Soccer Gaming Catch-All

Well, on a quad core with 4 gigs and Vista I run

England (to Blue Square)
Scotland (to Div 3)
Holland (to their div 2)
Spain (to Segunda B)
Italy (to Serie C)
Germany (to their div 2)

I think that's 21 divisions, medium database, and it runs fine.

Nice. I usually run 15 to 20 divisions. I'm planning a start unemployed floater game, go into a club, whip it into shape (or fail miserably) then in two or three season (or when they sack me) move on to the next challenge.

So I need a good mix of respectable leagues and lower divisions.

In 09 you can get a job at a Blue Square North/South club with Sunday leaguer experience.

EDIT:

The game's just over halfway through the download and I've started downloading a 2.5gb facepack for it with over 55000 players in it. A kits pack with over 2900 kits and a 1.75gb logo pack

Could you post the links for them ? My installation is fairly vanilla at the moment, apart from some 'adjustments' I've made to the funds of various teams that I despise

I'm running over thirty divisions In my current save on 4gb of ram and OC'd CoreDuo, with >120k database and it's running fairly smooth, though it has those long stretches of simulating games or gets clogged during transfer window, but hey, tea time!

I have 2,5 gig facepack too, when I get home from vacation I'll check if it's the same. Generally speaking sortitoutsi.net (and it's forums) is great soure for FM graphics.
Sometimes I also get carried away and cutout those portraits myself.

Yeha all of those I linked originate on sortitoutsi, but that site is down at the moment because they got hacked, these are just alternative links for the stuff.

(Heeeey, I'm back! Vacation shmacation, time to play some FM.)
Pred, can we (meaning you) change name of the thread to something else than 08/09? I guess that by 2011 it may become a tad confusing for new Goodjers.
And I'm finally going to post my tactics this evening.

Arrrgh! After half a season with Blue Square South relegation candidates Worchester my game decided to crap out with an XML parsing error. I've fixed the error so I can play FM10 again, but now I can't open any of my save games!

First news about FM11:
-improved training
-improved scouting/searching for players
-introducing players' agents
-improvements to 3d

@Pred
short analysis of my 4-2-3-1:

# team instructions
balanced;
standard/counter against stronger teams or when in lead
passing: short/mixed against stronger teams
closing down: often;
everything else untouched;

#player roles
GK - sweeper; distribution to quick throw to DL
DCs - normal defenders
full backs - one in support full back role, one in support/attack wing back role (make sure it matches side of your more defensive MC - e.g. if your attacking full-back is DL, then make MCl ball-winner*)
MCr - ball-winning midfielder in defensive role (you can experiment with using standard role or even central midfielder making forward runs if opposition is defensive)
MCl - deep-lying playmaker; support -> THIS IS ESSENTIAL TO THIS TACTIC - you need a player who sits deep and has a good vision -> setting him up in that role means he will enjoy a lot of space until your opponent plays with very compact midfield
AMC - attacking midfielder in attack role but WITH LOWERED MENTALITY (and forward runs at often) - that means he sticks closer to our playmaker and offers an easy way to get ball closer to goal
AMR - inside forward on attacking duty - use MOVE INTO CHANNELS for wide play - he's your second striker, off-the-ball player who's busy making runs into space
AML - (notice it's the player on wing closer to playmaker) - inside forward on support duty - that means he's cutting inside while offensive DL is making runs down the line and AMC, AMR can move into gaps in opposition defence
FC - anything that fits you, I play normal advanced forward (watch his movement for couple of games if you want to keep "roam from positon" ticked, personally I keep that off because with single striker if that guy wanders to wing this leaves absolutely no one in scoring positions)

*however, I'm trying to do something opposite this season: I set my goalie to throw ball to that offensive DL and then stick my playmaker as MCl so that means he can recieve ball faster - if you're going to set your goalie to throw the ball to full-back, make sure that your winger has a little lower mentality/forward runs, just like in my example - just as with MCl and AMC this brings your DL and AML closer together and gives an option to pass. Perfectly your're left with a triangle involving: DL in possession of the ball, AML offering straight pass forward, playmaker offering safe pass into the center circle.

#what is required
GK, DR, DCs, MCr, ST are pretty simple, get as good players for these positions as you could.
DL has to be an all-round defender, stamina and work-rate are the key, as is passing and decisions (high enough to make sure that he keeps cool head when goalie throws ball to him - review match stats after games to see how effective he is at ball retention)
MCl - first touch, decisions, passing, creativity; there is a lot of such midfielders in game; sidenote: don't look for someone fast, but rather for big bloke, as this is crucial position for winning headers, as our MCl has AMC close to him and won header often means winning back possession
AML - most tricky: we like him to be right-footed, technically skiled and with good vision - he will be sort of advanced playmaker, teamwork is essential too
AMR - best shout is to look for one of these AMR/ST types (Balotelli, eh) - fast, athletic, good movement, can't cross but can finish
AMC - as good as you can get, but look for someone who feels good as second striker as we want him to make forward runs

The thing I love/hate about FM is knowing that, whatever they say about WHEN the game's coming out, you probably don't need to buy it for a good month or two after release, once a bug patch is released.

I'd say you have to wait till January/February when they release 11.3 patch, like they did last two or three times. I usually play two, three seasons before that and only after last patch really dive into the game.

Whoo, Fiorentina signed me for two years after three years in Greece. I had to leave because even as league champions all we could muster was 3-4 million transfer budget and same wages. I did pretty much all I could with that team, winning two titles, and getting thrashed in Europe by teams from big leagues.

Plus Fiorentina has Mesut Ozil. Creativity, passing, first touch, teamwork, decisions, technique all over 18. Pace, acceleration, dribbling, off the ball 17 or above.

UCRC wrote:

Whoo, Fiorentina signed me for two years after three years in Greece. I had to leave because even as league champions all we could muster was 3-4 million transfer budget and same wages. I did pretty much all I could with that team, winning two titles, and getting thrashed in Europe by teams from big leagues.

Plus Fiorentina has Mesut Ozil. Creativity, passing, first touch, teamwork, decisions, technique all over 18. Pace, acceleration, dribbling, off the ball 17 or above.

I can't get Ozil to play well at City, no matter what I try. There again, he did miss 4 months with injury as I finished 1 point behind Chelsea.

I also didn't realise that they'd implemented the Premier League's new stupid rules (I'm guessing in one of the updates, as I don't think it was announced in Sept last year). Fitting in the 8 HG players was a right PITA.

I guess you just can't make him playmaker/leader of the team, because he's got pitiful determination/work rate. I see him more as a AML player than Zidane-style playmaker (plus Fiorentina already has Montolivio, who's also huge talent, he develops very well in the game)

Meanwhile, I got bored with transfer dealings at Fiorentina and went back to my Greek savegame. At least here I got everything already figured out

UCRC wrote:

I'd say you have to wait till January/February when they release 11.3 patch, like they did last two or three times. I usually play two, three seasons before that and only after last patch really dive into the game.

True, but I always have a hard time resisting. Maybe if I skip the demo this year, i'll be better about it.

Wooohoooo, Pred, I think I'm going to do a longer follow-up on my 4-2-3-1. I've tweaked it a little, and since then in 3-4 months I've went to
1) beat Valencia (H), Inter (H), Valencia (A) in my first CL season, without losing single goal
2) top Greek league with 3.0 goals scored/game and 0.75 lost
3) do all of that while in injury crisis - against Valencia away (comfortable 2-0) I didn't have 9 players including best defender, playmaker and lone striker

...and my best earner is on 600k/year. Compare that to Panathinaikos, second in table, who have twenty-one players earning more.

:fistpumps:

edit: And I'm not buying like crazy either, my income:expenses ratio on transfer market is roughly 2:1. I have to keep it that way because average attendance is below 10k.

/quits Bishop's Stortford

/Takes over at Hellas Verona.

/Immediately is drawn into cup tie with Chievo Verona.

Tangential to this: remember how I've took over Fiorentina 'cause they've got Ozil and Montolivio and you gotta progress in this game and...' etc. and then got bored after an hour and got back to Panonios save?
Well, I'm playing them in CL knockout.

What division does Hellas Verona play in? What budget do you have? I've tried playing in Serie B some time go and discovered that it's easy to lure good players on free transfers, you just have to dig deep to ind them.

Assuming Pred didn't spend too long at Bishop's Stortford, Hellas will most likely be in Legio Pro Prima Divisione B (which was the old Serie C1). Nice big stadium (39,000 odd), and they actually attract more support than Chievo.

Not sure what their finances are like, they've had a few chairman over the past few years - but you can probably count on somewhere between 6 and 10 thousand season tickets, which isn't bad at that level.

Jesus, I got to sell less than 3,5k season tickets in the season after winning championship and getting into CL. Athenian suburbs, eh.

UCRC wrote:

Jesus, I got to sell less than 3,5k season tickets in the season after winning championship and getting into CL. Athenian suburbs, eh.

You not seen all that stuff on the telly about the Greek financial crisis then ?

In Season 2 of my MCFC game, 15 games in, currently 3rd in table after a slow start, won all 4 games in my CL group after doing Juventus 1-0 home and away, and.....

I got my first '3 games to save his job' off the media ??

The media, biased against City, I tell ya, biased !

I came into Verona at the end of July. It is a neat little club, arguably bigger than Chievo in some ways.

Dave's pretty much on. Big stadium, although they averaged only 12K a game last year. When I came in, the transfer budget was $1.2M, and a salary cap of $4.6M. I don't like jumping in with the big dogs, Verona is the most valuable club in Serie C1 (i'll call it that for simplicity), but they're only rated to finish 8th this season, and that's after finishing 4th last year. It's a team that's been beset by a metric ton of bad management, so I can still play my preferred underdogs card a bit.

The squad was threadbare when I arrived though. To the tune of only 16 first-team players as of August, so I've been scouring the "Transfers Out" pages of every big club in Europe and offering Trials to just about anyone who was let go at any point over the last 12 months. If I can get Marcos Tebar, Victor Vazquez and Jonathan Soriano to sign (let go from Real Madrid/Barca/Barca respectively), we may have a shot at promotion this year.

Yes, I did give up on playing hardcore LLM style, why do you ask?

So, i'm going to try a real-life tactic in my game.

As the always wonderful Jonathan Wilson explains, the 4-2-1-3 isn't much different from the 4-2-3-1, but the difference is significant, and has changed the game. I think my team has the personnel (wingers better at attacking than crossing, two defensive midfielders) to try and pull it off. I'm basing it partially off your 4-2-3-1 though UC, so this'll be an interesting experiment.

Or i'll get fired for blowing our entire transfer budget and not getting the top-6 finish I promised.

Wait, is that a new blog? Nowadays Jonathan seems to be writing more about 4-2-3-1 than football (tangential: did you have a chance to listen to world football phone-in where he was guest few weeks ago and started talking about his girlfriend? delicious)

Okay, now listen carefully, couple of tips to get your 4-2-3-1 started (last of them most important, you can skip right to it ;])
1) lots of personal instructions - I didn't upload the tactics file because I felt it made more sense to present logic behind these choices; it's all in post above

2) corner routines = trial and error; you'll be seeing a lot of corners (because you will be in possession, playing with wingers and making a lot of lateral passes etc. etc.)

3) if you have choice over wingers the best way to approach this is to find right-footed versatile AML (with touch of playmaker) and offensive AMR; in detal that means:
AML - first touch, technique, passing, creativity, long shots, decisions, teamwork - inside forward with default 'wide play' (which is 'cut inside')
AMR - speed, off the ball, flair, finishing - make him 'move into channels' (or try 'normal'), that will create movement from wings inside*, much needed to create anything when opponents shut up shop

*whereas 'cut inside' makes player carry the ball inside, 'move into channels' allows him to run *without* ball - we want both of these

of course you may try to invert this, but I don't think you will find anyone half-decent with left foot playing on right wing

4) striker and AMC are easier to set up; AMC should be playmaker, but if you have offensive AMC who loves to dribble, have no fear and just go for it - in my set-up AML is playing the deepest and AMC is almost a second striker
but if you have problems keeping possession consider moving AMC deeper (I've found the middle ground by keeping his mentality few notches lower than usual but allowing him to make Runs From Deep often)

5) tall midfielders: if you have defensive MC who's Makelele type of player you have to compensate with finding tall offensive midfielder
I play offensive MC in "deep-lying playmaker" role, but most often designate "playmaker" role to AMC; "deep-lying" is great because it has nice fixes to standard MC role: it sets him up a little deeper on the pitch, makes him hold the ball

take a look at Croatian Zvonko Pamić or Rene Khrin - those two guys can pass and are skilled players, but more importantly will also intercept a lot of high balls played through the middle because they're almost 190cm tall

6) breaking stalemate: switch MC from 'deep-lying' to 'central midfielder' - hopefully he will start making runs into the box and assign full-backs attacking duties; most of time it works much better than higher mentality which is my next and main point:

7) "Attacking" mentality has nothing to do with actual attacking! Generally it just means higher positioning on the pitch and longer passing, thus exposing you for counter-attacks and making retention much harder. Don't be a sucker for that and never start the games with offensive mentality! We want to probe the opposition, play tentatively for as long as we could.
Why? Because playing deeper creates space to be exploited as opposition players are drawn higher up the pitch trying to close you down. And if they don't close down... well, then it creates enough space around your midfielders (or some attackers) when they recieve ball to allow them to operate freely in offensive positions. This compensates for the fact that we aren't world-class team and some players will have sloppy first touch or won't be able to make decisions on the spot. They need time, they need space. Keep that in mind.

Personally, this season I've never switched to anything higher than 'standard' before 80th minute. However, consider playing more direct passing style when at home and looking for more decisive attacking play.

Oh, and I've beaten Fiorentina away But it was lucky, I wonder if we can pull that thing off again at home.

edit: Yep. They didn't even had shot on target. Next in line... Real Madrid. Hmmmm. Arduous.

Well it's not a 4-2-3-1 remember, it's a 4-2-1-3 with two holding midfielders (he says as if he's Béla Guttmann or something).

I'm working with two new DMCs, one as supporting DMC, the other as a Anchor man, and my MC plays as a Advanced Playmaker, leaving his mentality roughly about the same as my Defensive Midfielder. This way, my attack essentially becomes three in the box with one man loitering just outside. I've followed your instructions for the AML and AMR, although i'm flitting between using a Target Man and a Advanced Forward for the Striker.

We've done well in two games though, two 1-0 wins of reasonable comfort. There's still a crapload of gelling for the team to do, and they still have to get used to the tactic, but so far, so good.

EDIT: Five, FIVE straight 1-0 wins. Boring, Boring Hellas Verona.

I've beaten Real away. I'VE BEATEN REAL. WOOHOO.
Recipe for success: 1st minute goal -> bore them to death -> miss penalty at the end. Have I scored that penalty I would be coming home with two goal advantage.

As for your tactic. Two DMCs is hard to pull off if you play offensive wide players. I've never managed to create successful tactic using it.

It matters. With the proper people, it can work, I had a game in Holland where I played a 4-2-4 that had two DMCs in midfield and a huge gap leading to two strikers and two wingers, and it actually worked well. So far, the key (as with real life) is making sure my MC has time to turn and look upfield with the ball. If he's getting suffocated, I bring up a DMC and it becomes, what, a 4-1-2-3?

If the MC has time on the ball, he can get it to the wingers. the current issue is, my wingers love to selfishly crank the ball wide of net rather than lay it off to THAT GUY WHO'S TOTALLY OPEN RIGHT THERE.

Eh, I lost 1-2 at home and got eliminated by away goals. But, hell, I had 60% of possession and their goalscorer, Benzema, earns more than my whole squad.

Prederick wrote:

If the MC has time on the ball, he can get it to the wingers. the current issue is, my wingers love to selfishly crank the ball wide of net rather than lay it off to THAT GUY WHO'S TOTALLY OPEN RIGHT THERE.

So, after all I said, you still signed Shaun Wright-Philips ?

(shakes head)