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Lineup planning is accessed via the Lineups option on the team menu. Clicking it opens a screen with a "dressed list" (as on the lines screen) that includes all of your contracted players (colour-coded as on the Depth Chart screen), and two tabs with lists for each position (20 spots each) for even-strength and special teams lines (as well as goalies, extra attackers, and shootouts.)
If the lists are empty (as they are by default), they do nothing; the game operates normally and you'll still have to make changes for yourself. So if you don't want to use this feature, make sure they're clear (there's a "Clear Linups" option on the Action Menu) and the game will simply operate as it used to. Additionally, for the lineups to be used, your "Setting Lineups and Tactics" option (in Manager Settings) must be set to your assistant - essentially, you're turning the assistant on but using the lineups to override the logic it would normally use.
If, however, any players are present on the Even Strength tab, the AI will override your regular lines with the order used on the list. Before each game the AI will clear the line data completely, and then do the following:
- it will first attempt to fill all the lines and spots on the dressed list according to the listed priorities
- when the game fills the lines, it will fill them unit-by-unit in the order C/LW/RW/LD/RD, using the priority list to determine the next available player to go into a slot, then go on to the next unit
- when a player is added to a line he's also dressed and locked to that spot
- if there are open lineup and/or line spots remaining, they will be filled by the regular AI lineup and line selection functions (note that this can also function as a way to force the AI auto-select your lines on a game-by-game basis without needing to use Assistant: Create Lines every time - if you only add one player to the even-strength page, that'll activate the Lineups feature, place that one guy, and then have the AI handle all of the other lines. Effectively, it's something like GM-only mode while you're playing as GM/Coach.)
There are some action buttons related to this feature:
- On the Lines screen, Create Lines from Lineups: this just uses the Lineups AI logic to show what the AI will do when it has to create a lineup for a game, which will let you see if your Lineups are working the way you intend, without needing to actually play a game.
- On the Lineups Screen, AI Set Lineups will fill out the lineups using some very crude logic (just sorting by talent, essentially.) We don't actually recommend using the list in that order, you should still try to choose your line combinations in a sensible way. The button can just save you some drag-and-dropping: use it to start your lists, then shuffle your players around as desired.
- Also on the Lineups Screen, Clear Lineups will erase all the entries on that screen, which, as mentioned above, will deactivate the use of the Lineups feature in games.
Note that tactics will be unaffected by this feature: for example, if you have unit-level tactics turned on for your third line, they'll still be in place regardless of who the Lineups fill that line with.
