This is a beginner's guide to SeniorLeagueHockey.com. Please also check in the FAQ section. Every Senior League Hockey manager is assigned a team. You can customise your team and players with new names and images. From your squad you select three line-ups and special units for power plays and penalty kills. You also decide training methods and tactics including style of play, aggression level and more. Ice conditions, the referee and your opponent should all influence your decisions. You can improve your squad with training, or by luring new players from the waiver market. Matches are played at night by the computer and full match reports generated. There is a wide range of division, cup and exhibition competitions. Still confused? It's actually very simple - honestly! Probably best to just get started…       Step 1. Team Information The first thing you will see once you have logged in will be the Team Information page. From here the options are almost endless, but for now all we want to do is get set up to play a game!     Don't worry if the Last Six League Results don't look too good - you've taken over a team that was managed by a computer until you joined the game, and they don't make good managers!       To get started, you need to know a bit about the team you're going to be playing. You will know by seeing this:     Click on the name of your next opponent, and you'll be taken to their team tactics page…       Step 2. View Team Layout This is where you see how you've got your basic tactics and team set up. All your choices made in Tactics are on the left, and the lines selected in Team Management are on the right showing (at first) the faces of your 'Line A' players. You can click on Line B and C to see who is on each line there too. The best thing about this is that any players injured or missing will have their picture altered, so you can see at a glance if you need to make changes. The images are like this:           Step 3. View Opponent's Tactics This tells you what to expect your opponent to do when he plays you. At the top is information on the referee and the state of the ice at the rink the games are played on.     If you click on the referee it will tell you a bit about him, which is really useful in deciding how aggressively you play. There's also an Info button that tells you about the various different ice surfaces you will encounter. In fact, most pages have an Info button in case you get stuck or don't understand something. Next is the way your opponent will play you, shown as Playing Style, Instructions and Aggression. Make a note of these, because they'll affect the decisions you need to make.       Step 4. Tactics Once you've had a look at how your opponent is set up, you need to click Tactics on the navigation panel on the left. This takes you to your own tactics page, where once again you can see the Referee and Ice Conditions. You can still click on the name and picture of the referee for a reminder of how strict or lenient he is, and the Info button on the far right for an explanation of the ice surface. All of the parts you saw on your opponent's page are there on your own page too, but the difference is you can select your options to beat him.     Click on Info to find out what each style is all about. It will give you a few tips that might just help you counter your opponent's tactics. Once you've made your decision, click on the circle under your chosen style and it will mark that one as chosen.       This sets how you're going to play the game. You can choose to go for goals (Attacking), try to stop your opponent scoring (Defensive), or try and win by getting your opponent to try and score against you a lot (Counterattack). Some tactics work better than others depending on how your opponent's tactics were set up. Once you've decided which one is best for you, click on the circle under your chosen style and it will mark that one as chosen.       Always remember to look at the information on your referee (until you think you know them all well enough) because he is an important factor on how tough you're going to play this game. You can set your aggression level from Pansy for those referees that are very strict, to Psycho for the more bloodthirsty or wimpy referees! Once you've decided, click the circle under your chosen option. But be careful! Aggressive play affects lots of things that happen during the game.       Now you've got a game plan. The last thing to do is click the Confirm Button and you're ready to pick your team!       Step 5. Choosing Your Players On the navigation panel on the left of the screen you will see the Team Management option. This is where you decide who gets to play and who doesn't. It might look really complicated at first, but we think you'll soon get the hang of it with a little help from us! First you need to understand the things that are on the page once you've clicked on to it: There are 4 buttons at the top: These buttons show you vital information on your players, ranging from whether they're injured right down to just how good they are at passing. Everything to do with the abbreviations and icons is explained if you click the Info button - so you have a handy reference at the touch of a button!     The important part is the Line A, B and C boxes on the right. This is the bit of the game where you're deciding who is going to play where. Each line is made up of 5 players and a goalie. The most important thing to note now is that you only select a goalie on Line A. Once selected, your goalie will automatically play with all 3 lines.     You can see in the example the places on each line that chosen players will play match up with their Pos (position) on the basic info page. This is always the first page you come to on Team Management. You can experiment with choosing a team using the other pages later. To assign a player to a position on a line, the easiest first step is to order the players according to their Position. To do this, click on Pos and it will group the together by position. Now you need a goalie. Look at the players with a G next to their names and check that they don't have a or next to their name. If they do, you can't use them. They may also have a next to their name. In this case he is injured. You can click on the player's name to find out how badly, but if you have a Goalie with no icon by his name then that's the man for the job! To select your goalie, click your mouse pointer over the list-box under line A in the row his name is on. You will see the options for position. Click G. You've chosen your goalie! Now for the other players, on all three lines… You need two defensemen, a left and right winger, and a center for each line. Let's start with line A.     You've already got your goalie, so now it's best to choose your defensemen. Again make sure they're available (they don't have , or by their names) and then click on the line A listbox next to the defender's line. You will see: Click an option to choose. You can choose either LD or RD, but whichever you choose, your next defender on the line must have the other. If you choose LD and LD or RD and RD on a line, you'll be informed of this by an error page when you've finished.     Now you need to choose a left and right winger and a center. Again check they are available, and then using the same process as for goalies and defenders, put them into their positions. The main thing to remember here is that left wingers (LW) work best at LW and right wingers (RW) work best at RW. If you're lucky enough to have a player with just a W by his name, he will play just as well on either wing. Once you can see you have a G, LD, RD, LW, C, and RW in the Line A column your line is complete! Now you can do the same thing again for Lines B and C. You don't have to choose a goalie though, remember. Tip: Try not to have the same player on more than one line. It means he will get tired a lot quicker than his team-mates. OK, you're almost done! All you need to do now is tick the boxes in the PP and PK columns. These set who is going to play on the Power Play and Penalty Kill that sometimes happen in a game. If they're already filled in, you may want to leave them as they are for your first game. As long as there's 5 boxes checked in PP and 4 checked in PK then everything is read for you to press the Confirm Button.         Note: If anything goes wrong, you'll get an error page. The great thing about this page is that it will point out to you where you've gone wrong - making fixing the mistake really easy! Your team is now ready. You've got the men for the job and you've got your tactics.       Step 6. Advanced tactics This is not really something for beginners at the game, but by all means click on the Advanced Tactics option on the navigation bar on the left to see what exactly you can do to ensure a win, come back from going behind and so on. Advanced tactics can really turn a game around, and you can see how and why by reading the page that comes up when the Info button is pressed. To get you started down the path to a high ranking on SeniorLeagueHockey.com though, try changing the captain by clicking on the listbox and choosing a new player. When you have you will see a new face appear. If it's got a bandaged head or says "banned" or "AWOL" then try someone else. Once you've got a Captain, click Confirm Button to get ready.           Step 7. You're done! You've got your tactics set up, you have a team ready to play, and you've even given them a captain. All you need to do now is wait for that all important result!