Transfers Reset/Realistic Season Start (23.4)

[mwttstck]

I am currently working on a (rather large) file aiming to undo every transfer (both players and staff) since the start of the 2022 summer transfer window.

It has always felt somewhat immersion-breaking to me to start an FM campaign with real-life transfers already done in-game. While the option to disable the first transfer window goes some way to fixing this, it always felt superficial to me. I'd also like to be able to use the more up to date data of the winter update without having to use the updated transfers/squads.

I have already reset almost all players contracts and non-playing histories to their previous state (spring 2022) and am currently working on resetting the playing history as well. Additionally, I will be doing the same for club and national staff and hopefully also contract renewals. Cases of player retirements and cases where person type changes from player to non-player or vice versa are more tricky. New players/staff introduced in FM23 will also be harder to do.

Essentially I am looking for input/feedback on things that play into this that I haven't considered.

Some other considerations:

- resetting loans (should be easy)

- pre-arranged future transfers

- squad number changes

- resetting transfer instalments, wage contributions and conditional fees

- changing club budgets/balances to reflect money not spend/received

- board member/ownership changes (not sure if possible)

Would appreciate any thoughts on this. Perhaps someone in the community has done something similar before. What am I missing that would break this?

[Fredrik]

On 23/05/2023 at 06:13, mwttstck said:

Would appreciate any thoughts on this. Perhaps someone in the community has done something similar before. What am I missing that would break this?

I have similar thoughts as you about immersion breaking by transfers. I have long since decided to use the original database and edit it myself. Future transfers are added regularly and I edit players, clubs and more when I find things I want to change. 

I don't typically play the very long saves over decades but instead several saves. This means that whenever the database becomes more and more real(according to my preferences) over time. 

 

I don't think you break anything by doing what you do. There's always things to fix. 

[Wolf_pd]

On 23/05/2023 at 06:13, mwttstck said:

I am currently working on a (rather large) file aiming to undo every transfer (both players and staff) since the start of the 2022 summer transfer window.

It has always felt somewhat immersion-breaking to me to start an FM campaign with real-life transfers already done in-game. While the option to disable the first transfer window goes some way to fixing this, it always felt superficial to me. I'd also like to be able to use the more up to date data of the winter update without having to use the updated transfers/squads.

I have already reset almost all players contracts and non-playing histories to their previous state (spring 2022) and am currently working on resetting the playing history as well. Additionally, I will be doing the same for club and national staff and hopefully also contract renewals. Cases of player retirements and cases where person type changes from player to non-player or vice versa are more tricky. New players/staff introduced in FM23 will also be harder to do.

Essentially I am looking for input/feedback on things that play into this that I haven't considered.

Some other considerations:

- resetting loans (should be easy)

- pre-arranged future transfers

- squad number changes

- resetting transfer instalments, wage contributions and conditional fees

- changing club budgets/balances to reflect money not spend/received

- board member/ownership changes (not sure if possible)

Would appreciate any thoughts on this. Perhaps someone in the community has done something similar before. What am I missing that would break this?

Resetting loans is easy, there is a button to remove them all in the editor.

Board member/ownership is a tricky one usually.

It can take some sniffing up, but it can be done. There are a few things to consider if you move back players. The game usually starts at 1-7 depending on what nation you pick to start with, so you need move the transfer data to 30-6 or before, otherwise the game will take the transfer into account and that means transfer fees flying around.

[mwttstck]

5 hours ago, Fredrik said:

I have similar thoughts as you about immersion breaking by transfers. I have long since decided to use the original database and edit it myself. Future transfers are added regularly and I edit players, clubs and more when I find things I want to change. 

I don't typically play the very long saves over decades but instead several saves. This means that whenever the database becomes more and more real(according to my preferences) over time. 

 

I don't think you break anything by doing what you do. There's always things to fix. 

I also rely quite heavily on the Editor for all kinds of changes to implement “my personal truth” in the game. Although I personally don’t mind things going in a different direction than real life once I start a game and try to embrace it as an alternate universe on its own, so this is is more about getting the starting conditions right (i.e. I don’t really care about future transfers not close to my start date).

[mwttstck]

4 hours ago, Wolf_pd said:

Resetting loans is easy, there is a button to remove them all in the editor.

Board member/ownership is a tricky one usually.

It can take some sniffing up, but it can be done. There are a few things to consider if you move back players. The game usually starts at 1-7 depending on what nation you pick to start with, so you need move the transfer data to 30-6 or before, otherwise the game will take the transfer into account and that means transfer fees flying around.

Yeah, my chosen cutoff date is (somewhat arbitrarily) May 16th giving you enough time to plan the summer transfer window (also I initially wanted to role play as Erik ten Hag taking over Man United on that day). You’re right that removing the current loans is easy but I will also try to add back in last seasons loans (end dates after 16-5-22) which could be interesting in case of buy options etc.

The way I’m actually realizing most of this is by coping the contract and history data (+ loans etc.) of all people who moved since May from the final FM22 database and importing those into FM23. This way I can mostly automate the process (Laptop running 24/7 on its own ) since I didn’t feel like manually editing around 150,000 people. But this also means of course that I am coping any mistakes in the initial database as well. Also I am probably missing people who signed new contracts between March (FM22 cutoff) & May and then after again.