IFPA WPPR system – Global Endorsement Fee to start in 2023

At the start of 2018, the IFPA implemented a $1 endorsement fee for all events in North America that wished to be sanctioned as part of the IFPA World Pinball Player Rankings (WPPR). In 2020, after sustained growth in the number of events in North America, a similar fee was implemented for events in Australia, led by Australia’s country and state directors. For the coming year, the IFPA is expanding this fee to apply across the globe.

Starting on January 1, 2023, the IFPA will implement a global fee for all open events that wish to be sanctioned as part of the WPPR system. 

Please note that this fee DOES NOT apply to women’s-only events, which are sanctioned toward a separate ranking system.

Please note that for North America nothing changes. If you hear Robert Byers talking about the NACS fee increasing to $2 in 2023, he’s spreading lies.

The fee will be collected in local currencies, set to the amounts listed on the Global Fee page. Tournament/league directors will be responsible for submitting payments to the IFPA after tournament/league results have been submitted.

The fee will be distributed based on a standardized approach where the majority stays within each region. Distribution will largely follow the 70/20/10 model currently used in North America and Australia: 

  • 70% staying local 
  • 20% toward regional/world championships
  • 10% toward processing fees 

For Europe, the 20% will be broken down as follows: 15% towards IFPA European Championship Series Final expenses and 5% towards IFPA World Pinball Championship expenses.
For North America, the 20% will be broken down as follows: 15% towards IFPA North American Pinball Championship expenses and 5% towards IFPA World Pinball Championship expenses.
For other countries, the 20% will be broken down as follows: 15% will go into the “local” pool and 5% towards IFPA World Pinball Championship expenses.

This does not mean that the 70% staying local will necessarily go toward prize pools for local tournaments (as it does in North America and Australia). We are mindful of the differences in pinball communities from region to region, and local distribution could mean anything from facilitating the country championship series finals to making a donation to a local charity. The IFPA is consulting with local representatives to determine the best approach for each country and region. 

In any case, no part of the fee will be used as compensation for IFPA staff. “Processing fees” refers to the fees that Stripe charges to handle the processing of credit card transactions and any currency translation charges. The IFPA continues to operate through volunteer work and does not generate any income whatsoever for IFPA staff, country directors, or state/province/district representatives.

Like with all our policy changes, this is driven by the goal of growing competitive pinball worldwide. After seeing continued growth in the number of sanctioned events and players participating in those sanctioned events in North America, we are confident that it will ultimately be successful on a global scale. The IFPA will follow up with further information in the coming months, and we look forward to spirited discussion on this policy as the details are finalized.

Women in Pinball Feedback Survey

The IFPA recently launched our Women’s Advisory Board in order to better include women’s voices and perspectives on issues related to competitive pinball. The Board would like your input in determining what topics are most important to the women’s pinball community.

Our aim is to learn more about the backgrounds and priorities of women who participate in competitive pinball events so that the IFPA Women’s Advisory Board can better advocate for the topics that matter most to female pinball players. This survey should only take about 5 minutes to complete, and we truly appreciate your feedback.

Please click HERE to take the survey.

For questions related to the survey please contact The Women’s Advisory Board ifpawomen@gmail.com.

After the Dollar: A Review of the IFPA’s Endorsement Fee by Dennis Kriesel

This Week in Pinball published a piece by Dennis Kriesel with a review on the impact of the endorsement fee started in 2018. Click HERE to read the article.

Endorsement Fee – Payment Walkthrough

Accounts will be tied to email addresses. For tournament directors and league organizers that have used multiple email addresses to submit results to the WPPR system, it is highly recommended that you use ONE email address going forward.

http://www.ifpapinball.com/payment will be the dedicated website for depositing funds into your account. Payments can be made via credit card through Stripe, check or money order (picture below). Further instructions will show the payment process through Stripe.

For payment through Stripe, follow these steps:

Step 1 – Enter the dollar amount you wish to deposit into your account (picture below):

Step 2 – After you click “Pay Fee”, you will be prompted to enter your email address and credit card information (picture below):

Step 3 – Fill out those details, using the email address that is linked to the IFPA calendar submission that was submitted (picture below):

Step 4 – After clicking to Pay the deposit, the blue area will turn to green if successful. You will then be shown that the deposit is complete including a transaction ID number through Stripe (picture below):

That’s it! The funds will be added into your account, and we will begin applying those funds to any results you have submitted into our system that have been approved. We will be keeping a complete history of every ‘in’ and ‘out’ transaction for every tournament director. See picture for an example of that detail:

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Tournament Fee Payment

Starting in 2018, an endorsement fee of $1 per player, per event will now be required for events in North America and Australia, to be endorsed by the IFPA and award WPPR points.
Women’s events are not subject to this endorsement fee. This fee is for open events only.

 

How the endorsement fee will work
  •  Endorsement fees are required for each and every event submitted to the IFPA that wishes to receive WPPR points.
  •  The fee is $1 per player per event for endorsement. (For example, 35 participants in an event would mean a $35 endorsement fee)
  •  TDs are responsible for submitting payment to IFPA after results are approved. WPPR points will not be posted until payment has been received by the IFPA. Tournament directors will be able to make deposits into their account via check, money order and Stripe. We will be maintaining a balance for every tournament director under their email address. Funds will be applied to that account when a result is approved by the IFPA. Please use the same email address referenced in the payment details as is used to submit results on the IFPA website so we can put these funds in the appropriate account.
  •  Fees will only be paid based on when results are submitted. For example, a 20 player event that meets monthly is welcome to submit results monthly, and pay $240 for the year. Each monthly event will be awarded WPPR points separately. Organizers are also welcome to pool together individual events into a league, keep their own internal standings for that period of time, and then submit those results annually instead. This would result in an endorsement fee of $20 for the year, however WPPR points would only be awarded one time per year based on that single submission. We leave that flexibility up to the organizers and players within each individual community.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

 

Three ways to pay

 

Check Or Money Order By Mail.

International Flipper Pinball Association
Attn: Josh Sharpe
1537 N. Kaspar Ave.
Arlington Heights, IL 60004

Check Or Money Order In Person
IFPA officials:

  • Josh Sharpe
  • Zach Sharpe
  • Brian Shepherd
  • Brian Woodard
  • Adam Becker

 

Note: We cannot accept Cash as payment. All credit card processing is handled by Stripe. We do not store any Credit Card information on the IFPA servers.

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Tournament Fee Submitted!

We have received your tournament fee deposit. Once approved, we will apply it to any tournament balances you may have. Any leftover funds will be used for future tournaments that are submitted under your account.

Thank you for taking the time to hold pinball tournaments and your support!

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An Empirical Evaluation of the IFPA Endorsement Fee

blog post courtesy of Phillip Grimaldi

The purpose of this analysis is to provide a data driven perspective on the impact of the IFPA’s recent announcement to charge $1.00/per player for every tournament submission. My approach was to examine the 2016 calendar year as a proxy for determining the impact in future years. The data for this analysis was obtained directly from the IFPA via their API. Analysis code and data files are available at my github repository. Readers are encouraged to report errors by contacting me directly or by submitting a pull request in github.

Click HERE for the details.

2018-19 State Championship Series – Endorsement Fee and Prize Pool adjustment

The IFPA has set a goal to increase the prestige of the State and National level Championships.

To serve that purpose, starting on 1/1/18, the IFPA is implementing an endorsement fee that will be required for any event that wishes to be counted as part of the IFPA World Pinball Player Rankings. Please note this is for North American events ONLY.

The fees collected will be used to exclusively create individually self funding prize pools for the State Championship Series in the US and Provincial Championship Series in Canada for the 2018-19 season.

Below is how the endorsement fee will work:
  • Endorsement fees are required for each an every event submitted to the IFPA that wishes to receive WPPR points. 
  • The fee is $1 per player per event for endorsement. (For example, 35 participants in an event would mean a $35 endorsement fee)
  • TDs are responsible for submitting payment to IFPA after results are approved. WPPR points will not be posted until payment has been received by the IFPA. A dedicated page on the IFPA site will be available for TDs to make these payments.
  • Fees are 100% payback –> 75% contributes towards the relevant individual State/Province Championship prize pool, 25% contributes towards the National Championship prize pool.
  • Fees will only be collected based on when results are submitted. For example, a 20 player event that meets monthly is welcome to submit results monthly, and pay $240 for the year. However, that event is also welcome to run their own series of events every month and then report those final results to the IFPA annually instead. This would result in an endorsement fee of $20 for the year. We leave that flexibility up to the organizers and players within each individual community.
This program enables organizers to proportionally contribute to their own State and the National prize pool. With the activity of each state varying so greatly, as well as organizers and sizes of events, each event will only be required to subsidize a proportional amount. As a historical example, the money that would have been collected for all endorsed events in Illinois during the 2016 year was $1217. These fees would then generate $913 for the Illinois State Championship prize pool along with $304 being generated for the National Championship prize pool.

A preliminary prize structure would payout all 16 participants of every State Championship, along with all of the finalists of the National Championship.

We anticipate questions regarding the implementation of this program, the biggest being how the $1 will be funded for tournaments. We understand that different communities have different priorities in terms of recruiting and retaining new players, so we are not proscribing where the fee comes from. We have purposely made it flexible so that everyone can implement it as they see fit for their needs:

Option 1 –> Location and/or operator funds this $1 fee for the event. For those events in public locations a TD may request this of the location. For example if 20 players show up for a monthly tournament, the location may commit to sponsoring the $20 IFPA endorsement fee knowing that the earnings of the games played that tournament night will easily cover that fee.

Option 2 –> TD’s can take the endorsement fee out of the prize pool. For example, if 20 players show up for a monthly, with an entry fee of $5 per player, and prizes of 50%/30%/20% to the top 3 finishers, instead of the prize pool being $50/$30/$20 for the top 3 finishers, it would be $40/$24/$16 for the top 3 finishers.

Option 3 –> TD’s can increase their entry fee by $1 to cover the endorsement fee. For example, if 20 players show up for a monthly with an entry fee of $5 per player, the TD would charge $6 per player. The prize pool would then continue to be made up of the $100 in entry fees.

Option 4 –> Find your own plan. Kickstarter? Patreon? GoFundMe? Outside sponsorship? TDs can come up with other funding options if they choose, we just wanted to list some examples.


April 2nd update: 

While we have had our share of April 1st fun over the past few years, this announcement is 100% real and will be implemented for the 2018 season. Looking forward to a spirited discussion over the next 9 months before it launches.

 

Stern Pinball looking for player feedback!

Stern Pinball is looking for some feedback from the IFPA player community on their latest designs.

If you have a chance, please check out the survey here:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DZF3H6K

Please rank the previous 6 Stern releases, 1 being the best, 6 being the worst.

 

 

 

 

ACS Official Rules (2024)

Quick Overview

The IFPA Australian Championship Series is an annual pinball competition with players qualifying throughout the entire calendar year. At the end of each calendar year, the top 16 or 24 ranked players with the most WPPR points from each state will qualify for the playoffs, where they will play for the title of IFPA State/Territory Champion within that area.

From there, these champions, along with the other Top 4 or 6 finalists from each State/Territory final, will be invited to play for the IFPA Australian Pinball Championship, details of which can be found below. The remaining portion of the field of 64 will be filled by the top WPPR earners (best 20 results) throughout the calendar year.

All mentions of “State” below also refer to Territory winners.

Competition Details

  1. How to qualify

Unlike most tournaments where the qualification process takes place over a couple of days at the tournament site, qualifying for the IFPA State Championship Series is based on results from all the IFPA endorsed tournaments held throughout the year in each eligible state. Utilising its World Pinball Player Rankings, the IFPA will be tracking results based on where those IFPA endorsed tournaments are held, maintaining separate state rankings made up of those filtered results.

For example, the Queensland State Rankings will be made up of IFPA endorsed tournaments including the Brisbane Masters, Empire Pinball Tournaments, Sunshine Coast Pinball, Park’n’Plunge, Coomera Classic, etc. Those 16 or 24 players that earn the most WPPR points based only on these subset of events, will qualify for the IFPA Queensland State Championship. Similar to the World Pinball Player Rankings, only a player’s best 20 events within that state will count towards their standing.

No player will be eligible to play in more than one IFPA State Championship, so it is likely that the IFPA will have to move down the state/territory rankings list to find 16 or 24 eligible qualifiers to participate in the State Championship. It is possible to qualify for an IFPA State Championship within a state that player does not live in, and it is even possible for players that live outside Australia to qualify for an IFPA State Championship should they earn enough WPPR points within a state to qualify.

It is the player’s responsibility to make sure they have an email address on file with the IFPA, or they run the risk of not being contacted for participation in any State Championships they are qualified for. Please fill out an IFPA profile to ensure we have a way to contact you. If you see a green check within your profile information on your IFPA profile page, it means we do have a registered email address on file for you.

While all States will have a minimum of 16 players that qualify for the State Championship, certain states will be eligible to expand their qualifying field to 24 players. Any States that have a minimum of 200 unique players and 50 events held within that state during the calendar year will be eligible for that expanded 24 player final.

  1. Fees

An endorsement fee of $1 per player, per event will now be required for events to be endorsed by the IFPA and award WPPR points within Australia.

Tournament Directors are responsible for submitting payment to IFPA after results are approved. WPPR points will not be posted until payment has been received by the IFPA.

The fees collected will be allocated to the prize pool of that state (60%), prize pool of the Australian Championship (25%), mandatory prize pool for IFPA World Championship (5%), with the remaining 10% of the fees being withheld to cover processing fees related to those payments.

Format of Matches

  1. Seeding of finalists

Once all participants are finalised, the 16 or 24 players will be seeded based on their State rankings position at the end of the calendar year. In the event that any players are tied with the same amount of In-State WPPR points, we will look at the overall WPPR rank of those players as of the end of that calendar year. Any players tied on the qualifying bubble with the same State ranking position will result in a play-in tiebreaker game to determine who joins the field of finalists for the State Championship. Game and position will be pulled at random by the TD.

  1. Machines Chosen

With each IFPA State Championship being held at a different location, each will have a different set of games available for the tournament. Please check with the IFPA State Representative for details on the game list once the location has been finalised for that particular IFPA State Championship.

  1. Head-to-Head Single Elimination Format

Players will be placed in a single elimination bracket once seedings have been completed.  At no stage will matches be contested in a Slaughter format, with the exception of the first round.

First round pairings (based on 16 entrants) are as follows:

1 vs. 16, 2 vs. 15, 3 vs. 14, 4 vs. 13,
5 vs. 12, 6 vs. 11, 7 vs. 10, 8 vs. 9

Second round pairings are as follows:

1/16 winner vs. 8/9 winner, 2/15 winner vs. 7/10 winner,
3/14 winner vs. 6/11 winner, 4/13 winner vs. 5/12 winner

Third round pairings are as follows:

1/8/9/16 winner vs. 4/5/12/13 winner,
2/7/10/15 winner vs. 3/6/11/14 winner

Fourth round pairing are as follows:

Two winners of round 3 play for the State Championship
Two losers of round 3 play in the Consolation Final for 3rd/4th place.

Each match will be a best-of-seven series. The higher seeded player will have a choice of machine or position for the 1st game.  For every game thereafter in the same match, selection of machine or order will go to the loser of the previous game, and will continue until someone has won 4 games. Players must select from whichever machines are available for play at the time of selection, however a machine may not be played more than once in the same match.  This does not apply if there are less than 7 machines available. If that is the case, only after all machines have been chosen can either player select that game to be played for a second time within the same match. Once a player verbally announces their game choice, or chooses position, that decision will be locked in and cannot be changed.

Each player will have the opportunity for up to 20 seconds of practice time before starting every game of every match. This is to ensure that both players have a chance to get familiar with the machine.

The winner of the match advances to the next round, while the loser is eliminated.

The 3rd/4th place Consolation Final will be played as a best-of-three instead of a best-of-seven like all other rounds, using the same rules. It is up to the IFPA State Representative as to whether matches will be played out to determine 5th through 16th (or 24th) place.

For any state that is eligible for the expanded field of 24 finalists, the top 8 players will receive a bye, with the 9th through 24th seeds playing in an opening round. The rest of the bracket will play out as per usual.

  1. Winners

Winners will receive cash prizes as cash during an awards ceremony shortly following the conclusion of all final rounds.. All decisions by tournament officials regarding winners and prizes are final.

Any state with 16 finalists will have the following payout structure:

1st place – 25% of the prize pool
2nd place – 17% of the prize pool
3rd place – 13% of the prize pool
4th place – 9% of the prize pool
5th through 8th place – 5% of the prize pool each
9th through 16th place – 2% of the prize pool each

Any state with 24 finalists will have the following payout structure:

1st place – 22% of the prize pool
2nd place – 15% of the prize pool
3rd place – 11% of the prize pool
4th place – 8% of the prize pool
5th through 8th place – 5% of the prize pool each
9th through 16th place – 2% of the prize pool each
17th through 24th place – 1% of the prize pool each

First Place will also receive the title “IFPA State Pinball Champion” for the state being contested. For example, the winner of the IFPA Queensland State Championship will receive the title of “IFPA Queensland State Pinball Champion”. This title remains in effect until the next annual IFPA State Championship Series, or will expire after two years if the IFPA State Championship Series is discontinued.

Rulings and Malfunctions

All rulings and malfunctions will be based on the rules for the IFPA/PAPA unified ruleset, available HERE.

IFPA Australian Championship

As part of the prize package for each IFPA State Championship, the Top 4 finalists (or 6 for any State final with 24 entrants) will be invited to the IFPA Australian Pinball Championship. If any of those Top 4 or 6 finalists are unable to attend the IFPA Australian Pinball Championship, the next finalist(s) from the State Championship will be allowed to participate and serve as the representative(s) of that state, down as far as the 8th placed finalist.  If there are less than 4 finalists from the Top 8 from a particular state, that spot will be given back to the National WPPR rankings.

The IFPA Australian Pinball Championship will be held early 2025 in Empire Alternacade + Events in Townsville, QLD (exact dates & times TBC)

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