p.s. The “coolest” (yet, most useless) three switch exploit to try is on Congo where you can actually start the Satellite Transfer mode from the Travi-Com targets without validating the playfield (it’s tough because you have to hit the those targets and dump four times each without careening into other switches). Sadly, actually starting the Satellite Transfer mode inexplicably validates the playfield, lol, so you can only set this up, and at 10 million a target hit during the mode it’s definitely NOT something you would EVER bother to do in a competition, lol. There are WAY better 3-switch exploits on Congo, but starting Satellite Transfer is the coolest.
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I am pretty sure shot plunging on ACDC is a bad idea because it has 2 shooter lane switches. I seem to recall shot plunging in a pingolf because I thought it was safer. But in reality it caused the ballsave to not trigger, making it more risky instead of less risky.
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TWD is similar I think. I tried short plunging once and it messed up the ball save
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Yes, TWD punishes with a very short save if you try to bypass the skillshot. Quite the bummer when you’re trying to plunge normally but the ball catches a pop instead of going around and up… in this case you can lose the ballsaver before it even exits the pops.
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#collectsouls
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Choices choices… “G-R-A-Y” or “J” all day? 
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CSI has a fun one where you can max your bonus multiplier before officially starting your ball because the C-S-I in-lanes are all minor switches. Now I happen to agree with @cayle that this is a tremendously skillful thing to attempt and a just reward for impeccable shatzing and draining, but The Powers That Be at PAPA were having none of it, and once they were made aware of the exploit the year CSI was in the A Bank (PAPA 18), they got Lyman to quickly patch the game so that the very first switch validated the playfield. An unintended consequence of this change, though, was that the skill shot was no longer make-able from the plunge, lol! Because the ball passes over a switch in the right orbit before arriving in the large skill shot scoop. You could, however, still make a skill shot by short plunging and banking it into the scoop similar to a piano bankshot in TZ, but it becomes possibly the hardest skill shot in all of pinball. Deep Cut on CSI, btw, while we’re here. After a lock to the skull, the game auto-plunges your next ball into play, but you can beat the auto-plunge and be awarded a skill-shot if you make it, which is a non-trivial amount of points in that game.
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But please. If a TD calls passive play and kindly asks you to get on with it or else… Accept it like a gentleman.
On the WPC platform it is an individual property per switch, if it should be a 3-switcher, an instant ball-in-play or passive in this account (trough switches, shooter lane). Designing this feature they knew it could be trouble. But I guess it was wastly overlooked to optimise the, shall we say, hazard of prolonged game time. When finishing up a game design. Which is understandable given the priorities at hand and the infamous “crunch”.
On Sopranos, i once not only started multiball, but collected the super jackpot before qualifying the playfield.
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Another adjustment I made was set boat MB extra hard so the player either has to sneak a lock in or hit the drop like 4 times before the first lock lights.
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white water (OLDER roms) let get the letters for free.
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The switch halfway up the shooter lane immediately validates the ball saver. I guess I’ve never tried, but I would be extremely surprised if this didn’t also immediately validate the playfield.
A single spinner rotation will validate the playfield, so to get the ball on the flipper, you’d have to short plunge and miss the right orbit spinner on the way down somehow, or get it to pass through the spinner without causing a full rotation (which I’ve never seen on Iron Man, but I did twice on stream at NYCPC playing Kiss, to my own massive detriment because it didn’t lock in my song choice, which changed as soon as I flipped).
Although it’s generally referred to as “3 switch validation”, I learned from re-watching the Intergalactic that it validates after the 3rd switch, not on it. In other words, it’s the fourth switch that validates. Not sure if this is true for other “3 switch validation” games or not.
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I would be shocked if it wasn’t 3 switches. There is one extra rule, though, and that is that you need 3 UNIQUE switches. The same switch won’t count > 1 time. This should be true for pretty much any implementation of valid playfield at any company.
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i discovered this when i was testing Ghostbusters exploits. woof, was that game rife with … potential. i mentioned earlier in the thread that it is possible to light all the locks, both the 2x and 3x multipliers, and activate 6x playfield before validating the playfield. That was on old code though, and i dont have the game anymore, so i don’t know if it still applies.
i also suggested that there should be some logic in there that if the player drains three times or more without validating the playfield, then that should automatically validate the playfield, because either they’re engaging in annoying shenanigans on purpose, or the game is broken in some way. can’t really think of a good reason the game wouldn’t want to validate the playfield after 3 free plunges.
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Older Avengers ROMs allow you to short plunge all day to collect LOKI letters and then make the left orbit for the locks, allowing you to get Loki Multiball without validating the playfield. This was fixed though.
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Agreed, Jackbot is 3 unique = Valid.
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Thanks, I guess I didn’t understand that. Validation should be thought of as “switches”, and not “switch hits”.
So would short plunge → sling → sling → sling → sling → sling → drain give you the ball back? Or do you think alternating minor switches treated differently than back to back hits of the same switch?
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Alternating slings will only count as two unique switches and give you the ball back on most valid PF games, including JackBot. You can hit the slings 500 times and drain as long as no other switch fired. This happens a lot on GB and GoT too!
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For sure, pretty funny when it happens. 
The other fun one on JB is the same pop rapid firing against the rubber or the 10 point switch, then drain and coming back
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I used the “free letters” feature of Whitewater not so much to get free letters, but instead to practice sling catches and shatzing for free.
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