One-On-One Hoops? YES!
EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve added to this blog post 05.26.22 with an alternate one-on-one variant offered by PLAAY Gamer Cooper Gilbert, you’ll find Cooper’s idea following the original post below…
A lot of great ideas come from our awesome sports board game community! The most recent comes from PLAAY Gamer John Weber, here's an excerpt from an e-mail I got from him last week...
"I watched your hoops update video with interest, particularly the part about offering a set of all-time great stars. This made me reflect on the concept of possibly expanding the gameplay from the Highlight or History Maker area with a new variant that would focus on the individual stars going against each other one-on-one as opposed to two teams going at it.
"Interestingly, this concept has been explored once before in a game I picked up many moons ago called One-On-One Basketball. Here's the link on BoardGameGeek.com. I actually tried running an all-time tournament but never finished (another abandoned sports game project, sorry to say). In part, it was because of the large number of players (I believe around 300 in total) but also because the game had lots of charts to look up and thus each game took a long time to complete. Seems like the History Maker engine and the qualities on each of the player cards could easily be integrated into such a concept."
Of course, I found myself in quick agreement with John--I feel like HMH is perfectly suited for something like this! I envisioned basically playing the game with the standard rules, except that you don't rotate players! So I got out a copy of the all-time greats and tried it out...
I started out by running a test match, George Gervin vs. Bob MacAdoo (couple of my '70s favorites!). MacAdoo won in the expected high-scoring shoot-out. I then drew four cards at random from the set for a quarterfinal playoff--David Robinson, Carmelo Anthony, James Harden and Kevin Garnett. Robinson beat Anthony and then Harden for the test-title. As I continued to tinker with the rules, I expanded the field to eight: James Worthy, Nate Archibald, Shaquille O'Neal, Bob Pettit, Magic Johnson, Elvin Hayes, Hakeem Olajuwon and Elgin Baylor. Hayes was the winner in that one.
All this took about an hour. Obviously, some adjustments have to be made, some of them contextual, some of them with the game mechanics. Here are the rules I ended up with, although I don't consider them to be final for my own game table, so you're free to experiment on the fly and make your own adjustments...
• 10-Card Games: For a one-on-one tournament, probably the players would play to a certain score--say, 21. This would roughly equate to playing to "3" on the scoring track. But I prefer more open-ended results, so I dealt out the standard ten cards for a 12-minute game. I also dispensed with the minimum and maximum scoring caps (although I didn't see any scoring track movement beyond five in the games I played).
• Scoring Grid based on Qualities: I had this idea after the play-testing was finished. I used the MID-LO grid for all my play-test games, with scores ranging from the teens to the 40s. I had one game where Kevin Garnett was held to 7 points. It occurred to me after the fact that perhaps the scoring grid choice could be based on net play-making qualities. You'd add up the offensive play-making qualities of both players (stars and triangles), and then do the same for the defensive qualities (stars and squares). If it's a 1-3 quality advantage for the defense, use MID-LO. More than that, use LO. If it's a 1-3 quality advantage for the offense, use MID-HI. More than that, use HI. I didn't use this methodology in my play-test games, but I probably will going forward.
Bear in mind that scores will be higher than normal, for any grid, if you use this method, because of the all-star status of the players.
• HOME vs. VISTOR?: For this, I simply made the favored (or, perceived favorite) player the "home" player. I tried alternating the HOME role, but it was confusing when the fast-action card called for the home or visitor player on offense/defense, because it was always changing. NOT recommended!
• COACH readings: My first thought was that maybe each player should have a "coach"--but that really wouldn't work well. So I experimented with the COACH fast-action cards using a few different methods. I finally settled on a mechanic that uses the orange coach pawn similarly to the way it's used in the standard game. The player with the orange pawn gets to "shoot," one die roll, with the success range based on the number of shot qualities he has. For example, four shot qualities, 1-4 is good. Then you switch the pawn to the other guy. However, where in the standard game you put the pawn on the HOME coach, in the one-on-one variant, you out it on the VISITOR player to start. I felt like this was a good balancing move, negating the home advantage somewhat.
That's about it! Games are quick, you get a sense for what the players are doing, and some memorable match-ups can happen. I had Tiny Archibald matched up against Hakeem Olajuwon, in a "Mutt and Jeff" scenario--it seemed like Olajuwon was a shoo-in. But Archibald started the game with a double-SKILL move, stole the ball with a couple of defense QUICK moves and just like that, it was over! You could "see" Archibald running circles around the big guy, it was pretty cool.
Thanks again to John Weber for suggesting this. Let me know how it works for you, as well as any rules adjustments/innovations you might come up with!
NEW: Alternate One-on-One Game Play for HIGHLIGHT MAKER HOOPS
This idea comes from PLAAY Gamer Cooper Gilbert, an alternate way to do one-on-one hoops with HMH…
I loved the blog post about One-on-One play for Highlight Maker Hoops, and I loved the quick video (couldn't help noticing that the full run-time of the video was essentially the time it takes to play an actual game of HMH: about 15 minutes).
You had mentioned you would like feedback from other people trying 1v1, including other formats.
I set up a 32-man tournament from the 85-86 season and played the first 12 matches tonight. So far I am loving it. But I do have a different format:
• Every "scoring opportunity" counts as an actual basket (so no scoring grid needed; I keep the actual score on the track on the main board, including free throws; I also keep score on "paper" (GoodNotes on iPad) as backup.
Baskets are worth 2 points each, with two exceptions (below).
• Games play to 21 points, must win by 2 (so no clock, and no counting FAC cards, just keep score. In fact, I only shuffle the FAC deck after I go through all the cards, and so far I average about 3 1/2 matches per trip through the FAC deck.
• Most other rules are the same (underlined offensive playmaker values are still two scores, so four points). I use deny attempts, lightening status, etc.
• HOME vs. VISTOR?: The "favored" player is considered the home player, but as indicated below, he does NOT always get the benefit of an even REF look.
• COACH readings: No coaches, but this is when a player looks to make a strategic attack (I picture him deliberately dribbling at the top of the 3-point circle, defender shadowing every move, as the ballhandler waits for his moment to strike). I believe I use the original suggestion from the blog: I count the shot qualities and roll d6. So a player with 6 shot qualities automatically makes it on a COACH card. (I am considering allowing an opportunity to deny on made coach cards). Of course, the "token" rotates with each coach card to alternate turns.
• 3 Pointers: A player with the underlined ARC quality gets a three point basket when:
> He makes a shot from a COACH card (and he has the underlined ARC)
> He makes a basket because the FAC card checked his ARC quality (I am considering awarding the 3-pointer in this second scenario ONLY if the player is trailing OR the 3-point shot would win him the game.
• REF look tie-breakers: When two players are tied for a ref look comparison, the tie breaker goes to the TRAILING player, with the HOME (favored) player getting the benefit if the score is tied.
• Other notes: I disregard any results that talk about adding or discarding FAC cards, and any results that indicate a player is pulled from the half/game.
As for game run time, I played 12 games in under an hour and a half. Given that I get through all 72 FACs in about three and a half matches, I figure it takes me 2 to 2.5 times as long as the example you showed in the video (20 to 25 cards per game instead of 10). But it’s a blast because you see every score and get more ebbs and flows.
I am loving the game and loving this spin-off concept! Keep up the great work!