Scout Scribbles – Lukaku Concern for Everton

They should just put it back to how it was last year

It may be slower, but the slower rise in players also coincides with a slower rise in team value, so in a way it means the currency itself is stronger. A pound goes further than before, but our banks have less money.

I think the percentages used for rises or falls should be linked to the number of dead teams, which could be estimated by the rate of decline of overall transfers throughout the season.

I would like them to give all of my players double ruses, then abandon them altogether.

You need to pass the baton on these Jonty man 🙂

Every Wednesday night there's a price change according to ownership rise/fall. Once a week, less confusing and more clear.

Can we please stop listening to Triggerlips. One person does not represent the views of a community no matter how many times he spouts it.

The system is fine as it is. The game is about football and not stock markets. A minor reward for getting players early is good, but that is as far as it should go.

I dont mind the new system.
Gives the time for making decisions,exploring options.
Before there were way too many knee jerks and jumping on Bandwagons, resulting in abysmal failures

FPL should just show it as part of their own site, just as TOYALFPL, and view it as part of the game. I have no idea why they wouldn't want to. It would increase traffic enormously on their site with far more folk logging on daily.

In terms of the mechanics of the thing the past two seasons have been spot on...Playing the TV offered two ways of playing...Early build up of TV or a more patient approach with the balance fairly well set between the two approaches...

I have no idea why they wanted to change it and no idea why they don't make it public.

No I think price changes help make the game more interesting. I think FPL can capitalise on this by being transparent about price changes and displaying it on the FPL site. FPL should see this as an economic win for them too as it will encourage the casual player to be more observant with their team during the week bringing more traffic to the site.

The FF dream for me would be:

At the end of transfer window the number of each player currently selected is locked. Therefore if you want Costa in your team as a transfer later on in the season someone must be willing to sell him from their squad.

A Betfair system is then in place to enable individuals to sell their players to each other

Last year I did my best to avoid looking at price rises and not chase team value. Ended up 350th overall! There maybe other factors in that such as Suarez no Brainer captaincy but I feel it freed me up from following the herd and choosing players I didn't want just to gain TV. For instance every time a defender scored they would rise.

Also haven't players been dropping more quickly or the same as last year. Need to be careful not to lose value this year...

I always wanted more downward price movement to incentivise looking for value and going against the herd

Yes abandon price changes.

Hate being forced into an early transfer before seeing your new signing crocked on international duty.

High team value gives the top managers too big an advantage later in the season. If you have a bad start you shouldn't spend the rest of the season paying for it

I've been talking to my mini league rival plenty of times over the last few years, since he's very much against the price change system overall.

His argument is that it rewards bandwagoners too much and creates strong template teams for large parts of the season.

I'll make an example. We're playing this season but with the price system of last year. Siggy has scored 18 points in two weeks but you don't believe he will keep it up. You have lined up another player for the same price that should do better. What do you do and how will the option you choose affect your team depending on how well he does for the upcoming weeks?

A) You buy Siggy and he keeps up the scoring. Great. You won the jackpot. You collect the points and the price changes. Almost regardless of how well your differential did you will be better off this way.

B) You buy Siggy and he fails. You don't get a whole lot of points but you pocket 0.6m value for following the herd. If your alternative pick did great you would have been better off with him, but the prices soften the blow a lot.

C) You buy your alternative option instead. He doesn't score. Now here is where it gets ugly. Not only do you not get any points, and you shouldn't because you made a bad pick, but you're also left behind badly in team value. Even if your option outscore Siggy by a little bit you might well be losing further team value over the upcoming weeks. Disaster.

Now, the scenario I think is least desirable here for the game is scenario B. You have been rewarded for the knee jerk transfer. Being a sheep, as some call it. The potential downside of scenario C is why the game of previous seasons didn't encourage people thinking differently. And while thinking differently and getting it wrong shouldn't be a good thing either, I think it creates a more fun game if you can try out a different pick and only lose the actual points you lose, plus potential transfer hits, if you get it wrong. Siggy scored 11 points in gameweek 3 and you didn't get them. It might work out to 15 or 19 if you took a hit or two. It's a fair punishment and a big deal.

Some will argue that playing the price market takes skill and is an added dimension to the game. I can see that aspect of it. I agree that it is a skill. It's just not a skill I'm particularly interested in myself, and also one that I think favours those with a lot of time at their hands late evenings a bit too much. On top of that I think the early changes, while requiring skill, come with their own element of luck. The same early transfer might reap great rewards one week and end up with a midweek injury the next week. It's a random element not directly related to the football. Not my cup of tea.

Last I'd like to add that I think that the price change system does add a certain dynamic to the game. Every week the landscape is a little bit different. I quite like that, so I'd possibly be inclined to keep these slow price changes rather than scrapping them at all.

TLDR: The earlier price change system favoured bandwagon hoppers too much and created a strong template team for the early and mid part of the season.

In oder to make the game as diverse and intersting as possible there needs to be good price discovery in the market. This means if a player is unpopular he should fall until sufficient people think he has reached 'fair value' in the sense he is 'punt worthy'.

The system leeds far to quickly to template teams because the market construction is and always has been poor.

Siggy Fab Ramsey Sterling is already template amongst casuals never mind here.

In this sense the problem is not too few fast rises but no enough falls at the low ownership end of the market.

Also players should continue to rise when heavily owned with much less overall NTI, as this corresponds to a higher than initial % of the overall active market that doesn't own a given player.

Same as last year, but make the information available to everyone on FPL website.

I prefer how it is now, you don't get tied to keep players by their value increasing so much. As it is now you can move players that have done well out for a short period, not lose too much value on them, and then get them back later on if you want without too much difficulty.

I like it without knowing who will rise or fall

Another point I'd make is that having a really high team value isn't always that useful. Imagine a scenario where welbeck fires for arsenal, sig maintains his form, and a couple like tadic and de jong become immense (all plausible). Suddenly we'd struggle to spend all our money and those with higher TV would feel obliged to buy more expensive players

God no, its an important part of the game. You speak of it being as relevant as in previous seasons - well i think it has become skewed in recent seasons, possibly due to the sheer numbers playing the game and taking advantage of the price change websites.

This has led to an increase in the kind of Team Value achievable with ease. In the last few seasons it has been easy to achieve ~115m as a TV by the end of the season. This didnt happen when FPL started out.

I think FPL have tried to redress the balance slightly. It remains to be seen if they have gauged it right. I still think it is an important part of the game, possibly even more so, and it may now require a degree of thought and skill to achieve a decent team value.

No way!
Would be gutted if the casuals could bring in Siggy for 6m. Feels like it would not reward players for punts.

Can we just go back to the old system? Let the casuals rot and get left behind.

There is literally NO argument in its favour beyond 'I liked it how it was' and 'it helps stop casuals.'

Absolute rubbish. The game is so much more open for variety when the prices move more slowly. Price changes being a core part of the game stifles variety in teams, which is a bad thing.

without experiencing the alternative fpl wise i dont think the game would be better off.
i quite enjoy the current stability though, mainly because i feel less left out now (started ignoring price changes last couple of seasons), but also i enjoy a bit of mayhem

I am late to the conversation, as often happens with Hot Topics, but I find the whinging on here about the mystery of price changes rather shocking this season when there are so many affordable options right now.

Look at the total score leaderboard on the FPL page. Who do you want that you can't get? Last year's pricing system would have made several players much more expensive than they are this year and a template based on value at least as much as points would be forming already. For people who seem to abhor casuals I can't imagine a more lockstep, groupthinking formation than that.

If you can't have everyone you can afford then you have to make choices based on hunches, flair, stats, patience, irrational loyalty to club/country/dreamy haircuts, etc. How would it be more enjoyable to play it for prices before these reasons?

Price changes are part of the game and make it more challenging, but not too challenging. What I want is to get the full sell-on price when I sell a player, not just half of it. That penalizes me for buying and holding good players, and makes it too hard to replace players who are injured, suspended, or out of form.

I'd prefer it if the price changes were taken out of it

My main problem with price rise/fall has always been that when the price rises of X player, I don't get that same high value for that player. E.g: Currently Fab's price is 9.2 but it has only risen to 9.1 so if i sell him (not that I want to) I will get less.
The best way to counter this price rise/fall is have 2 wild cards any time in the season..

I would like to see price protection removed for players injured or suspended, that would increase the need for transfers, and encourage variation.