City Champ

City (of Concord) Champ

November 4-5, 2023

The Flipper Room

1033 Shary Cir, Concord, CA 94518

Tournament Location

The Flipper Room is a pinball arcade, art gallery, and framing shop located in Concord, CA with ~35 pinball machines. It’s accessible from the major Bay Area airports (closest to OAK), and located near a BART station.

 

Stream

The end of qualifying, tiebreakers and finals will be streamed at https://www.twitch.tv/dri374

Registration

Registration will open on Saturday, September 30 at 10am PDT at https://forms.gle/1ZXt3PWxPeW2Ce848 The first 72 players will be registered for the tournament. Any subsequent players will go onto the waitlist. The player list will be updated with registered players and the waitlist. Cost for the event is $80 (plus coin drop for games). This will be due in cash at check-in to the tournament (exact change appreciated, there is no ATM at the location). We ask that any registered players unable to attend email us at concordchamp@baybridgepinball.com so we can let people from the waitlist know. ANY PLAYER THAT NO SHOWS WITHOUT NOTIFICATION WILL BE INELIGIBLE FOR THE NEXT ITERATION OF THE EVENT.

 

The registration form (when it goes active) is shown below. Player name (first and last) and email address is required. A second player can optionally be registered at the same time. No google login is required.

 

Tournament Format

The qualifying format is group match play. The player limit is 72 players. Qualifying will be 12 rounds in groups of four players. New groups will be drawn for each game/round. Scoring will be 3/2/1/0. Pairings will be random for the first round and tiered Swiss for subsequent rounds. The Match Play software we utilize to run the tournament picks games. Playing order and arena draws will be balanced.

The 24 players who earn the most points will qualify for playoffs. Seeds 1-8 get a bye round. We will only play tiebreakers that determine who will make it into the playoffs, for getting a bye round, and first overall seed. Tiebreaker matches will be best of 1 game on a random game chosen from a bank of games deemed to be playing well by the tournament directors with random playing order. For other ties, we will use the built in tiebreaker in Match Play that counts your strength of opponents. If for example two players have the same point total at seed #10, and also have the same strength of opponents, we will use a randomizer to break the tie. This will be used only for the playoff bound players. For example, if three players are tied at seed #48, they will remain tied.

Playoffs format

• In each playoff round, there will be groups of four players where the top two from each group advance to the next round, until we reach the finals. The scoring will stay 3/2/1/0. We will only play tiebreakers when advancement is at stake. The higher seed has the option to pick a game from one of the banks not played by the group that round that is not currently being played or can defer this selection.  Order choice will go by the highest seed of players that did not make game selection. 
• Three banks of four games will be available for play in the finals. The Banks will consist of games from four different categories. For example: EM – Old Chicago, SS – Flash Gordon, Late SS/Early DMD – Congo, Late DMD/LCD – Jurassic Park. The tournament directors reserve the right to use a SS in place of an EM in the event that not enough EMs are available.
• The EM, SS, Late SS/Early DMD games in each bank will be chosen by the tournament directors. The top seeds will then have the opportunity to choose the Late DMD/LCD game in the banks from a list of games provided by the tournament directors. The number 3 seed will get to choose the first game, followed by the number 2 seed, followed by the top seed.  The top seed will then get to place one of the games into a bank of their choice, or defer this to the second seed. The seed that did not make the first pick will then choose the banks for the remaining games.
• The top seed in each group will be able to choose which bank to play on starting with the group with the highest overall seed. They may also swap one of the games in the bank with a game of the same era in a bank that has not been selected by any other groups yet if they want to. No more than two groups can play on a single bank. A player may not choose the same bank in consecutive rounds, but bank selection may be deferred to the next highest seed if a player wishes to do so. The top seed in the group will still retain the right to swap a game after bank selection even if they defer bank choice. The games will be played in the order: Late DMD/LCD, EM, Late SS/Early DMD, SS. If a second group chooses the same bank, they will begin on the Late SS/Early DMD.
• Order selection on the first game will go in order of seeding (top seed gets first selection, next highest seed gets second selection). In subsequent games, order selection will be in the reverse order of the result of the previous game (last place gets first order selection, 3rd gets second selection, etc.).
• The first playoff round will be four groups of four players. The bottom two in each group will be placed in positions 17-24 depending on their point total in this round.
• Quarterfinals will be four groups of four players, with the 1-8 seeds entering the playoffs. The bottom two in each group will be placed in positions 9-16 depending on their point total in this round.
• Semifinals will be two groups of four players. The bottom two in each group will be placed in positions 5-8th depending on their point total in this round.
• The Finals will be one group of four players. A tie-breaker game will be played for any ties in the final group. 

Schedule

Saturday

Doors open 9:15AM. Practice on tournament machines allowed until 10:00 AM.

Player check in starts at 9:30 AM, and ends at 10:15 AM. If you are not in line to check in with the registration desk by 10:15 AM, you will forfeit your spot to the first person present on the waiting list.

Below are approximate times. If play is quicker than planned, we will start the next round earlier than noted below.

• Round 1: 10:30 AM
• Round 2: 11:10 AM
• Round 3: 11:50 AM
• Round 4: 12:30 PM
• Round 5: 1:10 PM
• Lunch break (everybody gets at least 20 minutes)
• Round 6: 2:40 PM
• Round 7: 3:20 PM
• Round 8: 4:00 PM
• Round 9: 4:40 PM
• Round 10: 5:20 PM
• Round 11: 6:00 PM
• Round 12: 6:40 PM
• Tiebreakers: 7:20 PM

Sunday

Players without byes must check in with the tournament director no later than 10:00 AM. Players with byes do not have to check in at the start of playoffs. They just need to be there when their round starts. In the event that they are not there when their round starts they will lose any bank or order selection and their balls will be plunged on any games until they arrive. Players without a bye who are not present by 10:00 AM will forfeit their spot if an alternate is present.

Times are approximate. If play is quicker than planned, we will start rounds sooner than listed below.

• Doors open: 9:30 AM
• First round: 10:00 AM
• Quarterfinals: 12:15 PM
• Semifinals: 2:30 PM
• Finals: 4:45 PM
• Awards ceremony: 7:00 PM

Tournament Rules

The PAPA/IFPA rule set will be used for the tournament.

A couple of additional notes:

1. Tournament officials may declare a player as a winner of a game in progress; that player will get 3 points for that game. This will generally occur only if the pace of the tournament is at risk due to exceptionally good play. The affected player must stop play immediately. Any other player reaching the same score in that game will also receive 3 points for that game.
2. Extra balls will be off on (almost) all games. Should a player earn an extra ball on any game, they will be able to play it. If EBs were not noted as being on the game sign, we ask that the player notify a tournament official after the game, so they can check whether EBs should be on or note that they are on for other players.

Prize money

Prize money after accounting for IFPA/Stern Pro Circuit fees and expenses associated with running the event (trophies, food/drinks for volunteers) assuming full field of 72 players:

• 1st: $1000
• 2nd: $740
• 3rd: $500
• 4th: $300
• 5th-8th: $160
• 9th-16th: $80
• 17th-24th: $40
• Top qualifier: $100

Games

Coming soon, but see pinball map for many of the candidates.

Players

Coming soon

 

Contact Us

Email: concordchamp@baybridgepinball.com