Learning Traits, CA, Improving at 25

[stopazricky]

Hey guys! As Juve I'm trying to make the best out of Vlahovic, and for tactical reasons I would like him to stop Moving into Channels (he has that as PPM), as I want him to stay in the box as much as possible (I play him as a Poacher).

So here's my doubts:
1) He's 25, rated 5 star (won the Ballon d'Or in 2024) but the report says he can still improve a bit. Will having him train to remove the trait have any significant impact on his future growth? Does it hurt a little bit, or more like a lot?
2) Do working on new traits/removing old ones eat into Current Ability (potentially making him worse than he currently is)?
3) As a rule of thumb, how much do you think I can reasonably expect a world class AF to improve past 25?

Thanks for the help!

[HUNT3R]

Player traits don't take up any CA.

I've had players still improving at 28. The question is whether there is still room to improve , ie his CA hasn't reached his PA yet. Even then, players have different development curves, so best would be to keep an eye on his attributes and how/if they develop.

[el_manayer]

2 minutes ago, HUNT3R said:

Player traits don't take up any CA.

is that 100% certain? I would swear I read the contrary some time ago from some moderator/someone with apparent knowledge

[HUNT3R]

5 minutes ago, el_manayer said:

is that 100% certain? I would swear I read the contrary some time ago from some moderator/someone with apparent knowledge

Yes. I don't have a bookmarked post that answers your question, but I found these. The second is from a researcher and the third from Herne79 who used to be a mod on here and knew (still knows!) how the system works:

 

The third post deals with the weak foot player trait (it used to be one) where it is mentioned that a player trait doesn't take up CA.

[stopazricky]

2 ore fa, HUNT3R ha scritto:

Player traits don't take up any CA.

They don't, but training one takes away some of his training efforts (or makes the training load heavier), and that's the source of my concern: is TRAINING the PPM (or untraining it, such as this case) a bad idea at this stage of his growth? Is the training time spent on that going to make his CA go down/not go up?

[2feet]

Also, reports that say 'very close toi full potential'... in my experience using the editor, this can vary from a couple of CA short of maximum, to about 10/15 CA short.

Even with staff who have 16/17 for JPA anf JPP.

[HUNT3R]

2 hours ago, stopazricky said:

They don't, but training one takes away some of his training efforts (or makes the training load heavier), and that's the source of my concern: is TRAINING the PPM (or untraining it, such as this case) a bad idea at this stage of his growth? Is the training time spent on that going to make his CA go down/not go up?

It increases his workload. If it's going to make him a better player/more effective, it's always a good idea.

[herne79]

2 hours ago, stopazricky said:

They don't, but training one takes away some of his training efforts (or makes the training load heavier), and that's the source of my concern: is TRAINING the PPM (or untraining it, such as this case) a bad idea at this stage of his growth? Is the training time spent on that going to make his CA go down/not go up?

The main concern for training / unlearning a Trait for that particular player is his age.  The older a player is the harder it becomes to learn/unlearn a Trait.  At 25 he's ok but not ideal.

CA is not and never is a concern - it is not a measure of how good a player is and is a useless (for us) hidden metric.  Player progression is the issue - if you feel the player will be better for you in your team in your chosen role if he doesn't have Move into Channels then go ahead and ask him to unlearn it (the point about age above notwithstanding).  Cohesive player development for both Attributes and Traits combined is what's important .

However, to specifically answer your question, it would never make his CA go down and any impact on CA progression would be minimal if anything at all.  This is because it only really affects workload and decent top players can handle heavy workloads; and at his age playing matches at a relevant level is more important than training.  Training's not irrelevant of course but playing matches takes precedence.

One other thing to add:

4 hours ago, stopazricky said:

for tactical reasons I would like him to stop Moving into Channels (he has that as PPM), as I want him to stay in the box as much as possible (I play him as a Poacher).

Move into Channels is about player movement.  A Poacher with that Trait is still going to be in the box, it may just encourage him to use the channels a bit more often, that's all.  If you've actually watched his movement in the box and aren't happy with it then fair enough, but if not it might be an idea to watch how he plays first before trying to unlearn the Trait .