WPPR v5.8 sneak peek

General
402

Well if you scroll up a bit the definition is still being debated. But I don’t think I’ve heard anyone propose that the format (I.e. multi matchplay or certified) had anything to do with it. What I have heard is that a farm features

  1. a single location
  2. hosts multiple high value events over the course of a weekend
  3. does so multiple times per year

Under these conditions, LPA seems to fit the bill. Not as big as other farms like fulda, but still a farm.

I don’t think the quality of events factors into it. By all accounts, the D82 events are top notch. How would you define a farm? It sounds like you think farms are synonymous with low quality?

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403

I don’t think farms need to be synonymous with low quality, but there is a risk that cramming so many events together can lead to that.

At Fulda for example, to try and keep to the schedule:

Finals brackets (for at least one comp) were played on classics machines (classics all set on three balls too by the way). This was to separate the finals, which were overrunning, from a flip frenzy event taking place in the main hall.

Tie breakers played as two ball games. In the past I’m pretty sure 1 ball games have been used.

Games played on machines that were left leaning, or had terrible flipper alignment. I believe the tech was also playing in the tournaments, so barely any time for maintenance. (Both TDs also played all the events)

None of which is intended as criticism of the enormous effort that went into that weekend. One of the tournaments went on through to 5am for example! But the very nature of cramming so many events together can lead to compromises being made to the quality.

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404

Hard disagree.

Efficiency is definitely a hallmark of WPPR farms. I would wager that the vast majority of WPPR-farm tournaments do not go more than a game or two beyond 100% TGP. At LPA most recently, the main tournament had 36 games played in qualifying plus best-of-five for the top 24. They could have played three 100% TGP tournaments in the time that took.

With WPPR farms, quantity becomes a quality of its own that often overrides other traditional qualities. This usually means the tightest possible final rounds or the most efficient qualifying to only just clear 100% TGP in time for the next tournament to start.

This isn’t necessarily a value judgment as the tournaments within a farming weekend can be of higher or lower quality depending greatly on the qualifying format, how many go through to final rounds, etc., but quantity and efficiency become the main goals.

150% TGP next year should temper this somewhat.

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405

The US farms are typically including a certified event, so it reaches it is exceeding 100% TGP as well

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406

Borås, which is a WPPR farm, included a certified event as well. However, even with these certified events, the tournaments don’t really go above and beyond that, they stay within the parameters to be efficient and fit in more tournaments.

Borås played 14 qualifying games and 16 playoff games for their certified tournament at their weekend in March, and the certified tournament was one of 8-9 tournaments that weekend.

LPA played 3 tournaments their weekend and the main tournament included something like 56 machines total toward TGP (36+~20 for qualifying and final rounds). The point wasn’t efficiency and more tournaments.

Borås is a WPPR farm, at least their tournaments in 2021 and 2022. Fulda is a WPPR farm. LPA is not. If LPA is included on that list, a lot of other places need to be included as well.

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407

WPPR v6.0 updated with Fulda results :slight_smile:

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408

Drew Geigel up 3 spots. Interesting!

409

Boiling down your points, I’m hearing you say that “Number of meaningful games per tournament per tournament matters”.

How many meaningful games beyond 100% does the tournament need to go?
What proportion of tournaments need to go beyond 100% before they aren’t considered a farm? (e.g., 1 event with 50 meaningful games and 3 events with 25 vs. 4 events with 25 meaningful games)

I’ll also point out that it’s incredibly difficult for an outsider to distinguish these finer points you are making. In the IFPA data, a tournament that had 25 meaningful games looks exactly like one that had 50.

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410

How does that help keep schedule? Because there weren’t any other working games available?

I’m sorry, but that sounds awful.

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411

Some in this thread would clearly disagree…not me though. Farms are cool, they have chickens and stuff. More farms please! However I wouldn’t mind a little less classics. :grin:

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412

Everything pre 2000 is gonna be a classic soon!

For those of us that like to try and create a pinburgh type tournament that requires players to play all eras, dmd/lcd games are unfortunately only about 1/3 of the equation at best.

I have started to go more like 1/2 dmd/lcd and 1/2 EM/SS.

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413

Hurt my soul when I played White Water with @abagwell85 at Logan and he called it a classic. He wasn’t wrong. But I still exacted revenge upon him by playing my best whirlpool ever on a comp ball.

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414

For many years, CAX had modern, solid state and classic divisions. Each year the lines between each division blurred depending on what was available. Might see a High Speed in modern or a Taxi in classics. More important to have good playing games than to have each era equally represented.

I do worry we may run low on EM techs soon. Many props to you EM folks currently keeping them working. It is appreciated.

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415

I was but a competitive babe back then, ignorant to the true Classics.

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416

It’s posted up on the IFPA website now.

Increased event weight for IFPA Certified event weight to 125%. Addition of IFPA Certified+ tournaments with an event weight of 150%. Updated criteria of eligibility:

Clarification question: Does this mean there’s going to be two “levels” of certification in 5.8? Sorry if I missed it but I didn’t realize that Certification was sticking around in addition to Certification+

  • Certification - Currently 20%, will be 25% boost next year
  • Certification+ - New Concept, will be 50% boost next year

If so, are there revised rules on regular “Certification” for 5.8?

Second clarification: How does the value get calculated arithmetically?

Scenario 1: Certified+ Event, 100% TGP, 32 Base Tournament Value
…so it should be 32 base * 100% TGP * 150% Boost = 48 WPPR

Scenario 2: Certified+ Event, 150% TGP, 32 Base Tournament Value
…so it should be 32 base * 150% TGP * 150% Boost = 72 WPPR, right?

Any tournaments that eliminate games due to time (this is often done by switching to “all Classics” when a tournament is running long) will no longer earn TGP after the point in time in which games are eliminated. For tournaments that run into this problem often, we recommend you changing the format to a lower amount of games played, or eliminating any long playing games at the start of the tournament.

Here’s my scenario:

  • On MatchPlay.events, I’ve split the games into “Fast” and “Slow” games so keep all players on similarly-timed games. We will draw a round as either a “fast” round or a “slow” round. Reason: I don’t want ten groups playing early Solid States that finish in 20 minutes while one group is playing Batman 66 for an hour.
  • This has lead to less average downtime between rounds and gives a better player experience.

With this rule as written, are we even allowed to draw rounds using Arena Classifications? I’m inherently “limiting” the set of arenas that can be drawn, and either the faster or slower playing games will be not be considered in the final round.

I also want clarity on how this affects a transition to Finals.

Scenario: We run a nine-round Match Play, followed by an A, B, and C Division Knockout Finals. We have 30 machines available.

  • I’ve split the machines up into 10 A and 10 B and 10 C machines. A, B, and C will play out seperate Finals on MatchPlay which can run independent of one another because there’s no machine overlap.

Is this allowed under 5.8? I would like it to be, because it gives great flexibility to finish out Finals, allows three divisions to run in parallel, and again minimizes waiting around time between rounds.

417

As per Josh, you have to be consistent and communicate your intent up front. Alternating fast-slow is perfectly fine as per v5.8 but you can’t swap from that tempo and do a:

oops all classics
oops all classics1080×1178 156 KB

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418

And I think your ABCD divisions are fine. Think pinburgh. That was fine then, and it is now. Just communicate what the finals banks for each division will be at the start of the event.

419

There are now two levels of Certification. The revised rules for Certification are on the post on our site, but I can list them here:

Updated criteria of eligibility:
a) 128 player minimum – This is only needed for IFPA Certified+ events. There is no player minimum for the 125% boost level.
b) Limited Herb/Card – minimum 24 attempts with minimum best 12 games being counted, minimum 20 hours of qualifying time.
c) Unlimited Herb/card – minimum 20 hours of qualifying time, minimum 5 games being counted.
d) Match Play formats (4-player groups) require minimum of 20 qualifying games.
e) Head to head formats require minimum of 40 qualifying games.
f) 24 finalists minimum (up from 16)
g) No other qualifying formats eligible (Flip Frenzy, Pin-Golf, etc)
h) No player may receive a bye beyond the round of 16 finalists.
i) Maximum length of the tournament is 4 consecutive days.
j) Finals for the top 24 cannot start on the same day that Qualifying starts.
k) Finals portion of the tournament must consist of one of the following approved formats: PAPA style match play rounds (minimum of 3 games per round) or IFPA style head-to-head play (minimum best of 5 matches per round). All game choices during finals must be made by the players.

Certified does not need to meet item “a”. That’s only something Certified+ events need to hit.

The WPPR formula calculates a value for the event. This value is first multiplied by the TGP value. That value is then multiplied by the “Event Boost” value. Your scenarios are both calculated correctly.

Lewis and Erik are correct in their comments, so I won’t bother repeating those answers :slight_smile:

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420

What if it’s announced up front and not a switcher-oo? Is a pre-established format of x rounds of moderns/classics and x rounds of classics only now disallowed? Or is the issue if you pull games without explicit up front notice, due to unforseen time constraints?

421

Switching to classics only after “Round X” or after “X P.M” would limit your TGP to stop accumulating at whatever X equals.