New North America Pyramid

[Suntan Superman]

Since the FM18 Beta isn't enticing me right now(too many crashing bugs, will definitely be playing a bunch once the full game drops though) I've decided to start work on making all of the rules/requirements etc for a completely new North American structure. Personally when all is said and done, I'd like to model the CONCACAF Champions League closely to the UEFA Champions League, as well as have a meaningless Europa League or even just a Cup Winners Cup. That is neither here nor there however, as that's still a bit far off in the editor. What I am going to work on is a USA Pyramid, and a Canadian Pyramid, yes they will be separate.

Here are some of my current ideas - I'd like as much criticism as you want to give, even if I may not change some things.

D1 - 20 teams
D2 - 20 teams
D3 - 20 teams
D4 - 20 teams
D5+ - ?

Basically structured the way England probably should be, 4x20. D5+ will be a further out project, but I'd like to re-organize all of the USA based teams into regional divisions, and have the regional divisions feed into D4.

P/R is as follows -

D1 - 3 relegations
D2 - 3 promotions(2 automatic, one playoff), 3-4 relegations
D3 - 3-4 promotions(3 automatic, one playoff), 3-4 relegations
D4 - 3-4 promotions(3 automatic, one playoff), 5 relegations

Depending on how difficult it is, what I'd like to set up inside the pyramid is an and-one playoff system, basically. Much like England, spots 4-7 duke it out in a two-legged playoff, then will play the 16th place team in the league above them to see if they can stay, or join them on the way down. Currently not a part of the plan is to use this for promotion to the top flight, but I could be convinced to change those plans.

I'm setting up a rough google spreadsheet on how the teams will be distributed throughout the divisions, you can find and criticise that here

D1 rules include things like max 7 foreign players in registered squad, 25-man squad size, 4 HG at club, maximum of four loanees in squad. U21 players don't need to be registered, if possible U23 HG at club players don't need to be registered.

D2-4 rules basically the same, with the addition of max of two loanees from a single team, removal of the four loanees max, squads of 30, and minimum two U21 players in the 18 for games.

Haven't thought much about the Canadian Premier League, so I will figure that out when I get to it. Based on the number of viable teams in the game, I will possibly end up doing something like a two-part season. But I'm unsure right now.

[Suntan Superman]

I added a preliminary prize structure, TV money, league money, and now just have to wait to find out how LAFC are coded, it appears as though the new NASL teams weren't put in. I'll be doing up a preliminary Division 5 set-up tomorrow.

[Suntan Superman]

In case anyone is following this, I've already made a good amount of progress, did a test sim tonight for a year just to see how it would work and so far.....

[Suntan Superman]

Update #2
After 31 hours between testing and editing, and re-formatting, we've arrived. I'm going to bed and setting myself to holiday indefinitely to see what the results are when I wake up. I need to make sure that the money is balanced, that the US Open Cup and the American Premier League have the correct number of continental qualifications, and double qualifications is handled properly.

Currently the biggest recurring issue throughout testing is that no matter what, it seems as though LAFC is poised to have a poor year, should I add players immediately to them? I'm not sure what that solution is, or what it looks like, so if someone has an idea, feel free to share it, if someone wants to try it out and actually play as a club rather than simming, shoot me a pm and i'll ship it over. I haven't tested it with real name fixes or anything else yet.

[Suntan Superman]

Dailyish update time: America works! Six Divisions(I don't suggest trying the sixth, I've just made it as a place to put teams) 332 teams are playable. 332 teams enter the US Open Cup, Canadian leagues made and working! 3 divisions, 80 teams. I can't get the Canadian Championship to work yet. Now as I go to bed, running a holiday sim to RE-test the long term ramifications.

Sent from my 0PM92 using Tapatalk

[Suntan Superman]

We're here. It took me pretty much all of release weekend and a few less-than-ideally-productive work days, but we are in the final build. If anyone wants it, feel free to PM me.

Here are the highlights, and some other WIP stuff:

The 20 team American Premier League

Spoiler

The 20 team American Second Division

Spoiler

The 20 team American Third Division

Spoiler

The 20 team American Fourth Division

Spoiler

The 24 team American Fifth Division - East

Spoiler

The 24 team American Fifth Division - Central

Spoiler

The 24 team American Fifth Division - West

Spoiler

[img]https://fmshots.com/images/Dh1ZZ.png[img]

I'm not going to picture the Sixth Division, it's still a bit of a mess that I don't have a real intention of fixing yet. Eventually it will be regional like the Fifth Division, but there are 180 teams in it right now.

The US Cup features all 332 US-based clubs in the American Pyramid, It's a nine-round tournament, the top division clubs don't enter until the 3rd round.

Canada has split off, and has it's own pyramid featuring:

The 16-team Canadian League One:

Spoiler

The 16-team Canadian League Two:

Spoiler

No pictures, but also has a 48-team, somewhat regionalised Third Division as well.

I was unable to make the original Canadian Championship work, so I created the generically named Canada Cup, in which all 80 teams in the Canadian pyramid will participate.

All Five NACL spots should be accounted for.

Money is much higher for teams at the higher levels(obviously), however teams shouldn't go broke unless there is some gross mismanagement of funds. I based most of the television money on some of the details of the proposed 4bn TV rights deal to create promotion/relegation. Unfortunately I'm a little dumb, and I started making all of the money related numbers in £, I think I was able to convert them all to $ now though, but it left a few numbers like $10,001, instead of $10,000.

Promotion/Relegation is as follows:

American Premier League: 3 relegated

American Second Division: 3 promotions(2 automatic, 1 via four team play-off) 3 automatic relegation, 16th placed team plays the winner of the Third Division Promotion playoff for the second division spot

American Third Division: 3 automatic promotions, playoff winner plays 16th placed team in second division, 3 automatic relegation 16th placed team plays the winner of the fourth division promotion playoff

American Fourth Division: 3 automatic promotions, playoff winner plays 16th placed team in third division, 3 automatic relegations, 15th and 16th place meet in a playoff with the 2nd and 3rd placed teams from the three regional divisions to determine who gets the two spots in the Fourth Division

American Fifth Division: 3 automatic promotions, to each regional champion, 2nd and 3rd place teams qualify for a playoff with the 15th and 16th placed teams from the fourth division. Bottom Team from each regional division is relegated, 22nd and 23rd qualify for a playoff with the champions of the 9 divisions, with six of those teams either being relegated or returning to the Sixth Division.

Canadian League One: Top 8 teams split into a Championship group, playing each other team once in a separate table to determine the Champion. The bottom team is relegated to the Canadian League Two. Teams 9-15 play in a league with the 2-4 placed teams in League Two, with each other team once, and the bottom 3 teams remaining/being relegated to League Two

Canadian League Two: Top team is promoted to Canadian League One, teams 2-4 qualify for league with teams 9-15 in League One, with the bottom three remaining or being relegated to League Two. The bottom two teams enter into a single-elimination with the 6 division winners from League Three, with six teams going down or remaining in League Three.

Canadian League Three: Top team from each division qualifies for playoff with the bottom two teams in League Two.

I might've missed some other stuff, but this typing already took longer than I intended so hopefully my last sim test yields the wanted results, and I can actually play Football Manager instead of Football Manager Editor.

[gopher_guy]

That looks awesome, man!!

It's a very tempting idea to try and take Minneapolis City SC to the top of the pyramid. Hopefully MNUFC would stay up too so there could be a Minneapolis derby!

[Suntan Superman]

All right, after some very generous feedback from ZO, we're at version 1.1: changes made include
-Removed requirement for 4 HGC players from APL and ASD, as teams were not properly credited, their academy teams are.
-changed squad size from 25 to 99 since they won't allow me to make U21 players free under the basic editor
-changed disciplinary rules to 1 match ban after 3 yellow, 5, 7, 9 yellow then a 2 match ban for every 2 yellows
-changed some Div6 teams to stop being U18 only teams.
-prevented promotion of "academy" teams from Div6(I think I got all of them now)
-other assorted small fixes