The Speculatron!

[Al Svanberg]

Jeeves- I have a few wishes/suggestions!

I love this game, and I think the new training system has been simply awesome! And I definitely think that is the direction you should keep going in. Like, you don't have to spend a ton of time on it, but you have the option to put in some time on training and get rewarded with better results.

Long term, I would definitely love to see similar improvements made to (1) the financial and organizational side of the game, and (2) scouting and transfer side of the game. I also think (3) there is room to make the game-play a bit, but still significantly, more transparent and "analyzable". And (4) I have some suggestions for minor improvements that I think can be done.

With all this said, I just want to add that I do think that one of the best things with TE is the combination the game has of being plain BUT still so challenging and rewarding. There is no point in adding -- any -- feature to just make things more complex and time consuming. The key from my POV is to -- just like with the new training function -- find that perfect balance between offering a game that is, in lack of better words, (1) plain, and not necessarily tremendously time consuming, (2) challenging without being too complex, (3) and that enables a large number of players to compete with each other notwithstanding if they put 30 minutes or 3 hours into the game per day. But I do think there is potential to make the game more rewarding and exciting by giving us players more options and more function to enjoy. I do realize that many of the improvements I suggest are tremendously difficult to create and implement while keeping the mentioned balance. But here they come!

1. Club administration/organizational/financial functions
As it is now you kind of just floats around here and it doesn't really have much impacts on your club if you are active or not in these areas. Its an extreme example, but I came across this player that got to level 40, without doing anything with the arena (still only having 200 seats):


Naturally, the challenge in this area from my POV is to find features that is not only a burden for players, but still fun to work with and rewarding, without tilting the competitive balance between very active and somewhat less active players too much. Sure you can easily just complicate things, make negotiations more complex and more like in the real world, transfer-fees that are paid out over several years, contract negotiations with players that are more complex, individual bonuses etc. Adding negotiations with sponsors and what not. But what is fun to work with for us players? What would be rewarding? And what would just be complicated and burdensome? These are of course the key issues.

But I definitely think there is a lot of improvement potential in this area. Maybe adding a real youth academy at some point (from a certain level) is a good option? Build a little on the current financial system, make it a little more complex, while maybe especially making the impact it has a lot bigger. As it is now, basically you get most money from training and selling players, and some from competition rewards. The other sources are more or less irrelevant. After only a few seasons, money is not an issue anymore it seems.

So what can be done? Just thinking out loud so to speak these thoughts have come across my mind:

-Adding a building called Front-Office, or Headquarter or whatever, with different levels were like a sales-department at different steps can improve the number of tickets you sell and the income you get from sponsors etc.

-Making the youth academy much more complex. Why not have kids in it that maybe starts at 14-15 years of age and that is developed. The youth academy can cost a lot more to run, but also give a bigger gain.

-Maybe especially adjust the impact of the financial and arena system so that it matters a lot more. It seems like many pretty fast reach a point where they have money on the bank to buy 3-4 completely new teams. That is never the case for real teams. IMO money should be a factor always, as it is in real soccer. Nobody is so rich that they always can afford any player they want. Selling out your arena should be a challenge and the number of fans you draw can be impacted to a bigger extent and by many many more factors. If you can sell out your arena it, the money you get should always give you a real competitive edge. Just sharpen the financial challenge in the game a lot more. This will make it more rewarding for us players to work with it, which will increase the overall stimulation we get from the game. On par with how the training function was developed and made more complex.

-Scouting department. Below I touch upon how the transfer and scouting aspects of the game can be improved. With reference to that, why not also let players build and develop a scouting department in the arena section? Maybe change name of the arena section to become more of a organizational section?

-Analytic department. Below I touch upon how the game-play might be improved. Why not make it possible to build up and improve an analytic department of your team? See more below of what that would do.

2. The transfer market and scouting

I think the current transfer market in TE is functional, rewarding and fun. But it is still pretty rural. Like the old training function. Just as that was improved and made more complex and rewarding, I think many improvements can be made to the transfer-market and scouting functions of the game.

So what can be done? I think a lot can be done. As it is now, a lot is about getting up early in the morning and getting your hands on the fast trainers early in the season while you after that have a few weeks to fill out your roster and the last two weeks of the season you don't spend much if any time building a squad. The scouts recommendations fills a purpose, but its not much you work with as a player. This can just be done a bit more complex but also more living and challenging.

Just thinking out loud again, if you add more of a scouting function that you control, IE llike adding a function where you hire scouts or develop a scouting department in the arena function, and then set your scouts to search for players that you then can sign. Should all abilities of young players be visible when you sign them? Should it depend on how good your scout is? Youth players can be added to the equation. Where you like can focus on getting young players that you develop yourself, or more established players that are finished products. As it is now, so much is about getting your hands on the right kids and working them hard. That can maybe be balanced out a bit, by making more established players more valuable by them potentially having a bigger impact.

3. Making game play more transparent and analytic-able

The biggest advantage with TE is IMO how adjustable and challenging the game engine is. Hands down. There is no crazy beat em all "3-1-5" with long passing formation you can make up that will win you anything. Many factors matters, but none takes over. To get results, you need to work on all fronts, and still -- just like in the real world -- the ball is round and what not and anything can happen.

OTOH, even if you know that actions you make impacts things, what impact an action in the game has can not only be cloudy, in can in many instances be more or less impossible to see. I think this takes away some excitement from players, and it also confuses other players a lot because since its so abstract they start to think that nothing matters etc.

Like in so many other team sports, in Soccer the "analytic" side of the game. Everyone want to be that computer nerd in Money Ball right, and it also does have a real positive impact on how well managers can do their job. I definitely think there is a lot of potential to make the game play more transparent and hence more rewarding for players -- while still keeping the mystery/abstract part of it that makes the game so great.

-Add more stats, and make them more living. As it is now, passes completed, shots and fouls say very little about what is actually going on on the field. These stats can be developed a lot to more reflect how numbers look from a real game and they can especially more be broken down on a player level. IE so that you can see how an individual player passes the ball and so forth.

-I think the individual impact of each player and their skills can be made more transparent.

-The impact of special abilities is very cloudy.

Now we get a lot of info from the Assistent Manager, I think it would be possible and more rewarding, if this info could come from stats and not from the AM and that we could get more info of what is going on on the field.

4. Minor improvements

Just a thought I have. I think that the people who love TE and other games like it, loves to mixture with things and see the result of it. We love the reward we get from being patient, putting in the work, and then to see it pay-off. On both sides of this spectra, I think the following improvements could be made:

1. Adding a special ability is very exciting. We play in a dream world, and are lured by this option. Why not make it possible to add up to three special abilities per player? It would enable us to dream even more! And to take it even further, why not add more special abilities? I am sure many can think of good options. Target player is one (stronger and better at heading). Box-to-box player (conditioning, speed and positioning maybe. Or why not like "two" arrows, both offensive and defensive?!!). And so forth.

Imagine how much we could dream about getting these optimal players? An striker (/aml) that is like a dribbler, target player and one on one finnisher! And so forth. Would add a lot of excitement to the game!

2. On other side of the spectrum, I would suggest that more "rewards" are added. In short, this game is about putting in work, and the following the process to be rewarded. Always thrive forward. Every little award -- that can give you an edge -- matters. Everyone turns into perfectionists. In this context, I think there are four "competitions" in TE that only are paper product.

Firstly, you have the achievement sections. Add small rewards to them, and it brings more excitement to the game!

The other three "competitions" in the game that are paper tigers are the three Top players categories, Ie. Top scorer, Best Grade and Most assists in the League. I can only speak for my self, but if my player got a trophy, like the "Golden ball" for top scorer, AND I got say 5 rest-packs if my player wins it, you know, I would work a lot on getting my player to win it. I would check this page daily. Am I winning?? Do the same for most assists and best grade. A trophy for those two awards too, add a page to the players bio where you can see trophies won, and give an award. Why not 5 skill-point for best grade and 5 moral packs for most assists and so forth. And why not do the same for top scorers in the Cup and Champions League!? I think this would make the game more exciting and rewarding to play.

Also, when talking about the skill-point, I also want to add that for me as a new player this is a bit of an odd bird in the game. It is hard to understand, 4% for a player? Why? What is it? When you learn the background, you understand it. Ie you train, get skill-points (the reward from training), and can assign it. Right? But as a new player, I don't understand it. Hence I would suggest that maybe its given a new name, why not "Personal Training Session" or something like that? That would make sense to me. I received a Personal Training Session as a gift from a friend, this resulted in that one of my players got 4% more. I like the reward in itself a lot! And with a better name, I think it could be used more! But I would like to also suggest that they can be stored and then assigned to players at the managers choosing. If this option existed, the "Personal Training Sessions" could be seen as a very very exclusive Resource, that would be very useful to save up during a season and use for New Positions or Special Abilities for new players.