Tactical Theorems and Frameworks '08 Part 2

This is part 2
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Sliders and the Ambiguity of Management
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Having leant towards the positivist theories of Sir Karl Popper earlier in the thread/article, I hope you'll forgive my taking a sharp U-turn into the realms of critical management theory. This is the area of management...

in which I earn my real-life living (as a management researcher) and about which I am the most qualified to comment. I hope the following section doesn't come across as self-satisfied onanism and most can read it in the manner it is intended.

I decided to steal Popper's falsification theory (and slightly misuse it) in order to illustrate how the best laid plans of mice and men may come to nothing due to an event or series of events that invalidates the previously observed data. In theory, a purely scientific approach to tactics, recognising the hows and whens of theory falsification, should consistently ensure one choosing the 'best' tactic for any given situation with good form logically following. However, management does not follow the practice of positivistic science; it is at best a social science, at its most abstract an art form. Either way, it is influenced almost entirely by language usage and the human responses this usage engenders. Simply put, it contains the full spectrum of human motivations and emotions which can only be made sense of through a complex network of interrelating theory. It is impossible to determine through scientific enquiry why two seemingly similar people react differently when confronted by the same phenomena. For that you need to understand their personal histories, current motivations, future plans, chemical imbalances, levels of tiredness/stress etc, etc.

If SI were to program FM in the positivistic pattern it would cease to be enjoyable before too long. It certainly wouldn't be a simulation of management any more. Once the best tactical algorithm has been discovered it would become little more than Player Purchaser 08, because only the quality of player would matter. The tactics would have been solved to the extent that if you knew you had the best squad you would automatically win the league. Previous versions were like this, and were fun for a time, but didn't portray the real world managerial experience. SI introduced extensive ambiguity in '06 and '07 and emotionally ambivalent reactions followed. Arguably, such reactions suggest SI are beginning to finally successfully simulate management.

The most common complaint in the forums for FM07 was the ambiguity of the sliders. People complained that they didn't know how they worked, what they did, and the plethora of competing theories didn't help. Indeed, they argued that the competing theories 'proved' that the game was flawed. Some even argued that we shouldn't write theory unless we 'knew' we were right; that is was dangerous to do otherwise. However, does this outlook equate to reality? Yes, there is a UEFA Pro-License for managers which teaches the same theory to all, but do managers really follow the same practices. Can anyone really argue that Ferguson, Wenger, Mourinho, Benitez and Eriksson share the same management style? All are successful, but all undoubtedly put into practice different theoretical approaches to the art of management.

Not knowing exactly what the sliders do allows us to approach FM in a similar manner. We have to use our intuitive experience to construct a style of play and management we are happy with. Some tactical theorists try to use a one-size fits all solution and tweak in-match, others have a home and away package, TT&F employs a five-pack, and the extreme tacticians design 14 sets. All work to an extent; all are more or less useful. As in the real world of management, those who wish to manage must choose a system to follow, cherry-pick between systems, come up with one of their own, or combine all three to create a personal best practice. The frameworks and theorems we write about are no more than a series of more or less useful guidelines that the reader can choose to learn from/use/reject depending on how they 'feel' about them. It is style over and above science.

Let's look at an easy to understand slider to illustrate my point, the passing slider. Set it to short and you expect your players to look for short passes >75% of the time. Easy. No problem. But when added to mentality you have a conundrum. My mentality instructions are telling the player to look for attacking balls >75% of the time. What happens if the 'best' attacking ball is a long pass? Will he try it? Let's look at his decision stats. OK, 16, so he should look for the attacking pass most of the time. However, would his low creative freedom setting stop him from even thinking of the pass. Would his passing stats make the longer, attacking pass feasible in the first place? Decisions, decisions!

And then we are back to the crux of the matter. Decision making. We must learn to trust our decisions and the only way we can do that is through experience, literally learning from our mistakes. We must expect to go wrong at times and learn to adjust our decision making process to minimise the chances of it happening again. As things go wrong less and less often we begin to gain in confidence and then can start to experiment in more creative ways. Eventually, management becomes easy because we can no longer be surprised and we can relax. Or does it? The management process can always throw you a curve-ball. In FM07 the curve-ball was the different tactical approach required once your team ranking and your personal reputation reached a certain plateau. Once at that level, things that worked previously began to fail. Also concurrent with the management experience. Past success must be unlearned when its practices no longer solve the conundrums of the present. People complained of the unrealism of the game when their world-class squad suddenly failed to perform. Instead of asking why, they just cried 'the AI cheats' and stormed out of the debate. But the why is simple. The AI changed the rules by consistently playing more conservative formations that required a different tactical approach to break down. The solution was simple and logical, but people became blind to it due to not being able to throw off the yoke of past experience. Spread the play, open up the pitch, become more creative, keep the ball, remain patient. Focusing on this enabled performance levels to remain high, but failing to make that adjustment meant players became frustrated at their constant failure to put the opposition away and became vulnerable to the break. It may be the same curve-ball in '08. It may not. Only time will tell. But the fun is in not knowing.

FM needs ambiguity if it is to remain a simulation over and above an arcade game. The slider instructions must contain some ambiguity so we can't take a purely positivistic approach. We must learn to manage. And learning to manage means accepting ambiguity and ambivalence and coping with them both to the best of your ability. TT&F can help, but only to a certain extent. The rest is down to you. The remainder of this article/thread is our attempt to minimise the frustrations of virtual management. We hope you can find use for it.


Frameworks

The framework section details the key settings for team shape. If a team has a poor shape it becomes easier to break down and less fluent in attack. Frameworks specifically deals with mentality arrows and forward runs.


Mentality Systems

SI have explicitly stated that mentality is the most important setting in the game. Getting it wrong is likely to cause lots of grief. The following details some potential base settings and additional tweaks to gain best advantage. Please note that TT&F fundamentally believes that the individual mentality settings do not work in tandem with the team setting in conjunction with all other dual settings. Thus, if you choose to set all mentalities individually it does not matter where the team mentality slider is positioned.

The most fundamental change between FM06 and FM07 was the reworking of mentalities. Prior to that it was possible to defeat the match engine by spreading mentalities across the board so that you could launch lightening attacks and remain defensively stable. The reworking disabled such systems, most notably the Rule of Two (RoT). It was now inadvisable to have such extreme mentality splits. Thereafter, TT&F began to recommend and still recommends having no more than 6 (six) slider notches separating the most defensive-minded defender from the most attacking-minded attacker (with the exception of a rule-breaking proviso to be detailed later). The format TT&F developed was the Rule of One.

The Rule of One works very simply. Each level of the team is separated from the next level by a mentality of 1 (one). Thus, when setting up the side you would do so in the following manner:

Rule of One


Defend Counter Balanced Attack

DCs: 2 6 10 14
FBs: 3 7 11 15
MCd: 4 8 12 16
ML/R: 5 9 13 17
MCa: 6 10 14 18
FCs: 7 11 15 19



Please note: Control is either equal to or slightly more conservative than Attack.

We do not believe this is the only way to set up mentalities and believe there to be various alternatives. However, in conjunction with the above set up, were you to choose a framework based on Global Mentalities we would suggest you take the mean settings as a guide:

Global Mentality Average

Defend: 4-5
Counter: 8-9
Balanced: 12-13
Attack: 16-17




Additional Mentality Settings

Central Midfielders

Mentality differences seem to be more acute than in previous versions. In defensive-minded tactics any kind of mentality gap between the midfield and the DCs leaves a gap that the AI will ruthlessly exploit. Thus, it is beneficial to have one MC on the same mentality setting as the DCs no matter what the tactic in order to provide defensive cover (with the possible exception of a Control based tactic). NB: This was extremely necessary in 8.0.1 but it may well be the case that this is not required in the 8.0.2 patch. Be prepared to experiment.

Equally, it is problematic if you have too big a mentality split between the midfielders and attackers. Large mentality splits in this area create a void between the two strata that effectively forces the midfield to hit direct through balls to breaking attackers. It is impossible to build up attacking play and create easy chances. All you will create are frantic one-on-one dashes or hopeful long shots. These problems will be exacerbated if the forward runs/farrows are poorly structured.


The Strong/Tall Target Man/Creative Forward

Even though they perform very different roles, the Strong/Tall Target Man and the Creative Forward require something similar in terms of mentality settings in attacking tactics. With too high a mentality setting, neither has the chance to become involved in the game as much as they should. Drop their mentality to the lower end of the team mentality split (12 in Balanced, 14 in Attack) so they can better link up play. Too high and they will only ever look for attacking balls rather than team-linking passes or cushioned back headers. Too low and they will lose their attacking effectiveness.


Playmaker

As with the Strong Target Man/Creative Forward, the Playmaker is likely to perform better with a slightly lower than team average mentality setting. It will allow him to drop into space and dictate play via a wider range of passing options rather than only looking for attacking balls. If you are using the MCd as the Playmaker, this won’t matter. If you are using the MCa, consider dropping his mentality to a similar level to the MCd.


Quick Target Man/On–the-shoulder Striker

To ensure the Quick Target Man/On-the-shoulder Striker is playing on the shoulder of the last man, it is imperative you add a few mentality notches for Defend/Counter/Balanced. We would suggest adding three-four notches for Defend and Counter, and one or two for Balanced.


Arrows

The only arrows we wish to be explicit about are the forward arrows for the most advanced wide players (ML/R in 4-4-2, WBs in a 5-3-2). For Defend there should be no forward arrows; for Counter and Possession short forward arrows, for Attack and Control long forward arrows.

Other arrows are more optional, although the side-arrows on the FCs can be useful for Defend and short diagonal backward and forward arrows for the MCd/MCa can aid the other systems.


Forward Runs

The Defensive Trio

The two DCs and the MCd should stay back at all times to protect the penalty area in the defensive tactics and to recycle possession in the attacking ones. Therefore, in all formations, they should have their forward runs set to rarely.

Wide Players

Forward runs are arguably most vital for wide players. With them set badly the full-backs won’t support attacks or the wingers won’t track back to help defensively. Forward runs for Full Backs and Wingers should, respectably, follow this pattern:

Control: Often, Often
Attack: Mixed, Often
Balanced: Mixed, Mixed
Counter: Rarely, Mixed
Defend: Rarely, Rarely


The Attacking Trio

Setting forward runs for the front three is vital in terms of getting the tactic to function but is more of an art than a science. The standard starting setting would be:

MCa: Often
FCd: Rarely
FCa: Mixed

However, they can be altered depending on player type and team requirement. A speedy FCa playing in a Counter or Defend system may be most effective with forward runs set to often, so he is always trying to break the offside trap and get behind the defensive line.

An FCd might also benefit from forward runs mixed in Defend or Counter systems, although the forward runs rarely will be vital in the more aggressive tactics. In those, his job will be to drop deep to link up play and/or pull his marker out of position so a team mate can exploit the space behind him. A lower mentality coupled with forward runs rarely should ensure that happening.

The MCa might be required to play a more defensive role for Defend or Counter systems entailing a mixed or rarely setting. Likewise, if he is a Playmaker, mixed or rarely might ensure he is in more space to receive the ball.

Getting these right for each system can be a matter of trial and error and often is related to the player type. It is pointless having a lazy playmaker making forward runs all the time whereas a hard working midfield dynamo can do it all day. If both strikers are speedy snipers and not suited for creative roles then it may be best to have them both making forward runs mixed/often. Just watch the offside count! Getting it right can turn a tactic from a semi-effective one to a world-beater so experiment as much as possible.