Football Manager Live: The day after

YouTube · Wed Mar 10, 2010 7:09 pm

Μπορείς να έρθεις στον Keane και να πας σε FG με τους άλλους Έλληνες...

YouTube · Wed Mar 10, 2010 7:50 pm

Summary

Version 1.5 is the last piece in the puzzle before the grand re-launch of Football Manager Live. It includes many important changes to the way the game plays including (but not exclusively).

- An overhauled skills system that encourages specialization in 2 of the skill branches. If you want to learn above level 3 in skill branches you have not specialized in, it will take progressively longer to learn them. As well as tweaking the learning times and effects of the skills we have also added a brand new skill queue to make learning those skills even easier.
- Now users are awarded medals for extreme levels of achievement. Medals are for those people who have done something out of the ordinary and distinguish the very best, most hardcore or most fortunate in the world. There are even a few medals for those who happen to have been most unfortunate in some areas.
- Changes to the locking and wage system. You now have unlimited locks to use but at the cost of increased wage demands for your best players. Players will now ask for a wage relative to both their reputation and their club's reputation in the gameworld.
- Preselected Pool system implemented for the beginning of a gameworld. Choose your initial squad from a pool of 50 players. You have until 24 hours before season starts to try out all the players in your pool and find out who you want to keep for the first season.
- Injury length now tweaked so that the numbers are more realistic making squad management much more important.

Read on for the full detailed list of how all the above changes will work as well as all the other smaller changes that have been implemented in 1.5.

Academy

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Auto selector and initial pools

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Achievements

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Awards

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Challenges

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CPU Clubs

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Finances

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- 'General Income' now listed as 'Commercial Operations' and 'Stadium Income' now listed as 'Match Day Revenue'.
- Don't veto transfer activity if the veto is due to a low projection due to having fewer than 16 players. Otherwise it makes it hard to get out of a hole - it doesn't let you sign a player to bring you back to 16 players!
- Freeze income, wages etc for a team who hasn't yet confirmed their squad.
- Maximum overdraft now only starts rising from the start of season 3. This eliminates this as a contributing factor to imbalances, especially during season 1 when a few days difference in sign-up time could equate to the difference between being able to bid or not bid on a particular player.
- Removed dampening effect of low wages on matchday/commercial income.
- If you confirm your squad early, then it now caps your income to no higher than your wages or wage cap, whichever is lower. This negates any financial advantage in confirming your squad before the transfer market has fully opened.
- In the first month following a manager's first sign-in, don't limit daily income to no more than their wage bill if they haven't yet got a ranking as this just confuses people. After a month, however, if they become inactive to the extent they no longer have a ranking, then it's ok to limit income.
- Increased interest rates on debt; if you are within your overdraft limit then you will pay around 0.01 x the balance per day (so on a debt of 100k, around 1k), whereas if you are over your overdraft limit you will pay around 0.02 x the balance per day (so for example on a debt of 200k, that would be 4k). This is instead of what it was before, which was around 0.0035 x balance per day.
- When you've not yet confirmed your squad, financial projection shouldn't attempt to make a projection based on incomplete information.
- When a club confirms their squad, pay them whatever minimum prize money they would normally be due for the proportion of time remaining until the start of the next season. This applies after the first pre-season only. No prize money is paid during the first pre-season

Football Associations and competitions

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- 'Assign Reputation & Prize Money' option now works for UFFA too, setting appropriate figures for GC, SC, CWC and GWC.
- 'Estimated Length' of a competition now takes into account the time specified for shared/won rights to be played after the deadline, and the scheduling system also takes this into account now too.
- Added a 'Suspend' option for competitions, which can be applied to an empty competition to hide it from the default views and prevent clubs from joining it. Suspended competitions are also excluded from automatic prize money and reputation allocations. The corresponding "Unsuspend" option is used to bring back a suspended competition.
- Added FA organiser option to remove all teams from an FA in one swoop.
- Added two new competition options, editable from the "Scheduling" tab of the competition popup. "Decide Playing Rights" allows an organiser to configure the period of time leading up to a match deadline during which offline playing rights are decided based on challenges made and online time (previously this was fixed to 5 days), while "Allow Playing Match" allows an organiser to configure the period time following a match deadline during which the winner of the offline playing rights (or both managers if they were shared) during which the match can be played before it will be auto resolved by the system (previously this was fixed to 24 hours).
- Added a 'Number Of League Runs' setting to federation editor, which will shortly be used to fix issues with prize money projections relating to FAs that run their leagues multiple times within a season, and various other similar glitches.
- Added an FA option "Assign All Clubs To Leagues..." which is intended to be used in two key places during a Gameworld's early growth. The first is after the first FA lockdown, and can be used to randomly assign all clubs in the FA to a qualifying league. Once the qualifying leagues have been run, and clubs have thus gained a reputation (for example, after 3 seasons), this option can be used to assign all the clubs to the appropriate position in the league structure according to their reputation, thus the best clubs in the top division, next best clubs in the next division, etc.
- At FA lockdown, automatically grant FA membership to any team whose manager has signed-in during the past season but is currently without an FA, to an available 'Open' FA if there is one.
- All competitions are now given an "Intensity Rating" which is a basically the maximum number of matches that a team can play in the competition divided by the maximum number of days the competition can run for to give a rough guide to how intensive the schedule us. As the first part in steps being taken to protect the auto resolution system from meltdown, a limit of 10.0 has been set for the IR of any competition. Existing competitions that exceed this will not be able to re-start in future without adjustment, and competitions cannot be created or edited to exceed this.
- Allow competition organisers to specify an offline % but no prize money penalty. This won't do anything, but means the offline % can be displayed as a guide and used by those FAs whereby we want to move teams from one FA to another if they exceed the %.
- Don't make the setup assistant prod you into joining an FA if it's not possible due to lockdown.
- Don't reschedule a fixture if it's within 24 hours of the deadline.
- Changed 'Official' and 'Unofficial' stats categories to 'Major' and 'Minor'. For senior football, Major means all senior FA competitions with a reputation setting, and for youth football, Major means all youth FA competitions.
- Future seasons will last 23 days instead of 21 days, with the subsequent pre-season period reduced to 5 days. Future player contracts will align themselves to the 5 day period from season-end, instead of the 7 day period.
- Fixed a bug where a manager could move FA's and win an FA award despite not playing any matches.
- Fixed slight bug in automatic prize money calculator, where it gave a small minimum prize money amount to all teams, even if none was asked for.
- Re-worded news item when it pays out final league position prize money under the new deferred/accumulated prize money system. Now talks about you having 'earned' rather than 'received' the money, since you haven't actually received it.
- When validating a competition length, if it's a league competition then check it can run multiple times in the case of an FA with a number of league runs setting of greater than zero.
- Clubs can now only enter or confirm entry into competitions if the intensity rating of the competition would mean the user does not exceed the maximum total intensity rating, currently set to 100 for each user.
- Disabled the accumulate prize money FA org option, it should always be set when the automated allocation system is run and shouldn't be turned off. Now it can't be!
- Expanded federation types from 'Domestic' and 'Super' to 'Domestic (Open)', 'Domestic (Traditional)', 'Domestic (Live)', 'Domestic (Active)' and 'Super'; these new definitions will allow a simpler and more effective FA finder to be implemented, and also allow us to automatically assign users to the most appropriate 'Open' FA type if they are in danger of missing out on an FA.
- Length of preseason for season one is now independently configurable from the normal preseason, in case we need it to be longer than 5 days at the launch of a gameworld.
- 4829 - Competition has failed to auto start and the user has no option to manually start the competition

Manager

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Matches and match day

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Moderation

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News & mail

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Players - AF, Transfers, wages, contracts, morale and auctions

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Players - Reputation and progression and regeneration

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Skills

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- Added the concept of a skill queue. It is now possible to queue up any number of skills so long as they *start* within 24 hours. This means for example you could queue up a 23 hour skill and then add a 2 day skill to the end, or alternatively queue up a large number of the smaller, lower level skills before placing a big skill at the end.
- Added a new skill to the Physio family - Conditioning, which increases match fitness before matches by 5% per level helping to ensure your side are always in good shape for the match ahead.
- Academy Operation skills now require only Scouting level 3, and Youth Team Coaching level 2, meaning that we don't have a situation where under the new specialisation system that building more than one academy would require three specialisations, which is what we're trying to discourage. Learning regional Academy Operation skills to level 4 upwards however, still requires the corresponding regional scouting skill level of 4 upwards, and thus would require Scouting as been a specialised skill category.
- Enhanced the skills page so that when all bonus points are spent, or the skill queue is full it will no longer be possible to drag new skills onto the list. Previously skills could still be dragged even though they would not be added.
- Highlight a suitable default row in the skills list as you browse these pages
- Halved the maximum effect of the commercial skill boost on general income from a 40% increase down to a 20% increase.
- Judging Potential levels 1-2 can now be learnt under Scouting level 3. This is more consistent with the weaker JP skill these days and the fact that you get a basic JP ability even without a JP skill and makes for a more gradual increase in your ability to judge potential up through the skill levels.
- Made a change to the skill system so that now when learning lvl4 or above of a skill the user must choose whether or not to specialize in the skill. If they do not specialize then the skill will take longer to learn (5x longer at present) The user may choose to specialize in 2 categories of skills.
- Overhauled the skill timings. Level 4 and 5 skills will now take longer to learn than they did previously, but will also give larger rewards. The lower end skills (level 1 to 3) will take the same time as before but will bring in lowered rewards than previously.
- Position Learning as the last skill in the list on the skills page, since it is slightly different.
- Reorganised the skill page so that each category can be selected from an icon bar down the right side of the page.
- 4810 - Fixed a bug whereby when learning a skill the next level of the skill would automatically be displayed as '0% complete' implying the user had part-learned it.

Stadiums

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User Interface

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Match Engine

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YouTube · Wed Mar 10, 2010 7:53 pm

The Times They Are A Changin?

And by ?times? I mean, the skill system. As was announced a little while ago we have been listening to feedback on the forums about the current skill system and looking into ways we can change it based on this feedback. This blog is intended to outline the concerns raised by you guys and detail the changes we are making to address them.

?The Lower Level Skills Are Too Fiddly?

One of the main issues with the current skill system is that the skills you learn at the start of the game take very little time to learn. While this is good in that it allows you to catch up some ground on the more established users very quickly it is also fiddly as you have to change skills a couple of times an hour. This can lead to the loss of valuable skill training time if you log off and don?t have any longer term skils available to tide you over until the next time you log on.

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Now this has been a long-standing issue with the skill system and one that we have attempted to address before. Most notably we tried to tackle this with the starting skill selection system in which you would get a choice of the kind of manager you wanted to be. This choice would then learn some skills in the chosen category, giving you a headstart in a particular area, but also unlocking some longer term skills. However this is only of a fairly limited use and doesn?t cater to every play style.

So what are we doing about this issue? Well, rejoice, as we are introducing a skill queueing system!

This system will allow you to queue up any number of skills provided that they *begin* within 24 hours. So you could queue a 23h and 59m worth of skills before adding that 20 day behemoth to the end for example. As you would expect from a queue once one skill finishes, the next will begin learning immediately.

?There Isn?t Enough Specialisation ? Everyone Is A Jack Of All Trades?

Another area that has been identified as an issue with the present system is that the majority of users tend to learn the lower levels of each skill rather than specialising in a particular category. This is the logical approach in the current system as each level of a skill takes longer to learn but only gives the same benefit as the previous level. The original aim of this system was to ensure that the game wasn?t too biased in favour of the established user i.e. it was possible for a new user to catch up to being a level or two behind an established user very quickly however this clearly encouraged users to learn only low levels of skills. This aspect of the system was intended to be countered by rewarding specialisation by unlocking new skills at higher levels. With the exception of one or two areas (for example Commercial being unlocked at level 5 of Finance) this hasn?t happened however so this became another part of the skill system which needed an overhaul.

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So, what are we doing about this issue? In the new version skills will give differing benefits depending on the level you unlock, bringing the reward more in line with the time invested.

To give an example, let?s take the Coaching skill. In the new code it will look something like this :

Level 1 : 2.50% Boost (Total Boost : 2.50%) 40m to learn
Level 2 : 2.50% Boost (Total Boost : 5.00%) 2h 40m to learn
Level 3 : 2.50% Boost (Total Boost : 7.50%) 16h 40m to learn
Level 4 : 5.00% Boost (Total Boost : 12.50%) 12d 12h to learn
Level 5 : 12.50% Boost (Total Boost : 25.00%) 41d 16h to learn

As you can see from the above the total boost at the end is that same as before (25%) however the way in which this total boost is earned is different, with the reward at the higher levels being increased, and the lower levels decreased.

A final change in this area which will enforce specialisation is that under the new system a user can only specialise in 2 areas. Attempting to learn a level 4 or 5 skill in a non-specialist area will take will take significantly longer than normal. This means that users will have to choose carefully which area of the game they intend to focus on, helping to encourage increased specialisation.

This isn?t a closed door though ? it will be possible to change which categories you specialise in, however any level 4 or 5 skills learnt in the category you choose to ?unspecialise? in will be lost.

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Anyway, we are hopeful that these changes will help to bring the skill system more in line with what you guys have been asking for and help to address some of the long-standing issues with the system. As always all comments, questions and suggestions are welcome on the forums!

YouTube · Thu Mar 11, 2010 8:32 am

The new medals system

We?ve just announced the full changelist for 1.5. A blog all about skills and the changes we?ve made is being made tomorrow.

Celebrate Success

One of the things we wanted to make sure we did over the course of a relaunch was to ensure that everyone was able to take with them a record of what they had achieved in their previous gameworlds.

To do this, we?ve expanded on the current achievements system and created a brand new set of manager achievements in the form of medals.

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Many of you have been in your gameworld since the start, hopefully some of you feel like you?ve done really well, you?ve probably won a few competitions, been near the top of the rankings and maybe once upon a time you were the gameworld champion. The manager medals will recognise and reward all of these efforts. These medals will again be portable between gameworlds and aim to serve as a reminder, to anyone you come across, that you?ve got an FML history behind you.

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Here?s a summary of what medals you can earn so far. I?ve only got 3 in my beta gameworld

FML Founder (Signed up within Cantona?s first season)
Gameworld Founder (Signed within the first season of the GW)
World Champion (Had the crown at some point)
Defender of the Crown (Defended the champion crown at least 5 times)
Medal of Achievement (Reputation >= 6500)
Superior Medal of Achievement (Reputation >= 7500)
Exceptional Medal of Achievement (Reputation >= 8500)
Purple Heart (Suffered at least 300 injuries per week signed up)
Medal of Marksmanship (Scored at least 600 goals per week signed up)
Medal of Industry (Played at least 400 matches per week)
Medal of Marketing (Transferred at least £20,000,000 per week signed up)
Medal of Finance (Bank balance of at least £50,000,000)
Medal of Expenditure (Paying at least £300,000 in wages)
Medal of Construction (Have a stadium with at least 100,000 capacity)
Cup Winner (won an official cup competition)
Gold Cup Winner
Silver Cup Winner
Medal of Renown (Had a player with reputation >= world class level at some point)
Community Medal (users who have been awarded the community manager of the season award at least 3 times)
Medal of Obsession (percentage of life signed in greater than 30%)

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YouTube · Thu Mar 11, 2010 9:22 pm

Pre-selected squads

The concept of FML starting squads is changing:

In the past, we?ve run a system where managers are able to (within financial limits) sign whoever they want in their initial teams.

What we?ve found with this is that whilst some are able to quickly assemble their very own ?Dream Team?, others are left trailing in what?s sometimes simply a race to be the first to the free agents list.

A New Beginning

The aim of the game after the reset is very different: you?ll now need to ?build? a Dream Team over time, rather than snap up stars on day one (or soon after). As such, managers must now choose their starting squads from preselected pools of 45-55 players (pic below).

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Each manager will be given a unique pool, but these are designed to be of an equivalent standard from manager to manager ? all players have Acquisition Fees of under £100,000, and pools are balanced by Current Ability (CA) and, for youth players, Potential Ability (PA). Pools will also have a generally uniform spread of player ages and player positions.

Your Role

Your role on day 1 in V2.0 is to lay the foundations of your Dream Team. The players you pick initially won?t necessarily be the ones that get you to the top, but they are the guys that could give you a vital head start.

So, how are you going to sign?

Do you want young players to develop and/or sell on later?
Oldies might deliver instant results, but will need replacing sooner!
The more spent initially, the less that?s left for subsequent transfers. Are you going to go big on fees/wage now, or hold fire?

Making the right decisions in these areas could give you a real edge.

Week 1

The good news is that what you can do with your squad in week 1 is also changing:

You no longer need to confirm your squad before playing friendly matches or challenges ? this means you can really mix and match in week 1 to discover which of your pool players are the ones you want to go ahead and sign.

It also means you can get a head start in the race to collect Reward Points, and maybe even be the first club in your gameworld to have a mascot!

Squad Confirmation & The Transfer Market

Here are some other quick points on what you can and can?t do in week 1:

You will not be able to buy, sell, loan or swap players with other managers until after the start of the first season.
You are still able to sign players from the free market after confirming your squad, but only if they are unlocked (see below).

Note that:

No extra income is generated through the first pre-season, so there?s no rush to confirm your squad!
Once you do confirm your initial squad all the players left over in your pool will be released onto the free market for others to sign.

Locked Players

As part of our efforts to make building an FML Dream Team a game of skill rather than one of speed, the best players are now locked away for gradual release over a gameworld?s first three seasons.

The emphasis now lies on earning the right to be (financially) in pole position to sign as player once he becomes unlocked.

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The ?Locked Players? screen (pic above) will tell you when Ronaldo and co are due to become available, so be sure to keep an eye out!

We hope you?ll rise to the challenge of building a squad of stars and wish you the very best of luck in doing so!

YouTube · Sat Mar 13, 2010 1:11 pm

It?s tough at the top

A new economy is coming to FML, and it?s one which promises to keep all managers ? especially those used to seeing their clubs at the top of the world rankings ? on their toes.

Here are three reasons why:

1. CASH ? EYES ON THE PRIZE

From reset onwards, there?s to be a clearer than ever link between performances on the field and the money your club makes.

Pure prize money now makes up a full 50% of your potential income each season, with stadium income making up a reduced proportion at 35%, and daily income 15%.

IMPACT: A big stadium and/or an historically good club rep will help you, but they alone won?t be guarantees of a place amongst the game?s elite ? consistent levels of performance are now an essential to keep your club moving in the right direction.

2. MONEY-GRABBING SUPERSTARS

The days of getting away with paying players below the going rate are over, with auto-renewal wage demands now scaling in three ways:

Player Status: Is your player a major star? The higher a player?s reputation, the more he?ll ask for. Those of 4* or 5* rep have the biggest demands by far, reflecting their scarcity value.
Club Status: Are you managing a top side? You may be bringing in more money than other clubs, but your players will, accordingly, expect a piece of the pie!
Length of Service: Players aged under 30 will generally ask for more each time they renew their contracts ? after all, loyalty shouldn?t go unrewarded.

IMPACT: If you don?t keep bringing home the bacon, your players might still be asking for alot of money when their contracts come up for renewal, but you?ll need to eat into your cash reserves in order to keep paying them.

If you?re a lower rep club, however, the weighting of the system means you?ll have the breathing space to keep growing without some of the pressures bigger teams face, so breathe easy!

3. PLAYER LOCKS ? THE GOLDEN GAMBLE

Good news ? player locks are now unlimited, and you can lock as many or as few squad member?s contracts as you wish. As shown by the pic below, you can even auto-renew contracts up to 2 weeks before they expire!

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The catch is that, as described above, players at bigger clubs will often be asking for significant rises via auto-renew, leaving wage auction auto-rebids as the most cost-effective option.

IMPACT: The dilemma that faces you more than ever as an FML manager in reset is this: is this player worth what it will cost me to extend his contract, and is that an outlay I can justify?

When your team are on the way up, tying all your players down will seem an attractive proposition, but if your club begins to struggle you?ll either need to gamble on a rapid revival, or be prepared to sell some stars and rebuild afresh.

IN SUMMARY

To those of you used to hitting the heights in FML we say this: attaining gameworld domination may well be a great achievement but, after reset, only getting to the top and staying there will go down as a crowning glory. Can you handle the pressure?

As for the rest of you: there?s never been a better chance to get your club to the top, so get ready to show the world how good you are!

YouTube · Mon Mar 15, 2010 9:27 am

Player Attributes in 1.5

Some of the keen FM players amongst you FML fans may have noticed differences between any one player?s attributes in the FM database compared to FML. For instance, Torres? shooting and finishing could be 1 or 2 points higher in FML compared to FM. In fact, comparing to FM you?d notice almost all players in FML appear to benefit from higher playing attributes.

We noticed this too, and did some investigating?

The Problem

It turned out the issue laid in what we call the ?balancing code? for player attributes. What this means is as follows:

When players are created they are subjected to code which checks all their attributes are in line with their current ability (CA). This code is also run when player?s CA progresses/regresses to make sure attributes progress/regress at a similar rate.

The problem we found was that the (hidden) ?footedness? rating determining the overall effectiveness of a player?s attributes when using his playing foot/feet was being treated differently to how it is in FM, and not changing in line with overall CA movements.

The Solution

The game now knows the correct scale for the ?footedness? rating, and so will no longer let it be out of balance in the way described above.

In a new gameworld this fix will be present from the start, and you?ll notice nothing unusual with player progression & development ? except that guys like Torres will see their stats kept in line with FM levels.

How This Affects Your Team

In existing worlds, however, players currently have too many attribute points allocated to visible attributes at the expense of ?footedness?, and our fix means some redistribution will occur.

You?ll see some clear falls in player attributes, but remember

that this is an across the board change that affects every manager?s team, and
that the changes are of a neutral affect, because your players? current ability ratings aren?t falling overall ? it?s just that ?points? are being given back to the hidden ?footedness? stat.

brekekes · Mon Mar 15, 2010 7:28 pm

Σήμερα, μετά την αναβάθμιση σε 1.5, τα skills σας θα χαθούν!!! Τα skill points όχι όμως

Αυτό θα γίνει , για τεσταριστεί το reset. Μπορείτε να τεστάρετε που θα χαλάσετε τα points.

ότι και να επιλέξετε τώρα δεν πείράζει, αφού τα skills θα χαθούν πάλι στις 24/3

Founes · Mon Mar 15, 2010 7:32 pm

Ειχα την εντύπωση οτι μετά το ρεσετ το μόνο που θα παραμείνει ήταν τα skills...

brekekes · Mon Mar 15, 2010 8:07 pm

Μένουν τα skill points που έχεις. Οπότε απλώς τα εξαργυρώνεις.Έχουν γίνει αλλαγές στον υπολογισμό τους βέβαια. Έχει γράψει ο Τσακ στο thread του για το update.

g-max · Tue Mar 16, 2010 2:11 pm

Με το νέο σύστημα skills μπορούμε να διαλέξουμε δύο τομείς skills στους οποίους θα εξειδικεύσουμε.Από ότι έχω καταλάβει, μόλις φτάσουμε στο σημείο να επιλέξουμε το level 4 ενός skill, θα ερωτούμαστε αν επιθυμούμε να εξειδικευτούμε σε αυτόν τον τομέα skill λαμβάνοντας ένα boost (πιο γρήγορη εκμάθηση) από ότι αν δεν διαλέξουμε να εξειδικευτούμε.Διορθώστε με αν κάνω λάθος.Δυστηχώς δεν αφιέρωσα τον απαιραίτητο χρόνο στην beta για να είμαι σίγουρος

brekekes · Tue Mar 16, 2010 3:23 pm

ακριβώς, G.

YouTube · Tue Mar 16, 2010 11:13 pm

Wages in 1.5 ? Q & A with Oliver Collyer

With the much anticipated release of 1.5 yesterday to the live gameworlds, we sat down with Football Manager Live creator Oliver Collyer to discuss the changes to the wages system added in this version.

Q. So what?s it all about then, some of my top players are suddenly asking for extremely high wages!
A. From version 1.5, a player?s wage demand is linked not only to his reputation, but also to the reputation of the club he plays for. Over time, top players? demands will rise higher the higher the reputation of club he is playing for. In addition, we?ve removed the restriction allowing you only to guarantee keeping 5 players. You can now keep all your players, for as long as you are prepared or able to meet their wage demands.

Q. So what?s the reason for this change?
A. One of the problems that led to the reset of FML was the fact that the top teams were able to lock their best 5 players on their basic wage demand. Essentially this meant that most of the Gameworld?s top players were all unable to get a ?market wage?, i.e. even if there were teams prepared to pay them more than their basic wage demand they could not do so. The result was that top teams could keep on winning and earning cash and make large profits which would further secure their position at the top of the Gameworld and was bad for the game. By allowing the top players at the most successful clubs to progressively ask for a higher wage, we prevent this situation from happening, while also providing an interesting and strategic choice for the manager. Do I pay the high wage and bank on success in winning competitions to pay for it, or do I try and secure players on lower wages but with a greater risk of losing them to a rival club?

Q. But isn?t it a bit sudden, all these increases?
A. When this code was applied to the current live Gameworlds, then yes the demands can jump suddenly. However, when applied to a Gameworld from launch, the effect will be more progressive and subtle, partly because club reputations will take some time to grow, and partly due to changes to the way player reputation works (see below).

Q. What if I can?t afford to keep a player?
A. Each contract renewal, wage demands may rise and you?ll have the choice of whether you wish to pay the demand and keep the player, or allow the player to go to an end of contract wage auction to try and keep his wages lower. If you choose the latter, you still have the advantage over other bidders in the auction in that 1) you do not pay a signing-on fee if you retain the player and 2) you will only pay what the second highest bidder pays + £1, so the odds are still stacked in your favour.

Q. So what will be the starting bid in a wage auction, now?
A. Top players at top clubs will set a minimum starting bid of considerably below their wage demand, to stimulate interest. Essentially what would have been their wage demand under the old system is still used as the basis for starting a wage auction, meaning you can always have a chance to get a player?s wage down by going this route.

Q. You mentioned player reputation will work differently now?
A. Previously, players could acquire a high reputation by playing well enough even in games at a low level, although it would take longer. This meant it was common for squads to contain a number of well known or famous players, and subsequently wage demands would begin to rise. Under the new system, player reputation is now tuned to the new competition reputation system. What this means is that players can only gain a certain level of reputation by playing at a certain level of competition. For example, a player cannot become a household name without playing well in a Premier League, or in the top-end UFFA competitions. The result will be that many of the high reputations of players seen in current live Gameworlds, and their corresponding high wage demands, won?t be seen after the reset. Only the very top players will demand these inflated wages, and only when playing for the top clubs.

Q. Can managers not just keep trading players to keep wages down?
A. No, because when you sign a player on a high wage, he keeps his high wage. If the buyer was a smaller club, then his wage demand will gradually fall over time, but this would take a number of seasons to take full effect and make such an exploit worthwhile. If the buyer is an equally big club, he?ll continue asking for high wages.

brekekes · Wed Mar 17, 2010 10:09 am

Για μένα, η πιο σημαντική αλλαγή στο FML. Και μάλιστα την βλέπω πολύ θετικά.

YouTube · Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:52 pm

Fantasy gameworlds

Reset brings two types of gameworlds into being; one being ?Returning Stars?, the other ?Fantasy?. The second of these types is to be populated entirely by fictitious players, and I?m going to talk a bit about how the players in this brand of gameworld will be created.

In Summary
We want the balance of ?Fantasy Worlds? to be the same as that in ?Returning Stars? worlds, which are filled with real players, so the FM player database is still our template.

What we don?t want however is Messi, Ronaldo and others to just be given a random name and age and keep the same stats ? it would be easy to spot top talent if that was the case!

Therefore we effectively pull out certain parts of real player information, do a little bit of jumbling, and then stick the parts together again.

The Scientific Part!

We go some way to achieving this by pulling out player influences that are cross-linked, stuff you can?t really split up without unbalancing things. For instance, this involves:

Ensuring countries like Brazil have a higher number of quality players than lesser footballing nations.
Dictating that there are typically more high quality players in some positions (i.e. strikers) than those in more niche roles (i.e. left wing backs, or defensive midfielders).
Keeping essential rules like that which ensures most younger players don?t have really high starting abilities.

Let me give you an example of how the first of these examples works in practice:

When we give a newly created player a nationality we check the available nations left in the database (as we try and create a set number of players per nation), and then give the player a similar ability level to a player of that nation in the real life database. Those players are then both crossed off their respective lists ? so once one Portuguese player with a Ronaldo-level PA/CA (not necessarily with the same stats, or even playing in the same position) has been created for the initial launch DB, another probably won?t be.

This kind of process helps ensure the balance of players is maintained, and then once we have the basics we can fill in the other parts of the player?s data.

The Finishing Touches

We create a name based on the player?s nationality: we have a list of common first names & second names stored for different nations & regions and we can choose these at random.

The next part of the player creation is creating all the attributes for players ? Current Ability determines the overall strength of a player?s attributes, but these are of course flexed by position ? so a good defender will be better at marking than shooting, for instance!.

A player?s nation will also play some part ? for example a South American player will often be given a slightly higher bias towards technical attributes then a UK player. This isn?t always the case of course, but there is more chance of it happening.

Along with these age will play some part too as certain attributes (especially physical attributes, such as strength) grow more when a player is younger, whilst other attributes will only peak at the later stages of a player?s career ? many of the mental attributes are good examples of this.

At the end of it all you have the end product ? a living, breathing fantasy player!

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