IFPA WPPR Rules define Hybrid as a version of best game qualifying where each player is limited to playing a number of entries that’s at most 4 maximum of exactly 4 times the unique titles included in the tournament.
Basics
Pinball tournaments using the “Best Game” format have a set of machines available for the duration of the tournament. Players purchase or receive entries that govern how many attempts they can use to put up high scores in single-player games on those machines. For “Hybrid Best Game” tournaments the number of entries that any player can use is capped at a maximum of the number of machines multiplied by 4. Example: For a tournament using 6 machines each player can use a maximum of 24 entries. Additionally, the format is only considered to be Hybrid Best Game if at least 10% of the players actually play the maximum number of entries.
Disclaimer
This is an unofficial summary of the IFPA rules. The official rules can be found on ifpapinball.com under the Resources > WPPR Rules menu.
IFPA Philosophy
Hybrid was introduced to encourage more best game tournaments that are effective at identifying the most skilled players. Players who have the most money and time to buy and play extra entries generally have the best chance at an Unlimited Best Game tournament where entries are not capped. Tournaments that limit players to a number of entries that’s smaller than what is allowed by Hybrid Best Game are more likely to reward players who are familiar with the quirks of the particular machine copies being played or the players who have more luck in their plays. The 4x play count in Hybrid Best Game tries to strike a balance between these two other Best Game styles.
To encourage adoption of the Hybrid Best Game format, the IFPA grades the tournaments using this format by giving 12% TGP per score counted. To illustrate the impact of this tournament grading, a 20-hour best game tournament would need to count this many scores to achieve approximately the same WPPR points:
- Limited Best Game: count 29 scores
- Unlimited Best Game: count 12 scores
- Hybrid Best Game: count 10 scores
This makes Hybrid Best Game a good format for tournament directors who want to organize events with a large number of players and worth a large amount of WPPRs using a small number of machines.
FAQ
Q: What if I’m counting more than one score per machine?
A: The number of entries should still be 4x the number of machines available, not the number of scores counted.
Q: Do I have to price my entries so everyone gets all of them or can I sell initial entries with more available for purchase later?
A: Hybrid does not come with any special rules for pricing entries. You can give all the entries for free, or charge for entries one at a time, or charge a single fee to start with all entries, or anything In between.
Q: What actually happens if less than 10% of players play all entries?
A: The tournament will end up with a lower TGP%. It will be graded as Unlimited Best Game rather than as Hybrid Best Game. Each score counted will only contribute either +4% or +8% towards TGP rather than +12. Under Unlimited Best Game rules each hour of qualifying will also contribute +1% to TGP. If you think you might not meet the 10% play all entries criteria consider planning an event that uses fewer machines or more qualifying time to make it more feasible for players to complete all of their entries. If you do fall short of this criteria it’s best for the event to have 20+ hours of qualifying time so the TGP per score counted only drops to 8% rather than 4%.
Q: Does it count if 10% of players buy all entries but they don’t play some of them?
A: No, at least 10% of players must actually play all of the entries otherwise the tournament will be graded as Unlimited Best Game.
Q: Does 10% mean more than 10% or close to 10% or rounds to 10%?
A: Take the number of players who played the maximum number of entries, divide that by the number of players who recorded at least one score in the tournament. If this number is less than 10% then the tournament will receive TGP based on the Unlimited Best Game rule.
Example: The tournament includes 8 machines. 41 people are in the tournament standings in Match Play Events or Never Drains DTM. 4 of those people played 32 games in the tournament. 4 / 41 is less than 10% so this tournament would not count as Hybrid. If 5 or more players had played 32 games then it would meet the requirements of the “10% rule” for Hybrid.
Q: What happens if I have to give a player an extra entry because of a malfunction or scorekeeper error?
A: In the software it may look like the player played more than the maximum allowed number of entries. Include a note in the IFPA results submission explaining the anomaly and it should not adversely affect the grading of the tournament format.
Q: How does it work if I have two or more copies of the same game have all scores from both copies go into a single queue and results list?
A: The IFPA treats this as a single machine when determining how the number of entries allowed for the Hybrud Beat Game Format. Example: one tournament has 5 machines, each is a unique title; another tournament has 25 machines with 5 copies of each of 5 unique titles; in both cases 20 is the maximum number of entries allowed for Hybrid.
Q: How does it work if I have two or more copies of the same game have separate queues and results lists for each copy?
A: The IFPA treats these as separate machines. Example: a tournament has two copies of Whirlwind and three copies of Funhouse; each of the 5 machines is treated as a separate queue and players’ scores are only compared against other scores of that particular machine; the tournament should use 20 as the maximum number of entries to meet the Hybrid format requirements.
Q: If I want my Hybrid tournament to be Certified does it need to be at least 20 hours of qualifying, at most 20 hours of qualifying, or exactly 20 hours of qualifying?
A: For a Hybrid Best Game tournament to be certified it needs to have 20 or more hours of qualifying open to all participants.
Q: Can I have separate volunteer-only qualifying hours?
A: Yes, but volunteer-only qualifying could not count towards the Certified requirements for minimum number of hours.
Q: What happens if a machine has a catastrophic malfunction before 50% of qualifying time has elapsed and can’t be repaired?
A: The IFPA WPPR rules don’t constrain how you handle this scenario. If you’re using the IFPA/PAPA Tournament Rules for your tournament (which is a good idea, but not required) then you would replace the machine with a different machine and return the entries that were used on that game back to the players so they can re-play those on either the newly added machine or the others.
Q: What happens if a machine has a catastrophic malfunction before 50% of qualifying time has elapsed and can’t be repaired and can’t be replaced?
A: Still return the entries that were used on that game back to the players so they can re-play those on the other machines. The maximum number of entries per player will still be what it was based on the game count you started with rather than the reduced game count.
Q: What happens if a machine has a catastrophic malfunction after 50% of qualifying time has elapsed and can’t be repaired?
A: The IFPA WPPR rules don’t constrain how you handle this scenario. If you’re using the IFPA/PAPA Tournament Rules for your tournament (which is a good idea, but not required) then you would keep the existing scores even though the game is no longer available for play.
Q: Can I run two hybrid tournaments at the same time on the same bank of games with separate queues and results lists?
A: Yes, this is allowed by the IFPA. There is a utility that can merge the queues for tournaments with overlapping machines. https://gameboy9.github.io/mergequeues.html Alternatively, you can leave it up to players and scorekeepers to manage who goes next when both queues have players waiting.
Q: If I run two hybrid tournaments at the same time on the same bank of games with separate queues and results lists can they both be Certified?
A: Yes, this is allowed by the IFPA.
Q: Can a dog play basketball?
A: Ain’t no rules says a dog can’t play basketball.
