I think Football Manager's formation system needs to change to keep up with modern football.

[zzkeg27]

the role of positions in today's football is losing its power compared to the past, and the 3-2-4-1 tactic currently used by Manchester City's head coach is no longer possible to implement in Football Manager.

Isn't it time for a change that could benefit from a different formation tactics system, such as the separation of defensive and attacking formations?

What do others think?

Edited June 20, 2023 by zzkeg27

[wazzaflow10]

1 hour ago, zzkeg27 said:

the role of positions in today's football is losing its power compared to the past, and the 3-2-4-1 tactic currently used by Manchester City's head coach is no longer possible to implement in Football Manager.

Isn't it time for a change that could benefit from a different formation tactics system, such as the separation of defensive and attacking formations?

What do others think?

The current format provides some limiting structure so that you at least have to pick a formation that is within reality. In some of the CM days you had total freedom of player positions. Some of these freedoms meant you could find game-breaking tactics that the computer would never consider and that SI could never possibly test. People still find ways to overpower the engine on occasion but they are much easier to root out and eliminate. 

So the current engine will always be behind "modern" tactics until the player movement can be hard coded and tested.

[zzkeg27]

10 hours ago, wazzaflow10 said:

The current format provides some limiting structure so that you at least have to pick a formation that is within reality. In some of the CM days you had total freedom of player positions. Some of these freedoms meant you could find game-breaking tactics that the computer would never consider and that SI could never possibly test. People still find ways to overpower the engine on occasion but they are much easier to root out and eliminate. 

So the current engine will always be behind "modern" tactics until the player movement can be hard coded and tested.

The limited structure of the current formation, unlike in the past, is no longer appropriate for the movement of players in tactics in modern football. Rather than eliminating the way to overwhelm ME, I think we need to change the formation system now so that we can implement real football-like movements.

Edited June 21, 2023 by zzkeg27

[DarJ]

2 hours ago, zzkeg27 said:

I think we need to change the formation system now so that we can implement real football-like movements.

The problem with that is you will have to figure out a way for the AI to adapt to whatever the human managers throws at it and I don't think they are anyway near there yet. I know nothing about game development however, my guess is that the reason why we still have structured formations is mainly to give the AI points of references so even if you give roles that change the movement a bit the AI still roughly knows where players will end up. If you look at asymmetric formations for example, the reason they can be very successful is because they break that structure for the AI because you will have players making movements and ending up in positions where they shouldn't really be. 

I would love a more fluid system if they could find a way to make it work but before they implement that I want them to give us a way to set up how we want to press, it still feels a bit random at the moment and the players don't do it as a unit if you go and watch any of the tactical videos on the coaches voice YouTube channel you will find out that we can't do most of what the managers talk about.

[forameuss]

3 hours ago, Renyy said:

The AI still doesn't for what it's worth. Maybe it's time they should? 

Sorted then, no idea why they didn't think of that before.

It's much, much easier said than done.  The reason the current tactical system is so locked-down and on-rails is because it's easier for the AI to understand and react to.  It still has its issues, absolutely, but there's even more work needed to get it up to the sort of standard that would be needed to allow true freedom like what's being asked.

[wazzaflow10]

5 hours ago, DarJ said:

The problem with that is you will have to figure out a way for the AI to adapt to whatever the human managers throws at it and I don't think they are anyway near there yet. I know nothing about game development however, my guess is that the reason why we still have structured formations is mainly to give the AI points of references so even if you give roles that change the movement a bit the AI still roughly knows where players will end up. If you look at asymmetric formations for example, the reason they can be very successful is because they break that structure for the AI because you will have players making movements and ending up in positions where they shouldn't really be. 

I would love a more fluid system if they could find a way to make it work but before they implement that I want them to give us a way to set up how we want to press, it still feels a bit random at the moment and the players don't do it as a unit if you go and watch any of the tactical videos on the coaches voice YouTube channel you will find out that we can't do most of what the managers talk about.

I almost never use asymmetric formations anymore because it can be considered an exploit. It'd be nice if the AI would adapt to these or even use them. I do think it'd be beneficial to have a Wib-Wob visualizer only (rather than tactic creator) so you can see how your team will attack and defend. That would go a long way I think to helping understand the nuance behind player roles. I know SI probably doesn't want to make it to easy to unlock the secrets of a good tactic and dominate but for the non experts it would be much easier to understand why there's a gaping hole in your formation.

[wazzaflow10]

1 hour ago, Renyy said:

Because they don't want to. Compare FM23 to FM13. That's all. 

Way too much talk here, there and anywhere about exploits in a single player game with no impact on anyone else. I'd rather have a fun game you can break to **** if you really wanted to than play by rules that have no place in reality. There seems to be more new features every year aimed at shutting down exploiters than improving the game. 

Then I guess go play CM 01/02?

What rules have no place in reality? I'd say having a system in place where your right back can't cut all the way across the pitch to be your inside left forward is pretty realistic. Do you give up some flexibility? Sure but how many teams have a John Stones that will step up and play in the midfield beyond the Libero role? 10 years ago dropping your defensive midfielder in between the center backs was revolutionary (for modern times anyway). Or Thomas Mueller's raumdeuter role. Or the wide centerbacks role They're all in the game now. In 2-3 years they'll have the Stones role coded. If the SI developers could invent roles that  they'd probably be working with Pep not on this game. You're never going to have the newest fad of tactics in the current year. Frankly you don't need it because unless you're playing as the team with that player you're not going to have a someone suitable for that role anyway. 

Legitimate question, have you ever written code before? There's more features aimed at making the game more realistic by shutting down exploits that take advantage of the match engine's limitations. Its impossible at the moment to program a match engine that can handle every scenario a player can throw at it. Maybe in 10 years or so, with enough video footage, there could be some form of a neural network + markov chain where a match engine can be created to mimic real life and learn. But that's an enormous task. OpenAI took 50 years of industry development to implement into something that is passable. If SI were capable of that we'd probably see the game shut down b/c Man City would want the engine to test out tactical scenarios. 

[zzkeg27]

1 hour ago, wazzaflow10 said:

Then I guess go play CM 01/02?

What rules have no place in reality? I'd say having a system in place where your right back can't cut all the way across the pitch to be your inside left forward is pretty realistic. Do you give up some flexibility? Sure but how many teams have a John Stones that will step up and play in the midfield beyond the Libero role? 10 years ago dropping your defensive midfielder in between the center backs was revolutionary (for modern times anyway). Or Thomas Mueller's raumdeuter role. Or the wide centerbacks role They're all in the game now. In 2-3 years they'll have the Stones role coded. If the SI developers could invent roles that  they'd probably be working with Pep not on this game. You're never going to have the newest fad of tactics in the current year. Frankly you don't need it because unless you're playing as the team with that player you're not going to have a someone suitable for that role anyway. 

Legitimate question, have you ever written code before? There's more features aimed at making the game more realistic by shutting down exploits that take advantage of the match engine's limitations. Its impossible at the moment to program a match engine that can handle every scenario a player can throw at it. Maybe in 10 years or so, with enough video footage, there could be some form of a neural network + markov chain where a match engine can be created to mimic real life and learn. But that's an enormous task. OpenAI took 50 years of industry development to implement into something that is passable. If SI were capable of that we'd probably see the game shut down b/c Man City would want the engine to test out tactical scenarios. 

Football manager grows with new young players appearing every year. In my world, a player like John Stones can appear at any time. So I don't understand what you're saying.

Unlike in the past, in modern football, positioning play that values space is very important, not a set role such as wide center back and raumdeuter.

The current tactical system is rather facing excessive limitations through the compulsory role assignment of players such as wide centre-back and raumdeuter.Clearly, it is very sad that the current limitations of the formation system's excessive rules prevent the formation of tactics suitable for modern football.

Rather, it is very nostalgic that the classic tactics of the old CM series were able to form various forms by slide bars and arrows.

Edited June 21, 2023 by zzkeg27

[wazzaflow10]

55 minutes ago, zzkeg27 said:

Football manager grows with new young players appearing every year. In my world, a player like John Stones can appear at any time. So I don't understand what you're saying.

Unlike in the past, in modern football, positioning play that values space is very important, not a set role such as wide center back and raumdeuter.

The current tactical system is rather facing excessive limitations through the compulsory role assignment of players such as wide centre-back and raumdeuter.Clearly, it is very sad that the current limitations of the formation system's excessive rules prevent the formation of tactics suitable for modern football.

Rather, it is very nostalgic that the classic tactics of the old CM series were able to form various forms by slide bars and arrows.

I think you need to visit the tactics forum. There's plenty of people who recreate real tactics pretty well in the game. Every realistic base formation is possible. How the players move with and without the ball is up to the roles you select for them. Not every movement is possible because SI hasn't had the time to code in every prominent new role into the game. But by and large as roles have entered the modern game they've included them after a few years. If you feel nostalgia for sliders and fiddling around with go back and play FM05/06/07/08 then I guess. 

 

 

 

[wazzaflow10]

5 minutes ago, Renyy said:

I'm being hyperbolic of course, but how come we still can't have our central midfielder or deep lying playmaker role swap with a fullback in possession? Your only option is playing a halfback which can only take up the position between the central defence and crucially, is not a playmaker. So if the feature that allows me this allows you that, I'd rather we have both than neither. If you don't wanna have exploits in your game don't use them, and if others do, who cares. Single player game. Infinite methods to cheat already. Doesn't affect anyone else one bit. 

Because this game isn't create crazy tactics simulator? They're creating a game meant to be based in the  real world. If someone is exploiting a weakness in their engine they're going to patch it. If they can't patch it they'll remove it. I don't see how that's controversial.

 

20 minutes ago, Renyy said:

And when they do people like you call it an exploit. Can't win.

You're missing the nuance of both points. the original point of this thread was having zero tactical freedom. Its just not true. You can recreate some real life tactics. Just not Pep's formation, yet. In 2-3 years they'll likely have a way to do it since the game tends to follow real life. But I'm sure by then someone else will be complaining they can't immediately recreate Pep's new master class. SI can only do so much in a given year and Pep certainly isn't giving out tactical secrets.

I personally choose not to use asymmetrical formations because the computer for whatever reason cannot or does not either. It's not an immediate exploit since not all asymmetric formations are inherently exploits like a wide midfielder and a winger and DCM/CM/AMC on opposite sides. But if you told me you created a Z formation I'd question what you were doing.

32 minutes ago, Renyy said:

I have written code actually, and if SI took some of that time and resources they've invested into DMing agents, players kicking up a fuzz about the game's workflow features, AI demanding more money of the real manager, price and sponsorship biases, or scouting being reworked for the 5th time, then maybe the match engine would be in a better place. Don't try to make it look like I'm saying it's easy. It's time..and money...that they invest poorly every year. 

FM23 hardly has enough on FM20 to call it a new game, never mind FM22, and on top of that they seem to release every game in a beta at this point only for the real release to happen with the .3 patch. We ought to hold them to somewhat of a standard. 

I don't disagree. But that's not really been the topic of this thread. The majority of development should go towards improving the match engine. We've had the same bugs in there for years now. Throw ins and crosses namely have been bugged for as long as I can remember. And this year my personal favorite is (particularly when you're a weaker side or away from home) your players simply give up either closing down or dribbling so the opposition can just have possession. I went back to playing FM18 and its refreshing to not see every cross blocked and every throw in turn into the best chance of the game. Your center forward will actually flick the ball onto a teammate who runs onto it instead of to no one. There's actually errors in passing too, not the kind where your player dwells on the ball for 15 mins and then picks out the other team with 3 other safe options. Ones where you can see what they're trying to do immediately and it doesn't reach its destination or its behind the runner and you get a Ryan Giggs FA Cup semi final counter attack. But that version certainly has faults. Pressing/closing down is pretty bad. 1v1s and long distance shots are pretty meh. 

Frankly the release version of the ME was better than any of the patches they came out with. Its been that way for probably the last 3 iterations. They all end up in the same place at the end though. I don't think there's much to separate FM 21 to FM 23 in terms of how the ME plays out as a whole. There certainly was when each came out though. Best I can hope for is they're coming to an end of a dev cycle and 24 or 25 will introduce some freshness and eliminate some long standing bugs they haven't been able to fix.

[themadsheep2001]

I think this thread is a good example of why people shouldn't assume stuff tbh. Ultimately you have to have a system that the AI can use, and one it can use dynamically, because the whole system needs to work, not just one for the user. Which is why they continually develop the AI. Which is considerably easier said than done. As for the investment, the ME/AI is probably the biggest it's been been with the most funding it's had. And developing a multi year project that has yearly releases means some things will have incremental improvements until its "done" and you see a large jump 

[(sic)]

8 minutes ago, wazzaflow10 said:

Because this game isn't create crazy tactics simulator? They're creating a game meant to be based in the  real world. If someone is exploiting a weakness in their engine they're going to patch it. If they can't patch it they'll remove it. I don't see how that's controversial.

But nobody's saying that it is, or that it should be a "crazy tactics simulator". It's about creating realistic representations of real life tactics. 

The argument against it, was how the AI couldn't keep up, and their argument is how they don't care, as it is a single-player game, and the way you play the game doesn't affect others - if you want to exploit it, you do you, if you don't want to exploit it, then just don't. I don't know how you managed to get the "crazy tactics simulator" from all of that. 

A CM/DM moving to RB in possession, isn't crazy, and it's something that does happen in real life. Just like a RB moving more narrow to form a back 3 and act as a CB is nothing new nor crazy.

 

Pep's tactics and his usage of space is nothing new. He just finds new ways to do it, latest example Stones moving from CB to DM like a libero. This is already in the game, except you can only use the Libero role in the middle of a back 3. 

 

The way the tactics system is designed is very rigid. Roles/duties are just presets you're allowed to play with, you don't have much say on how you want them to move or what positions to occupy in the buildup, in the middle third or in the final third, just like you don't have a say in how they play in transition or defence. That's already determined by the devs and their interpretation of what a role should be and how it should move and play. Your job is to select whatever preset the devs have given you, and hope it matches what you actually want the role to do.

The thing with that is, it may have been okay 10 years ago, but nowadays it is possible to create something better - and I'm also including a smarter AI here, as the technology has improved massively from the days of FM12/13.

[santy001]

1 hour ago, Renyy said:

I have written code actually, and if SI took some of that time and resources they've invested into DMing agents, players kicking up a fuzz about the game's workflow features, AI demanding more money of the real manager, price and sponsorship biases, or scouting being reworked for the 5th time, then maybe the match engine would be in a better place. Don't try to make it look like I'm saying it's easy. It's time..and money...that they invest poorly every year. 

 

3 minutes ago, Renyy said:

That's another problem. Gonna spare the thread of the 40 minute rant I prepared in my head since it's too much of a change of topic, but this isn't FIFA. The match day is the culmination of your gameplay time, but only a fraction of it. By the 150th game you've witnessed it all no matter how much work is put into it. Game would be so much better off with the same investment elsewhere. Like basic levels of usability. 

It probably helps if you can hold a somewhat consistent point in your posts... at least for an hour or so.

[santy001]

Well in the first quoted post, your point is bemoaning the resources used on areas away from the match engine. The key little part there being "maybe the match engine would be in a better place"

Then in the next quoted post you're bemoaning that by the 150th match day you've seen it all. It's possible I'm misunderstanding what you're referring to by that, but what plays out in the match engine definitely is a big part of the match day for me. I presume this because based on your claimed understanding of coding, it wouldn't have made sense to conflate a few screens and presentation of information on the day as somehow being at the expense of the match engine. 

[themadsheep2001]

Contradictory points aside, nothing can be built with the user in a vacuum. It has to work for the AI as well and it has to be dynamic. Sometimes simplyfing gets you more depth, which AI is much better then when it was WIBWOB. The key now is to keep pushing that so more complexity and dynamism can be added. 

[wazzaflow10]

On 21/06/2023 at 16:43, Renyy said:

These features exist in the game. That's a fact. Time and money was invested into making that the case. Stating that said time and money could've been more productively invested elsewhere than literally making the game worse, is not even remotely close to me stating I wish they invested more in the match engine. 

I never claimed to understand coding.  The question was "have you written code", to which the truth is yes, I have. It's a footnote to shut down any lazy attempt at the argument "Well then why don't you code it yourself?" as these conversation so often stoop to. If you weren't so dishonest you'd notice the greater point being about priorities, not difficulty. 

Didn't reference a single screen or presentation of information on match day.

You wanna keep going with your personal attack on me or can the thread move on? Moderator btw

I'm not sure how you can construe anything that was said as a personal attack by anyone here.

Also if you're going to be disingenuous in your responses i.e. coding then I don't expect to continue the conversation in good faith. The response isn't why don't you code it yourself but rather you'd have an appreciation for how difficult it is to even make a minor change. You'd understand that asking for quick fixes and total overhauls is nigh on impossible without major setbacks in the very thing your asking for "total tactical freedom". Last I heard the engine was in the millions of lines of code. Just to run the match. Maybe the stagnation in the match engine is because they've stopped developing this iteration and have moved on to a new module that allows them to not have to band-aid over a limited base concept. 

We're also at the behest of SI needing to show SEGA they've made updates to the game. SI and SEGA execs aren't going to be wowed anymore by the match engine than they already are. There's plenty of match moments they can show to say "look it looks like a real football match!". A short upgrade featurette of new for this year is the Stones inverted halfback role and they do a side by side comparison of how that role looks in real life and the game. And then they move on. No one at SEGA really cares about minutia of the engine. What they care about is the flashy updates that can sell the game. So SI needs to devote some time and resources to new features. That's the reality. 

Edited June 23, 2023 by wazzaflow10
spelling

[themadsheep2001]

@wazzaflow10 it's actually even more simple than that. There's no point creating a Stones role if the AI can't "use" it. Thats the really hard bit.

[wazzaflow10]

33 minutes ago, themadsheep2001 said:

@wazzaflow10 it's actually even more simple than that. There's no point creating a Stones role if the AI can't "use" it. Thats the really hard bit.

I'm assuming the AI is capable of it if it's in there and being demoed. Its along the lines of why in career saves I tend to not use asymmetric formations. And why wibwob while fun is never coming back. though I'd love for someone at SI to say they're developing something in the backend to see the tactics in game to help evolve how the AI creates tactics.

[wazzaflow10]

10 minutes ago, renyy0 said:

When someone strawmans me, abuses their moderator privileges and makes inflammatory comments I consider that an attack. 

No one strawmanned you or abused their mod privileges. 

10 minutes ago, renyy0 said:

How are you gonna hit me with this then immediately blatantly lie about my position on this topic? When did I ever ask for total tactical freedom? The only things wrt to the match engine I've requested here is that AI responds to your tactics and attacking formations, but that I'd rather they don't focus their attention on the match engine in the first place. 

you said this 9 hours ago, so yeah you kind of did say you wanted total tactical freedom or to use your words "break to ****". I'm not sure what else you could have possibly meant by that considering the thread is about rethinking the formation system and it's limitations.

9 hours ago, Renyy said:

I'd rather have a fun game you can break to **** if you really wanted to than play by rules that have no place in reality.

 

Edited June 21, 2023 by wazzaflow10

[DarJ]

13 hours ago, (sic) said:

The argument against it, was how the AI couldn't keep up, and their argument is how they don't care, as it is a single-player game, and the way you play the game doesn't affect others - if you want to exploit it, you do you, if you don't want to exploit it, then just don't. I don't know how you managed to get the "crazy tactics simulator" from all of that. 

While I somewhat agree with that premise but let's be honest they don't even believe that because you can come to the forum every year and you will see most people complain about how the game is easy, how your CB can score 20 goals a season from corners is unrealistic or how bad teams just passing the ball around aimlessly is realistic and no one tells them "don't set up you corner routines right then or don't play with big teams or restrict yourself in the transfer market etc.". The truth is we all push for realism when it suits us and dismiss it when it doesn't suit us with the excuses of it's just a game so we don't have to do X or it's a single player game so I should be able to do whatever I want.

 

[jcafcwbb]

Using a half-back and two defensive midfielders you can go from a defensive 4-5-1 to an attacking 3-2-5 of sorts. Not the way Pep does it but still do-able. You could try what I am playing a defensive 5-2-2-1 into an attacking 3-2-4-1.  Having 2 AMs also helps with the higher press.

Pep's formation and philosophy only works because he has the best squad. You cannot translate his tactics to most teams.

 

[mp_87]

There definitely needs to be more option available. The implementation in recent years of the different sub-screens for your attacking/defensive/transition instructions is a step in the right direction but it should go further. I'm not saying you should be able to instruct each player where to stand exactly at every moment of the match, but to reflect football you should be able to split the tactical instructions further for different phases, both with and without the ball.

- The "John Stones role" is a brand new trend and would be unfair to criticise FM for not having in the game... But the fullback inverting to DM, whilst the rest of the defence shuffles across to make a three, has been around years now and still no mechanism to do it naturally without the user trying their best to shoehorn it via instruction.

- Sometimes players have different instructions depending on where the ball is on the field. Let's take a fullback again for instance, some teams will have them "invert" or narrow to help with the initial build up, and then when they have reached advanced positions will expect them to be back up the flank overlapping. You can't do this in FM.

- Again on a related note, the relationships between players and maintaining a positional structure. Eg. between a wideman and his fullback/central midfielder team mate.... If A is holding the width, B will position in the channels/halfspace. If B is wide, A will play inside. In FM players don't dovetail, they'll just stand next to each other...

- The defensive formation might not be the same as the attacking formation. Loads of teams you'd say are eg. a 4-3-3 with the ball, but when they defend it will be a 4-4-2 shape. Now on the forums you'll get told well yes so just set your formation as 4-4-2 or 4-4-1-1 and get the attacking movement from that, but again that's doing some really shonky workarounds via what instructions you have to use.

- And there are some tactical examples where that advice just doesn't work very well, and the ability to have split tactics is needed. Conte's "3-4-3" system, where they defend in a 5-4-1 shape but then with the ball the wide players become dual 10's floating about in the pocket has never been well replicated in FM, no matter what any user tries to claim in the Tactical Recreations threads. Simeone's approach is another, FM'ers have always been puzzled how to play 4-4-2 with his certain instructions, such as the wide players and getting the forwards back in to defend really deep.

- And again without the ball, teams will be in a different shape depending on where the ball is on the field. The "formation" (plus things like width, spacing, etc) they press in might be different to the shape they drop in to to consolidate. Yeah some might argue this can be achieved somewhat by role or instruction, but I'd say it's still in way too limited fashion.

 

Those are just some examples, you could add many more. Some may be sorted about by Role tweaks, or the additional instruction, but I think really it needs an evolution of the tactical possibilities available. I doubt we'll see it happen though, certainly in the near future. The AI needs to be able to compete and keep up with this, and it's clearly not in the position to. And in any case I think SI (and many users tbh) are scarred for life by "WIBWOB" and the previous dalliances at stuff like this in the old game.

[nie jem frytek]

It's really weird to see people arguing for "less freedom is better than more freedom".

[greenz81]

FM is tactically inept when it comes to advanced tactics. When you see the AI version of managers using the tactics FM can’t implement properly suffer (Conte, Guardiola, Simone) it’s pretty obvious. FM should give a lot more freedom to how the player wants to play. All this talk of exploits and why they remove features is just a cop out. Man City, Barcelona, Real Madrid have been exploiting football for years, whether it’s off the field tactics or just blatant money cheat code. SI should concentrate on making the game more fluid and free. Even the UI is rigid, and that is a great representation of how SI in general with regards the beta and patches… stuck in the past 

[themadsheep2001]

On 22/06/2023 at 09:29, DarJ said:

While I somewhat agree with that premise but let's be honest they don't even believe that because you can come to the forum every year and you will see most people complain about how the game is easy, how your CB can score 20 goals a season from corners is unrealistic or how bad teams just passing the ball around aimlessly is realistic and no one tells them "don't set up you corner routines right then or don't play with big teams or restrict yourself in the transfer market etc.". The truth is we all push for realism when it suits us and dismiss it when it doesn't suit us with the excuses of it's just a game so we don't have to do X or it's a single player game so I should be able to do whatever I want.

 

Exactly this. Ultimately, SI do want to balance this. And this is something that's often ignored in the various demands - SI will also have their own plans and ideas. Some people might not care about a balanced ecosystem between user and AI but they do, and it underpins what they do, so they aren't going to build stuff the AI can't use.  

[wazzaflow10]

1 hour ago, nie jem frytek said:

It's really weird to see people arguing for "less freedom is better than more freedom".

Yeah really weird right? Like just let me set up whatever tactic I want and barrage the AI with 4 striker formations. Maybe Pep will notice my tactical intellect and i'll be his ass man while guiding City to back to back trebles! 

[Nick_CB]

The Football Manager ME was ruined in FM 22 with an attempt to make Gegenpress less efficient. Today FM 23 is a limited game in terms of variations and styles of play, where whoever has the tallest player and plays more directly achieves more success

[themadsheep2001]

32 minutes ago, Nick_CB said:

The Football Manager ME was ruined in FM 22 with an attempt to make Gegenpress less efficient. Today FM 23 is a limited game in terms of variations and styles of play, where whoever has the tallest player and plays more directly achieves more success

I mean this isn't true.There's loads of variation and you definitely don't need to tall and direct to get success. @Rashidi alone has made dozens of different successful play styles. Whether people are good enough or understand enough create different styles is a different debate

[Rashidi]

7 hours ago, greenz81 said:

FM is tactically inept when it comes to advanced tactics. When you see the AI version of managers using the tactics FM can’t implement properly suffer (Conte, Guardiola, Simone) it’s pretty obvious. FM should give a lot more freedom to how the player wants to play. All this talk of exploits and why they remove features is just a cop out. Man City, Barcelona, Real Madrid have been exploiting football for years, whether it’s off the field tactics or just blatant money cheat code. SI should concentrate on making the game more fluid and free. Even the UI is rigid, and that is a great representation of how SI in general with regards the beta and patches… stuck in the past 

While I do think the game would be infinitely more interesting if tactical creation became fluid, the reality of this task is somewhat daunting.

Each team needs to be thoroughly researched,  the researchers have a different template they use that sets up how the AI will interpret their systems. How well they do this translation depends ultimately on the data entered. That’s just the first point of failure from a data perspective. Next whatever tactical systems they set up need to have various alternates depending on the tactical versatility of the AI manager. 
 

The current system may not be perfect but it’s easier to manage.  Then we have the tactical inventiveness of some managers who do things others having Conte with his pendulum central defenders, Zerbi with his pivots and there have been some managers with a rotating 3 man pivot in midfield. Some of these innovations happen once a season, sometimes they happen very often. For a fluid match engine much like what people expect we would need the developers to be coding new stuff the moment it happens. The complexity of this is already mind boggling.

I much rather they focus on giving us a new set piece creator or a better more accurate UI.  Guardiolas use of Stones could very well see a new role being added to the game, maybe not for FM24, though I can remain hopeful. I think SI could tweak some of the roles and perhaps adjust how the defensive line works right now.  
 

Having two tactics one for defending and one for attacking equals four tactics for most AI teams maybe even six.  I am not saying it’s a bad idea but if people feel strongly about it, pop it up in the new features thread. SI still have bad memories of how the Ai was eviscerated with WIMBO or those with ball and without ball formation setups of the past. Even then the veteran players were quick to point out the game was waiting to be broken. It broke in beta never to find its legs again. 

[Nick_CB]

Em 23/06/2023 em 15:04, themadsheep2001 disse:

I mean this isn't true.There's loads of variation and you definitely don't need to tall and direct to get success. @Rashidi alone has made dozens of different successful play styles. Whether people are good enough or understand enough create different styles is a different debate

So I don't particularly know anything about FM anymore, although I've been playing this game since 2012

[iMan]

You can replicate the way city play in possession but you can’t make the 3-2-4-1 switch to a 4-4-2/4-4-1-1 out of possession like they do in real life, they either need to bring in an in possession/out of possession formation options or add some new fullback and and centre back roles 

[themadsheep2001]

3 hours ago, Nick_CB said:

So I don't particularly know anything about FM anymore, although I've been playing this game since 2012

You're the one making erroneous claims, I'll leave that with you.