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Computer
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
Upgrade Policy................................1
Exchange
and refund policy....................1
CHAPTER 1
– INTRODUCTION
Description of game...........................2
CHAPTER 2
– INSTALLATION
System Requirements...........................3
Installation..................................3
Loading The Game..............................3
Pick
League to Work With......................4
Configure
System..............................4
Exit
Program..................................4
CHAPTER 3
– A QUICK TUTORIAL
Tutorial......................................5
Important
Notes...............................8
CHAPTER 4
– GAME FUNCTIONS
Restore Saved Game............................9
Program Computer Coach........................9
Non-League Games..............................9
STARTING
GAMES:
Playing Games.................................9
Which
Days....................................9
Summary Files................................10
Automatic Games..............................10
Box Score When...............................10
Box Score Where..............................10
Game Files...................................10
Injuries.....................................10
Rest.........................................10
Event
Definition.............................10
Important
Note About Interrupting Autoplay...11
Manual
Games.................................11
UPDATE
PREFERENCES:
Shot
Grid....................................11
Sound Error..................................11
Game Files...................................11
Visiting Team / Home Team Coaches............11
Display What.................................11
Video
Clips..................................12
VGA
Graphics Delays..........................12
Text
Delay...................................12
GAME PLAN:
Computer
Coach Instructions..................12
Edit
Lineups.................................12
Duplicate
Lineups............................12
Let
Computer Set Lineups.....................12
Scouting
Report..............................12
Set
Eligible Players.........................13
Export
Game Plan.............................13
Import
Game Plan.............................13
LINEUP
SCREEN:
Lineup
Screen................................14
Fatigue......................................14
Defender’s
Positioning.......................14
Team.........................................14
Sub..........................................14
Swap.........................................14
Assign.......................................14
Block........................................15
In/Out.......................................15
2-Team.......................................15
Safe.........................................16
Vs.
Out......................................16
Offense......................................16
Defense......................................16
Let Comp
Suggest.............................16
Get Box
Score................................17
Scout
Report.................................17
Timeout......................................17
GAME PLAY
AND ICONS:
Game
Play....................................17
3–Pts........................................17
Outside......................................17
Pen..........................................17
In...........................................17
Power........................................17
Fast.........................................17
Let
Comp Suggest.............................17
Continue.....................................17
Bench........................................18
Free.........................................18
Pass.........................................18
1-PG.........................................18
2-SG.........................................18
3-SF.........................................18
4-PF.........................................18
5-C..........................................18
Hold.........................................18
Time.........................................18
Get Box
Score................................18
Scout
Report.................................18
Update
Pref..................................18
Score
Board..................................18
Exit.........................................18
CHAPTER 5
– GENERAL MANAGER
LEAGUE
MAINTENANCE:
Create A
New League..........................20
Update An
Existing League....................20
Restart A
League.............................20
Delete A
League..............................20
Schedule
League Games........................20
Schedule A
Game..............................21
Delete A
Game................................21
Change
Starting Date.........................21
Generate A
Schedule..........................21
Print
Schedule...............................21
Blanking
Out Schedule........................21
TEAM
MAINTENANCE:
View Team
Roster.............................21
Copy A
Team..................................21
Copy A
Team Without Players..................22
Update An
Existing Team......................22
Delete A
Team................................22
PLAYER
MAINTENANCE:
Trade
Players To Another Team................22
Clone
Players To Another Team................23
Delete
Player From A Team....................23
ChAPTER 6
– STATISTICAL PACKAGE
Notes
About Statistical Reports..............24
Stats For
Player/Team/League.................24
Recap &
Standing Report......................24
League
Leaders...............................24
View Line
Scores.............................25
Game
Summaries...............................25
Work With
PRT Files..........................25
Process
Game Files...........................25
Import
Game File.............................25
Export
Game File.............................26
Delete
Game File.............................26
Delete All
Game Files........................26
Manually
Create Game File....................26
Get Box
Score................................26
Mandatory
Game Info..........................26
Visiting
Player Edit.........................26
Home
Player Edit.............................26
Save Game
File To Diskette...................26
APPENDIX 1
– PLAYER RATINGS AND STRATEGY
Players
Rating Descriptions..................27
HINTS AND
TIPS:
Fatigue
System...............................30
Using
Players Out Of Position................30
Using The
Board Game Cards...................30
APPENDIX 2
– STATISTICAL REPORT FIELDS
Description of fields........................31
APPENDIX 3
– TROUBLE SHOOTING
Speeding
Up The Game.........................32
Error Message [0007:2]
Reading
Copy Protection.................32
Insufficient Memory..........................32
Program
Hangs................................33
Printing
On A Serial Printer.................33
Telephone
Support............................33
APPENDIX 4
– SETTING UP DRAFT LEAGUES & PLAYING BY MAIL
Draft
Leagues................................34
Using The
“Profile” Screen...................34
Play By
Mail Leagues.........................36
APPENDIX 5
– BOARD AND COMPUTER GAME DIFFERENCES
List Of
Differences..........................38
APPENDIX 6
– BACKING UP YOUR LEAGUES
Copying
League Rosters To Diskette...........40
Copying
League Statistics to Diskette........40
Restoring League Rosters Or
Stats
To Hard Drive.....................40
APPENDIX 7
– STRAT-O-MATIC FILES
List of
file names...........................41
APPENDIX 8
– SAMPLE GAME SCREENS
Sample
Screens...............................42
PREFACE
UPGRADE
POLICY
Regular
customers will receive nominally priced game upgrades each year when they
order the current year’s roster disk. We hope to maintain this policy, but
we do not rule out the possibility of charging a larger upgrade fee if we
make major changes to the game.
Occasionally
customers who don’t purchase the new team rosters each year will forfeit
the option to upgrade after 2 years.
You will
always need the newest version of the game disk to work with the current
season roster disk. For example, the 1993-94 team roster disk will not
work with the Version 1.0 game disk (which was manufactured for the
1992-93 season).
EXCHANGE
AND REFUND POLICY
We allow up
to 30 days to exchange the game for other merchandise or a refund. All
exchanges must include the original disk and manual.
Should the
copy protection on your Master game disk stop functioning (an unlikely
occurrence) simply return the disk to us with a note explaining the
problem and we will send back a replacement ASAP. We will not replace lost
Master game disks, nor do we well this disk as a separate item.
-1-
CHAPTER
ONE – INSTRUCTIONS
The
Strat-O-Matic computer basketball game is based on the popular
Strat-O-Matic board game. The best parts of the board game (the individual
ratings and the realistic manner in which they interact) has been retained
and we’ve added some nice embellishments on the computer version. We
believe you will find that no other game on the market captures the feel
of basketball the way that Start-O-Matic does.
If, after
playing this game, you have any comments or ideas for improving on it,
please drop us a line. We are committed to improving all our games with
your help.
It is highly
recommended that you read Appendix One which explains the rating system
and some nuances about how they interact. You won’t need to read it to get
started, but we strongly recommend that you read this section at your
leisure if you want to get the most out of your players and team.
Appendix
Eight contains sample screens that can be referred to while reading this
manual.
-2-
CHAPTER
TWO – INSTALLATION
You will need
640k memory, a VGA monitor and a hard drive to play this game. You must
have at least 580,000 bytes of conventional memory available to run the
game. The game is copy protected method so you will need to have your
Master game disk handy to start up the game.
To install
the game follow these steps. The following example shows an installation
from drive b: to drive c:. Substitute the appropriate drive
letters for your system, but remember the game cannot be installed to a
floppy drive (it can only be installed to a hard drive).
Insert your
Master game disk into the diskette drive and type the following:
b:
install c:
NOTES:
You must type the hard drive letter after the word “install” as shown in
the above example. Please ignore the message “@echo bad command or file
name” if it occurs.
When the
installation of the game is complete insert your team roster disk into the
dirve b: and type the following:
Install c:
The team
files will be installed onto the hard drive. When this is complete you are
ready to run the game.
LOADING THE
GAME
Assuming you
have installed the game onto drive c:, type the following:
c:
cd \sombk
swish
NOTES:
IF YOU DO NOT HAVE INSTALLED ON YOUR SYSTEM THEN TYPE: “swish –m” instead
of “swish.”
If you get
the message “Cannot execute \sombk\swish.exe” or “Program too big to fit
in memory” please see the “Insufficient Memory” section of Appendix Three.
Enter
drive letter on which to search for valid initialization code:
Insert your
Master game disk (MASTER GAME DISK #1 FOR 5.25” USERS) and type in the
letter of this diskette drive (either a or b). You don’t need to hit the
Enter key after typing in the drive letter. The Master disk will be
checked for the copy protection which takes a few seconds. When it’s
complete you will be presented the main game menu. You can put away your
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Master game
disk now; it won’t be needed until the next time you load the game.
When you’re
at the main game screen you can choose between “Basketball Game” which is
described in chapters three and four, “General Manager Functions”
described in Chapter Five, “Statistical Functions” described in Chapter
Six, “Pick League To Work With”, “Configure System” and “Exit Program.”
The final three choices are described here:
PICK LEAGUE
TO WORK WITH: When you first start the game the league (displayed in the
upper left hand portion of the screen) is shown as “Not Selected.”
However, when you go into a function you will normally be asked which
league to work with. The first time you select a league it becomes the
“active league” and it’s name is printed in the upper left hand portion of
the screen. Most functions will use this “active league” so that you are
not constantly being asked which league you wish to work with. If at any
time you wish to make another league the “active league” simply select
this function from the main menu and select the new “active league.”
CONFIGURE
SYSTEM: This function is used to configure the computer game. You can set
the drive letter of the League Disk (this is the hard drive that you
installed the team roster disks to).
You can also
specify the letter of the “Work Drive,” a diskette drive (A or B) where
certain functions will read from or write to. For example, when you export
a computer game plan to diskette it will be written to the “Work Drive.”
Another item
that can be set is the “Double Strike Printer” field. Normally this should
be set to an up-arrow which indicates your wish to double strike the
headings on a printer (this causes them to appear in bold type). If your
printer doesn’t print these headings in bold, but instead prints two lines
of heading, then you can set this field to a down-arrow which will shut
off double striking. To toggle between an up-arrow and a down-arrow simply
select the field with your mouse or use the cursor keys to get to the
field and then hit the space bar.
You can also
specify whether or not you want the icons to display. Normally the icons
should be displayed for aesthetic purposes. However, if you have a slow
machine you will find that the game will play faster if you don’t use the
icons. When you choose to shut the icons off a small rectangle and
optional text are displayed in place of the icon.
The final
item that can be configured is the mouse. If you don’t have a mouse this
should be set to a down-arrow. Otherwise you should set this field to an
up-arrow. But remember, if you don’t have a mouse you should always start
the game with the “swish –m” command.
EXIT PROGRAM:
Allows you to exit the game. You will be given a “final warning” message
that verifies you really want to exit the game. Entering Yes to this final
warning will cause the program to exit back to DOS.
-4-
CHAPTER
THREE – A QUICK TURORIAL
As you
navigate through the menu system you will notice it is icon driven and
quite easy to use. You can use your mouse to click on an icon, or use the
underlined letter to activate a choice. On certain screens there will be
ACCEPT, CANCEL, and/or CONTINUE buttons displayed. Their meanings should
be obvious. On screens where data entry is allowed you can use the Insert
key to toggle between insert and overlay mode. Insert mode is indicated by
a read line, overlay mode is indicated by a yellow line.
Select
“Basketball Game” and you will be allowed to play a league game, a
non-league game, restore a saved game or program the computer coach.
A league game
is one where statistics will be accumulated. A non-league game plays just
like a league game, but at the end of the game no statistics are written
to disk.
You will
probably want to get going right away so why not select to play a league
game at this point and we’ll go through the options that are available to
you. Don’t worry that the game will start accumulating statistics – you
can simply run the “Restart A League” function at a later date to zero out
the league statistics.
Once you’ve
selected to play a league game you will be prompted to choose that league.
Each year has two leagues associated with it – a “D” and an “N” league
(for example: 1992-93D and 1992-93N). The “D” league contains no players
and is only used when you wish to setup your own draft league. You won’t
be doing this now, but the process for setting up a draft league is
described in Appendix Four. For now select the “N” league (“N” stands for
NBA).
Then you will
be presented with the first day of the league’s schedule. You can navigate
through the schedules by using the “Next Day,” “Previous Day” and “Jump to
a Day” options. Try this now. When you’re finished experiencing then
simply jump to a day in the schedule where there is only 2 or 3 games
schedules and we’ll continue our tutorial (for the 192-93 season you can
jump to day 11).
You will
notice that all the games are set to “Automatic” which means if you
started playing the league games all of them would be played automatically
by the computer. We’ll want to play one game from this day manually, so
decide which game you’d like to play for this tutorial. Use the “Change
Auto/Manual/Hold” option to change this game to a manual game.
Now select
the “Start Game” option. You will be presented with a menu that asks you
which days you wish to play and whether or not you wish to save summary
files. Select “Current day only” and “Save Summary Files.” Then “Accept”
this screen.
You will now
receive a menu with options. Set the options as follows: Box score only
for event, save box-score to file, no game files, no injuries and full
auto rest. These options will be explained later in the manual so just set
them as shown above and then “ACCEPT” the screen.
-5-
Since we said
we wanted a box score only for an event another menu will now be shown
which asks you which events you would like to receive a box score for.
This way when games are played automatically by the computer you can have
a box score saved only when your pre-defined events occur. There are
pre-defined events already displayed on your screen. You can alter these
now if you choose. When you are finished “Accept” the screen.
The game(s)
that were marked for automatic play will begin. The amount of time each
game takes to autoplay varies dramatically based upon your computer type.
A 486-33Mhz machine can play each game in about 2 to 3 seconds, while a
386-25Mhz machine needs about 30 for each game. (NOTE: FOR OPTIMUM SPEED
YOU SHOULD BE USING A DISK CACHE SUCH AS SMARTDRIVE – SEE APPENDIX THREE
FOR MORE INFORMATION).
When the
autoplay game(s) are complete you will be presented a Preference menu. Set
the options as follows: Regular shot grid, sound is on, no game fiels, no
injuries, human coaches visiting team, computer coaches home team, show
all action ,use video clips. Leave the VGA Graphic Delay and the Text
Delay alone – don’t change their default values. When this is done,
“ACCEPT” the screen.
Now you’ll be
presented the computer coach screen for the visiting team. Select the “Let
computer choose lineups” option and the computer will set up a game plan
for your team (this game plan will only be used if the computer is to
coach your team – an option we will explore later in this tutorial). After
the lineup has been filled out by the computer, you can “Continue” with
the game.
Now the
computer will automatically set the lineup for its team. When it’s
finished “Continue” with the game.
At this point
you will see the Lineup Screen which lets you make substitutions and
control your strategy settings. You should first try the Scouting Report.
Choose “Scout Report” and then select a player or two and you’ll be
presented a graphic screen which shows his strengths and weaknesses. The
longer the black bar listed under each category the better the player is
in the category (note that a grey bar is displayed to indicate the maximum
length of a black bar). Look at a few players to get an idea of the depth
of our ratings system. And please keep in mind that most of these ratings
are derived not through purely statistical means, but through the hard
work of studying and watching the player’s real life tendencies (For more
on this subject see Appendix One).
When you’re
finished looking at the scouting report simply “Continue” and you’ll be
back in the lineup screen.
There are
other options available, but for the tutorial just select “Let Comp
Suggest” which will automatically set some of the strategy options for
your team. That’s enough to get going so after you’ve selected that you
can “Continue” with the game.
You’ll
receive a final warning message – select Yes to continue. The game screen
will now appear. The left hand portion of the screen is a basketball
court. Below this is an area where the play-by-play displays.
-6-
The top right
portion of the screen has the scoreboard. The 24 second clock is located
to the left of the scoreboard. Below this area all players currently in
the game are listed. And the lower right hand portion of the screen is
where the icons will appear when you have a decision to make.
The
basketball will appear on the game screen and zip back and forth as the
players pass the ball. When a player shoots you will see a small digitized
picture of a player shooting and then the ball will head toward the basket
and either flash (indicating a basket) or bounce away from the rim if it’s
a miss. If the VGA action is too slow or too fast then use the “Update
Pref” option to adjust the VGA Graphic Delay (the larger the number the
slower the ball will travel on the screen). Similarly, if the speed of the
play by play text is not to your liking you can adjust the Text delay.
You’ll notice
that when a rebound occurs, the two players trying for the ball will
appear with bars next to their names. The longer the bar the better
rebounder that player is. The bars not only tell you who got the rebound,
but it helps you see the relative strength of the rebounders.
When the
computer’s team is in control of the ball he will make the decisions for
that team. However, when your team gains possession of the ball you will
usually have a decision to make. You might have to decide which player to
pass the ball to. Or if a player is in position to shoot, you might have
to decide which type of shot to take. Sometimes you’ll have a choice of an
Outside or Penetration shot. Sometimes you’ll have to choose between a
normal inside move and a Power move. Sometimes a switch will occur and
you’ll have your choice of any type of shot vs. the defender. Play with
the game for a little bit just selecting the first choice that is
presented by the icons. This will give you a feel for the game.
Notice when
your player has a choice of shots that the bottom left hand portion of the
screen displays 4 lines of information for each type of shot he can take.
They are Offense, Defense, Must Pass, and GAME. The key to selecting a
shot is in the Offense and Defense portions of the screen. A bar will show
under each type of shot that the player is eligible to take. The longer
the bar the better it is for the offense (this applies to both the Offense
and Defense sections). So the best shot will normally be the one which has
the longest “total” line if you added the lines from the Offense and
Defense sections together.
However,
other factors will come into play in your decision. For example, if your
high scoring guard is in foul trouble you should refrain from penetrating
as much as you normally would for fear of drawing an offensive foul.
Conversely, if the opposing defensive layer is in foul trouble you might
take him inside (even if it’s not your offensive players strongest shot)
so that you can try to foul out the defender.
Certain
players will have a bar in their “Must Pass” section of the shot screen.
The longer this bar the more often this player will pass the ball instead
of shooting. The GAME section of the shooting screen will indicate how
that player is doing from each section of the floor to this point in the
-7-
game (for
example 2/5 means he has attempted 5 field goals from that section of the
floor and he as made 2 of them). The GAME section tells you where a player
is “hot” form and can also help you decide where to shoot from.
For now, just
play along for a few more minutes. You should try different types of shots
and passes to get a feel for how they display on the screen. If you need
to get a timeout when the other team has the ball simply hit the F1 key
and the next time you gain possession of the ball you will be given an
opportunity to call timeout. You should also try to “Get box score” option
and the “Scoreboard Mode” options. After getting familiar with these
selections you can continue with this tutorial.
Now lets try
the Quickplay feature. It’s like Autoplay but it allows you to play
portions of games automatically and can stop and go back into manual mode
when you request it to. Hit the “Exit” icon and at the end of the current
play you will be given an opportunity to exit the game. Continue playing
until ou see a menu that comes up and allows you one of four choices:
Continue with game, Save game and exit, Exit without save and Quickplay.
Choose the quickplay option, then select the 4th quarter, then select 2
mintues left and finally select “Watch box-score.”
Sit back and
watch as the box-score is updated and the yellow bars race across the
bottom of the screen to indicate the score of the game. When the game
reaches approximately 2 minutes left you will see the “Contineue” icons
appears. You can study the boxscore to see the situation (for example,
who’s in foul trouble) and then “Continue” with the game.
Now it’s time
to finish out the game. Call a timeout and you’ll go back into the lineup
screen. Make a substitution now and see how easy it is to bring a player
into the game. The next chapter in this manual will describe the other
choices on this menu. For now just make a substitution and “Continue” with
the game.
After the
game ends (hopefully your team carries you of the court on their
shoulders!) the computer will autoamically save the game stats and you’ll
be given a chance to view the box score. You can choose to print it,
display it on the screen or write it to a disk file. When you’re finished
doing that you can exit the game and you’ll get back to the main menu.
That concludes our tutorial. The rest of the manual is dedicated to
describing in detail the functions of the game.
IMPORTANT
NOTES:
Please be
sure to read Appendix One to get some hints and tips on using the game.
Don’t forget
to make regular backups of your leagues rosters and statistics. It is very
important that you get into the habit of backing up your data on a regular
basis. You should try to backup your leagues after every time you use the
game.
-8-
CHAPTER
FOUR – GAME FUNCTIONS
When you
first choose “Basketball Game” from the main program menu you are given a
choice to play a League Game, Non-League Game, Restore Saved Game, Program
Computer Coach and Exit.
RESTORE SAVED
GAME: The Restore Saved Game option will restore a saved game from your
hard drive. Details on how to save a game are discussed later in this
chapter.
PROGRAM
COMPUTER COACH: This displays a menu that allows you to edit the computer
Profiles or the computer coach Gameplan. The computer Profiles are preset
for all team disk that Strat-O-Matic sells. You can use this screen to
define how many minutes each player is to play at a given position, among
other things. The information on this screen is used by the computer coach
as a guideline. Please see appendix Four for further details on this
Profiles screen. The Gameplan option presents the same screen that appears
before every game. This lets you set a gameplan for a team without having
to start a game.
NON-LEAGUE
GAMES: Non-league games differ from league games in the following ways:
They allow you to play a game between two teams from different leagues and
they do not accumulate statistics or allow game files (described below) to
be saved. When you select to play a non-league game you will need to
select the league and team for both the visiting and home teams. Once the
game begins all functions will work just like a league game.
PLAYING
GAMES: The remainder of the chapter is devoted to describing he playing of
a game.
When you
first enter a league game you will see the current league schedule. The
first day on the schedule which has an unplayed game will be displayed.
If you are
interested in generating a schedule of your own please see Chapter Five
(the League Maintenance section).
WHICH DAYS:
You can choose to play the current day only, all days in the schedule, or
up to a given day on the schedule. For each day the program will play all
games marked as “Auto” in automatic play mode (computer vs. computer with
no human intervention). Then you will be allowed to play all games marked
“Manual.” When all auto and manual games have been completed for that day
the computer will move onto the next day if you have requested “All Days”
or “Until A Given Day” option. Note that games marked as “Hold” can not be
played until they are changed to “Manual” or “Automatic.”
SUMMARY
FILES: You must specify if you wish for “summary files” to be saved.
Summary files provide a minute by minute account of what transpired in
each game. If you wish to watch other games on he “Scoreboard” while you
play a manual game, you must save summary files. In addition you can print
or view summary files with the general manager functions.
-9-
AUTOMATIC
GAMES
If you have
any Automatic games scheduled for the current day then a menu will appear
that asks you which options you wish to use with automatic games. The
following options are available:
BOX SCORE
WHEN: Lets you decide when to save a box-score for an automatic game. You
can choose “No,” “Always” or “For Event.” If you wish to save a box-score
only for an event then you will be prompted to define the events after you
accept this screen.
BOX SCORE
WHERE: If you answered “Always” or “For Event” for the above then you
must define where the box scores are to go, to disk or printer. You will
probably want to go to disk with them because autoplay will move quicker
than if you print them, and you won’t have to worry about running out of
paper.
GAME FILES:
Game files are an advanced feature which would normally be used only by
people involved in a play by mail league. If you plan to participate in a
play-by-mail league with other gamers you should read Appendix Four.
Otherwise set this option to No Game Files.
INJURIES:
Injuries can be toggled on or off. However once a player is injured
shutting the injury option off will not change o cancel his injury – he
still must be out for the specified number of games. We recommend against
injuries if you are gong to be using autoplay because if multiple injures
and foul outs leaves a team without any players to fill a given position,
then the computer will revert back to manual mode so that a human coach
can decide how to handle the situation.
REST: There
are three levels of Autorest: No, Partial, and Full.
If you choose
No Autorest then the computer will not alter your pre-defined eligibles
and gameplan. In other words, every game will be played with the same
gameplan. The option is not compatible with injuries.
If you choose
Partial Autorest the computer will not alter your pre-defined eligible
players, but it will generate a new gameplan before each game.
If you choose
Full Autorest the computer will generate a new eligible list before each
game, and then make a gameplan based on those eligible players. Note that
for this system to be effective you need to have at least 12 players on
the team’s roster.
We recommend
you use the Full Auto Rest system. This system can automatically make
players ineligible or eligible based on their usage. This will make for
more accurate replays as a given player who only appeared in 20 games
won’t be used in all that team’s games.
EVENT
DEFINITION: If you choose to have a box score saved only for an event then
this screen will also appear before your first Autoplay game. Simply edit
the event Definitions to suit your taste. If any of the pre-defined events
occur a box-score and a summary file will automatically be saved for that
game. Note that the summary file will be saved even if you have requested
no summary files.
-10-
IMPORTANT
NOTE: To interrupt autoplay games simply hold your finger down on the
Esc key until Autoplay halts (it will stop when the current game comes to
an end). Make sure to keep the Esc key depressed until Autoplay halts –
hitting the key one time will not cause autoplay to halt.
MANUAL
GAMES
After the
automatic games have completed (if any were requested for the given day)
you will be given the opportunity to play the manual game(s) that you have
requested. Before each manual game begins you can update your preference.
The “Update Your Preferences” screen can also be called during a game. The
following choices are available on this screen:
SHOT GRID:
You can choose a “Regular” or “Detailed” shot grid. The shot grid displays
in the lower left hand corner of the screen when a player has a choice to
shoot. It helps the coach decide which type of shot that player should
take. The regular shot grid shows one bar for offense and one for defense
under each shot column (the longer the bars the better it is for the
offense). The detailed shot grid breaks each column down into more thought
to make a decision. The length of each bar indicates the relative chance
of each result occurring. This offers a more complete understanding of the
risks and rewards for each type of shot, so some people might find it
better than the regular shot grid. NOTE: The pct. That shows in each
column of the detailed shot grid represents how often that player shot
from that area of the court – it is NOT the field goal%.
SOUND ERROR:
The only sound built into the game is an error tone that indicates a
problem has occurred. You can shut this off if you wish.
GAME FILES:
Game files are for play-by-mail leagues. If you would like further
information about them please see Appendix Four.
INJURIES:
This option is discussed in the Automatic Games section.
VISITING TEAM
/ HOME TEAM: This option lets you specify who is to coach the given team –
you or the computer coach. A hybrid method (“Human – only shots”) is also
available. Using this option will allow the computer coach to handle the
substitution and strategy options but the human coach gets to make the “on
court” decisions such as which shot or pass is to be made.
DISPLAY WHAT:
This option lets you choose what is displayed during game play. Five
levels of detail are available. “Show all action” is the most detailed and
it graphically depicts all passing and shooting and offers additional play
by play text. “Show Some Action” is similar, but some of the transitional
play by play is cut out and rebounds are quicker. “Show Only Final Action”
cuts down on most of the play by play and passing graphics, and
graphically shows you the final action which is normally the shot. “Show
No Action” eliminates all the graphical elements of the game and is
designed to speed up play as much as possible.
“Max Speed
(No Chart)” should only be used by people with slow CPUs or no disk
caching available. It speeds up the game by eliminating the graphical
court and the scoreboard (all action is shown against a black screen).
-11-
VIDEO CLIPS:
Sometimes when a player dunks the ball a VGA video clip will show the
play. They occur pretty infrequently but if you don’t wish to use them the
option is here to shut them off. If you hit a key anytime during the
display of a VGA video clip it will immediately halt and return to the
game. Note that on certain IMB compatible machines the video clips will
“fly by” very quickly. This is due to the clocking method used to display
these VGA video clips and cannot be altered. Also, the VGA GRAPHICS DELAY
described below doesn’t alter the speed of these video clips (it only
relates to the speed of the ball on the screen).
VGA GRAPHICS
DELAY: The higher this number the slower the VGA graphics will be. Set
this number to 1 for the fastest graphics available on your machine. If
this is not fast enough see Appendix Three for tips on speeding up the
game. You might need to do a little trial and error to get this number
just right for your configuration.
TEXT DELAY:
This is similar to the VGA Graphics Delay but it controls the speed of the
play by play text that appears in the lower left hand portion of the game
screen. A little trial and error will allow you to set this number to a
comfortable speed for you.
COMPUTER
COACH INSTRUCTIONS
This screen
allows you to define a “game plan” for a team. The top portion of the
screen is broken down into game segments. The first line is the first 6
minutes of the game, the second line the next 4 minutes, ect. There are a
total of 12 time segments listed, 3 for each quarter. In addition to
naming the lineup for each segment you are able to define if you would
rather run a Fastbreak or Halfcourt offense for that time segment. And you
can also specify which players are to be “positioned inside” on offense.
Positioning of players on offense and defense will have a great deal of
influence on the outcome of your games. Please see Appendix One for a
complete description of this topic.
EDIT LINEUPS:
Allows you to manually update the game plan including the lineups, OFFENSE
and INSIDE settings.
DUPLICATE
LINEUPS: Lets you copy one line to another, or to copy the first line the
other 11 lines. This second option works well in concert with the Edit
Lineups selection. First enter in the starting lineups with Edit Lineups,
then use the Duplicate Lineups to copy the starters all the way to the
end. Then you can go back and used Edit Lineups to indicate your
substitutes.
LET COMPUTER
SET LINEUPS: This is great tool for setting your lineup. When you select
this option the computer generates a complete game plan. All lineups,
offense and inside readings will be chosen by the computer. After the
computer generates a lineup you can go back and edit it if you wish.
SCOUTING
REPORT: This offers a detailed description of each player’s strengths and
weaknesses. The key to running a successful team is to understand how our
individual ratings interact during the course of the game. Please read
Appendix One for a complete description of these ratings and how you can
use them.
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SET ELIGIBLE
PLAYERS: This screen lets you toggle players between eligible and
ineligible. A player is eligible if an “E” is shown next to his name. An
“I” indicates the player is ineligible. “J” indicates the player in
injured. Also, for league play this screen shows the players current usage
as a percentage. 100% means this player is right on target to reach his
actual minutes played. More than 100% indicates the player is being over
played. Under 100% means he is not being played enough. Note that you
should always make 12 players eligible for each game.
EXPORT GAME
PLAN: This option lets you save the currently displayed game plan to
diskette. The game plan is written to the “work drive” (either drive A or
drive B, as defined in the Configure System option from the main menu).
Exporting a game plan is normally used for play-by-mail leagues so that
you can mail, or modem, a game plan to your opponent. However, it can also
be used to save a given game plan for later use by solitaire players.
IMPORT GAME
PLAN: This option impost a game plan that has previously been exported.
Simply insert the diskette containing the game plan to import and select
this option from the menu.
LINEUP
SCREEN
At the
beginning of each game, and when you call a timeout or go to the bench
during the game, you will receive the lineup screen. This screen is where
all lineup and strategy changes are made.
The left hand
side of the screen shows the visiting team, and the right hand side of the
screen displays the home team. The screen is further broken down into the
current game lineups (shown at the top), the team strategy choices (shown
in the middle), and the bench areas (shown at the bottom). The menu
choices are shown at the bottom of the screen, between the two benches.
The game
lineups show the players position, his name, his fatigue Status (under the
letter S), the number of fouls he has (under letter F), his offensive
positioning (I for Inside or O outside), the defender(s) assigned to cover
him from the other team, and his defender’s defensive positioning.
FATIGUE: The
Status (shown under S) is the player’s fatigue status. The same number is
also shown in the bench section of this screen. It also appears on the
main game screen and when you get a box-score. The status has the
following meaning:
1 = Player is
not fatigued.
2 = Player
will start fatiguing shortly.
3 = The
player has started to fatigue.
4 = The
player is fatigued.
5 = The
player is exhausted.
* = The
player is not fatigued and he may play until the end of the quarter
without fatiguing.
Note that the
players fatigue level is actually much more precise than the numbers shown
here. So once he starts to fatigue every minute he plays will have more of
a negative impact on his game. Fatigue affects both offensive and
defensive abilities including shooting and rebounding.
-13-
DEFENDER’S
POSITIONING: For an offensive player positioned outside the defender’s
positioning will be shown as playing Close, Normal, or Sag. For a payer
positioned inside on offense the defender’s positioning will be “inside.”
Other defensive notes are also shown in this area. For example, the
defensive “Block Man” will be identified. If a payer is “Playing Safe”
that will be shown. If an offensive player is double teamed a “dt” will be
displayed. A message will be displayed if an offensive player is Open (due
to double teaming or because he is positioned outside yet is covered by
the defensive “Block Man”).
The team
strategy choices are shown in the middle of the screen. The offense can be
either “Fastbreak” or “Halfcourt.” And the full-court defense can either
be “Normal” or “Press.”
The bench is
shown at the bottom of the screen. The players are listed along with their
fatigue status (as indicated above), their fouls, and the positions they
can play. The positions are listed as a number and they have the following
meanings:
1 = Point
Guard
2 = Shooting
Guard
3 = Small
Forward
4 = Power
Forward
5 = Center
The menu
options on the lineup screen are as follows:
TEAM: You
will notice that one team is shown in black while the other team is shown
in grey. The team shown in black is the “active team,” that is the team
that you make changes to at that point. To make the other team active
simply select the first icon show, the “Team” icon. Then the other team
will become active and you can make changes to it. Note that if the
computer is coaching the other team then you cannot make it active.
SUB: This
lets you bring in a bench player as a substitute. You will first be asked
which bench player is checking into the game, and then which player he is
to replace.
SWAP: This
will let you swap the positions of two players who are in the game. For
instance, you can flip-flop your point guard to off guard and vice-a-versa
with this function. You will be prompted to select the two players to
swap.
ASSIGN: This
lets one of your players play one position on offense and another on
defense. To illustrate, when you first start up the point guard is
assigned to cover the opposing point guard on defense. However, your best
defensive matchup might be for your point guard to cover the opposing
point guard. To accomplish this select the Assign function and you will be
asked which defender is to be changed. Select the point guard. Then you
will be asked which player you wish him to defend, and at that point
select the opposing shooting guard. NOTE: Changing defensive assignments
will cancel any double teaming that is in effect. Therefore you should set
your defensive assignments before double teaming an opposing player.
-14-
BLOCK: This
function lets you select a “defensive block man” who is also referred to
as the “defensive intimidator” in this game. This chosen player provides
interior defense and will try to block, or change the shot, of the
opposing players who penetrate into the lane. Naturally the “block man” is
normally a big man, such as your center or power forward.
There is a
price to be paid for using this feature. If the player that the “block
man” is assigned to cover is positioned outside on offense then he will be
considered “open” when he takes outside shots. Because he is open he will
hit a higher percentage of these outside shots. There is not penalty if
the player that the “block man” is covering is positioned inside on
offense.
Under normal
circumstances most teams will choose to utilize this feature. However, if
the opposing player is a good outside shooter then he might force the
defensive coach to forgo this feature so he can move his big man outside
to cover the offensive threat. To cancel the “block man” feature (so that
you have no block man) simply select this feature and hit the Esc key when
prompted to select the black man. The player that is normally chosen to be
the “black man” is the player that has the highest intimidation rating.
IN/OUT: Use
this to position your players inside or outside on offense. You may only
position 2 players inside on offense, he others must be positioned
outside. You can choose to position less than 2 inside, however most times
you will opt to choose 2 players because most big men are more adept at
scoring from inside. Remember that if you opposing team’s “black man” is
assigned to cover a player positioned “outside” on offense, then this
player can take “open” outside shots.
NOTE: Not all
players are rated to be positioned both inside and outside on offense. To
be positioned inside the player must have an “I” as part of his tendency
rating. To be positioned outside the player must have at least one “*” as
part of his tendency rating.
2-TEAM: This
function lets you double team an opposing player. You will first be asked
which player to double team, and then which player will be performing the
double team. Double teaming will cut down on the number of shots the
double teamed player can take, and it will also reduce his field goal
percentage. However, it will always result in leaving one of the opposing
players open. This player will take “open” shots whenever he gets the
ball. It is not advisable to leave a player open (due to a double team) if
he is positioned inside on offense, or if he is rated to “Create Shots” on
the scouting report. To cancel a double team simply select this option and
then hit the Esc key when prompted for the player to double team.
Only certain
players are eligible to double team. For purposes of illustrating the
valid double teaming combinations imagine that ht players are positioned
on the left side or right side of the court. The point guard and small
forward are on the right side of the court, the shooting guard and power
forward on the left side of the court. And the center, well, he’s uh . . .
in the center!
-15-
Using our
double teaming rules, players are not allowed to move across the court
diagonally to double team an opponent. Additionally, forwards are not
allowed to move across the court to double team the other forward.
However, the center may double team any opposing player and may be double
teamed by any opposing defender. The valid double team settings are:
Double-teamed Player Positions allowed to double team
Point
Guard SG, SF, C
Shooting
Guard PG, PF, C
Small
Forward PG, C
Power
Forward SG, C
Center PG, SG, SF, PF
SAFE: You can
use this function to have one of your players “play safe.” This strategy
will help prevent the player from picking up additional fouls. However,
the player will not be nearly as effective on the defensive end of the
court. To have a player “play safe” select this function and choose the
player. To return to playing normal select this function and the player
again, and he will no longer be playing safe. RELATED NOTES: If a player
is in foul trouble another good way to avoid picking up fouls is to avoid
penetrating. Penetrating increases the chance that a player will pick up
an offensive foul.
VS. OUT: This
option lets you position your players defensively. This is a very
important feature of the game that should not be overlooked. When you
choose the function you will be asked to identify the player your defender
is guarding. The player selected must be positioned outside on offense for
this function to work. When you select a player who is positioned outside
on offense the computer will determine which of your defenders is in
charge of covering him and then ask you how to position this player. The
choices are Normal, Sag or Close. Your decision will be based on a number
of factors and a complete discussion of this topic is found in Appendix
One.
OFFENSE: This
function allows you to choose between a Halfcourt offense and a Fastbreak
offense. Note that a fastbreak normally occurs after a defensive rebound
of a field goal attempt. It does not occur after a defensive rebound of a
free throw. Also, there are not fastbreaks after a team rebound.
DEFENSE: This
function lets you choose between a normal full-court defense and a “press”
full-court defense. Naturally when you press your team will incur more
fouls, allow more fastbreaks and force more turnovers. A press defense
should be used to aid in a comeback attempt or to disrupt the rhythm of
the other team’s offense. It should not be used on a regular basis.
LET COMP
SUGGEST: This is a handy little function that can be a great time saver.
To use this function you should first set the lineup the way you want it
with the Sub function. Then choose this function and the computer will set
the defensive assignments, black-man, offensive positioning, double
teaming, ect. For your team. You can then override any of these settings
if you wish.
-16-
GET BOX
SCORE: This option displays an in-progress box-score of the game. This is
a handy way to view all players personal fouls and fatigue status during a
game.
SCOUT REPORT:
The scouting report displays a graphical scouting report for a selected
player. The player’s statistics can be displayed as Totals, Per Game or
Per 48 minutes. His ratings are shown in graphical format with a back bar
drawn on top of a grey bar. The longer the black bar the better the player
is in the given category. The grey bar defines the maximum length of a
black bar, and is for comparative purposes only. Also shown are the
players “Create Shots” and “Tendency” ratings. All of these ratings, and
the way in which they interact, are discussed in Appendix One.
TIMEOUT: You
will receive this option only when you go to make a bench substitution
during a game. Since a bench substitution is not a timeout you will not be
allowed to change your team strategies (Halfcourt Vs. Fastbreak and Press
Vs. Normal full-court defense). If you wish to change one of these
strategies you must call a timeout to do so. You can use this function to
call that timeout.
GAME PLAY
Once you have
set the lineups the game begins. The game will flow along as described in
the tutorial section of this manual. If you need to call a timeout and the
other team has the ball simply hit the F1 key and the next time you gain
possession of the ball you will be given a chance to get a timeout. Note
that an offensive rebound by the other team resets the play and you will
need to hit the F1 key again to indicate you still want a timeout.
Note that
when a player starts to fatigue the background color around his name will
change from black to grey as a visual reminder.
The following
options can be selected during game play:
3-PTS: Take a
three point shot.
OUTSIDE: Take
an outside jumper.
PEN: Make a
move towards the hole (penetrate).
IN: Take an
inside shot.
POWER: Make a
power move inside. This is similar to an inside shot but it increases the
players chance of scoring a basket, drawing a foul and being called with
an offensive foul.
FAST: Take a
fastbreak shot.
LET COMP
SUGGEST: Let the computer coach decide which shot this player is to take.
This option will allow for a more “hands-off” approach to coaching your
team.
CONTINUE:
Continue with the game.
-17-
BENCH: Go to
the lineup screen to make a substitution.
FREE: Take a
foul shot (or “free-throw”).
PASS: Make a
pass to setup another play.
1 – PG: Pass
the ball to the point guard.
2 – SG: Pass
the ball to the scoring guard.
3 – SF: Pass
the ball to the small forward.
4 – PF: Pass
the ball to the power forward.
5 – C: Pass
the ball to the center.
HOLD: Hold
the ball for the last shot of the quarter. A steal or other turnover can
still occur when you select this option. Also, be careful not to hold the
ball too long or your team won’t be able to get a shot off!
TIME: Call
for a timeout. The timeout will be charged to the team currently in
possession of the ball. The number of timeouts available to each team is
listed on the scoreboard. The first number listed is full timeouts and the
second number is 20 second timeouts. When you call a timeout the computer
will automatically decide if it’s a full or 20 second timeout and it will
decrement that number on the scoreboard. NOTE: If you call a timeout in
the last 2 mintues of play you can “run a play” for the player of your
choice.
GET BOX
SCORE: Display an in-progress box score on the screen.
SCOUT REPORT:
Display a scouting report for the selected player.
UPDATE PREF:
Update your preferences. The preference screen is described in the section
on “MANUAL GAMES” earlier in this chapter.
SCORE BOARD:
Display the out of town scoreboard. This scoreboard displays the other
games that have been played on the current day’s schedule. For each game
the score, high- points leader, high rebounder and high assist man is
shown. This scoreboard is updated every minute throughout the game so that
in the final minute of the game you are playing you will see the final
scores of all the out of town games. To use this option you must specify
you wish to save SUMMARY FILES at the start of the game.
EXIT: Exit
the current game. Exiting the game is normally a delayed function because
the game must be at a logical breaking point before you can exit. So when
you select this function you will be given an informational message that
confirms your request. Then, when the next logical break point occurs, you
will be given a chance to exit the game. When this occurs you will have 4
choices.
The first
(“Continue with game”) cancels the exit request and puts you back into the
game.
-18-
The second
(“Save game and exit”) will save the current game to the hard drive and
exit to the main menu. You can use the “Restore A Game” function to get
back into this game at the point where you left off.
The third
option on this menu (“Exit Without Save”) indicates that you wish to exit
the game without saving it. Be careful with this selection because if you
choose to do this the current game will be lost.
The final
selection on this screen (“Quick Play Option”) will allow you to quick
play to a given point in the game. When you select this you will be asked
when you want the game to stop “quick-playing.” You can specify a given
quarter and time left, or you can let the game play to its conclusion.
After you choose the time you will be asked if you want to watch the
box-score. If you choose to watch it you can see the box-score being
updated as the game progresses. For maximum speed you can choose the
“Don’t watch” option and the screen will go blank until the game has quick
played to the specified point.
-19-
CHAPTER
FIVE – GENERAL MANAGER
The General
Manager functions will allow you to manage your league, teams and players.
LEAGUE
MAINTENANCE
CREATE A NEW
LEAGUE: Use this function when you want to start a new league. You can
copy teams and players into this new league. You do not need to specify
the conferences or divisions as they are optional. NOTE: If you don’t wish
to have conferences simply enter “1” as the number of conferences and
leave the conference names blank. The same applies for divisions.
The first 4
entries on the CREATE NEW LEAGUE screen are mandatory, as is the final
entry (GAME IN LEAGUE SCHEDULE). This final entry would normally be set to
82 games for a current NBA season. This field is used to compute the magic
number and also to generate the pro-rated statistics reports.
UPDATE AN
EXISTING LEAGUE: This allows you to update a given league’s information,
such as its conference names, division names and games in a league
schedule.
RESTART A
LEAGUE: This entry restarts an entire league by resetting all statistics
to zero and marking all games on the schedule as being unplayed. When you
select this function you have a choice of four types of restarts. The
first one (“Set All Games To Hold”) sets every game to “Hold” on the
schedule which will come in handy for play by mail leagues (see Appendix 4
for more information on this option). The second one (“Set All Games To
Autoplay”) marks every game in the schedule as an autoplay game. You can
then play the entire league in autoplay, or change any given game to
“manual” if you wish. The third choice (“Set All Games To Manual”) will
mark every game on the schedule as a manual game. The final option (“One
Team Manual, Others Autoplay”) will come in handy if you wish to manually
play your favorite team’s schedule while autoplaying the rest of the
league schedule. When you choose this option you will be asked which team
will be a manual game and any game not involving that team will be set to
autoplay.
The Restart A
League function is a long running function that might take a substantial
amount of time, depending on your hardware. The function will display
messages as it progresses through its steps to let you know it is still
running properly.
DELETE A
LEAGUE: This function will delete an entire league, its teams, schedule
and statistics. Even the game files and summary files associated with this
league will be erased. This function may take some time to run, depending
on your hardware.
SCHEDULE
LEAGUE GAMES: This function will bring up a menu similar to the one you
see at the start of a league game. The schedule for the league will appear
in a window on the left side of the screen and the available functions are
shown on the right side of the screen. The first three options (“Next
Day,” “Previous Day” and “Jump To A Day”) function just as they do when
you start a league game. The following is a description of the other
functions:
-20-
SCHEDULE A
GAME: This lets you add a game to the current days schedule. First you
will be prompted to select the visiting team, and then the home team.
DELETE A
GAME: This function will prompt you to enter the game number of the game
you wish to be deleted from the current day on the schedule.
CHANGE
STARTING DATE: This function lets you update the starting date of the
schedule. This date refers to day 1 of the schedule. The computer will
automatically compute the date of any other day on the schedule. It will
also handle leap years correctly when computing dates after February.
GENERATE A
SCHEDULE: This is the automatic schedule generator. Before using this
function use the “Restart A League” function against the league you wish
to generate a schedule for. After you have done this select this function
and you will be prompted to enter the number of home games within and
outside each team’s division. If you don’t have divisions then enter a
number in the “IN DIV” section and leave the “OUT DIV” as 0. The number
you enter is the number of home games each team is to play versus every
other team that falls within the specified category.
PRINT
SCHEDULE: This function will print this league’s schedule on a day-by-day
basis. You may direct this report to the printer, a PRT file or the
screen.
NOTE:
To blank out a schedule simply enter 0 in both fields and allow the
schedule to be generated. This will remove all existing games but it will
not schedule any games leaving you with a totally blank schedule.
NOTE:
If you are using divisions, and the number of teams in each division is
not equal, then the total number of games played by each team will not be
the same. The computer will generate a schedule based on the numbers you
input. You can hen manually add or delete games as needed in order to
balance the number of games for all teams.
TEAM
MAINTENANCE
VIEW TEAM
ROSTER: This function will print a team roster which includes the players’
statistics and ratings. This function is similar to the Scouting Report
feature in that all player ratings are shown. However, instead of showing
them graphically the player ratings are shown in text format. This allows
an entire team to fit on one or two pages. Please see Appendix One for a
complete description of the player ratings.
COPY A TEAM:
This function lets you copy an entire team from on league to another. When
you select this function you will be asked to choose the league containing
the team to be copied. Then you must choose the team that is to be copied.
After selecting the team you will be asked which league is to receive a
copy of this team. Finally, you will be given a screen that lets you
update team information as it is being copied into the new league.
Changing this information does not affect the original team. Only the
copied team is affected. The fields on the screen are self explanatory
with the exception of the FB style and the division.
-21-
The FB style
describes the percentage of time you wish this team to fast break. Enter a
“3” if the team is to always fastbreak, a “2” if the team only fast breaks
on about 2/3 of it’s chances and a “1” if you only wish this team to
fastbreak about 1/3 of the time. This information will be used by the
computer when it generates a game plan for this team.
The division
the team resides in might not exist on the new league. For instance,
Portland is in division 4 (the Pacific division) of the 192-93 team disk.
Let’s say you create a league with only 2 divisions in it. When you copy
Portland into this league you must change its division number to a “1” or
a “2” to conform to the league it is being copied into.
When you
finish updating the field on this screen “Accept” this screen and the
team, along with all of its players, will be copied into the selected
league.
COPY A TEAM
WITHOUT PLAYERS: This function is the same as the previous one except it
does not copy the players along with the team. This function should be
used if you plan to set up a draft league. Please see Appendix Four for
more information on using this function.
UPDATE AN
EXISTING TEAM: This lets you update a team’s information, including the
year information, the team name, nick-name and abbreviation, the team’s
actual won-loss record, the FB Style (see the previous discussion on the
FB style above), and the division the team plays in.
DELETE A
TEAM: This function will delete an entire team, along with its players,
from a league. A team cannot be deleted after a league has started. You
must first restart the league in order to delete the team.
PLAYER
MAINTENANCE
TRADE PLAYERS
TO ANOTHER TEAM: This function lets you move a payer between two teams
within the same league. To copy a player from one league to another
please see the “Clone Player To Another League” function described below.
When you
select this function you will be asked which league contains the teams
involved in the trade. Then you will be asked which team has the player(s)
to be traded. When you select this team you will be given a list of all
players on that team’s rosters. To trade a player change the down-arrow
located next to his name to an up-arrow. This can be done with a mouse or
by cursoring to the player with the keyboard and hitting the space bar.
Mark all players to be traded with an up-arrow, then Accept the screen.
You will then be asked to identify the team that is to receive these
players.
You will be
given a final warning, and if you want to proceed with the trade then
answer “Yes”. If you answer yes then the player(s) are moved from the
first team to the second.
In many cases
player(s) must be moved from the second team to the first team to complete
a trade, but sometimes this won’t be the case (for
-22-
example, when
a player is traded for a draft pick). If players are to be traded in
return, simply run this function again.
CLONE PLAYER
TO ANOTHER LEAGUE: This works just like the Trade Player function
described above with two differences. First, the teams must reside in
different leagues. Second, the player(s) are not removed from the first
team.
In practice
the Trade Player function performs a “move function” while the Clone
Player function is a “copy function.”
DELETE PLAYER
FROM A TEAM: This lets you delete player(s) from a team. The players are
completely removed from the team and are not stored anywhere else (they
simply disappear). When you first enter this function you select the
league and team you wish to work with. That team’s roster is displayed on
the screen and you are allowed to select which player(s) are to be
deleted. When selecting players to delete an up-arrow indicates he will be
deleted while a down-arrow indicates he will remain on the team.
When you are
finished selecting players to delete you have a chance to “Save Changes.”
If you wish to cancel the deletions simply hit escape on this screen and
no player will be deleted. If you wish to delete the players then choose
the “Save Changes” option.
-23-
CHAPTER
SIX – STATISTICAL PACKAGE
These
functions allow you to print or display your league statistics. There are
also functions available to work with GAME SUMMARIES, PRT FILES and GAME
FILES. Please refer to Appendix Two for a description of the various
fields that display on the statistical reports.
NOTES
ABOUT STATISTICAL REPORTS
Most reports
give you the option of printing the report, displaying the report on the
screen or writing the report to a file. If you write the report to a file
you can always view it or print it at a later date.
When you
display a statistical report on the screen you can scroll through it on e
of three ways: Either section at a time, 1 line at a time or 10 lines at a
time. A section begins with a heading, shown in read on the screen. The
menu to scroll is shown at the top of the displayed report and can be
activated with a mouse or by keyboard.
STATS FOR
PLAYER/TEAM/LEAGUE: When you choose this function you are given a choice
of “One Team,” “All Teams” or “League Totals.” “One Team” prints a
detailed report of that team. “All Teams” prints the same detailed report,
but it includes every team in the league (be careful – this report might
require a lot of paper!). “League Totals” prints a short league total
recap.
After you
make that selction you must choose how you wish to display the statistics.
The choices are “Show Totals,” “Per Game,” “Per 48 Minutes” and in some
cases “prorated Full Season.” The first three should be obvious. The
fourth choice will prorate the players’ totals as if they had played an
entire league. The resulting report shows you the “pace” the players are
on. For example, if a player has played 1 game and scored 30 points he is
on a pace to score 82 times 30 or 2460 points. The Prorated Full Season
report would show this player as having played 82 games and scored 2460
points.
RECAP &
STANDING REPORT: When you first select this option you will notice six
different items with arrows next to them. The recap report is comprised of
these six items: WON/LOSS BREAKDOWN, SCORING GRID, WON/LOSS GRID, TEAM
HIGHS & LOWS and TRIPPLE DOUBLES. We suggest you choose to view all of
these sections the first time you use this report and then decide which
you will normally want to print. The next time you use this report simply
set the sections that you don’t want printed to a down-arrow.
LEAGUE
LEADERS: Just as with the Recap & Standings report you can pick and choose
which sections of the league leaders you wish to print. The first item
that you can set is the number of league leaders to print fo reach
category. Then you have 4 sections that can be printed: Primary Leaders
Page, Raw Total Leaders Page, Per 48 Minute Leaders and Individual Game
Highs. Note that for the Game Highs category a maximum of 10 leaders can
be printed. For the other categories a maximum of 50 leaders can be
listed.
-24-
VIEW LINE
SCORES: This will display a “line score” for each game that has been
played. One game is printed per line and the information displayed
includes the final score, and the players who led the game in points,
rebounds and assists. You can choose to display the line scores for one
team or for the entire league.
GAME
SUMMARIES: Game summaries are an option that can be turned on or off a the
start of the game. If you have chosen to save the game summaries then on e
game summary file sis saved per game. The information is very similar in
format to the Line Scores discussed above, but for each game there are 48
lines of detail that show the “linescore” at the end of each minute of
play. This is a great way to see when a team made its comeback surge and
other interesting details about a game. When you first select this
function you can choose between viewing the SUM files, deleting a single
SUM file or deleting all SUM files.
WORK WITH PRT
FILES: PRT files are generated through the statistical package, the
General Manager package and the game itself. For instance, if you write a
box-score to a file it becomes a PRT file. Selecting this function lets
you view, print or delete a single PRT file. You are also given the
opportunity to delete all PRT files with one command.
PROCESS GAME
FILES: This section is an advanced group of functions that you may not
need to use. If you are in a play by mail league you might become
intimately familiar with these functions. However, if you are a solitaire
player you might never need to use them. Game files are only saved to disk
if you request them. This option is selected at the start of the game as
described in Chapter Four.
Game files
contain the final statistics for a game. These statistics can be exported
to a diskette and then, usually on another machine, they can be imported
into your statistical database. More details on the how’s and why’s of
this process are outlined in Appendix Four.
The following
functions are available when you process game files:
IMPORT GAME
FILE: This function takes a previously exported game file and imports the
statistics from it into a specified league. When you select this function
you will be prompted to insert the diskette containing the league file you
wish to import into the work drive. Afer doing this you will be asked
which game file is to be imported. Select the game file you wish to import
from the menu. Then select the league you iwish to import this game file
into. At this point the game file is read into memory and the statistics
are ready to be added into your selected league.
You must now
specify the day and game number from your league’s schedule that this game
file is to be imported into. Your league schedule must have a matching
game on that day and game number that has not been played. If you function
does not find an unplayed game schedule between these two teams on the
specified day and game number you will not be able to proceed with the
import. If such a game is available on your schedule then you can accept
the screen and you will be given a final warning to make sure you wish to
import this game. If so answer “Yes” and the statistics will be imported
into your league.
-25-
EXPORT GAME
FILE: This function exports a game file from your hard drive to a
diskette. When you select this function you must select which game file is
to be exported and then you will be prompted to insert a blank diskette
into the work drive. The selected game file is then copied from your hard
drive to the work drive.
DELETE GAME
FILE: This function allows you to delete a given game file from your hard
drive. This function will not erase a game file from diskette, so you must
use DOS to perform that.
DELETE ALL
GAME FILES: This works the same as the above function but it erases all
game files for this league from the hard drive.
MANUALLY
CREATE GAME FILE: This is probably the most complicated function of the
game, yet it is quite easy to understand and use. The purpose of this
function is to allow you to manually create a game file that will later be
imported into a league.
There is any
number of reasons why you might want to do this. As an example you might
be in a league where some games are played via the computer and other
games are played via the board game. You need a way to get the games
played via the board game into your statistical data base. This function
provides the means to accomplish this. The first thing you are asked is to
choose the league that this game efile pertains to. You must then choose
the two teams that are to play the game. When you have done this select,
“Play Game” from the menu. You are then presented a menu of these choices:
GET BOX
SCORE: At this time during the process of manually creating a game file
you can get a box-score to see if your totals are matching up with actual
box-score you are working from.
MANDATORY
GAME INFO: This is the first function you should run when you get to this
menu screen. Just select this function and enter in the number of points
that each team scored in each quarter. Verify that your totals are correct
and then “Accept” this screen.
VISITING
PLAYER EDIT: This allows you to edit the statistics for any of the
visiting team players. When you select this you received a menu of players
on the team and you must choose one to edit. Then you can enter in the
statistics this player recorded during the game. When you are done editing
the player, “Accept” the screen. Each player should be entered in this
manner.
HOME PLAYER
EDIT: This works the same as above but it allows you to work with the
players on the home team.
SAVE GAME
FILE TO DISKETTE: After the mandatory game info and all of the players
have been entered you should use the Get Box Score function to verify that
everything has been input correctly. If it has then use the SAVE GMAE FILE
TO DISKETTE function to save your game file to the work drive. You will be
prompted to insert a blank diskette into the work drive and then the game
file will be copied there. After this is complete you can use the IMPORT
GAME FILE function to add this game’s statistics into your league data
base.
-26-
APPENDIX
ONE – PLAYER RATINGS AND STRATEGY
The heart and
soul of every Strat-O-Matic game is our rating system. In all of our board
and computer games we strive to have the most realistic ratings available
to the gaming public. This way, when you play with a Strat-O-Matic game,
you can be assured you are doing more than just “juggling numbers.” You
have the ability to control real-life athletes with real-life strengths
and weaknesses. This is vastly superior to other games where statistical
accomplishments are the only level on which players are measured.
In basketball
this is clearly evident in the area of defense. Most games rate players on
their ability to steal the ball, block a shot or grab a defensive rebound.
But as any basketball fan worth his salt knows, that barely scratches the
surface when it comes to measuring a player’s true defensive worth.
Some games
try to get by with a simple defensive rating that covers the “intangibles”
so that you are told a player is a “good” defensive player, or a “poor”
one. This is better than nothing, but it still falls for short of the
mark.
Our game uses
a much more detailed system which interacts with the opposing offensive
players in a thoroughly realistic manner.
Using the
1992-93 season as an example, suppose Boston is playing New York. Dee
Brown of Boston is a good defender against outside shots, outstanding
against penetration shots an poor versus inside shots. Now if the player
he is guarding is someone who prefers to penetrate, like Doc Rivers or
Greg Anthony, Dee Brown is going to have a major impact on his game. But
if the player Brown is guarding likes to shoot from the outside more than
he penetrates, like Rolando Blackman or Hubert Davis, then Dee Brown’s
defense won’t be as much of a factor. However, if Brown has the assignment
of guarding someone with all around offensive skills, such as John Starks,
be prepared for anything. Brown might even find himself posted up inside.
As this example illustrates, Strat-O-Matic is able to capture the
subtleties that impact real NBA contests.
Another area
which provides for realistic interaction is the ability to individually
position your defensive players. Not only can you assign your defensive
matchups but you can have your players “cheat” to stop the opposing
player’s strength. Or you might have them “cheat” by sagging towards the
middle so they can help out against the big men inside.
For example,
let’s say your opponent’s team has a point guard who’s great at
penetrating, a shooting guard who doesn’t penetrate much, and a small
forward who can pop from the outside or drive to the hole. You might want
to “Sag” against the point guard, play “Close” against the shooting guard
and play the small forward “Normal.” However, if that same team’s top
scorer is their center, you might want to drop back off the shooting guard
and small forward so these defenders can help out against the center. In
this case you might want to play the shooting guard “Normal” and you could
“Sag” against the small forward. Of course there is a price to be paid for
doing so, as the other team’s shooting guard or small forward might start
-27-
“lighting it
up” from outside! It’s your job as coach to find the proper defensive
alignment against any lineup the opposing team might put out against you.
The following
is a description of the various player ratings:
MINUTES BY
POSITION: There are the minutes the computer game will try to average for
each player at each position. This information is supplied by
Strat-O-Matic on all team roster disks we well, however it can be altered
with the “Profile” screen described in Appendix 4.
CREATE SHOTS:
Shown as a numeric value on both the Scouting Report and the Team Roster
display. Most players are rated “0” which means they are normal. However,
certain players are rated “1,” “2” or “3.” The higher the rating this
player receives the greater his ability to create extra shots. This rating
is highly influenced by the player’s filed goal attempts per 48 minutes.
You should try to keep at least one player with a “Create Shots” of “1” or
higher on the court at all times. If all players are rated a “0” in
this category then your offense will have a tendency to bog down and
you’ll experience a higher ratio of 24 second violations.
TENDENCY:
Shown as a text description on both the Scouting Report and the Team
Roster. This is a quick way of determining the player’s real life shooting
tendency. The number of stars a player receives indicates his propensity
to penetrate when positioned outside. Additionally, some players are given
an “I” rating with means they are rated to be positioned inside on
offense. The meaning of the stars follows:
STARS
MEANING
(none)
This player is not allowed to be positioned outside on offense.
* This player is strictly an outside shooter.
**
This player prefers to shoot from outside but penetrates on occasion.
***
This player is equally adept at penetrating or shooting from the outside.
****
This player prefers to penetrate but will also shoot from the
outside on occation.
*****
This player will always try to penetrate. This is a very rare rating
because almost no NBA players will penetrate on every occation.
OFFENSIVE AND
DEFENSIVE REBOUDN RATINGS: These ratings are shown as a black bar on the
Scouting Report and as a number on the Team Roster. The longer the bar is
(or the higher the number) the better this player’s rebounding ability is.
These rebound ratings are based on the player’s rebounds per 48 minutes
and are adjusted based on the “available rebounds” which removes any bias
based on the team he played with. For example, a team that plays at a fast
pace will generate more shots and therefore more rebounds will be
available to the players on this team. Our rebounding system removes these
team based biases.
PASSING AND
FB PASSING: These ratings are shown as a black bar on the Scouting Report
screen. The longer the black bar the better passer the
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player is.
Some players are excellent passers in a half-court environment but aren’t
as god on the break. Some players swing the other way. You’ll want to pay
close attention to your point guard’s ratings – it will help you decide if
you want to fast break when he’s in the game.
SHOOTING:
These ratings are shown as a black bar on the Scouting Report screen. The
longer the bar the more ability the player has from that area of the
court. This provides a more detailed breakdown of the player’s abilities
then the tendency rating can give.
Note that the
three-point, outside, inside and penetration areas can be compared to one
another to determine which area the player is better from.
However, the
fastbreak area is a separate case which shows you the player’s releative
strength on the fastbreak. Because of this, a player’s fastbreak bar might
exceed his other areas but this does not necessarily mean he is “better”
suited to a fastbreaking offense than a half-court offense.
INTIMIDATE:
Shown as a number (0 to 20) on the Team Roster and as a black bar on the
Scouting Report. The higher the number the more “defensive pressure” this
player has. This is a very important aspect of the game as a good
defensive intimidator (or “block man”) can save his team a number of
points during a game by altering the opposition’s penetration and inside
shots. A truly great intimidator, like Hakeem Olajuwon, can even make the
other team shy away from penetrating.
STEAL AND
BLOCKS: These ratings are shown as a black bar on the Scouting Report
screen. The longer the black bar the more chance the player has of
stealing the ball or blacking a shot.
PRESS
DEFENSE: This rating is shown as a black bar on the Scouting Report and as
a number from 0 to 6 on the Team Roster. The longer the bar (or the higher
the number) the better suited this player is to pay when you are in the
press defense. Use this rating in conjunction with the steal rating to get
the best idea of how many turnovers this player might force the other team
to make.
MAN TO MAN
DEFENSE: These ratings are shown as a black bar on the Scouting Report and
as a number from 0 to 6 on the Team Roster. These rating are the key to
determining your defensive matchups. The longer the bar (or higher the
number) the more defensive ability a player has against the give type of
shot. Players are rated vs. Outside, Penetration, Inside and Fast Break
shots.
HINTS AND
TIPS
SHOOTING
DURING GAME: The total length of the two bars (when using the regular shot
grid) usually indicates the best overall shot for the offense. However,
your decision must be tempered with the knowledge of foul trouble.
Penetrating instead of shooting from outside will cause more offensive and
defensive fouls to occur. Similarly, making a Power move instead of an
inside shot will increase fouls. If your offensive player is in danger of
getting into trouble you might think twice before having him
-29-
penetrate or
make that power move. Of course if you get too gun shy then you can cost
your team the game. Another strategy is to try and penetrate or make a
power move if the opposing team’s player is in foul trouble.
Also, don’t
forget the importance of the defensive “block man” or intimidator and the
strategic interaction that can take place with him. Remember, if he’s
covering a good outside shooter you might want to move this player outside
to try and “draw out” the defensive intimidator. If you are successful
then another player on that team will have to be named as the defensive
intimidator.
FATIGUE
SYSTEM: Players are allowed a certain amount of playing time based on the
mix of players that comprise the 12 man roster for a given game.
Internally the game decides the total minutes each player is allotted for
the game, the maximum he can play during each half, and the maximum he can
play consecutively during a given stretch. These numbers are not displayed
because a real NBA coach doesn’t know when a player is going to fatigue
before the game begins.
The game
keeps track of fatigue to a very fine level. Once fatigued each second of
additional playing time will further fatigue the player by a very small
amount. We do not show this “fatigue level” for the same reason we don’t
show the allotted times described above. Instead we show a very simplified
fatigue number to give you a general idea of the players fatigue status.
Finally,
simply resting a payer on the bench will not necessarily “recharge his
batteries.” If he has exceeded his allotted time for a given half then he
will not recharge until the start of the next half or overtime.
USING PAYERS
OUT OF POSITION: There are no restrictions on using players out of
position. However, your chances of winning a game will be seriously
damaged if you play a center at point guard or use other “silly”
alignments. This is because the passing and defensive matchup segments of
your game will put you at a major disadvantages.
USING THE
BOARD GAME CARDS: The game is a 100% recreation of the board game except
for the items listed in Appendix Five. Because of this the board game
cards can be used as the “ultimate” scouting report for a player. By
examining the cards (especially the OPIF, PASSING and DEFENSE sections)
you can obtain further help in planning your strategy. Knowledge of the
board game rules would be necessary to take full advantage of the
information on the cards. The cards are not included with the computer
game and must be ordered separately if you wish to use them. The board
game cards may not be available for all seasons – call Strat-O-Matic for a
list of available cards.
-30-
APPENDIX
TWO – STATISTICAL REPORT FIELDS
Most of the
fields on the statistical reports should be easily identified by
basketball fans. However, there a few statistical categories that need
some explanation.
On the
Player/Team/League stat report there are categories for Outside,
Penetration and Inside shots. These fields show the field goals made and
attempted from each of these areas on the court.
On the recap
report the team scoring grid shows you the number of times a team and its
opponents scored in a certain range of points. For instance the 90 heading
means a team scored 90 and 99 points. The 10 heading is for between 100
and 109 points.
On the league
leaders report a number of fields require explanation. The ASSIST/TO RATIO
field stands for assist to turnover ratio. The PRODUCTION field is the
players’ production as defined in Martin Manley’s Basketball Heaven. This
rating attempts to define a player’s total worth in one easily compared
number. The EFFECTIVE FG% removes the bias of three pointers from the
traditional field goal percentage. The formula is the number of points
from field goals divided by the number of field goal attempts times two.
Thus, a player who takes many three pointers is not penalized, as he is by
the traditional FG% statistic. And DEFENSIVE STOPS is the number of times
a player’s man to man defense was the direct reason for stopping an
offensive player’s field goal attempt. This number can help you name an
“All Defensive Team” a the end of your season.
-31-
APPENDIX
THREE – TROUBLE SHOOTING
SPEEDING
UP THE GAME
If the game
is running slowly on your machine make sure you have experimented with
setting the VGA Graphic Delay and the Text Delay on the Update Preference
screen. Set these values down to 1 for maximum speed.
If the game
is still too slow you should check your system to see if it is using a
disk cache. Smartdrive is the disk cache supplied with the more recent
Microsoft operating systems and we highly recommend you use it to speed up
your game. Consult your DOS manual for information on how to install it on
your system.
Another
avenue to explore would be adding a math co-processor to your system. This
can dramatically speed up the game.
Two other
options may be taken to speed up the game. On the Update Preferences
screen you can choose “Max Speed (No Court). This will prevent the VGA
court and scoreboard from displaying which can speed up the game
substantially on a slow computer. The other option is to shut off the
icons in the configure game menu. Again, on slow machines this can make a
major difference in speed. Shutting off both of these options and setting
your delay values to 1 will maximize the speed of the game.
ERROR
MESSAGE [0007:] READING COPY PROTECTION
If you
receive this message the computer cannot read the copy protection from
your master game disk. Make sure you have you master game disk (Master #1
for 5.25” users) in the drive that you have specified. Do not
write-protect the master disk as this can cause this message to occur. You
can also try removing the diskette and inserting it again which sometimes
will alleviate the problem. If all else fails simply mail us back your
original master diskette with a short letter describing the problem and we
will send you a replacement ASAP.
INSUFFICIENT
MEMORY
You can check
how much conventional memory is available with the DOS “mem” or “chkdsk”
commands. You will need about 580,000 bytes to run this game. Of course
there are many third party solutions to the problem of insufficient
memory, and DOD 6.0 even includes it’s own utility to free up conventional
memory for your programs (MEMMAKER”). If all else fails you can make a
“BARE BONES” DOS boot disk as follows:
To create a
“bare bones” DOS boot disk you will need to format a blank diskette in
you’re A: drive. The “/s” switch will be used to copy the system files
onto the diskette (this enables the disk to be booted). After formatting
the disk you can then boot the system with this “bare bones” diskette in
the A: drive.
The format
command varies depending on your version of DOS, the disk drive
-32-
you will be
using (3.5” or 5.25”, regular or high density) and the diskette itself
(360K, 720K, 1.2MB, 1.44MB). You can try the following command:
format a: /s
Generally
speaking, this command will work as long as the diskette you are using is
the highest capacity supported by the drive (for example, a 1.2MB diskette
in a high density 5.25” drive). If the format doesn’t work on the disk you
are using you may need to set on other option switches. You should consult
your DOS manual for further information on formatting a diskette.
PROGRAM HANGS
The only
known time the program can hang is when it’s trying to initialize the
mouse driver and the driver is not present. If you do not have a mouse
driver loaded (you wouldn’t after booting off a “bare bones” dos diskette)
then you should start the game with the “swish –m” command as discussed in
Chapter Two.
PRINTING
ON A SERIAL PRINTER
If you have a
serial printer you may need to issue a DOS command before loading the
Strat-O-Matic programs. Try this command if you are experiencing problems
(substitute the proper Com port#):
Mode
lpt1=com1
TELEPHONE
SUPPORT
The telephone
support number is (516) 783-8856. When you call please be at your compter
and have your Master game disk and serial number available. We offer
telephone support during the following hours (there is no weekend support
available):
Day of
week Times
Monday –
Thursday Between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. EST
Friday Between 6p.m. and 9 p.m. EST
-33-
APPENDIX
FOUR – SETTING UP DRAFT LEAGUES & PLAYING BY MAIL
DRAFT
LEAGUES
Teams, as
well as individuals, are rated for defense in the Strat-O-Matic system.
This team defense concept can account for those occasions when the “sum of
the parts does not equal the whole” for a team.
But when you
want to play in a draft league you wouldn’t want the actual teams’
defensive ratings to affect the outcome of a drafted team. Our solution is
to provide a “D” league on every team roster disk that we sell.
The “D”
league has one team on it and that team is rated as an average defensive
team for that season. So to set up a draft league the procedure would be
as follows:
-
Create A
League
-
Use the
“Copy A Team Without Players” function to copy the team from the “D”
league into your new league. You will need to provide a team name and
other information about the new team you are creating with the copy
function. Refer to Chapter Five for more information about copying a
team.
-
Use the
“Clone Player To Another League” function to copy players from the “N”
league to this new team. This function is described in Chapter Five.
-
Repeat
steps 2 and 3 for each team you wish to add to your draft league.
Note that if
you wish to mix and match players from different seasons any of the “D”
leagues will be fine to use in step number 2 above. Just make sure you use
the same “D” league for all the teams in your new league.
IMPORTANT
NOTE: A given player should only appear on 1 team in a league at any point
in time. In other words, don’t clone the same payer onto more than 1 team
in a given league. You can use the Trade Player function to move a player
within a league.
USING THE
“PROFILE” SCREEN
When players
are drafted onto a team quite often the drafted team will not have enough
minutes at a given position. For instance, if you draft 5 guards and 4 of
them played mostly shooting guard you probably won’t have enough minutes
defined at point guard. The PROFILE screen allows you to solve this
problem. It also lets you define a couple of other settings to be used by
the computer coach. The following fields can be altered on the PROFILE
screen:
GP –
Initially this is the actual games played for the player. However, if you
plan to Autoplay games with this drafted team you can change the GP field
to indicate the “target” games you wish this player to play in. You should
note that Auto Rest must be set to “Full” for this field to be effective.
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GS –
Initially this is the actual games started. When the computer generates a
gameplan it uses this field to determine which of the eligible players for
a given game will start. You can alter this field for your drafted team to
force a given player to start more or less than they did on their real
team.
INPCT – This
is the percentage of time this player is to be positioned Inside on
offense. The higher the number the more often the player is positioned
inside. If this number is set to 0% the player cannot e positioned inside
on offense. This field is used when the computer generates a gameplan to
determine the 2 players to be positioned inside during each time segment
of the game plan.
STLSHT – This
is the “Steal Shoot” percentage which tells the computer coach how often
this player is to take a fastbreak shot off a “Steal” reading. Some steals
are followed with a potential fastbreak shot. When this occurs the
computer coach refers to the Steal Shoot percent to determine how often it
takes the fastberak shot or pulls up into a half-court offense. This
number is pre-defined on the Strat-O-Matic team rosters but very often
draft league players will want to alter this field for their team.
PG, SG, SF,
PF, C: These fields list the “target” minutes to be played at each
position. When a gameplan is generated the computer looks at these fields
to determine how many minutes each player should be used at each position.
You should alter this grid for your drafted team to give at least 48
minutes to each position. But, for realistic usage, you should not alter
the total minutes for any given player (as an example, if you add 10
minutes to his PG field you might subtract 10 minutes from his SG field).
NOTES: It is
important to set the positional minutes on a drafted team even if you
don’t wish to use the computer coach. That is because the fatigue
system relies on these fields to determine the amount of playing time that
should be allotted to each player for any given game. A minimum of 3
players should be defined with minutes at each position. If a player is an
“emergency backup” at a given position, simply given him 1 minute at that
position.
If you add
the total of the 5 position fields you will get the target minutes per
game. Multiply this by the GF filed and you will get the target minutes
for the season.
By setting
the GP and GS fields to the number of games scheduled in the league (82)
for the current NBA) you can define a given player as the starter in every
game.
Changing
the GF field will affect the PER GAME display in the Scouting Report.
Obviously,
this is a very powerful function and play-by-mail leagues will need to
have rules to control what can be altered in this screen.
The fields
that you change are permanently changed on the file. Make sure to make a
backup copy of your league before and after using this function.
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The
information defined on this screen is transmitted when you export a
gameplan. So for instance, say you are involved in a play by mail league
and you change the steal shoot percentage for one of your players. When
your opponent imports your gameplan into his machine the change to the
steal shoot percentage will be reflected on his machine.
PLAY BY
MAIL LEAGUES
The
commissioner in a play by mail league should be in charge of creating the
schedule, maintaining the rosters and maintaining the league statistics on
his machine. When trades are made the commissioner should make them on his
machine and then send a copy of these rosters (along with a copy of his
stats) to each of the members in the league. This is best done on a
monthly basis. The league members can then copy the rosters and stats to
their hard drive. Please see Appendix Six for the procedures to backup and
restore league roster and stats.
When each
play-by-mail league member receives his monthly disk from the commissioner
he should restore it to his hard drive (see Appendix Six). Then he should
go through the schedule and change any games for that month which feature
his team as the home team from “Hold” to “Manual.”
He can then
proceed to play his home games. Perhaps he will import a computer coach
from a disk sent by his opponent. Alternatively his opponent could mail
him a sheet of instructions that indicate how to program the computer
coach. Another method your league might use is detailed written
instructions that do not require the computer coach (this is the way that
board game leagues operate, and it give you the most control over your
team). In any case the league member plays his home games for that month
on his computer.
Each league
member should save his Game Files and export them to diskette for delivery
to the league commissioner. After each league member has played all of
their home games for the given month he should mail (or modem) the
commissioner his game files from that month, along with other documents
required by the league (for instance, a list of the games played and
results and/or a list of requested player movements). The commissioner
should import these game files into his league, which will contain the
entire league’s statistics. See Chapter Six for information on processing
game files.
After the
commissioner has imported all of the Game Files for that month he can
proceed to make the roster changes (trades, cloning “free agent” pickups,
deleting players no long needed, ect). He can then backup his rosters and
stats and end them to each league member. Another method of delivery would
be via a BBS that the commissioner would run. In either case each league
member can restore the rosters and stats and the monthly cycle would begin
again.
For the
ultimate in accuracy the league commissioner can save all game files for
the entire season (including those from his team). Then, after the season
is complete he can restart the league on his machine and import the game
files in the order in which they were scheduled. This way the streak
information will be accurately portrayed.
-36-
NOTE: We
recommend that you do not use the injury feature when you are playing
games by mail. If a player is injured during a game on your machine, and
you then export a game plan to send to a friend, the player’s injury will
carry over onto his machine. Because of this we recommend against using
injuries in play by mail league.
NOTE: Trades
can be made with the Trade Player function. “Free Agents” can be cloned in
from the “N: league when they are acquired. Players who are “released” by
a team can simply be deleted from their roster. If another team decides to
pick up one of these “released” players simply clone them back into the
league from the “N” league again.
NOTE: Before
the season begins the commissioner should create the league schedule.
After he has created it he should restart the league setting all games to
the “Hold” status. Then each individual, including the commissioner, can
toggle his home games from “Hold” to “Manual” when he is ready to play his
games.
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APPENDIX
FIVE – BOARD AND COMPUTER GAME DIFFERNCES
Because
playing time is a limiting factor in board game design there are certain
features that appear in our computer game that have not been implemented
in the board game. This section describes those features for the benefit
of those who are familiar with our board game.
Team
defensive cards are selected individually in the computer game. When a
player is positioned outside his opponent’s defensive stance (Normal, Sag
or Close) will determine which team defensive card is to be used. But when
a player is positioned inside the computer will randomly choose from among
the players positioned outside to determine which card should be used.
Thus, in the computer game, the more players you have Sagging the better
chance of “hitting” the team Sag card on an inside shot.
Technical
fouls and loose ball fouls have been introduced into the computer game for
realism.
The power
move is a variation of an inside shot that simply increases a player’s
chance of scoring a basket, drawing a foul and committing an offensive
foul.
The
rebounding rating system is totally different in the computer game. Please
refer to Appendix One for more details on this rating system.
Automatic
three point shots are sometimes taken by players who are positioned
“inside” on offense. This allows for players who spend most of their time
Inside on offense but take a substantial number of three point attempts.
When these shots are taken assume that the player has moved from his
inside position to the three point area.
Unlike the
board game, three point shooting accuracy increases when the player has an
“open” shot. Also, some players who don’t have any three point rating will
show a small bar next to their three point offensive area. This small
amount is allowed for each player in order to statistically balance the
effect of the desperation three point shots.
Double
teaming rules have been altered for the computer game. One difference is
that a “1” rated player does not automatically become a “0” when
double-teamed. He ends up getting about 2/3 of the “pass to any 1 plus”
passes. The other third of the time the pass is treated as a “pass to any
player” except the double-teamed player is not eligible to receive the
pass. As a consequence of this rule, no “0” rated shooter may become a “1”
due to a double team (in the board game this can happen). Another
important difference in the computer version is that a player who is open
due to a double team can never get a “Replay” reading. If a “Replay” is
rolled on the internal computer dice then the computer will continue
rolling the dice until a different result is obtained. This rule change
allows a player like a John Paxson (excellent open shooter but he has a
lot of replays) to be a major threat when left open due to the double
teaming rules.
The playing
safe rules have been changed so that F2 fouls attributed to a player from
the Foul Assignment Chart are considered unassisted baskets.
-38-
Fouls found
in the defense column of the player’s card, offensive fouls and X+F(1)
fouls are still considered fouls. In the computer game you may play safe
even if you are involved in a double team or are the defensive
intimidator.
During the
last two minutes of play a coach is allowed 3 timeouts. When play resumes
after these timeouts the coach may “call a play” for a specified player.
In the board game’s terminology the Control reading is ignored and the
player named automatically starts out with the ball. Play is then
conducted in the usual manner by checking the home or visitor section of
the next action card.
Certain
players who “max-out” on replays (26 combinations of replays) generate
more than their actual field goal attempts per 48 minutes in the board
game. In the computer game these players are subject to additional replays
in order to accurately reflect their field goal attempts per 48 minutes.
-39-
APPENDIX
SIX – BACKING UP YOUR LEAGUES
Unfortunately, due to memory limitations, we were unable to build a backup
utility into this game. Therefore you will need to use DOS or a
third-party software package to backup your leagues. We provide the
following as a sample DOS method to backup your leagues but we highly
recommend using one of the many backup programs currently available on the
market. If you are a league commissioner, and your are familiar with pkzip,
you may wish to use this compression product before mailing the diskettes
out to you league members.
NOTE: The DOS
command copies over files of the same name without warning you. Make sure
you are familiar enough with DOS before using the commands that follow.
COPYING
LEAGUE ROSTERS TO DISKETTE
Put a blank,
formatted diskette in your diskette drive. Then issue the following
commands from the DOS prompt. These commands copy the rosters from your
hard drive to diskette. For this illustration we are showing the 1992-93
NBA league, hard-drive C: and floppy drive A:
First insert
a blank formatted disk into drive A:, then type
copy c:\sombk\leagues\199293N.LEG
a:
copy c:\sombk\leagues\199293N.T*
a:
copy c:\sombk\leagues\199293N.SCH
a:
COPYING
LEAGUE STATISTICS TO DISKETTE
Put a blank,
formatted diskette in your diskette drive. Then issue the following
commands from the DOS prompt. These commands copy the league statistics
from your hard drive to diskette. For this illustration we are showing the
1992-93 NBA league, hard-drive C: and floppy drive A:
First insert
a blank formatted disk into drive A:, then type
copy c:\sombk\leagues\199293N.S*
a:
copy c:\sombk\leagues\923N????.*
a:
RESTORING
LEAGUE ROSTERS OR STATISTICS TO HARD DRIVE
Again, we are
illustrating this example with floppy diskette A: and hard drive C:
Insert the
backed up rosters (or statistics) into drive A: and type:
copy a:\*.*
c:\sombk\leagues
The files
will be copied from the diskette file onto the hard drive.
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APPENDIX
SEVEN – STRAT-O-MATIC FILES
The following
is a list of files found in the leagues sub-directory. This example shows
the files for the 1990-91 NBA season:
199091N.LEG
League file
199091N.T?? Team roster files
199091N.SCH Schedule file
199091N.S?? League statistics files
901N????.GFL
Game files, ???? is the game number
901N????.SUM
Summary files, ???? is the game number
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© 2003-2007, SOM Hoops
All rights reserved.
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