Intruduction
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Striped Pitch is a football management simulation played in real time. Games are played three times per week. Two days are reserved for national championship matches and the third day is for cup or international league games.
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Competition Structure
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There are three main competition types in Striped Pitch: National Championship, National Cup and International League.
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National Championship
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| The national championship consists of one or more divisions with 16 teams in each division. The season involves 30 games (every team plays every other team at home and away). We chose to have 16 teams in each division for technical reasons as well as to make sure that every country gets the same number of games, thus allowing for a balances calendar. |
If a country has more then one division, then the bottom two teams are relegated to the lower division at the end of each season. Similarly, the top two teams are promoted to the higher division.
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National Cup
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The national cup is played by all the teams in first and second (if present) divisions. The match-up is decided by a single game and the pairs are determined by a random draw.
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International League
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| The international league is a competition that is played by last season's four best teams from each country. Thus, there is no international league competition held during the first season. The qualifiers include top three places from a country's first division and the national cup winner. If the cup winner is also among the top three places, then forth place team also qualifies. |
| The qualified teams from all countries are randomly drawn into groups of four where they play six games against all other teams in their respective groups, home and away. The qualification for playoffs is a bit different then the traditional way. Instead of top two teams qualifying from each group, the teams with top sixteen records out of all the participating teams qualify. For example, if there were eight groups, four teams in each for a total of thirty two teams, sixteen would qualify. This may mean that some groups may have three or even all four teams go through, while others may only qualify the top team. |
The playoffs are held in a way similar to national cup playoffs. Each match-up is randomly determined and decided by a single game elimination.
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Striped Pitch Client
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| The Striped Pitch Client is used to manage a team's infrastructure, roster, play actual games and many other activities. It can be downloaded by registered users from the downloads section of the website. We are continually working on improving the client and the game engine, so it is very important to keep the client up to date by downloading the patches that are periodically released (the patch can be found at the downloads section as well). We will also periodically release language files to provide support for other languages. If you would like to help us with translating the client and this website into your language of choice, please contact us. |
| When you register with Striped Pitch, you can download the client and login using the same username and password you used to log into the website. When authenticated, you will be taken to your main team screen which displays useful information about your team. Below is a review of all the buttons that are located on the main screen. |
| Infrastructure – this button will take you to your team's infrastructure screen. Here you can update your ticket price and, funds permitting, stadium seating capacity, base, academy, field and medical facilities. Your home game's attendance depends on your team performance and your set ticket prices. The base has impact on how fast your players' condition recovers (each player's condition deteriorates with each game played and is restored somewhat at the end of each week). The higher academy level will produce both higher quantity and quality young players. The field level will impact the players' quality (with better players suffering more on bad fields then average players). The medical facilities level influences the length of your players' injuries, when received. |
| Transfer – this button will take you to the transfer screen. Here you may place your own players on transfer and bid for players currently on transfer from other teams. You may choose to sort players based on some characteristic and filter the transfer list to only display players with selected characteristic within specified values. You may also choose to only see players within your price range. The transfers are performed once a week. |
| Strategy – this button will take you to the strategy selection screen. You can choose your team formation, line-up and special instructions for each player. The players within your formation may be moved around the field as you see fit. Just point your mouse to a player, press the left button and drag him to a needed location. You can also send your roster to us, if you choose to. This option is useful if you know you will not be able to play your next game in real time. This way we will use your specified roster instead of generating one on our own (this is what happens if there is no manager for one of the teams playing). The sent roster is only used for one game and has to be resent if you would like to use a roster for next game too. |
| Player Exchange – You may use this screen to setup a direct player exchange with another team from your world. First select a team from the drop down list, then select a player, then enter an amount of money you would like to receive from that team, choose your own player to send to that team, and finally the amount of money you will pay. This screen can also be used for direct purchases of players from another team. In other words, if you wanted to buy a player from another team, you would select a player you want and specify the amount of money you will pay for him, leaving your player unselected. IMPORTANT: the exchange will only take place if the manager of the team you are trying to deal with submits an equivalent request in the same week. Both managers should agree on the terms of the deals, otherwise no exchange will take place. |
Friendly Game – Use this screen to play a friendly game against any other team in the league that is currently looking to play. This is a good way to test your strategies, as the result of friendly games is not counted and no player stats are changed. The condition of players, injuries and suspensions are not modified either (see Game Play section).
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Game Play
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| When the numbers counting down to the beginning of the next game turn red, most of the client functions become disabled as the next game is to start soon. Click on Play Next Game button and you will soon see the initial game screen with both teams lined up. The game flows without interruption until one of the managers involved in the game requests a pause. Each manager is allowed to request a pause which will stop the game every so often and allow the manager to make changes to his/her team strategy. There are occasions when the change is necessary (like an injury or a red card), in this cases the game will be stopped and the manager would have to adjust his/her team strategy. |
| The home team always has their goal at the bottom of the screen, during both halves. If the game goes into overtime (happens in case of a tie in a playoff game or in a friendly game), then two halves fifteen minutes each are played out. There are no golden or silver goals. In case the game is still tied, a penalty kick shootout occurs in a regular fashion. |
After each regular season game played (non-friendly) a player looses some of his condition. The condition lost depends on the base level of the team he is playing for. The condition is lost as follows:
Base Level 0 – 9%
Base Level 1 – 8%
Base Level 2 – 7%
Base Level 3 – 6%
Base Level 4 – 5%
Base Level 5 – 4% |
The condition regained each week:
Base Level 0 – 8%
Base Level 1 – 9%
Base Level 2 – 10%
Base Level 3 – 11%
Base Level 4 – 12%
Base Level 5 – 13% |
| Players sometimes may also become injured. The length of an injury will not exceed ten weeks. It is reduced by the medical facilities level of the injured player's team. |
| Yellow and red cards may result in suspension of a player. Three yellow cards received will cause a player to be suspended for one game. A red card received will cause a player to be suspended for two games. |
| Players' attributes determine how well they will play in the game. While all attributes are important, some are more useful then others to different player positions. For example, a goalkeeper will be better off with a high reaction attribute then a high shot attribute. Challenge is important to defenders, passing is important to midfielders and dribbling is important to forwards. Leadership is an important attribute for a captain (choosing a captain with high leadership attribute can cause your team to play better). A low stamina attribute will cause your player to get tired faster in the game, possibly requiring a sub in the late stages. |
Team Finances
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Team expenses consist of buying new players (from the transfer list or through direct exchange) and improving infrastructure. Infrastructure costs:
Stadium upgrade (per seat): 200
Base upgrade (per level): 1.000.000
Academy upgrade (per level): 750.000
Field upgrade (per level): 300.000
Medical facilities upgrade (per level): 500.000 |
| Team income is generated by ticket sales, selling players and winning competitions. Teams receive prize money according to how well they’ve performed in each of the competitions they participate in. |