The Alternative FML Roadmap

I for one was immensely disappointed at the reveal of the Roadmap for FML .. in an alternative world I left university and went to work for Sports Interactive rather than IBM ... here's my alternate-world roadmap:


1. Reward players for "doing stuff".
It could be argued that in FML the benefits of actually logging into your GW on a regular basis are negligable.
- A week well spent during the wage auction period can set your team up for the season ahead and with offline match plans you can set your team up to play exactly as you want them to when you're away.
- New players are being introduced into the gameworlds in a large burst rather than a slow stead stream, as long as you're around for this you can get your youth team in place for the season ahead.

So what are you missing out on if you do not log into FML during the season?
- You can't set a new skill to learn after your current skill has completed.
- You are costing your club money because the cost of maintaining your stadium is not linear, repairing your stadium every day will cost you substantially less over a season then repairing it every other day.

There needs to be more a link between time invested and progression in the game in the same way that any other MMO works. FML is increasingly becoming an online Fantasy Football game, and the way people lose interest over time mirror's what you see in most Fantasy Football games.


2. Fix the transfer system
- In wage auctions establish a link between a players Acquisition Fee and their wage demand. If you bid five times a players wage demand then you should pay 5 times the players Acquisition Fee (+/- bonuses from Transfer Negotiation skill).
- This will reward clubs for developing young players that they cannot spare a senior lock for, as any poacher that attempts to bid high to "steal" their player will now pay a premium.
- Say goodbye to 16 year old regens on £25k/day wages. The AF payable for such players would be in excess of £1m and more than likely closer to £2m.
- The Auction List is rendered unusable due to the high number of over-priced players listed there, although it's someone's right to ask whatever they want for a player, these speculative listings make looking for a signing a chore. Apply a fee to Transfer Auctions with a starting value higher than MV. A fee of 10% of the difference between the player's MV and the auction starting value should be levied against the team.


3. Better structure the Gameworlds
Placing teams in competitions that they can be competitive in regardless of their skill level should be key here. Too many of the current rules prevent that, and actively discourage competition at lower levels in favour of the high-end game:

- Teams moving FA enter at lower tiers regardless of their ability. Ruins the entire season for teams that are genuinely competing at that level.
- Teams exceeding the AI restrictions are relegated a division, this concentrates the inactive managers at the levels where the lesser teams play. How is this fair on the latter? Not only do they lose to the better teams relegated through this route, but most likely they will lose to that team managed by the AI which we all know is even more frustrating that losing to a human opponent. When I was still making my way in the game, I missed out on my first senior honour as I was beaten to a 2nd tier league title by a team relegated from the top-tier due to his AI%, who finished that season with 90% AI also.


4. Fix the AI rights/DND issue
My problem with DND is that it is used by managers to put off matches until this AI rights stage starts in the first place, so rather than 21 days to play our matches against these people we only have 5 so it is any surprise that a lot of these games get to the point where auto-resolve becomes an issue.

Why should AI rights only be awarded 5 days before the match in a 21 day season? If we're in the playtime of a competition then I think AI rights should ALWAYS be up for grabs during the playtime of the competition, and challenges should be able to be issued to anyone online during the playtime regardless of how far off the AI date is.

Everynight everyone gets an e-mail saying: "You currently hold AI rights for the following (official) matches, and your opponent holds the rights for these (official) matches ...". Each match is listed with the opponent, the AI date and the competition which should encourage people who've lost AI rights to try challenge back at the next opportunity.

Seeing as green is used right now as a way of saying "it's time to play this match" more than anything else, why not take advantage of that:
White = Any match out of competition playtimes. DND can block it, AI rights not awardable
Green = Any match during competition playtimes. DND will not block it, AI rights will be awarded.
Orange = Autoresolve approaching (5 days). Used to highlight games that need to be played as a priority (as green is right now).
Red = AI rights awarded, 24 hours til auto-resolve.

Everyone has the right to say "I don't want to play a match right now", but that's why AI rights exist; to reflect the fact that someone else tried to play the game and you turned them down.


5. Improve the way GW history is available
- Bring offical youth honours to club's profile; make the official honours element a tabbed panel that allows you to switch between looking at official senior honours and official youth honours. Obviously official senior honours should be the default viewed, but provide a simple tab that lists the number of wins in both and allows you to easily view official successes at both levels with the click of a button.
- Alter the Gameworld records page to only count official games (and goals). Player's histories have gone the right route only taking into account official stats, hopefully the GW records will follow suit. All the data is there already -- just pull in the top stats from each Domestic & Super FA's record books, which will only count official games.


6. Comparative Filters
Give us the option to add fields from the database to both sides of a filter to make the "don't waste my time" filter a possibility:

Auction Start Price IS LESS THAN 0 OVER Market Value
AND Player Wage IS LESS THAN 5'000 OVER Wage Demand


7. Make AI/Offline Limits in competitions mean something
When teams exceed the AI Limit in competitions there should be consequences, this encourages users to enter competitions that fit their playstyle (offline or online) -- negative effects that impact team's performance on the pitch should be imposed on teams when they are over the AI restrictions for a competition, this rewards those that meet their commitments. It does not penalise casual managers as they will be playing matches in casual competitions with no AI restrictions.

e.g a morale impact "hey, where's our manager these days?


8. Fan Expectations, Interaction & Support Levels
- Bring some fan expectations to the game, in addition to the "fan feedback" we currently get -- it'd be nice if they responded to the progress (or lack thereof) your club was making in a more direct & impactful manner and we had some tools to directly interact with them during major events at the club (transfers in & out, honours won/lost etc) that also had an impact on their support for the team.
- Have fans become jaded with the way the team is playing, perhaps they are unhappy that you have not brought in a big name signing recently despite sitting on a pot of gold?
- Failing to interact with fans in any way does not cost you anything (the club have a press officer who will always choose the neutral option in your absence) you do not have now for free, however interaction with fans can lead to temporary increase in support (attendance + stadium income) or temporary decline. It provides an optional mini-game to play that brings benefits to those that do, but is balanced out by the potential for a loss also.


9. Rivalries
Allow us to enter into a rivalry with other clubs that adds extra emphasis to matches between the teams. Limit this to a maximum of 5 rivalries per club, tie this into Fan Expectations and Support levels, winning a crunch game (official only) against a rival will provide a nice boost to fan support.


10. Academies
Create Academies as an optional season long mini-game. The end result being that at the end of the season you are left with X players on full-time contracts at your club and players that didn't make it.

The key elements of this mini-game:

• individual judgement.
• introduce a balance of risk/reward.
• the more effort you put into your academy the more you get out of it. However if you don't have the time, or are not interested, you can still get benefits, but you're in the hands of the AI.

First things first: Judging Potential does not exist. There is no Potential rating in the game anymore. That was just a bad dream. Now let's move on.
Secondly, "fog of war" returns to FML.

Background
When a new player wants to enter the world of football he has two options:
1) Get an agent and become a free agent, his agent will ensure that he get's the best deal possible.
2) Sign up at a local academy.
There are now two distinct markets for youth players.

It is the start of the season. You recieve the following:
"Academy Director Joe Bloggs has reported that, following regional trials, x players have been signed on an academy contract. As manager it is your responsability to decide whether to offer these players full professional contracts or release them as free agents before their academy deals expire."

1. Academy contracts are always signed at wage demand. Academy contracts are fixed at 4 weeks. If you terminate an academy contract early you do not get back that space until the contract was set to expire. You are stuck with that player for the duration of his contract.
2. Players on Academy contracts are not considered full-time professional players. They are not eligable to play in senior football, at all.
3. The spread of nationalities from your regional trials will be influenced only by the regional scouting skills you have
4. Ability (potential and current) of the players that arrive as a result from regional trials is completely random, and equal for all. This is the starting point for everyone.

General gameplay:
During the season you can choose to invest time scouting new players to bring in to supplement/replace those already at the club, and make decisions about who to keep at your academy and who to release because spaces are restricted. However, if you choose to you can do nothing and simply retain the players that arrive as a result of the local trials.


Assessing (judging) players:
Reminder: JP does not exist.
1. Play youth team matches during the season.
2. Watch their development over the course of a season before you have to make a decision to sign them on a full-time contract or release them into the free agent pool.
3. Get reports from your Academy Director, and the assesment centre throughout the season.


Sample Elements of the Academy
Your Academy requires a financial commitment that will impact your effort elsewhere. The benefits of a good academy are huge, there must be a downside.

1. Ongoing running costs. The hiring of an Academy Director. This man is key to the success of your academy, he is your best way of getting an insight into the potential ability of players at your academy. This cost is an ongoing cost, which over time adds up, but does not restrict even a beginner manager from hiring an above average Director at Day 1 to run their academy.

2. One-off Infrastructure costs.
a. Assessment Centres -- investment here will affect the accuracy of the reports you get from your academy
b. Training facilities -- investment here will provide, to all players on an academy contract (thus their first season in the GW only), an additional boost based on your coaching skills. e.g. the bery best facility will provide a 50% boost to all skills: eg. a level 4 coaching skill provides a 20% + 10% boost and a level 5 coaching skill actually provides a 25+12.5% boost. Each facility provides a boost to a group of related skills. You are limited to the number of facilities you can create, certain facilities exclude other facilites being created, etc etc. There needs to be the potential for a real strategy here rather than "build everything".
c. Housing -- investment here increases the number of players you can have signed on an academy contract at any one time.
d. Regional Academy Presence -- investment here creates a presence for your club in the different regions. Investment here aids with seeing through the "fog of war", providing a boost to the regional scouting skills. e.g. at the very top end you get a 50% boost to the effectiveness of the skill you have learned. Therefore building an academy presence in UK & Ireland will seriously aid you in being first to spot the young talent in that country. Investment here increases the number of scouts you can send to players from this reason at any one time (see "New Scouting System")

New Scouting System
All new players appear in the gameworld with zero visible attributes. Based on your regional scouting skills players attributes will reveal over a period of days for different players for different managers. No two managers will have the same view of the player database, this is where a necessary random element comes in to play.
- Free agent wage auction bids are completely hidden. No more "following the crowd".
No more JP, you have two options for signing a player:
1. Take a punt. Go with your gut feeling on the player. High risk, but a good chance of getting the player before interest from elsewhere.
2. Send a scout to look at the player. Take a day out to send a scout to evaluate the player, this instantly gives you access to all the players' attributes, and you get the equivalent of a JP reading for the player as a bonus. However you have limited scouts who exist per region, so it's a mixture of luck/judgement as to whether you send socuts to watch a rubbish player or a potential star.
Active Scouting You choose the players, you manage the scouts.
Passive Scouting The AI randomly selects player to be scouted for you.
You get a daily report summarising your scouts opinions.

Players signed through wage auctions are signed on professional contracts, not academy contracts.


New academy signups during the season
If the number of players at your club on academy contracts is less than the number that you have at the club currently, you will be offered a random selection of new regens every night to sign on academy contracts, along with your academy directors opinion of the player (his fog of war is 100% clear). If you reject the opportunity he goes to the free agents, otherwise he signs a 4 week academy contract and takes up one of your allocation. Because once you have signed a player on an academy contract that uses up one academy space for 4 weeks you canot simply sign a player and then release him if someone better comes along. This introduces an element of risk/reward -- do you take a chance on the player that looks good and risk not having room for a GREAT player that might come along tomorrow?


11. Skills Trading
Hire another manager to lend his Physio skills to your club for a period of X days. The rates are set in stone based on the level of skill a player has, thus avoiding exploitation.


12. PvE Scenarios
Examples:
- Your team is 3-0 down at half time in the cup final, you pick the team, but the match starts at the beginning of the 2nd half. Can your team capture the spirit of Istanbul to win the trophy?
- Your team is down to 9 men against a 20* opposition with 30 minutes to go, can you set out a tactic to hang on to a 1-0 lead against the strongest team in the AI ranks?

Keep a logbook of all the scenarios in the game, and your progess/records against each one. This could even influence your transfer policy as you look to attack the scenarios where you need a rock solid defence next season even though your current team is more suited to open, attacking football.

Each scenario can be completed in two ways:
1) With a pre-selected AI team that you will manage for that one match. This team is hand picked to be suitable for the challenge. This is considered a success, but the real challenge lies with option 2 ...
2) With your own squad. This is considered a super massive achievement to pull off ...

The scenario logbook records your progress for each scenarion seperately for both the pre-selected team and using your own team.

New scenario's can be added every season to keep the game fresh, and keep the population generally playing similar (ie new) scenarios at a similar time, helping bring a competitive edge to things.


13. UFFA New Member (in an existing GW) Tax Breaks
"Welcome to the UFFA, during your first season the UFFA will pay all agent & signing on fees using the taxes collected from member clubs. You will recieve notification when your tax break expires."

Take the agent and signing on fees out of the equation and the new member has an advantage which they can leverage to gain a foothold in the game, at the same time it's not a poke in the eye to existing members, unlike many other suggestions to make it easier for "newbies".


14. Stadium Customisation, funded by tokens
Re: Token prizes, please let us modify the appearance of our stadium using tokens.
- Add a car park, a tube station
- Roofing (opening/permanent)
- Pretty up the local area
- Choose the design of our stands
All completely cosmetic changes, but allowing us to give our ground some character -- rather than seeing our stadium rendered against a grey background with the same graphics for all, we see it placed on a street map. I could see myself spending a hell of a lot of token points building up this "scene". With enough development effort designing a stadium and it's surrondings can become as central an element in FML as designing your avatar in the more traditional MMOs.