FC 25 91 Mode Mastery Rodrygo Player Review

The Winter Wildcard promo has officially dropped with loads of objectives to complete and cards most of us will never pack… But ticking along slowly in the background is the Mode Mastery tokens and a variety of options for redeeming those.  The recent Attacking Avalanche EVO brings into question whether or not Rodrygo is the best bang for your, well, time I guess, and so this review hopes to shine a light on Rodrygo and let you make that decision for yourself.

The amount of time and effort that it has taken to acquire Rodrygo definitely made this one of my most anticipated reviews of the year so far.  The idea that all of that grind could essentially go down the drain with a bad “feel” or poor Passing/Shooting animations was on my mind with each and every individual submission towards the completion of this card.  However, if the NIF version was any indication this was always going to be a zero regret completion.  

Been a lot of changes in some of my formations lately as there just doesn’t seem to be one for me so far this year.  The 4-2-1-3 has emerged as a favorite since the Salah POTM forced me to spread my wings (literally), and offered a solid option to try Rodrygo off of the right.  While the 4-1-2-1-2(2) has returned as well and again worked perfectly to test Rodrygo in a two man striker formation.  In both cases the HAWK Chemistry Style just seemed best for this one and all was set to dive into another Weekend League graft.  The hope was that Rodrygo could master the Champs mode all weekend long in the following squad:

Rating: 9/10

Maybe it is just copium that you can simply grab a card, spend 250k,  and turn them into a similar option to Rodrygo when I spent hours on the grind… But this card is exactly what I hoped for.  I knew from the NIF version earlier in the year that I would like the movements of Rodrygo, and now the Mode Mastery version is simply Rodrygo on steroids.  The 7 goals and 3 assists in 5 matches (3 rage quits) speaks to how ruthless this card was in game and more than that it was key to getting my squad up the pitch with his Pace, Dribbling and general movement.   

Main Statistics – Movement

Skills: ★★★★★

Pace Rating: 10/10 

Dribbling Rating: 10/10

PlayStyles: Technical Plus, Flair

No RAPID, no QUICK STEP, no problem… Rodrygo has enough statistics in the bank to more than make up for those deficiencies.  It does make a guy wonder just how cracked Rodrygo could be if he had either or both of those, but overall I was never crying out for either as the 99 ACCELERATION & 97 SPRINT SPEED felt incredibly fast on top of the EXPLOSIVE AcceleRATE.

The 5 STAR SKILLS are always lost on my hands but for those that also apply those dark arts they are their to exploit along with the FLAIR PlayStyle.  For those of us mere mortals the 92 AGILITY, 89 BALANCE & 94 DRIBBLING create a responsive feel and cause nightmares for defenders.  Again the EXPLOSIVE AcceleRATE helps with darting into the spaces you can create with the touch tight dribbling and from there it is simply picking the best option to produce the finish.

Value/Time

Value/Time: 5/5

Bit of a change up in this category as Rodrygo essentially cost me nothing but the time that I was willing to put into grinding throughout the week… Which given the gameplay some nights felt more like it was costing everything, but that is a debate for another time.  In terms of the value for the tokens I submitted, it is impossible to disregard the ICON picks that you see online that have the best of the best in them… But then you see those that have absolutely nothing and knowing that Rodrygo is going to be a cracked addition to the squad and a link to Bellingham long-term, and I think I made the right choice. 

Good vs. Bad 

Good vs Bad Rating: 5/5

Maybe more than the quality of the movement with this card I was impressed with the lack of a “weak spot” and in all aspects Rodrygo was able to contribute to the success of the squad in one way or another.

+ The Shooting was always going to be the make or break and of course the lack of a 5 STAR WEAK FOOT was going to keep the rating from perfection.  However the 97 FINISHING, 91 SHOT POWER & 92 LONG SHOTS were bolstered by the FINESSE SHOT PlayStyle and more often than not Rodrygo finished the chances he should have.  The DEAD BALL PlayStyle is another nice addition and makes sure that I have someone with that talent in my squads moving forward.

+ The Passing and Physical I would put into the same category despite having zero to do with one another.  In both cases I was concerned about the lack of PlayStyles and lower statistics… And in both cases I was pleasantly surprised time and time again throughout the review.  The 89 SHORT PASSING was enough to make sure that my passes were finding their targets and the 3 assists is proof that enough of those found their mark in dangerous areas.  Along the same lines the 71 STRENGTH was always a concern but I noticed nothing different than the forwards I have used previous.  There were moments where Rodrygo was bounced off the ball, but there were also moments that Rodrygo looked jammy enough to cause any defender issues.

Closing Words

For those that are saying the Attacking Avalanche makes Rodrygo Mode Mastery obsolete I would argue that in both cases the cards you get from completing it will be worth more than the 250k for the EVO.  In fact if you take the Base Statistics for Rodrygo of 94 Pace, 88 Shooting, 88 Passing..etc. you will find that there are only 4 cards in the game that can compete… The cheapest being Winter Wildcard Hansen at 2.63 million.  There are some cards that start to show up if you lower some of these categories but from a pure statistics perspective, Rodrygo is extremely hard to match in this game, and his play on the pitch more than backed it up.  While I won’t sit here and say this is a must, must, must complete… I have zero regrets.

Hoping you are well.  Enjoy your holidays. Cheers for reading.