PINTERESTING OBSERVATIONS (Fall 2023 WEEK 3)
Replay:
With week 3 of play officially in the books, competition is starting to shape up for the CFFC Fall League Championship. This week, Jon Mann put up the performance of the night, earning a hefty 18 points from play in Group 5. Following closely behind was Feletia Lee (also Group 5) and Ed Tank (Group 3) with each banking 17 points. As a result, there was some movement in the Overall Standings. With a lot of luck, Dave MacQueen (me) remained at the top with a total of 50 points. With a strong week of play in Group 1, Dylan picked up enough points to pass Eric Sutton and slide into a tie for second place with Kamuela Kaneshiro at 43 points. With 39 points on the season, Luke Faulkenberry picked up enough points this week to elevate into 3rdplace. Pick up enough points across the 9 weeks of league and you might earn the honor of competing for glory (and trophies) in the CFFC Fall League Championship, held after the 9 weeks of league competition are complete. If you find yourself with a lot of work in order to climb the leaderboard as it presently stands, don’t despair. After Week 9 is in the books, players will be assigned to a Division A or a Division B. The best players in each of the divisions will then compete for their respective Division championship. In a few weeks you will see that the overall standings will display which players are currently assigned to Division B and which are assigned to Division A. These assignments are made based upon your average “rank” within the league after each week of play. This average is reflected by the “Div Avg Ladder” statistic now displayed on the overall leaderboard. If you win your group and move to a higher grouping, then your ladder rank (div avg ladder) will improve, lose your group and your rank will tank. You want the lowest ladder rank possible so that you can compete for the premium glory of the Division A championship. Let’s inspect how we got here.
Group 1
This was the first week of play since Group 1 was reduced to a 3-player group as a result of realignment. While score from this group may not have been as eye catching as is observed some weeks, competition for the win was quite close. In the end I was able to edge out Dylan Lipscomb by a single point for the win and 16 points (13 game points; 3 bonus points). Bonus point wins on Monster Bash and Jurassic park tipped the scales. Only on Monster Bash did I put up a new personal season best but it was just enough to scoot past the current league-wide season record on the machine (by less than 1 million points). As usual, Dylan was excellent on Godzilla, earning a bonus point win. He also won the match on Foo Fighters, and put up a strong performance on Jurassic Park. His scores on both machines raised his personal season high and he walked away with 15 points (13 game points; 3 bonus points) on the evening. Meanwhile, Eric Sutton blew up Iron Maiden for a win and claimed 5 points (4 game points; 1 bonus point) for week 3. Dylan and Dave will remain in Group 1 for Week 4 to welcome Dale Becker. Eric Sutton will compete in Group 2 with Kamu Kaneshiro, Ed Tank, and Marty Henion.
Group 2
Each player in group 2 picked up a win on a machine in week 3 and only 6 points separated their point totals for the night. For Dale Becker, a bonus point win on Monster Bash boosted him into 1st place with 15 points (12 game points; 3 bonus points). He was certainly brining his A game as he set new personal season high scores on Iron Maiden, Foo Fighters, and Monster Bash. As a result, Dale will join Dylan Lipscomb and myself in Group 1 for next week’s matches. Luke Faulkenberry and Kamu Kaneshiro both put in work on week 3. Notably, Luke dropped over 400 million on Iron Maiden for a bonus point win and the league-wide season high score. Kamu got wins on Godzilla and Foo Fighters, setting new personal season highs. Both players picked up 12 points in the end (10 game points; 2 bonus points each). Not to be outdone, Ryan delivered a performance on Jurassic Park worthy of a win, a bonus point, and his personal season high. He also earned his personal season high on Foo Fighters and walked away with 9 points for his season total. Next week, both Ryan and Luke will join Group 3 to matchup with Brian Stubbs and Jay Sutton. Kamu will remain in Group 2 as it gets 3 new additions; Eric Sutton, Ed Tank, and Marty Henion.
Group 3
Ed Tank had one of the best point totals of the night (17 points) and it was accomplished with a win in Group 3. Ed won Jurassic Park with the bonus, won a close game of Monster Bash, and kept it tight on Godzilla. His Monster Bash and Godzilla scores were his best of the season on those machines. Marty Henion was able to claim 12 points (10 game points; 2 bonus points) and a 2nd place finish without getting a win on any of the machines. This means that he kept things competitive on ALL of the machines. His game is only getting better with new personal high scores on Iron Maiden, Jurassic Park, and Godzilla. Marty will have to contend with Luke again next week as the play against Ryan Kirkendall and Jay Sutton in Group 3. Just a point shy of Marty, Gary Dean ended the night with 11 points (9 game points; 2 bonus points). Setting his personal season high, Gary edged out Ed on a tight game of Godzilla. Tory MacQueen racked up wins on both Foo Fighters and Jurassic Park and banked 8 points (7 game points; 1 bonus point) for her league total. On Jurassic Park, she revealed a new personal season high score. Tory and Gary will mix it up with Jon Mann and Feletia Lee in Group 4 next week.
Group 4
Group 4 play was impressive this week. Not a single score below 10 million was submitted by any player on any machine; Group 1 is the only other group for which this was true in Week 3 and there are only 3 players in that group. In addition, more personal season high scores were set in Group 4 this week (9) than any other group. Brian Stubbs led the charge with a bonus win on Godzilla, along with wins on Monster Bash and Foo Fighters. All three were personal highs and he got 15 points for his efforts (12 game points; 3 bonus points). Jay Sutton blew up Jurassic Park for a bonus point win and gave everyone a run for their money on the remaining machines. The 14 points (12 game points; 2 bonus points) was enough for a second place finish meaning that like Brian he will matriculate into Group 3 for the next week of play. There they will have to contend with Luke Faulkenberry and Ryan Kirkendall. Both Dane Bryant and Jared Cline had strong performances in Group 4 as well. Dane set his personal season high for Foo Fighters and both Dane and Jared set new personal highs for Iron Maiden. While Dane may have won the match on Iron Maiden, Jared claimed a few more points on the night, finishing with 11 (9 game points; 2 bonus points) points to Dane’s 8 (7 game points; 1 bonus point). They’ll both be looking to replicate those Iron Maiden scores in Group 5 next week, where they will be joined by Meghan Cook and Melissa Becker.
Group 5
In week 3, the overall point leader on the night came from Group 5. Jon picked up bonus point wins on both Jurassic Park and Iron Maiden to claim 18 points (15 game points; 3 bonus points) for his league total. In addition, he put up his best scores of the league so far on three of the five machines (Jurassic Park, Godzilla, and Monster Bash). While he ultimately won the group on Tuesday, Feletia Lee really gave him a run for his money! Flee picked up her own bonus point wins on Foo Fighters and Monster Bash, and kept the other games close enough to land herself tied for the second best point total of the night at 17 (14 Game points; 3 bonus points). Her iron Maiden and Monster Bash scores were her best performances on those machines in league to date. Both Jon and Flee will be moving on up to Group 4 next week to meet Tory MacQueen and Gary Dean. Meghan Cook also recorded a win on the evening in a closely contested game of Godzilla. In combination with her performance on other machines she walked away with 9 points (7 game points; 2 bonus points) and personal season records on both Jurassic Park and Iron Maiden. Melissa Becker was the third player in this group to put up her season’s best on Jurassic park and earned 4 points this week (4 game points). Meghan and Melissa will welcome Jared Cline and Dane Bryant to Group 5 for week 4.
Movers, Shakers, and Tilters:
One of the things I love about CFFC League Play is that it is much more than a really long tournament. In a tournament, you might get matched up against any other competitor and it can be quite deflating to get matched up with other players who are currently playing above your skill level. In contrast, league play is designed to keep players matched up against their nearest competitors. This fosters competitive play, enhances the learning of machines and new pinball skills, and is usually much more fun and social. However, if you are interested in how your play compares to everyone else participating in league, the “outscored percentage” is the metric to look at. This metric reports how many matches you would have won if your scores were compared against every other player’s on every machine. This week, the strongest performances in terms of outscored percentage were recorded by me (77.78%), Jay Sutton (74.44% ), and Dylan Lipscomb (68.89%). As a result, I remained in first place on the season for this metric (81.13%), Dylan moved up 3 positions into 2nd place (64.65%), and Luke improved his metric to retain hold of 3rd place (68.29%). As of last week, Kamu and I were tied for the best win/loss record however, as a result of week 3, Kamu took sole claim at the top of the win/loss leaderboard (31 wins; 68.89%). He was followed by me and Dylan who are tied for 2nd with 27 wins (67.50%). With his impressive week, Jon Mann elevated into the next spot with a 60% win/loss record (18 wins).
As a whole, the strength of play in league continues to improve. Out of the 95 scores submitted from play, 36 of those scores set the players high score on the machine for the season (37.89%). Clearly, players are working hard to elevate their game. Though the league average score only improved for Iron Maiden this week (61,932,330 -> 87,797,940) average scores on the remaining machines remained relatively stable with the exception of Godzilla (118,605,320 -> 106,411,540). This picture is quite positive with regard to group play given that this week did not feature as many eye-popping scores as last week. There were however, a couple of new league-wide season records set. Luke laid claim to the title for Iron Maiden, with an intimidating score over 432 million. I was able to grab the title for Monster Bash but, only elevated the record score by less than 1 million over the previous high score. Another way to look at how the group is doing as a whole is to compare machine performance against metrics obtained from the last season on machines used for both leagues. The spring 2022 league included 3 machines used in the present league (Godzilla, Iron Maiden, and Monster Bash). Compared to week 3 averages in the Spring 2022 league, our present group is averaging much higher on Godzilla (62,730,650 vs. 118,605,320), a bit higher on Monster Bash (21,911,890 vs. 30,179,340) and is about the same for Iron Maiden (62,726,730 vs. 61,932,330). Stay tuned for more analytics as the weeks progress. In the meanwhile, here are our current machine titles:
Foo Fighters Pro:
Dave MacQueen; 777,621,940 points
2 consecutive weeks (both player and score)
(14.25 times the league average)
Godzilla Pro:
Dave MacQueen; 720,044,990 points
2 consecutive weeks (both player and score)
(6.77 times the league average)
Iron Maiden Pro:
Luke Faulkenberry; 432,822,620 points
1 consecutive week
(4.93 times the league average)
Jurassic Park Premium:
Eric Sutton; 761,852,650 points
2 consecutive weeks (both player and score)
(7.49 times the league average)
Monster Bash SE:
Dave MacQueen; 161,366,280 points
1 consecutive week
(5.54 times the league average)
Thanks for reading
As always, shoot straight, shake that thing, and stay special when lit.
-DAM