Subject: I.1

Good luck outside PPM. Thanks again for the advice you gave me when I first joined the game (for those of you who don't know, read the III.2 thread), getting solid advice at that point in my team's history definitely helped my team perform as well as they have.

Your team is officially gone

I'm making just a bit more than you. It's around 14.2M total (11M General, 2.7M Media and 560K for the boxes). You definitely should have been making much more than that. I'm basically a 20th place team in I.1 while you're an 11th place team.

How much were you paying your staff per week? I'm at 5M right now, but I'll be cutting almost 2M of that in the next week or so.

So in 5 season I have 80 mil....humm...sounds like alot but is it really. You increase any facility(ies) with that money then you daily expense in rease shriking your 80 intake. You take your time and get (with 80 mil) 3 players maybe 4 worth for a fourth line start. 80 mil doesn't buy you many quality players. Atleast not compared to the players that I currently have. Just a quick scout of the market this morning to replace my 4th line winger (my lowest postion) with simialr stats age and approx qualities would run me 18-19 mil. Thats my 4th liner! I can only imagine the higher up my lines I go, the more expensive players get.

I think this is where things get hard for some people to understand. By no means is what I'm about to say directed at anyone nor I am I trying to sound full of myself. Most of the comments are made by fresh teams to league 1 or by team with "OTS" weaker teams. 80 mil will buy lesser team better players in greater amounts then a stronger team. 80 mil for me would get me more starters then 80 mil for leggy, conversley 80 mil for you would get you more then me. It all about perspective, my team is basicly ranked the same as flyers which is why it is much easier for me to have realted to his situtaion. Which is why I keep trying to help explain his feeling.

I keep coming back to opivy and all the things he warned about in being a middle of the row team in league 1. Flyers was one of many casualties that this is going to happen to. There is a saying, "If your not first your last!" Now super competitive people belive this, but I this this economic system is also setup on this very same belief. Not quite to the extreme but I hope you get my point.

I haven't had a post this long since trying to run for NT coach in soccer. GL to everyone this season by the way!

That cost of upgrading a stronger team is a solid hit on me. I know in soccer it takes a lot of money for me to bring in a player who is able to contribute immediately.

However, and I should have stated it, I assumed that a player (probably a 4th liner) would be sold around the same time as the purchase. In your case, that could function as a 17-18m (assuming low transfer fees) discount on a purchase.

Assuming a team only has the talent and revenue to finish in the middle of I.1, the only way to improve their bottom line (without selling players) is to cut costs. Personally, I recently went through a reduction of my staff and my daily staff salaries are now down to 326k. I have no idea how flyers had 18M in weekly expenses, unless he was including a loan, construction, and/or acquisitions.

My GS dropped 15% in the offseason after finishing 17th in I.1 (relative to 2nd in II.1), which is about what I expected. That includes the decrease due to the reduction in the number of divisions. I hope to be back in I.1 next season and I'll be trying a bit harder to avoid relegation if that happens.

I understand where you're coming from. I had a similar experience in HockeyArena. Not so much a financial crunch, but the players I was working with weren't good enough to get me into I.1. My stadium was already complete so there was nothing I could do to help them. Maybe I could have sold some older guys and brought in better players, but it would have only been enough to get me into I.1, not enough to make me competitive. I chose to sell off the entire team, including my favorite player Matthew Cagle. I did that knowing I would have a terrible team for the next 5-7 seasons. I'm finally back with one of the better teams in II, possibly going into I.1 this season, certainly next. It was a hard decision, but it had to be done. My team is better off for it.

That's the point I'm trying to make. Sometimes you have to f**k up your team in order to move up. It hurts, but that's part of managing a team.

It's even more important that you make the tough decision in this messed up system. Certainly not in I.1.

Hope nobody minds me poking my head in here, nobody talks in my league.

I read back a couple pages and from what I can gather, the game is set up so that the less represented countries like the US run into sponsorship issues from season to season to the point that mid and lower tier teams in I.1 begin to run into problems and the US team isn't given a chance to compete internationally. Sorry if I missed or glossed over something, but 142 pages would have been a lot to scour.

Though I'm a long way from I.1 right now, I'd like to be competitive in it down the road. I was wondering if in light of what I've been reading some of you could share tips on building a team based on your experiences in I.1. It'd be nice to anticipate or even avoid some of these bumps in the road, especially sponsorship and income issues.

If it's been said before and nobody wants to repeat something pertinent, a link would be great as well. I can't seem to find a search function on these forums.

Basically, the only way to be competitive is to be able to generate income for your team. Right now, most of us are finding it really hard to run our teams through sponsorship offers. The only revenue stream that remains at that point is to buy low and sell high (players, not staff members). It is the only solution I can think of. Last season I bought a few young players that will keep for a couple of seasons and sell at a pretty good profit. But you have to be smart and monitor the market constantly. If you look at the transfer history of most top teams, they have done precisely that and done it early.

Thanks, makes the comment about this being more like the stock market make sense. So far I'd been using friendly game for pucks as a way to create consistent (albeit minor) income. By choosing to play against teams with better arenas and stronger team strength ratings I've been able to turn a profit most days I'm not paying to construct something, but I know that won't hold out long as my team gets better. It just seemed more productive than playing teams my own strength to increase my OTR by maybe .3 a pop when the only thing I can see that influencing is attendance in a minor way.

I'd been watching the market but not quite well enough to start trading. I'll try to keep an eye on it.

Facilities facilities facilities. You should be upgrading training/regeneration/youth school constantly as your top priority. Both in hockey and soccer I've been able to develop a team with minimal foreign players because my developed YS has given me players that I can train well.

It might take you a while to be good, but you could easily wait until you have good facilities, and then blow up your squad to bring in some talented youth, which thanks to your facilities will develop into a good team.

I don't think anything is more important early on.

build up the stadium if you can. my tv contract this year is worth more than my general sponsor
I built from 0 to max in each section - have to wait to do it but saves money in the long run

Thanks for the tips. From the sounds of it my plan actually lines up pretty well with what you're saying. It's nice to know I'm on the right track.

I really wanted to build from 0 to max in the stadium but realized I'd be handicapping myself in the meantime. I may try rounding out my stadium to all large standing and then go to the max, but we'll see. I always preferred English to math so can't give you the numbers to support it, but I feel the income from the attendance and earlier increases to media sponsors may be worth not waiting to go from 0 to max on the stadium. Like I said, it's more of a feeling though, so any math major may feel free to prove me wrong.

Go with facilities.

Listen to Leggmann. He's the best in the country. He's literally won everything in the US except for one regular season title and one or two National Cups.

He's posted his sponsor money a couple of times in the past and I always assumed it was a 75/25 split between General and Media. Nope. It's more like 50/50. Which is some of the best news my hockey team has had in a while. Because I can't build a team as good as his in the next few seasons, but I can build a stadium

Lmao he is beginner right now. He needs to get facilitied to level 10 first, and than maybe invest in stadium.