Archive of SportingNews.com's old SOM Baseball forum

Hi I'm new at this, how does Strato work. So we draft players, and my team plays another team like in the majors? And the players we draft, do they get points based on what they did in real life.

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You manage your own personally selected 'virtual' team and set strategy for games that will be played on a computer. The performance of the players are based on their statistics from the 2005 season. The teams play out a 162 game season, followed by playoffs/championship. :)

Read the FAQ which gives the rules of the game.

To clarify above posts, in Strat each player has a card which statistically reflects his performance and abilities. In the TSN version ... as opposed to the board game, CD-ROM or NetPlay ... each game is played automatically. The result is one of chance, based on the roll of three dice -- one (1-6) representing a column on the pitcher's or hitter's card and the other two (2-12) referring to line on the card -- and the drawing of a 1-20 split card, when necessary. There are a number of markings on each card which reflect certain variables (ballpark attributes, clutch hitting ability, pitcher fatigue). Hence, the cards are no more than statistical probability, and can skew up or down for each player depending on a number of factors. In that, this differs significantly from Fantasy or Rotissiere games; Strat-O-Matic is a simulation game.

There are various themes which offer drafting advice for SOM Newbies and both general discussions of players and draft strategies as well as specific team analysis by veterans on this board -- who are more than willing to generously share their opinions. Before putting your first team together, I recommend reading some of these to get an idea of how to approach the draft, which -- like Fantasy leagues -- remains the most crucial part of the process.