Tilt through rules question

Good question came up last night during a tournament.

Two players playing a solid state game. If a player shakes a machine to try and save a ball, but does not tilt and loses ball. Bonus collects.

Before the other player steps up to machine to play his/her ball, the game tilts due to bobber finally tilting due to previous player’s actions.

Should this be considered a tilt through even though player 1 didn’t tilt their own ball during the actions the eventually tilted player 2’s ball? I don’t have a good answer on this one and even though it seems highly unlikely, it could happen. What would be the ruling?

Had player 2 touched the game in any way before the tilt appeared? The plunger? Flip the buttons? If the player had not made contact with the game, that’s a tilt through.

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Tilt through never actually occurred. Rather, I was begging it to tilt through and then joking about the DQ and it got us to wondering what would the ruling be. I agree with your feedback but it is a curious question.

Other considerations, how long does a player get to wait to see if tilt occurs. What if someone nearby is hopping up and down or playing another game so hard that the floor is noticeably moving that might cause the tilt? I’ve seen that at apartment / residence tourneys as well as in a conference room on a third floor where we had machines setup. Tilt bobber never would stop moving due to floor vibrations. Probability of that occurring are probably extremely low though.

It’s up to the following player to give the game adequate time for the tilt Bob to rest. As discussed in our expo coverage, 1-2 minutes is usually okay. However, there does become a point where waiting TOO long becomes obnoxious and inconsiderate.

Yes, this is a tilt through.

In my experience this is typically a tilt-through.

One way to mitigate this in a head to head is to start a 4-player game and only use players 1 and 3.

I’ve never understood this philosophy. Nudging is a critical pinball skill, especially on games where tilting through is a problem. Why blatantly favor one skill / situation over others?

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Happened to us this weekend at the 24 hour final battle. Was about 3 AM on AC/DC. Player shook trying to save the ball. They got 1 danger. Ball drained. Bonus collected and then 2 dangers on the next player. P

Was player 1 penalized in any way? I’ve never heard of anyone DQ’d for dangers without a tilt on the next player’s turn.

Unless something has changed in the rules, I’ve always known that to fall under “unfortunate situation, but play on”.

In the IFPA/PAPA rules under Player Errors:

“Any player who tilts their own ball, which then results in a tilt warning given to the following player will not have any consequences for the first offense. The player with the warning will be allowed to continue play as normal, or choose to have the ball played on a fresh game. A second offense by the same player anytime throughout the tournament, and it will be treated as a tilt of another player’s ball, with the rules from the previous paragraph being enforced.”

I would follow this verbiage even if the player didn’t actually tilt their own ball, but still caused the interference on the next player’s ball.

Warning for the first offense . . . DQ for the second offense if that same player does it again at any point in the tournament.

The player that gets boned with the warnings doesn’t necessarily have to “play on”. They have the right to play a fresh ball on a fresh game to replace the impacted ball to be played.

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Good info and thanks for the detailed clarification. I never realized the next player could choose to play a fresh ball.

Player did get a warning and player who got the dangers chose to play on.

I had a similar problem at Pinburgh and was meaning to get a rule clarification. The player ahead of me tilted through my ball, but he said that because I touched the flippers he shouldn’t have been penalized for it. This was on an EM and there was actually no way for me to tell that the tilt had happened until I touched the flippers. So, um, what?

This is definitely a matter of timing. If you touched the flipper and it clearly didn’t fire, it should be a tilt-through.

There was another situation at Pinburgh where a game tilted while a player was plunging the ball into play… oops, they should have waited a little longer :frowning:

Neither did I.

What is the procedure when the impacted player opts to play a ball from a fresh game? Are they allowed to plunge the affected ball, and potentially earn a skill shot, incidental points, and an end-of-ball bonus, so long as they don’t flip?

Player would tilt that ball out (since they are taking the ruling as if they were tilted through)

This makes sense, but I think it warrants being added to the rules explicitly.

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Doesn’t sound that anyone was following that rule anyway :wink: