Rules

Bay Bridge Pinball Ruleset v3.0

  1. Summary

1.1.      Active Rosters: Unlimited

1.2.      Gameday Rosters: 4 or more people taken from a team’s Active Roster, who compete head-to-head on league nights

1.3.      Teams have a home location; Half of their matches will be held there

1.4.      Matches consist of 4 rounds of play: 2 singles round, 2 doubles rounds

1.5.      Singles round: 4 games of 1-player vs 1-player

1.6.      Doubles round: 2 games of 2-players vs 2-players

1.7.      The season will be 10 weeks followed by a single-elimination playoffs

  1. Team Composition

2.1.      Teams consist of Active Rosters of unlimited players, with 4 or more competing on any given night on a Gameday Roster. Each player can only be on the Active Roster of one team, and may only play on Gameday Rosters for that team.

2.2.      Gameday Rosters may have:

2.2.1.   No more than one player that have a matchplay rating in the top 500.  These players are restricted to playing in a max of two matches (one singles and one doubles) each week.

2.2.2.   No more than two players that have a matchplay rating in the top 1000.  These players are restricted to playing in no more than three matches each week.  Note that the no more than two players in this category would include a top 500 player (if the team has one).

Matchplay ratings can be found at https://matchplay.events/live/ratings

2.2.3. Should a team violate restrictions, the result will be the forfeit of matches that would be necessary to make them in line with restrictions. The matches that are forfeited would be the most valuable to that team. For example, if forfeiture of game the player lost in or a game the play won would meet roster construction rules, then the team would forfeit the match that the player won.

2.3.      Once a player is on a team, the commissioner will record that player’s matchplay rating, to use for the rest of the season.

2.3.1.    In the event that a restricted player falls out of the restriction criteria during the season, they may play as a non-restricted player, but this must be checked each week.

2.4.      Each team should have a captain responsible for communication with the league about rosters, scheduling, and scoring. The captain is also the team’s representative in all league matches. A co-captain should be designated for when the captain is unavailable.

2.5.      Teams are responsible for keeping track of their own active rosters. Substitutions: Four players are minimum necessary (if they are non-restricted) to field a full team each week (although you can play with three (see section 7.2)) and up to 16 players can potentially play. A player can be added as a substitute for any week provided the following conditions are met:

2.5.1.   Based on the substitute’s current matchplay rating,  the Gameday Roster still meets the matchplay rating restrictions;

2.5.2.   The player is not on any other team’s Active Roster;

2.5.3.   Substitute players cannot play more matches in a week than any (nonrestricted) members present from the team’s Active Roster; and

2.5.4.   Once a player has subbed 4 times during the season for a team, then that is the only team they may play for in the playoffs.

  1. Locations

3.1.      Each team will have a home location. Their schedule will consist of half of their matches at their home location and half of their matches at another team’s location. In order to host a team, a location must have a minimum of 3 machines (ideally 4 or more) and be available for play on Tuesday nights. Locations can host more than one team. The schedule will be designed so those teams aren’t both home in the same week (there may be some weeks with two matches at the same venue if enough teams share venues that this can’t be avoided).

  1. Matchplay

4.1.      Prematch: Captains meet to confirm their Gameday Rosters for the night and confirm which games are available for play. Both captains must agree to remove a game from play.

4.2.      Each night of competition shall consist of four rounds of play between the teams:

4.2.1.   Doubles round 1 (2 matches): Away team picks the machines and plays as player 1 and player 3. Home team chooses which of its players will compete on each machine after the Away team makes its selection of machine and players.

4.2.2.   Singles round 2 (4 matches): Home team picks the machines and plays as player 1.

4.2.3.   Singles round 3 (4 matches): Away team picks the machines and plays as player 1.

4.2.4.   Doubles round 4 (2 matches): Home team picks the machines and plays as player 1 and player 3.

4.3.      Constraints on selecting players and machines:

4.3.1.   No player may play in more than one game in each round; and

4.3.2.   Provided that enough playable machines are available, no machine will be selected more than once in any round

4.4.      Scoring:

4.4.1.   Each singles match will be worth 1 match point for the winning team.

4.4.2.   Each doubles match will be worth 2 match points for the team with highest combined point total.

4.5.      Minimum and Maximum Play:

4.5.1.  Any player that plays in two or more rounds must play in at least one singles round and play in at least one doubles round.

4.5.2.   Each player may not play two or more rounds than any other (non-restricted) teammate on that player’s Gameday Roster.

4.6.      Tie-breaking:

4.6.1.   If the teams are tied 8-8 after four rounds, a shared player game will occur as the tiebreaking game.

4.6.1.1.            The home team will pick the game and play as player 1; and

4.6.1.2.            The visiting team will play as player two.

4.6.2.   A 3-ball game will be played where each ball of the game must be played by a different player (all players that were active for the team are eligible for this game)

4.6.3.   The winner of the game wins the overall match, but no additional match points are awarded.

4.7.      Scorekeeping

4.7.1.   The scoresheet can be downloaded here. The captain of the home team is responsible for bring a scoresheet to the match. At the end of the match each captain should sign the scoresheet and take a picture of it. The captain of the home team is responsible for sending the scoresheet to league@baybridgepinball.com or posting on slack

  1. Standings

5.1.      Standings are in terms of win-loss record, with cumulative match points as the first tie-breaker. In the event that teams are still tied, ties will be broken by head-to-head record, followed by head-to-head match points, followed by winning percentage against common opponents, followed by percentage of match points won against common opponents, followed by a coin flip.

  1. Playoffs

6.1.      The top 4 teams (for this season, will be adjusted for future seasons depending on the number of teams) will make the playoffs, which will consist of a single elimination bracket. Format will be the same as the regular season. Players are eligible to play for a team in the playoffs if they have played for them 4 times in the regular season. In the event that two teams based in the same venue are home for the playoffs, the higher seed will be given the home game at the venue. The lower seeded team may attempt to find a time to reschedule the match with their opponent, but if this cannot be done a neutral venue not holding a game that night will be chosen by ranked choice voting.

  1. Attendance

7.1.      League play is structured such that each team has at least 4 players available for each match. Teams are allowed to have more than 4 players on their Gameday Rosters and allowed to have substitutes in order to ensure that teams should be able to have 4 players available for each match.

7.2.      In the event that a team does not have 4 players presents (or has 4 players but some are restricted), they may play with 3 players with a penalty.

7.2.1.   Teams playing with 3 players in a singles round:

7.2.1.1.            Forfeit one of the games of the round

7.2.1.2.            Other games are played as normal

7.2.1.3.            Teams playing with 3 players in the doubles round:

7.2.2.   One game in each round will feature only one player from the short team against two players from their opponent, in a 3-player game

7.2.3.   Scoring remains the same — team with highest score wins the game and two match points

7.2.4.   The same player may not play alone in both doubles rounds

7.2.5.   If both teams are playing with only 3 players, then doubles rounds will take place as described above and the singles round will only have three games. Only 14 match points will be contested for the night.

7.3.      Tardiness

7.3.1.   Matches should start on time if each team has 4 players present. Additional players that arrive after the start may play, as long as such players (i) would otherwise be permitted to play on the Gameday Roster as specified in Sections 2.1 and 2.2, and (ii) meet Matchplay requirements specified in Section 4.5. If a team has fewer than 4 players at the scheduled start time, then they will be permitted 15 minutes to wait for additional team members or to recruit a substitute for the evening. After 15 minutes, the team must play with 3 players as described above or forfeit if they do not have 3 players.

7.3.2.   Captains may agree to waive any provisions of Section 7.3.1, delaying start of a match to a mutually agreed time.

  1. Miscellaneous

8.1.      Coaching

8.1.1.   Since this is a team league, coaching of teammates is allowed and encouraged; however, players should not cradle the ball to receive coaching for more than 30 seconds per ball in play.

8.1.2.   Coaching, distracting, etc of a player on another team while they are at the machine is prohibited.

8.2.      Rules

8.2.1.   In general, with a few exceptions, the PAPA/IFPA ruleset will be used and can be found at https://www.ifpapinball.com/menu/rules/ Some relevant differences are highlighted below.

8.3.      Extra Balls

8.3.1.   Extra balls should plunged and not played. A player may lane change before plunging a ball and skillfully plunge on games with a manual plunger. Once the ball has been plunged, a player may not touch the flipper buttons or nudge the machine. Balls returned to the plunger lane and not autoplunged may be plunged again using the same rules.

8.4.      Playing Out of Turn

8.4.1.   Players (and their team) are responsible for making sure it is their turn before plunging their ball. Playing out of turn results in a score of 0 that player. In a doubles the other player on the team’s score will still count. If one team plays out of turn on the opposing team’s turn the affected player will have the option of playing a new game after the current one or continuing to play the current game. If a player plays out order on a teammate’s score, the opposing team will have the option of allowing the affected player to continue to play the current game or forcing the affected player to play a new game.

8.5.      Malfunctions and Rulings

8.5.1.   If a machine has a major malfunction and has to be removed from the round, then the team that selected the original machine will pick a different machine to be used. They also have the opportunity to pick different players if they have not already played in the round. The other team then picks their players and play on a new machine will begin.

8.5.2.   For all other cases of malfunction or ruling, the captain or co-captains from each team should meet, and come to agreement on a fair ruling according to the rules of the league and the PAPA/IFPA ruleset (https://www.ifpapinball.com/menu/rules/). If the captains cannot agree on a fair ruling, then a text message can be sent to league officials (who might be playing at another location), with a maximum 10-minute wait for a response. Since a response cannot be guaranteed, if there is no response in 10-minutes then the game will be voided, and the players involved will start a new game. The new game will be on the same machine if the issue was not a machine malfunction, or a different machine if the fairness of the machine is questionable.

8.6.      Forfeits

8.6.1.   If a team does not have at least 3 players for a match, then the forfeit the match and receive 0 match points. The other team will win the match and receive 12 match points.