FM24 Feature Blog: Truer Football Motion, Match Authenticity & Positional Play

[Choi seung won]

One concern is that all center backs, regardless of their stats, will naturally assume the "John Stones" role, when in reality, only top-level players with high tactical intelligence and physical ability can play the John Stones role. It's unrealistic to expect every center back to naturally play the John Stones role without missing a beat. 

Dear Match Team, are my concerns misplaced?

[gam945]

35 minutes ago, Choi seung won said:

One concern is that all center backs, regardless of their stats, will naturally assume the "John Stones" role, when in reality, only top-level players with high tactical intelligence and physical ability can play the John Stones role. It's unrealistic to expect every center back to naturally play the John Stones role without missing a beat. 

Dear Match Team, are my concerns misplaced?

I guess it's going to be a False Nine situation, i.e. you can of course put whoever you want in F9 but only a limited number of players with the right attributes would actually perform well?

[Rashidi]

5 hours ago, Choi seung won said:

One concern is that all center backs, regardless of their stats, will naturally assume the "John Stones" role, when in reality, only top-level players with high tactical intelligence and physical ability can play the John Stones role. It's unrealistic to expect every center back to naturally play the John Stones role without missing a beat. 

Dear Match Team, are my concerns misplaced?

Yes they are, for that to happen every team in the db will need to have a manager who wants multiple players in his tactic playing that specific role which is as remote as the nearest habitable planet to earth.

[Kevinho7]

All the blog posts are just outstandingly beautifull. Really looking forward to next year’s iteration of the game!

Match also looking sharp again. 
 

Now I’m just hoping that all people who own a decent mid-tier laptop, could maybe play the 3d match kind of fluidly again as well? 😇 I never owned a top tier laptop, but I remember back in the day all you need really was mid-tier to enjoy a nice looking fluid 3d match.

 

Lovely stuff SI !!

[pedrosantos]

Advertised as the "most complete" edition, it would be nice to finally have the closing down glitches solved and a different set of options for closing down instead of "more" and "less".

[aj6658]

Think it was very clear that FM23 had alot of features that were scrapped due to time constraints and its clear that for FM24 they knew well before that the feature list would primarily made up of those cutting room floor items. 

These blogs have smashed it out of the park for me and I hope the fact that some of these features have had an extra long development time will mean an excellent edition of the game 

[ElJuanvito]

How smart are players now about positioning without the ball? In a 4-2-3-1, I usually put the 10 and the striker in different vertical channels so that they know which defender to pick up while pressing, is this still necessary?

[aj6658]

One thing I would have liked from the blog is actually putting effort in the videos. The first picture isn't what the team is on the first video. No one commentating or explaining or the advances 

 

This is some really cool additions, show off to people, pause it highlight elements 

[Fritz13]

On 01/10/2023 at 20:14, Jack Sarahs said:

Yes they are both Inverted Full-backs. 

So there is always a need to have 3 hybrid CBs even if the two outer ones are actually IFBs for this to work.

just wondering if only one was set to IFB then how would the defensive setup behave?

[Jack Sarahs]

2 hours ago, Fritz13 said:

So there is always a need to have 3 hybrid CBs even if the two outer ones are actually IFBs for this to work.

just wondering if only one was set to IFB then how would the defensive setup behave?

There would be 2 CB’s left after the rotation.

The CB & the IFB and they would form a 2 CB pairing after the rotation. 

[Fritz13]

2 minutes ago, Jack Sarahs said:

There would be 2 CB’s left after the rotation.

The CB & the IFB and they would form a 2 CB pairing after the rotation. 

Thanks @Jack Sarahs

So to take this further could you play 4 across the back with 2 LIBs and 2 IFBs?
LIBs would both (or one at a time possibly) move into the DM area and the IFBs would cover the central area of defence.

I saw that a LIB won’t venture forward is they have an IWB next to them but wasn’t sure if there were any other prioritisation calls within the LIB logic.

Lastly are there any times like playing a LIB close to an IWB where one role almost cancels out the other - maybe more concerning IFBs.
You can play an IFB with a single CB to make a 2, and a single IFB with 2 CBs to make a 3, plus 2 IFBs with a single CB to make a 3 ….. does it stretch to 4 I.e. defending incredibly narrow?

[geraniumdt]

Quote

Available now in both a back four and all three central defensive roles in a back three, the Libero will move up into defensive midfield in a similar way to the Inverted Wing-Back.

Just want to shoutout a huge thanks to whoever made the decision to make this enhanced Libero role available for all defenders in a back 3. I was imagining a system where the wide centerbacks could go forward as DMs and the fullbacks tuck in to cover the space they leave, which is something that these new roles should finally make it possible (at least from what I understand so far). Extremely excited for the release!

[stopazricky]

So does this mean that the Inverted Fullback in a back four will also tuck inside to form a back three when a Wide Centerback overlaps? Or is the Wide Centerback never available for CB's in a back four?

Because on paper, nothing should stop a CB to overlap and both fullbacks to stay back to form a back three with the more conservative of the two CB's

[Jack Sarahs]

15 minutes ago, stopazricky said:

So does this mean that the Inverted Fullback in a back four will also tuck inside to form a back three when a Wide Centerback overlaps? Or is the Wide Centerback never available for CB's in a back four?

Because on paper, nothing should stop a CB to overlap and both fullbacks to stay back to form a back three with the more conservative of the two CB's

Wide Centre-back isn't available in a back 4 you will need 3CB's for this role to be selected on the tactics screen.

Just an additional note that further information on the positional play rotations will be available here on the forums when the Beta is out. 

[andu1]

Looks good on paper but will the AI managers be able to use the new roles/positional play in their tactics?

[Jack Sarahs]

10 minutes ago, andu1 said:

Looks good on paper but will the AI managers be able to use the new roles/positional play in their tactics?

Yep!

[-Jef-]

40 minutes ago, Jack Sarahs said:

Just an additional note that further information on the positional play rotations will be available here on the forums when the Beta is out. 

Will that information be available next week, then?

[daveh83]

On 07/10/2023 at 14:47, stopazricky said:

So does this mean that the Inverted Fullback in a back four will also tuck inside to form a back three when a Wide Centerback overlaps? Or is the Wide Centerback never available for CB's in a back four?

Because on paper, nothing should stop a CB to overlap and both fullbacks to stay back to form a back three with the more conservative of the two CB's

You need inverted wingbacks when playing a back 4. So they come into mid ahead of the 2 CBs

[andu1]

On 07/10/2023 at 17:19, Jack Sarahs said:

Yep!

Jack, One last question if you don't mind

Will the AI managers use more their second favorite formation? Even at starting lineup?

I get it there are some managers that don't like to swith their formations, but the flexible ones should rotate more...

Currently in FM 23.. regardless of how flexible a manager is they usually stuck 90% with their main tactic...for example below... they never start their other formation.. only the first one..

 

[wazzaflow10]

Question for the SI team - does this upgrade to positional play and awareness improve the engine's ability to deal with asymmetric tactics? I think the general consensus was that asymmetric formations tended to have players pop up in odd positions that the AI/Engine couldn't handle or didn't expect. Are these formations more balanced now that players are more aware of their surroundings?

[MrPeers1981]

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-67063855

 

 

Will this article effect anything with FM25?

[DarJ]

23 hours ago, wazzaflow10 said:

Question for the SI team - does this upgrade to positional play and awareness improve the engine's ability to deal with asymmetric tactics? I think the general consensus was that asymmetric formations tended to have players pop up in odd positions that the AI/Engine couldn't handle or didn't expect. Are these formations more balanced now that players are more aware of their surroundings?

I hope we won’t need asymmetric tactics now because one of the reasons they existed in the first place was players didn’t recognise each other’s movement for example the reason you offset your striker and attacking midfielder is to make sure they don’t occupy the same space so if that do that automatically now you wouldn’t need to offset them 

[wazzaflow10]

42 minutes ago, DarJ said:

I hope we won’t need asymmetric tactics now because one of the reasons they existed in the first place was players didn’t recognise each other’s movement for example the reason you offset your striker and attacking midfielder is to make sure they don’t occupy the same space so if that do that automatically now you wouldn’t need to offset them 

I was also thinking of one winger in the midfield strata and one winger in the AM strata too rather than just the straight 4-2-3-1. Never felt like the AI/ME handled that formation well so I stopped using it.