Important attributes for a player role in order of priority

[Sly419]

Does anyone have a link or can provide me with a list of important attributes for the player roles, but in terms of priority. So for instance, if the role was a full back, the attributes would be in a list of say the 2 most important, then the next two etc...

[Draakon]

It's very difficult to list them in priority order in real life as well, I can't imagine it's easier in FM.

More important question for me is which one to develop - should I try to improve weaknesses or try to make strengths even better?

What if your striker has finishing 13 and composure 11. Let's say that finishing holds priority. But what focus should you set for his individual training? Does +1 finishing in this level more important than +1 composure? And what if those attributes are, let's say, 11 and 9? What about then?

[Welshace]

Both of these questions completely depends on how you play the players in question...

i.e if you want your fullback to do a bit of everything, defend and attack etc.. than of course you'll want him to have all the right attributes to cover this..

HOW you want your fullback to attack would be the next level of things to look at.. i.e do you want him to have the pace to attack on the outside or the trickery and vision to move inside and play almost like an inside forward for instance..

It's a lot more difficult to pinpoint than just a simple order or priority..

Just like irl, each manager will prioritise certain attributes in players over others when looking at players.

[phnompenhandy]

My personal philosophy goes like this - at youth level I have them train as Complete Wingback, Central Defender, Central Midfielder, Complete Forward to get a spread of relevant attributes up. Then I assess them and put them on more specific roles so a narrower set of attributes are developed further.

[isignedupfornorealreason]

This is already available with the attributes highlights. Dark blue = more important than the light blue bits apparently.

You just have to read them up in the manual and decide whether that is important or not.

Full backs for example, if you want more defensive fullbacks you'd prioritise marking and tackling, but if you want the more attacking variants you'd suffer a hit to those attributes in order to have greater pace, dribbling and whatever. You might even suffer a lack of pace for a player with incredible crossing ability, but you'd do well to consider making them cross from deep so they don't get caught out when they do venture forward, unless you can cover behind them.

That's why it is impossible to offer more specific guidance, you have to pick and decide based on what level of football you're at. The lower leagues for example, will never, if ever, have a reasonable spread of attributes, and in some cases it is often better to pick the better athlete than it is the better footballer.

One thing I suggest doing once you've got an idea of how players work in your role, is to go through and eliminate attributes you don't need. For example, I don't particularly worry too much about a goalkeeper's kicking and throwing, because I know even if they are poor, I can make sure that his distribution is 90% out of pressure situations anyway, so an error on that part isn't going to be a big deal. And I can accept the risk for other areas, especially if it means I can get a keeper with superior handling skills.