I get to play REAL Pins tonight!

Finally got the timing worked out with my only pinhead friend to go to the new pinball cafe in Toronto tonight! Here's the lineup they have currently (changes ever month or so). Any pointers?

■BAD CATS – Williams 1989 $0.50/3 balls
■BATMAN – Stern 2008 $1.00/3 balls
■DOODLE BUG – Williams 1971 $0.25/2 plays. 5 balls/play
■MEDIEVAL MADNESS – 1997 Williams $1.00/3 balls
■MYSTIC – Bally 1980 $0.25/5 balls
■PIN BOT – Williams 1986 $0.50/3 balls
■TALES FROM THE CRYPT – Data East 1993 $1.00/3 balls
■X-MEN Stern 2012 $1.00/3 balls

Love the variety of old and new. I was there once before to check it out and played all the pins on the list except Batman and Doodle Bug as they didn't have those. They had the Stern NBA table which was pretty sweet, too bad it's gone. God I hope they get WOZ.....

I can only give you some advice on Bad Cats and Medieval Madness. Bad Cats, keep shooting ramps. MM, get into a groove with shooting the castle over and over again.

Right on. Have a good time.

I'm not the greatest at the new Sterns, but here's a few tips.

Batman Dark Knight

• The skill shot is those three flashing inserts in the plunger lane. Whichever one you collect doubles that feature's scoring for that ball. So aim for Joker when you're close to starting Joker Multiball, etc. Collecting all three in the same game doubles your bonus for the last ball.
• Starting Scarecrow Multiball involves hitting the moving crane. Some of these are death shots. In particular, save the center crane hit for last so that if you get a SDTM, it won't matter because the multiball will be starting up.
• Multiballs do stack with each other; it is possible to make progress and start the other modes while you're in one. Combined with 2X Scarecrow (from the skill shot), this is probably the most accessible opportunity for good scoring.

X-Men

• Before playing, study the upper playfield and learn where the shots are. Stern crammed a lot of ramps and holes up there, and while there are of course inserts to guide you, some of the shots are partially obscured.
• The main multiball (Magneto) takes a lot of work to get to; it is quite possible to go through an entire game and not see it. If you're in search of quick points, hit Wolverine a few times (carefully - he's a bit of a center drain risk) to start Weapon X Multiball instead. Not huge scoring, but nice for getting into the game.
• Keep off that damned whirlwind disc with the magnet in the center if you can help it. The infernal thing loves to throw your ball down the center or direct to the outlanes. (But when not disc-assisted, the outlanes are actually quite friendly and amenable to nudging.)

And of course, Ye Olde Medieval Madness. Warning: The real table is much harder than the TPA version.

• Accuracy is key. Errant shots off the ramp posts or Troll standups cause most of the drains on this table.
• Most of the rest of the drains are caused by wailing on the Castle Gate. Aim carefully from a trap, and be prepared to nudge after every Gate hit if needed.
• Try to stay out of Merlin's Magic when only 1 Madness light is lit, because you'll only get a 2-ball Multiball Madness with really crappy jackpots. Get more Madness lights before starting Multiball Madness.
• Also, Multiball Madness is an excellent time to complete Trolls! with minimal risk. If you succeed, not only do you get credit for Trolls!, but your Multiball Madness restarts with Troll Madness added, any lost ball(s) returned (and a 3rd or 4th ball if your new Madness light count qualifies for another ball), and higher jackpot values. Plus, the trolls stay active for an easy chance to hit 10 of them for the Master of Trolls light.
• Don't forget about Castle Multiball at the lock. The first one only takes three lock shots. There's an extra ball available if you complete the Super Jackpot shot at the lock during the round.
• Other relatively-easy extra balls: The one at two castles destroyed, and the one for successfully completing Royal Madness.

Good luck, and have fun!

X-men: Shoot the flashing light

Carl Spiby said:

X-men: Shoot the flashing light

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And you conveniently neglect to mention that the entire bloody table is flashing most of the time.

Serenseven said:

And you conveniently neglect to mention that the entire bloody table is flashing most of the time.

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LOL!

Thanks for the tips Seren. I played the MM table before. It was DEFINITELY harder. But at least thanks to TPA I knew what I was doing

Id say play them all once,but $1 for 1 game uh play twice for that Let us know which tables wernt working right, Oh snap some pic's if you can.

SKILL_SHOT said:

Id say play them all once,but $1 for 1 game uh play twice for that Let us know which tables wernt working right, Oh snap some pic's if you can.

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I took A bunch the last time I went. I'll get some more and put them up tonight or tomorrow. Lemme see what I can find from my last trip.

Oh and they were all in perfect working condition the last time I went. I think the owner rents his machines, which is how he can change them so often. There is a playdium store in Toronto that rents pretty much every machine you can think of (well the newer ones). And the owner is clearly a pinhead (he was playing the machine beside me the last time) and takes care of them pretty well.

Ok here ya go.... The LOTR table is actually from a bar up the street. Also in surprisingly good shape. Sorry for the blurry pics. I'll get better ones when I'm not stalking some stranger on the machine. Now I can stalk someone I actually know

Hey have fun!

Awesome!

A tip for Bad Cats that sometimes goes unnoticed:
On the last ball, keep looping the left ramp (tiger ramp). If you hit it 5 times in a row on your last ball, you get 20 million, a HUGE scoring opurrrrtunity (get it?) for this table. If you get an EB on your last ball, you can potentially do this for a cool 40 million.

Clawhammer said:

Awesome!

A tip for Bad Cats that sometimes goes unnoticed:
On the last ball, keep looping the left ramp (tiger ramp). If you hit it 5 times in a row on your last ball, you get 20 million, a HUGE scoring opurrrrtunity (get it?) for this table. If you get an EB on your last ball, you can potentially do this for a cool 40 million.

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Ahh nice...thats one of the cheap ones so I'll be on it alot

Enjoy yourself have fun and come home wanting more

Get the info from the place that the tables are rented from, they could have pins 4 sale. (smoover and I chated Via EYETOY PS3)

So I had a few good conversations with the owner. He only has two machines on revshare (I'm assuming the Sterns, Batman and Xmen) and the rest are actually his own machines! Turns out he is a collector and had over 30 pins at one point. He just bought a Top Gun which will be out very shortly. He's a total pinhead and loves to talk pins. Really great place, floats n shakes n such. Old backlights hanging on the walls....

Since I don't have a ton of experience on real pins (I KNOW what I need to be doing, but I quickly found out last time that my virtual skills do not really traslate as well as I'd hoped they would) he was kind enough to give me a few pointers. And coming from a guy who can score 650M on a real MM table, I'll go with what he says Watching him play and picking up a few pointers DRASTICALLY improved my game in only 10-15 mins. Just learning how much you can actually nudge a table alone helped so much. Right after his lesson he opened the coin door and popped 5 free games of MM for me. Really nice guy.

Onto Batman. Wow. LOVE THIS TABLE. I was doing so well at one point I turned to the owner and asked if it was considered an easy machine. Knocked out about 40M in one ball my first game! The table felt perfect, great STRONG flippers, and a great layout. Those two flashers right above the slingshots are definitely there to blind you....

Surprisingly my next fav table there was Bad Cats. Cheesy theme, but the shots and layout are great! I have the table in VP and the recreation there is BANG on. But the real thing is just merciless. No ball save and FAST drains. Still, 3 games for a $1, aint half bad.

MM in real life is a ***** of a table. Even though it was the only table I actually knew the ruleset to, it was the hardest one for me by FAR. TFTC was also a ball muncher. Mystic wasn't my cup of tea. X-men is good, but I had no idea what I was doing on it. His Pinbot is in near mint condition, I need to relearn how to play that table for next time.

I managed to stretch $15 into 3 hours. And that was with throwing my last $3 away in the last 10 mins. So all in all good times! If anyone reading this is in Toronto or close by I highly recommend checking this place out!

Sounds like a really nice guy. I wish I had a place like that close by.

It's great! I foresee myself spending too much time in there VERY thankful to have a place like that so close. Whole experience was made that much better by such a cool and knowledgeable owner

smooverr said:

It's great! I foresee myself spending too much time in there VERY thankful to have a place like that so close. Whole experience was made that much better by such a cool and knowledgeable owner

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I wish I had a local public place to place that many pins.

There is no Top Gun pinball, so what is the actual game meant here? Three likely choices:
* Big Guns (http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?250)
* F14 Tomcat (http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=804)
* Gold Wings (http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=1043)