Downloaded WWSM on Sunday and am already deeply immersed in my game with Blackpool (the team I've gravitated toward since way back in the original CM). I have to say I've had zero problems with crashing; everything's running smoothly, although I have a fairly crappy computer and am only running the English and Scottish leagues on a small database because I want my first game to run as fast as possible.

I really like some of the things I've seen in the 2D matches. Genuine attacking fullback play seems possible now. And players seem smarter; in my game against Hartlepool last night we had a free kick on the left some way outside their area; I was fully expecting a blasted shot goalward, but instead the kicker curled the ball to the right side if the area, where my winger was racing into space. He controlled the ball and drilled it past the keeper. Nice. I have a greater sense of players actually thinking in this version.

I have zero interest in training, so I really have no opinion on the new system. I hope just setting the coaches on autoassign won't have majorly bad consequences.

I can't put my finger on all the reasons, but I am finding this game a lot more fun that fm2005 (which I liked a lot). The players seem more like people than a collection of stats, and compared to fm2005 good results are harder to come by, which is a good thing.

Great game.

started a test game to fool around with in WSM2006 last night. I have yet to sim much, but for now it's running smoothly with 39 leagues in 35 nations. Basically, I'm running England, L2 and up and the top division in Spain and Italy in Europe, and the MLS all on normal detail, and EVERY possible nation's first division in Europe on basic detail, with a normal size database. This is with an Athlon 2000+ (1.67Ghz) w/512mb RAM.

I found it ran reasonably well. I'll do some testing where I'll go on holiday and will sim a long period of time and time it...

Anyway, I love the feel of the game as a whole, even more immersive than FM2005, which may mean that I'll take longer to sim a season, at least at the start...

On thing that's struck me as nice is the fact that I am getting some bids on players put on the transfer list. I mean, you know how you start with some players already transfer listed by your predecessor. In FM2005, I'd never get any bids on these guys. I thought it was mostly because they were big piece of crap kind of players, but both times I've started games with WSM2006, with two different teams, I've receieved either bids, or enquiry for players valued very low but that could have some appeal to lower league teams (but not more appeal than what they would have had in FM2005)...

Anybody has seen more transfer offers coming your way in the 2006 version?

FM

Was really starting to get the hang of this with Cambridge City in the South League and had the club playing at a better than .500 clip ver the last 10 matches or so and was only 1 or 2 players away from having all the pieces needed for my style, when suddenly coming off a decisive 2-0 win, and within 4 points of the top 10 teams, I get fired!!

One thing that was buggin me for a couple of weeks, was that my players kept mentioning how they thought we should be performing at a higher level.....I wonder if this influenced the board as my confidence votes had all been good prior to this? I was getting so into the game I was actually pissed for a little while :)

Anyway, league rival Maidenhead has hired me and it would be a great chance to get revenge on Cambridge, but I think I would rather start over with them........stupid game, making me get attached!! :rolleyes:

Just started my second season with St Albans in Conference South. Some Interesting side stories.

1.) First Friendly match of the season Young Striker Scott Martin is Red Carded and suspended for "punching" an opponent.. I fine him and send him to the reserves. He thinks I am unfair, considering his options....Now 5 games into the season he is content and I notice I am now his Favored Personel..Looks like the kid had a little wake up call.

2.) Star Striker Lee Clarke tears his calf muscle in the final game of last season (I should not have even played him :mad: ). He was out 5 months and just returned to my line up. I have been given him spot duty until he is fully fit and just about every time he touches the ball match commentary states " he seems a little nervous out there". So obviously he is concerned about the possibility of re-injuring or perhaps he is not fully healed. What ever the case is it sure makes me nervous as hell!

3.) 22 year old midfielder Brian James, who is by far at least a League 2 caliber player, passes up opportunities to play in higher divisions to sign with us. We are paying him $410 a week, which is $200 more then the next highest player, and he is had an incredible start. His value has sky rocketed and this and the other situations really make me feel like these players all have their own personality and makes the experience "real"...

Great game!!! Now off to promotion!

I've noticed the attacking fullbacks making overlapping runs, it's cool to see.

I would spend a little time fiddling with the coach assignments. Autoassign is okay, but it won't be as good as doing it manually. If you want 4 or 5 stars for each training type, you need to assign them manually.

I too am enjoying the game a lot. I do have some complaints, all around match gameplay, but I believe most will be addressed in the next patch. Things like moral spikes and dips, crazy defenders crossing into their own 18 or passing to the other team way too much, the giant killer (small teams beating large) issue.

If it weren't for the crashes, I'd play 24/7 :)

Question: How can I tell which (if any) of my players attributes are moving up?

I'd like to think I don't have to replace my whole team to stay in the higher division after promotion. I get a monthly report about certain players getting better in strength, etc., but when I look at their stats nothing jumps out at me.

The one thing I've noticed early on:

With my FC Dallas team, I was forced to sell Edward Johnson pretty early on (he moved for ~$3.5mil to Ajax Amderstam). Before I sold him, I'd been (successfully) playing a quick, short-passing, uptempo game. Without him, that game plan has simply fallen apart. The old style relied on the "final ball" always having a recipient, and it doesn't now, so I think I'll need to slow things down and take a more direct approach as Carlos Ruiz will have to handle the majority of the workload!

On the player card, there is a "training" tab (along with History, Personal, Transfer, etc.)... there are graphs there that will indicate progress that has been made.

A temporary "fix" that has been mentioned in the SI Forums and one that I have been trying for about 4 hours so far with good success is turning off the "Threading" option in the Preferences. It's slowed down the game a little bit, but I haven't had any crashes tonight, as opposed to having one every 5 minutes if I didn't wait for my cooling fan to turn off. :)

I missed the attempted delivery today, but according to the notice they posted on my door I have to pay $5.35 CDN in customs fees, which is lot less than I was fearing.

I'm home all day tomorrow so I shouldn't miss them again!

Hmm, think I may have found a bug. A VERY quick glance on the SI forums didn't mention this, but I very well coulda missed it.

Transferred out a player for 900,000. Guy had a 50% next of sale clause, which went through. Couple days before I agreed to the transfer, I made certain I got some transfer funds back from my team (30% made available to me, to be exact).

Transfer went through...I actually lost available funds and went to $0 available.

ALMOST positive about the losing funds. I can't be 100% certain there, but obviously I didn't get the cash I was supposed to.

Do you have a save game before the transfer went though that I could look at to check? ..

Go to training and look at the attribute graphs for a player - this will show you their changes over the last 12 months, very handy for checking the effectiveness of your training regimes (and showing if that 'crap' player is actually a good one who's just recovering from an injury and getting fit again etc.).

Thanks for posting this. I haven't had a crash since I turned off "Threading".

So, I got no replies the first time around, so I'm asking again:


I'm saying because I offered two players to other clubs yesterday, players that I'm pretty would have never received any bids in '05 but I received 2-3 bids on one (offered for transfer) and one loan offer on a player that I had indeed offered to other club to loan. May be silly, but this adds tons to my enjoyment of the game, as I saw some possibility to unload players I didn't want to keep on the team, a possibility that eluded me for many seasons on FM2005...

FM

Didn't mean to leave you hangin' FM. Yes, I was a little thrown off by the new feature where the team just sent out offers to every team, but it definitely is an improvement over the old way of doing it. And yes, I've definitely noticed that it's now easier to dump that unwanted player.

Speaking of transfers...this is to anyone...at what level do teams train full-time as opposed to part-time? I've started a career with Northwich in Conference North and I've been burned by the "bring a once full-time trained player who's attributes take a hit once they only start training part-time" scenario.

Also, why do loaned players continue to train full-time when they are brought in to play for my team? I noticed that you can't switch them to a part-time training schedule.

Yep, I actually mentioned the transfer thing a little earlier in the thread. I've found it a little easier to transfer players out and a little harder to transfer them in. I think this balance is an improvement over previous versions.

I also am very happy they finally got rid of the response from each team saying no to transfers and incorporated all the no responses into one email.

Possibly. I'll check when I get back home.

It's going to depend on their contract. If they have a full time contract with their original team, they will train full time.

At what level do players start training full-time? Is it League 2?

I believe Conference National is considered the first full time professional league.

Ahh, ok. That helps. Just need to get out of Conf North now. :)

Does this happen in the EPL ever? Do we still have to put in a code for stuff like this to happen in the EPL?

I've had luck offereing some players full time contracts when my official club status is part time. I'm not sure what they do half the time because my coaches are part time. :D A lot of players won't accept full time contracts at that level of pay though.

I remember in CM 03/04 seeing a guy punch a referee and getting suspended for something like half the season. Always fun to see those once in a blue moon occurrences in there.

I'm not sure I follow what you are saying? why wouldn't an EPL club have a youngster that they fine because he punched an opponent in a friendly?

FM

Oh, I must have missed your first comment. I find it also more realistic that at least one person would be interested in my extra players. I mean I'm playing with Luton Town in the Championship, there have got to be teams in League Two or below for whom the player may be of help. In FM2005, I'd get about 75 emails telling me the player was either not good enough, or that the club thought they couldn't get a player of his caliber to sign with them, without even trying!

Same goes with not being as easily able to buy players off other teams. I mean who would let one of their star players go at face value? I know I don't...

The fax thing also makes more sense, you at least only hear from whoever is interested, instead of going through said 75 emails that all say about the same thing...

FM

Hey FM, have you had any players turn down transfers out? I have a young player that's been offered two transfers out and refused both of them because he likes playing for me (even though he's been stuck on my reserve team for most of the last two seasons). I almost feel guilty about keeping him on the transfer list...:D

I've not played enough with '06 but it's happened to me a few times in FM2005. Similar to you, the guy had not played with the first squad in about a season and a half, with Q.P.R. in the EPL, and he refused twice to sign to a Championship team, saying he didn't want to go play for a lower level team. I was like "YOU DUMBASS! YOU ARE NOT PLAYING WITH US ANYWAY!!!" :D I think I ended offering a mutual termination... heh.

FM

I just remembered this afternoon that there are a few EB Games stores in Quebec City, so I called a couple of them. The first one, cutting me off after "Worldwide Soccer Manager", first told me that it was an old game and they didn't have in stock anymore. When I said the "2006" and the fact it had just been released, the guy said he didn't have it in his system, but had been asked about it lately and he didn't think they'd have it. When I told him that Gamestop has it online and that both EB Games and Gamestop are now in the same family, he told me something along the line of "well Gamestop is in the States and Quebec is a whooooole other world, I can't help you". When I insisted a bit and asked him kindly if he couldn't look into making a special order, he told me "well, I can't build it for you, take your credit card and buy it online"... So stupidly idiotic, I couldn't help but laugh at him...

Called another place and while the guy also told me it wasn't in the system, he told me it wasn't impossible that it would be added at some point. He also couldn't make a special order but told me I could call back every once in while to see if it's been added. I told him he gave me a much better service than the other fellow in the other store and he laughed a hearty laugh. Guess he knew who I was talking about :)

FM

Just had another crash with WSM06. This time it said there was a serious error and that a file was generated. I can send it to you if you want, Marc.

I think the code you are asking about is the old "arse" command*. I think that is a relic of the old CM days and hasn't been in the game for some time.

* The "arse" command was a "secret" easter egg that unlocked strange behavior in players (like punching referees).

I thought I read once that without the code (ARSE) players wouldnt do things like that - as they (SI) were worried about getting sued? Something to do with mischaracterizing players.

Eaglesfan - Have you tried unticking the "Threading" option in the preferences yet? This stopped my WWSM06 from crashing last night.

what does threading do? I have to check if I have my game(s) with this on, but I have yet to have a crash with my downloaded FM

I love this new addition.

Nope. I guess I will try that, but I like using my computer's hyperthreading function. However, it seems like a reasonable temporary solution.

My download version was crashing also until I tried this. It was crashing to desktop every week or so, now three months game time and nothing. It does slow it down though.

Sounds interesting - might help us with tracking this down ('tis something we're working on) ...

Right, it's kind of a temporary solution to the crashing problem until the next patch comes out. (Hopefully) And yes, it definitely slows down the game, but it stops it from crashing every 5 minutes.

This is something I read over at the SI boards.

It depends on the players contract - if you've the budget turn one or two players in the lowest league full-time, it can really make a difference to a team if you pick the right players ... they'll be fitter and can have a bit more of an 'edge' to their skills.

Okay, I see what you mean now but punching an opponent, as mentionned by Jari's shorts is hardly something new in terms of real life stuff. I've seen numerous times in game commentary of FM2005 the line "xxx has been kicked by yyy" and while I don't remember the term punching being used, I'd assume it's just as possible without the ARSE command...

FM

fwiw, sendit.com has FM2006 selling at £17.99 with shipping at only £1.60 for Canada and USA. That's £19.59 or $33.63 in US dollars. Still a tad more expensive than the download, but it's the best deal for FM2006...


I know some people ordered from sendit last year, so I'm only mentionning it...
FM

Is there any significance to a club that is continually mentioned in your news that appears to have an unstable manager situation and a box asking if you want to "declare interest in job"?

Besides the obvious, I don't really know. I really don't think it's any more than asking if you want to declare interest in the job. :)

Yeah, just found it kinda odd that probably once a week this email pops up and always with the opportunity for me to declare interest.

it could be an impetus to push the coach on the edge of being fired over the edge..


"We want to fire this guy because we think someone else can do it better.."

Then you declare interest, as if to say.. "Fire him and Hire me!"

If they consider you a better fit.. guess what happens? They dump the guy and come looking to hire you!

Isn't sendit.com the place that sold shall-we-say-dubious copies of fm2005 for a sweet-looking price?

hrm, maybe, but I thought they took them back and sent replacement ones if you asked...

FM

So I have barely had any time to get into FM lately. Part of the problem is that I need large chunks of time to get into the game as it's one that requires my full attention.

Another problem, which I'm sure many newbies have had, is that I've got little to no ability to read my current team and determine what kind of tactics/system I should start with - who should I keep/get rid of? And what kind of attributes should I be looking at for this new system?

I've read Marc's hints and a couple of articles on Susie, but I'm still just "dinking" around in the game and not getting any progress made. I don't want to move ahead if I don't have some goals for my team set. I'm kind of compulsive like that - I need to know exactly what I'm doing and where I'm going. And right now I don't. I started a game with the Belgian team Aalst (3rd Division A). I've got quite a bit of money to work with - 100k transfer money and I can more than double my current wage level.

What are the chances that someone could briefly run down that team and tell me what they see? What would you do with the team personally? Have any of you other guys been in my situation and do you have some other tips for me?

I love reading about the game and I love browsing around in it, but with my limited time (and limited soccer knowledge) it seems likely that this game will get pushed to the side again soon if I don't make some sort of progress. Thanks for any help any of ya'll can provide.

Oh yeah.. what kind of roster size should I shoot for at this Div. II/III level?

IMO it kinda depends on what kinda budget you've got as far as transfers and salary. I try to build some young depth if I have some $$ room, but not always possible.

It depends on how many matches you have to play. I'd say at that level, around 18-20 would be a good squad size.

sovereignstar makes a good point.


maybe someone with Instant message can help us newbies out by giving us a walk thru in what you do prior to your games and after. it can help us understand it better.

Is the tutorial not very helpful?

I can't look at your team since I don't have Belgium active. However, I'll try and give you a rundown on how you might choose to start out.

If you don't know what you're doing, I would recommend starting out with the default 4-4-2 tactic. That's the standard soccer tactic.

What you want in a flat 4-4-2 positionally:

Strikers: A common tactic is to pair a small, fast striker with a tall striker who is a good header. For a small, fast striker you want Pace, Acceleration, Off the Ball, and Finishing. Big +s are Technique, Dribbling, and Composure. For the big striker, you want Strength, Jumping, Heading, and Finishing. There are a lot of other stats you want ideally, but those are the basics.

Midfield: The two wingers should have Pace, Acceleration, Dribbling, Crossing, and Creativity. +s are Work Rate, and the small striker stats, among others. If they can tackle and mark well, that's a very nice thing to have, but not essential.

One center mid should be defense focused, generally a DMC. Look for Strength, Positioning, Tackling, Marking, Anticipation, Work Rate, and Stamina. Aggression, Bravery, Team Work, Determination are big +s. If he can Jump and Head, that's great too.

The other should be more offensive minded, generally a MC or AMC. Mental stats are huge, as this guy is your field general who should dictate the play from the center of the pitch. Work Rate, Team Work, Determination, Creativity, Decisions, and Passing are huge. Pace, Acceleration, Off the Ball, Dribbling, Technique, are +s. This position is key, so really you want this place to be filled by one of your best players (meaning spend money here).

Defense:

For fullbacks, see the DMC overview, but add in Crossing and Pace.

For CD, Stength, Jumping, Heading, Positioning, Anticipation, Tackling, Marking, Determination, and Bravery are all important. +s include Passing and Concentration


This list isn't comprehensive by any stretch, and at the level of your team, it'll be highly unlikely to find players that meet all, or many of those attributes, but hopefully it can serve as a guide. An easy way to see what is really important to a particular position is to look at the stats of the top players in the world.

Tactically, I would start out with the base 4-4-2 and then try and mold a formation to your team strengths once you develop a better understanding of the game. FM06 is pretty complex tactically, so it does require some patience. At that level, I would keep things simple anyway though, as the more specific instructions you give your players, the better they have to be to be able to implement them, if you follow.

sometimes i find it helpful when playing with a brand new team and players i've never heard of Sov, to just let my AssMan handle all of the team selection, and keep the tactic a straight 4-4-2, at least for the first month or so. To get a better idea of how your players are actually performing versus what their ratings are.

I can absolutely relate to your situation as this was me a year ago with FM2005. I may talk a good game now, but when I started with Luton Town, I had about no clue what to do. Yeah, I'd seen some soccer before, okay lots of soccer but knowing what 4-4-2 meant was about the extent of my knowledge as I was a referee more than a player in my youth and as a ref, you don't "watch" the game in the same way.

What I did first was ask one of my coach (or my ass man) to do the selection on the basic 4-4-2 setting. I then managed the friendlies, subbing everybody out at halftime and I tried to take notice of who was playing well in what position, no matter what their skills were. I then started making switches with what my ass man was recommending I sort of built on that and started adding new players only later in the season. I saw that first season as a kind of "you gotta simply avoid demotion, you'll do better next season", maybe even more so since the guys in place are not really "my" guys... Sure, I went into an 18 game streak of sort in which I didn't win won and drew many times. At one point I was very close to getting sacked but I kept on going...

I'd also recommend taking a look at the in-game tutorial. I have not read many of the screens but the ones I've read, I was extremely impressed with.

FM

I am struggling with obtaining friendlies and I want to keep my guys in shape, sure, I'm in the Super League in Malaysia right now, but why is it so difficult for me to get a friendly during the off season?

I can't bartar with $, they say I only make 1k from the friendly, any tips?

If you are completely desperate then schedule some friendlies with your reserve team..

That's what I was going to recommend. I usually book a couple friendlies between my reserves and my U18 squad only to get both squads a bit of work before the season starts...

FM

A couple more suggestions I'd add to what FM said above.

1. I'd print out a roster sheet and then go through each player and check out their "position" screen. Make note of how good they are for each position they play. This gives you a much better idea of how to set up the lineup with the players that can play multiple positions. Also, it's a good way to note any holes you have as far as depth goes.

2. Pay attention to the highlights during the games. I think the 2D match engine is a great source of information. I watch for things like players that make bad/good passes, are really fast or slow, guys that take bad shots when there's another player open, etc. There's tons I don't know about soccer, but I can see for myself if someone is constantly doing stupid stuff or is slower than everyone else. :D I then use that information in conjunction with match ratings and skill ratings to evaluate my team over the season.

try games on the road, usually teams will accept away friendlies, since they're going to get paid (and you're not)

Expect to get your ass handed to you on a silver platter the first time or maybe two you try out the game. Especially since you are trying out a tougher team (lower budget, lesser name). It's an unfamiliar game and an unfamiliar sport to you. That's just the way it is.

Check what Des, Bee and Frogger said. Specifically, just start with a basic 4-4-2. Let your assistant manager pick the squad. Read Marc's guide for what specific ratings to look for at specific positions (as you play more, you'll see what other ratings may contribute more but that's later). Watch the 2D games to see what glaring holes you may have. I would even suggest watching a game or two on "full match" mode (basically, watching the whole game) before switching back to "extended" or "key".

I didn't have any games in the CM4-family prior to '06 so I can't speak for any of those but my 01/02 game did have players punching referees. It just didn't happen until generated players started becoming more prevalent. I believe the biggest thing with the ARSE command was that it allowed current players to do so as well.

Based on what I read here, that was my impression as well.

This game is hard for a novice, but not impossible if you look around for advice and try it out. All the advice here is basically what I've done. Mark's tips helped leaps and bounds. I still haven't learned everything I need (I'm not running individual training regimens yet, for instance) but I had great success last season, getting a striker 30 goals and placing 7th (after a good run, reaching 3rd place, then fading at the end..) I think experiencing a little success is vital to feeling like you know how to play the game.

This season has been much more difficult. My monster striker is suddenly mortal and moody. I've imported players who I THOUGHT would improve my team, but apart from a loaned winger (who got hurt and had to be sent home!) I've not improved at all and actually slipped. I'm sitting in the high teens in late January. I know I've got a good enough squad to repeat last season's success, so the problem is ME! I had a great run managing the emotions of my squad last season, keeping them at superb, and wisely choosing when to kick their butts a little. This season I've been off the mark. I'm apparently condoning some poor play and being too harsh too soon -- SI has done a pretty good job of making this part of the engine feel like an art and not a science.

But through persistence we tasted success once again. Finally we fought through in the FA Trophy, soundly beating a team we should have beat and then drawing against a team from a higher conference that should have destroyed us. We did that because I learned how to manipulate the sliders -- ultra defensive, slow down, counter. The vastly superior team was frustrated beyond reason and started getting yellow cards. My second string goalie had the game of his life and when we forced the second game, which we of course lost, my squad was on cloud nine. We lost, but we'd built something, and we used what we learned to frustrate and ultimately DEFEAT SOUNDLY one of the promotion contenders in our conference, a team that had smashed us to bits in our first meeting.

(I think I learned that I have a talented defensive/counterstrike team. Had I not experimented I wouldn't have realized this. I'd have kept trying to resurrect last seasons wide open goal scoring machine.)

Once you learn how the game operates just a little bit, you'll be hooked. I've never played a game that is as deep as this, that makes you feel like you are doing something, like your decisions actually count. It keeps me on the edge of my seat watching matches.

A string of losses is a frustrating thing, but now I've seen the promised land and I think I can get us there. I keep reading threads like this one for pointers, and I keep watching my players to see what they are doing well and what they just can't do.

Now I have to figure out training.. I've already learned to staff as many coaches as you can afford. I've got eleven. I'd like more!

Remember that players may need time to gel together and become a team, especially foreigners. I've had this experience in the first season in which I'd brought in tons of new players to Q.P.R., all players that I knew where supposed to improve my squad. That was true in '05 and should be true in '06 too.

I've also seen that some players may take up to one full season before they are really comfortable with the team. That was true with Cristiano Lucarelli in his first season. He scored many goals in that first year but they came in burst and he was capable of the worst kind of games, then in his second season with us, he's a goal scoring machine...

FM

One other thing that I've used to "get to know my team" is to start the game as unemployed with a made-up name. I then run the game on holiday mode for a couple years (run it while you are doing something else). Then, during the offseason, I'll add myself in as the manager of the team I wanted in the first place.

With this method I've generated a couple years worth of form ratings for the players and history for the team (who's the fan's player of the year, top goalscorer, discipline leader). Starting a team from the beginning always seems like starting from a dead stop. This way is a little more exciting as everything is moving and you're just joining in.

you know, this is not completely crazy, I kind of like that... I probably wouldn't sim two years, maybe only one, but I like that idea and the fact that players have a tangible history behind them when you take over a team...

FM

FM

It usually works best with a team you don't know anything about, because if you started with a team you know well, you might be disappointed that the previous manager sold off your favorite players. I'll also run it with a number of leagues and save it - that way I can start up a game in whatever league I feel like at the time (or sometimes, I'll take over a team that has a manager opening). Set it to run before you go to bed at night and see how far it's gone by morning (if you can sleep, sometimes the excitement is too much :D ).

Thanks for all the suggestions, guys - really appreciate them. Will keep everything mentioned here in mind when I fire her up again. :)

Sidhe pretty much summed up my career so far.

Had a decent first season with Northwich from Conference North. I fell two points short of qualifying for the playoffs in season one. Then brought in a bunch of new better and younger players for season two and it's been a disaster.

I'm just about halfway through the season, and I'm sitting 18th in the table and battling with the morale of my team after each game. From my many hours played with FM2005, I should have known better than to bring in so many new players, especially young players, to start off a new season but I just couldn't help myself. I saw all these young guys that were so much better than what I had on my roster, but I guess the experience factor of what I got rid of is hurting me big time.

I also got burned by bringing in players who were getting trained full-time and then their attributes fell somewhat once they started training part-time. :(

In my own defense, I tried not to bring in too many. But two of my starters got injured early, and then I found a wicked good goalie who actually wanted to play for me..

So what was going to be a couple of tweaks turned into wholesale changes..

The injuries were devastating since they destroyed my left side attack -- wing back and winger, gone for six months.. all the high energy, the crucial assists, disappeared. That's when I loaned in the guy who would have been the best player on my squad if he weren't one of five new starters. It's too bad HE got injured before he could flower into the system. That would have been righteous..

But I won't complain too much. I do have a better team. A few of them agreed to go full time, too, so we should be even better next year.

A message to you all, and especially Marc: humble apologies! Transfer budgets, now I'm over the intial shock work pretty well - as I've been doing pretty well in the PL with Leicester in the 2006/7 season, the board have gradually released more funds - amounted to around an extra £4m after the initial £2.8m budget - this £6.8m figure strikes me as about right: what I would have expected tbh. And the board obviously wanted to play it by ear as to the finances: in case of relegation I guess.

But as my wages were £130k a week as opposed to £300k a week (I refused to give even decent contracts until I saw how we would do), we were making (only a little bit of cash) as well.

So at the beginnning of the January, with the mighty Foxes being generally 5th - 7th for the majority of the season (we were actually at that time 2nd and 3rd depending on who played when) I get possibly the best message I have ever seen in a FM game mid season...

I went back to the board, and checked that they had not put a decimal point in the worng place, but no, they confirmed the amount - £9m extra to spend! Woo hoo! :p :cool:

Given that we have been constantly in a European spot, have just got to 39 points in early Jan, and are still in the UEFA, it seems pretty good how the board have been cautious, and then when I can buy again, they say - OK, you've proved to us we can do well - here's some cash.

Now, just gotta make sure I don't blow it :D

I've noticed the same problem. It happened in 05, but is far more noticeable in 06. If you bring in an entire new squad in to the Premiership after promotion or what have you, you'll get your butt kicked for a season. I avoided relegating back down with Leeds by one spot even though I had far superior talent than the rest of the bottom half.

In my opiniong, this is not really a "problem", it kind of mimicks real life. Think about it, would you bring a whole new starting eleven in real life and hope they would all get together right from the start? I don't think so, things have to be done in little steps... Even more important is the fact the we, at least I do, usually bring in players from all around the world to make up one team, often no matter if they even speak English...

FM

dola, I meant not a problem with the game, more a problem with how we build our teams :)

FM

That's what I meant too. ;)

and you and I both realise that there is probably a thread titled "OMG IT'S A FRIGGING BUG, MY TEAM IS SO MUICH BETTER AND SHOUDLN'T BE LOSINGLIKE THAT!!!!!111......SI PLEASE RESPOND!!!" on the SI forums somewhere where somebody brought in 3 Spanish players, 3 Italians, 3 Brazilians, a Swede, and an Argentinian to an EPL squad and doesn't understand that the players just can't communicate with one another ;)

FM

This is kind of an aside, but I've started bringing a bunch of Belgians to Exeter City. I don't know why. I guess I'm trying to turn us into Belgium West. :)

hmmmmm, waffles :D

FM

"Mr. Sidhe, while you have done a good job getting the players to play in your system, are you aware that we are now 75 THOUSAND pounds in debt?"

Uh.. no I didn't catch that.

They gave me a new contract but narrowed the amount of money I can spend considerably. Now I'm almost 2k/wk over budget..

This because I wouldn't sign a long term contract last year since they were LOWERING my wage. Of course, I was losing them money..

So there's a whole other side to being a manager I wasn't really paying any attention to while I was fiddling with tactics and players.

Is it possible to get out of that hole in the Conference South? Largest crowd I've ever noticed at a Basingstoke home game was just over 400, and that was last year when we were winning.

oops...

Yea'... promotion. :)

Seriously, if you're in the top half of the table all year for a year or two, and especially if you're in the promotion chase, your attendance will increase.

Moreover, if you can get an FA Cup (not FA Trophy) matchup against a L2 or up side, you'll get a real nice payday. In your case, I would base all my decisions around fielding a team that can win a game or two in the FA Cup.

I just want to know one thing. Has Quiksand played this?

Well I just resigned from Leeds at the end of January 08' after not winning in lord knows how many months. I was getting sacked sooner rather than later anyway. The first time in any CM/FM game I've had to resign/been sacked. The season started out with promise, first after October, but then it went all downhill. A few bad games turns into a moral issue turns into players losing confidence, turns into no goals. No injuries to speak of, just bad play. I had a good training program, four and five stars, good players, what I thought was a good tactic. I'm actually not unhappy that the game would play out like that, I just wish I had some sort of clue as to why. :confused:

I think that's my frustration, is not feeling like I have the tools to understand why my team is underperforming.

Fortunately I got the USA job before I resigned, so hopefully I can bring them glory.

The morale thing seems to be very important. Once you lose that, you have to work on getting it back or you are sunk. I guess. I don't want to sound like an expert because it could be who knows how many other things besides, but it looked to me like once my team lost morale, they tanked and it took a morale lift to get them into good form again.

I can also say that I have a couple of guys who play well even when they aren't particularly inspired. I remember someone, Mark maybe, mentioning that professionalism could play a part in it.

At my level, ECS, there isn't much professionalism to be had.

I seem to have been wrong about my budget because now it shows me at 700 pounds per week under budget. But we are still losing money hand over fist! I don't know why at the end of last season it showed me running such a huge overbudget (2K/week). When the season ended I let some contracts expire, but these would have been worth about 50 pounds apiece, times half a dozen or so. Does not equal up to 2.5K/week. I do not understand what I saw at the end of last season -- it was at the bottom of the page where you make an offer for a guy. There's a sentence there that advises you how close you are to your budget limit. I got to within 70 pounds but I didn't go over the original budget, then IT APPEARED that when I signed the new contract WHAM I was 2K/week over. Is there something that ordinarily happens at the end of the season that I stumbled across and just don't get? Someone help me out..

I am now a cool 100K in the red.. Why don't those stingy Basingstoke peeps come out to the show? WHAT ELSE do they have to do there? :mad: ;)

I live about half an hour outside of Basingstoke - tbh I don't know what they do there: it's a strange place - one of those that you drive through rather than to ;).

How much was your contract worth? I would imagine, but don;t know for sure, that this would be counted within the budget, so if you are on £2k a week more than before (unlikely I know!) that could explain it.

Even if you stick to budgets, this is not a guarantee that you will break even or better - many lower level clubs run at a loss in the hope of either getting promotion or selling a couple of players to balance the books. So you could find yourself slipping into debt even if you stay within the level set - if you go over it you are likely to be haemmoraging cash

Oh yes. I dont know if he has bought FM2006 yet, but with the previous versions he has done some very enjoyable dynasty threads with the lower league team Lincoln.

http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~fof/foru...ad.php?t=37337

The board reassess budgets at the end of the season and can alter them so your budget might have raised or dropped, also if you have players with seasonal rises then this mounts up quickly (if you're silly enough to give a player a 25% rise per season then you'll find his wage gets big fast).

What problems were you facing? Was the team just not scoring?

Ha! I'm on an 80 pound per week retainer.. That's about $120/week. I'd make more than that working at McDonalds!
:confused:

There has been some questions on the SI Forums as to how many concurrent installations of the downloaded version of WSM2006 one person can have. While it was always believed to be two, as per Graeme Kelly, some people mentionned having trouble registering for a second one. Here's what Graeme just posted on the SI Forums:


That one had been bugging me a bit, mostly since we may get a second computer in the house next Spring. Now I should be able to install the game on two separate machines following that procedure.

FM

hey, if it's 80 pounds of burgers, you're not in that bad a shape ;)

FM

PS: I do know you were talking about British Pounds :p

I thought the British used kilograms or stones or some nonsense like that. ;)

I'm Canadian, but I'm multi-scales, pounds and kilograms are all right, although stones, got no clue about these :D

FM

I'm finally about to start my second season with Exeter City. I thought I was going to get fired (I even got the dreaded vote of confidence from the board at one point), but a decent finish has netted me a new 2-year contract. One of my star players was very happy to see me get the new contract. The fans have no comment. I think they haven't forgiven me for an incident that happened during my first season. I embarrassed myself by declaring an interest in Jeff Agoos, when everybody would know that he'd have absolutely no interest in leaving MLS to come to Exeter. I figured that I'd try declaring interest just to see what would happen, and the fans ripped into me for it. I'm not sure if they've gotten over that yet. :)

I'll be playing all weekend!

1 stone = 14 pounds. Weight, that is, although I'm sure there are some nice stones you could buy for 14 pounds cash.

Coming toward the end of February in my first year in charge of League One Blackpool, and we are in a rather impressive fourth place, in a playoff position and still with some hope of catching Swansea for the second automatic promotion spot (Forest are way out in front).

I am enjoying this game a lot, and am getting a real sense of the personalities of my players. I have a pretty young squad, and they seem an enthusiastic and positive bunch of kids. They also seem pretty laid back. My star defender Peter Clarke wanted to move to a bigger club, and when a half-million pound offer came in I gladly took it, seeing as his contract was up at the end of the year. The fans were not happy, but Simon Ford, the replacement I brought in from Kilmarnock on my scouts' recommendation has done great. Since Clarke left there has been not a whisper of discontent among my team; I suspect our decent league position has a lot to do with that.

My main concern has been strengthening midfield and covnering for injuries with a pretty thin squad. Some more of the Clarke money brought in young Bradley Orr from Bristol City, who has been solid if rarely spectacular in midfield; however, my coaches think he could have what it takes to be a great player in the future.

This post is in danger of becoming a minidynasty; I hope it illustrates how involved I'm getting with fm2006, which I believe is the best CM/FM game yet.

I had a player on my Exeter team who was absolutely ripping up the league. He didn't score many goals, but he knew how to find open teammates and make the perfect pass. One of the few goals he scored turned out to be the Goal of the Year in the Conference National, though. :) He got injured near the end of the season and missed the last 10 matches or so. His value had skyrocketed to $300,000 (sorry, guys, I can't help playing with dollars), and my team had started to learn how to play without him, so I let him go. I really hope that another of my players can make such huge strides this season (hopefully a player who's already tied into a long contract!).

Loving this game, guys!

can you trade in fm 2006?