Quote Originally Posted by Cody Allan Taylor View Post
There is far too much work that needs done on player counts before even thinking about subs. Namely the fact that your team rating is an average of all your players. Nordeus uses that number for almost all their calculations, but it's easily "fluffed" by simply having less players. Less players means that you devide by a smaller number, and thus every time a player improves it has more weight on that average number than a team with more players. To eliminate this they could sum your starting 11 only, but that won't happen.
I had some thought on that earlier too, but as you mention it:
If team stats would be calculated from only the starting formation, a manager can simply put his best players to reserve as needed, thus "cheating" his average strength. But he can already do that through his reserve players being bad, so it wouldn´t be any worse than it is now. Maybe the best way would be to add just his strongest eleven players strength.
I had a hard time winning the cup in season 3, playing against only season 4 players. I thought ok, this is the way of a cup and they can´t let season 1 teams play against season 20, so somewhere has to be the split. Next season I´m season 4, playing season 3 & 4 teams in the cup. So far I guessed. Now I´m season 4, playing season 5 & 6 teams only.
I have to say it is fun. More fun than slaughtering season 4 teams in the league. From that point it´s a nice thing to have competitive teams to play the cup. BUT:
If the teams are equal in the beginning of a season there´s one thing to keep in mind. I start with a whole cap level transfer market roster, and through the season I can only further improve them by training. A season 6 players transfer market cap is 10(!) levels higher than mine. He can easily improve his team to a point I can never achieve with just 1-3 transfers.
In the end of the season (where it counts) I have little chances to be competitive anymore.
This is a BIG disadvantage in the cup system as it is played right now. Making it harder for the best players to get a cup than for anyone else. I think the cup should not be a second Champion League but bring together teams from different leagues. But there should be a modifier like a +3 per team level when determining team strength for that matter. I know it is supposed to be realistic and hard to play against higher leagues. But keep in mind the differences of a game here. As there is no league cap for that in T11, player experience is just: The better you get the worse it gets. At least until you reach season level 40 or whatever is the top right now.

So, dear top eleven, here´s my suggestions:
1. No more cancelled matches against zombie teams, as it may ruin league competition in the worst case.
2. Give us at least 10 reserve players to matches.
3. Cup team strength modifier based on team level.