How important is the consistency attribute?

[namlas]

I ask this because i recently bought Martin Odegaard ad his consistency attribute is extremely low. What are your experiences with Odegaard on FM20 and how important is this attribute altogether?

Spoiler

consistency attribute is at 3

 

[FrazT]

I cant speak about that player, but I would have thought that a consistency attribute at that level would not be good news for any manager.  You really dont want a player's game ratings to be 6.5, 6.0, 9.2, 5.8, 6.7 for example and I suspect that is what you will get.  At the top level, I would be looking  for a consistency attribute of at least 12.

[OrjaN]

Purely anecdotal, but in my experience, FrazT is absolutely right about consistency being important. As with most values, the more extreme end the attribute moves towards, the more it seems to matter. In other words, I think that an inconsistent player with consistency of around 8 is frustrating, but playable. A rating below 5 I find completely useless. How someone decided to absolutely trash Ødegaard's consistency stat in the winter update, is beyond me. He now has the lowest consistency of anyone in the game with above 117 CA, having been adjusted from

Spoiler

12 to 3

I'd be interested to see if anyone has a save where he has a productive career on the winter update. As a side note, I am a bit annoyed at how relatively fixed the consistency stat seems to be, given its importance.

[blue heron]

I'm currently in season 2 of a save I started recently - so with latest update. Odegaard isn't doing too bad for me. So I don't think the consistency is that noticeable.

 

[Il_Maestro]

Consistency is key, but you have to have in mind that, if Odegaard goes on a hot streak (25-50 matches) its consistency will go up a little bit, or should improve at least.

Hot streaks are common to players that have determination and other good mental attributes, and we also have to have in mind that hot streaks are a season with 6.8+ on average.

But again, it has to be continuous for him to get better consistency.

[santy001]

Consistency doesn't stand alone, and therefore it can be offset by other attributes. Furthermore, it doesn't affect physical attributes. Certain players can ride out a low consistency better than others as a result. 

It means that consistency doesn't just mean your play-maker might pass badly in a team, in fact, his attributes may blend together to have a near negligible impact on his passing. However, there could be much more drastic impacts such as on how hard he's going to work. How well he takes up positions, and that might mean some of the players metrics (pass completion % or such) ride through a downturn quite well yet there's a distinct period in which they didn't perform.

For me, it has to be prioritised by position in the team, and the demands of that role. A low attribute for determination, important matches and consistency is almost a perfect storm of disappointment waiting to happen in a big game. If you play a forward who relies on brilliant finishing and precision movement to score his goals, consistency is a deal breaker. If you have forward who just needs to be fast and strong to bludgeon defences into submission then its much less important. Yet at centre half all the pace and strength in the world wouldn't compensate for low consistency when facing up to technically competent opposition. It may even be more likely to end up in a red card.

On one hand its the most important attribute you can focus on from a broad level, yet its the attribute you'll never be able to tell just what impact it has had. You'll never be able to point to a situation and say that was because he has poor consistency, or that happened because of great consistency.

[shaunwwfc]

Does the consistency attribute increase or decrease? If the answer to that question is yes, what plays a factor in that?

Infact, same question to Professionalism.

[alanschu14]

I've had quality players that had poor consistency. It's just that sometimes they'll have a game where they aren't as good as they could be. This may or may not be bad depending on your team, as well as costs and whatnot.

The programmer in my suspects that a player with poor consistency will occasionally go into games with penalties to some attributes (evidently not physical ones like santy001) says. Thinking a bit "logically," things like work rate and concentration and other mental abilities are probably most likely to be impacted, but I could see it mean that occasionally technical skills aren't up to their snuff as well.

That said, if my striker's 15 finishing is considered a 12 for a game, it might not actually mean that he doesn't score goals, it just tips the probability against it. I try not to over thinking it tooooo much, although I do try to make sure I don't have too many inconsistent players on my team.

[DementedHammer]

Years and years ago (FM04 or FM05, so too long ago to be meaningful to this discussion) I played a friendly between Dagenham and Redbridge and Schalke 04, where I gave every Dagenham player 20 consistency, and every Schalke player 1 consistency. The final result was something like 7-4 to Dagenham - when Schalke clicked, they ripped Dagenham to shreds, but for 70% of the match they couldn't string two passes together. 

Edited April 26, 2020 by DementedHammer

[Barcafan27]

Consistency does change, but from what I have seen not a lot.  It seems to be either age or games played dependent.  I saw a few players move up by +2 with the best age range for this being gong from early to mid twenties - ie 21 to 25 or 22 to 26.  

[Zemahh]

17 hours ago, alanschu14 said:

The programmer in my suspects that a player with poor consistency will occasionally go into games with penalties to some attributes (evidently not physical ones like santy001) says.

That's exactly how it works. Player's attributes that you see are basically his attributes on the best possible day, meaning the less consistent the player, the less likely he is to actually perform up to his attributes. I suspect morale, fitness, press conferences and other things also affect attributes in the similar fashion.