Revisiting the Basic Game

After wrapping up my latest tournament, I was starting to feel a little burned out on Strat-O-Matic Basketball. I'd been playing nothing but modified super-advanced for quite some time now and it just seemed like I was getting into a rut recently. What to do? 🤔

Ah ha!  I decided that I would go back to where it all began and play a game of basic Strat-O-Matic basketball. Now, I can't remember when the last time was that I had played the basic game, but it must have been long, long, ago.

The first thing I had to do was go to my parts game box and find my basic action deck. Then, I hate to admit this, but I had to grab my rules booklet and do a quick once over of the basic game rules. 😳 Though, as it turned out, the only thing that I would not have remembered is that there is a double-team rule in the basic game, and how it works. So, after 15 minutes of prep time, I was ready to roll (literally and figuratively).

I chose the current 2023 season and selected the Philadelphia 76ers to face off against my Boston Celtics and man did I have a blast! The basic game was not only fun to play, but the statistics for my game were quite reasonable as well. Boston ended up winning 115-103.

Playing the basic game was so much fun, and such a refreshing break from my modified super-advanced game play, that I think going forward I will be playing the basic game on a regular basis, in addition to my regular game play.

If you're currently an advanced or super-advanced player only, who hasn't played the basic game since you were first introduced to the Strat-O-Matic basketball game, I highly recommend that you revisit the basic game. I'm sure glad that I did!

2023 Division III Tournament Updates

I'm just finally now getting around to posting the results from the 2023 Division III tournament. I'll be updating the tournament page each day with results. It was a wild tournament, so be sure to check back daily to see how it all played out.

Delusional ebay Seller - February 6th Edition

2008-09 Strat-O-Matic Basketball Card Set + Extras In Original Shrink Wrap 🤣

What in the world would make this person think that somebody would pay $901.00 for this Strat-O-Matic basketball board game season?!?!

Coaches Challenge

The Coaches Challenge, or "green light special" as Celtics color commentator Brian Scalabrine likes to call it, was introduced prior to the start of the 2020 NBA season and has played a prominent role in NBA games since.  As such, I thought it would be really cool to add the coaches challenge rule to my Strat-O-Matic basketball board game play.

Coaches Challenge Rule

A coach may call a timeout to utilize a Challenge to trigger a review of an F(1), F(2), offensive foul, or T result against his own team. Roll a 20-sided die. If the result is a 9 or lower, then the challenge is deemed successful (the call overturned), and the challenging team does not lose its timeout. If the result is 10 or higher, then the challenge is unsuccessful (the call not overturned), and the challenging team loses its timeout.

For seasons from 2020 - 2023, a team will be allowed a single challenge in each game. Beginning with the 2024 season, teams will be allowed a second challenge if their first challenge is deemed successful.

My research has found that Coaches Challenges have been successful right around 45% of the time, thus the 9 or lower mark on the 20-sided die in order for a challenge to be successful for this rule. As a side note, I like to refer to optional rules like this as "reality rules." These are rules that aren't implemented for statistical accuracy purposes, nor as strategical or tactical options, but instead are intended to add a touch of "realism" to the game.

Full disclosure, I stole the term "reality rule" from the 1987 release of TSR's "Top Secret/S.I." roleplaying game, which implemented optional rules to make gameplay seem more "realistic."

Here is a link to the official NBA Coaches Challenge rule.

Solitaire Game Play Options Update

The Solitaire Game Play Options document has been updated. The main change is in regard to the Determining Shot Type rules. In the previous version, if a player rated to shoot from both outside and inside did not attempt a three-point or penetration shot in certain situations, then a die roll against the shooting stars would determine whether or not an outside or inside shot would be attempted. That has been changed to a straight 50/50 chance of the player attempting an outside or inside shot, regardless of the number of shooting stars the player has.

In the previous versions, if a *I rated player, for instance, did not attempt a three-point or penetration shot, then there was an 83% chance that the player would attempt an inside shot and a 17% chance he would attempt an outside shot. A ****I rated player would have a 33% chance of attempting an inside shot and a 67% chance of attempting an outside shot in these situations. Obviously, when we get to the point where an Outside/Inside rated shooter may have an outside or inside shot, there should be a 50/50 chance of either occurring. 😣

Other changes were the fixing of typos and/or poor wording in the text in certain sections of the document. The new version is now available for download from the X Files section.

New Tournament Section

I've added a new Tournaments section to the blog, where I will post the results from my various solitaire play tournaments.

I mainly play with modified Super-Advanced rules in my games, which is the Super-Advanced game rules, modified by incorporating the rules from my Solitaire Game Play Options document. But, for the sake of variety (and comparison), I will also be playing tournaments using the other rule sets as well, unmodified Super-Advanced, Advanced, and even Basic. The formats of the tournaments will also vary.

Each tournament page will have the bracket at the top, which will be updated as games are completed, followed by a description of the tournament format and rules used during play. I will also provide a link to game notes and statistics for each game, and possibly even a link to the scoresheet used for each game.

My hope is that these tournament results will not only be entertaining, but informative as well, giving an insight as to how various rule sets affect the statistics generated by the game.

Record Price for Past Season Basketball Set

Holy Cow! A 1982 season basketball card set just sold for $485.00 on eBay this past Sunday. 😮I have been looking for out-of-print Strat-O-Matic basketball cards for over 20-years now on eBay and I have NEVER seen a set sell for north of $290.00. This must have been the "Holy Grail" set for whomever submitted the lone bid to win that auction.  I can't come up with any other explanation for dropping that much dough on an out-of-print basketball card set.

Now, 1982 is one of the two seasons from the 80s that I do not possess, the other being the 1981 season. So, I was watching this particular auction with interest. My thought was that there is no way in hell anybody is going to make the opening bid price of $485.00. I figured that I would wait until the final day of the auction and then make on offer based upon what I think is a fair price for that set, $300.00. Imagine my surprise, and disappointment, when I saw that somebody had actually met the opening bid price. Alas, I would not be adding the 1982 season set to my collection. 😔

This got me thinking about the sad state of affairs when it comes to the availability of past seasons for the Strat-O-Matic basketball board game. There are currently only fourteen seasons available from Strat-O-Matic for the basketball board game, 1999 - 2000, 2003 - 2007, and 2017 to present (after the 2023 season drops near the end of October). When the original printing of a season set sells out, that's it. Strat-O-Matic does not print any additional sets to restock the sold-out season.

That's too bad, considering that in today's day and age the ability exists to digitalize these out-of-print card sets and to either offer printed sets via print on demand, or to simply offer PDF files of those sets, which purchasers could print and cut out on their own. Instead, out-of-print of Strat-O-Matic basketball card sets are only available on the secondary market, which results in scarcity, and in turn exorbitant prices.