Today I want to tell you how the implementation of the footballers’ classes is going.
Why do we have decided to introduce new classes? The reasons are as follows:
- The flank play and crosses in the real football are possible because there are special flank footballers. Our four basic classes are too restricted in their abilities to use the flanks and head play
- We wanted to add more tactical elements to the matches additionally to the skills and talents
- We wanted to add more ways to the team development. The classes add more possibilities to express your tactical thinking
At the moment we are testing the basics of the new system. I’ll tell you how it works in the current iteration. However! The mechanics aren’t finalized. We still test them, analyze and improve.
The image above shows how the crossings work. Do not look on the animations. For the prototyping purposes, we use the animations which already exist in the game. The new animations haven’t added yet.
Universal and Special classes
Basically, there are two types of the classes: universal and special ones.
Universal classes are similar to those which are currently in the game: DF, MF, FW but they will have more possibilities. They are called universal because they can be useful in any position on the pitch. For example, DF will have one additional ability - he will be able to intercept the passes performed on the neighbour cells. Such footballer can be very useful not only in the defence but in both middle and the attack.
Special classes are totally new classes which have special abilities. However, these abilities are available on the special parts of the pitch. For example, while the Sweeper stays on the first line of the pitch, he will be automatically taking the position near the ball. While the Right Midfielder stays on the right flank, he can run 4 squares.
There is a list of the classes which we are going to add:
Defence:
- Sweeper - automatically takes the square near the ball
- Center Defender - automatically tries to tackle the ball if the opponent moves on the neighbour cell
- Right / Left Defenders (they are actually RWB and LWB but for the consistency reasons we want to simplify the names) - run on the 3 squares, Pass is increased, Pressing doesn’t consume action point
Midfielders:
- Defensive Midfielder - intercepts the passes in the near cells, Defence is increased while intercepting, Pass is increased
- Center Midfielder - Pressing doesn’t consume action point, runs 2 squares on the whole pitch
- Attacking Midfielder - decreased penalty for kicking from the distance, available unique action which doesn’t consume AP “attract a defender”
- Right / Left Midfielder - run on 4 cells
Attackers:
- Center Forward - at the start of the turn automatically tries to take a cell closer to the opponent’s goal, head play is increased
- Right / Left Forwards - increased Pass and Accuracy on the flanks
Above you can see how the Sweeper class works. He automatically tries to take the cell closer to the ball.
Every class gives an advantage in the match (however, flank classes are similar to each other because even in the real football the difference between them is blurring). For example, it’s really tough to get close to the line of the three CDs because they automatically try to tackle the ball. So the opponent has to shoot from a far distance. Even if you used Rainbow feint, the CD will try to tackle the ball after you have won the encounter. However, they can’t intercept the goal kick flying on the neighbour cells.
Universal defenders can intercept the goal kicks. But they do not automatically tackle the ball. So you can freely move near them.
Combining the footballers with the special and universal classes will allow you to use more interesting attacking and defending tactics.
Upgrading classes
In the current development iteration, the system works as follows:
- At the start of the game, you get a footballer without class. Is like a clay: you can make from him any class you want. But it will take a lot of time. Also, you have to take to account their attributes. If a footballer has a good accuracy you won’t want to make him a Center Defender.
- When footballers perform actions in a match, they earn Class Points (CP). For example, if a footballer plays in the defence, he earns Defence Points
- After earning some amount of the points, the footballer learns the basic class which will be marked with one letter: G, D, M, F. These classes are similar to those which are in the currently released version of the game. For example, F (Forward) can perform actions even after performing unsuccessful goal kick.
- Now, the footballer with the basic class earns CPs of the special classes. Do you use a Basic Defender (D) in the first defence line? Earn Sweeper points. Use it in the right flank? Earn RD points etc
- After earning enough CPs, you can choose what class you want to upgrade to: the universal or special class. For example, you can upgrade the basic defender to a Sweeper or Universal defender.
Here you can see the violet numbers which show the earned class points.
Additional notes
Again, the described systems are not carved in stone. We test a lot, improve, change. Our goal is to make a deep football manager where you totally understand how your results depend on your decisions. So if we see that some features do not feel well we will postpone the release and improve the feature until it is fun.
Btw, last week I wrote a small news in our social webs about long-awaited throw-ins. Subscribe if you want to be in touch ;)