Advanced match tactics

You may have noticed that I have mentioned 3 game developments on the main site. 1 of which I have been vague about. 

I know this blog doesn't get updated often but I don't get chance to develop that often either so the 2 go hand in hand. As such, I'm interested to know who follows this blog, however you may read it, and I would appreciate it if you don't post the below on the game message board.

However, feel free to let me know in the comments that you have read it (and you play the game).

Anyway, this is a sample screen shot (not finished) of the new game tactics;

It's not finished yet because it doesn't actually do anything - I've only altered/added to the display. My next job is to make this page work and save to the database before I implement it into the game engine.

If you are wondering, then you will be able to add multiple of each - so you can attack for one half and then change to defensive after 45 minutes. On top of making the changes at specific times, there are a list of reasons for a change shown here;

This means a change will only happen if the selected scenario matches.

As well as this, I will be adding an option to select 'Any' minute so that a change will happen based on just the scenario. Therefore if you have a man sent off you can go all defensive - or attack even more if you like! I haven't established exactly how the 'any minute' feature will work yet because 'if drawing' for example could happen multiple times and there may be conflicts so I will work on that as I implement it.

I know some of you may suggest that this should be done with substitutions as well and I intend to at some point. I'll try to walk with this first before running with timed subs.

Team colours

I have recently established the colours for every team in the Mystify Soccer game. I will shortly be displaying them on the team pages like this:

They are possibly also useful to help managers differentiate what team they are currently managing in the case where they have 2 but I'm unsure where I can place them on each page so it;'s obvious.

I've tried a subtle horizontal line near the top of the page but it doesn't seem to have been noticed.

Therefore any ideas or suggestions would be handy.

Player contracts

OK, this could be a biggie.

I am still working on the game engine and I do see one or two complaints about not enough shots going in or too many cards, for example. However, you won't see the changes to things like this dramatically as it would be unfair to make the changes too drastic but be assured, they parameters the game uses are being altered and monitored so that eventually it will get there.

However, whilst monitoring them I am trying to bring in the other features I feel are required. the biggest one being Player Contracts.

The end game is to remove player valuations from the game as I actually want a free market where people negotiate properly with no limits (barring perhaps an upper limit to stop stupidity). The reason valuations are there are to try and discourage cheating but contracts should stop all that - if I can get it right.

So, I'm starting to think about how to implement this. I have lots of ideas in my head but am looking for as much input as possible. I need it so that players won't be signing for clubs they don't want to play for as a definite requirement. By this, I mean top players won't play in the bottom leagues and poorer players won't always sign for clubs to never play (although there will be some players happy to pick up a pay cheque and do naff all else).

It also goes hand in hand with clubs finances and I perhaps need to have a wage bill limit per club that matches their division. This is possibly the only thing I am pretty sure of at the moment.

So before I go into depth about things I have considered already (as I don't want to sway thoughts a certain way), please let me have any thoughts you have about what you'd like to see with player contracts. Should players be allowed to sign a contract with a club within the last 30 weeks of their current one? How would you like negotiations to take place? Should players always sign for the biggest offer? Do I need to include signing on fees?

Any thoughts are welcome before I get started on this big change.

Timeline update

In case you didn't realise, I am currently working on improving the timeline for the match reports. It's not finished yet but I like to provide updates every now and again. 

The first thing I need to do is actually log the match details in the database.  Once I have done this I can add the data to the screen reports. I have provided an example of where I am at below and you will see it contains all shots, both on and off target, alongside the data that was previously there (goals and substitutions). The below is actually a genuine match that was played earlier this week and so you will be able to view this once I put it live.

My next challenge is to include yellow and red cards into this timeline - it should give managers a better idea of how their game went because at the moment they just know a red card occurred in a game with no idea if it was in the first ten minutes or at the end of the game. I need to store these times in the database first though so don't expect it too quickly. I may, however, put the current timeline live sometime before I add cards just to show improvements to those who don't read this blog.

Transfers by new managers

I notice recently that there has been a spate of sad people taking over teams, selling their best players and then quitting.

I've tried numerous things in the past to try and stop this happening but it's getting to the stage where I will have to make transfers occur by bid only, which would remove a lot of the freedom but also make it much much harder to cheat.

Before I do this though, I'd like to look for alternative suggestions.

One suggestion I have had put to me is to not let new managers make transfer for a certain period of time and I'd like to know what people's thoughts on this are. I know there is some debate on the message board at the moment but I only scan this and don't get involved. This blog post is therefore for a proper debate to be had, with me joining in. The more comments the merrier as I'd like to come up with a solution that suits as many people as possible.