Rules
Equipment
Pallino - Target Ball. This is the smaller white ball.
Bocce Balls - 8 balls, divided by “stripes” & “solids”, our set trades out the traditional, heavy, ceramic balls for lighter wooden balls. They are still regulation size (100mm) but far less likely to destroy things.
Measuring String - For determining proximity to the pallino when it is difficult to just “eyeball it”.
Only the equipment provided by Luppoleto may be used for League play.
Who Goes First?
To determine who plays first, a player from one team hides the pallino in a hand behind their back. An opposing team player guesses which hand the ball is in. If the player guesses correctly, their team plays first.
Lining Up
Typically, teams split up and send half the players to one end and half to the other. In this case, they will alternate games: acting as judges when gameplay is initiated from the other side. This saves time from walking back and forth and may be adviseable given the somewhat tight confines of the indoor bocce court layout. But this division is not required.
All play is initiated from the end of the court and players must toss from behind the wooden backstop. Players must remain off the playing surface during active play.
Gameplay
Toss the Pallino - The first player tosses the pallino. It must go past the center line but NOT hit the back wall to be considered “In Play”. If the player does NOT satisfy these requirments, the other team has an opportunity. This is repeated until there is a valid “In Play” toss.
First Roll - Whatever player got the pallino “in play” rolls their bocce ball first attempting to get as close as possible to the target ball. NOTE: A ball is eliminated from play if it hits the back wall without hitting another ball first.
Away We Roll - From this point on, the team that is “away” (further from the target ball) rolls - one at a time - until they are closer to the pallino than their opponent. At which point, the opponent is “away” and rolls until they are closer. This continues until all balls are played. If your opponent is still away but has no bocce balls remaining, you play the remainder of your balls and attempt to score as many points as possible whilst mocking them incessantly!
Scoring
Each team rolls 4 balls each round. Points are scored for every ball that is closer to the pallino than ANY other ball on the opponents team.
How much closer? The rule is that it must be OBVIOUSLY closer which means a simple string measurement ought to be sufficient. We aren’t pulling out tape measures.
If all of the balls from team A are closer to the pallino than ANY of the balls from team B, team A is awarded a bonus point for 5 total points.
Any of the bocce balls that are touching the pallino (a baci!) also earn a BONUS point.
The first team to score 15 points wins the match.
League Points
Rather than recording “Wins and Losses”, we use a League Points system for determining standings. When a team wins a match, they are awarded 1 League Point for their victory plus 1 BONUS League Point for a margin of victory of 5 points or more.
NOTE: When determining the “Margin of Victory”, points scored in the final round, AFTER reaching the 15 point threshold, are included. For example, if the winning team starts the round with 14 pts and scores 5 points in the round their final score is 19.
Violations
If a player steps past the plane of the wooden backstop when bowling, the opposing team may remove any 1 of the balls played by their opponent.
Hitting the back wall without hitting any other ball is also a violation. Whenever practical, these balls should be removed before the next ball is rolled.
Obviously, you are not allowed to interefere with an opponent’s toss in any way. If intereference is called, the player may re-throw or remove an opponents ball from the field of play. This includes sudden shouting or sudden loud noises, and any form of physical disruption (no touching! or waving hands in front of players). Trash talk is fine, and distracting poses from the other side of the court are finer ;-).