Chris Nielson - Comments

Thanks Rogerio! I'll post in English and do a google translate beneath to portugese to give more clarity. 

Right now, there is a bug in the editor that keeps the database from verifying when I edit the database in advanced mode. In previous years I was able to set up the outcome so teams qualified for the club world cup, but the bug prevents it. I was hoping it would be fixed by now, but I don't think we will get that bug corrected in FM 26. 

No momento, há um erro no editor que impede a verificação do banco de dados quando o edito no modo avançado. Em anos anteriores, eu conseguia configurar o resultado para que as equipes se classificassem para o Mundial de Clubes, mas esse erro impede que isso aconteça. Eu esperava que já tivesse sido corrigido, mas não acredito que esse erro será consertado no FM 26.

There is no MLS, but all of the teams are present, and there is a pro/rel structure. 

Yes! I realized this when I was playing through, but thought I would wait until the editor was less buggy before releasing an update. Alas, a lot of the stuff I was hoping would be fixed hasn't been yet, but I am going to push out some new files for FM 26.2. 

Hi Andre! Great question. The opening and closing playoffs weren't a part of my US set-up (as I planned it), but they are a core part of both Mexico and Costa Rica's structure (along with a few others.) So, for those countries, they won't have the structures they would be used to. Thhanks for asking!

Known Bugs (That are outside my control at the moment.)

• Continental Comps have some limits, including having to register U21 players for them to be a part of the squads. I can’t edit them in advanced mode because the editor doesn’t recognize the created US level 1 division. 
• I can’t have two cups within a division in the same year, so the opening/closing playoffs in a lot of the leagues with opening/closing stage structure don’t exist yet. If it gets fixed it will be an easy enough addition, and I’ll make those adjustments.  
• Some cups don’t show up in the search bar - mostly the continental ones. You will need to search for the North American Champions Cup and navigate from there. 
• Because I can’t edit the continental cup rules in advanced mode, I can’t set up the club world championship qualification, and that tournament is broken. If it gets fixed I’ll release an updated version so you can compete in that competition. 

Details

Roster Rules

• Limit of 9 foreign players registered per squad for continental cups and most competitions (13 for the US)
  • Several Free Movement Agreements that categorize players as domestic:
    • Island Zone (Unaffiliated Caribbean Nations like Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Curacao.)
    • Central American Zone (Mexico, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Panama, Guatemala)
    • Commonwealth Zone (Nations that are part of the Commonwealth in North America, including Trinidad, Jamaica and Canada)
    • US gets 4 extra foreign player slots for domestic competitions
• 5 homegrown players from nation in squad

4 Continental Cups

• Champions Cup - 20 teams total
  • 2 from Mexico and US, 1 from rest
• Gold Club Cup - 20 teams total
  • 2 from Mexico and US, 1 from rest
• Silver Club Cup - 20 teams total
  • 2 from Mexico and US, 1 from rest
• Bronze Club Cup - 20 teams total
  • Inactive nations in CONCACAF

United States

• 8 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Level 1 is a National tier, levels 2-8 are regional tiers
• 1 National Cup
• 2 Leagues Cups
• 10 Regional Cups before opening and closing stage.
• No (and will never have) NCAA teams

Canada

• Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver in CPL
• 4 Tiers, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
  • CPL roster rules apply to levels 3 and 4
• 2 National tiers, 2 regional tiers
• 1 National Cup
• Part of Commonwealth Zone

Mexico

• 4 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
  • Liga Expansion roster rules apply to tiers 3 and 4
• 2 National tiers, 1 regional tier, 1 lower national tier
• 1 National Cup
• Part of Central American Zone

Belize

• 1 Tier, No promotion/relegation
• Part of Commonwealth Zone

Costa Rica

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Central American Zone

Curacao

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Islands Zone

Dominican Republic

• 2 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Islands Zone

El Salvador

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Central American Zone

Guatemala

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Central American Zone

Haiti

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Islands Zone

Honduras

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Central American Zone

Jamaica

• 3 Tiers, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Commonwealth Zone

Panama

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Central American Zone

Trinidad

• 3 Tiers, Open/Close Structure, Promotion/Relegation between tiers
• Part of Commonwealth Zone

Thanks Lefto! I am - I'm mid update now actually. Aiming for a mid-december release I think - it's just a bit of an undertaking every year. 

Hi Yatch! Thanks for asking. The short version is no. 

The much longer version is there are three reasons I have no interest in adding colleges to my databases (I get asked about this a few times a year, so I'm just going to stick this in here for future reference - yachtmistjr you can ignore the rest if you're not interested.) 

1. It would be a lot of work to create all of the colleges - even if I just focus in the 129 FCS colleges. Because colleges don't exist in the FM database, it would be a lot of work to research and add them. It took me about five hours to add 150 news sources for the US database, and a lot of that could be copied over and didn't require unique additions. Accurately representing the colleges would require a good amount of extra work and created teams, locations, and stadiums. 
2. Every time a new version of the database is released (2-3x a development cycle), the unique ids for all created teams change, so any graphics work has to be updated every time, which is tedious (especially if you mess up the unique ids in a small but meaningful way - never had that happen…)
3. Most importantly - Football Manager is not built for the US sporting model. We're used to “amateur” and professional sports as separate structures. The pyramid model of English Soccer operates entirely differently, and so it is really hard to replicate the financial and developmental aspects of college sports in the United States. Additionally, the restrictions sometimes only impact teams controlled by players and no by ai - which makes this frustrating as a player (I've seen this happen with salary caps, for example, in older databases.) So if you can imagine getting ten years in and playing with a team that has no budget and no development and is stuck with 19-22 year olds, while your peer teams have 28-29 year olds, and there's no way to improve, you can see how it would be a less than ideal db. 

I know others have taken a run at adding the NCAA (I think Owncredible on the SI forums had a version that had NCAA teams), but I'm just not interested in figuring it out. Thanks for asking though Yacht, and I hope the response isn't too long!

Hi Kyle - Merry Christmas. Two things - can you send me a screen capture of the files that are activated, and then load in the US screen and put your mouse cursor over the icon to show why the US isn't showing up in game? 

Hi Kieran - I think the bugs should be worked out between the two. Let me know if it's still a problem!

For this version, I'm sticking with the current structure. In the next one (depending on stability, etc. on release) I may rethink the schedule and league sizes. Thanks for asking though xythos- I appreciate it!

So, for those of you looking for an election night distraction (or, if this goes sideways, an alternate universe to escape to) I am putting out a “beta" of my US database. I may do a few tweaks, but I think it's stable and ready. A few notes on the changes: 

• Schedule shifted to Aug-May instead of Feb - Nov. 
• Instead of winning automatic promotion if you win a stage, you get home pitch advantage in a promotion playoff (Or champion play off in the top tier.) 
• The top division has been expanded to 18 teams, and the next three divisions have been expanded to 16 teams. 
• The leagues cups have been moved into the opening/closing stages, reducing some fixture congestion in those windows. 

I think these tweaks make the db stronger and hopefully more enjoyable. I was planning to do all of this for FM 25, but, well, we know… 

Happy gaming!

Well, we have some time now. I'm working on a us database update, so I'll add rounding out the concacaf ones to my list too. Hopefully I'll have something for you by the end of the month if that's ok!

I attached the missing icon below - you should be able to grab it and add it in. Let me know if that doesn't work - thanks Schraunbokopter!

Hello Deniz! Yes, it makes sense that you'd have a lot more clubs making inquiries - there are about 100+ professional clubs with budgets on par with (or greater than) the UK's pyramid, so they're looking for more players. I understand why it would feel unrealistic, but I kept a few features of US sport (lots of money and lower immigration barriers) that may be impacting the game.

And yes, this year I didn't include extra leagues in Mexico and Canada. There were some …issues with the editor when it released this year, and I decided to narrow my scope a bit. We'll see the state of things for 25/26, and I may expand it again. 

Yeah, that's an in game bug. Quit the job, sim past the date, and rehire yourself. Sorry, I wish there was a better answer, but that's the only solution. 

Yeah, I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on how it's ruined the experience - I'm assuming it's the problem with too few games to secure promotion. I played a couple seasons and felt the same coldness about it - I have a few tweaks I am planning to make for FM 25 (more teams, and a different promotion structure), but if you have any other thoughts I'm open to them. Thanks for the honest feedback Baldo!

Hi Cristian! It only works if you do it with the databases in the set as a whole. So, you couldn't use a vanilla BVI database with it because of the changes made to the US system. 

Hi IG - are you unzipping it in the documents/sports interactive/graphics folder? It looks like you're unzipping in your one drive folder, and that may be the wrong directory. 

Hi Ali - are you using this mod, or looking for one in general? This one does require you to have a few homegrown players, but is not nearly as restrictive as the actual MLS rules. If you're looking for a setup that has MLS with modified roster rules I don't know of one at the moment. 

Yep!

Quick note - there was a yellow card issue in the fifth tier that was fixed in this latest update. Additionally, I added in the current USL Championship and USL1 expansion teams. 

It does not. It operates on European rules - so transfers and academies instead of trades and drafts. 

It’s a ctd issue in game. If you quit and sim past the date and then take the job again you should be ok. It will probably happen on the 4th Wednesday of May every year until you get out lf the NPSL. 

Happens to the best of us. Hope you enjoy it webb!

Hey Bret! Good question. No, the opening/closing stage was my original vision, but it took a couple months to figure it out. There is an option in the editor to create league breaks where games don't take place - that's how it worked in the original versions of the db. I had to build the opening/closing stages from scratch in advanced mode. 

Hi Christian - I'm sorry for the slow reply. So, the reason Liga MX is labelled that in the db is that is what I found when I googled the name - if there has been a change in sponsorship (or anything else I should be aware of) please let me know and I can tweak it. Thanks!

Hey Brit - it would be helpful to know what part you want to change to UEFA. My guess is probably no (not without a LOT of work in the editor), but it would be helpful to know the specific changes you want to make. 

Thanks for the picture and explanation - my guess is that it has something to do with distance for the clubs and the size of their max attendances. I'll have to poke around a bit and see what's going on with that. 

Hi Tan! Great question. The short version is, the database files can't be changed once the game is going. You'll need to start a new game with the new db files for the changes I made for 24.4 to take effect. As far as the graphics go,  you have now will work in your current save going forward, but if you load up a new one you will want the new graphics. 

Longer explanation on the graphics- every time SI releases a new version of Football Manager, they include new teams, people, and stadiums, which changes the unique id (uid) that the xml files have for each graphic. So, every time a new release comes out, you need an updated logo pack to match the new unique ids. It's a…pain, especially if you want to go back to an old save. I'm thinking through options for future years to make it less onerous - hope that helps.