Premier league title in first season with Palace - Why ?

[ifoundthatessence]

So I just won the Premier league  with Palace in my first season playing counter attack. This was really weird, because the worst team i'd ever won the league with in my first season in older versions of the game was Southampton, so i think it's safe to safe that whatever has happened here has pretty much matched up with the demands of playing counter attack within the game. But the question is why ? 

My aim was to recreate Blackburn 1995, have a flat back 4, with two deep midfielders, and then rely upon getting the ball forward very quickly to the front 4, with the wingers putting in crosses to the front two, as Ripley and Wilcox did for Shearer and Sutton.  I also wanted some aggression in the tackle, ala Colin Hendry and David Batty and Tim Sherwood. 

I've done a lot of analysis of the tactic now, i believe one of the foundations of the victory was the determination we scored SO many goals in the 75th + minute - if you see from the mental characteristics of the players (see image), their determination is off the charts. We also won a lot of tackles, and watching the games the amount of sliding tackles going on was ridiculous. I think determination seems to marry well with the counter attacking mentality, as well as the high team work, work rate, bravery, aggression, and the high pace and acceleration of our wide players and strikers.  See the YouTube video to accompany the tactic 

I've attached most of the necessary screenshots. You can download the tactic from the steam workshop http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1209247153. It's also available from mediafire http://www.mediafire.com/file/czsw83zxevde2t0/palace10-1nice.fmf

You also need the overload version of the tactic which i use when chasing a game, e.g. 1 or 2 nil down, or drawing 0-0 at 60 minutes. Available from http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1209309704. Also available from mediafire http://www.mediafire.com/file/hv19q2rd88u16p7/rescuetacticpalace.fmf

The rescue tactic was quite important in the victory, we won a lot of points from coming back from behind or turning 0-0's into wins. Second season, I've just come back from behind twice to beat Man City 5-2. I assume part of the reason for this was the determination though, as well as the stamina, we were often far more fit than our opponents. I think having strong dynamics was also really important, and i focussed upon this straight from day one in training (see season two early season training schedules). Although we're so good second season i rarely use it. Just beat OG Nice 10-1. 

I'll be really interested to know how anyone else gets on testing the tactic, or tweaking it to the demands of their teams. I'm going to test it with a completely different club now and see how it goes. Maybe with out the determined players, and the aggression and pace it might not work so well ? 

I also made a blog post to give a little more info about it, cos i think it's a really exciting tactic https://footballmanager2017dotblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/24/the-classic-english-442-counter-attack/

You can see that it's essentially a structured tactic (which should marry well with less expressive and playing offside). It's a very quick tempo which obviously marries well with width, exploiting flanks and mixed passing. I didn't find pass into space provided any benefit though weirdly, but maybe at a club with better passers it might ? As i said we were very aggressive in the tackle, and OI's were set to the AM, but i set every position to Hard Tackling also. Obviously we used Run At Defence, although no overlapping used, as the wingers are set to attack functions. 

[ifoundthatessence]

overload version. 

[Continum]

Just read your blog. Will definitely try out some of the things you mentioned. Good stuff man, keep it up. 

[Armistice]

Meanwhile I read a lot of tactical articles and guides and still struggle with Spurs 

[ifoundthatessence]

Thanks guys ! 

LOL. We just beat OGNice 10-1 in the Champions League - didn't film it :-( did film the 3-0 win in Seville, so you can see how the tactic plays

Oh believe me - it was pure luck i believe to stumble on this. Like i love tactics and read a lot about them - but when you try to recreate systems in FM, it hardly ever works.

I did ok with my Sarri tactic in FM17 (also on my blog), but it wasn't amazing with smaller clubs, even like Everton i couldn't win the league only 3 Cups. I'll go like 3 or 4 seasons with Palace and I might try to create a Sarri tactic next week or something. 

[wobbly007]

Impressive. It's tempting me to buy FM18 and give it a go!

[looping]

You ask why, I answer.

Win Premier League with Palace. Win any CL match 10-1.

Unless you are constantly micromanaging (and doing it better tan anyone else in the world including the most experienced mods here) you've found a bug and you are exploiting it.

It is very sad this is still posible in FM. It speaks a lot about the game and how nonsense can be.

 

[Ellandroadhero]

Those are some great signings for Palace! What budget did you have!? 

[Lucas_26_7]

On 26 November 2017 at 07:03, looping said:

You ask why, I answer.

Win Premier League with Palace. Win any CL match 10-1.

Unless you are constantly micromanaging (and doing it better tan anyone else in the world including the most experienced mods here) you've found a bug and you are exploiting it.

It is very sad this is still posible in FM. It speaks a lot about the game and how nonsense can be.

 

Is it not simply a recreation of Leicester? Things like this are rare and hard to do, I would say that Leicester's tactic was the real life equivalent of a manager finding a 'bug' and exploiting it.

[Bigpapa42]

Leicester's title win was clearly a bug in reality and an exploit.

[looping]

12 hours ago, Lucas_26_7 said:

Is it not simply a recreation of Leicester? Things like this are rare and hard to do, I would say that Leicester's tactic was the real life equivalent of a manager finding a 'bug' and exploiting it.

A tactic with lots of TI, most of them simply nonsense and the others unnecessary and/or redundant. Structured shape but even more disciplined, exploit the flanks but 2 magnets (dlp, TM) in the middle, wide formation but even play wider, Deep defensive line but play offside trap....

Winning 10-1 a CL match against any competitive team.

Consistently supreme overachieving with a poor side.

a) You are a genious, at the same level tan Rashidi and Cleon which is hardly plausible. 

b) You found a bug.

Tactics were not the reason of Leicester's title. At least, not the most important.

[fmFutbolManager]

3 hours ago, looping said:

A tactic with lots of TI, most of them simply nonsense and the others unnecessary and/or redundant. Structured shape but even more disciplined, exploit the flanks but 2 magnets (dlp, TM) in the middle, wide formation but even play wider, Deep defensive line but play offside trap....

Winning 10-1 a CL match against any competitive team.

Consistently supreme overachieving with a poor side.

a) You are a genious, at the same level tan Rashidi and Cleon which is hardly plausible. 

b) You found a bug.

Tactics were not the reason of Leicester's title. At least, not the most important.

A structured shape still has a level of creative freedom, it may not be much, but it is there.

Exploit the flanks increases the mentality of the wide defenders and wing-backs. It's entirely plausible and reasonable to use this with a Target Man and  DLP. I myself use these instructions with a DLP. If your game plan is to play out from the back, create overloads on the wings and whip/float crosses in for the Target Man.

Playing on Counter mentality naturally will make the shape quite narrow in attack. He's within his rights and it is completely normal to ask the team to play wider. It might cost some issues defensively with his shape as the team look to get back into their defensive shape which will be quite narrow, but getting the wide men out on the touchline when attacking will give them plenty of space, used with the exploit the flanks they'll create good overloads on the wings.

You can play offside with a deep defensive line. I don't know why people thing you can't. It is in instruction that asks the defenders to look to step up when balls are played through to the attackers. It doesn't just mean when you're high up the pitch. Players will still look to play through-balls close to the goal.

Overall, I wouldn't have said there's a lot wrong with that system. A few of the instructions go against the counter mentality, like a higher tempo, but other than that the other things here look plausible. 

[Curtinho]

Does a higher tempo really go against the counter mentality though? Doesn't it simply increase the speed and urgency of the play with the ball? Seems to be exactly what a counter-attacking team would be doing. 

[fmFutbolManager]

 

3 minutes ago, Curtinho said:

Does a higher tempo really go against the counter mentality though? Doesn't it simply increase the speed and urgency of the play with the ball? Seems to be exactly what a counter-attacking team would be doing. 

Are you talking about tempo in the context of counter attacking or the counter mentality? These are two different things. 

[Curtinho]

13 minutes ago, fmFutbolManager said:

 

Are you talking about tempo in the context of counter attacking or the counter mentality? These are two different things. 

I'm talking about it in the context of altering the team mentality through TIs. I don't think it makes sense logically for a team that is set up to play on the counter to not play with a 'higher tempo' regardless of the phase of play. Those teams generally play fairly direct and quickly whether it's on the break or not; there's not a lot of patience on the ball in those sides.

[fmFutbolManager]

2 minutes ago, Curtinho said:

I'm talking about it in the context of altering the team mentality through TIs. I don't think it makes sense logically for a team that is set up to play on the counter to not play with a 'higher tempo' regardless of the phase of play. Those teams generally play fairly direct and quickly whether it's on the break or not; there's not a lot of patience on the ball in those sides.

A counter mentality is a low risk mentality. When a counter is not triggered the play is still cautions with little risk. It's a step up from defensive football, and not too dissimilar, with the main difference being threshold for a  counter is lower. From a goal kick you wouldn't bomb forward with pace and energy, hitting the ball into the channels to catch the opposition team unawares, would you?

So when thinking about the counter mentality, it is a defensive mentality and ordinarily would be played as such. Sit deep, reduce risk taking, but be prepared to attack which when you win the ball and the opposition is our of position. If you are starting from deep and a counter is not on, the play will be much like defensive build up: slow and calculated (unless you fudge the TIs to make it play differently from the default setting)

[looping]

4 hours ago, fmFutbolManager said:

A structured shape still has a level of creative freedom, it may not be much, but it is there.

Exploit the flanks increases the mentality of the wide defenders and wing-backs. It's entirely plausible and reasonable to use this with a Target Man and  DLP. I myself use these instructions with a DLP. If your game plan is to play out from the back, create overloads on the wings and whip/float crosses in for the Target Man.

Playing on Counter mentality naturally will make the shape quite narrow in attack. He's within his rights and it is completely normal to ask the team to play wider. It might cost some issues defensively with his shape as the team look to get back into their defensive shape which will be quite narrow, but getting the wide men out on the touchline when attacking will give them plenty of space, used with the exploit the flanks they'll create good overloads on the wings.

You can play offside with a deep defensive line. I don't know why people thing you can't. It is in instruction that asks the defenders to look to step up when balls are played through to the attackers. It doesn't just mean when you're high up the pitch. Players will still look to play through-balls close to the goal.

Overall, I wouldn't have said there's a lot wrong with that system. A few of the instructions go against the counter mentality, like a higher tempo, but other than that the other things here look plausible. 

All you said is a load of nonsense, if not completely wrong. It doesn't follow any real life logic, nor FM logic.

Any tactic that produces magical results (win PL with Palace, beat any CL team 10-1....), unless you are constantly micromanaging (and even in that case), is exploiting a bug/ME flaw/AI stupidity and needs further investigation by SI to fix it.

 

[Pablo Sanchez]

14 minutes ago, looping said:

All you said is a load of nonsense, if not completely wrong. It doesn't follow any real life logic, nor FM logic.

Any tactic that produces magical results (win PL with Palace, beat any CL team 10-1....), unless you are constantly micromanaging (and even in that case), is exploiting a bug/ME flaw/AI stupidity and needs further investigation by SI to fix it.

 

Salty mate?

[looping]

1 minute ago, Pablo Sanchez said:

Salty mate?

Just discussing the topic.

12 minutes ago, looping said:

ny tactic that produces magical results (win PL with Palace, beat any CL team 10-1....), unless you are constantly micromanaging (and even in that case), is exploiting a bug/ME flaw/AI stupidity and needs further investigation by SI to fix it

If you disagree from that, we are living in different realities and there is no point on discussing anything. No tactic should produce this kind of results.

 

[ifoundthatessence]

On ‎26‎/‎11‎/‎2017 at 07:38, Ellandroadhero said:

Those are some great signings for Palace! What budget did you have!? 

Hey pal. 

We had like 15m or something, from expanding the expectations to EURO Cup qualification. Then i raised 57m from players sales. McArthur, £15m, Dann, £7m, etc, plenty of loans out too. That gave us about 70m. 

So with Zivkovic, i paid £8m up front, then £30m over three seasons. We were able to do similar things for the others, Wendell for 6m plus 10 over 3 seasons, etc. Fellaini out of contract in June, can be bought for 3m, same with Vida. Huth and Cahill were peanuts. Yeah, just made sure that they all had amazing mental stats. 

Great save, though wheels are off second season. Still finished second though, and got to champs league final. 

[ifoundthatessence]

5 hours ago, fmFutbolManager said:

A structured shape still has a level of creative freedom, it may not be much, but it is there.

Exploit the flanks increases the mentality of the wide defenders and wing-backs. It's entirely plausible and reasonable to use this with a Target Man and  DLP. I myself use these instructions with a DLP. If your game plan is to play out from the back, create overloads on the wings and whip/float crosses in for the Target Man.

Playing on Counter mentality naturally will make the shape quite narrow in attack. He's within his rights and it is completely normal to ask the team to play wider. It might cost some issues defensively with his shape as the team look to get back into their defensive shape which will be quite narrow, but getting the wide men out on the touchline when attacking will give them plenty of space, used with the exploit the flanks they'll create good overloads on the wings.

You can play offside with a deep defensive line. I don't know why people thing you can't. It is in instruction that asks the defenders to look to step up when balls are played through to the attackers. It doesn't just mean when you're high up the pitch. Players will still look to play through-balls close to the goal.

Overall, I wouldn't have said there's a lot wrong with that system. A few of the instructions go against the counter mentality, like a higher tempo, but other than that the other things here look plausible. 

Thanks man, that's really helpful. 

I actually didn't realise that counter constricts width, so that's good to know. I've always loved football tactics, but never delved into the fm tactics in this level of depth, so all the theoretical content on the site is learning for me. 

I agree that it obviously has elements of an exploit about it - but i think in the blog / video i make it clear I did a lot of analysing what happened to the team when i fiddled around with the TI's, and use the analysis screens to ensure that PI's were not harming our overall style. I actually played a lot of friendlies throughout the season, and experimented with different things. I used the % GW stat to pick my team as well, which i'd never done before. I mean i guess my approach was reactive and data analytic driven in that sense, and i'm a data geek so i ended up fitting a tactic to the demands of the engine instead of imposing a system on it. Although i never wanted it to lose too much fidelity to Dalglish's Blackburn, which was my initial aim, despite the tinkering. 

It's not great at Leicester or Newcastle, mid table at Xmas in both, which is suggestive of it not being a total exploit. The cohesion isn't as high as quickly, as it was at Palace, nor is the overall determination, work rate, team work of the squad, but pace stats are higher at Leicester though. I still think there's something unique about what happened there, which is really interesting. 

Interesting cheers.  

J 

[fmFutbolManager]

7 hours ago, looping said:

All you said is a load of nonsense, if not completely wrong. It doesn't follow any real life logic, nor FM logic.

 

Which part specifically—in your opinion—is nonesense? Could you quote specifically the parts that you are rubbishing and give a detailed explanation of why it is illogical. Thanks. 

[looping]

8 hours ago, fmFutbolManager said:

Which part specifically—in your opinion—is nonesense? Could you quote specifically the parts that you are rubbishing and give a detailed explanation of why it is illogical. Thanks. 

 

19 hours ago, fmFutbolManager said:

A structured shape still has a level of creative freedom, it may not be much, but it is there.

And why you want to be more disciplined? What specifically happened during the match that encourages you to tell your players to be more disciplined? More tan what Structured shape implies?

 

14 hours ago, ifoundthatessence said:

your game plan is to play out from the back

If your game plan is to play out from the back, why do you use a TM which is exacty and precisely the opposite?

 

I'm not going to get caught up in this, a total waste of time.  If a tactic allows you to supreme overachieve consistently, without constant tweaking, reacting to match events, you simply found a bug and are exploiting it. Perhaps you didn't realize, but that's the only plausible explanation.

There is no magic combination of roles, duties and instructions that allow you to overachieve to this extent (10-1 win against CL team) unless you are exploiting a ME flaw.

 

 

[ifoundthatessence]

30 minutes ago, looping said:

 

And why you want to be more disciplined? What specifically happened during the match that encourages you to tell your players to be more disciplined? More tan what Structured shape implies?

 

If your game plan is to play out from the back, why do you use a TM which is exacty and precisely the opposite?

 

I'm not going to get caught up in this, a total waste of time.  If a tactic allows you to supreme overachieve consistently, without constant tweaking, reacting to match events, you simply found a bug and are exploiting it. Perhaps you didn't realize, but that's the only plausible explanation.

There is no magic combination of roles, duties and instructions that allow you to overachieve to this extent (10-1 win against CL team) unless you are exploiting a ME flaw.

 

 

Hi Mate 

I looked to create a varied approach really. 

I think I wrote in the blog, Benteke being set to target man was more a case of utilising him in his best role. Obviously Sutton and Shearer assumed these roles at Blackburn in terms of receiving long direct central balls, holding up the ball, and then involving the wide players (hence their mentalities are set higher and we play wider). 

I alternated GK distribution over the season, playing long initially, then utilising Cabaye in a kind of quarterback role id seen Xhaka and Pirlo do especially well for their countries. Hence he has DLPD set up. 

A lot of this was using players beat roles and thinking how they could be best used. 

If players are playing in their best roles, the tactic and team is fully cohesive throughout the season, the system uses players strengths, they all have very high mental attributes, and the obsession over morale means that players are always very very happy - would this not satisfy the majority of demands the game wants you to make ???

[fmFutbolManager]

1 hour ago, looping said:

 

And why you want to be more disciplined? What specifically happened during the match that encourages you to tell your players to be more disciplined? More tan what Structured shape implies?

 

If your game plan is to play out from the back, why do you use a TM which is exacty and precisely the opposite?

 

I'm not going to get caught up in this, a total waste of time.  If a tactic allows you to supreme overachieve consistently, without constant tweaking, reacting to match events, you simply found a bug and are exploiting it. Perhaps you didn't realize, but that's the only plausible explanation.

There is no magic combination of roles, duties and instructions that allow you to overachieve to this extent (10-1 win against CL team) unless you are exploiting a ME flaw.

 

 

Having done some research on you, I'm now not sure if you're trolling or genuinely engaging in conversation so I will give you the benefit of the doubt.

Say, for arguments sake, creative freedom is evenly distributed across the shapes, form 0-20 with Highly Structured having 0 creative freedom to Very Fluid having 20. It stands to reason that there is some creative freedom distributed to players on a Structured shape. So, be more disciplined dials this down further.

I'm not sure what you misunderstand about the role of a Target Man, but it is very possible to play our from the back and still use one. It is not precisely the opposite as you put it. There are different phases of play during the course of a match. Restarting a match from a goal kick, for example, and playing out from the back is very possible with a Target Man. If you go to your goal keeper's individual settings, you can tell him to distribute to the central defenders, you can tell him to distribute to a Target Man, you can tell him to look for a playmaker if you wish. If you choose to distribute to the central defenders and ask them to play out from the back they will do. Sure they may hit the ball up to the Target Man sometimes, but they'll also attempt to play out.

I'm not arguing about the exploitative nature of the tactic, I'm arguing your insinuations that the instructions are illogical. 

[looping]

 

1 hour ago, fmFutbolManager said:

'm not sure what you misunderstand about the role of a Target Man, but it is very possible to play our from the back and still use one

If you want to play out from the back with a TM, then of course is perfectly plausible to win PL with Palace and win 10-1 CL matches. Follows the same logic.

Seriously,OP asked why, I answered, I can be wrong or right, you can agree or disagree. The point has been made.

[Helmerzinho]

looping, clearly you lost the loop here....

i suggest you go look for the princess in another castle 

[FrazT]

Cut out the bickering please- be civil and keep on topic.

[Pablo Sanchez]

This is just a great tactic. And recruitment with players that suit the system. It is not a exploit anymore then Leicester tactics in real life

[looping]

I had a far more angry and less constructive answer so I'd rather say:

Obviously this is a great tactic and so are the results it produces. What I tried to answer is why is a great tactic, which is precisely what the OP asked.

It's a great tactic because there is something wrong in the ME it is exploiting. Those results are not realistic unless your standards are to beat CL teams 10-1. In that case, I surrender.

Otherwise, which is more rational, OP found a combination of roles duties and instructions which produces and unrealistic overachievement that shouldn't be allowed by the game.

Almost everything in the tactic is against both FM and real life logics and if you can't see this, I'm done. The most basic football and FM concepts are contradicted. If you think play out from the back+Tm is a rational combination, ok, feel free to think whatever you want but you are wrong all in all.

Excellent tactic, for the download section, which is fine, but not a realistic tactic, not even in Fm terms.

[BadAss88]

38 minutes ago, looping said:

I had a far more angry and less constructive answer so I'd rather say:

Obviously this is a great tactic and so are the results it produces. What I tried to answer is why is a great tactic, which is precisely what the OP asked.

It's a great tactic because there is something wrong in the ME it is exploiting. Those results are not realistic unless your standards are to beat CL teams 10-1. In that case, I surrender.

Otherwise, which is more rational, OP found a combination of roles duties and instructions which produces and unrealistic overachievement that shouldn't be allowed by the game.

Almost everything in the tactic is against both FM and real life logics and if you can't see this, I'm done. The most basic football and FM concepts are contradicted. If you think play out from the back+Tm is a rational combination, ok, feel free to think whatever you want but you are wrong all in all.

Excellent tactic, for the download section, which is fine, but not a realistic tactic, not even in Fm terms.

You've made your point already! No need to repeat it 6 times

[dan_bre_1988]

13 hours ago, looping said:

I had a far more angry and less constructive answer so I'd rather say:

Obviously this is a great tactic and so are the results it produces. What I tried to answer is why is a great tactic, which is precisely what the OP asked.

It's a great tactic because there is something wrong in the ME it is exploiting. Those results are not realistic unless your standards are to beat CL teams 10-1. In that case, I surrender.

Otherwise, which is more rational, OP found a combination of roles duties and instructions which produces and unrealistic overachievement that shouldn't be allowed by the game.

Almost everything in the tactic is against both FM and real life logics and if you can't see this, I'm done. The most basic football and FM concepts are contradicted. If you think play out from the back+Tm is a rational combination, ok, feel free to think whatever you want but you are wrong all in all.

Excellent tactic, for the download section, which is fine, but not a realistic tactic, not even in Fm terms.

I agree to an extent that the tactic has exploited something in the ME as winning the league as Palace in the first season is completely unrealistic, as is beating a CL 10-1. However, I'm not sure having read the conversation, that the OP has deliberately tried to exploit a bug. He's analysed his tactic and created something that works and his explanation is logical with regards to what he was looking for.

The fascination with playing out from the back with a target man is something that intrigues me. Not sure why it is so illogical? Rightly or wrongly, in my Spurs save, I play Llorente as a TM when I'm resting Kane (or he is injured) with a 4231, I want my wingers pushing wide and playing crosses into the box for Llorente as he is more effective in the air so their PI is cross more often and aim for TM.

However, my general style is to play out from the back and control the game. Sometimes the Cbs will play it direct, yes but in general a shorter passing style will mean they play out more often than not.

[shadster]

14 hours ago, looping said:

Almost everything in the tactic is against both FM and real life logics and if you can't see this, I'm done. The most basic football and FM concepts are contradicted. If you think play out from the back+Tm is a rational combination, ok, feel free to think whatever you want but you are wrong all in all.

Excellent tactic, for the download section, which is fine, but not a realistic tactic, not even in Fm terms.

 

On 28/11/2017 at 00:19, looping said:

All you said is a load of nonsense, if not completely wrong. It doesn't follow any real life logic, nor FM logic.

Any tactic that produces magical results (win PL with Palace, beat any CL team 10-1....), unless you are constantly micromanaging (and even in that case), is exploiting a bug/ME flaw/AI stupidity and needs further investigation by SI to fix it.

 

You often quote experts on tactics, Cleon, Rashidi, etc, and one thing I think they always say is there's multiple ways of play and understand this game. There's no FM logic, there's many FM logic. What fmFutbolManager wrote may not be logical to you, but the explanations he gave are far from nonsense, I think. 

The tactic, personally I don't use so many TI, as I don't have the knowledge or the patience to implement them, and good to see a good 4-4-2 tactic, because as I said before, I was never able to implement a 4-4-2 tactic with success. I always feel that my mildfield become to weak and exposed on the defensive phase, I loose control of games, and playing usually with Benfica I like my team to dominate the game.

 

[ifoundthatessence]

14 hours ago, looping said:

I had a far more angry and less constructive answer so I'd rather say:

Obviously this is a great tactic and so are the results it produces. What I tried to answer is why is a great tactic, which is precisely what the OP asked.

It's a great tactic because there is something wrong in the ME it is exploiting. Those results are not realistic unless your standards are to beat CL teams 10-1. In that case, I surrender.

Otherwise, which is more rational, OP found a combination of roles duties and instructions which produces and unrealistic overachievement that shouldn't be allowed by the game.

Almost everything in the tactic is against both FM and real life logics and if you can't see this, I'm done. The most basic football and FM concepts are contradicted. If you think play out from the back+Tm is a rational combination, ok, feel free to think whatever you want but you are wrong all in all.

Excellent tactic, for the download section, which is fine, but not a realistic tactic, not even in Fm terms.

Perhaps I've not been clear about the philosophy as well as the approach i took ? I've highlighted interesting things in bold, just because, although I've said them all before, they don't seem to be filtering through into the minds of some. 

The GK kicks long to target man - this was varied throughout the season, including distribution to the playmaker (as I've said numerous occasions - the purpose was to get a system and tweak it to work with the match engine, through trial and error and an data analytical approach). As i note, i used %GW in selecting the team as well as using the Analysis screens post-game to look at where possession was being lost, and mistakes were being made. Perhaps this is not a realistic approach ? 

Anyway, back to this issue of the playmaker, when i clicked distribute to playmaker, in my head, i had thought about the way Kante and Drinkwater do drop deep and spray passes to the front two at Leicester (although agreed that neither Leicester striker is a Target Man - i assume though they bought Slimani to essentially achieve this ? Maybe you should slate Ranieri for thinking up something unrealistic?), i'd also thought of the likes of Pirlo in the QB role pinging balls upto Italy's front 2 in Euro 2012 (was Balotelli not playing as a Target Man ? maybe Prandelli also being unrealistic?),  or the way Xhaka plays direct to Giroud when he actually starts. I agree that Sherwood into Shearer / Sutton was not a frequently used tactic by Blackburn - but it does happen. No-one can deny, that using Sutton as a target man in a Blackburn replication is not a loss of fidelity ? Would you also say that Sherwood was not a playmaker ? i imagine if you asked Blackburn fans, whether he was a box to box, or a central midfielder, or a playmaker, a decent proportion would say he was a playmaker. So you've got Cabaye, whos' a great playmaker ? Why would you not choose a setting for him that is reasonably consistent with the influence behind your tactic ? If you want to discuss this idea why not be constructive - why don't you comment on whether or not, using players best roles in a tactic is a constructive method or not ? Is it not constructive ? Is it better to go with only one magnet and play players in a slightly less suitable position or is it better to go with two central magnets which ensure that players play in the best position possible whilst achieving relative fidelity to your inspiration and winning too ? If it is the case that you should never tailor your system to players strengths then why when teams sign players do they tailor their system according to players best roles ? Is this unrealistic ? You're obviously reasonably knowledgeable about these issues, it might be nice for a novice like me, and other novices reading the post, to understand why this isn't an appropriate method. I would argue that dealing with things like magnets and player roles is a case of trade offs. But anyway. 

And tbf, in this tactic, despite being set as the DLP, Cabaye doesn't often play direct to Benteke. I've also stated, that i used a lot of tinkering and analysis through spreadsheets to try and figure out effective combinations of things i was unsure about - citing that it was a data driven tactic to a degree. I thought some people might find this method interesting ? Maybe everyone does tinker and play lots of friendlies to try and develop their tactic to a better degree ? Or maybe someone found it useful to know that that's a good method of fine tuning the tactic ? Maybe using data to analyse tactics and them make subtle changes to them is not a realistic method in football ? Weird though, that clubs spend millions on data analytic approaches ? Again, be nice to know why doing so, is not realistic, ot consistent with the principles of the game ? 

I'd be happier, if perhaps you addressed the ways in which there was a loss of fidelity from the Blackburn tactic - I've watched many many of their goals from 1994-95, and believe me the job this tactic does is reasonably good job of replicating the style. It's not a like for like, and as I've done throughout this thread, in my videos, and in the blog, a reasonable job, i think, of trying to explain the influences behind the style. Perhaps, you are an expert on Dlaglish's Blackburn, and can help me achieve better fidelity, whilst not compromising the success of the tactic, that'd be great. 

The idea, that it's an exploit tactic, in my view, appears to lack justification, given that it has done a mediocre job at Leicester and Newcastle. So there are obviously factors, about Palace and this tactic, which lead it to achieve the success it did. So ok, it's overpowered at Palace, but why not address what it was overpowered at Palace with these players ? That was the purpose of my post. I've put forward the suggestion that the determination of the players, together with the ability to win the ball back contributed to the success of the overload tactic in rescuing many games - and I've advanced the idea that having constantly full morale was also important, as was very good and excellent cohesion. I'd be more interested in whether those are factors unique to Palace ? Perhaps others have tried it, and also had some success ? Then we could look at what makes it successful and better understand it's fundamental essence. I'd love to know, how i could get Newcastle and Leicester playing well, because at the moment, ive' wasted two days trying to figure it out. 

In my Milan save, i'm in February i still don't have full cohesion, it's much harder to maintain perfect morale, and i don't yet have the level of determination that i would like for the players to pull off the Saachi essence.  I've tried using the overload tactic at Milan to save games, and it's nowhere near as effective. Again, perhaps others have used it, and it's worked brilliantly. Again, i'd be interested. 

In fact, there are an unlimited amount of interesting avenues that one could go down in analysis this tactic - again, which was the purpose of the post. I've highlighted in bold, perhaps the number of interesting discussion points you might want to make in any future replies. You seem to know the game, so i'd be genuinely interested in your replies. 

I'm glad that others are enjoying using the tactic, and reading the post, it was my first post on here, and it';s nice to know there are supportive people out there, as well as receiving constructive comments from other people. This was the purpose of the post,  as well as the time I've put into making the tactic, it's origins, and how i built it public. 

J  

 

 

[looping]

6 hours ago, dan_bre_1988 said:

that the OP has deliberately tried to exploit a bug

In my humble opinión, which can be wrong, he obviously didn't try to deliberately exploit a bug.

That said, the tactic is obviously exploting something, those results are simply imposible otherwise, unless you are a Fm magician, better tan the best mods here. Nothing written here encourages to think so.

6 hours ago, dan_bre_1988 said:

The fascination with playing out from the back with a target man is something that intrigues me. Not sure why it is so illogical? Rightly or wrongly, in my Spurs save, I play Llorente as a TM when I'm resting Kane (or he is injured) with a 4231, I want my wingers pushing wide and playing crosses into the box for Llorente as he is more effective in the air so their PI is cross more often and aim for TM.

This is not what a TM does. A TM drops Deep to get the ball, holds it up and waits for teammates to join the attack. Finally, provides a good aerial presence inside the box.

Though, the most important part is ignored here. TM almost overwrites any other tactical instruction because players will look at him with long balls (TARGET MAN), which absolutely conflicts with playing out from the back (actually, it conflicts with anything that doesn't involve channeling the play almost exclusively through him). You want a big, tall strong striker who can finish crosses? Use a DLF or even a DF. They do exactly the same tan a TM without the magnet effect so you can effectively play out from the back.

5 hours ago, shadster said:

There's no FM logic, there's many FM logic. What fmFutbolManager wrote may not be logical to you, but the explanations he gave are far from nonsense, I think. 

FM logic means following what each role/duty and instruction produces. There are obvious contractidory and redundant instrucions. You can have a general visión of how you want your team to play and you can preset some instructions. That's fine, but you don't know if that is producing the kind of football you want until you watch a match. At the end, TI come with observation: my point is, for instance, you want your team to strictly follow your instructions, defenders defend, midfielders transition and strikers attack, you don't want creative freedom. It's a good call to go Structured shape. Okay, then what did you specifically see during the matches that made you use the be more disciplined instruction? Why did you decide to overkill creative freedom? Did you see too much creative freedom? When, how and why? You need to be specific to answer this questions.

I see here a general and prematch logic, which is fine, but no way explains the use of Be More disciplined instruction.

The same with Close down more or play wider. Do you know that playing wider your wingers will have technically less space? Did you observe that? What encouraged you to think your central players didn't have enough space? In every match happened the same? No matter the opponent and its tactics?

There is no based on observation thinking behind, so the only explanation for the results is a lucky encounter with a combination of roles, duties and instructions that exploits something in the ME.

6 hours ago, ifoundthatessence said:

The GK kicks long to target man - this was varied throughout the season, including distribution to the playmaker (as I've said numerous occasions - the purpose was to get a system and tweak it to work with the match engine, through trial and error and an data analytical approach). As i note, i used %GW in selecting the team as well as using the Analysis screens post-game to look at where possession was being lost, and mistakes were being made. Perhaps this is not a realistic approach ? 

That's fine. In case you are constantly tweaking and having these results due to this constant tweaking you should be able to answer the questions I've raised.

If you can, then I apologize and I acknowledge I was completely wrong.

what did you specifically see during the matches that made you use the be more disciplined instruction? Why did you decide to overkill creative freedom? Did you see too much creative freedom? When, how and why?

 

6 hours ago, ifoundthatessence said:

ould you also say that Sherwood was not a playmaker ? i imagine if you asked Blackburn fans, whether he was a box to box, or a central midfielder, or a playmaker, a decent proportion would say he was a playmaker. So you've got Cabaye, whos' a great playmaker ? Why would you not choose a setting for him that is reasonably consistent with the influence behind your tactic ? If you want to discuss this idea why not be constructive - why don't you comment on whether or not, using players best roles in a tactic is a constructive method or not ? Is it not constructive ?

This is completely missing the point.

You don't need to use a playmaker role to make one of your players to be the playmaker of your team. A cm or a bbm can perfectly act as playmakers, if you set your roles and duties properly arround him.

Essentially, the difference is playmaker roles have a magnet effect. 

Using players best roles in a tactic is not a constructive method at all. This has been discussed multiple times and I won't go for it again. Any player can play any role/duty if he has the righ attributes and that doesn't necesseraly mean Green circles on the chalk board.

6 hours ago, ifoundthatessence said:

And tbf, in this tactic, despite being set as the DLP, Cabaye doesn't often play direct to Benteke.

Then, why do you use a TM if you don't want your players to play direct to him?!?!?!?

 

Seriously, those are excellent results, keep it up. You asked why you were winning and I answered. That's all.

[shadster]

38 minutes ago, looping said:

FM logic means following what each role/duty and instruction produces. There are obvious contractidory and redundant instrucions. You can have a general visión of how you want your team to play and you can preset some instructions. That's fine, but you don't know if that is producing the kind of football you want until you watch a match. At the end, TI come with observation: my point is, for instance, you want your team to strictly follow your instructions, defenders defend, midfielders transition and strikers attack, you don't want creative freedom. It's a good call to go Structured shape. Okay, then what did you specifically see during the matches that made you use the be more disciplined instruction? Why did you decide to overkill creative freedom? Did you see too much creative freedom? When, how and why? You need to be specific to answer this questions.

I see here a general and prematch logic, which is fine, but no way explains the use of Be More disciplined instruction.

The same with Close down more or play wider. Do you know that playing wider your wingers will have technically less space? Did you observe that? What encouraged you to think your central players didn't have enough space? In every match happened the same? No matter the opponent and its tactics?

There is no based on observation thinking behind, so the only explanation for the results is a lucky encounter with a combination of roles, duties and instructions that exploits something in the ME.

 

You are pointing your vision of the game. Is not right or wrong, is your vision and I'm sure of many others as you have been helped by people who are great at the game. But others don´t have to play the game that way. If the OP decided that he didn't want to play very structured as this would result maybe in too much space between lines and wanted to reduce creative freadom to the level of very structured. He does not have to watch the game and see what happens, it could simply be the way he wants the team to play. And the explanations that fmFutbolManager pointed made all sense to me, and you called it all nonsense. 

My point is, you clearly have learned a lot, and I'm sure most of the things you write are correct, bue you forgot one part I've pointed you. All of the great players of this game say that there's many ways of playing it, understand it, and they say that it's one of the fun things about it. I followed many of your threads, as I learned a lot on them. But you had many many many different advices and people sharing their view. It doesn't mean some were wrong.. they see, understand and play the game with different visions and interpretations. That's all I'm trying to say

[looping]

1 minute ago, shadster said:

You are pointing your vision of the game. Is not right or wrong, is your vision and I'm sure of many others as you have been helped by people who are great at the game. But others don´t have to play the game that way. If the OP decided that he didn't want to play very structured as this would result maybe in too much space between lines and wanted to reduce creative freadom to the level of very structured. He does not have to watch the game and see what happens, it could simply be the way he wants the team to play. And the explanations that fmFutbolManager pointed made all sense to me, and you called it all nonsense. 

My point is, you clearly have learned a lot, and I'm sure most of the things you write are correct, bue you forgot one part I've pointed you. All of the great players of this game say hat there's many ways of playing it, understand it, and they say that it's one of the fun things about it. I followed many of your threads, as I learned a lot on them. But you had many many many different advices and people sharing their view. It doesn't mean some were wrong.. they see, understand and play the game with different visions and interpretations. That's all I'm trying to say

I agree to some extent,

The problem comes when you use redundant and contradictory roles, duties and instructions. Can you do that? Yes. Can this work? Yes. The point is, if you use redundant and contradictory instructions, you are looking for  very specific effect which can only be spotted via match observation.

You have a general ideaof how you want to play (disciplined, strikers attack, defenders defend), go structured. You have what you want. Then, if you add Be More disciplined it's because you've seen something during the match, otherwise is just gambling.

If he used a fluid shape and he wanted to kill creative freedom (which is fine), the use of Be More disciplined wouldn' t be redundand and would make perfect sense. No further explanations would be needed. It's a good general idea that you can preset before a match.

Structured+be more disciplined is so specific and extreme that can be only be wisely used after watching a match and spotting why, how and when you needed less creative freedom.

[shadster]

Structured + be more disciplined = creative freadom from very structured but with less space between lines. Makes sense to me.

And my first reply on this post is that I don't use that many TI's, as I don't have the knowledge and the time/patience to understand them all. And I'm happy to see a good 4-4-2 as I've never made one 4-4-2 work. 

[ifoundthatessence]

32 minutes ago, looping said:

In my humble opinión, which can be wrong, he obviously didn't try to deliberately exploit a bug.

That said, the tactic is obviously exploting something, those results are simply imposible otherwise, unless you are a Fm magician, better tan the best mods here. Nothing written here encourages to think so.

This is not what a TM does. A TM drops Deep to get the ball, holds it up and waits for teammates to join the attack. Finally, provides a good aerial presence inside the box.

Though, the most important part is ignored here. TM almost overwrites any other tactical instruction because players will look at him with long balls (TARGET MAN), which absolutely conflicts with playing out from the back (actually, it conflicts with anything that doesn't involve channeling the play almost exclusively through him). You want a big, tall strong striker who can finish crosses? Use a DLF or even a DF. They do exactly the same tan a TM without the magnet effect so you can effectively play out from the back.

FM logic means following what each role/duty and instruction produces. There are obvious contractidory and redundant instrucions. You can have a general visión of how you want your team to play and you can preset some instructions. That's fine, but you don't know if that is producing the kind of football you want until you watch a match. At the end, TI come with observation: my point is, for instance, you want your team to strictly follow your instructions, defenders defend, midfielders transition and strikers attack, you don't want creative freedom. It's a good call to go Structured shape. Okay, then what did you specifically see during the matches that made you use the be more disciplined instruction? Why did you decide to overkill creative freedom? Did you see too much creative freedom? When, how and why? You need to be specific to answer this questions.

I see here a general and prematch logic, which is fine, but no way explains the use of Be More disciplined instruction.

The same with Close down more or play wider. Do you know that playing wider your wingers will have technically less space? Did you observe that? What encouraged you to think your central players didn't have enough space? In every match happened the same? No matter the opponent and its tactics?

There is no based on observation thinking behind, so the only explanation for the results is a lucky encounter with a combination of roles, duties and instructions that exploits something in the ME.

That's fine. In case you are constantly tweaking and having these results due to this constant tweaking you should be able to answer the questions I've raised.

If you can, then I apologize and I acknowledge I was completely wrong.

what did you specifically see during the matches that made you use the be more disciplined instruction? Why did you decide to overkill creative freedom? Did you see too much creative freedom? When, how and why?

 

This is completely missing the point.

You don't need to use a playmaker role to make one of your players to be the playmaker of your team. A cm or a bbm can perfectly act as playmakers, if you set your roles and duties properly arround him.

Essentially, the difference is playmaker roles have a magnet effect. 

Using players best roles in a tactic is not a constructive method at all. This has been discussed multiple times and I won't go for it again. Any player can play any role/duty if he has the righ attributes and that doesn't necesseraly mean Green circles on the chalk board.

Then, why do you use a TM if you don't want your players to play direct to him?!?!?!?

 

Seriously, those are excellent results, keep it up. You asked why you were winning and I answered. That's all.

 

4 minutes ago, looping said:

I agree to some extent,

The problem comes when you use redundant and contradictory roles, duties and instructions. Can you do that? Yes. Can this work? Yes. The point is, if you use redundant and contradictory instructions, you are looking for  very specific effect which can only be spotted via match observation.

You have a general ideaof how you want to play (disciplined, strikers attack, defenders defend), go structured. You have what you want. Then, if you add Be More disciplined it's because you've seen something during the match, otherwise is just gambling.

If he used a fluid shape and he wanted to kill creative freedom (which is fine), the use of Be More disciplined wouldn' t be redundand and would make perfect sense. No further explanations would be needed. It's a good general idea that you can preset before a match.

Structured+be more disciplined is so specific and extreme that can be only be wisely used after watching a match and spotting why, how and when you needed less creative freedom.

As I've said a few times, i'm not up on exactly how the match engine replicates certain things. Again, in my head, structured + more disciplined,  was the starting place for the tactic. It was about absolute risk minimisation and trying to build a strong defensive unit from which we could add the offensive style i wanted to play. It was about having players stay in their positions and having a strong shape. 

Do you not think that Burnley under Dyche play like this ? I genuinely don't know, and it's been great in the past few threads to hear you explain some aspects of the tactics i had not thought about. 

J 

 

[ifoundthatessence]

Also i'm into April now on my Saachi save, and the overload component of the Palace save just does not work at AC WHATSOEVER.

Weird. 

 

 

[looping]

36 minutes ago, shadster said:

Structured + be more disciplined = creative freadom from very structured but with less space between lines

Can you spot during a match the difference in terms of creative freedom between structured and very structured? If you can't, using be more disciplined has no rational support. If you can, then you are top 10 fm players in the world.

 

38 minutes ago, shadster said:

nd I'm happy to see a good 4-4-2 as I've never made one 4-4-2 work.

Have you played fm18? It maybe only me, but I've find easier to play 442..

31 minutes ago, ifoundthatessence said:

Again, in my head, structured + more disciplined,  was the starting place for the tactic. It was about absolute risk minimisation and trying to build a strong defensive unit

The most defensive combination of mentality + shape is Contain+very fluid.

32 minutes ago, ifoundthatessence said:

It was about having players stay in their positions and having a strong shape.

If you wanted your players to stay in their positions, why didn't you use stick to positions instead of Be more disciplined which only kills creative freedom?

 

42 minutes ago, ifoundthatessence said:

Also i'm into April now on my Saachi save, and the overload component of the Palace save just does not work at AC WHATSOEVER.

A ME exploit doesn't equal to Plug&Play tactic.

.

 

 

 

 

[shadster]

I'm playing FM 18, but didn´t try 4-4-2. I'm pretty happy with my 4-3-3 or sometimes I use a 4-2-3-1.  Maybe when I'm done with this save I will try a 4-4-2 formation. 

[TCSSkin]

On 11/27/2017 at 16:53, looping said:

Winning 10-1 a CL match against any competitive team.

I beat Viktoria Plzen 10-0 with my newly promoted to the Championship Blackburn Rovers, using a tactic that went 1-4 in the first 5 league games? Matches like that happen, Southampton beat Sunderland, what? 8-0 a few years back

[herne79]

I'm stepping down as a Mod so I didn't want to get involved here, but I will.

@looping You've previously been told to stay out of the T&T forum.  But this is FM18, a fresh start and we gave you some rope to post help threads, which you've done.  But arguing the toss and constantly trying to defend your own incorrect corner by labouring dodgy points is taking it too far.  You've made your point and you'll do well to listen to people such as @fmFutbolManager.

@ifoundthatessence - No idea what your other results are (or why people are assuming what they are), but good job on taking Palace into the CL.  That particular 10-1 result which seems to have got some so riled up isn't necessarily exploitative (you'd need to repeat similar results for that to happen) but it is somewhat freakish.  Freakish results do occasionally occur in real life as they do in FM so they tend to stand out when they happen.  What you could do is open a new thread in the FM18 ME Issues Forum with the match pkm just to flag it up to SI to say along the lines of "hey, bit of a freakish result.  Not raising a bug as such but something for you to look at to see if anything can be learned".

[looping]

57 minutes ago, bluestillidie00 said:

I beat Viktoria Plzen 10-0 with my newly promoted to the Championship Blackburn Rovers, using a tactic that went 1-4 in the first 5 league games? Matches like that happen, Southampton beat Sunderland, what? 8-0 a few years back

I agree, while this matches remain as isolated events. And Viktoria Plzen is not OGCN.

Can you win a match 10-0? Yes. The problem comes when you beat a CL side (decent side, by the way) 10-1, you beat ManCity twice 5-2 and you win PL with a poor side, among other results. All this coming together is at least suspicious. I've also had weird results, anyone experiences weird matches, including real life, but that's not the point here. We don't have an isoated event, we have an unrealistic consistent overachivement.

Add to this we have a tactic that looks like exploitative with redundant and contradictory instructions which don't come after a specific observation. Anyone is more than entitled to think there is something wrong here.

Unless it is proven otherwise, which I admit is very difficult because extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and we have extraordinary results. But I'm open to be convinced.

 

[jc577]

2 hours ago, looping said:

Add to this we have a tactic that looks like exploitative with redundant and contradictory instructions which don't come after a specific observation. Anyone is more than entitled to think there is something wrong here.

What instructions are redundant and contradictory? In Cleon's 'Defensive Arts' Thread from way back, he used a combination of defensive + highly structured + be more disciplined.. I think he may have even included 'stick to positions' yet played good football and got good results. As others have pointed out, perhaps the OP didn't want the extra spacing that a highly structured shape brings, but wanted the same level of creative freedom. He is not required to watch games and then determine this; it could be something he thought about prior. I admit winning 10-1 against a good Nice side is a bit freakish, but these results do happen occasionally (United 8-2 Arsenal ). What the OP has done is use a real life team as inspiration, tweak and analyse his tactic and got the right players to play the system - which is most likely the reason why it didn't work in his Milan save. To say a bog standard 4-4-2 is a 'ME bug' and 'Exploitative' is doing the OP a massive injustice; he's got the fundamentals of the game right which is to play to your strengths and get the right players (attribute wise) in the right positions. 

Kudos @ifoundthatessence top work