RSL in the WSL Part 8

From DNA to DPA

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RSL in the WSL Part 8

I mentioned two days ago that Football Manager is really a game of ratings, not stats.  It’s the ratings that make the game engine go.  You’ve got to pay attention to player ratings and what they mean to ensure that you’ve got the right kind of player.

It’s also a game of personalities.

Player Growth

One of the difficult truths of Football Manager that all managers encounter eventually is that players simply aren’t created equal.  Some players with high potential grow quickly and reach that potential in a few years.  Other players toil along, year after year, amounting to very little before either an injury derails their career or they are traded.

It’s not completely random, however.  We know at least a little bit about what causes and hinders player growth.  In fact, Football Manager’s personality system gives us some clear clues as to what we can expect from our young players.

DPA

Remember our talk about squad DNA?  Well, there’s something that’s even more important: squad DPA.

DPA stands for:

• Determination

• Professionalism

• Ambition

We talked about Determination two days ago – it’s how determined a player is to perform well.

Professionalism is also pretty obvious.  It’s a measure of the attitude that a player takes to the game.  You want players that will approach the game and training with a professional attitude, and you want to stay away from the players that simply don’t care.

Ambition is similar.  It’s a measure of how hard the player will try to reach his goals.  Players that aren’t ambitious won’t push themselves to perform better.

These three factors, more than anything else, tell us how our young players are going to develop.  These are the things we should be looking for.  We want players that are determined, that are ambitious, and that are highly professional.

How do we know this?  Because Sports Interactive have come out and said this directly, on its own forums.

This thread from 2017 is the most important thread on the topic.  And the most important post on the thread is this one, about halfway down the first page:

Wassell’s wording makes it clear that DPA is not the only factor in player development.  There is also no guarantee that a player high in all three factors is going to be a superstar after a few years.  Football Manager includes quite a bit of chance, which is one of the things that keeps us coming back.

However, it is absolutely true that all three of the DPA factors contribute significantly to a player’s chance of success.

In fact, Evidence Based Football Manager ran a comprehensive series of tests on so-called wonderkids a few months ago.  And, surprise surprise, he discovered that determination, professionalism, and ambition correlated very strongly with a player’s chance for success:

Surprisingly, player morale has almost nothing to do with player growth.

Max’s efforts in doing this research also confirms to us that the player development system is not substantially different today than it was in 2017.  In fact, I strongly doubt SI will change this system in the foreseeable future.

Competing Voices

Seb Wassell’s post also helps us understand evidence to the contrary.  Most critics of the determination attribute, for example, point to this Zealand video:

The problem with Zealand’s video should be obvious if you compare it with Max’s video above.  Zealand’s test did not control for all possible outside variables.

Anecdotal evidence will also show us that determination does indeed matter.  Try to put together a squad of players with extremely low determination levels and see where you wind up.

Finding the Right Players

Okay – so now we know that DPA is pretty important.  How do we find players with high ratings in these attributes?

Well, it’s not as easy as you think.  Assuming we’re not cheating, we can only see the player’s determination rating.  Professionalism and ambition are both hidden stats.

However, we do have a way of predicting what kind of professionalism and ambition ratings our players have.  And this is where the personality system comes in.

I’m not going to take the time to rewrite here what others have already written about which personalities correspond to which ratings.  This FM Scout post provides the most up-to-date statistical information about each of the possible player personalities.  If we read these carefully and look for personalities that guarantee high levels of professionalism and ambition, we can figure out which personalities to look for, and which ones to stay away from.

Personalities to Look For

Depending on how you look at it, there are either 4 or 5 “must have” personalities in Football Manager.  I go with 5, though the 5th might be a bit controversial.

• Perfectionist.  A Perfectionist will have ambition, determination, and professionalism all in the 14 to 20 range.  To pay for this perfection, you’ll have a low temperament rating; I consider that a price worth paying.

• Model Citizen.  Model Citizen is usually thought of as the best personality in the game, bar none.  My concern here is that ambition can be as low as 12.  Other than that, model citizens are excellent at everything you need.

• Model Professional.  A Model Professional has perfect (20) professionalism and a high temperament.  They’re rare, so hold onto them when you see them.

• Professional.  A Professional player has very high professionalism and a good temperament rating.

• Resolute.  This is where things can be a tad controversial.  Resolute gives us a determination of 15 to 17, a professionalism rating between 15 and 20, and an ambition rating can fluctuate all the way from 5 to 20.  For the sake of experimentation, and because I can’t woo a lot of players with really good personalities to my club, I’m counting this as one of the top 5.

Other Good Personalities

Now – if we can’t build a squad of players with these 5 personalities, it’s not a huge deal.  There are other personalities in the game that can get us close to where we want to be.  These aren’t all obvious; in fact, one of these show up as a negative personality in the game, believe it or not.

• Spirited.  Spirited players have a professionalism level between 11 and 17, which is good enough.  The trick here is that determination can be very low.  Of course, we can see the determination rating – if you sign a spirited player, make sure that rating isn’t too low.

• Driven.  Determination is between 17 and 20, and the ambition rating is 12 or higher – this is a good combination.

• Very Ambitious.  Ambition is at 20.  Determination can be as low as 1; however, we can overcome this obstacle by ensuring that we check the determination rating before we sign.

• Ambitious.  Similar to Very Ambitious, an Ambitious player will have an ambition rating between 16 and 20, and a determination rating that can fluctuate.  Again, look before you leap.

• Mercenary.  This is the “negative” attribute.  Yes, I know that mercenary players will try to weasel their way out of their contracts.  However, they have good ambition, and, once again, you can make sure that their determination rating is high enough.  In other words – loyalty means very little in Football Manager.

• Fairly Professional.  Professionalism for these players is between 15 and 20.  Determination won’t be higher than 14, however – but, remember, you can see this rating before you sign.

• Iron Willed.  An Iron Willed player has a determination between 15 and 17 points.  We don’t know about professionalism and ambition – at least, the personality won’t tell us.  It’s not easy to find Iron Willed players – it would be fun to hire one or two as an experiment should they arise.

Two More Personalities

There are many personalities in Football Manager.  I did want to note two others in particular.

• Light-Hearted.  It’s common for players to freak out when Model Citizens suddenly become Light-Hearted.  Light-Hearted players have professionalism and determination attributes between 1 and 17, which is why this can happen.  If the player was originally a Model Citizen and has now become Light-Hearted, don’t worry – he likely still has high ratings in all 3 DPA attributes.

• Balanced.  Most of your players are going to have Balanced personalities at the start of the game.  Balanced is actually not a great personality, as all three of the DPA attributes are capped out at 14.  I consider Balanced to be negative, and will never sign a player with that personality.

Media Handling Styles

Two media handling styles also tell us a little bit about professionalism.  Players who are either Evasive or Reserved have professionalism between 15 and 20.  If you see one of these two, you know for a fact that the player has a high professionalism rating.

In Practice

Okay, enough theory.  How does this look in practice?

I had two players on my squad when I first came on.

Jose Silva looked like this:

Devin Mills, meanwhile, looked like this:

How do we distinguish between the two?  Simple – by the personality.

Silva has an Unambitious personality, which tells us that his ambition is extremely low.  We can also see that he has low determination, and there is no indication anywhere that he has high professionalism (Unflappable is not a positive media handling style).

Mills, on the other hand, has a Light-Hearted personality with a middling determination rating of 10.  Again, we don’t know much about his professionalism, but we do have reason to suspect that it’s not extremely low (otherwise his personality would be something like Slack).

What did I do?  Simple – I sold Silva right away and stuck Mills in the first team.

The idea is to try to mentor Mills, to try to nudge up his professionalism as much as possible, assuming that it is there.  If he does well, we’re in good shape.  If not?  We can always sell him like we sold Silva.

Impact

Paying attention to DPA impacts more than just player development.  For one thing, it makes training a lot easier.

This is the sort of training screen you’ll be used to if you pay careful attention to personality ratings.  The truth is that professional players in Football Manager simply train well.  There’s no need to give players a talking-to for poor training performances if they are professional to begin with.

Similarly, team meetings are a lot easier with professional players.  You know those players that pipe up and contradict you during your meetings?  That’s not a sign of poor squad morale.  Rather, that is a sign of an unprofessional player.

If you do things right, you’ll see something like this on your club info screen:

The real nice thing is that a highly professional squad will actually cause professionalism to grow.  Young players like Mills are much more likely to see their professionalism ratings increase if the players around them are also professional.  Conversely, a squad lacking in professionalism might have a detrimental impact on even the post professional players.