Tic-Tac MAGiCK: FM12 Version

FM12 version 12.1.1 244099(m.e. v993)

Playmaker = MCR (Forward runs rarely)

Screenshots

Managed to finish the season unbeaten in the league:



Top goalscorers:
1) Messi: 72 goals (56 games) - 44 League
2) Villa: 33 goals (52 games) - 26 League
3) Pedro: 25 goals (59 games) - 18 League

Top assists:
1) Messi: 37 assists (56 games)
2) Villa: 25 assists (52 games)
3) Iniesta: 21 assists (36 games + 18 sub appearances)

The team averaged 461 passes per game.

How I build my tactics

Introduction
Firstly, I prefer to build my tactics in the Classic view. I think it’s just a habit ingrained from the earlier versions of FM, when the Tactic Creator wasn’t available. I spent a long time trying to figure out what the sliders actually did and I now feel more comfortable using the Classic view as opposed to using the Tactic Creator.

I like to keep things simple when building my tactics, which may sound ironic when I’ve told you I like to use the Classic view. My basic philosophy is that real world football teams would have global settings. i.e. Fergie would tell his team to play attacking football, keep the passing short, press the opposition, etc. However, it is also true that certain players will be more defensive or attacking based on the position they play. i.e. Ferdinand is going to be playing less attacking than Scholes, with Ferdinand’s passing and closing down being slightly less. So my ambition was to find a balance of rigidity (try pronouncing this) within a global framework.

Slider Mechanics

Individual Sliders
The following sliders can be set individually:
- Mentality
- Creative Freedom
- Passing Style
- Closing Down

I’ll first focus on the Individual sliders then I’ll talk about the Global sliders. The Individual sliders have values from 1-21, where a value of 1 equates to 0 clicks and a value of 21 equates to 20 clicks.

*() = Slider value
*[] = Slider Clicks
Each Individual slider has three primary ranges; these being:
- Low: (1-7) = [0-6]
- Mixed: (8-14) = [7-13]
- High: (15-21) = [14-20]
Therefore, the mid-point of each of these ranges can be calculated as:
- Low: (4) = [3]
- Mixed: (11) = [10]
- High: (18) = [17]
These mid-point numbers constitute the base values of each range. Hence, 3 clicks up will give the upper value of that range, whilst 3 clicks down will give the lower value of that range.

So we now have the 3 basic ranges, but we now need to calculate the transitional ranges. i.e. those which link both the Low and High ranges to the Mixed range. The ranges are as follows:
- Low-Mixed: (5-11) = [4-10]
- High-Mixed: (11-17) = [10-16]
With the mid-point of these ranges being:
- Low-Mixed: (8) = [7]
- High-Mixed: (14) = [13]

To summarise, we now have 5 slider ranges for the Individual Sliders:
- Low: (1-4-7) = [0-3-6]
- Low-Mixed: (5-8-11) = [4-7-10]**
- Mixed: (8-11-14) = [7-10-13]
- Mixed-High: (11-14-17) = [10-13-16]**
- High: (15-18-21) = [14-17-20]

Global Sliders
The following sliders are set Globally:
- Width
- Tempo
- Time Wasting
- Closing Down

For some strange reason, the Global sliders have values from 1-20, or 0-19 clicks. As such, the Global values differ slightly compared to the Individual values. I split the slider into two halves; the “Lower Half” and the “Upper Half”.

The Lower Half consists of the following values:
- Extremely Low: (1) = [0]
- Low: (4) = [3]
- Low/Mixed: (7) = [6]
- Mixed: (10) = [9]
The Upper Half consists of the following values:
- Mixed: (11) = [10]
- Mixed/High: (14) = [13]
- High: (17) = [16]
- Extremely High: (20) = [19]
I then choose which Half I wish to use. i.e. I may decide I want to play a high Defensive Line, but I may not want to leave too much space in behind the back four; I therefore choose a value of 14.

The whole process of splitting the sliders into ranges is for simplicity. Using these ranges allows me to quickly transfer my ideas into slider values with relative accuracy.


Ranges used for this tactic

Mentality (Mixed/High): (11-14-17) = [10-13-16]
Creative Freedom (High): (15-18-21) = [14-17-20]
Passing Style (Short): (1-4-7) = [0-3-6]
Closing Down (High): (15-18-21) = [14-17-20]
Width (Low-Mixed): (7) = [9]
Tempo (Low): (4) = [6]
Time Wasting (Low): (4) = [3]
Defensive Line (High): (17) = [16]


Enjoy!