Howdy Pardner!
Howdy Pardner is a weekly co-op pinball event that we bill as an anti-tournament of sorts. Each and every Thursday we build different teams of 3-4 players, each team will then play 5 machines, and team scores will be combined and then compared to all other teams that week.
HP is a wholly unique format we created that places emphasis on team building and community instead of IFPA points, and overly serious and boring pinball tournaments.
If you’re too intimidated to play in other pinball tournaments, or dislike the length and overall structure of traditional pinball tournaments, then come out to Howdy Pardner, it’ll be the event to change your mind on organized pinball. Each and every week we have players of all skill levels who show up to learn, play, and bond over pinball in this truly one-of-a-kind pinball league.
Got more questions? Keep reading below for more info on how to sign up, the format, and what we call “The Howdy Pardner Difference”
HP is a casual weekly pinball night, open to all players of any skill level. It is co-op, and team based. They happen every Thursday night at Wedgehead. To enter, all you have to do is register by 7pm. We will start at approximately 7:30pm.
You will be placed into a team and compete together. There’s no buy-in required, your wristband is sufficient to be entered and get to play all night. There will be prizes for the winning team each week, and each week the groups will change. It’s a very fun and social pinball event.
Important note: Since HP is a team event, that means that we need to have a certain number of players of players to register so that we can split y’all into even teams of 3 or 4 players apiece.
This means that depending upon on how many other people show up, we might need to cut a player or two from the sign up sheet to get to a properly divisible number.
To ensure fairness, the last people to register will be the first ones cut to make teams even, in the event that we need to do so. Cuts happen about 20% of the time.
We also have a hard limit of 32 players due to capacity and run time. Full capacity isn’t common, but it does happen (about 10% of the time).
Either way, the best way to guarantee your spot is to sign up early! But in the event that you show up a little late and just miss the cut, don’t be bummed, you’ll still have the opportunity to play pinball. Only 5 of the 21 machines are in use for HP, leaving you with plenty of other games to play that evening. Try again the next week (and be early!)
Players will register and then be placed into teams of 3 or 4 players. There will be a captain of each team that will handle scorekeeping duties and keep the team moving along. Teams will be balanced with a mixture of beginner, intermediate, and expert players on each to ensure a fun experience and a level playing field.
Your team will each then play 5 machines as a group. Your scores will be added up together, and recorded as a cumulative team score for each machine. Every team plays the same 5 machines, rotating through the circuit as the other teams finish their games.
At the end of the circuit, once all teams have played all 5 machines that week, the scores will be reviewed. For each machine a team will receive points based on top 3 finishes as follows: 1st place = 4 points, 2nd place = 2 points, 3rd place = 1 point.
The team with the highest point total at the end of the night will get a polaroid of them placed on the wall of champions, and earn the prize of their choice from exclusive champions merch trunk. These special items will never be for sale and can only be earned by competing and winning as a team during Howdy Pardner.
The biggest difference is the co-op style. In most pinball tournaments you are playing some sort of match play against 1-3 other opponents at a time. At Howdy Pardner, the people that you are playing the machine with aren’t your opponents, they are your teammates!
So in most tournaments, you are left hoping that the people you are playing with play poorly so that you can win. And if you do not know the rules or strategy of a game that you are playing, nobody in your group is gonna want to help you out and have you potentially beat them. In true IFPA tournaments, coaching is actually strictly forbidden! Wtf?
But since you’re on a team at Howdy Pardner, everyone benefits from a player playing well, and they are incentivized to help you in any way they can. Everybody shares the glow of a good game, and the sharing of rules knowledge and tips and tricks is encouraged naturally.
It’s a form of indirect, rather than direct competition. And since there is no way to know how your team’s score will stack up until the end of the night after all teams have played, there’s no instant sting or feeling of failure after each game.
We are focused on minimizing the downtime, and keeping it moving. Playing in a tournament should mean that you spend most of the evening actually PLAYING PINBALL, not waiting around. So there will be no wasted time choosing games, or choosing player order.
Unlike some other formats like a 3 strikes, if you show up for HP you will be guaranteed to actually get to play at least 5 games with your team. There’s no early knockout.
Our night is balanced by skill level variations amongst individual players on each team. This is to ensure an even playing field, and to allow everyone to have fun whilst giving everyone a reasonable shot at winning.
Games like Golf, Bowling, and Pool already do this, and it’s frankly a little bit weird that pinball doesn’t…until now.
Lastly: We focus on fun. What does that mean? Well, you’ll see this in many different aspects, but here’s a major one: YOU GET TO PLAY YOUR EXTRA BALLS!
