Last night in league I ran into a situation on STTNG. I locked my 3rd ball (starting multiball), loaded the cannon and hit the jackpot. Ball goes to reload the cannon, fires it out of the VUK into the left outlane, bonus collect, end of ball (no multiball). I asked for a ruling, and the ruling was - minor malfunction, play on. There were several ways the ruling could have gone, and I expected this ruling, but I wanted to get one anyhow.
Is there a situation where a recurring minor malfunction would result in a game being tossed? In other words, if it had been a major malfunction, I would have been given another ball, and THEN the game would be in danger of being removed if it happened again, but since I wasn’t given a compensation ball, if it happened to them, that’s still pinball, right?
The STTNG I used to own would do that sometimes. Really sucks. As for your question, I’m not 100% of the correct ruling, but I did see a similar situation in a tourney. On TSPP throughout the day the ball would sometimes fly off the right wireform into the right outlane. Each time a ruling was asked for it was deemed play on and the game was not pulled from the competition.
So, the wireform Simpsons rationale came up, but it seems a little different, because I started multiball and never got a multiball. From what I read somewhere else, although I can’t find it, the issue is the code.
A minor malfunction that occurs repeatedly, to the extent that it is markedly affecting play of the machine, may be considered a major malfunction at the sole discretion of tournament officials.
I think it is tournament officials discretion no matter what. If you are arguing over semantics of what the classify this, i think this might be “nature of the game” and not even a minor malfunction.
I am really curious if anyone can reproduce the No Multiball when failing to load the canon.
So “multiball” doesn’t technically start until you miss the cannon shot (or make them all). Even though you made the first cannon shot, you’re still in single ball play, and the unlucky drain ends your ball. That’s annoying. This could have been coded better for sure.
This seems to be in the same category as a failed kickback - unfortunately I think that was the right call.
I don’t think it was the wrong call, brutal though it is. Had I not binked my actual strategy (warp 9.9 + Q) it probably would have affected my mental state. I still would accept the ruling, because I think that is best for everyone.
I was the one that made the ruling (with some discussion with Fred C and Jon R).
This was the section on malfunctions that guided my decision:
“Note that unrepeated physical failures, such as kickbacks or balls jumping off ramps, balls flying over flippers, or balls moonwalking into the outlane following a successful shot do not qualify as major malfunctions. This is the physical nature of pinball.”
I saw it as a ball jumping off a ramp and poor software for the situation.
At that point of declaring it a minor malfunction, we move to the “repeated” section:
“A minor malfunction that occurs repeatedly, to the extent that it is markedly affecting play of the machine, may be considered a major malfunction at the sole discretion of tournament officials.”
As it did not occur again, I didn’t have to come to this point. But I would have been hard pressed to call it major since the players at that point knew the possibility existed, and could play around it.