Tell me your tactical methods

[pEst410]

I'm curious about several tactical aspects of this game and since this year I'm struggling more than in previous years, I would like to hear your approaches, especially regarding the following:

1. How do you choose a player over another for the same position before a match? Do you look primarily at OVR? At the hexagon? Do you give a lot of importance to playing styles?

2. How do you balance form and OVR vs team spirit? Meaning, if a player is in better form or has a higher OVR or is better at the aspects you need (so individually he's the better option) but another player will give you higher team spirit, what do you do?

3. Do you use fluid formations? If so, what do you change? Personally, I move players forward/backwards but I avoid going too extreme or changing their position (i.e., a CMF is always a CMF, I don't change it to DMF when defending but I move him back).

4. What's your marking strategy? I tend to mark only CF, LWF, RWF and AMF. When I play against 2 strikers I often struggle with what to do...

5. How do you go about defining all your tactical options including the new advanced ones? Do you always use the same or adapt to the team you're facing? Do you test them all in several games to see what works? This game is so much tougher this year I'm actually going into the database to see how every team plays and then adapt my tactics to them. For example, was not being able to score against the weakest team in the league until I saw they play with defensive line 1, so I played with more attacking tactics and could beat them...

 

[Kazuki_Ito]

I'm curious about several tactical aspects of this game and since this year I'm struggling more than in previous years, I would like to hear your approaches, especially regarding the following:

1. How do you choose a player over another for the same position before a match? Do you look primarily at OVR? At the hexagon? Do you give a lot of importance to playing styles?

Primarily at OVR. Hexagon is just a different way of looking at their individual stats but can be useful. I don't look too much at playing styles but I take into account whether my strikers are like a slow hold-up striker or a pacy finisher.

2. How do you balance form and OVR vs team spirit? Meaning, if a player is in better form or has a higher OVR or is better at the aspects you need (so individually he's the better option) but another player will give you higher team spirit, what do you do?

I've played to the point where my team spirit is in low to mid 90's and only now am I able to win matches comfortably on superstar difficulty. If you have a new signing with a high OVR but he brings your team spirit down then you might just have to bite the bullet and play him til your team spirit rises again. Remember that players of same nationality can bed in together better. I have Saul from Atletico and Xabi Alonso in cmf and my team spirit benefited from that.

3. Do you use fluid formations? If so, what do you change? Personally, I move players forward/backwards but I avoid going too extreme or changing their position (i.e., a CMF is always a CMF, I don't change it to DMF when defending but I move him back).

I don't use fluid formations. I toyed with some tactics when I started out and had low team spirit but now I have high team spirit it seems to have made much more difference that tweaking tactics.

4. What's your marking strategy? I tend to mark only CF, LWF, RWF and AMF. When I play against 2 strikers I often struggle with what to do...

I don't change individual marking. I do man-marking tactics in-game at corners. I play a 3-5-2 (close to 3-5-2 B1 from old PES games) and try and use manual control (hold R1+R2) to read the game and get in front of attackers.

5. How do you go about defining all your tactical options including the new advanced ones? Do you always use the same or adapt to the team you're facing? Do you test them all in several games to see what works? This game is so much tougher this year I'm actually going into the database to see how every team plays and then adapt my tactics to them. For example, was not being able to score against the weakest team in the league until I saw they play with defensive line 1, so I played with more attacking tactics and could beat them...

I don't change my tactics at all to suit the opposition - very much from the Wenger school of thought and not Pep or Moroniho. Like I said before, now my team spirit is high my formation seems to work and also I am signing higher OVR players which surely helps. I don't have the time to be honest to tweak tactics all the time. I also don't use any of the tactics like gegenpress, tiki-taka etc. I tried them with low team spirit and they worked a bit but I'll say again that team spirit helped me much more than tactics have.

x

 

[valencia5]

I'm curious about several tactical aspects of this game and since this year I'm struggling more than in previous years, I would like to hear your approaches, especially regarding the following:

1. How do you choose a player over another for the same position before a match? Do you look primarily at OVR? At the hexagon? Do you give a lot of importance to playing styles?

2. How do you balance form and OVR vs team spirit? Meaning, if a player is in better form or has a higher OVR or is better at the aspects you need (so individually he's the better option) but another player will give you higher team spirit, what do you do?

3. Do you use fluid formations? If so, what do you change? Personally, I move players forward/backwards but I avoid going too extreme or changing their position (i.e., a CMF is always a CMF, I don't change it to DMF when defending but I move him back).

4. What's your marking strategy? I tend to mark only CF, LWF, RWF and AMF. When I play against 2 strikers I often struggle with what to do...

5. How do you go about defining all your tactical options including the new advanced ones? Do you always use the same or adapt to the team you're facing? Do you test them all in several games to see what works? This game is so much tougher this year I'm actually going into the database to see how every team plays and then adapt my tactics to them. For example, was not being able to score against the weakest team in the league until I saw they play with defensive line 1, so I played with more attacking tactics and could beat them...

I'll type more later but I'm in a hurry so I can share a little bit of what I do.

1. I try to recruit faster players. That rating has the biggest impact on the game I think, as well as real life, but it seems the other ratings don't offset this one. Then I go by overall, then adjust by condition, play styles, don't seem to make a big difference at all if any in my observation.

2. I try to train my projected preferred team...the team spirit will eventually rise.

3&5. Yes fluid formations, also I use all strategies, and advanced strategies...simple example, being attacking zone/defense contain - middle/wide....depending on how the opponent is playing.....all the advanced strategies are useful depending on the situation...in my opinion I've used most of them....except really the counter target....since the forwards rarely drop anyway. It's just for saving stamina...but completely unrealistic, and awkward....

4. I never use the marking assignments...seems to mess things up greatly. If players are marking someone, and someone gets pulled way out of position...another player will not leave his mark to cover anything, lanes, the ball, even if his current mark is of no threat and another players has the ball with a free run to 1 on 1 with the keeper....This happens excessively frequent.
The tight marking on advanced has a little better AI, cuz the defenders will pass him off if dragged into an extremely vulnerable situation and keep the shape of the D somewhat.

 

[Kru23]

What seems to be getting my more goal opportunity with my ML default team is a 433 counter attack.

 

[tokwan]

1. I prioritize OVR, then form i.e. I won't select a player with higher OVR but on worst form (down red) to start a match. I might sub him in 2nd half if the team is leading comfortably just to get him 'familiarized' with the team instructions and to build up team spirit in the long run. The hexagon is just a summarized info of a player stats which I already know about (you did analyze all your players' strengths and weaknesses when you're appointed as the manager of the team, didn't you). I don't really look into each player playing style for match selection as I train the players according to the playing styles that I want (we can change a CLASSIC NO 10 player to a BOX TO BOX player via training method if we want).

2. As explained for question #1. With very low team spirit, there'll be more misplaced passes. Players become sluggish. When the opponent gets the first goal, flood gate opens and come back is nigh impossible.

3. When I started the ML, I used fluid formation for my club team. Possession formation was a bit attacking than start formation; player positions maintained. Out of ball formation was more defensive, positional wise dragged back of course, with my wingers becoming AMF, AMF became CMF and CMF became DMF. They all had the defensive positions as their second preferred positions though.

4. I don’t mark players. I found it’s easier to snuff out dangers by being more defensive in overall team shape (double tap down on the D-pad). Also, I found it easier getting my player to just run (R1) in front of the opponent player to take the ball from his feet (R2 towards the opponent when you are next to him, to cross ahead of him and ‘take over’ the ball from him). Holding R1 + X to tackle is difficult if your player stats is not overwhelmingly higher than the opposition.

5. I have not tested all the tactical options and advanced options. In my ML third season, I took up the offer to manage Holland. I found it easier to play and score with Holland compared to when I played my club team (both teams used 433 formation). My Holland team was on default formation & tactic, with no fluid formation. I did very minimal changes as I don’t want a drop in team spirit. I copied over the Holland formation and tactic to my club team with success, and never bother to test other tactical options since.

With my overall team strength at 82 now, I can comfortably chalk up 3 goals margin win at the highest difficulty level. Oh, I don't play when my mind is not focused on the game - losing is one thing but i hate buying new controllers :tongue:

 

[pEst410]

Interesting approaches, thanks, some similar to mine, others different...

1 - I tend to go for OVR, counting +-5% for diagonal up/down arrow, and +-10% for up/down arrow, as I've read that's roughly how much form changes stats... But I look at the hexagon for some things... For example I notice that if I use a 78 CMF with low DEF rating as a box to box, he doesn't do that well, but if I use a 74 CMF with a balanced hexagon and much better DEF, he gets great ratings in the end and may even score more than the other more attacking player. I started wrting down player ratings at the end and tend to repeat the ones that work despite lower OVR, so long as theirs or other players' form doesnt change that massively. I also find that yes, speed makes a big difference especially for wingers.

2 - I also try to field players that lower team spirit in the 2nd half if the game is controlled, so they familiarise themselves.

4 - I always find it better to mark (playing on Advanced), I've tested and generally I take more goals if not marking and get more clean sheets marking. But occasionally I'll get a match where I'm annihilated by the attackers dragging markers out of position and opening clearings for them to score from easily. This usually happens more against 2 strikers, so in those cases I may not mark them at all, and if there's a SS that I really want to mark I use a DMF on him, not a CB...

5 - I haven't been able to properly test all advanced tactics either, but the ones that have worked well for me and that I usually start with now are False 9 and Centring Targets. Occasionally if I'm getting hammered by crosses I may turn on Flood the Box and if it's Through Balls I may turn on Deep Defensive Line, but both of those have also backfired on me for the pressure they invite...

I also make sure I don't play if I can't fully focus on it Even just a beer or being knackered at the end of the day make me lose a match 3-0 I'll easily win if I repeat it next day...