The Master League Experiences Thread

[DunkLFC]

I don't think it's scripted to specifically happen in those early games. I think it is purely down to the opposition style of attack, our defences and the team chemistry, which is comparatively low at the start.

I do the following :-
1) Drop my CBs to the the closest they can be to the keeper
2) Place them close together as well, so there isn't a huge gap between them.
3) I play with the defensive line set to 3 bars. If the opposition start to spam lofted through-balls, I drop this to 2 bars.
4) I play quite a compact setting (can't recall exactly how compact) to stop ground based through-balls.
5) I think I have the team set to guide the opposition attacks wide. They seem to go wide slightly more than they try down the middle.
6) The other really important thing I have done is to buy an 85 rated defender. That helped more than anything else.

The biggest spammer of the long ball tactic against me is Man Utd, which I find funny.

Chelsea tend to work their way through me no matter what I do. I was sort of fine with this when the game came out, but I'm finding it less and less realistic as each week passes. ~evil grin~

 

[Ali]

So, I see that player age increases mid season.... what's up with that? :huh:

 

[Parkinfed]

So, I see that player age increases mid season.... what's up with that? :huh:

Did you not know that everybody on earth is born on the first of January?? But seriously, care to give any more details? I haven't got the game this year...really wanna know.

 

[Ali]

Did you not know that everybody on earth is born on the first of January?? But seriously, care to give any more details? I haven't got the game this year...really wanna know.

Well, you know how usually (in ML at least) the player ages increase at the beginning of each season (around June/July)? This time, they've switched it to mid season (January). New players in your youth team has also moved mid season.

 

[Paul Scott]

I don't think it's scripted to specifically happen in those early games. I think it is purely down to the opposition style of attack, our defences and the team chemistry, which is comparatively low at the start.

I do the following :-
1) Drop my CBs to the the closest they can be to the keeper
2) Place them close together as well, so there isn't a huge gap between them.
3) I play with the defensive line set to 3 bars. If the opposition start to spam lofted through-balls, I drop this to 2 bars.
4) I play quite a compact setting (can't recall exactly how compact) to stop ground based through-balls.
5) I think I have the team set to guide the opposition attacks wide. They seem to go wide slightly more than they try down the middle.
6) The other really important thing I have done is to buy an 85 rated defender. That helped more than anything else.

The biggest spammer of the long ball tactic against me is Man Utd, which I find funny.

Chelsea tend to work their way through me no matter what I do. I was sort of fine with this when the game came out, but I'm finding it less and less realistic as each week passes. ~evil grin~

Interesting... I look forward to getting promoted and battering Chelsea and Man U!!! YNWA!!!

 

[rebelinho]

Well, you know how usually (in ML at least) the player ages increase at the beginning of each season (around June/July)? This time, they've switched it to mid season (January). New players in your youth team has also moved mid season.

It makes sense really. As there are youth players that come in both July and January, their age will increase after a full year has passed since their rebirth. As for the normal players I think all of them grow older in the summer.

 

[Ali]

It makes sense really. As there are youth players that come in both July and January, their age will increase after a full year has passed since their rebirth. As for the normal players I think all of them grow older in the summer.

No, the normal players grow older in January.... at least they did for me!

 

[DunkLFC]

Well, you know how usually (in ML at least) the player ages increase at the beginning of each season (around June/July)? This time, they've switched it to mid season (January). New players in your youth team has also moved mid season.

Like thoroughbred horses then where they all have the official birthday of 1st January. Except the Aussies where its August. :unsure:

 

[rebelinho]

No, the normal players grow older in January.... at least they did for me!

It might. I honestly don't care. This is yet another problem that could be so easily fixed (add a birthdate option to the players' edit menu), but as usual I'm not expecting any changes.

 

[DunkLFC]

... YNWA!!!

OK, so after all the chat about Suarez, I went to look for him at Barcelona to see how much he costs. Aged 30, he would cost me more than his £25M market value. He also had zero bars of 'likelihood' of joining Woking. :/

I then spotted the 23 year old Sterling was also at Barcelona with a higher OR than Suarez (88), including 97 speed and 97 explosiveness at just £17M market value. He only had one bar of 'likelihood' but my first "It'll never happen" bid got accepted with £21.5M being asked for. I already have Jese at LWF so despite this being a reasonable price for this level of player, I renegotiated with a 72% chance. They then dropped the price by £2.7M, so I now have Mamadou Sakho, Joe Gomez and Raheem Sterling as ex-LFC players in my team. :laugh:

I bought Gomez halfway through the first season, thinking he'll become a regular over the course of time, not realising quite how quickly you can up-trade players into your squad by trawling the out of contract players. Joe is only 73 OR, but has the stats in good places, but he's still my 4th choice now. I was surprised to see Sakho drop from 85 OR to 84 though, when he's only 27 and plays as my first choice CB! :shocking:

So season two has just finished with me securing fourth spot in the Premiership. Typically, it was Liverpool that just missed out - Doh! But at least Arsenal were below them in 6th. If I'd won the last match, I'd have taken 3rd spot from Long-Ball Utd, but Newcastle avenged their early defeat in the season to become unbeatable on the last day. I have to assume their strikers and keeper were on red form. I had more of the ball, more crosses, corners, tackles, interceptions, pass completion rate, shots (10), shots on target (7), but I lost 4:1 with each of their 4 shots going in. Heh, I don't mind it when the opposition AI plays really well, but I do find it annoying that when the opposition are on red form, the game makes your players play like idiots - failing to stay goal side and leaving massive holes at the back. :realmad:

 

[DunkLFC]

It might. I honestly don't care. This is yet another problem that could be so easily fixed (add a birthdate option to the players' edit menu), but as usual I'm not expecting any changes.

Yes, the PS4 has oddles of power, but year on year, PES is reducing the number of fields recorded against players. Strange.

 

[Paul Scott]

OK, so after all the chat about Suarez, I went to look for him at Barcelona to see how much he costs. Aged 30, he would cost me more than his £25M market value. He also had zero bars of 'likelihood' of joining Woking. :/

Suarez refusing Woking!? How dare he!? :laugh:

I then spotted the 23 year old Sterling was also at Barcelona with a higher OR than Suarez (88), including 97 speed and 97 explosiveness at just £17M market value. He only had one bar of 'likelihood' but my first "It'll never happen" bid got accepted with £21.5M being asked for. I already have Jese at LWF so despite this being a reasonable price for this level of player, I renegotiated with a 72% chance. They then dropped the price by £2.7M, so I now have Mamadou Sakho, Joe Gomez and Raheem Sterling as ex-LFC players in my team. :laugh:

Wow Sterling for 2.7m, sounds about right! And I'm not even slightly bitter about him leaving for Citah....
On a serious note, I'll be looking out for the lil shit with stats like that! I actually bargained Arsenal down to 7mil for Walcott but I chose Suarez and Insigne combo instead.
Last year I ended up with (or at one point had) Moreno, Flanagan, Markovic, Gerard, Cisse, Crouch and Kuyt..

I bought Gomez halfway through the first season, thinking he'll become a regular over the course of time, not realising quite how quickly you can up-trade players into your squad by trawling the out of contract players. Joe is only 73 OR, but has the stats in good places, but he's still my 4th choice now. I was surprised to see Sakho drop from 85 OR to 84 though, when he's only 27 and plays as my first choice CB! :shocking:

Hmmm Sakho is on my wish list. I'll have to keep an eye, surprised with that OR drop tho!

So season two has just finished with me securing fourth spot in the Premiership. Typically, it was Liverpool that just missed out - Doh! But at least Arsenal were below them in 6th. If I'd won the last match, I'd have taken 3rd spot from Long-Ball Utd, but Newcastle avenged their early defeat in the season to become unbeatable on the last day. I have to assume their strikers and keeper were on red form. I had more of the ball, more crosses, corners, tackles, interceptions, pass completion rate, shots (10), shots on target (7), but I lost 4:1 with each of their 4 shots going in. Heh, I don't mind it when the opposition AI plays really well, but I do find it annoying that when the opposition are on red form, the game makes your players play like idiots - failing to stay goal side and leaving massive holes at the back. :realmad:

Haha champs lge spot going into your 3rd season is a solid achievement. I'm realistically targeting a CL spot in Season 4, either by a top 4 spot or winning the Europa lge because I'm totally all out to win this FA cup in my second season to take me there!
I agree with ye on your players turning into imbeciles in certain games! That drift they do as the opposition is approaching thru the mids, or the slow start or cart-horse turn they do which gives the opposition a crazy head start to be one on one with your keeper is completely infuriating and totally outta your hands! -Which is where the joypad usually ends up, except with a lot of force. :laugh:
I think those little "scripting" episodes have always been there thru the years on PES and will remain. It happens in 2 player friendlies too, myself and a mate used to have long bouts of friendlies with our ML teams against each other and after a while 1 person would find it incredibly easy to win. We called it "the ascendancy" and we noticed coming outta there and going back to "mode select" menu would fix it. Hahahahah. If someone had an inkling of a match being completely impossible and "funny stuff" happening their top defenders you'd hear a shout "ASCENDANCY! BACK TO MODE SELECT!" Hahahaha good times, good times....

 

[rebelinho]

I renegotiated with a 72% chance. They then dropped the price by £2.7M

I never got a positive answer back if the % was lower than 85. And more often that not, if it is between 85 and 90, they will end the negotiations.

 

[DunkLFC]

I never got a positive answer back if the % was lower than 85. And more often that not, if it is between 85 and 90, they will end the negotiations.

Really? I generally get a about the right number succeeding or failing over time based on the percentage. Most of the time a 72% will work ... as the number implies. I've pushed for a second price boost on selling one of my DMs and the chance is down to 52%. I don't mind if he stays or goes, hence the gamble. I'll let you know how it goes.

 

[Joey Tribbiani]

I'll write this essay for the second time as this site logs you out with no warning for some reason when you preview a post...

I'm currently about 14 games into my ML campaign with the mighty Derby. I added Bradley Johnson, Andreas Weimann and Jacob Butterfield manually as I could no longer be bothered to wait for Konami to get their act together.

I also edited some of the players stats - both up and down. It's ludicrous that both FIFA and PES can be so dismissive of defensive midfield God George Thorne and give him a miserly 66 or such like rating, yet can issue Butch Lesbian Ancient Egyptian lookalike Ryan Shotton with an obscene 70. I also altered players positions to more accurately reflect real life.

Upon starting I decided to not make any signings until at least January and have rejected the many offers for my players from the various fictional teams that inhabit my ML universe (including a £4 million offer for my 3rd choice keeper from the comically named outfit "Pleasure Horn".

It has quickly become apparent that team spirit seems to affect the ease at which you can win. I struggled to wins in my opening 2 fixtures against Rotherham and Bolton before a battling 1-1 draw with QPR. After these early games my Team Spirit had risen to around 70 for the trip to the City Ground where I registered an emphatic 6-1 win against the Red Dogs. This was followed up with a 7-1 rout of Ipswich Town at home before back to back away wins of 5-2 and 4-1 over Blackburn and Brentford. Scoring then is way too easy on Top Player.

After 12 league games i've scored 41 goals, conceding 12 with Darren Bent and the rediculousluly under-rated by default Chris Martin vying with Charlie Austin at the top of the scorers charts with 10 each. Not bad considering they each only play about half of my matches.

I got knocked out of the FA Cup in round 2 (!) by Liverpool in a game notable for a few things. It was one of only two games that have been played in the afternoon (are Konami basing this on the incredible amount of our games that have been rescheduled for TV in real life, or do they genuinely think 95% of 2nd division matches take place at 7:45?). It was also for some reason played at the neutral and not real Rose Park stadium meaning I couldn't cash in on all that extra Scott Carson merchandise that apparently the Derby faithful like to purchase...

Defending is frustrating. Historically this has been my strongest point and remains so for 99% of the time. However when you limit the opposition to 1 shot on goal all game and it goes in every time from about 20 yards it gets a bit annoying. Almost all of the goals I concede are from through balls that magically evade the wildly out of position Richard Keogh (possibly accurate) and the lumbering Jason Shackell (not particularly accurate). Even the shots aren't that good but beat the hapless Carson almost right down the middle. Are Konami basing him on his showing for England against Croatia in 2008? No, because it happens if I put the slightly lower rated Lee Grant in the sticks as well.

The only clean sheet I've kept was a 1-0 win over Middlesbrough who are somehow 3rd bottom having won just 1 in 12.

Another bugbear is the referees insistance on wearing black when i'm in my dark purple away kit. I've tried messing with the kit details beneath the template I have copied in but nothing seems to make a difference.

The monthly stats are very nice as is the team of the month but this is somewhat spoilt by getting player ratings of 6.5 when you've scored 2 and got 3 assists off the bench.

Overall i'm enjoying it but feel that i'm going to have to risk the scripting of Superstar difficulty if this is going to be remotely challenging.

Below is the side I have:

Carson (72)

Baird (C) (71) Keogh (72) Shackell (76) Forsyth (69)

Thorne (74)

Johnson (72) Butterfield (74)

Ince (72) Weimann (75)

Bent (74)

Subs:

Grant (69)

Pearce (71)

Warnock (69)

Hughes (72)

Bryson (72)

Hendrick (71)

Martin (74)

 

[Silver Surfer]

I'm currently about 14 games into my ML campaign with the mighty Derby.

Great read (and user name) :laugh:

It sounds like you're having fun overall, apart from a few small 'Konami hiccups' (standard). Team spirit is important this year, you need to keep a good group of guys together and make sure you don't rotate to much. I find the more regular your starting XI, the higher your team spirit will become. Obviously winning a few games along the way helps as well.

The night games are an issue for everyone, lots not happy with it at all, however after a while i have learned to 'accept' it and enjoy the game for what it is.

Will Hughes is my favourite Derby player, that lad has got bags of potential, in real life as well...with hair as white as the moon

 

[Joey Tribbiani]

Will Hughes is my favourite Derby player, that lad has got bags of potential, in real life as well...with hair as white as the moon

Yeah I've started playing him more in the last few games as he was negatively affecting team spirit at the start and Johnson had a slightly higher rating. Now i've built up to around 86 team spirit it doesn't matter if it goes down 1 or 2 points whilst he beds in to the team, plus Johnson is on the decline.

He is a class player, shame he got such a bad injury at the start of this season.

 

[DunkLFC]

The night games are an issue for everyone, lots not happy with it at all, however after a while i have learned to 'accept' it and enjoy the game for what it is.

Yeah, I keep forgetting that the games are mostly night time, as I'm so focussed on the actual football. Then suddenly I'm playing a sunny match and I'm loving the look of it. However, as much as I like the sunny matches I find the shadows cast from the stadium over a goal area can make it hard to see what's going on in the box sometimes due to the contrast settings on my TV.

Regarding squads, I've reached a new challenge. We've just had another influx of former superstars into the the youth team and I'm struggling to stop myself from signing them up purely to loan or sell half of them on. I've just hit the 32 squad max, which is one way of stopping me I suppose. :laugh:

If I wanted I could field an entire 11 of 16 year olds averaging 74 OR from youth team arrivals since 1st January. And despite being about 74 OR, they play better than that because of the 'skills' they have. I'm presuming the skills count towards the OR, but if so they don't count enough. I've just sold Fofana (76 OR in my game) as he's blown away by a 16 year old Plasil who is 74 OR at the moment ... and Plasil comes as a ready made Captain as well possessing a career's worth of other tricks. Maybe it would be OK to have one these pop up in your youth team a season (like finding a young Gerrard), but I've had about 10 pop up in 6 months including Klose, Plasil, Carvalho, Joe Cole, Bent, Mauri and several others. It also completely renders my efforts with any of the original youth team players I brought through completely pointless. The ones I kept in my squad have all been sold for about £1M and the ones I loaned out have come back to find themselves going straight onto the transfer market. There's no point sending them back out on loan, as they'll never catch up to the new batch and they're just taking up valuable slots.

I love the game, but they do need to sort out some silliness here and there.

 

[anfield89]

Any1 know if the 'Other European' teams reshuffle in the Champions league & Europa each season?. I'm Liverpool but I wanna see my created Celtic in the mix for the purpose of another british club.

 

[Ali]

Finding a bit too easy to score at the moment. Hopefully it gets more difficult when I get promoted.

I've managed to sign a few players, not many though, but am currently in negotiations to sign a few on a free at the end of the season. I'm finding that it's much easier to sign South American players than European ones.

One major annoyance is that Clough is out for 12 weeks, and looking at his development graph, it comes at the time when he's expected to develop the most! Do players develop at all when they're injured? Clough has alread jumped from 71 to 77 overall, due to being on a flashing red arrow for a number of weeks.