They are using Karl’s software?! That is change!
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Lest we forget the end of the original IFPA when people on rgp kept questioning where the money was going for that tournament after all the manufacturers donated 20K/each/year (80K total), donated the use of the games (25/manufacturer, 100 total), donated the labor to set them up, all the players paid their entry fee and coin drop was charged on every game. Support dried up real fast after that one (IFPA 4, 1994) both from the player side and the manufacturer side.
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Getting a little off topic, but…
Are we talking strictly about the competitive side, or the hobby overall? The last two times that pinball has ‘made a comeback’ operators, distributors and manufacturers made money.
The competitive side already has a ridiculous saturation rate. Zero to tens of thousands in just a few years. For the hobby to make lots more money, we need people who don’t own games playing regularly. Portland is the model. If the ops, distributors and manufacturers start making big money again, it will trickle down into the competitive side. Play on location regularly, blah blah blah…
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You keep making Broad statements based on limited events. That doesn’t help ANYTHING its just soap boxing.
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It’s comments like these that make me think we overpaid for the IFPA brand when we purchased it 10 years ago 
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I guess that depends on the price!
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It’s quite interesting that there seems to be a divide between the US and European tournaments in regards to the popularity of the herb format.
Most tournaments I’ve been to have had a set price of entry, and most of them no real monetary prize pool.
I’ve always assumed the entry fee went towards cost of the event, game maintenance and keeping the place open if it was a public location.
Personally I co-run a small location open once a week (~$10 for 5 hrs of pinball). We’ve held 1 tournament at the place with a ~$50 flat entry fee. I think we had a profit that covered 2-3 months of rent at the end of it (which the weekly entrance fees are nowhere near covering). In my mind that’s a fair way of doing things.
I do understand the need for transparency (especially in herb), but can understand why some TD’s take a cut of the top and not end up with a 100% payout
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No offense, but $5 to win $30 where the organizer makes $3000 isn’t realistic. I think realistic is where player entries and payouts after expenses typically differ by 10 - 30%.
Let’s say Pinburgh didn’t take in enough entries to cover the 4k. Would you likewise be okay with taking less? If you flew out to the show, paid for hotel, paid for the event and was told the prize would be 4k, would you be okay with them changing it if they didn’t meet their entry goal? I wouldn’t!
Of course, this is why most tournaments don’t do this and instead guarantee percentage payouts, but again, thinking along the lines of evolution, guaranteed payouts is part of that. It represents both a big selling point for the organizer but likewise a risk. This is why I wouldn’t have a problem with them meeting their goal “one way or another” (i.e. player entries, outside sponsorship) and then taking the difference - they took on the risk as well.
My experience with European tournaments is that many have entry fees that are comparable to the USA for comparable formats.
The difference I see is that in the USA most tournaments give the entry money back to the players through prizes (after tournament expenses usually) - Where in Europe, much less appears to go towards prizes.
I guess this discussion is just proof that it’s different for everyone. I’m not personally interested in the absolute payouts of a tournament. I don’t need Pinburgh to promise $4k. If only 3/4 of the expected people show up, then it’s $3k for 1st, but I’m still getting the same odds on my entry. That’s all I care about. If only 5 people show up, then I can only win $200 or so, but I also only have to beat 4 players to win one of the most prestigious events in the world. 
I’d fly to Pinburgh even if there was zero prize money. Those who have the ability to offset their air/hotel/travel costs through tournament winnings is what…less than a 100 people in the entire world?
You said that my example wasn’t realistic, but it seems like there might be HERB formats out there taking 75% of the entry money and awarding back 25%, or worse. That is made possible by setting fixed prices while accepting (potentially) unlimited entries.
That’s all I’m objecting to…setting a maximum payout, which allows for an unknown and potentially unlimited profit to the organizers.
I would not travel long distances to participate in tourneys without some kind of payouts. No, you can’t make money but it’s nice to win something to help offset the cost of the trip.
I would play in local tourneys with no payouts, but only if they were on the IFPA calendar. If there’s no money and no IFPA points, I might as well be playing at home or on location for fun.
It is easier to hide money when you use paper tickets 
For Pinvasion I openly tell anyone what our payout is. First year we counted the money with PAPA and compared it to the systems tally.
I like having the larger prize pool using Herb but I’m also 100% transparent.
Come to Atlanta for Pinvasion III 10k payout!!! based on take in of course but last year was $9300
Scaled prize pools are illegal in many states if they’re over a specific number. As tournaments grow larger, cash prizes will need to be 100% guaranteed and not be tied to player fees, or there will be unwanted interest from law enforcement.
Also, this is somewhat off-topic, but most people would be shocked at the expenses that are incurred as a tournament scales upward regarding players, games, and complexity. A lot of the axioms that are relied upon in a tournament of 64 or even 128 are totally unusable at 400 or 600. We’ve had to re-learn how to build Pinburgh two or three times to keep it from totally collapsing on itself. Things don’t always scale easily or evenly. As tournaments get larger, the amount of money paid out in prizes will decrease percentage-wise in relation to the budget of the event.
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Mark, I’m wondering if you could speak a little more to this. I’m mostly just curious/interested.
Sure, here’s a few of the more obvious / understandable examples.
Basically what I’m saying is as tournaments grow significantly larger, a new set of problems take priority, or the same problems must be solved with different solutions. Things like bathrooms and food are obvious (although not always easy to solve), but you also have to account for physically moving 500 players from place to place on a schedule that runs to the minute. Proper scheduling is something all tournaments should do, but as things get bigger, it becomes the most essential part of the event.
Then there’s spacing… With 32 or 64 players, an issue like tournament space is considered, but when you have 600 players, something as simple as the width of your aisles or placement of garbage bins can be devastating if done incorrectly. Problems that could once be solved by eyeballing require flow charts and actual measurements. You need physical access points into the tournament area and people to monitor them, and a procedure like calling out names for attendance breaks down due to the sheer distance and noise. And then there’s the inevitable delays… in a local league or small event, a player who is late can call in and get a 15 minute extension, but what happens when you have a plane with a mechanical problem in Chicago or Atlanta delaying 48 players? On a morbid note, what happens if a player dies? You can take 700 people from any cross-section of society and be guaranteed there’s at least one who isn’t in the best of health. When handled professionally, there needs to be a different level of transparency, expectations, and structured recourse for all kinds of eventualities.
Then there’s breakdowns… At a local league or tournament, if a game breaks, or a director makes a bad call, a player may end up losing a few hundred dollars. This type of thing sucks, but it happens and people get over it. But what if something like that happens when $10,000 or $50,000 or $100,000 are on the line? That’s life-changing money for some, and in those eventualities, your planning has to go beyond damage control for an upset participant; you have to be prepared for litigation. You need waivers, extremely clear rules, and a process that protects your volunteers and directors. You need to be prepared for, and hope you never have to use, a level beyond what is standard operating procedure at smaller events.
Then there’s communication… In a tournament with 12, 20, 50, or even 100 machines, you can get by as a director walking a lot and calling out to one another. Even WITH our current systems, our directors can expect to walk 20 miles per day… sometimes much, much more. You need to bring multiple pair of shoes and socks. Your feet hurt at the end of the weekend, but it’s doable. When you start to expand even further, the process becomes impossible without a distinct chain of command to ensure different areas of the floor are working in sync, and rulings are all similar and communicated. One person, or even a few people, cannot physically accomplish what is required no matter how much they walk or how great of techs they are. On average, players expect to be attended to within three minutes, no matter what other problems are occurring elsewhere. When there’s only 20 games and two techs staring at the tournament space, that’s easy. The player raises his or her hand and you walk over. When you have 300 games, hundreds of players, and 100,000+ square feet of space to manage, you need a system. You need lights, two-way radios, and clearly defined parameters of what tech, director, and volunteer are assigned to monitor what chunk of floorspace and games.
…and you have to make it fun ;o)
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It’s stuff like this that I can’t stop thinking about in how it relates to FPF. I was there, but didn’t stick around for the finals Sunday, but heard that the payouts weren’t exactly as published, which I thought were “guaranteed”. A little math leads me to believe that number is not that far off base for that event, with 2 days of qualifying.
If they only had 8 games total, that’s going to keep your prize pool smaller. A pump and dump at a show should have at least 10 games. For years, CAX did 3 divisions (modern, SS and classic) with at least 5 games in each bank. The numbers of games used is just as important as how much time there is for qualifying when you use that format.
As a Florida player, it concerns me that people might be thinking negative thoughts about FPF regarding the prize money. This is my home state and a welcomed opportunity for us to play with world class players and I want to see players come back.
My son and I have played FPF event every year. It is our big chance to play a major and my favorite memory is making the final 4 with Bowen, Zach and Steve in 2013.
Each FPF tourney has been run basically the same way by the same director. I don’t recall people complaining about the prize funds prior.
We have played in this event every year and prior to this year, we qualified for A division every time within budget and always felt we had enough tries. We have even won money at this event and it always seemed fair.
For us, I typically budget $100 per tourney for a standard 3 for $10 event. I have done this each year. I figure that’s 30 games. My rationale is this : for a 5 game bank, if I haven’t qualified after an average of 6 tries on each game over a course of 20 hours, then I am just not playing well and I refuse to chase by throwing money at the situation.
In 2015 at FPF, we tried qualifying in both events (we both made classics). However, I left with a decent amount of budgeted tourney money in my pocket.
I am not complaining about not giving up more money, but we certainly did not “donate” much this year because I know for a fact we played less than we have before. I suspect others who have been here before played less and hence did not contribute to the pot.
I don’t know the 2015 FPF prize pool funds, but I just don’t think the pot could have been that large because the lines simply were not moving that fast to allow for people to pump that much into it and there were less games for people to try.
The wake up lesson for me was stop being a 1950s TV set needing forever to warm up, and play better sooner 
Anyway I hope that sheds a little light on the issue.
What do you think was the difference this year? Were there fewer tables than last year? Were there more competitors?
I was there and didn’t think the pot was light at all.
With only 5 games in main, that is going to severely limit the money that is brought in. If anything I thought the main pot was too big and it seemed like classics was a little light. There is no good way to track how many tickets people used for classics, and how many for main so he had to do his best and guess. The lines for classics were longer than main lines for most of the time while qualifying was going on.
So the overall pot with main and classics added together seemed right to me.