I've pegged my personal benchmark for IFPA "success" at 12,600 active players for 2018. I would be really happy if we hit that number.

As previously mentioned, the $5 per player fee doesn't get us to numbers that we feel are significant for this initiative.

Currently there's about 2500 players in the US/Canada that have a "registered" IFPA account. Registering your IFPA account is currently free, and makes you eligible to participate in the SCS/PCS/Nationals/Worlds/Rewards Program/etc.

If we assume that we have a 100% success rate for these 2500 players that will now pay for this service, we're talking about $12,500.

This would push $3125 to the Nationals prize pool, and leave $9375 to be split among the 50 States/Provinces (roughly ~$200 each per pool).

Enacting this at the tournament level gives us the opportunity to hit a much higher level to be given back to the State/Province pools. Previously we paid out 3 winners were State. With the new plan we can now pay out 16 players per State (or in some cases 24 players for the "Super States" - field expansion is part of the final rules for the 2018 season).

As for the payment module, we understand it's an extra step for TD's and we have attempted to make the process as seemless as possible. Here's a peek at the payment page as it sits right now:

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It's tough to compare because the only numbers to use are based on the current "free" system. Based on 2016 numbers the total funds raised would have been right around $92,000. I haven't run the numbers for 2017, but realize that once we go away from "free" that there will be some shrinkage in the funds generated based on events now running without IFPA sanction, along with TD's optimizing their submissions to be as economical/WPPR friendly as possible.

There is a Google Group for all the IFPA State Representatives. Will was added to the group as the TN Rep.

We prefer not to add "All TD's" to this group, as we rely on the State Reps to then communicate what's going on with their local TD's. So best would be for you to talk with Will to stay in the loop on any higher level IFPA discussions, unless you guys want to split the TN Rep duties (which is perfectly fine as well).

You can absolutely do this option if you want. You are correct that you can't have your cake and eat it too, so you would only submit the results based on those that put money in the fishbowl. The WPPR points calculated would be based strictly on the names from that list.

How many of those 2500 people would pay $20 . . . and at some point as the season gets into the second half what's the chance of convincing a player to pay their $20 for that current season?

With the current rate of registered accounts, you would then have results that are 91% 'empty' with 0 points assigned to them. The idea of pulling up the Pinburgh results of 800 players and seeing that 728 of those names listed as "0.0" doesn't seem like a positive thing to me with respect to the optics of people checking out results on our site.

We're also 5 weeks from launch and are putting the finishing touches on the current implementation plan. The idea of starting a NEW plan now, scrapping all the work we've already done to get this process started just isn't going to happen (even if the greatest idea ever was pitched RIGHT NOW).

This has always been an option at the TD level.

A TD is welcome to offer IFPA sanctioning as a player opt-in for their events.

Think of it as a "Sidepot" so to speak. If 40 players show up, and 11 players choose to "opt-in" for IFPA sanctioning, that TD will submit the results of those 11 players from 1st place through 11th place based on where they finished among just that "Sidepot" group of players.

You could absolutely finish 5th in the 40 player tournament, but be the highest finisher of those 11 players that opted-it. You would listed as the 1st place finisher of the event for IFPA submission purposes, but the value of the event played would be that of an "11 player event", not a "40 player event".

That had me LOL

Quick not public but soon to be public update. Other rules changes for the 2018 SCS season:

1) Best 20 results within a state will count for each player (similar to the way the World Rankings are calculated).

2) “Super States” expansion of the qualifying field will be in play. Any States that have a minimum of 400 unique players and 100 events held within that state during the calendar year will be eligible for that expanded 24 player final.

I kind of love that this is on the Bowen is suppressed thread

Not at all. I fully respect the decision Bowen made for himself on this, and that it has made his pinball experience a more positive one by suppressing. I've known the guy for just about 25 years and I think we both understand one another 100% on this.

My reference was that this thread title has nothing to do about the nuances of our 2018 season changes, but now has the "most current information" regarding some of our final rule changes that aren't in the other IFPA $1 related threads.

TECHNICALLY there is an exploit within our participation rules that would allow you to 'rage suppress' and not be counted in that event.

We require players to play in at least 50% of the qualifying requirements to be included in the results submitted to the IFPA. This percentage goes up if an event has more than 50 players (by 1% per player).

Any event that has 100+ players, a player has to compete in 100% of the qualifying requirements to be included in the standings submitted to us.

Pinburgh going south for you? Just rage quit after session #9, don't play in session #10, and the Pinburgh TD can't 'legally' include you in the results because you didn't play in 100% of the qualifying rounds.

This is up to the TD organizing the event. They have the ability to offer an opt-out at the player level if they choose to do so.

There are a bunch of events I'm aware of where the location is sponsoring the fee, so there's no $1 to be paid by you.

There are a bunch of events I'm aware of where the TD is taking the fee out of the pockets of the winners, so there's no $1 to be paid by you (unless you win - then you are subsidizing the fee).

I would contact your local TD to see how they plan on moving forward with respect to the fee.

The opportunity to help YOU of all people out . . . so tempting!

Yes. Players can turn themselves on and off at their leisure, for whatever reasons they prefer. I once had a player turn themselves off because their boss saw the results on their profile that included a date that player was "sick from work". Once I rebuilt the rankings with them suppressed, their boss couldn't prove anything to get them in trouble.

A player that is suppressed for any portion of the current year forfeits their rights to any IFPA related "perks" for the following year. Taking Bowen for example, by suppressing himself in 2017 he has disqualified himself from qualifying in any SCS, the IFPA WC, Stern Rewards Program. In 2018 this will also include the Stern Pro Circuit as one of the IFPA "perks". Suppressed players can of course participate in the individual SPC events, but they won't be tracked in the SPC standings and won't be able to qualify for the SPC Final.

Yes. The player still exists in all the calculations we do on the backend. Once we go to "display" the results publicly to the website, the names are removed for those players that are suppressed. Taking the Bowen example, he still adds .5 base value points as well as his high level of 'ranking' and 'rating' value add to the WPPR pot in any event he plays in.

Everything exists for Bowen in our system. The only thing we don't do is display his stats publicly linked to his name. If he ever requests to be turned back on, all that activity will exist as if he never suppressed himself at all.

For those with minor detective skills, if you knew every event that Bowen played in, you could sleuth your way into knowing exactly where he would be today.

Here are the results from PAPA A:
https://www.ifpapinball.com/tournaments/view.php?t=18407

We all know he finished in 2nd place, so as of that date entering the tournament he was ranked 13th in the world and had an IFPA Rating of 1771.43.

He earned 118.52 WPPR's for that event. The only way to know where that boosted him is to know the next tournament played in after PAPA 20 (which I don't). That will list his WPPR rank going into that next event, and so on and so on.

Correct. Even if unsuppressed TODAY, he's already ineligible to play in SCS on 1/20/18. He forfeited his rights to the "2017 season".

He has until 11:59pm on 12/31/17 to make himself eligible for the "2018 season" with the finals held in Jan 2019.

We can dig into our backend for any TD's that need to know information regarding a suppressed player.

I've also heard of TD's using the rule that any players suppressed from IFPA are presumed to be of the highest restriction, which is also fine.

I would gladly offer to sponsor the $1 fee for the MGC out of my own pocket for the importance that event has been in the history of the 'new' IFPA as Dan mentioned. Dan knows this, and I'm well aware that his issues go far beyond who actually pays the fee, sponsored or not.

Knuckles deep bro

We don't have the functionality in place to mark a period of time where a player's results based on when they were suppressed would continue to be inactive on their profile once they do because active again in the system.

The WPPR system is meant to be an accurate system with respect to the world ranking of players. Having a player pick a choose what events they want counted based on constantly suppressing/unsuppressing themselves makes our system less accurate based on the skill level they have proven through their actual play.

It opens up exploits for players to sandbag certain events. If I want to play in C division at Pinburgh, I can get all the way up to that cut line, suppress myself, and then turn myself back on the day they lock in the restrictions for Pinburgh based on ranking.

The other issue is that our standings are always "LIVE". If myself, Zach and Lyman chose to suppress ourselves right now, we would disappear from the Illinois SCS standings. Everyone would move up 3 spots. Those in 14th-16th place that think they were safe would be in for a rude awakening when Zach, Lyman and myself turn ourselves back on at the end of the year, pushing those players to 17th-19th and below the cutline. Our standings would be inaccurate for those following it to guide the level of their participation chasing the cut line.

I prefer that the penalty for suppressing be super clean, super simple, and lean on the side of "too harsh" rather than "not harsh enough". We don't have to honor anyone's request to not be included in the system, but I'm happy to support those that feel the need to be removed. You just forfeit a bunch of perks as the consequence for doing so.