Base Camp: January 2023

HEADS UP!  

Shipping Notice: Any hard copy orders received from January 16th through the 19th will be shipped on Friday the 20th.

Now available in PDF! The 2022 World Cup set contains all 32 teams and a cover card. This is your ticket to revisit, or perhaps revise, recent history in the grandest of all sports spectacles! How will it unfold on your table top?  Can defending champions, France, repeat?  Will Lionel Messi weave his own magnum opus and lead Argentina to the pinnacle? Or will rivals Brazil punch their ticket to the finals? Also watch out for potent squads from England and the Netherlands, who could rewrite the history books.

                      New for Stone Cold Hockey!

1967/68 Pro Season: This was the most-requested season in our informal online polling.  

• The SCH for Windows version is HERE.
• The PDF version is HERE.

The new PDF format features three team cards per page in landscape orientation. These are exported from Excel which has its own pros and cons. On the upside, we will be able to produce more seasons, faster, and keep prices in-check with this approach. Also, these cards have room for more depth in the goalie section, so they will match the computer versions.  On the downside, these cards don't look quite as sharp as ones produced with desktop publishing software. Fonts in the player grid are a bit smaller and color options are limited, but we hope it will be a good compromise to grow the catalog faster.

Free Community Content for Dice United

Now that many of you have become familiar with the Ratings Guide (released in November), there are a number of terrific seasons now available on the Dice United Home Page, including:

• Bundesliga 1997-98 by Enrique Temes
• MLS 1996 by Glenn Bonesteel
• EPL 2003-04 by Mike Schnepp
• NCAA 2022 by Scot Long
• NWSL 2022 by Andrew Rothman

Special thanks to these gentlemen for sharing their creations! We look forward to seeing what else you guys produce, uh... when you're done enjoying these seasons, of course!

Updates on the other things that are coming soon(ish)!

• Stone Cold Hockey, 1993/94 Pro Season: 80% complete, current target date: End of January
• Dice United, 2022 MLS Season:  50% complete. Still on track for February.
• Dice United for Windows and Dice United 2nd Edition: Early stages of development, these will be developed together, each reinforcing the other. The objective is to use computing power to refine some statistical areas, while expanding the depth and narrative through the table top experience.  The 2nd edition will be 100% backwards compatible with existing seasons, teams, and the Ratings Guide. Target Window: April-May
• LOB 2nd Edtion (aka LOB 20th Anniversary project) and Kings of the Ring 2010s.  This will become my primary focus this summer. Target Window:  August-October timeframe
• Untitled Robot Battle Game (formerly titled "Shrapnel")  I discovered that there is a video game in development by the same title, so it looks like I'll have to rename it.  Also as this concept takes shape, I'm leaning more toward using the framework of LOB as the basis for this game instead of paring down a huge RPG ruleset. More to come in the 3rd quarter.

It is wonderful that there's more going on than I can follow, but let's take a look at a few of the replays, campaigns, and projects using SMP games online.

On Delphi

• Tales from the Boxing Multiverse by JamieM209 – An immersive, well-written boxing campaign is always near and dear to my heart and this one has been going for nearly a year.  Now it is over 300 posts and is approaching 36,000 views. If you're a boxing fan, don't miss this one.
• 1983/84 NHL Replay by 7777bf  – This replay is moving along as he is into the late October schedule with plenty of "firewagon" scoring. It features key player images and box score style summaries.
• Diceroller1 – David is really busy these days with multiple campaigns/replays. He's the only one posting about GridZone right now, so I definitely want to give him props for that! Ha!  Check out his progress with the AGL. Also, he is spending some time with the 21/22 NHL, with a combination of written summaries and highlight list, this replay is a fun read. It's also good to see a contemporary season getting some attention.
• CCL Season 1 – MBaron (Mike Boling) and I have been conducting parallel seasons with the Central Cities League with SCH. Not a coordinated effort, it just worked out that way. Pretty cool! He pops in with occasional standings updates, while I have been doing short written summaries for each game.  His standings after 38 games is on the left. My standings after 40 games is on the right. Now I'm getting pumped for the playoffs!  Our dice agree that Dayton is awful! Meanwhile, Regina, the favorites on paper, have under-performed for me, but they are dominating in Mike's season.

On FaceBook

Speaking for myself, it is much more difficult to follow long-running campaigns on FaceBook, but there are several "mountaineers" out there who have continued to post regular updates on their sports worlds.

• More CCL Results: Dee Dee Mike completed season 1 and had Regina prevailing over Springfield in the finals to win the first Patrick Cup!
• Al "RedSoxFan" Loschiavo continues to delight us with links to his YouTube videos featuring lively narrative through entire fight cards using LOB for Windows.
• Sports Replay Blog by Bernard Stroum has also produced videos for his Greatest Middleweight tournament of late.  He has also featured some Stone Cold Hockey results as well.
• 1965 NHL Playoffs by Rick Teverbaugh: Rick has been sharing his in-depth, game-by-game write-ups from the semi-finals between Detroit and Chicago. Good stuff!

Thanks to all who continue to share your results and enthusiasm for the hobby! Just know that the time you put into it makes a huge difference for little game shops like mine!