Federal League 1920: The Prequel I May Actually Have Needed

With everything else going on, the craziest idea I've had is not restarting my Dice Baseball campaign... from the very beginning.  

Early on for the blog, I expressed my love for Dice Baseball, and even admitted that I ran my Federal League for 22 years, right up until the birth of my first daughter.   The old desktop didn't survive its time in the garage, and although I recovered a lot of RPG material when the hard drive was salvaged, the 2009-2016 seasons I did not have hard copies of just could not be retrieved.  A bit despondent over that loss, I shoved everything back onto the shelf in their binders and longed for a way to restart thing.  

It took the freaky snowstorms in March to ponder things, but akin to that show Yellowstone, I'm doing a prequel!

My Federal League always started after the failure of the original Federal League, so to build out teams for a new league was a cinch.  After years of worn out notebooks, dated word processers, and MS Works for the last storage, I have doomed Google Drive now, as everything will be stored in an online folder.  I even have a binder full of inexpensive loose-leaf to maintain all scoresheets.  

And, to avoid flooding the Gnomes with America's pastime, I started up a new blog: Federal League 1920.  Expanding things to eight teams, but maintaining 50-game seasons is gong to be chaotic, so I might as well write up very short recaps (sometimes in old-timey newspaper speak, other times), and help keep myself alert of other trends and issues each team is facing. 

(Kickstarter) Deadball, 2nd Edition

I may have no interest in current big-league baseball, but I've slowly rekindled my interests with Dice Baseball over the last month.   Even with those super-simple (and super-random) mechanics, I'm always interested in a new set of rules, and the latest Kickstarter for Deadball, 2nd Edition piques my interest.

While I believe the system I prefer couldn't get easier if it was reduced to coin flips, I have deep respect for a man who designed a baseball game to play while feeding his one-year-old infant, and still involve some player stats and polyhedral dice to resolve at-bats.   It's not Strat-o-Matic or AAPA, but there's just enough to it to ensure Hank Aaron has a better at-bat versus Sandy Koufax than Carl Sawatski. 

I'm particularly impressed by the campaign rules and sample, the Southern Circuit, and the Nine Pennant Race end-of-season mini-campaign.  I love the games in general, but if you can tie something to it, all that dice rolling as more emotional energy, and an enduring legacy.

For $7 you can get the PDF, for $12 you can get the digital and Print on Demand options (additional costs and shipping apply), and for $25 you get the new rules plus all digital on POD versions of the previous library of Deadball products.  

The Archaeological Reconstruction of My Gaming Record

One of the big things I did after the dead-stop phase of the pandemic last year was drop off my old hard drive at the local computer place to try to recover whatever they could.  I had them start on my Hackmaster GM Toolkit Folder, and those files were successfully recovered.  

The guy promised to keep working on recovering anything, but the drive was near dead when I got what I got, so I've officially written it off.  

There was a lot of miscellaneous crap that would make me wax nostaglic, but the loss  of the drive saddens me on two accounts. 

#1 - Five Eight seasons of my solitaire Dice Baseball Federal League that were never printed to hardcopy.  My 1995-2008 seasons have a proud spot on my bookshelf.  I guess the storyline ends with Boston finally winning the pennant and before they surmounted the mighty Washington Senators as the next dynasty.  Washington becomes a basement dweller with a move to Brooklyn and Baltimore relocates back to Providence, but Atlantic City never goes to Hartford... plus the league expansion of 2016 might have been the breaking point... if the kids hadn't taken away my free time.  

#2 - My Gaming Record.  Crammed on the right sidebar of this blogs is a lot of crazy data.  Figures painted, games purchased, want lists, but one of the craziest thing is the ten plus years of my gaming data.  

Under each year is each game I've played followed by two number (*/*).  The first number is the number of times I've played the game (sessions when it comes to games like Magic), the second is the number of times I gamemastered, moderated, or was teaching someone how to play.  Playing Settlers of Catan?  That's a 1/0.  Teaching Magic to some kids at the store?  1/1.   Running D&D for the group?  0/1.

Here's the scary fact, the 2009 to present on the blog is miniscule.  I had my entire gaming history recorded...

... since 1990

... on that blasted hard drive. 

It survived years of hand writing, more years of floppy disks holding word processor data, then PC floppies, and finally that old computer.  

With hours of waiting in between training sessions and testing sessions at work, I did a little historical research  and digital archaeological digging to reconstruct my gaming record.  I'm never going to recover the minutiae of how many games of Legions of Steel I ran for people back in, but  I could compile when I ran games.  

Those that know my weird gaming calendar know that this is complicated by the Fall con season, so I've done my best to put things into perspective.  

What's posted below is by no means complete.  Just while writing this out, I realized two glaring omissions:  a TORG game circa 2003, a Midnight Massacre game of Fire and Fury pre-kids,  and my entire 90's run of Talislanta.  

Here's hoping my Google Drive survives until I can finagle a hard copy of this.

#RPGaDay2020: Day 12 - Message

I'm usually ahead of myself when it comes to #RPGaDay posts, but today was going to cut it pretty close. 

"Message" is today's prompt, and all I was hoping for was a message on my voice mail:

"Hey ViscountEric, it's Bob from Top o' the Mountain computers. We've completed the data recovery on the hard drive you dropped off and you can come pick it up..."

Well into the pandemic, after the initial doom and gloom and depression that we'd never see another human being we didn't live with, I made my first attempt to declutter.  We had dozens of bags of clothes, toys, and household items reading for the Salvo, but one item was put aside, an old hard drive from a twenty year old computer. 

The desktop, running on Windows Millennium Edition, and a 30 gig hard drive, had served me well through the early 2000's  (the last days of dial-up).  It was my repository for two things dear to my heart: all my ttrpg info, specifically more and more detail about my homebrewed World of Georic, and over twenty seasons of data of my solitaire Dice Baseball leagues. 

In its final days of use, more than a decade ago,  it was relegated to an out of the way mudroom, and with the birth of my first daughter, the tower went up on a shelf in the garage and was forgotten about. 

Once restrictions were lifted on "non-essential" business, I dropped the hard drive off at the local computer place with a flash drive and simple instructions: Recover everything in My Documents, but if there were problems, attempt to pull at least the Hackmaster GM Toolkit, which had all my Georic notes, all the Hackmaster specific notes, and a character creation program that probably doesn't work on Windows 10.

I'll say this about our local repair place, communication has been pretty good and he's put in more hours than he's charging.  The hard drive is failing after a few minutes, so I'm grateful I didn't bug some friends for the cables and tried the transfer myself.  When he finally gets the last few files off, I'll be delighted to pay the man his going rate and see what files are actually salvageable, clean them up in a modern format and save the files in two spots.  

(Kickstarter) Pine Tar Baseball 1884

My love of Dice Baseball is as strong as ever, even if I never have a chance to play. 

I usually balk, when it comes to sports games on Kickstarter.  Most are either over-complicated messes or under-produced pipe dream from the creators.  I think Pine Tar Baseball 1884 might hit the sweet spot of the bat.

You're not necessarily pledging for the rules (there's a link to them on the KS page for free), rather its the APBA-styled cards for each team.  Most at-bats are conducted with a single percentile roll, referencing the card stats for the batter and pitcher.   A few follow-up rolls (d10) may be required under special circumstances. 

The main thing that appealed to me was the fact that the full edition uses the eight National League and 13 American Association teams from 1884. 

Pledges run from $2 for the rules, and two teams on pdf, to a $36 (plus S&H) for the boxed set with all 21 teams, scoring sheets, playing pieces, and dice.

It's not Dice Baseball, but I'm not that biased to know that this looks to be a great game.

(12 Days) #9 A Little Present for the Dice Baseball Fans

I get a lot of different searches leading people to my blog.  Perhaps not as sick and twisted as the ones that Jugular Josh gets on his, Where There Had Been Darkness, but enough that I'm careful with my words.

Although, as I commented on his post, I'm soooo creating a Diabetic Giraffe for Gamma World.

The one expected search that warms my heart either comes up "Dice Baseball" or "Fireside Dice Baseball.  It's a pleasant surprise that so many people are looking for a set of rules for a game that were published over 55 years ago.  I espoused my love for the game here, and despite not mentioning it all since then, the post and the page I made for the rules have had some significant traffic.  The rules page is my seventh most popular post/page of all time.  Not bad for blog dedicated to gnomes and geeky gaming.

After a few messages and comments, I finally added the rules for tagging up runners and stretching out base hits to Dice Baseball.  Go ahead, grab two dice and try everything out.  It will work beautifully.

And any excuse to break out The Second Fireside Book of Baseball off the shelf is worth it, just for the first page:

At any rate, this may keep a baseball fan busy, until pitchers and catchers report, starting February 11th. Enjoy!

Playing Card Football

"Last night's half-hour experiment while my wife was watching SVU was going through Goren's Hoyle Encyclopedia of Games looking for sports games.

There actually were three different baseball games: two using dice and one using cards. The dice games were underwhelming: Five dice thrown and the combined score is referenced. A lot of the numbers come up "ball" or "strike" which immediately threw me off. I hated that when I played APBA and I still hate it now. It drags out the game when some could just labeled "base on balls", while others were "strikeout." One game liked yacht/yahtzee a bit too much, giving bonuses for straights and five of a kinds, while the other gave completely arbitrary results

examples:
30 - home run, four runs score, even with no man on base
6 - triple play, three outs even with no man on base
5 - triple play, and any runs previously made in that inning are called off becuase the umpire reverses a decision.

What? Is the umpire drug testing players mid-innings and voiding AN ENTIRE INNING of play? Seriously. None of them have the simplicity of "Fireside" Dice Baseball, and although the "wtf?" results are rare, I believe it detracts from what should be a nice simple game for a rainy afternoon.

For the sake of completeness, I'll try the card version later on. It looks promising, despite the strike/ball fault included in its rules as well.

I actually enjoyed the Playing Card Football listed in the book. It uses one 52-card deck to play, and despite a number of situational "what ifs," it flowed like a traditional football game. Cards
have yardage values, from Ace =1 to King =13. Red is positive yardage, and black is a loss.

The offense is given four types of plays, with expanding "What if" scenarios using more cards:
Example: Draw play: draw one card. If run, ball is moved that number of yards. If black, draw another card. If that card is red, no gain. If black, team loses that number of yards, but no more than five.

The other three plays (Sweep, Short and Long Passes) allow for "exploding" plays: If the criteria is met, the player continues to draw cards from the deck, and so long as they are red, those numbers are added to the yardage gained. There are special rules for interceptions, fumbles, and sacks, and I won't get into special teams, but they involve more "what ifs" and a LOT more cards.

While Benson and Stabler were trying to figure out why women were having sex with John Stamos, I went through the deck of cards about five times and played a little solitaire version of the game. It was a 0-0 defensive slugfest with only one field goal attempt. Special teams ate up the decks (one punt normaly used about nine cards), and I only completed one long pass (25+ yards). Given the copyrights for the book are 1950 and 1961, it perfectly fits the era that it came from: Three yards and a cloud of dust, with a spectacular pass or special teams play for flavor. I might just try it again, and if I can find out the perameters of the copyright, I might post it up on the main page, next to Dice Baseball.

Dice Baseball

Some of you may have noticed the new page labelled "Dice Baseball". It looks as if, most click on it, go "hmmm", and go on their merry way.

Here's a confession that very few people know: My fervor for gaming pales in comparison to my love for Dice Baseball.

Many moons ago, when the closest thing to fantasy was the D&D cartoon on Saturday mornings, and the closest "wargaming" was a mish-mash of Star Wars and G.I. Joe figures fighting it out in the flower beds, there was baseball.

From an early age I've loved baseball in all forms. From the first warm day in the early Spring, to the kickoff of the first NFL game, we would be playing wiffleball in someone's backyard. My buddies would pretend to be Mike Schmidt and Don Mattingly, trying to smack it over the maple trees in my backyard. Ultimately we moved to baseball cards, crunching and comparing stats between part-time starters and utility infielders. My friend Scott Riley then showed up one day with HIS OWN LEAGUE, a couple of ratty sheets with team names that would make the XFL look conservative, make-believe stats and imaginary players. Occasionally, our wiffleball games would decide these 'fake' games.

Pretty soon, envy of a friend's ingenious idea, and a love for The Natural created my own League of Imaginary Players, focusing primarily on the 1980's version of the New York Knights. I tried mixing up box scores for game results, I even tried mixing up cards from the AAPA Baseball game, with limited results.

Then my thirteenth birthday hit.

The only thing I remember from my thirteenth birthday is my Grandfather giving me his copy of The Second Fireside Book of Baseball. It was a collection of tales, comics, photos, and odd references to baseball. This where I gained my appreciation for "old school" baseball, from Cap Anson to a certain leggy blond doing "The Stance"

Hidden within the middle of the book was a three page article, aptly titled "Dice Baseball." It was very similar to what I've typed on my page, plus rules for tagging up, sacrifices, etc. If my Grandfather gave me a Bible of baseball, these three pages were the Sermon on the Mount.

All throughout Junior High and into High School, I played solo games of Dice Baseball whenever I had a chance. Snow days, rainy days, it didn't matter, I was chucking dice and filling in box scores. Since my mom was stingy with notebook paper and I swear prices were twice what the seem today, I had little opportunity to keep track of stats, just a few players, positions, and I'd fill in the blanks... usually with the NY Knights winning, A LOT.

When I joined the gaming club at NCC, Dice Baseball came out. I actually got another Scott (Birkner) into it and he set up a west coast league, a new team for my Federal League (The Baltimore Bees), and we even had a "World Series" which Scott won in 5 games.

With a renewed fervor and a word processor, I finally put down the stats,schedules, and on something I could save, update, and PRINT. I officially set up a 6-team, 50-game schedule, threw out all the imaginary records and started the 1995, one year ahead. Since then the seasons ebb and flow, but somewhere on my old computer is the 2016 season, about 2/3 of the way through.

The author in the article praised the 2d6 system for it's realism. I'll warn you, it's perfect for a Koufax/Gibson era. Twenty-one and a half seasons of the Federal League sets the Mendoza line at .180, home run leaders would normally average 30 in a regular 154-game season, and an ERA of 3.00? Number five starter, if not middle relief.

This mostly random game has even created the special events Baseball purists love so much. I've had a few guys hit for the cycle, one four-homer game, a bunch of no-hitters, and even a couple of perfect games (the first one was Thanksgiving 1987 up in Vermont.. All hail Wayne Edwards of the Boston Clippers!)

What frightens me at times, is that I tell stories about imaginary players and teams that are far more interesting (to me) than anything on Sportscenter. I've grown to love some of these players and believe it or not, wonder how some of them are still playing (a random free agency and injury system keeps some of the poorer players employed much longer than they deserve, just like the Major Leagues.)

With the old computer in the garage, the game has been on hiatus since we moved two years ago, but it has risen again as the Facebook games become bleh and I will need something to keep my brain active during my three months of leave with two small kids. Can the Boston Clippers keep their title as best team of the decade? Can Ray Kennedy of the Hartford Blue Sox recover to win his third MVP title and remain the greatest home run hitter of all time? Can the upstart Baltimore Spiders, with C-level stars at best, make a run for the title? Will the Providence Commodores break the record for most losses in a season (three years after smashing the record for most wins)?

Play Ball!