputation to the in-game editor.

I don't know, it's just extremely frustrating to have done things "by the book" on here in regards to such an issue, for it simply to be ignored. It greatly undermines the way that bugs and issues are meant to be reported on here when after 2 years (and 2 new releases) nothing is done about one that has been reported multiple times, and it seems that it's now trying to be passed off as "oh well, it doesn't matter".

[Some Guy!]

Nothing has been ignored, it's more a case that you do not agree with a design choice that has been made & that's fine as you are not obliged to be happy with every choice that is made.

You've mentioned that the team behind the IGE acknowledged a thread about being unable to adjust a II teams rep & hopefully they can introduce that functionality so that you can alter the game to what you want, as I said earlier in this thread we are happy with the behaviour of II teams based on the feedback we have received from the German research team, as someone who lived in Germany for 13 years & played for a few lower league clubs out there I too am happy with how this area of the game works.

As for senior squad players appearing for the II team to regain or maintain fitness this doesn't happen irl, as an example Gündogen made no appearances for Dortmund II as he recovered from a very serious injury lay-off.

So the choice is to have the entire feature completely broken, having previous said that it was to be looked into.

Again, the problem isn't their behaviour, it's that reserve teams are stuck at a reputation based solely on the initial database and an over reliance on the reputation for selecting promoted teams from nonplayable leagues leads to the issue. The "design choice" about less II teams getting promoted is irrelevant here. The issue is the static reputation, that's the exact issue.

If static reputation for II teams was the design choice, then that is poor design and I have previously been mislead by people on here.

If you desire a discussion on use of the II team, then I'll be more than happy to enter into one later.

[Jean-Luc]

As for senior squad players appearing for the II team to regain or maintain fitness this doesn't happen irl, as an example Gündogen made no appearances for Dortmund II as he recovered from a very serious injury lay-off.

That's not exactly correct, the problem here is more that different clubs use their II team in very different ways.

SC Freiburg for example puts quite a lot of players into their II team to regain match fitness. They also put quite a few new (younger) players who are supposed to be part of the professional team into the II team first to "learn the ropes" of their system. They do profit form the advantage that their 1st team normally is quite young, so they can easily switch some players between the two teams without getting any problems with age restrictions.

At the same time, they totally refuse to rise to 3rd Division. If they gain promotion, they decline to take it, because the amount of logistics is, in the eyes of the club, not worth the effort, and 4th Division is seen as just as valid to train the Youngsters.

[ANDEHLSON]

Based on the feedback provided by the research team & real life history we are happy with the frequency of II teams being promoted to the 3rd tier.

If the team has what it takes to get promoted it should get promoted. That's it. This is a terrible (or lazy) and unrealistic system. It was meh a few years ago, but after all this time...

This is something that has never been well implemented in FM. In previous FMs it wasn't even possible for any kind of B/II/U23 whatever team to get promoted. That included Spanish B teams. Only when they implemented that affiliate system that became a thing. But the ones not set as affiliates still can't get promoted from the unplayable divisions in most leagues (even if they have 9999 reputation, Messi and Ronaldo).

Hell Idk if they can get promoted in any country other than Germany as I tested a couple of leagues in FM14 and it just wouldn't happen.

So even though you're an expert and the same issues recur, you chose not to start with tier 4/5 active, even though you know that would solve the problem? Best blame someone else though, you can't have done anything wrong.

This post is completely ridiculous. It's like there is a button for you to activate the 4th and 5th tiers. Or like every file that adds a start and end of the season date works. Even one I found on some German forum is buggy and has this stubborn idea of implementing the U19s in a buggy way that makes it impossible to scout.