[Suggestion] The Parameter "Potential Abilities" should not be at all

[vsavinov]

In general, I believe that there should be no parameter "potential abilities" at all, the parameter defining the peak to which a football player can develop should not be at all. How a player can develop should be determined on the basis of his physical natural data and his mental ability, how purposeful and hardworking he is, and this should not depend so much on the training abilities of the team.

Even in modern football, not all super football players have been in the star super clubs, and most of them got there when they were mature and accomplished players.

At the same time, not all pupils of star super clubs became super football players, rather even on the contrary.

Edited October 26, 2021 by vsavinov

[FrazT]

This has been discussed regularly over a number of years and SI are perfectly prepared to listen to any alternative suggestions that could be implemented instaed of PA

[vsavinov]

9 hours ago, FrazT said:

This has been discussed regularly over a number of years and SI are perfectly prepared to listen to any alternative suggestions that could be implemented instaed of PA

I cannot understand what the difficulty is.
The best solution is if it's based on real life.
At birth, we have not prescribed the date of death, and no standards are set from above, which we may or may not achieve.
There are already a sufficient number of parameters in the game that can help realize the relative value of the potential without limiting it from above.
As far as I could understand, the speed of development depends on 3 parameters (one open and 2 hidden) Determination, Ambition, and Professionalism, and there are already characteristics in the game, such as Personality, which are derived from a whole group of parameters, so why not make Potential Abilities by the same principle.
I'm sure this is not rocket science)
For example, why not make Potential Abilities dependent, but not on the 3 parameters responsible for the learning rate, but expand the list of these parameters, and add to the already existing Determination, Ambition and Professionalism such as Natural Fitness, Work Rate (as a parameter for how much is ready to give all the best in training, close to Decisiveness, but even so it's completely different), and Adaptation (as an opportunity to perceive something new for oneself, in addition to the ability to adapt to a new environment, even if it is also responsible for how the player is receptive to new knowledge), and also Consistency, as a sign of how long he will maintain a high rhythm of work for his development, and of course his age, although this does not have to be very tough. Any player with good Adaptation and Work Rate should progress well, especially at first, getting into better conditions for development (such as Club, Opportunities, Coaches) than the player had before.
Understanding these parameters and how his career will develop will depend on what results in the player ultimately achieved.

In FM21 it was very strange to meet players with Current Abilities - 82 and Potential Abilities - 86 at 20 years old.

Edited October 26, 2021 by vsavinov

[vsavinov]

The main idea is to make the equation of the player's development rate from more than three parameters, and on the basis of them calculate Potential Abilities, and then a lot will depend on his luck in developing a career that will help him develop. Given that these parameters can evolve over time, the Potential Abilities value will also change accordingly.
This can significantly diversify the interaction with scouts and the development of players, it will no longer be necessary to chase the value of only one defining parameter Potential Abilities, and everything should happen more naturally.

[gunner86]

The case for the defence:

Your problem here isn’t with PA, it’s with player development. To which I’ll agree there is definitely scope for changes. There is currently some diversity now but not really enough, but the human player here really skews everything. It’s far too easy right now to identify the best youngsters, bring them in cheap, develop them, and sell them at 25 for a massive profit.

Too many human managers have squads just full of wonder kids, and sell players at ridiculously young ages because they’re either too old for their squad (25 is not too old), or to make room for the next player on their endless development line. In my opinion, this can be fixed by slowing down the development timelines, and/or making PA much harder to reach, but PA itself is not the issue.

On 26/10/2021 at 23:43, vsavinov said:

it will no longer be necessary to chase the value of only one defining parameter Potential Abilities, and everything should happen more naturally.

My second point relates to the above. You don’t need to be chasing PA now, there are plenty of examples out there where players with low PA have consistently outperformed high PA players, and the same is true with CA (current ability) - plenty of players with low or at least lower CA have outperformed higher CA players, not only that but the two in combination. Just because a player reaches his PA doesn’t mean his going to be amazing. Nor does it mean that he actually can’t improve - although at this point the only way to improve is by redistribution of attribute points. I’m not entirely sure what the solution is here, potentially splitting the CA across the 3 attribute areas? Although again, making PA harder to reach would help with this. Again though, PA itself is not the issue.

A lot of people don’t really get what PA is and what it’s for. Every human being has their limitations, no matter how determined, professional and ambition I have, no matter how good the facilities I use or how skilled my personal trainer is, I’m never going to be a professional footballer. Part of that is because I’m 35 and eat to much pizza, but it was also true at 25, and 15. So in reality, by the time players are in the game, how good they can go on to be really is already decided, the question is whether or not they can get there. Here, professionalism, ambition, determination, facilities, staff, injuries, playing time will all influence speed and amount of development, but again, people can only ever get so good. Part of the problem here is that mentoring (less so than in the old days) means that this is too easy to manipulate and for human managers to game the system and improve these attributes - I don’t think the solution here is fixing these attributes either; just this week Mikel Arteta discussed how Emile Smith Rowe had made changes to his lifestyle to aid his development, these things do change.

PA also needs to be there because otherwise human players would otherwise find a way to max out every single attribute, and also, to allow some differentiation between players. I agree that not every player is developed at the big clubs, but lower league clogger Steve Fletcher was never going to as good as Lionel Messi.

For me, PA isn’t the problem. Development is. I’m not privy to all the details (only what I pick up on here and some uneducated guesses) so I don’t know whether development being so easy for humans is by design. But there needs to be more variety, both to approaches of development (you shouldn’t be able to just use one plug and play approach to player development and have everyone be amazing), but also more variety in development curves. 
Finally, I think PA is to visible, I get that the pre and in game editors have made this basically essential, and we’re too far down the road now to really do anything about it.

But yeah, to sum up, PA isn’t the issue.

EDIT: me mentioning Messi has started my brain on a track. I need to formulate it all the way through though.

Edited October 28, 2021 by gunner86

[StewartAHannah]

Potential attribute should NOT EXIST far to many players around 21/24 have already maxed out their potential so what is the point of wasting time with coaching training development etc? All that matters is players current attribute and whether that can be improved developed worked on or not. A mix of the players personal professionalism ambition, the quality of the coaching staff and the influence of star players and I guess what league they play in the number of games and whether they get European and International experience.

When I start a new save I just max them all and any players I buy, it does not ruin the game few develop beyond good to average but then that doesn't matter as human managed players don't need to be superstar to be great players. Taking for example Newport to the Premiership has been fun, almost 75% players still capable yet none are super stars. I buy superstars they are no better. Good to see a player once worth 32k now worth £56m playing for their country and happy winning medals. Yes I work em hard and if they dont like it I sell them, plenty of players like training and development. Not fun was ground sharing more than playing at home and then when we are there deciding to finally build and own our own ground. I probably spend far to much time on training, but you do get the rewards !!

erm sort of cos come Premiership you have players on say £20k offer them a new contract on £60k they dont ask for much but they demand a release clause of £104m? then come transfer window if I didnt remove said clause, you name it comes in after all of them. Clubs who supposedly don't have enough transfer budget left still buy them aaaaugh No hands off not for sale option, except the editor thank god we have an editor to help fix whats BROKEN in the game

Edited October 31, 2021 by StewartAHannah

[gunner86]

On 31/10/2021 at 17:29, StewartAHannah said:

Potential attribute should NOT EXIST far to many players around 21/24 have already maxed out their potential so what is the point of wasting time with coaching training development etc? All that matters is players current attribute and whether that can be improved developed worked on or not. A mix of the players personal professionalism ambition, the quality of the coaching staff and the influence of star players and I guess what league they play in the number of games and whether they get European and International experience.

When I start a new save I just max them all and any players I buy, it does not ruin the game few develop beyond good to average but then that doesn't matter as human managed players don't need to be superstar to be great players. Taking for example Newport to the Premiership has been fun, almost 75% players still capable yet none are super stars. I buy superstars they are no better. Good to see a player once worth 32k now worth £56m playing for their country and happy winning medals. Yes I work em hard and if they dont like it I sell them, plenty of players like training and development. Not fun was ground sharing more than playing at home and then when we are there deciding to finally build and own our own ground. I probably spend far to much time on training, but you do get the rewards !!

erm sort of cos come Premiership you have players on say £20k offer them a new contract on £60k they dont ask for much but they demand a release clause of £104m? then come transfer window if I didnt remove said clause, you name it comes in after all of them. Clubs who supposedly don't have enough transfer budget left still buy them aaaaugh No hands off not for sale option, except the editor thank god we have an editor to help fix whats BROKEN in the game

You're kind of missing the point though.

That's not a problem with the player being limited by their PA, it's that that PA is far too easy to reach, especially for human managers who can easily manipulate (manipulate might not be the right word, but I can't think of a better one) the system to ensure a much higher success rate of achieving that potential.

The alternative of just removing PA makes no sense either, otherwise that just leads to human players going to non league clubs, picking up a eleven 16 year old for 85p and a packet of crisps, and training them all until they're prime Barcelona.

I strongly feel that there are better alternatives to the current system, but just straight out removing it makes the situation worse, not better.

[StewartAHannah]

Whilst what you said could potentially be an issue I have found players tend to find their own max subject to whether they can use both feet the number of positions they can play and other attributes applicable to their positions like tackling marking dribbling shooting vision etc. Look at the England U20/u18 teams of 2017, the world cup winners, not every player fulfil their potential and that is also true in game.  But I do agree its not the best solution its just the one I tend to use as it potentially makes the time spent monitoring and tweaking players development rewarding. I just find deciding what position is best for a youngster irrespective of where they played in the past and training them specifically for that position works best. 

[Michael Sant]

The removal of potential ability is a topic that does come up from time to time and has over a long period of time, and it is something that has been reviewed previously but largely isn't a direction that is on the agenda at this time. Things may change in the future, but keep in mind that when requesting features involving areas like this there does need to be consideration given to not only how it works in game, but how the system will work for the many, many researchers and how they can reflect the players around the world.