How Important are the Tactics in Top11?

BACKGROUND
League Level 6;
8 competitive teams (above 90% and active managers).
I expect this league to be tough!

WHAT IS GOING ON?
A team leads with wonderful 9 wins and 1 draw, using the same tactic all matches: 3W-4-1-2.

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I don't know his team instructions, but it looks like he plays Attacking/Mixed/Mixed/Counter-attack On/Low Pressure/Normal Tackling.

Is his team good?! Yes, it is! Is his tactic good? Humm, I don't think so. And I'll tell you why.
The team that spots the 6th place (6 wins, 4 loses) plays the same tactic, has the same quality and the manager is also as active as he is. Maybe the instructions are different, but I don't think it can explain the big difference between the forms: 9W-1D-0L vs. 6W-0D-4L.

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I have been spying this manager and watched some of his important matches. Some of these matches got what I would call "unfair result". His opponents could take control of the matches, shot more on target, but the strikers were missing some easy goals during the highlights. His goalkeeper done miracles and he got awarded by a CK or a FK goal many times.

WHAT CONCLUSION CAN WE GET?
Alright, he is a good manager with a good team, but... Looks like the Top11 is trying to help him putting a new trophy in his room with some kind of "extra help" :P
Last season I won the league with 23W-3D-0L (and it was as competitive as this one now). I tried hard, built a strong team, used different tactics for different opponents, but I feel I had the same kind of "extra help" that this guy is having this season. I won some matches that, looking at the numbers, I should have lost. I think that even if we are stronger, it's normal to lose sometimes. But he is facing equal teams and beating one by one.

My questions are: am I wasting my time testing many different formations on this game? Should I pick one formation and keep it the whole season, cause the "luck" is more important?

And let me add that, if you win the triple the system will fight you hard xD

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Originally Posted by Anarcho

And let me add that, if you win the triple the system will fight you hard xD

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Yeah! I think so! Last season I won League and CL. This season I feel like getting my arses kicked in all tournaments ;D

I would have laughed at your question just a couple of months ago. But I am facing the same issue in my league. Fortunately, I am still leading but there is this unbeaten team that uses the same bloody tactic (see thread related to the 3DC-1-2-3WAM-1) no matter what the opposition comes with. This is p... me off big time. I cannot accept a tactic with so obvious weaknesses to remain unbeaten for so long.

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My questions are: am I wasting my time testing many different formations on this game? Should I pick one formation and keep it the whole season, cause the "luck" is more important?

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for me formations is the 4th important factor.
Quality, Luck, Presence of the manager are much more important.

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Originally Posted by nikolgiorgos

for me formations is the 4th important factor.
Quality, Luck, Presence of the manager are much more important.

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Most of all, luck in the top of the list. [emoji16]

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yes, Luck is no1 but if you look back in the whole season, usually the winner of any competition, isn't only the luckiest but must have a mix of above ;)

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Originally Posted by nikolgiorgos

yes, Luck is no1 but if you look back in the whole season, usually the winner of any competition, isn't only the luckiest but must have a mix of above ;)

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Yes sure, good quality squad and always be present in the matches are really important to be a winner. No doubts about that.

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Originally Posted by nikolgiorgos

yes, Luck is no1 but if you look back in the whole season, usually the winner of any competition, isn't only the luckiest but must have a mix of above ;)

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Yah. And there is this "system help". It pushes some teams up and some others down.

I won't change my formation until the end of the season and let's see how it's gonna end hahaha

Honestly, luck cannot be the most important factor. I was one of the best two teams in my last 3 cups and won all of them. Maybe luck helped me a bit to beat the second best but just think of what where the odds in my favor if it was just a matter of luck ? Luck helps in one particular game from time to time. But to me, team quality is by miles the most important parameter. Then, tactics. But I started doubting about this one recenty

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Originally Posted by gizzmo

Honestly, luck cannot be the most important factor. I was one of the best two teams in my last 3 cups and won all of them. Maybe luck helped me a bit to beat the second best but just think of what where the odds in my favor if it was just a matter of luck ? Luck helps in one particular game from time to time. But to me, team quality is by miles the most important parameter. Then, tactics. But I started doubting about this one recenty

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I agree with you. And I still have faith that things like luck and this "system help" aren't the major factor. If that's the case, I'd be really disappointed with the game.

I have been playing football managing games from Elifoot98 to FM 2016, until I decided to play Top11. I'm just addicted to football :p.
The first games of this kind were about pure luck, until "Championship Manager 4" made some kind of awesome simulations. And then Tactics were the most important from Championship Manager until Football Manager 2016.

So, based on my "experience", I built an excel spreadsheet to help me calculating probabilities of winning matches depending on formations and instructions. Ofcourse, I don't know the maths behind the game simulation, I just made some sort of assumptions that I think it's right for the game. Take a look below:

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Seeing things like those unbeaten 3N-1-2-3W-1 and 3W-4-1-2 makes me think I just wasted my time and my brain developing it :(

Very good question OP.

I would have to say, tactics are very important. But i'd have to add-in match preparation and quality as play a role as well.

Testing the importance of tactics often has some pitfalls.

1. Several wins are because our opponents suck. They either aren't active, don't have 40%, low win bonus, etc... If my win bonus is $16.8M and my opponents is $0. If my training bonuses are 10-10-10-10 and my opponents are at 2-4-4-2, I should win regardless of what my tactics are.

2. We don't have a control group. I don't know the opponents orders. So if testing, I can't be 100% sure of what strategy i'm testing against unless playing a friend.

3. Nordeus hasn't told us how the source code is programmed. Because of this, we can't be 100% what the relationship between variables in the programming code is. It's very possible, that even if we know the opponents orders, that we can be testing the wrong variable and be drawing a conclusion off of a flawed experiment.

A few trends I've noticed of late are.

1. Attacking, high pressing setups I've had success counter-attacking effectively against.

2. Defensive, counter-attacking teams, I've had success playing a possession based game while applying a low press and the offsides trap and can normally win handily.

I'm going to emphasize this because last season I played an active gold 1 manager in the CL quarter-finals. He won the first leg 1-3 and decided to play 4-1-4-1 2nd leg. Clearly, he was parking the bus 2nd leg, so I went to my 4-5-1v, normal/flanks/short/off/low/normal/m2m/on and won 7-0. It isn't the only large scoreline where we just obliterated a defensive bunker w/ that setup as well.

3. Most my defeats/draws are against balanced formations. This could be due to either the formation being more stable, or the formation being more flexibile so lower probability of an educated guess of the opponent's orders being correct.

4. My strongest rivals at my level have had the upper hand on me recently. However, for several seasons before last season the upper hand was mine. I tanked in level 31, but haven't tanked since and am now in level 40. So they've had plenty of time to study my tactics and identify a tactical pattern. Key was last season when I lost a league match 0-2 and CL final 0-2 to Galatasaray S.K. I have one defeat in league this season, 2-3 against Kutluhan. In level 37, I beat Kutluhan in league 8-1, and beat Galatasaray 4-2, 5-0, 9-1 (lvl 38, CL semi), 2-1 (lvl 38, CL semi-final) and 4-0 before his two wins against me. I believe it's tactical and they've switched up their orders against me. Both Galatasaray and Kutluhan are in the same association, which is in Gold 1, so they are probably communicating strategy about league rivals between each other.

Just to update it here.
For some reason, this 3W-4-1-2 is under some bad moment.
He leaded for 22 rounds, but now he has got 3 bad results in a row, including, unexpectedly, a loss to this team which spots the last place. ;OOO

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