I think I know what's going on

So, Nordeus is punishing me for something I did. But for what?

How do I know I have been blackballed? I had a strong start: something like 20 wins, 2 losses, 2 draws. I was on top of the league by 8 points and making my way through the cups.

Then everything changed overnight. I am winless in six official games: 2 losses, 4 draws. I squandered the league lead and got knocked out of both cups. The guy who knocked me out of the cup plays in my league and is in the 10th place; I had beat him 3:0 on his ground in the league play before my so called cold streak began.

I lose to the teams whom I used to beat and whom I outclass. I just barely tied the team in the last place, which I outclass by 8 points. Before the match, I made sure to check how he did in the previous round. The 3rd place guy (same Q as me) spanked him 6:1. I copied the winning formation just in case. I played at home. 0:0 at the half. He scored early in the second. I changed formation to 4-5-1V and went hard attacking. I scored one goal. Then my MC grabbed two YCs at 84 and 89 minute and it was all over. This is pretty much when I knew.

There is only one explanation: I stopped spending tokens on players. Don't need to, don't want to.

They went Pavlovian on me. They want to see if I push the right button in response to the electric shock (or whatever Mr. Pavlov did to the dogs). They want to see me go on a buying spree and spend down some tokens. Somehow, in the end it's always about the tokens.

Tell me I am paranoid. Or tell me if you can see the correlation between your own cold streaks and reduced token spending.

I don't want any new players. Can I just rename someone or reschedule some matches?

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Originally Posted by ponzu

So, Nordeus is punishing me for something I did. But for what?

How do I know I have been blackballed? I had a strong start: something like 20 wins, 2 losses, 2 draws. I was on top of the league by 8 points and making my way through the cups.

Then everything changed overnight. I am winless in six official games: 2 losses, 4 draws. I squandered the league lead and got knocked out of both cups. I lose to the teams whom I used to beat and whom I outclass. I just barely tied the team in the last place, which I outclass by 8 points. The guy who knocked me out of the cup plays in my league and is in the 10th place; I had beat him 3:0 on his ground in the league play before my so called cold streak began.

My quality is up, my team is optimized, I know more than ever knew about formation and orders. I give top win bonus, I won my last three friendlies 5-0, 17-0 and 6-0. 17:0, people! The most ever. But in competition play, clearly Nordeus has decided that I am going to lose. You know how it goes: my posession and passing numbers are where they should be, but my players grab red cards or get injured, or just get otherwise trolled.

Why?

I have only one explanation: I stopped spending tokens on players. Don't need to, don't want to.

They went Pavlovian on me. They want to see if I push the right button in response to the electric shock (or whatever Mr. Pavlov did to the dogs). They want to see me go on a buying spree and spend down some tokens. Somehow, in the end it's always about the tokens.

Tell me I am paranoid. Or tell me if you can see the correlation between your own cold streaks and reduced token spending.

I don't want any new players. Can I just rename someone or reschedule some matches?

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Not gonna say u are paranoid, but I think the game engine change from time to time, I have I good team and usually dominate my matches, but talking about this season I lost two games and draw two so far, one particular day I lost 2-0 and had a draw in the same day and I couldn't do much my tatics and tricks didn't work and was against a weak formation on defense 3w-1-4-2 so I stop and think next day I have to do something different more carefully to make sure my team morale and form doesn't go down, because I believe the worse thing its make a good team perform well when the form its bad, so IMO try to fix where you see a problem.

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Originally Posted by FVS0777

fix where you see a problem.

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But that's the thing. I don't think there is anything I can do to win. After going winless in 5, and having a quiet day, I played three friendlies. I edited this part out because the post was too long, but I see that you copied it.

5-0, 17-0 and 6-0. 17-0 was my highest ever. The morale was through the roof as a result.

There is no doubt in my mind that Nordeus wants me to lose. Not forever, but at this point in the season. The only questions are "Why?" and "What am I supposed to do?" I am looking at the transfer markets. I guess I can hold ST tryouts. They seem to play well for a 4-5 games after acquisition.

Well I don't want to buy strikers not so soon I rather buy wingers than ST, good luck.

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Originally Posted by FVS0777

Well I don't want to buy strikers not so soon I rather buy wingers than ST, good luck.

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for ST, i think need to see the height, i prefer someone like 1.9Xm and can shoot either foot.... this may help scoring...
my sub ST, a fast trainer, 18 yrs old... so far play 9 league game, most are sub in, score 4 and 3 assist~ i got another one yesterday 19 yr old, play one league today, score 1, 2 assist ~ both height are over 1.9 and either foot~ i have 5 ST right now, but 3 of them can play other position, AMC, AML, AMR for each one and all of the play as AML, AMC, ST, my two ST only sub, only sub in if i need more men in the box~

We're not going to make this an ST discussion thread. I bought an ST, fast trainer, he had 4 goals and 3 assists in the first 3 matches. Then leveled off. Currently 8 goals and 4 assists in 13 matches. I bought another to keep him company. Fast trainer he may be, but he is 0 and 0 in 4 matches. First guy 192cm, right footed. Second is 189cm, right footed. I assumed height, weight and footedness are completely cosmetic, but the tall guys is playing better. I wills sell the shorty and see how the next one does.

Let's try to stay on topic.

This season I was about mid table, struggling to get more than 1 win. I kept drawing games, it was crazy.

Now, I have 7 draws and 1 loss and won all the rest. Currently 2nd. My rival hadn't lost a game until 2 days ago until I beat him. Now he's lost 2 in a row. This is the guy that beat me at the start of the season and I'm turning it around and just 5 points behind him.

I have a very very good chance of winning the Cup and I'm leading the first leg in the CL game QF. I didn't think I could do it but I'm turning it around.

Now, a few seasons ago I was in a similar position to you. Won most but drew 2 and lost 0. Suddenly in the last 6 games I kept losing and drawing and I couldn't understand it. I finished 3rd that season with a 2 point difference between me and 1st. I was gutted.

I believe systems and tactics change from time to time. What might work one week won't work so well the next. I don't believe they would be naive enough to affect the ones who buy tokens. Surely it would be the other way wrong to pressure non token buyers like me to actually buy to increase my chances.

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Originally Posted by El Pistolero

I don't believe they would be naive enough to affect the ones who buy tokens. Surely it would be the other way wrong to pressure non token buyers like me to actually buy to increase my chances.

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I don't buy tokens, I get them from sponsorships + I fulfilled a few advertised requirements to earn tokens. I am sitting on 36T and watch it slowly grow (from sponsorships) for the next season. I don't think Nordeus differentiate token buyer from token earner. I think they may be targeting non-spenders.

Do you get your ass man advice saying with better quality we could of won this?

I'm not too sure Nordeous are smart enough to catagorize token buyers/non-token buyers/not using saved tokens.
If they could do that then the bugs this game has would be gone

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Originally Posted by El Pistolero

Do you get your ass man advice saying with better quality we could of won this?

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No. Do you? He says many stupid things, but not that.

Alright, let's say Nordeus is not punishing me for not spending tokens. Why then?

What does it mean "systems and tactics change from time to time"? How does the team that was rolling for the first half come to a dead stop like this? Am I supposed to start playing offside trap against teams with attacking midfielders now? Reverse the arrows? Throw away the table of counter formations?

I was prepared to make the argument that while I was enjoying myself and my success, others have been busy buying and training players and have caught up to me in quality. But when I failed to beat the 14th place team who is 8 Q points below me I knew it was not my opponents I was up against, but Nordeus.


It's not one bad match that makes me say Nordeus is killing me. One bad match can be a troll. Six bad matches is something else.

"Systems and tactics change from time to time". Perhaps. But I copied the formation that a guy in 3rd place used yesterday to clobber my opponent. I went with everyone at high morale (thanks to all the friendly wins) and rested. Could the wrong orders account for the difference? Again, it's not just one troll match that made me start this thread.

I suggest you reviewing the forms of your players, replacing poor form players with backup players even if backup players' qualities are far lower, and using consistent players who are not necessarily the highest quality players or MOM. As you have already been knocked out of CL &CUp, you only have 1 official match per day, so you can use a relative consistent starting lineup. In my experience, a consistent lineup can gradually help improving performances. If low quality player have good performances, I will continue to use them. Don't change your formation too dramatically. I also consider counter formation but changes are usually limited to whether I will use a DMC instead of a MC, whether my wingers will push up or down, whether I will move my DC/DL or DC/DR to the centre, etc. My teams always have better performance in 2nd half of seasons after I use a consistent starting lineup which always include one or two players who are the lowest quality players in my whole roster.

He has said it on my abondoned account once lol.

Systems and tactics change from time to time. Meaning that Nordeous will change the order of strongest and weakest formations. It does my head in when Nordeous decide 4-4-2 is the ultimate formation because what, Watford and Leicester have a few good counters. It's stupid, I know but I was killing the league with 4-5-1v with attacking short passing style and Nordeous decided to tank it. It took me a few games to realise "Normal mentality" was the new preferred order at the time. Now they've tanked that, the right arrow balance is the new thing for the time being depending on preferred mentality.

Having the right formation just isn't enough. I tell people this all the time but they never listen. I'm sick of people playing narrow diamond or 4-3-1-2 narrow and saying oh play mixed, or play down flanks, it makes no sense.
People post crazy orders like attacking, mixed passing, mixed style, high press, hard tackle, man mark counter attack?????
And then post on here saying why are they losing and blame Nordeous for messing with them personally.

Here is a basic formation and orders. An easy one.

4-1-2-1-2 narrow
Attacking
Short
Through middle
Own half
Zonal
Normal tackling
No counter
No offside

It is important you have a very good AMC.
If losing sub DMC for CM change to 4-3-1-2
Red arrows to full backs and AMC is important
Hard attacking, mixed passing, down middle, high press, hard tackle, zonal, no counter, yes offside trap.

I'm not saying that is the ultimate orders for the formation, but those are suitable for the formation.

can i ask mate which are the correct arrows for say 4-5-1v dmc blue n the wingers red?,ive an awesome striker but scores more when i play him in his other position amc,its the midfielders who seem to be getting the goals n forwards the assists,well to me anyway

For information, if strongest formation changes from time to time, probably 4-5-1v and 4-3n-2(AMR/AML)-1 are two of the recent good formations. After badly performing in first half season, both my teams continue to use these formations and they win all matches since beginning of second half season. There were many tough and close matches, but my team eventually won all of them till today.

I never buy any token, and have no chance to farm in this season. In case, Nordeus thinks that a winning steak can encourage me buying tokens to ensure winning champions, they will fail.

I've never spent money on this game and I had bad and good seasons, usually depending on my market choices and how good were my opponents. (and troll results too).
It would be ok for me if my team had bad and good times, even famous teams with great players have them. My only doubt is that nobody is sure about how this game works! If I knew what makes my team play like s**t all of sudden I would be glad to fix it. Maybe change formation and tactics? Send them to vacation to raise morale? Sometimes the game it's too inconsistent to actually help you finding the winning formula.

I don't need the source code for this game, but some more transparency on how it works would work.

BTW I agree on the fact that maybe it's not all about token buyers. Yes it helps a lot, but you can do it even without, I smashed through some seasons with no money spent.

I experienced what Ponzu says 2 seasons ago. I did not blame it on token spending as it happened to me just 1 day after I bought 5 scouts. I just think Nordeus decide, at some point, that you will not going to win. It is very frustrating and can make you do stupid things. My advise is: be low profile and wait for the storm to calm down. Easy to say ? I know that the (huge) difference between you and me is that it happened to me early in the season so I did not lose much as you did. Except my sense of humour. At some point, the engine started roaring again and I became unstoppable. This season I'm under much more pressure: everything goes like a dream, treble is in sight ! If something like this happens to me again, I am dead. But what I am sure of, is that this "valley of dispair" crossing has nothing to do with tactics or form or whatever: during this period, I played great games against strong teams (and won) and awful ones against weak ones (and lost) - all of them playing the same way! In my case, there was a huge difference between league and cup games. League seems to obey a kind of hidden rule in which Nordeus make life difficult for the best team (me, most of the times) to finally letting it win the title after a huge fight. Artificially, some weak team keep winning early in the season and suddenly collapse, just when you were beginning to think: it's dead for me this season.

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Originally Posted by Darren Power

can i ask mate which are the correct arrows for say 4-5-1v dmc blue n the wingers red?,ive an awesome striker but scores more when i play him in his other position amc,its the midfielders who seem to be getting the goals n forwards the assists,well to me anyway

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I stopped using 4-5-1v but it would depend on your orders. If you're attacking use more red arrows, even on defenders. Basically 3 red defence, blue DMC , 1 red MC 1 untouched and 2 red wingers. You will have to play around with it.

I use mostly 4-5-1V because I have had good success with it (well, not recently) and because it is listed as a counter to half the formations in the table. http://forum.topeleven.com/formation...ation-use.html Is this completely outdated? What, in your opinion, is the new "best" formation?

I have heard the advice not to change the formation too frequently. This goes against the idea that each formation has an optimal counter or two. Since my opponents refuse to have the same formation, how can I use the same formation all the time? When I first started, I played the first 5 seasons or so with 4-4-2, won some, lost some, won 3 leagues in the process. Then I started losing everything, turned to the forums and found out about counters. I started countering each opponent according to the table and climbed from the 7th to 2nd. I continued adjusting my formation according to the table, or past performances (big losses) by my upcoming opponents, or common sense, and this worked for 1/2 season this time around.

I am also hearing that formation, form and quality do not matter if Nordeus decides to put you in the corner. This, currently, is closest to my own conviction.

I guess, as a group, we are undecided as to why Nordeus does this, and how to get out of the doghouse (or whether it's possible). I bought an expensive 18 yo fast trainer Nordgen ST. Tall fella: 194cm. His debut is in a few minutes. I am still 1st (tied) playing the 8th place team. I have 3 Q points on him and he has been equally cold. We'll see what happens. I have no expectations. He is playing 4-1-2-1-2 ("Narrow diamond?" I don't see it looking like a diamond. Unless you consider DMC-MC-MC-AMC as making the small diamond with two ST above; I would have called this formation something else). The traditional counter, surprise, surprise, is 4-5-1V. Or 3N-5-2V, which I may try so that the new guy has someone to show him the ropes.

I spanked him 5:0 on his turf. I went 3N-5-2V. At one time my D seemed to be outnumbered, but the DMC with blue arrow (well, they are all the same color on the phone) did his job as a sweeper. The new ST was a beast. He only scored one, but it was a beauty. He dribbled around and past two defenders, a move I rarely see in the live game. He gained +109. With the other 1st place team losing, I regained the 3 point lead.

Not sure I proved anything. I did a few of the things that I and others suggested (as remedies for the doldrums), but in the end it may be just Nordeus playing god. We shall see how it goes from here on out.

I'm tanking this season on my main after too many troll results. My junior club has gone untouched since day 2 of this season and is currently 5th with 35 points in its league. There might be something to consistent lineup and formation in league play as I've been switching formation nearly every game with varied results.

Maybe this is a good time to ask what you guys mean by tanking. I have an idea, but want to ask the pros. My guess is tanking = playing to lose, making sure you don't finish in top 7 in the league. This will ensure your level will not increase next season. Is that it? I'm just not clear on what that gets you. Will you players star rating not go down next season if that happens?

right,
but go for the 9th position.
Many times the game promotes from the 8th pos., to fill some leagues.

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Originally Posted by ponzu

Maybe this is a good time to ask what you guys mean by tanking. I have an idea, but want to ask the pros. My guess is tanking = playing to lose, making sure you don't finish in top 7 in the league. This will ensure your level will not increase next season. Is that it? I'm just not clear on what that gets you. Will you players star rating not go down next season if that happens?

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You're right. :)
I repeated one season on purpose , I repented. I could play at the highest level now :/

I think the two best things about this game is to enjoy playing and to understand how it works.
This is a simple game, which must run in some thousands devices (pc,tablet,smartphones) at the same time, from different servers and connections.
So, of course it's not flawless. But it's important to recognize the weak points of it and just live with it.
I think it's impossible for the company to watch and react in a different way to players who buy/spending (or not) tokens/sources.
The roll dice has a big part in the game. People who buy token, complaining for their results, people who don't buy token, the same.
My experience, playing with my main team in different periods (buying, farming, not spending), as with my other teams, with different accounts
is that anything can happen to any team.
I 'm just trying to find the "stream" and swim with the flow. Sometimes, I get tired or pissed-off and I take a break (tanking/staying or taking a club from the beginning - from my other accounts).
After all, it's only a game (and at the moment, it's the one which have the most complete pack).

* I posted this in another thread which has a similar subject

There's no difference between my hot and cold streaks, since I never buy anything with ₹₹₹. Yes, Nordeus does troll sometimes, and this trolling is only elementary to me. I'd been winless for 6 games straight (pretty embarrassing since we're an extremely consistent team), then WLW and now back in track. I was 6 points ahead in league. Now 4 points behind.

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Originally Posted by Darren Power

can i ask mate which are the correct arrows for say 4-5-1v dmc blue n the wingers red?,ive an awesome striker but scores more when i play him in his other position amc,its the midfielders who seem to be getting the goals n forwards the assists,well to me anyway

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*facepalm*. Figure it out. But I advise you to keep the arrows symmetrical. And don't keep any arrows on the 2 DC and ST, it is not worth that.
But an attacking boost will be red arrows on DL and DR. My DR has 6 goals this season and is my 3rd highest scorer.

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Originally Posted by ponzu

I have heard the advice not to change the formation too frequently.

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I have no idea where you got that from, I almost never play two games in a row with the same formation, I would if it was suitable for the opponents formation, every time I change the formation/tactics/players depending on the next match, and currently I am on top of the league and playing cup semi-final tomorrow, with only 1 loss in the league and a couple of draws in the cup.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

That's why I play it like a just game,
I'm agree with Nik's last comment that's true

I've been playing Top Eleven for over two years now, which is a long way ahead record for a FB game for me, so something about it is keeping me playing long after other on-line games have outlasted my interest in them.

As Nik says, you have to understand how it works, and take the occasional Troll game as something that you will encounter and you can't do anything about it - once the game engine decides you're going to lose this critical game against the bottom team in the League, that's it...

It's got to the stage now where I can tell, 90% of the time, in the first 10-15 minutes of the match I'm not going to get the result I want. Their defence is too over the top in blocking/intercepting/tackling, the previously deadly goal scorers are firing into row Z, my defenders who are picking up yellow cards for the most innocuous challenges and the opposing players are kicking lumps out and just getting warnings, the previously absent opposition player who suddenly shoots from 30 yards and scores - that's it. Sometimes I can be wrong and the team suddenly goes back to status quo and pulls the match out of the bag, but that's a rarity in those types of match.

One thing you can't do is take that sort of result personally - my main reaction to the OTT vent threads about adverse results is 'ho-hum, so what? Get over it and deal with the next match'.

The other thing that is perplexing to me even after all this time, and is more pertinent to the subject of this thread, is the unexplained loss of form for a run of matches, and the subsequent return to 'normal'. Ponzu has suggested that it coincided with a reduction/ceasing in spending tokens. To a certain extent, I agree with the suggestion. I've found that spending 10T on morale boosters has done the trick, or buying an auction player, or even a Scout player - on a couple of occasions there's been nothing I've done has resolved the issue - witness Palace Casuals' 'three seasons of hell' recently (although one thing that I did that possibly ended the crisis in the third season was to re-sign all the players whose contract would expire at the season end). I'm trying to work up the courage to experiment with a season where I don't renew contracts until later in the last season (as I had been prior to the 'hell') just to see what happens...

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I have heard the advice not to change the formation too frequently.

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if I wrote that, I was meaning during game time, not season.

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I have no idea where you got that from, I almost never play two games in a row with the same formation, I would if it was suitable for the opponents formation, every time I change the formation/tactics/players depending on the next match

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agree

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It's got to the stage now where I can tell, 90% of the time, in the first 10-15 minutes of the match I'm not going to get the result I want

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yes, after some time, the manager has an instinct.