Ann Arbor, MI
Just thought I would give a quick rundown of an informal and casual tournament that was held for co-workers at Domino's and some friends at Pinball Pete's in Ann Arbor. No tournament experience for any of the players (except the VFW EM Tournament) and many had not played pinball in years. There were 16 players in total on a Monday after work. Speedy at Pinball Pete's was great in reserving the picnic tables and donating some prizes to the winners.
Setup was head-to-head play on random games, players and games on slips of papers pulled for each round (I need to get Brackelope Pro for future tournaments). We attempted to avoid rematches for the first several rounds and no repeat games for the first 3 rounds for anyone as well. This worked out because almost all of the better games were up and running well at Pete's (Need to get GNR, TOM, Monster Bash and ST:TNG repaired). $10 entry fee with all the entry money getting paid out. $100 to the winner, $30 for 2nd, $20 for 3rd and $10 for the player with the fewest wins.
Each round started at the same time and we played qualifying from 5:45 until a little after 7 p.m. A total of 6 qualifying rounds were finished. After qualifying the 4 entrants with the most wins were to move on to the semi-finals. We ended up with 2 players with 5 wins who qualified automatically and 5 others at 4 wins. We had tiebreakers games for the 5 players with 4 wins to see who would advance. The 2 who advanced were the lower seeds and played the top 2 qualifiers. Of course, both matches were upsets and the bottom qualifiers end up playing for the championship on the new KISS LE. The winner won by quite a bit and took home the prize of $100 and a Pinball Pete's t-shirt.
Everyone had a great time and the plan is to continue this every month with hopefully increasing attendance. Many of the people are also asking about other playing opportunities and acquiring games for their homes. Just a reminder that people enjoy pinball, they just need a little push to get going. I had to do some convincing to get some of the people to play but once they get over their fear and start playing, it is all fun. Pictures are below of some of the action.
