New updates and plan for youth squads

We're currently coding like crazy on youth squads, but I thought some of you might like some sort of overview of where we're headed.

Recent updates

First, let's look at what has been done recently. Since the last blog post lots of large and small updates have been implemented.

Part of the work we're doing is hidden from you as these are fixes and optimizations to background tasks, the season update, etc., but besides those, here are some of the recent improvements:

• A large number of minor fixes, such as to layout errors on pages related to youth squads
• Improved design on the youth squad section on the club history page
• Full league position table on the youth squad page
• The youth squad players are marked with different jersey color and icon on training exercises
• A new assistant manager page
• You get a warning notification when you log in if you have so few players in the senior squad that you risk being thrown out of the league (because some managers thought it was enough if the senior squad tactics were filled with players from the youth squad)
• On training statistics, you can now filter by squad and youth players are marked with an icon
• Instead of only being allowed to move a youth player down on the youth squad once, you can now do it again after 14 days

Mood

There might be further adjustments to mood loss in the future. First, however, it is important that we have implemented all the tools we can to give you an overview of the players' mood. It is no use making changes to the algorithm if you do not have the tools you need to see the effects.

The new Assistant Manager page has a section that shows recent time on the pitch, mood, and the resulting training effect for all players in a single table.

I'm also working on a way of estimating the players' future mood changes based on what matches they are in the starting lineup for. This info will be added to the assistant manager page, and we might also be able to alert you if a player is about to become unhappy. This will help you plan and allocate playing time to your players.

If you currently have difficulty keeping some of the players' mood up, keep in mind that in the new mood system cup matches and friendly matches give full mood points. A few low-tempo friendly matches will help your reserve players' moods tremendously.

In general, the point of new mood system is to continue to ensure that the players actually get some time on the pitch, and don't just train for several years without playing a single match.

It must be balanced in such a way that it is not trivially easy to keep 40 players at maximum mood 100% of the time. You're not supposed to be able to do that - at least not without some extra effort, for example, to arrange friendly matches and to distributing playing time among your players.

But, we also don't want it to become a constant annoyance, so it is up to us to make sure that you have great tools for handling player moods and to keep an eye on whether the algorithm need to be adjusted.

Youth Cups

It's time for the youth squads to get their own cups, so we'll start implementing that next week. There will be 1 national cup in each country, and a World Cup for the best youth squads.

End of the beta period

Right now, I don't know exactly when we can say that the beta period is over. There are still some things I would like to implement before then.

But what will happen when the beta ends?

• Everyone retains their youth squad - so nothing is deleted.
• All clubs, including those without youth squads, will switch to using the new mood system
• All senior squads will have the same number of player slots as the beta testers now have, ie 22 (if you have premium). 22 was the original number of slot a few years ago, but it was increased to 25 and then 30 as a kind of temporary poor-man's youth squad.

Youth leagues

I am becoming increasingly convinced that we should move the youth squads out into their own league system, rather than them playing against senior squads.

It will be a lot more fair if the youth squads always play against equals, and it'll be more fun if you can measure your youth squad against other youth squads, and strive for 1st division.

Work on implementing the youth leagues will start later this year, some time after the beta is completed and we have had time to work on some other tasks that are on the to-do list.