Operation Sports Forums - Getting an universal home advantage setting for FIFA

edit: i'm keeping the original post below, but there's no need to follow the testing instructions as i asked anymore. the thread unfortunately didn't get popular as soon as i was hoping, so i did all the preliminary testing myself. but i just mean "no need to follow strict rules", whatever data you can share to helps us is still very much appreciated.

if you want home field advantage in fifa, with intensity tested for realism, do the following:

- before each home game, subtract 2 points of the user pass error slider and add 2 points to the cpu pass error slider.

- before each away game, add 2 points to user pass error and subtract 2 points from cpu pass error (using your original slider set as the baseline).

- before each game on neutral field, undo any of these changes and play with your original slider set.

this tweak was designed to work with any slider set (including default) and any controller settings (manual, semi or assisted).

use the neutral field setting for cup finals and international tournaments. for local derbies, i recommend reducing the offset to +/-1 pass error instead of +/-2.

if you use this trick, please tell your season home/away records in this thread, if possible, so we can tweak the settings if needed.

the original op is below, for... hystorical purposes :/

thank you!

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i'm working in finding an universal slider tweak that puts home advantage into the game and can possibly be used in every version of fifa from '12 to '17, regardless of the slider set you use (and also if you just play with all of them on default)

home advantage is a big thing in football, and it's a shame that it's not present in fifa career modes and tournaments. some people might not care, but i think it's a must for immersion.

the pc modding community found some strings in .ini files of the game that are supposed to control the intensity of home advantage, but the only string that i found to really work was one that dictates home advantage influence in the results of simulated matches. there's controversy if any of the strings related to played matches work. the ones that i was able to test i can assure they don't, make no difference at all.

i saw some people, gnemi for example, that play in different difficulty levels, like world class home and legendary away, or pro home and world class away, you know...

i see some problems with this: first, you have to build your slider set with this offset already in mind. if it's a world class set, legendary will be too hard. if it's a legendary set, world class will be too easy.

second, the difficulty gap is probably larger than it should.

third, there's no setting for neutral field matches.

fourth, it only changes the playing quality of the cpu, not yours. so you'll usually get intense away matches and relatively boring home matches.

a better approach, imo, is finding a way to make both we and cpu play worse away and both we and cpu play better in home field.

and this is where it comes.... wait for it....

SLIDERS!!!

i'm testing a very simple tweak (it takes 10 seconds to do) that is absolutely working for me. it works better than previous experiences i saw people do with staggered sprint speed and acceleration (which imo feels very very forced and artificial). and i think it comes closer to what makes home advantage a thing in real life (home confidence vs away anxiety, home familiarity with the grass, visual cues, etcetera...)

and the fact that the changes i'm trying are perfectly symmetric makes me believe that they would perfectly work for any version of fifa and any slider set. perhaps the effect is a bit more or a bit less pronounced in one or other fifa version, but i believe it should come quite close across the board.

the tweak works, i'm sure. but i'm at the point of defining the right numbers to make it realistic. and making it realistic is making a team, on average, score approximately 1.3 goals playing home to each goal they score playing away. same for cpu, same for you. simple as that. this is the average of the 5 biggest european leagues.

the problem is we have to play a **** ton of games to know how well this is working. analysing shooting stats is better than analysing goals scored, because the data converges much faster (bigger numbers), but still, the bigger the sample, the better. we have to play a lot of games. and this is where i need your help.

1. make a habit to go to the game settings before every game. then do this:

- if you're playing home, subtract 2 points of user pass error and add 2 points to cpu pass error.

- if you're playing away, add 2 points to user pass error and subtract 2 points of cpu pass error.

examples: if you play with default sliders (50/50 pass error), make it 48/52 home and 52/48 away; if you play fifa 16 with the community sliders (52/62 pass error), make it 50/64 home and 54/60 away; if you play fifa 14 with the gonira's sliders(tm) (51/65 pass error), make it 49/67 home and 53/63 away. so notice that when you go from home to away or from away to home, you actually change 4 ticks for a team and 4 ticks for the other, in the opposite direction. pay attention to this.

on neutral field matches, just undo these changes and play with your original slider set.

your global difficulty will remain about the same, but home games will be easier and away games will be harder.

i already did some tests with -3/+3 pass error. it works and it's fun, but the sample was low and the home advantage effect was perhaps a bit higher than it should.

2. play a home game and an away game with this change (-2/+2 pass error). you should play with the same team in both games and cpu should play with the same team in both games.

example: liverpool (you) vs chelsea (cpu), then chelsea (cpu) vs liverpool (you). don't forget to make the proper pass error changes, as previously instructed.

leave every other setting untouched between the two games! just don't forget to invert the pass error offset!

you can do this in your career (double-legged cups are great for this), you can do in friendly mode, i don't care. and you can play manual, assisted, semi or any combination of these, no problem.

3. post the stats of both games here: score, shots, shots on target, possession and pass accuracy. please, also tell what version of the game and your controller settings (manual, semi or assisted).

play as well as you can in both games. don't try to force numbers to one or other direction.

i'll do the same.

don't post stats if the changes you made aren't exactly the ones i suggested and don't post stats if any other setting is changed between the home and the away fixture.

don't shy away not posting your stats if the away result is better than the home result. this happens and it's important that we also have this data.

unfortunately, fifa 14 is all my computer can handle, so that's the game i'm using in this experience. so it's important that some people help so we can be sure of how this translates to newer generation games. as far as i'm concerned though, sliders were always the same since fifa 12 and their effects in gameplay were always reasonably consistent, so you can't go very wrong if you just copy this tweak without thinking too much about it, even if you play fifa 17.

when we get a big enough sample, we can analyse stats and fine tune if needed.

this will be a game changer. :cool: