PLAAY Connect 2.29.24

Happy LEAP Day! Every four years, we get an extra day to PLAAY, and TODAY is the day! What better day to CONNECT, right? So, here we go with what's going on in the PLAAY Games universe...

TONIGHT: LEAP DAY Themed FUN in the PLAAY Space!

We alluded to this on last week's Baseball America Spring Training Tour YouTube stream, we have some leap-themed fun for you tonight, including a cool freebie! Join us tonight at 6pm MT (8pm ET) on the PLAAY Games YouTube channel!.

Last Day for Early-Bird Pricing, PLAAY-Dot-CON 2024!

Sign up soon to get early-bird pricing for the best two days in sports board gaming, PLAAY Dot CON 2024, 06.21 and 06.22.24! We just posted the first draft of our convention schedule, check it out here. Special guests from all across the sports board game world, including Glenn Guzzo from Strat-O-Matic, Joe Bryan from Sideline Strategy Games, Gary Brown from Stone Mountain Press and Grant Fines from 49 Sports Games! PLUS the debut of the "express" version of Soccer Blast Pro Soccer Game, our annual baseball and golf tournaments, "sneak peek" play-test segments for in-development games and LOTS more! Early-Bird pricing ends tomorrow (03.01.24)!

“Vegas Baby!” See You at Dice Tower West

It's almost time for Dice Tower West in fabulous Las Vegas, at the Rio Resort Hotel and Casino! Over 3,000 or the world's friendliest board gamers will gather for five days of board game goodness, and we are SO stoked to be part of it for the third consecutive year. We're leaving for Vegas early EARLY Wednesday morning and will be fully plugged in starting Thursday morning. Looking forward to catching up with old friends and making new ones!

Heads Up: Our website will provide PDF product delivery as usual, as well as at least one Dice Tower content update, but all printed product orders received after 5pm Tuesday 03.05.24 will ship after we get back (Monday 03.11.24). Thanks for your patience and understanding!

Our official DTW schedule is filled up, BUT we are scheduling some PLAAY-gamer ONLY events on the side. So if you're planning to attend, please let us know so we can give you the insider low-down.

“On the Road Again…”

In the words of the immortal Willie Nelson, “Just can’t wait to get on the road againnnnnn!” Dice Tower West is just the START of what's shaping up to be a very busy year of live events...

• Milwaukee Meet-Up, Saturday 04.27.24: we're gathering at Oddwillow's Games in Mukwanago for a full day of PLAAY. It'll be in the midwest tradition of "pot luck," where everybody brings a game they want to play. We'll be bringing a new Fury Hardball head-to-head variant, and are planning a small tournament to try it out. We'll create a web page for this event, coming soon.

• "Gridiron Games at the Hall of Fame," Canton, OH 08.24-25.24: We're honored to be invited to this event, put together by the APBA football club's Geoff Giordano. Our plan will include Second Season demo session (for those who aren't already familiar with the game), and some sort of tournament. We'll create a web page for this event later this spring.

• Fall Meet-Up TBA: We have some space in our schedule, but we're saving it for the "Pax Un-Plugged" board game gathering in Philadelphia in December. However, there are a limited number of available spaces and a submission process for consideration that begins in July. IF we don't get in to Pax Un-Plugged, our plan is to do an alternate event. Stay tuned!

Baseball is BAAAACK!

Big league training camps are open and exhibition play has begun, that means new card sets for History Maker Baseball are headed to your game table...

• Baseball America '24, to be released tonight (02.29.24), PDF and printed, standard and deluxe presentations.

• 2023 Pro Season coming in late March, PDF and printed, stay tuned for details!

Soccer Fans are getting a little Messi...

Fans asked for it and we're happy to deliver the Soccer Blast rendition of last year's North American pro soccer season, highlighted of course by the arrival of world football legend Lionel Messi! Our new 2023 North American Pro Season card set will include over 500 players, individually carded and presented in team colors in a distinctive new card style. Available 03.15.24, wait list is open now!

Hoops Game Add-Ons…

There’s a lotta hoops being played, we're excited to see it! Here are a couple of downloads to help you enjoy the game even more!...

• Instant results chart for hoops: This was suggested by PLAAY gamer Casey London, he noted that we have this for baseball, football and hockey, but not for hoops--until now!

• College hoops grid update: many thanks to PLAAY gamer Jule Sigall for rooting out a couple of very minor late-game score discrepancies on the college scoring grid--now fixed!

• Refs/Experience Add-On: Home-brewed by Michael Owens (the guy who rates the pro hoops teams for us!), these simple chart adjustments bring player experience and referee effect into the highlights game. BONUS: Michael's also come up with a fourth-quarter coaching tweak, also included. Michael has extensively play-tested ALL of these ideas and says they work great!

Coming Soon: 2024 IPFC for Cold Snap Canadian Football Game

"Spring football" has a little different meaning in our PLAAY circles. We're not talking about the XFL or UFL or whatever minor league football the networks are throwing at us this spring. We're talking about the start of a brand new pro football season in the Interprovincial (Canadian) Pro Football Conference! Now in its fifteenth consecutive season, under the steady hand of commissioner Jeff Tomlinson and personnel director Lenny LaFrance, the IPFC has blossomed into a thoroughly engaging tabletop experience. Last year the league expanded to ten teams, each team managed by a different PLAAY gamer! We'll have the 2024 IPFC package for you in next month's CONNECT!

FREE STUFF!

• David Gambrill's 2022 Canadian Pro Season for Cold Snap: David's our go-to guy for CFL ratings, but 2022 saw him tied up with work and health demands to such a degree that he was unable to complete the set--until now! "Better late than never!" And, good news: David is already at work on the 2023 teams, we should have them for you by the start of the new CFL season in June!

• Ed Meek's 1950-51 Pro Season for Hockey Blast: Another great home-brewed vintage season from Ed, who’s a huge fan of “old school” hockey!

• Batting Pitcher cards for 2024 Baseball America, History Maker Baseball: Our Baseball America universe aligns fairly closely with the real-life world of big league baseball, so now that both pro leagues are using the designated hitter rule, we’ve decided to eliminate the batting ratings from the pitcher cards. We recognize, though, that there’s a segment of the tabletop baseball gaming hobby who don’t like the DH. For those gamers, we’ve created these batting pitcher cards, based on our previously-released express baseball card sets which also eliminated the batting ratings from the pitcher cards, for aesthetic reasons.

• History Maker Baseball Freebie to be revealed on tonight's stream!

Video Activity!

We'll be in Vegas next week, so no PLAAY Space stream, but we'll resume video activity the following week...

• 03.14.24 North American Pro Soccer Kickoff Show: Of course we'll get Messi on the table as we break in this new card set with Soccer Blast. We'll also give you an update on the upcoming "express" version of the game.

• 03.21.24 Game Lab VII: Get a peek behind the curtain at several in-development PLAAY games, including a number of entirely NEW game ideas!

• 04.04.24 Highlight Maker Hoops College National Championship Game: This will be a play-through with our full-play hoops game module, showing you the final game components in anticipation of launching the wait list for our May release! The wait is ALMOST over!…

• 04.11.24 Wrestling America Federation 2025 Commissioner’s Edict Show: WAF fans, circle THIS date on your calendar (wait--does anyone use a paper calendar any more?). That's the night for the WAF 2025 Commissioner's Edict Show! We'll set the stage for the upcoming 2025 WAF card set, with a "fly on the wall" view from inside the commissioner's office using our "Commissioner's Edict" fast-action deck! Who'll get renewed? Who'll get "pushed?" Who'll have to wrestle and win to stay in? Who'll get (impolitely) shown the door? Even WE don't know! Watch it all unfold LIVE on the PLAAY Games YouTube channel!

Streams you may have missed?...

• Baseball America Training Camp Tour: All twelve Baseball America clubs in action, seven-inning exhibition games with HMB express, giving you an advance look at a majority of the cards included in the set!

• Ice Brew 600 2024 SCRAM Season-Opener: We went back to the MotorDome for our inaugural 2024 race, a venue that never disappoints!

• Big Game Pre-PLAAY, Kansas City vs. San Francisco: Our pre-PLAAY of the big game was eerily similar to the way it played out in real life!

Photo Finish…

PLAAY gamer Jesse Cheng held his own Second Season Express "Big Game Pre-PLAAY" at his local (Roanaoke, TX) "Raisin' Caines," except instead of San Francisco facing Kansas City he swapped in his home-town Dallas club. (And, it was actually more of a "Post-PLAAY," as this happened the week after the real game) That's Ryan Mitchell coaching the Cowboys (at left) and George Fletcher coaching the Chiefs (at right)! And what a game it was! George seemed to have the game in the bag, guiding the Chiefs to a 27-13 lead in the fourth quarter, only to have Ryan and the 'Boys storm back to tie. Alas, Dallas QB Dak Prescott threw a costly interception in overtime, setting KC up for an easy game-winning Harrison Butker field goal. Oh, and to make matters worse for Dallas fans, George spilled ketchup on the PASS defense game charts! (No worries, we've already sent a replacement!)

That's all for this month, hope to see you tonight for our Leap Day Stream! Thanks for reading through our news, and for being part of this amazing community of board gamers!