One solution is to start two player games instead of one player, during qualifying. The player only plays on game one and plunges all but the last ball on the second game. Then let it sit on player two ball 3 (or 5) until score is taken, to avoid attract mode.
I doubt this would be worth the confusion for the player, and might not even be a net time savings, but it’s one alternative for addressing the issue.
Another possibility is rebooting the game to see the score faster. This did not work on Hoops though, fwiw.
It might not feel like it while waiting through attract mode, but I’m fairly certain waiting for P2’s plunged ball to drain would add to, rather than subtract from, the total time from pressing start to recording score.
For SS games what I found was useful was just to watch when a player was on ball three and/or listen and learn the drain sound (or the players yelps of anguish) and then get over there quick with my phone out to take a pic of the score as bonus is counted up. This is a lot to do for some ADD scorekeepers though
I can think of some ways to take average of the score cameras that are already there for the streaming, though none of them are that easy. Such as having one scorekeeper for the early SS games like this watching them all on a monitor, taking a screenshot at the end and recording scores. Who verifies that the score was taken before the next game begins? Who calls out for the next player in the queue? I don’t know.
No offense, but I only see chaos coming from this idea… way too many players would forget, and play a “P2” ball… some would err the other way, only starting a 1P game but then plunging their ball 2, thinking it was the voided “P2”… either way, you’re left with unhappy players.
Thankfully, only a few games are truly awful about showing scores at end of game. (But the ones that are bad are REALLY REALLY BAD… I’m looking at you, --Sonic B-- Dr. Who.)
Oh, I agree that none of the ideas I’ve posted here are worth implementing I’m brainstorming out loud in case it leads anyone to more practical solutions.
In my experience, tournaments with >5 machines per scorekeeper often have folks waiting a long time for scorekeepers to take tickets and give clearance to start. I’ve seen long lines while having 40%+ idle machines which is frustrating for players and scorekeepers alike. This is made much worse when the scorekeeper is also TD, making rulings, clearing stuck balls, etc. 4 per scorekeeper also permits an occasional moment of human interaction between player and scorekeeper which is kind of nice when you’re doing hours of scorekeeping.
Often on this type of game, I’ll leave the match on, then you can listen for the match animation and get ready or the player can use that time to grab the scorekeeper’s attention.
Saw it posted on another forum of @alwysmooth’s ScoreKeeping Guide he used for Magfest. Very nice! Only thing I might change/add is make #4 into 2.5 (or make it 3 and make 3, #4, but basically insert it after #2). This is for when it’s busy and you want to keep lines going (like the final hours of qualifying
One thing I do is once I have the score entered - and the player is reviewing to make sure it’s OK and then considering their next game (which can take a bit of time as they peruse the queues, etc.) - I draw them away from the game while they contemplate and look at who’s queued up (often they are lurking nearby) and have them address the machine to get started to keep things moving… then once they figure out what they wanna get into queue for next, I enter that, and having already put the next player on the game, you can click on their name to make it official that they are up on the game (step 4d in the current documentation)
I totally forgot I had even put this together, lol. I’ll find the original and make the updates you mentioned. Then I need to put it back out here so TDs can use it more effectively.
I read your blog entry and I dunno if you were talking about me, but I didn’t have a registration photo because when I went to register the volunteer told me that I already had one on file only to find out later that it was of a blank area. I later tried to get a real photo of me on file but the program wouldn’t allow us to save it. Regardless of whether you were talking about me or not, I think you tend to look to deep into stuff that isn’t really happening.
For the record I disengaged and backed out of the conversation about Whoa Nellie because you seemed very heated and slightly tweaked in your opinions, and you chopped up a quote of mine to make it appear sexist. I didn’t see the point in continuing the conversation and, respectfully, I don’t care to talk to you about anything in the future.
At INDISC you came up from behind while I was with some friends and grabbed my shoulder. Instead of knocking your teeth out (I hate it when strangers grab at me) I cooled off and stepped away and casually avoided you until I went home. I have never met you and frankly it’s a little silly to see you boo hooing like I did something bad to you. Do not touch strangers. I will continue to calmly avoid you altogether from now on.
Thanks to all the dedicated scorekeepers out there, and sorry to derail, I will not be posting here again!
I would love to salvage this thread. Please stick to the topic. This forum has an excellent private message feature you can use to send a message to one (or two or three) individuals if you have something to say that won’t add any value to the current thread.
PAPA has been great so far - shout outs to the D Division scorekeepers for having to juggle D, Split, Women’s, Seniors, and Juniors without the queue system. Apologies if I didn’t understand that there was no electronic queue system until now
