The SCPC 2024 Card Championship is an IFPA Certified tournament that will take place from July 11th to 14th at the Hoover Lodge in North Canton, Ohio.

QUALIFYING:

Players will play a 5 game card consisting of 5 unique games out of the 15+ game bank. Points will be awarded based on the finishing position of each individual game on the card - 100 for first, 90 for second, 85 for third, and decreasing by 1 for each additional place down to 0. All games on the card will count together for the card’s standing and only a player’s best card will count. There are no era restrictions that apply to qualifying.

At the end of each game, players should wait for a scorekeeper to record their score before leaving the machine. It is the player’s responsibility to ensure that the scorekeeper records the score and to double check the recorded score for correctness. Any player who abandons their machine will be given a recorded score of zero for that play.

In the event of two or more scores on a machine being exactly tied, the highest point value of the tied positions will be awarded for each such score.

Qualifying will run from 2pm to 11pm on Thursday, 10am to 11pm on Friday, and 10am to 11pm on Saturday. Players with games in progress will be permitted to finish their games. All queues will be cleared after the active player (at the time qualifying closes) completes their game.

TIES:

Ties for insignificant positions (ties below the qualifying bubble or ties between eliminated plates in playoffs) will not be broken.

Qualifying ties for seeding will be broken by best finishing game (eg: Player A has a 3rd place score as the best individual game on their best card. Player B has a 5th place score as the best individual game on their best card. Player A wins the tiebreaker).

Qualifying ties for significant positions (players who are tied for bank realignment privilege, double or single byes, or qualifying for playoffs) will be played out after the conclusion of qualifying at 11pm on Saturday.

Playoff ties for significant positions (players who are tied for advancing to the next round of the playoffs, or any ties between players at the conclusion of the final round) will be played out after the conclusion of that round. The higher (or highest, in the event of a 3 way tie) seeded player will have first pick of game or position, with remaining picks proceeding in seed order.

PLAYOFFS:

The 15+ qualifying games will be broken into 3 era banks (old, mid, new or similar) for playoffs.

Bank realignment - the top seeded player can choose any game from the classics or women’s bank to add to the 15 main games from qualifying. Some games will be ineligible for this realignment, as determined by the tournament directors. This may be determined by length of play, technical functionality, reliability, or any other reason. The game that is brought in WILL NOT replace a game. The first seed may elect to waive this privilege.

Up to 40 players will qualify for A division playoffs (top half of field, rounded down if not). If A division takes 40 players, the top 4 will receive 2 rounds of byes (into the round of 16) and the next 12 will receive a 1 round bye (into the round of 28). Players will play 3 games per round in 4 player groups with 4/2/1/0 scoring. The top 2 scoring players will advance to the next round.

There will be a B division finals! B division finishing placements will not affect the IFPA results. There are no era restrictions in finals for B division, but they may not pick a game that was picked by an A division group. B division finals may run ahead or behind A. If an A division group wants to play a game currently occupied by B division, they may wait for the game but NOT vice versa.

The highest seed in each group will have the first pick of game or position for the whole round. Players do not have to announce all of their picks at the beginning of the round (they may wait until the conclusion of game 1 to announce the pick for game 2). If the highest seed picks position, the second highest seed (and etc. until someone has chosen a game) will get game picks. At the beginning of the round, the highest seeded group will get first choice of game with other groups proceeding in seed order.

Restrictions on game picks:
- Players may not pick the same game more than once between consecutive rounds.
- Each group must play one game from each era over the course of a playoff round. Each group can play in whatever era order they would like.
- Tournament directors reserve the additional right to, for time reasons, further limit the number of games that can be played on any specific machine in any given round in order to keep the tournament moving (eg: to prevent all X groups from picking the same game and creating a backlog). These restrictions will be announced as needed.

Games may have alterations made in between qualifying and playoffs. In the event of any such alterations, players will receive 30 seconds each of practice time prior to the game. A player may elect to not take practice. For simplicity’s sake, all players in the game will receive this option, even if they played the game in a previous playoff round.

ADDITIONAL RULES:

All tournament director rulings are final. Rulings that are not covered here will follow IFPA/PAPA guidelines.

Rules about player conduct will be strictly enforced - second infractions will result in a disqualification from the tournament and ejection from the facility without a refund.

Abuse of machines (smacking the glass, kicking the game, excessive shaking or throwing of games, etc.) will result first in a warning, then a disqualification of that player’s active card. A third instance will result in a disqualification from the tournament without a refund.

Game setup notes will be posted to the backglass. These will include all software changes made to the game from factory defaults but may not include physical setup notes - it is the responsibility of the player to look around the playfield and take note of various features (position of outlane rubbers and posts, type or length of flipper bat, enlarged post rubbers that may restrict access to shots, etc).

In the event that a catastrophic malfunction that cannot be repaired during the confines of the tournament (eg: a machine would be declared disabled) occurs during qualifying, the game may be replaced with another game of the same era from the free play area (after the replacement game is setup for tournament use). If this occurs more than 50% of the way through qualifying (7 PM on Friday) the scores from the disabled game will stand. If it occurs before that cutoff, all games will be voided. Any players with that game on their best card at the time the machine is disabled will have that game voided, and must play a new 5th game of that card. If a machine is declared disabled during the playoffs portion of the tournament, it will be removed from play without selection of an alternate from the free play area.

This rule clarifies an existing IFPA/PAPA rule: It can be, from time to time, tournament viable to intentionally lose a game for a qualifying or finals benefit. Players who intentionally tilt out in order to ‘thread the needle’ between two scores may be viewed with scorn by fellow players but will not be penalized UNLESS the intentionally tilting move is beyond reasonable as determined by the tournament director(s), in which case it will fall into the abuse of machine category. Application of the “tilting for benefit” rule will be limited to players who abuse tilts in order to win games (eg: tilting before validating playfield on a Stern solid state to retry a skill shot).