Cheating on Panzer Grenadier

[Matt W]

To expand just a little. SoM baseball is about managing a team over the course of a 162 game season. The decision aren't really within a single game but in how you choose to manage the team, who you play against left handers, when you bring in the junk ball throwing right hander who might give up a home run but typically gets fly ball outs, etc. To say that there are a ton of decisions in a single game isn't true but to look at the whole season and see how your pitching and platooning decisions come out is fun.

By SoM keeping the games to a 30-40 minute stretch, you are getting an entire season in by playing for only 100 hours, far less than, for example, Terrible Swift Sword, World in Flames, The Next War or The Pacific War. And you can do the whole thing solo and still have a very positive experience.

[vince hughes]

What's the appeal?

Andrew,

For solo play.... loads.

As a wargamer that, before the internet age, struggled to find adult 'live' opponents, I found that as a sports lover, a season long replay was akin to a campaign in the satisfaction it gave me. The thing with these games is that in general, the game system carries you along rather than decision making like our wargames do.

Given the stats your HQ throws up, I'm surprised you might not see the appeal. But on the simplest of examples, imagine replaying the 1961 season (I think it was) and seeing if Maris can replicate his 61 homers. Or maybe playing a Nolan Ryan life replay and comparing his on-table performances with those on the field of play etc ad nauseum.

For a whole season replay, you can compare team stats, individual stats and so on.

That said, I eventually missed my wargames and then discovered how the internet age had opened it all up again (for opponents) and ironically, this included boards and counter games too.

[Shad]

I guess it's hard for me to grasp because the real-world equivalent is readily available. There is very little chance I'll ever go through basic training and participate in NATO wargames, but I grew up in Florida where Spring Training was all over the place and messing around with pencil and paper and dice doesn't make sense to me when I could so easily go sit in the stands.

On the other hand, I was addicted to Football Manager for awhile when I certainly could never have gone to see a League game, so I guess it's equivalent with your situation...

But Matt? Playing paper baseball when you can go to see an MLB or AAA game so easily? Weird-o!

[Matt W]

Not so, this is before fantasy baseball came into its own (40 years ago I'm afraid to mention) and before my budget could handle going to more than 20 Pirate games (this is when they were especially good, in the 70s) a year, even in the cheap seats. At that time, we were lucky if one game a week was televised and heaven help you if it was a night game on the coast. I went to bed with a transistor radio turned on its lowest volume so my Mom wouldn't hear (If Dad heard he would come into my room and listen to an inning).

What's a kid to do when he lives and breathes baseball and can only see a game at most once a week? Get the dice and paper. Heck we even had a league. One of my best friends took the Reds and I had the Pirates and we played a short season of 50 some games.

I suppose that we were also candidates for the Future Actuaries of America, given our interest in statistics but we just thought we liked baseball... a lot.

[Shad]

Great post. From now on I will picture you in my mind as one of those kids from The Sandlot.

[tlangston28]

Not so, this is before fantasy baseball came into its own (40 years ago I'm afraid to mention) and before my budget could handle going to more than 20 Pirate games (this is when they were especially good, in the 70s) a year, even in the cheap seats. At that time, we were lucky if one game a week was televised and heaven help you if it was a night game on the coast. I went to bed with a transistor radio turned on its lowest volume so my Mom wouldn't hear (If Dad heard he would come into my room and listen to an inning).

What's a kid to do when he lives and breathes baseball and can only see a game at most once a week? Get the dice and paper. Heck we even had a league. One of my best friends took the Reds and I had the Pirates and we played a short season of 50 some games.

I suppose that we were also candidates for the Future Actuaries of America, given our interest in statistics but we just thought we liked baseball... a lot.

This is funny... When I was a kid, I had gone to several Cub games at Wrigley Field but the biggest problem there was that the games were all day games so school and no one to drive us there prevented us from going to a lot of games. (Always watched them on WGN). In any event there was a book called "Stuck on the Cubs" that described the life of a kid growing up on the South Side (White Sox country) that loved the Cubs. In one of the chapters, he describes a game they made up called Dice-de-dice baseball that laid out the rules to roll two dice and the results would tell you the at-bat outcome. I think I played out about a 40 game season that year and it was especially fun for me because it was the only way the Cubs would have a winning season and play in the world series.

[Hugmenot]

I suppose that we were also candidates for the Future Actuaries of America, given our interest in statistics but we just thought we liked baseball... a lot.

Not just a candidate in my case as I was an Associate of the Society of Actuaries for 10+ years before I let my accreditation lapse - I did not see much a point of spending $4,000-5,000 to attend a 3-day continuous education seminar when I had already moved to another profession.

My best guess is I played 15,000+ games of APBA Master Game and SoM combined so you could say I liked baseball a lot...

Also played plenty of other sports simulations ... there is no such things as too many statistics...

[zovs]

For me it's the other way around, my main squeeze is and has always been ASL, so when not tending to her wonderfully complex mysterious I will be fondling PG shortly. As I have posted elsewhere with over 500 games stashed about I have played a lot of stuff from about 1962 to 2012, I still own the old AH classics and a large assortment of SPI games I enjoy playing (smelling, love that old musty card board smell from 1972 for some reason). I got an itch to play SPI's 1812 soon and I am also thinking that the new Panzer and her expansions is looking tasty too.

I may buy Combat Commander and give that a go as well.

[beast013]

SPI's 1812 is a great game. I haven't played it in years but a great game!

For me it's the other way around, my main squeeze is and has always been ASL, so when not tending to her wonderfully complex mysterious I will be fondling PG shortly. As I have posted elsewhere with over 500 games stashed about I have played a lot of stuff from about 1962 to 2012, I still own the old AH classics and a large assortment of SPI games I enjoy playing (smelling, love that old musty card board smell from 1972 for some reason). I got an itch to play SPI's 1812 soon and I am also thinking that the new Panzer and her expansions is looking tasty too.

I may buy Combat Commander and give that a go as well.

[Dean_P]

Not so, this is before fantasy baseball came into its own (40 years ago I'm afraid to mention) and before my budget could handle going to more than 20 Pirate games (this is when they were especially good, in the 70s) a year, even in the cheap seats. At that time, we were lucky if one game a week was televised and heaven help you if it was a night game on the coast. I went to bed with a transistor radio turned on its lowest volume so my Mom wouldn't hear (If Dad heard he would come into my room and listen to an inning).

What's a kid to do when he lives and breathes baseball and can only see a game at most once a week? Get the dice and paper. Heck we even had a league. One of my best friends took the Reds and I had the Pirates and we played a short season of 50 some games.

I suppose that we were also candidates for the Future Actuaries of America, given our interest in statistics but we just thought we liked baseball... a lot.

This is funny... When I was a kid, I had gone to several Cub games at Wrigley Field but the biggest problem there was that the games were all day games so school and no one to drive us there prevented us from going to a lot of games. (Always watched them on WGN). In any event there was a book called "Stuck on the Cubs" that described the life of a kid growing up on the South Side (White Sox country) that loved the Cubs. In one of the chapters, he describes a game they made up called Dice-de-dice baseball that laid out the rules to roll two dice and the results would tell you the at-bat outcome. I think I played out about a 40 game season that year and it was especially fun for me because it was the only way the Cubs would have a winning season and play in the world series.

I played a season of APBA in high school ('81 Season deck) with a group from school. Eat lunch and play a game. Was a blast, except that I had the Braves - who stunk.

But growing up, before we knew about APBA and SOM (which I have never played), my brothers and I played a playing card driven baseball game that we got from a box of Pop-tarts. Two complete seasons, where we kept books and played a "World Series". Was a ton of fun, and taught me how to keep score.

Do a search on "kellog card baseball game" and several of the games show up. There was also a football, hockey, soccer and basketball game, but the baseball was the only one we played.