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INDISC 2019 - Classics II Playoffs - First Round

IE Pinball·video·1h 22m·analyzed·Apr 13, 2020
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.025

TL;DR

INDISC 2019 Classics II Finals first round coverage with tournament commentary and classic machine gameplay.

Summary

IE Pinball streams the first round of INDISC 2019 Classics II Finals, a Southern California tournament featuring 24 competitors across multiple groups playing classic pinball machines including Bow and The Arrow and Kings of Steel. Commentary focuses on tournament scoring format (4-2-1-0 points), machine modifications, player strategy, and competitive dynamics in a card-format tournament.

Key Claims

  • Over 215 players competed in the main INDISC 2019 tournament qualifying

    high confidence · Adam Lefkoff mentions '215 earlier' when discussing participant numbers

  • The 4-2-1-0 scoring format is new this year, replacing the previous 3-2-1-0 format

    high confidence · Adam Lefkoff explicitly states this is 'a new format this year' as opposed to past 3-2-1-0 scoring

  • Kings of Steel had its left gate removed as a modification for this tournament

    high confidence · Raymond Ashby describes the gate removal and its impact on gameplay strategy

  • Approximately 150,000 points was a qualifying score on Bow and The Arrow

    medium confidence · Adam Lefkoff estimates '150,000 to have an okay score' in qualifying on this machine

  • Matthew Stacks made the top 24 after the qualifying cutoff with his last game

    high confidence · Adam Lefkoff states 'Matthew Stacks actually drained into the top 24 with his last game' and 'Belsito'd in there'

Notable Quotes

  • “It's the beauty of this format. The internal pressure you put on yourself, the better you do.”

    Adam Lefkoff @ mid-stream — Describes psychological impact of the 4-2-1-0 format on player performance

  • “That tilt just cost him. Possibly two points... He literally just cost himself potentially first place.”

    Adam Lefkoff @ Bow and The Arrow group commentary — Scott Ian's critical tilt error on ball 5 demonstrated how costly mistakes are in this format

  • “if you didn't tilt, then you were cheated somewhat out of your ball”

    Adam Lefkoff (referencing Rick Stetta's philosophy) @ Kings of Steel commentary — References old-school pinball philosophy about aggressive play and risk-taking

  • “You just have to remember... You get in there the flow of things and you're like, oh, nope.”

    Adam Lefkoff @ Kings of Steel discussion — Commentary on adjustment difficulty with modified machines in tournament play

Entities

It Never DrainseventAdam LefkoffpersonRaymond AshbypersonJermainepersonGene LewinpersonScott IanpersonPaul SalempersonDave StewartpersonKarl DeAngelopersonJim Belsito

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Live streaming event with international viewership, interactive chat participation, and real-time rules discussion and appeals

    high · Commentators reference viewers from Finland, Sweden, and other countries; mention chat questions and viewer engagement during broadcast

  • ?

    event_signal: INDISC 2019 Classics II Finals represents major Southern California pinball tournament with 215+ participants, multiple divisions (main, women's, kids), and high-stakes evening tournament planned

    high · Tournament spans two nights with multiple groups playing qualification matches; event noted as significant regional gathering with participants from multiple states and countries

  • ?

    competitive_signal: 4-2-1-0 scoring format encourages strategic play with bonus point for first place, replacing previous 3-2-1-0 format; creates different win/elimination dynamics

    high · Adam Lefkoff explicitly contrasts new format with past format, noting the bonus first-place point changes tournament strategy and pressure management

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Grant Mortensen returning to competitive tournament circuit after period of reduced participation, attempting to join On Tilt league

    medium · Adam Lefkoff notes Grant has returned to tournaments after traveling less frequently; mentioned as trying to get into On Tilt league

  • ?

    technology_signal: Tournament using modified classic machines with specific mechanical changes (Kings of Steel left gate removal) that significantly alter gameplay strategy and difficulty

Topics

Tournament format and scoringprimaryClassic EM pinball machine gameplay and strategyprimaryPlayer performance and competitive dynamicsprimaryMachine modifications and their impact on playsecondaryTournament organization and event logisticssecondaryStreaming production and broadcast logisticssecondaryCommunity personalities and competitive landscapementioned

Sentiment

positive(0.75)— Commentators express enthusiasm for the tournament format, respect for players and event organization. Some frustration evident with technical broadcast issues (frozen camera, scoring display problems) and difficult machine conditions, but overall appreciation for competitive play and community gathering.

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.247

We'll see you next time. Oh, incredible. Saved his tournament life right here on ball three. Oh, he got it. He got it. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. Hey, good evening everyone. Welcome to the second night of the It Never Drains in Southern California Classics 2 Finals. finals. I am Adam Lefkoff. Alongside, introduce yourselves. Raymond Ashby. And Jermaine from Seattle. Jermaine and Raymond and myself. And we'll be watching the action here. This is the first round. We have our top 24 competitors. If you go to the website www.indisc.com you can see links to the standings and the groupings. What do we got here? Wow, I see Dave Stewart, but that's probably not bow and arrow first round we've got gene lewin gene's in the house that's uh good to see him that he's in classics i believe that's for two at least i think okay uh ian howerer of course uh and dave stewart and paul salem who's paul salem's a local guy la guy yeah simi valley is uh is he a classic specialist or both modern and he's played a variety of games um from my knowledge. Alrighty, so we're starting off on bow and arrow here. Bow and arrow was not working yesterday. Did they have it in finals yesterday, though? Did they turn it on, Carl? The final four. It came on for... And did they choose it or not? No. So this is the first look at bow and arrow. It's a wonderful wash, rinse, repeat game. You can have the bonus collect on the left up to 10,000 points. You build it by spinners, and it does not reset after the collect, so once you get the value up, I don't know. Germain, if it's lit for 3,000, are you interested yet, or are you hitting the spinner? Yeah, that was interesting. 3,000, maybe a little bit more. Yeah. Raymond, what about you? I usually go about 5 or so, which is where Gene's at right now. Anything north of 5, certainly I'm interested. And the kick-out's very challenging. You've got to do something on it. You can't just dead bounce, I don't think. We get to see right there. Actually, yeah, go right back in. Just went right back in. Just FYI, this is Gene playing now, I believe. Yeah. The player cam has frozen. Oh, our player cam has frozen? Yep. God, what kind of crappy setup are we running here, Carl? Looks like Gene just got the 100,000. He's very relaxed. Getting some nice inlanes, but still. Oh, he's got both spinners going at once. Unfortunately, it's an EM game, so that doesn't. It can only score one of them at a time Due to the nature of physics So on the left side, what do you do? Would you pass over? So you can try the post pass But I don't believe it works Alley pass is generally the preferred method I think But for some players who aren't comfortable With the alley, there's nothing wrong With putting it on the spinner Your green targets in the middle of the playfield Can light double bonus Which is not a non-trivial amount of points and then those targets themselves are worth $3,000 each. Again, nothing to sneeze at. Is that these targets over here? Yes, they are indeed. Do you need all of them? Yep. You've got to hit them all to get your double bonus. Well, then light up right there. So we're live again now? Yes, I think we moved back to player three. Okay, so this is a five-ball game. And scores in qualifying, I think it was like $150,000 to have an okay score. Really? This game, because the spinners are so dialed, you get some big scores on it. And honestly, the kick-out now is nicer than when I saw it earlier today. Yeah, looks like it's coming out nice. Yeah, you really could get into a rhythm of just hit it one time and right back up there. It's a fairly popular EM. People like playing bow and arrow. It's fairly safe. You know, the good shots. Full flippers. Right. Skillful game. Yep. I'd say it's one of the A-listers on the sweet spot of skillful, fun to play. So this will be really, yep. Those inlanes, it's very inlane-age. Yep. So it's a good start from Paul, too. Yeah, he's got up to 8,000 now. So let's see what he does left to right. Yep, so he just keeps land. That's fine. If you have a surefire way to do it, then you can really try and exploit the, because he's got max collect now. Right. and just don't tilt because you still get that bonus on the drain as well. So what are we seeing here? 116th Gene? Yep, 93 from player 2 which is Ian. And what ball are we on? Ball 3 I believe. It's kind of covered up in our... It is covered up but player 3 has 44,000 and Dave Stewart coming up with 29. Unless somebody has rolled it. Or 93 is the high we think? No, it's 116 or 18 by Gene. Gene on and he He's player one, so we assume he chose the game. Right. He's the highest seed. He is the ninth seed, yeah. That's a well-deserved brick drain from Dave. Did he try to backhand the right spin on there? He did. And you don't get as much energy when you do that, but at the same time, it's generally a safer play. That was a nice little dig right there. Very nice spinner hit there by Gene. He already got his collect up to 5,000. All right. Let's see if he's on the fly. Boom. Look at that. Oh. Oh. Yeah, that was unlucky. When you come out of the middle of the week, right? Yep. No power behind it, so. Yeah. Even like a really hard slap save there might not have gotten it. But he finishes with 130 there. We're not sure which ball we're on, unfortunately. We could peek around. What ball? What ball are they on, son? That's your saying, ball three, but then he shrugs because he's a teenager and he doesn't really know. Oh. That's Ian wondering where his end lane is. Yep. And that's his game. He did get over 100,000 that ball at least. I mean, he came in with, at the 24th spot, he had the bubble by one point. So if all four players like the 100,000 light, then all our viewers at home need to go and take a shot of their favorite libation. Get the full Monty, all four lit. Then you've got to get lit at home. That's how we roll here in Southern Cal. That's a lovely, lovely nudge there. Very nice. He saw the danger early and took care of business. Yeah, I like what I'm seeing from Paul here. Yeah. When I started playing a few years ago, he was one of the players I started watching. Right. He knows his games pretty well. Yep. He's shaking his head at his 69,000. And that was a very tough field today. I mean, you couldn't have one bad game to make it to the 24. All four games had to be on point. Yep. Your four-card game has to be there. And big lines, too. I hear there's over 200 people playing in the main here as well. 215 earlier. So if you're watching at home, it's Saturday night tonight. Tomorrow is going to be a huge day of pinball. We have the in-disc finals for the main tournament, for the women's tournament, for the kids' tournament. Yep. And then after it's all done and we're ready to go to bed, we're going to do a little high-stakes tournament, allegedly at like 9 o'clock at night. But if it finishes before midnight, I'll be really surprised. That's going to be a long day. So really get your chores done early and make sure the batteries on your computers are all good because this is going to be the longest stream ever. It's going to be a very long stream. We're going to get our... We'll be able to pee here without having to go to the bathroom. We're all going to have our jugs. I think we'll just take some breaks. Or not. I think we go for it. We go for the longest pinball stream of all time. It would be awesome. There are all different banks as well, which is, you know, like the women have their own banks. High stake have their own banks. And with the guillotine, we'll get to see all sorts of... We're going to see a ton of different titles tomorrow. tomorrow so definitely uh tune in for that and uh boy we've got a few hours to go for this first round the classics so ian is uh trying to catch up to gene he at least has a good foundation to work on oh that's a nice that was back in on the fly oh he's on one more oh there's a double no just missed it so he needs to catch what 130 something right uh yep 135 it looks like and In bonus right now, he's at 8-9, so he's got it. In bonus, not quite. Not quite. This is when the ball game does that. Oh! 125 with 10, 135, 350, 540. He got it. Unless that's 139. No, he only got 125. Oh, he tilts. He tilts it. He had it. I think he had it by 400 points. He very well could have. Is that 135 or 130? It looks like 130. Yeah, it's 135, 350. Yeah, so he had it. He had it. That tilt just cost him. Possibly two points. Yep. We're really not sure which ball we are on. If it's ball four, then it's no harm, no foul. It's ball five? We're trying to get that answer. It is ball five. So he literally just cost himself potentially first place. You were right. He would have had it in bonus. Yep. That's unfortunate for Ian, and especially with Papa scoring. So the first place is four points, second place is two, third place is one, and last place is zero. So you get a little extra. You basically get a bonus point for finishing first. And we'll see how Ian comes back in the next game on that because that can... Yeah, that's pretty rough. Yep. But that's pinball. That's a new format this year. In the past, it used to be four games a round in the final, 3-2-1-0. 3-2-1-0, where it's more of a slog and there's no advantage to... Right. Well, first is still great, but you don't get the bonus point. Paul gets a left out lane there, so he finished with, I believe, 81,000. 81 for possibly third or fourth, which is somewhat of a bad beat. Hey, if he could slink away with a point, that's something. Never great to start with a zero, but 4-2-1-0, you know, you come back to get a win later. Ooh, and Dave drains. He will get last, so it goes first place Gene, second place. Ian, third place Paul, and fourth place Dave. And so we'll see what they are. Are we going to follow them, Carl, for the whole round? Yep, we're going to go to the next game. I'm just looking through chat here. I see there's someone from Finland that's watching. I'm surprised. I thought we had everyone from Finland was here. Already. Olli Mikko and his contingent. There's four of them, four Finnish players in the tournament. I have one of my favorite. guys from Sweden, Lord Squeaks, in the chat. All right. Well, the Swedes, is Mats Rundstein in? He said he was going to tune in each night to cheer Ali on. He's mostly, I don't think we have any other Europeans. I mean, Damien doesn't count. Except for IFPA. I'm European. I saw you got citizenship. I did. Are you dual citizen? You kept your... Sure, sure. There's no need to drop your citizenship anymore. so it's got a point of each when when you know the the shit hits the fan you got to choose sides yeah that is true trying to catch up my daughter oh is this turned dark really quickly so let's get back to the pinball so here's let's look at our groups uh group two what do we got michael Eric Ridgeway don't know i'm going to rely on uh i actually don't know michael Eric Ridgeway at matthew Stacks, I also don't know. Raymond. Damon Ravenson. He looks like a 50-year-old truck driver. Yeah, no. So Raymond and Michael Mattson. So Matthew Stacks actually got into the top 24 with his last game. Oh, was he? After the cutoff. He Belsito'd in. He Belsito'd in. Wow. Yeah, I was. Of course, Jim Belsito is our tournament director this weekend and done an incredible job. co-director with uh carl carl d'Python Anghelo and bob matthews yep uh so group three is uh derrick price from san diego yeah that one uh and david peck oh i forgot he's not a european but another uh from out of town david peck and uh danny are here from new zealand yeah jason wordrick from chicago and uh hey ryan wenger he's a colorado guy uh and also get all of your led uh needs taken at Comet Pinball. Yep. That's right. Cometpinball.com. Maybe. I don't know if it is. I hope that's not a porn site. Got a nice little setup there with showing the LED versus incandescence over there on some NBA passports. Yep. Ryan's a great guy. He plays in my league. He runs the league. Operates some games in Boulder, Colorado. And he's really, last couple years, he's really upped his game. Yep. And then in group four, we've got Eskerher Lefkoff. All right. He's showing a nice L. L for Lefkoff. That's right. And Janny, sorry, anyone? He's European, I believe. Oh, I wonder. No, he's not one of the Finns. He's with one of the main guys. I can't think of the guy's name right now. Okay. Jockton. Jockton Streely, which is from our hometown. I was going to say, he's easy to pick out. He usually has a really interesting sort of mohawk colored. Great guy. Really nice guy. and grant mortensen ufo uh old time been playing forever yeah i want to keep elwyn's friends and uh we see grant uh still he's southern california i think that's where he's based um so i think he was like in arizona or something but my understanding is he's trying to get into the uh on tilt league so oh okay yep uh so yeah it was good to see grant haven't seen him in a while he used to travel to more tournaments we'd see him more often he used to come to expo and and some of the other larger tournaments. So this is our first round. We still have eight other players who have buys. So we have a good question. How did Bob Matthews not make the cut in a Classics tournament? You know, Bob tried hard. He had a great ticket going. And as Jermaine was saying earlier, you needed four good scores. And he had three good ones and one bad one, and he didn't make the cut. I found myself in the same boat. I had three really solid scores. and then I played Sea Witch and I got 180,000 or something. It's the beauty of this format. The internal pressure you put on yourself, the better you do. I think I did register probably the best score on El Dorado of 30 points. The whole game? Yep. You tilted on Paul. Please tell me you tilted. I tilted. All right, so we've got a couple more results. It looks like Group 3 finished with David Peck taking the win. on Joker Poker, which has been playing really mean. Oh, and Ryan Wenger takes last. And then in Group 4, we see Johnny won on Sea Witch, with Escher getting second, and Grant third. Sea Witch, it wasn't said very hard, like the Outland Post were in, but I wasn't able to get one good game the whole weekend. Last night in Vinyls, there were a couple of really good games on Sea Witch. A couple million. We unfortunately didn't get to watch that. No, that wasn't on last night? No, that's too bad. We were following the other group. We got a lot of laser cue and the right target, yeah. Kings of Steel. We'll probably be seeing a lot of that. Speak of the devil. There it is. Very interesting setup. You know, the left gate was removed at the bottom near your flipper. That changed the whole game. So what does that change about the game? I mean, it's very hard to get the ball on the left flip here. You can't really, you know, if you dead bounce right to left, pretty much it's dead. If you drop catch and there's a little bit of spin. Show us on the telestrator what you're talking about. So that gate, yeah, it protects the ball from going back. But that gate, yeah. But then we have the mod here that there's a gate up here that feeds the ball down into the shooter lane. Well, I wonder, do you think they took the gate from the bottom and moved it to the top? I expect they did, but you'd have to ask Jim that. That's interesting. All right, so that was Gene. It looks like on ball one, yep. I'm a little frozen. Now, at least other than the bonus, nothing carries over, so you can't carry over the saucer value or the right target. That's correct. It's truly a three-ball game, and you try and get up top as much as you can. I mean, the bonus does amount to a little bit if you get some bonus stacks as well by shooting your free stand-up up top. Yep. there is something to it. It's not just the right targets. Going back and forth to the saucer and the bonus tax. It balances the game more than before, really. I think what I learned when I was watching Raymond Davidson last night was he was actually opting to shoot the ball up and around on the right flipper because it was the safest shot. And he actually completely abandoned the right target. I think he got tired of it not registering. And I believe Escher was doing the same thing, too. Yeah. that's you found the shot he liked and that's wash, rinse, repeat. Yeah, I think the trick is there's a post on the right side of the target so if you shoot straight up, you usually don't really hit the target. Most of the time people try to bank it off Yeah, that way you need more left. Wow, that was a pure center drain there for Ian, nothing he could do and This is Kings of Steel. Decent score on it was probably half a million in qualifying-ish. At least, no, actually, yeah. Yeah, 8,000. People were putting good scores. So, Pin Daddy asked if there was going to be a score bit running tonight. I know we had on this. Oh, is it? Yeah. Okay. They're on eight games. I think there's a TV they're showing all game. They have the numbers. There it is. There's the left. And I don't know if Paul played this in qualifying or whether he's aware of it. You just have to remember. Yeah. You get in the flow of things and you're like, oh, nope. Yeah. You get in your motions and you forget that one little thing. You have to adjust to it. It's still possible. You can still trap it. You just have to have the right angle. There are plenty of games where you get that backdoor death. Grand Prix is the most famous, probably. There was one rollover off that year. I was going to say drinking game at home for every time that happens, but nobody would be left at the table. So maybe every third backdoor, we all have a drink. So we got Gene back up. Not a lot in it on ball one. Oh, very nice. I feel like he did a little. He helped that just a little. I mean, it's possible. He got the good angle on it. And it's interesting. He's not going up top. He's going to that bank. Yep. Just getting some bonus. Like, no one had a killer at ball one. It really not a bad set of decision the way it playing Oh that was tough Straight up the middle target Do you know how the bonus count is each car like 5 10 No one really probably tried to figure that out because of the rules of the game There's a skill shot right there by the rollovers. When you get to this guy, it says it's 80K. But before that, yeah. Oh, he gets a little luck there. Well, he kind of deserved it after the last drain, so we'll give him. Yeah. I don't think we mentioned, obviously going up top for the saucer is pretty good, but getting to 4 rollover is what builds your value. You start at 5 or 10,000. Oh dear. Here's the thing. Oh, it's going up. Yeah, he's not going to... Alright, someone call Josh. Is this a stuck ball? Let's take a vote in the... I would assume it's a stuck ball in a situation where it could drain, where the TD would not be able to save it for them. That would be my decision. If I personally, if I'm TDing that ball right there, I put it on the right flipper. Are you? But, like, the gate could close up and the ball could go in the out lane. It could, but it's not a sure thing. It's not a sure drain right at this point. Yeah, I believe I've always been in a situation where they would actually basically count it as a drain. What would, Carl, what's your call on this? Is that a stuck ball? Let's see if Bob comes over. Yes, that's the tech ball in my opinion. Let me go to him. It's funny. There's a million fringe cases because of the fact that that's a gate that opens and closes. Right. Because the gate earlier was closing a little bit. I saw that, and it went up a little, but it still isn't draining. The rule is generally that if the ball is on its path to draining, then you drain it. But you might have to be like, this is the user has to figure it out. Sure. Or you drain it. It's like I'll drain it, or you have to sort it out. Yeah. Interesting. Sometimes you can push a gate open. I've not seen it happen once on this game. Is it possible to push it open? And have it stay open? Probably not. It's probably trying to close just on the screen. So the question is, did he actually have that open? No. It wasn't open. He pushed it halfway. Yeah, he pushed it. And there are some games where you can open it and it'll stay open. Arduousy comes to mind. Although, if you push it too far, then you die. That happened on my $50 ticket. Wow. Okay, that's interesting. I mean, you can open the gate, but it's very difficult. I don't think in any of my games I got the gate open. It's a center target, which is a pretty deadly target. And it has to be. And it has to be on this guy. The glass is coming off. Oh, they're giving it to him. All right. New York has spoken. The rule has been made. All righty, then. we are going to play on. That's nice because that way you don't have to worry about the left side and the right side. So where are we at score-wise? Looks like this is Ian on ball two. Yeah, 300,000. He's got 300,000. He's a flipper. He likes to flip when the ball comes to his flipper. He really likes to flip, which is not a terrible thing to do in Classics. So from a trap on the right side, you can flip the ball up your inline and up your flipper and you can back all right yeah the targets get a little advanced bonus yeah you didn't get that but he has a nice saucer value he's up to 45 000 on that saucer i think it's 80 000. it's 0 40 and then 80. oh yeah so it's and then it goes to special or extra ball which reset the values that's not very good no it's already you want to stay at the 80 000 value right there see that was that was very nice there to not lose the ball down left here there was some good nuance there on the left flipper. So, I mean, he's got the skills to settle, but he just likes to flip. And with the upper flipper, you know, it's like you get some X for your eye. Nice. Boom. Oh, yeah. There it is, yeah. There's nothing he could do there. Yeah, that's a problem. I mean, nothing you could have done, right? Like, it's just the way it's set up. I had a few times where I would do that and it would actually go up in the D. Sometimes you'd survive. Yeah. Like it would go far enough. Yeah. That's classic, though, for you. Yeah. All right. So Paul is back. Yep. And it's really Paul and Dave Stewart who need to get back in this. Yep. Their plan B, of course, is that they get Gene wins. And that way, if Gene can get an eight, then everybody still has a chance on the third game. Yep. That's the beauty of this Papa style. Young Escher did a 59,000 on Sky Jump, or whatever it's called, Free Fall, as player one in his group. We'll see how that holds up. Yep. So let's see where Paul goes, up top or into the cards? He's been going into the cards. Oh, he went up top that time. I mean, the Socios spot cards as well, right? That's right. So, yep, it's just about the return. That was very nice. Yep, very nice. I think he was a little more aware of the death of that left side and didn't want to play around Yeah Don't want to... ooh This flip feels pretty long Oh my goodness He gets it back Yeah That's a freebie right there Oh my goodness He did it so hard that he did what you said It went all the way up and back And the game is quite sensitive You can't really push too hard like to try to make the gap on the left It's pretty tilty Yeah It will tilt pretty easily Yeah I've watched you play some, Jermaine. You're a tilty kind of guy. I try to save the ball kind of guy. As Rick Steader would say, if you didn't tilt, then you were cheated somewhat out of your ball. Unless you had, say, 50 million in bonus on Q-Ball Wizard. Yes, yes. That's a different topic. Sometimes you just have to use your brain a little more. Okay, well, he has 40,000 on his software, so, you know. It's coming together. I think he's got to 80,000 in bonus. Yeah, he's already up to about 500,000 now. No bonus sex quite yet, but he's making a nice comeback. He's going to put pressure on Dave with his 59. Yeah, especially with Dave at zero points, too. That's where I start getting into your head. Well, and that's the way classics go. Sometimes you just, you know, some of the battle is, yep. See if he gets that right target. Oh, nice. messes in way too late there back up to the uh saucer it's a good uh play time for sure this is excellent ball time oh he kept the right flipper up because he was yeah yep just having that gate out it puts you off just mentally you're you're thinking about something else yep all right now he caught up Yeah, yeah. 761, big ball. Just a big example why you don't keep flippers up. Two points. All right. But Paul finishes that ball with 761,000. This is ball two. All right. So Dave needs to get something going. At least, you know, flip the ball around, get some feel for the machine. It really could be a one-ball game. I mean, as Paul just showed us, he can get, you know, 600,000, 800,000 easy. Yeah. He opts to actually bounce it over and he's just going to go for that saucer. He's going to try to play it nice and safe. We were discussing that safe strategy. But he gets a sling into the right out lane. That's a risk going into the pop, right? You never really know how that's going to come out. Which is why this mod makes the game much more difficult. It's funny, I've never played that game in its normal form. There is one out in the bank back there if you want to try it. All right. Let me zoom. Yeah. All right. So, Jimmy's back. That's ball three, right? There's not enough. Yep. There's not enough pinball here. Oh, my goodness. Oh, so he's going to. Tough break. That's a third at best. The good news for everyone is there will be, this is going to be a one-game group. Everybody's going to have a shot. Yep. Dave needs to pass Gene, and then he'll have some outs. Yep. I don't know. Carl, he was talking about having the Out app just to show everyone's outs, like for what place you need and how everybody else. Oh, really? Is there an app that does that? There's an app. Yeah, there's a couple apps for it, but Carl's doing some TV right now, so we'll ask him when he gets back whether. So, Carl, we were talking about the Outs app and whether. I know I promised to try and do something for you, but it didn't come together. You didn't have enough to do? I'm sorry, CMK. No, she is not. I have nothing to do. Yeah, right. Is that like a Greg Don't Laugh app kind of thing? Greg did one, and a couple other people have as well. We were talking about making it so that we could put it on the screen, sort of update it. I mean, you know, people can do a little math, right? I mean, we're not all bowing. There's a surprising number of outs in Papa's style. Sure. Yep. So Ian finishes up just over a million, which is a very respectable score. Escher's still cursing. He had 2 million last night, and Raymond came all the way back and passed him at 2.5 million. And it cost him a chance at the finals. I think Raymond did that on two games against him. Yes, he did. Yeah, he did it on Sea Witch as well. But, you know, that's Ray Ray. Yeah, so we actually did get to watch that Sea Witch game. All right, so let's see if Paul can. He's close. That's a good bonus, too. Yeah, you just need some good ball time here. You can just get that last roll over to get the social value. That would be nice. Oh, my goodness. That ball was gone, and then it came back. So I was wondering, that flashing purple light stock, or is that something they added with the mod? Or is it always flashing purple? I feel like it always flashes for that. Oh, okay. I don't know. Yeah, I'm not familiar with the game, unfortunately. All right. Does he have it in bonus? He very well might. He has 80K, but he doesn't have any gas. He does have to worry about Dave Stewart, though, so he's going to keep playing. It's going to be close. I think he's passing by at least. Yeah, yeah, he had it. A little fist bump there. Nice work from Paul. Gets him right back in it. He can do no worse than second. So Dave's just looking to try to get some points. If he doesn't pass Gene, then he's out. Yeah, it's a 5-5-4. Yep. So he needs to get it past Gene at least and get one point, and then he has an out at five. Yep. So. 5-4-4-1. Yep. Generally, when it's 5-4-4, the fourth person has one single out. If they're fortunate, often they're done. So let's see how he does. The magic scenario. Uh-oh. All right. Let's bounce over. How much does he need? He needs 100,000. Wow, that's not much. To at least to give him one chance, but yeah, ideally he he does a Raymond and come all the way back. Yeah Anything's possible in this game Trying to keep the ball live right now. Yep. Oh can't find that right target, but he finds it is all right nice all right imagine that could have been the last flip of his classic finals yeah that would be a bad way to go yep he'd have to take a shot too i think for that one yep so uh okay so what do we have five five five four four one the uh i'm gonna let the computer do that for us math is hard when you've been playing pinball for 36 out of the last 44 hours yep five four four one falls in the lead on group one okay group two what do we have so michael with five points raymond four uh matthew three and michael richway with two so there's an out dave's out is a three-way tie at five points for a tiebreaker uh johnny is at eight in uh group four uh escher's at oh nope oh well i'll we'll wait till it updates yeah it doesn't update it yet we don't have the score we're trying to do charades with that shirt it's just not working i tell you kids these days so eight ball huh it's pretty fast usually i guess uh it depends on whether you like your kickback or not your ball time is is remarkably uh connected to whether you get the kickback or not i guess i'm gonna stand straight now yep straight enough suck it in i do like the banners this year they are their color theme is very strong yeah i like that they look like the trophy as well very nice nice truck this year. Hopefully they'll take one home. They did some serious upgrades to their branding this year and everything about it feels professional. Even the security guard sleeping with his dog at the entrance, checking bracelets. The dog is actually the owner's son's dog. It's a sweet dog. The scout. In the meanwhile in Maine, the qualifying continues and the queues on all the games It is. Depending upon when we finish tonight, we might peek in and watch. It's kind of fun to watch last runs and we can pull up people's tickets. As Luna has mentioned, it is Yanni not Johnny, which I knew in the back of my head. Where is Yanni from, Luna? Yanni? It's not the Yanni, though. It's just pronounced Yanni. Does Yanni, the musician, also spell it with a J? I don't know. Just trying to... He's from Finland, so he is one of the... Oh, he's one of the Finns. Yeah. I thought that was the case. It's funny because I met, I saw Ollie and I met the other Finns, but I couldn't. It is Ollie. Yes. Ollie was the one in the back of my head I couldn't pull out earlier. That's quite the treat from Cleveland. Yeah. Four of them came out to. Wow. That's impressive. Yeah. Yeah. Both Yanni and Janu was basically playing back-to-back on the classics, I know, yesterday. Yep. Very nice. That's our same bank of classics. And so in both main and classics, all the qualifying here this weekend has been ticket style, which is old school Papa style, which is much harder because it's not just keep playing the game until you get a high score. Your ticket is all connected. So we're on group three, game two. Fair enough. We've got Derek Price, David Peck, Jason Wardwick, and Ryan Wagner. Okay, so who's... Gold three, clear three. All right, so Jason player three, 125,000. So he's chasing player one and player two at this stage. He survived the play-ons. That's half the game. It is. But he still doesn't have his kickback lit, so he's still playing without a net here. And that's gone. That's why, I mean, I've seen people trying to tap pass from right to left. On this one, it seemed a bit difficult. Yeah, I saw Keith trying that the other day. The sling's not that strong, though, but I never actually got anything out of it, so I stopped trying that. Yeah, I think it's a bit tricky. So here's Ryan from Colorado. I know you're not going to like it, but you actually just flip into the sling, and you have a pretty good chance at liking it. Really? Is that a thing? It is a thing. So next time you do a classic kind of... I'll show you tonight after the tourney's over. Wow. I'd like to see that, because that sling was doing absolutely nothing for me. I mean, I know the strong bank shot to, you know, the gem shot, that works, right? So he actually did light his kickback and unfortunately goes out the right. Again, it's a drinking game for when the kickback is actually useful. Oh, my God. I think that's Ryan's second zero. So that was ball three. So that is unfortunately Ryan's second zero. Jason only got a point. Are they going to 6-6-1-1 it or 6-6-2? It's 6-6-2-1. So Jason's got one out, a tie at six. So Jason's got a tie at six, one out. Pinballer, thank you for the 400 biddies. I'm sure Carl will appreciate it. Yeah, but you jinxed Ryan. Maybe if he took his hoodie off before he played, he would have done better. Yep. Maybe. Yeah, pinballer. I give that to you. It's like, take your hood down, son. So today we are at the Museum of Pinball in Benin, California. It's in an abandoned, well, not abandoned, but an old aircraft hangar. They used to have an airport here, and now it is an amazing facility. There are 10,000 games? 550 pinball machines and another 500 arcade games. We had pinball stadium lights up there. And how often is it open? It's open three to four times a year. Right, for different events? Yeah, they did a Halloween thing just a few months ago. Everyone's dressed up and playing pinball. I think Arcade Expo is in March as well. Arcade Expo. That's the big one, right? Do they run any tournaments with Arcade Expo? They have been running the tournaments. With some of the games you see, they ran it with Sea Witch. Oh, my goodness. I really like the Sea Witch. Okay, I think we are... Very nice. So, yeah, we're back to our group. And we just saw another... You don't like that kickback. Your ball time is single digits in seconds. Yep. All right, so it looks like it's player three now. Yep. This is Paul Saylor. goes up but does not hit that 8 ball. Goes up the right spinner. That spinner spins pretty well. Yeah, yeah. If you can light it, it's dialed. And Bob was, last night, Bob Matthews won Classics 1. And he was able to backhand that spinner quite often. Like, not just once, twice, but like three or four times. On the left? Yep. And he got really good value there. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, but when it's not lit, it's 10 points of spin. So you get, you know, maybe 100 or 200. He just was going back up top. Playing without a net. Playing without a net. Getting a little bonus, but there's... Went up trying to hit that eight ball. Hit some pops and out that left out line. Do not try to do the backflip on the trampoline or the trapeze without the net. It's not my favorite game because the kickback's not lit. I have to play this in Denver a lot, and I hate it. I hate it. It's all about the plunge, right? If you can plunge nicer than before, you get the pop. 50-50. That's an excellent point, Jermaine. And a lot of people, I don't know if they know the skill shot or they're trying... Skill shot, right? That's a true skill shot, though. Yeah. Yeah, I know... It still takes a little luck. You don't always get it, but it definitely increases your... Like, bump there. Yeah, yeah. Nope. Wow, nice end lane. Yeah, that game wasn't even that sensitive. Oh, that's... Yeah. And the gap of the flipper. I mean, it's not just the outlane. Like, the gap is... It's a tough game. A lot... Most of these games were very tough in many senses. So Gene, oh, he had a chance at it. Oh, again, there it is. Nice. Good call. So he's got his net at least. And now let's see if he actually uses it. Yep. Spinner's ripped. We've yet to see it. Nice work from Gene. This is bread and butter here, and it's also a. 25K. Oh, that's a wicked feed. So again, you like the kickback, but it doesn't actually help you. It just makes you feel better while you're playing. Yep. Oh, the spinner. Spinner. It's really more about the spinner. Yeah, that's it. I mean, you still have to get the ball. Even when it kicks back, half the time it'll kick it to the right out wing. A quarter of the time it'll kick up and not get good contact and you'll still die on it. Sometimes it bounces back like this as well. There's no grace period on that kickback, right? So you really want to... It's like everyone taking their shoes off at the airport. It's not really saving you from being blown up, but it makes you feel just a little bit better while you do it. Right. All right. So this is ball two. No one's done that much. No, there's not a lot in it. Like one good spinner shot would take the lead now. What going on here He did catch the dough Oh he tried to go on the fly That would have been a huge spinner shot there He went for it again and bricks it unfortunately Third time's the charm. Just get it on the flipper to get a good... Oh, here we go. Settle, settle. Here we go. Big shot. Boom. Oh, he was a little late. Line it up. Boom. Oh, he was still a little late. You're going to get bounced. Yuri can't afford to miss two shots in a row. All right, what are you going to do? Go orbit. Get your multiplier. He's got a decent bonus. Like, right now, go for multiplier on the... Show him the horseshoe. I don't think we've... Right, the horseshoe. Yeah, that horseshoe. The candy cane, right? So you shoot it once, you get nothing. You shoot it twice, you get 2x, then 3x, 5x, and then EB was 25k, I think. 20 or 50. I don't remember. I didn't play. All right. Nice little flick there. There is value there. He keeps getting the cradle on the left, but not the right. Which is usually pretty hard. Yeah, it is. That was a hard brick. And he's still alive? Yeah, but he's just, come on, just one good spinner rip. Oh, power in lane. Oh. Just missing that spinner. Well, he got his 2X, though. Oh, he's good. He's good. He walked away from the machine thinking it was gone. Because he knew that was, but did you see? He was dead. He knew it. Yeah. He knew it was going to arrive. Dead man walking. Yeah. You know, I've seen that. Yesterday, somebody saved the ball by making a big move. He tilted, walked away, but he did not, and the ball just drained. I think that was Corey, actually, which took second. It was such a big move that he assumed it was... He's like, it has to have tilted. I love that moment where after you make a big move, you flip and see if the flipper still works. No, he literally walked away from the machine and then realized the flippers weren't dead. Okay, so he's got his kickback. Good plunge. So we've yet to see a kickback continue a player's turn. Boom. Oh, he was early. Oh, no, no, no. Okay, so we're 0 for 8 on kickbacks doing anything. Well, yeah. Other than lighting the spinner. And really, Gene's the only one who's had a decent spinner. So does that go through your head? Oh, there it is. There's the spinner, though. That's more points than everyone else. This is ball three, so he's got more. He's actually behind. Paul's actually got 92,000 right now. Yeah, I think his bonus carried him across quite a bit. Oh, he may have been able to take that one out. So Paul might have a thousand. I mean, very nice game. And it's just him not to be last. Oh, wait, wait. Five, four, four. No, he's got to be. Gene's got to be one of the one of the Paul or Ian. And Ian's got to be Gene or Paul. And it's, you know, it's a three. Dave's got one chance. But he's got to win before he worries about any of the other things. So what's Ian at? Nineteen thousand. Ian's trying to short plunge to the good lane I've seen a few people doing that I think it's better off the one bounce Right, because the gate The gate over here is going to stop your ball Or if you go too strong, you're going to power through And go too far The bounce is usually the good idea on this one Hey, Barry man, good to see you, man Oh, so close And he's still alive Oh, he tried to shoot it on the fly Oh, this is trouble This is trouble Oh, nice Oh, so much on the fly. Oh, is that the Bob Matthew backhand spinner? It would have been. Boom. Ten points a shot. It's lit. Will it actually do anything? I thought it was going to roll up. Yep, it looked like it was. Nice. Oh, my God. I was about to say, time for an out lane. Off the post, into the out lane. That's a well-deserved out lane, I would say, because it was a missed shot, and that's the way the game was designed. Does that go through your head when you think you're missing a shot and you know that if you hit it too early, you go in the outland, do you think about missing it late? Is it better to go late than early? I will usually make a decision if I've bricked it the one time and if I've got it cradled, I'll definitely consider, okay, I definitely don't want to do that again. I'd rather do it late than anything. I always think about how I missed it early and try and adjust, but you're talking about microseconds at best. All right, so with Ian, he has one out still. Yep. Now, Paul did pass Gene. Paul can do, I think Paul's through. Paul's through. Paul's through. Yeah, Paul's safe. He can do no worse than seven. So Ian's out, right? At best, he has a five. At best, Ian can get to, no, two players go through. So at best, Ian can get to five. Gene has already passed him, so it's over. Yeah, Gene and Paul are through. So actually, no. Oh, and Dave can pass everyone. I'm sorry, I was assuming that was going to happen. Oh, my God. So, all right, here we go. It's all done. Gene and Paul are through in our first group. And let's check in on the others. Let's get that guillotine over. Is everyone in the chat, is everyone familiar with the portable rig that Carl has put together? We saw it first in Orlando a couple months ago. And that's when we dubbed it the guillotine. We saw it first here at Lake Alice when we first started it, actually. When he was like, during its building, and it was prototype stages. Yep. And then I asked him, you know, so all you need to do is put some arms on it, and he actually says he's in the works of getting some arms for it to take over the world. Eventually it will achieve sentience. Yeah. If it can move itself, you know, like the cleaning robot kind of thing. Yeah. That would be nice. I wanted an actual blade, like an actual guillotine part that, like, you lose. You really lose. So he actually mentioned the arms are so he could get the other games on the other side. So I do know on group four, Yanni is already through because he won the first two games. Yep. And on Kings of Steel, Escher did 750K on his ball one. So he's. That's a solid first ball. So if Grant were Raymond, he would be in trouble. But I don't know if Grant's going to do the Raymond on him. but we'll see how that group goes. What else we got? I think group two would be interesting, Jocker Poker. You know, by the time they get the guillotine over there, I suspect... It'll be pretty much done, yeah. And if anyone is interested by the rig, I think Carl posted the bomb on Teal Forums to show exactly how it's made and if people want to order the parts. Very stable, very nice. Yeah, it's really well done. He's got it all. It could pack up really nice and easy, and you could teleport it. Or transport it. Teleport it, yeah. That's version 2.0 is the teleportation. 2.0 is the teleport. That costs a little more than option. It's a Briggs-Boson. We got the pro model, and then we have the LE model. What's the wormhole based on, the two guys, the Briggs-Straton? The Briggs-Straton. Yeah. All right. So Yanni was actually the main organizer of the EPC 2018. Oh, nice. I heard very good things from that. We had Colin McElpine represented the U.S. very well. Lyman Sheets also went. And both those guys made Final Four. Yorian Engelbrecht won the thing. I think it was the only tournament he played last year. Yeah, it was a tough Final, right? Because he was in the winner bracket and the French guy there kind of came back and pushed into the room. No, it was definitely some excellent matches and just a great facility, and everybody had a great time there. So hopefully they'll host again. I think the EPC next year has been decided already. Already? What's the location? So we're back at Bow and Arrow, and there's Dave Peck. And there's an outlaying for Dave. Let's see on the scores. Ball and play three. Three or two. I got old man eyes. No rods or cards. says two i believe no i think three i like three what is the but you know what we'll be able to tell next ball yeah it's two okay and now i see the two so they only played like they only picked seven balls wow yeah all the other games were on ball three player three or so so that's why i went to the front wow eight ball went fast so what do we have score wise uh looks like uh player two's in the lead. 71,000. So Jason has to win. He needs to prop Ryan up enough to come in second. Well, he's up right now. And he needs Derek or David to take last. I know Wenger will still try very hard. So that part of it should be alright. But he has 60,000. It's about to see him win. So 50,000 maybe? He's a player four at 39,000 Who has 7,000? He's player three That's David So if Jason can pull this off He could get to a tiebreaker It's tough to To survive at two Yeah, so it doesn't matter if Ryan is second or third, right? It only matters That was a very nice drop catch there On the right flipper It's whether Ryan's last or not to Jason's ability to get to a tie here. Misses that saucer, unfortunately, for $7,000. Jason has been playing forever. Very nice. He was the original. His nickname originally was The Kid because back in the day he was The Kid. No way. He's got some crazy stories in Chicago when he was a teenager. And all the manufacturers were still there, and he was a tester for them out on Joshua Clay. and he won a tournament to get, like, a free ticket to New York for Papa Wine. So you want to hear old school stories, man. Talk to Jason. So that's before the Sharps, then? Same time. Sharps were kids, but Roger didn't let them play much until they were older. Whereas, you know, I put Escher in when he was three playing competition. So it worked. Yes. All right, let's see, Ryan. Oh, look, he's taking his hood down, so I like his chances. Excellent. My son is through to the next round, but I'm not playing favorites. I'm just saying that for information purposes. Just facts being reported. Just the facts. Dead bounce, very nice. Yep. Ryan's, like I said, he's a solid player, and he's really come on in the last couple of years, and he's traveling a lot to different circuit events now, and that's what you've got to do. You get the experience. What was that? That was a spinner into the C bumper and straight down the middle. Wow. I mean, even though he cannot move on, obviously he wants to get as many points as possible. Just, you know, for standings and pride. There's a Bowden term for it after you're out, and then you have a great game the next time. Because everyone, you naturally relax, and you play better when you're relaxed. That's why the card qualifying is so hard, because you know how important the game is, and it's really hard to relax. I've run a few Game 5 tickets myself. Yes, and when you're playing a game where it doesn't matter. Yep, so Yanni and Escher are through. Oh, there you go. Two groups have moved down, yep. So I've expected the five-ball games takes a little longer than the quick solid-state three-ball games. Or you've got El Dorado. And in qualifying, I really like playing the EMs just because you get five balls, and you know you're going to get housed once or twice, but I just said three balls when you get housed on one of those hard-playing solid states. It just doesn't feel like you get your money's worth. Yeah. Wow. Yep. Ooh, that's a tough one. That's up and out. Yeah, there's not a lot Derek could have done there. So, Bulls 3PO3. All right, so this is David. Yeah, he really needs to get going here. Yep. What's Ryan at? Is it 30? Is it 70 or 30? Tough to tell. It's a tough angle, unfortunately. It's more than zero. I think with the EM and the Reels it's harder to look at, sure. No score beat for the EM quite yet. Once the guillotine achieves sentience, he'll be able to heal. He or she, whichever gender he chooses once he exists. I mean, he could be gender free. He bounces on that slingshot. Wow, it's going. Yeah, and he doesn't look real comfortable. Like, I don't, his body language is, he's already like thinking about the playoff. Yeah. I mean, I think yesterday in the first round, three of the four groups had tiebreakers. Yeah, there was a lot of tiebreakers going on. Not only the first round, but the quarterfinals as well. Yeah, there were. Yeah, Asher was in a couple of those. So David's co-pilot here is Derek. And so if Jason isn't able, Derek's got a pretty solid score here. And if Derek manages to finish ahead of Jason, oh, he got the double bone. no no there's one more light to go right so jason has to so even if david doesn't get a good score he still has an out at derrick two in a row yeah that was the second time he sent correct off and yeah all right let's see third time's the charm oh no now he's that's tough to get in your head yeah it does am i shooting it wrong he's gonna yeah boom boom oh no jason's so controlled Oh! Don't tilt, don't tilt Did he tilt? 78 He's still pretty close But I mean he's got to be He had two, that was 16,000 points Just gone So group number two is finally through Raymond Davidson and Michael Mattson advance Alright, so we're just waiting for the last two And then we'll be joined by the top eight seed as well Yep, semi-finals I feel like Phil Harmon is the top seed for this. All right, ball four, Ryan. I want to say someone might have actually overtook him. He has, really? I forgot who I saw. Either he overtook someone near the end or he... That scoop has just gotten super stingy. What do you do then? I mean, you have to go, right? You keep shooting it. You try and shoot it at a different angle. that was kind of weird that was a very strange shot there i think he might have been trying an alley pass but went super early oh so phil did do it and louise qualified second seed nice good job he's uh ryan's trying to alley pass here but he's going way early and we have a frozen uh player cam unfortunately that was a really nice alley but it didn't actually stick for him but he's doing really nice he's not panicking the ball's right at the end of the flipper But on EMs, you really, you don't need, like right there, you don't need to panic. So long as the ball touches anything, it's going to be fine. So a lot of times you see people over panic there. But he's working on that shot too. It's the nerves. It's playoffs. Yeah, I'm not sure if he has much left considering, you know. But he does get that big collect. So it's going to, oh, and he got the nice wood, Duncan. The dead bounce sounded dangerous. And now Jason is suddenly... Oh, did it bounce again? He wanted to risk it that time. If Jason finishes second and you get knocked out because the guy who was already out had a good game, because that's... He was a four as well. I mean, that's just fair. Man, look at that concentration on Ryan. He's just... It's like frozen in motion. Frozen. He's just so dialed. Yep. All right. All right, so that's back to Derek. Yep, Derek Price, 87,000. And Ryan. At this point, the only game that actually matters is Jason and can he beat the other scorers. Yep, if Jason wins here, he'll get a tiebreaker almost assuredly, although, you know. Unless David Peck gets a point. But that's a pretty steep hill to climb at this point. That it is. Nice match there. That was lovely. Derek's really taken to this game. Big spinner. Big spinner. Forehand spinner. Forehand, right? More energy. Backhand. Oh, look at them spin. Yeah. That spin. Backhand was fine. 3,000. One target away from double bonus, too. Trying the dead bounce there. To pass Ryan, he needs, what, 119? Yeah. But if you notice, he actually did a nudge there. Gate of the wall? Yeah, on the flipper, actually. He's at 106. This will get him to 110 plus bonus, 114. So he needs two more. The way that spinner, I would have done that as well at that point. Almost gets it. Oh, wow. This is really, yep. Look out. Look out. all right side to side yeah oh that's a big in lane oh again uh he's at 109 113. this is the black saucer again backhand backhand the spinner right here you think yeah what does he need oh he only needs two thousand yeah yeah backhand the spinner or forehand just hit the the spinner you like there you go oh it did uh it stopped itself no he's at seven he's at 116. plus he has one green light to go for double bonus shoot the green shoot that green target yeah shoot that green target that scoop is too dodgy i like the green i like your chances on the green target oh there you go all right you're good don't tilt now all right yeah don't tell until Don't do any. And there's that dead bounce straight into the. Yeah, we see that. We see that drain pretty. That's a very common drain on bow and arrow. All righty. So Derek has punched his ticket through. So here. Nearly. It's pull four. Oh, it's only pull four. It's only pull four. Okay. So Roto Dave has to pass somebody, right? To be safe. He just needs to not be last. But everybody's pulling away like 60,000 points minimum. What did we decide Ryan's first digit is? I would guess 119. 119, yeah. Oh, live catch, nice. All right, but you got to hit a spinner here. The scoop's not a good value yet. So forehand or backhand? I'm a forehand guy, but the backhand seems pretty good too. He actually hit that center target and he did it again. Does that do anything? It can open the gate. That's probably disabled. the gate the gate's up top there's a collect 3,000 or so it's not a it happens about once a year is he going for extra ball I don't know if he was missing the spinner or trying it looked like he was trying to hit that target I mean four times in a row yeah you would think you can get 5,000 on it but you also get out lane drains probably 75% of the time doing that I don't know that's the thing if you don't get to play You know, you don't get to adjust your angle, get your shots right. Look out, Jason. Oh, very lovely. That was a tough read, and he did the right thing here. All right, he's a backhand guy. Yeah, he was backhanding. Oh. But you miss, and you're down. Yeah, it's a well-deserved drain, but he would love to have one more try at it, because that was brutal. Well, he will get his ball five. That's the thing. You wait a little longer because you have more power on your shot. but then... Yep. So he's going to need a big ball five to try to get to that tiebreaker. He's hoping... We got a bunch of go-daves. By the way, Arsenic, thank you so much for that Twitch Prime sub. I don't know what that means, but yeah, thanks. I'll ask my son about it. It helps Carl with this dream He pays for the equipment Carlbot A little bit of it Oh poor Every shot that Ryan makes is more points that Jason going to need 136. So nice score from Ryan. He was already out, but he showed why he's here. Yep. And go buy some Comet LEDs. Either way. Yep. If that's your thing. I think the ball is usually pretty good. I like them in my GI at least. I'm old school. Soft white. You're going to wear that light on your forehead soon. I have it. It's in the bag just in case. Stargazer was pretty dark at night. I like the spotlight. Makes it easier to follow. All right. So Derek, if he passes Ryan here, then he's guaranteed a spot in the next round. And I like his chances. He just needs one more. actually a collect here would take him the 131 plus bonus 134 yeah probably us yeah oh just like Jason man that backhand well there that's an out for for Dave anyway but slightly less score he has to pass so he's not safe yet but I still I like his chances so Davis 26,000 just a little more than 100,000 behind? I'd say that center post is pretty... If you feel like you're tired and don't want to play anymore, just shoot that center post, because that'll finish your ball. I mean, that's how... Lickety-split. That's how the first two... Yeah. Yes, it is. All right. All right. Let's see if Dave continues his center post. It can be. I mean, I don't... All right. If he hits center post here, then he's going for it. He's going for it. He is. It has to. Is there a 50,000 point shot on it if you hit it enough? I'm baffled. It's 1,000, 2,000, 4,000, 5,000 open gates. None of that sounds good. Is this double bonus lit or is there still a light out that we're not one of the four lights out? Maybe he's just bored with the game and he wants to try for the game. Oh, see that lower left is wild. That's good to know. He's getting a lot of centers. Oh, that was a nice save. I think he opened the gate too, but... Yeah, but for what purpose? There you go. Shoot a spinner. Wow, he actually got his... He must have missed the spot. Maybe he's trying to shoot the spinner all this time and he's just missed like 12 in a row. Okay, so now he's got like 7,000 there. I mean... Yeah, let's see how he tries to go left to right. You know, you can do the double post pass, right? The regular post pass doesn't work, but then you do a second one while it's moving. No, you just shoot the center post again. Yeah. Oh, my God. If he comes back, then we're going to all – I don't know. I'll be speechless. I mean, yeah. Is he trying to pull his pass from left to right by using the center tackle? While he's – Oh! You know. We'll never be able to find out what he was actually trying to achieve with that. He had quite a few inlanes. So here's – if Jason gets to 136,000, he'll get into a playoff with David. If he falls short, then David and Derek will be through. Derek is assured through now. I mean, 56,000 is definitely possible. But the way, all right, that's half the battle right there is getting it on your flipper. He's going to backhand the spinner, going to shrug off that last power. There it is. There's a nice spinner. Got himself an in lane. Oh, all right. He's got a chance. I like that. He's got a chance. Lovely. Oh. He's got a chance. One more. Nice little nudge there. Oh, he needs a double bonus, too. And another bounce. Yeah, I saw that. All right, one more. Double it because he gets it on bonus as well. 16,000, yeah. He's at 128. If he makes a scoop, he's at 128. Oh, the shot. That's why you learned alley pass right there. That's a great park. He's at 18,000 if he makes his shot. Oh, he's feeding into... Oh. 130. All right, settle. Boom. All right, one more. One more. What does he have? 121. Oh, he got double bonus. He's got it. He's got it. Don't tilt. He's going to cradle on Paulie. He's got it. He's got it. He's 20,000. He's at 144. Just walk away. No, no, no. Yeah, I know. Trust that the reels work. But you play with white gloves. You flip. Don't go after the 500 million. And that is it. Nice. Well done. And Jason, just great read on what to do out of that scoop. If you can do the quick little drop, the little flutter was money. I think that drop catch plus the packing on the right side, that was impressive. Young Escher Lefkoff saw that, and he knows how to do that. That was some good stuff. So that's a tiebreaker between Jason and Dave. Yeah, and Jason's on this huge high. He's just done some really good stuff. And David, hopefully he'll play a game that has a target in the middle, and we'll see. King of Steel? Yeah, a little bit. It does have a target. That's a good point. It doesn't do much. Good point. So what's the tiebreaker like here? Is it a high seed picker game that has not been picked? Do we know? Is it completely random? I believe the higher seed will get game choice of a game that wasn't played in the round. That's our usual. I don't know who the higher seed is, but yeah. He was player four, so I assume. Interesting. That's the only tiebreaker, right? The other three groups where... I see some Escher's followers have... Spam, spam to bring Dave back. Oh, dear. Where's our moderator? Well, you will get to see Dave, Arsenic. Don't worry about it. So, Jason, right? A lot of Dave fans. What would you think Jason would pick at this point? Jason's a control guy, so I'd probably expect him to pick a solid state. Not an EM, but it kind of comes down to what game he's most comfortable on. Laser War. So probably a Laser War. What else? What are other? Kings of Steel was played in this round, right? No, that was the other group. Kings of Steel is another option, although, boy, that thing's brutal. Yeah, it's tricky. What's the other solid state that everybody was going to last night? I don't know. I mean, Mystic is dangerous. No, Mystic's not a good one. 8-Ball is dangerous. Oh, Sea Witch. Well, he was ranked two in Sea Witch this class. All right. Sea Witch, yeah. I bet you Sea Witch. And six on Laser Q. He's going to be one of those. Yeah. Depending what they have in play. I would choose Laser Q over Sea Witch. He was also two on Kings of Steel. I would as well. Laser Q, it's slippery, it's fast, but you've got three flipers, right? It's fair. Yeah, no. Actually, four flipers. I like the doubles because I like the dead bounce. People, for whatever reason, are afraid to dead bounce. And also, people forget you can catch on the upper of the two. And they're always so worried about being scissored. But at the same time, there's a lot of real estate to work with. It's important because the first few balls, you really need that upper flipper. Very dangerous for the lower one. So they haven't played leather. All right, Carl, we're tired of looking at us. We're getting a lot of love. Look at that. Everyone's loving us. Lots of love. Thank you, guys. So they play joker, poker, eight ball, and bow and arrow. Jason went to the restroom, and we're waiting for him to decide. Okay. All right. Okay. Okay. Why not? We didn't need to read that out loud, but. Yes, just a little break. So for people just joining us, if you haven't seen it, we are at the Nevergrains in Southern California 2019 circuit event. This is a Stern Pro Circuit event. First of 2019. I am Adam Lefkoff alongside Jermaine Mayo. And I'm Raymond. So welcome. Join us. We're watching the Classic 2 finals on Saturday night. Classic 1's last night was won by Bob Matthews. Yes. Very impressive. In a finals group that contained nine world champions chips between Keith Elwin and Raymond Davidson. Yeah. So great job from Bob yesterday. Bob just missed the cut line this today. We're using the Scorebit technology, which is a really cool device that can take the score from the game directly. Does it do an OCR? It actually takes it from the board, I believe. So it either gets the signal from the actual signal of it, or it takes a photo and optical character recognizes it. We have Colorado D&D and a lot of machines as well, including the Baywatch. That's the first time I've seen Colorado D&D on Baywatch. We have a Baywatch at Lions Classic Pinball in Colorado that has the exact same ROM and same color. Oh, nice. So, look, it felt very familiar. Oh, yeah. That Baywatch is playing. Maybe we'll get to watch some Baywatch later tonight when we watch final qualifying. Yeah. That Baywatch is playing. It's very strong. Very strong. Amazing drains. And so on top of this Classics 2 that's going on tonight, we have the main tournament final qualifying. All the standings are at indisc, actually, neverdrains.com slash 2019. You can check to see all your friends and buddies and neighbors and such and how they're doing. An insane number of people are trying. So we have the main until midnight and the women and the kids as well until midnight tonight. And the Women's and kids finals are tonight? No Oh qualifying will end tonight Yep and we'll check into that And then all the finals will be tomorrow And we're going to stream for like 30 hours straight Shouldn't there be a bedtime for the kids qualifying? That's what I thought The kids finals at midnight sounds a little strange In the old days at Pop-Up They used to run kids at 6 o'clock On Saturday In the morning? No at night And this is when Escher is like 6 and 7 It's like, you know, Kevin, it's too late. We didn't finish until like 9 or 10 o'clock. Oh, here we are. All right. Laser cue it is. All right. So it's funny because if you've ever seen Alien Poker, the layout would look very familiar. But the rule set is entirely different. All right. And just if people know the game, there's a gate usually between those two flipers that has been removed. So there's a lot more danger. Right. Oh, come on, Jason. Get it out there. Is it alive? Oh, there it is. Lovely. Lovely. Let's see that in instant replay. Oh, Carl's holding his hands up. No instant replay at the moment. Jason is a great dead bounce right there. Most people don't try that. And also, that wicked Jimmy is one of his signature moves. Never give up. They left the rubber on the outland on most of the game here, so there's a lot of action. Yeah, if you know what you're doing, you can get away. So you want to go up top, right, to the four lights. If you get your pool, you get your X, and that multiplies your bonuses. It's good. Oh, the dead bounce. Yep, the crook. That's why I stopped doing the dead bounce because it will hit and it will just slide on through. Only if it hits right in the crook. So you kind of have to on the fly sort of like it's a good one, it's not a good one. But you can't flip either because if you flip, you're going to scissor yourself. So you have to be ready to just flip it away. But overall, the control you get by the dead bounce, I still think it's a good value proposition. Because if you go on the fly there your chances of dying off the the five bank is Any balls, I don't think he progressed his rack very much. No, he didn't he was only trying to go up top to right All right. So Dave he's back. Hopefully we're ready to rebound Dave likes his system 11. I'm told so that's gonna be You know a lot more up in Haley way, hopefully So I would say usually I start from the left just go up top from there I try to get the balls and then depending how the game goes and start to prioritize one or the other. Careful there. Is that a mini flipper up top? Try to keep it alive or sometimes even send it back? I felt today that mini flipper was, it just kept bouncing out of reach. Right. Like from yesterday. Right. Just from yesterday. It shrunk a little bit. I'm uninterested in that little flipper. Yeah. I like the feed. If you don't flip, it comes to a nice little bank off dead bounce. Really? Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I'll take a That was a swoosh That was nothing No wicked shimmy on that It's tight but The ball goes It's a remarkable number Like you don't think It's kind of like on Stargazer Like these tiny little outlanes And that ball goes every time It's crazy Clunk Alright so Pretty much nothing both sides Raymond Davidson is sitting beside us watching And he was very impressed with Jason's wicked shimmy on ball one He gave it two thumbs up two G Fuel thumbs ups I think. Those thumbs ups were represented by G Fuel. Drink G Fuel for all your caffeine needs. Every time you say the word G Fuel he gets 10 cents. I've got G Fuel on the back. There you go. Alright so that third ball is safe but it's the next two that start to get dodgy. There it is. Oh nice. All the bounces right into there yeah sometimes like the game give you a free target or something it just it got it like a debout a double bounce jason looks really comfortable like he's every angle here now let's see like right there he he worried about the dead bounce that time he gave up on it oh oh he did a really nice bump but it was a little too much he saw the danger but he wasn't able to save it if there are i think there's enough outline rubber on that one no it's hard to tell uh no i think it's no it's It's just a metal rail. I think over here, on the top. Yeah, a little something to bounce it. All right. All right, so 168. I like the power punch. Like, if you do a... You can get some good spinach. So if you get the spinner lit and you... And you get it back in there, that's the best. A lot of people whack it. 50 or 60? Yeah, whack it with their head, but the actual power punch is your best option. My hand's too sensitive for that. Oh. Okay, so obviously the pool later moves only one side, so you oh so uh there we see the danger on laser q and uh you know i don't know if david played this in his run or not uh but when you're on a double double flipper game and you're not used to it you got to just use to you just want to flip and let go you just do a quick flip like there's a no hold because your brain tells you oh i can i can drop i can drop catch i can yeah and just you know if you don't know for sure don't flip like if you're not 100 sure it's not gonna go in between your flipper. So like right there, you can trap on the upper. Jason could have gotten to a trap there, but he was... He wanted the ball on the right side. So what do you do now once you get all your... Then you get your 15,000 bonus in the middle. Then you can do it again if you want more bonus. So at this point, you just go for multiplier? Yeah. Every multiplier is pretty much 15,000. Nice. nice oh and they increased strangely that was a that was a little two-stage dead bounce there yeah the bonus goes two three four five but then it goes seven ten fifty yeah yeah yeah oh he's a he's a little flipper guy hasn't actually flipped but still there's a little crook uh funny one oh he would have bounced back but that's fine you know he's he's doing good he's doing you can't get oh nice you can't get to the spinner it's an interesting angle here comes another spinner. Oh, he didn't want to. Hold it. Yeah, you're good. Very nice. Settle. Back up top. It's 350 there, and at least 45 in the bang. So really from ball five of there's the catch up top. Now go to, do that spinner. Why not? Yeah. From ball five on bow and arrow to these three balls, Jason, really come on strong, and it's funny how just your tournament life can just be on thin ice Oh, he's just not, he doesn't trust that dead bounce anymore after the crook test. All right. But, hey, that's a nice game from Jason. Very good. Dave's going to need some magic here to catch him. Ball three, 400,000. There's no progress. No progress. No fear. Other than for a multiplier, he's pretty much got to do with this ball. Apparently, Dave is powerful. All right. We not go home, that we say. That's trouble. That's a wicked feat. All right. So David is out in 17th. Yeah, we can't fault Jason for coming back after having two points following game two. He had his out, and he took care of business, and it wasn't easy. They didn't make it easy for him. There we go. So congratulations for the... All right, so as we wait for our next pairings, I'm going to go find my water bottle. I'll be back in one moment. But we should entertain the chat with some delightful, I don't know. We'll chat. Yeah. I know Jermaine's from Seattle, and I'm from this area. We met two years ago in Indy, actually. Yeah. How long have you been coming to Indy? That was my first. I went the year before, but I didn't compete. It was literally my first day playing pinball since college, basically. Was this the first year they had Indy's gear, three years ago? No, they had, it might have been. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I think they had it previously elsewhere. Yeah, no, the first time I went, I think it was four years ago, and that was the last year at the bowling alley. And I think they moved the air. I heard about it being in a bowling alley once, yeah. Shaper Lane, I believe it was. How long have you been in pinball? Pretty much 4 years since I moved to the US, with a lot of pinball in Seattle There is a lot of pinball in Seattle I've been told Multiple tournaments a night I've heard Yeah, different locations, different tournaments, there's a lot of great locations, you know, Arcade and Arcade, so there's a lot of choices I really love the new logo The new logo, they definitely put some time and effort to the logo Pretty amazing Okay, so... How's everyone in chat doing? How have you been enjoying the pinball, guys? I don't even know how many people we've got in chat, but we've got some Dave fans, which unfortunately did not get their way. I'm sure Dave will be back in Maine tomorrow as well. Let's see. I'm actually curious how badly I've bleeded through. Yeah, there's over 200 people in Maine, so top 24 moving on to the A final is pretty hard. Yep. People have been grinding games since 9 a.m. this morning. Yep, about there. About 14 hours of qualifying yesterday, 15 hours today. Yep. It's going to finish up in a few hours, and those queues are going to get really long soon. Yeah, I mean, if you look at the queue right now, it's minimum five people and up to, like, what, eight or nine? Yeah. Monster Bash has the longest queue. Interesting. What did you think about the game selection? You know, I always, there's some I'm familiar with and some which I have never actually played on other than for, like, on Pinball Arcade. So, like, Cuball Wizard, I got up to it. I'm like, okay, I know how to play this. I'm going to play it. Of course, they changed it to hard setting. Sure. So I spent my first ball trying to figure out how to start a mode, unfortunately. So once I got that, I was kind of getting there, but I still didn't do that well, unfortunately. I did like that when they changed settings, they put that on the score page on the neverdrained.com as well, or put them on the machine. Yeah, yeah, that's nice. So you could look at the machine, and you're like, okay, what scores am I looking to get? and, oh, look, I can't get, you know, the Pirates' multi-balls are harder. True.
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high · Raymond Ashby explains gate removal changes left flipper access strategy; commentators discuss how modification confuses players familiar with standard machine layout