suggestion for 2018 SCS

What do you mean exactly by “contributing to pinball in that state”? It would seem that by PLAYING in a tournament, one would do so. And if so, the player who plays one tournament contributes as well.

This highly depends on how the fees are collected. Assuming the bigger events charge the winners to pay, I would argue that Eric Stone would have single handedly contributed the most to the GA SCS pot.

Through his Main and Classics victory he would have contributed $207 to the pot, and he’s not even playing in the GA SCS I don’t think.

I can’t imagine any locals contributing more than that over the course of the year, so even the “contribution argument” supports Eric on this one IMO.

1 Like

Well, that was a bad idea on your part

Not sure I understand how you arrived at $207, but I know as someone who has hosted several leagues, participated in numerous paid tourneys, contributed work and time and games and parts, I’ve put way more than $207 into GA pinball this year. Contribution is more than just entry fees.

by the minimum standards, yes playing in a tournament is contributing but I wouldn’t say coming to one tournament equals a year of supporting pinball in the state. I’d have no gripes if the name were changed :wink:

Dear Mr. Hartman,

We appreciate your concerns regarding the IFPA budget and use of our funds. We do our best to spend our money wisely and the opportunity to save on setup costs by running a larger quantity of trophy toppers was something we chose to take advantage of.

Should we ever have to dispose of unnecessary toppers that will be part of the risk of having gone long on that inventory.

As we make choices in the future there’s no doubt some of them will be good ideas and some of them will be bad. Don’t hesitate in the future to continue to share your opinions as we do greatly appreciate the insights you’re able to provide.

Sincerely,
Josh Sharpe
IFPA President

8 Likes

I was assuming you were strictly talking about the funding of the GA SCS prize pool.

If you’re saying spots in the SCS should instead be based on whichever TD’s invested the most money within the events they ran in that state, we’ll just have to disagree on the concept the IFPA is going.

We’re always going to base our championships strictly on “tournament play performance” as that’s something we can easily track. I’m not sure how we would even begin to track money contributed towards supporting events, although Kevin Martin would surely be the top qualifier in PA every year under that metric.

2 Likes

I’m not suggesting spots should at all determine the slots. I’m saying that something titled State Championship Series suggests a player from the state or a situation of that ilk,. The current way it’s done isn’t anything like that. It would be nice to see either some more minimum requirement to play in an SCS, the name changed, or a more balanced way to distribute points so any one tournament can’t just outrank a dozen or more other tournaments in a state. That’s it. Not looking for any tournaments to be diminished, just think the scoring outweighs events and that the name doesn’t reflect how the setup works.

I only mentioned TD investment as a contribution because you brought up a $ amount, you made that suiggestion, not me. I also still don’t see where 207 comes from, perhaps you meant a projection for next year or something but it’s neither here nor there as that isn’t at the kernel of my complaint. I continue to support pinball, including through the IFPA, but this is a situation I cannot comprehend why there aren’t ways either more in keeping with the naming or more equitable for state participants to actually participate in a State Championship series. Perhaps you could consider setting up a system through IFPA for exactly that though nothing you’ve said about your plans for the IFPA suggests that this is something you are concerned with. That’s your decision but I disagree with it for the above stated reasons.

To preclude any sarcastic responses, I appreciate most of what IFPA does for ‘competitive’ pinball but as with most things there are disagreements here and there and this is an area I’d love to see IFPA address in a way befitting a state championship series.

In all honesty the “State Championship Series” to me has always focused on the EVENTS within the state, not the players. If a player lives just over the Alabama border outside of Columbus, GA, but play all their events in Georgia during the year, it doesn’t interest me to find a way to limit that player’s participation in this IFPA SCS campaign. Limiting them to “JUST ALABAMA” negatively impacts that player versus pushing them in a positive way to just get out and play anywhere you possiblyl can. The metric we are tracking is points earned based on an event’s location, so we’re reinforcing that with how the qualifying process works. I feel that gives the most opportunities to the most players to not worry about being limited to competing to a state in which they reside.

With that said, we currently do have a system in place for exactly what you’re talking about with respect to a more local approach to championships. While we’re not officially organizing anything from “IFPA Corporate”, we manage a bunch of custom rankings specifically designed to hold “City Championships”. Portland, Madison and Upstate New York quickly come to mind. These are all fantastic campaigns and does a ton of positive things supporting the argument you’re trying to make.

If you are looking to crown the greatest player that resides in Georgia, I would personally be more than happy to help you pull that through. We can create a custom ranking that removes any “national level” event from the standings, with the focus solely being on events where out of towners aren’t attending in large quantities.

5 Likes

I like what @shimoda is talking about with regards to SCS evolution. I don’t care what the name is personally, but if the goal of SCS is to encourage growth in the number of players playing competitive pinball then maybe making SCS have a minimum # of scores makes sense. Like the cap of top 20 events this is the reverse but rewards local players.

I also have no problem with the ‘grinders’ and feel if people love playing that much pinball they should be encouraged to play more and that helps grow the scene overall (most of us people on here probably aren’t that specific audience)

If you had a minimum of like 4 events then that is more than a pinball show might have and would thereby eliminate that big major/circuit event side of it. Since most any player traveling and placing high enough in those type of tournaments is likely qualified in many states it doesn’t really hurt them either. Just my $0.02

1 Like

Minimums don’t work in practice. As I mentioned earlier any smart out of town player would simply organize a bunch of ‘really small’ tournaments on the show floor.

As long as they submit 30 days in advance theres nothing stopping them from organizing something.

2 Likes

It’s still an easy fix - just have a requirement of playing twice in a state beyond the period of 7 days, maybe even a month but surely asking someone to spend more than a weekend in a state isn’t too much :wink:

Additionally, your suggestion of a separate ranking would work just fine and I and/or someone else may just take you up on it. :+1:

1 Like

Who says the show organizers will allow it?

I know damn well I’m clearing it with matt and Jeremy before I run anything at LAX.

I’m interested in This too. One for KY, and one for the major hubs in OH (CIN Cbus and CLE)

They don’t have to. A TD would have to work with the confines of the game being available “to the public” but that’s no different than most location tournaments. There’s no need to ask the organizers to separate a game on the floor out specifically for this event.

A simple one ball tournament on one machine open for one hour with one final game for the top 4 players (also a 1-ball game) will do the trick.

1 Like

And also be extremely lame and be an obvious gaming of the system that you could stop with the suggestion of 5 events and at least two different months or whatever. Let’s do this!

2 Likes

I hope you do! There’s no reason to push the SCS concept as being the only solution to what you’re personally trying to achieve. With the custom ranking option we can literally tweak your specific solution down to every small option you want to impose that other people may not think is “fair”, but complete control is turned over to the organizer managing that custom ranking.

Imposing restrictions on player eligibility by putting in arbitrary “challenges” for out of state players is also gaming of the system.

The system by design is meant to track wpprs earned based on event location, that’s all.

Take your idea and run with it as a custom ranking. That’s totally fine.

3 Likes

Introducing the IFPA Kentucky Players Championship . . . here’s your top 16 qualifiers for 2017:

1 Drew Donohue
2 Sean Davis
3 Erik Wurtenberger
4 Derek Fugate
5 Michael Hartman KY
6 Ken Guenther
7 Dusty Segretto
8 Brady Heuser
9 Shannon Moody
10 Josh Selter
11 Mark Smith USA
12 Mark Aaron Evans
13 Brittni Caudill
14 Matt Fleitz
15 Chris Renninger
16 Jason Bradley

The rest of the rankings can be found here:
https://www.ifpapinball.com/rankings/custom_view.php?id=17

:slight_smile:

Congratulations also to the top 16 qualifiers of the IFPA Georgia Players Championship!

1 Ray Smith
2 Joe Walters
3 Charlie Gehlhaus
4 Alex Ward GA
5 Eric Green
6 Robert Hay
7 Mark McGuire
8 Mark Jarzewiak
9 Tina Park
10 Gil Nogalski
11 Brian Lunsford
12 John Schlarb
13 Bryan Broyles
14 Marc Fleury
15 Joshua Yates
16 Daniel Debusschere

Complete qualifying standings found here:
https://www.ifpapinball.com/rankings/custom_view.php?id=16

Has no mention of Cincinnati players who participate heavily in KY pinball. Same with IN players right over the river from Louisville.

I think our point is, if you actively compete in a state throughout the year, you’re good. If you imposed a cap on the SCS events that count (that doesn’t affect anything really), why not add a minimum too?