Just another +1 to having the brightly colored distinguishable shirts for the TD. That was a great feature.
And another +1 to how quickly TD’s and Tech’s responded to the signal lights. The two times I went to signal for my group, it felt like FAR shorter wait time than prior years. Well done!!
It sounds like what you are asking for is a larger grace period if the person before you on the queue gets bumped. That makes sense given the size of Replay FX and how long it can take to walk from one location to another. I can see some potential problems with the approach you suggested, so let me suggest a different approach :
The software can track if a push notification was sent - so if the player before you gets bumped AND you have been sent a notification, then the scorekeeper could be informed to wait an extra X seconds before bumping you down the queue. In addition, you could get a push notification telling you that the person before you was bumped and you now have X seconds to report to the machine.
Does that seem like a reasonable approach?
I think the real issue is
The way the software works.
Player 1 isn’t there … bump
Player 2 isn’t there … bump
Player 1 isn’t there (obv since they were bumped 5 sec ago) … bump and out
Player 2 isn’t there (obv since they were bumped 5 sec ago) … bump and out
Player 3 …
The way the software should work
Player 1 isn’t there … bump
Player 2 isn’t there … bump
Player 3 is there … plays
Player 1 gets called after Player 3 finishes … bumped out of queue if not present
Player 2 gets called after Player 1 is bumped out or plays
Note that we were amenable to putting players back in the top of the queue when this happened as long as we were notified.
Thanks for considering the suggestion.
Actually, no. Given the player throughput needed to keep Intergalactic queues moving as fast as possible, I’d recommend that you allow scorekeepers to select the person highest in the queue that is present – whether that’s “next up,” 2nd, or 3rd, etc. I made the choice to wait out the queue somewhere else, and I deserved to get skipped over, even though through no fault of my own, the “next up” player wasn’t there either. And the faster you get a new player on the pin, the better.
What I’m asking for is that when a player gets skipped over for the first time, that she/he doesn’t get booted from the electronic queue entirely.
One scorekeeper mentioned that the software allows for the Next Up to get skipped (and not booted), but only if the 2nd Up player is there. And further, if both the Next Up and 2nd Up player aren’t there, the software keeps cycling between the two of them until both are booted.
So my suggestion is to have the software allow the scorekeeper to select the 3rd up (or 4th…) based on who’s there. If they put the 3rd Up player on the pin, it counts as a Skip for both Next Up and 2nd Up, and they maintain their positions as Next and 2nd, while 4th moves to 3rd Up. After X # Skips on a player, the player gets booted from the queue entirely.
And by the way: love the queue position update push notifications! Great feature!
Agreed. Definitely a game changer.
Ok - I’ll add it to the requested feature list for next year.
Perhaps in the queue view, show a name in yellow if it’s been bumped once and red if bumped twice; next bump is removal.
Because ultimately Sarah runs the house, I was at Replay on her schedule which means I was there incredibly early for my TD shifts. It was nice to just get lost in the arcade/video games and not have to worry about being asked any random show questions if I walked around in my TD shirt. I got to spend precious free time WITHOUT PEOPLE, even if it ultimately was used to roll Spy Hunter (never again).
Thanks for the shirt changes!
Neverdrains software removes you from the que after you’re skipped three times. I’ve rarely heard complaints about that process. Scorekeepers also can choose whomever is available and that feature is used a lot.
I also must give huge props to all the TD and Tech staff at Pinburgh 2018. The machines played amazingly. And I think the longest I waited after hitting the pager button was literally 30 seconds. Unreal. I can’t thank the ReplayFX and Pinburgh staff and volunteers enough for giving us a freakin’ amazing weekend.
Gary talks verry interesting and enjoyable about the story of Williams and Stern pinball during Pinburgh 2018 at Replay FX-Event in Pittsburgh filmed with 2 cams.
I didn’t see an official announcement, but it looks like Pinburgh will be 1000 players this year.
After registration opens and 1000 people sign up that is. It would of been interesting if they kept the number a secret till after it was full.
official you say?
From the Replay FX Facebook page:
Pinburgh rules for 2019 are updated! The three big takeaways are:
1000 Players!
Payouts in Division E!
Streamlined division restrictions!
[https://replayfx.org/competitions/pinburgh/pinburgh-rules/]
Tickets go on sale February 23 at noon eastern!
With the increased player cap, they ought to take about 8 more seconds to sell out.
no more restrictions for PAPA qualifiers - now I can sandbag the lower divisions!
We haven’t confirmed a mobile camera rig for the lower divisions yet, so you can’t legally sandbag as of yet.
There are rumors of a Sand Force joining the TDs to apprehend sandbaggers, though…
