Stroke Play

The format everyone learns first: count every stroke, and the lowest total after 18 holes wins. Simple — until handicaps and teams show up.

Gross vs. net

Your gross score is your raw stroke count. Your net score subtracts your handicap strokes — and here's the part people miss: those strokes aren't taken off the total at the end. They're applied hole by hole, using the scorecard's stroke index (the "handicap" row that ranks holes 1–18 by difficulty). A course handicap of 10 means you get one stroke on each of the 10 hardest-rated holes.

Course handicap 10 · you make a 5 on the hole rated stroke index 7
Stroke index 7 ≤ 10, so you get a stroke here → net 4

Why hole-by-hole matters: it changes skins, match play, and per-hole team scoring — a net birdie can win a hole even when your gross didn't.

Stroke play in teams — the three modes

When you play stroke play in teams, there are three honest ways to turn everyone's scorecards into a single team score. Bogey Logger supports all three:

• Combined total — every player's ball counts on every hole; the team score is everyone's strokes added together. One player's blow-up hole hurts the whole team. The most demanding version.
• Best player total — each player finishes their own round, and the team counts only its single best 18-hole total. One hero can carry the team — but they have to do it start to finish.
• Best per hole — on each hole the team counts only its best single score, and it can be a different player every hole. This is best ball scored as total strokes instead of holes won — and unlike the Best Ball format, it works with three or more teams.

Each mode can be scored net (with handicaps) or gross. In stroke-play team modes, every player uses their full course handicap — no reductions.

When someone doesn't finish

Phones die, storms roll in, someone's spouse calls. If a player misses holes, the fair comparison is over the holes everyone actually played — so in combined-total teams, a hole any player skipped is dropped from every team's tally. Nobody gets credit for a hole the other side couldn't contest.