"The Veet’s" EI Rare Event Deck, Part One

November 30, 2024

The fifth edition of Extra Innings reserves 13 numbers on the first roll chart for the gamer to use for Rare Events. EI uses three
dice of different color, mine are red-white-green, and when the dice are rolled, you read them in that order, giving you 216 possible
results. The thirteen numbers that trigger a rare event are in the range 2-3-6 to 2-5-6. This means that anytime on the first roll that
the dice fall into that range, you would refer to the Rare Event chart. This is an optional rule, and if you so choose, you would
simply ignore a dice roll in this range, and move on to the second roll. Me? I like to use it.

But wait a minute! EI does not provide you with rare events. The game leaves it up to the gamer to decide what can happen. As
it says in the fifth edition rulebook, “We leave it to your choice whether you want to run the risk, for the sake of realism, of having
a power failure, torrential down pour or a player’s strike stop the game. Also, you might have other rare events you’d like to include.
If you want to stop the game for ten minutes to chase a stray dog off the field…or anything you find gives the game as you play it
added zest, you can introduce it in this range of First Roll numbers.” Well, after reading that, I went to work! Below is an early rare
event chart I typed up and still have in my EI chart binder, though it's one I no longer use. Note that I used eight of the thirteen dice
rolls set aside for rare Events.

I used this chart for years. Then sometime in the mid-late 80’s, my good friend “The Veet” introduced something new for use in
an all-time franchise league we were in that was entering its fourth or fifth season. It was a small deck of thirty cards on which he had
written a different rare event on both sides of each one. At the top of each card he wrote either “Even” or “Odd.” The idea being that
if on the first roll you triggered a rare event, you would refer to the third die, and this would tell you how many cards to draw from
the deck. Depending on whether this number was odd or even, you would read the card that corresponded to this. On some cards,
both sides were either odd or even. If the third die was even, let’s say a 4, and you drew four cards from the deck and both sides of
the fourth card were “Odd,” you ignored the chance of a rare event, and moved along to the second roll. If the third die was even
and the top of the card said “Even,” you then read the rare event and applied it if the situation called for it.

When “The Veet” brought this idea up for discussion at one of our league meetings, I was against it. “Too many extra rolls to get a
final result!” I stammered. “Takes away from the rhythm of the game!” I continued. I used every excuse in the book. Then “The Veet”
said, “The situation in play more than likely won’t apply to what the card says. You’ll rarely use it. You’ll just move along to the next
roll!” So I gave that a little thought, then went through the deck. It had plenty of variety, much more than my original chart, and because
you draw a number of cards based on the number on the third die, the randomness of the whole thing made sense. Unlike the chart I
had created and had been using up to that time, where every first roll of 2-4-4 was a possible ground rule double, these would truly be
“rare” events. I adopted the rare event deck of cards and used that thing until it almost fell apart. In 2002, I created a word document
and transferred "The Veet’s" hand written card information in a way that duplicated both sides of the cards. I set it up to print both sides
on 4 x 6 index cards, and using a pair of scissors, cut them into the deck I use to this day. Well, just about. I’ll get to that in a minute.
Anyway, on the home page of my website you can see one of these cards on a score sheet where the rare event came into play (right
handed pitcher homers…Nolan Ryan was in luck that day! Notice the star drawn next to HR on that score sheet. I put a star on every
play that came as a result of a rare event. I also put a star if a player made a nice play, such as an SD fielder taking away a base hit). As
I mentioned earlier, not everyone uses rare events. It’s an optional rule, and one that wasn’t discussed in any of the articles written by
the game’s designer Jack Kavanagh in various newsletters. Ironically, even "The Veet" stopped using it! What a rat! Just kidding!!

Hopefully I didn’t scare anyone off with how the rare event deck of cards works. Personally, I love the thing. It gives me just enough
added zest and to me injects those instances that happen that make baseball the greatest game on earth! You can bet I’ll continue to use
"The Veet’s" Rare Event card deck. Which brings me to what I brought up in the previous paragraph. Twenty two years is a long time to
use the deck of cards I printed in 2002. I have played EI all over the place. Indoors and out. In dry weather and in humid. I have played
with an ice cold brewskie in one hand, and the dice in the other. These cards have had it! Early this year I printed out a new deck,
changing a couple of "The Veet’s" original events to omit rainouts (I do not allow them in my universe…rain delays? Yeah. Rainouts? No).
I plan to use them in my next EI project. I’ll put the word file up in the downloads section if anyone is interested.

In part two, I’ll present some rare event occurrences that had an impact on games played.

Clockwise from bottom left: original hand written cards created by The Veet, ca 1985, printed version of card set first used in 2002,
new set printed and ready to be cut.Clockwise from bottom left: original hand written cards created by The Veet, ca 1985, printed
version of card set first used in 2002, new set printed and ready to be cut.