CC Tactics and Strategies

[Advalle]

What tactics can you guys withthe points offer. I have been able to get no higher than 139 million but thats the only time i hit high noon. Is there any order you chase the missions to make it easier? I honestly just go for any shot available and thats all but no plan other than keeping the ball allive

 

[Pod]

I've read that stacking gold mine multiball and quick shot multiball is the key as the add a ball and ball saver of the later means you can keep the formers jackpot ticking over util it reaches mega levels.
However on trying it I found that the ball saver lasts for about a second so in the end you lose all the balls before you get to any serious score.

More investigation needed.

Pod

 

[9u1d0]

I try to start Showdown multiball, combined with Mine multiball. Did not score a lot yet, though.
Shots on the mine are pretty easy. So starting and restarting it can be done a lot.
Also the mine will eject the ball near the bonus-multipliers, which can give you 40M+ bonus on a good ball.

When the ball comes down the left loop I mostly let it bounce off the left flipper, on to the right and shoot with the right flipper in the mine. It is also very easy to catch the ball on the left flipper, or the right after the bounce. Nice way of getting control of the ball. Beware, sometimes the ball gets out of the left loop too hard or a strange angle and it will not bounce, or drains. You will recognize this after a couple of games

 

[Kolchak357]

I keep it simple. On the left flipper I shoot for Bart. On the right I shoot for gold mine. The rest takes care of itself.

 

[pinballchris]

I keep it simple. On the left flipper I shoot for Bart. On the right I shoot for gold mine. The rest takes care of itself.

This has been my strategy as well. High of 164M. Need to get better at the right and left ramps myself though.

 

[Kolchak357]

This has been my strategy as well. High of 164M. Need to get better at the right and left ramps myself though.

I have trouble with that right ramp too. Very small window to hit that shot on my iPad.

 

[netizen]

I am getting very frustrated with the R and L loop having no consistency in where they will feed the ball.

This makes ball control more difficult than it should be.

I don't play enough real pinball anymore, but this is not something I remember happening. If anything loops, ramps, etc have to have a reliable feed otherwise the game become more one of luck than skill, no?

 

[pinballchris]

That is an issue I brought up in the other thread here. It is frustrating for sure. Becomes kind of like CP-just blind nudging

 

[Kevlar]

Just had a great game yet only 189m. That high score seems highly unlikely to be beaten by 99.999% of people.

Back on topic, my strategy is to continually go for multiball, its so easy to hit the mine from the left flipper ( also from the right but easier from the left I find, I can hit it 9 times out of 10 from the left ) and just let everything else happen automatically.

 

[DJWhoDunnit]

Maximize scoring

Keys to high scores:
GET TO MARSHAL ASAP
Collect as many bounties as possible
Bonus
Stacking Showdown

First and foremost GET TO MARSHAL. Also try to have a multiball ready to start right after getting marshal so the special can be collected without losing ur ball. WHY you ask is marshal so important? In addition to making ur quickdraws worth up to 2 million, but far more important is the drastic impact it has on your high noon scores.

Three high noons is a helluva good game and what I shoot for personally. Using that here are the differences in ur high noons at each rank. (less any jackpots but thy are basically useless anyways.)

RANK FIRST SECOND THIRD TOTAL

stranger 22m 23m 24m 69m
partner 25m 27.5m 30m 82.5m
deputy 30m 40m 50m 120m
sheriff 40m 60m 80m 180m
marshal 70m 95m 120m 285m

Bounties are vital for multiple reasons, rank ups, bonus 1m, bonus x5, extra ball, light extra ball, and light quickdraws/gunfights, and random multiballs without needing locks. Best time to collect bounties in my opinion is during a QuickDraw or Polly's peril. I say that because it can't light gunfight/QuickDraw, and maybe even some others but it seems to increase the chances of getting an extra ball or 1m bonus.

Bonuses in this game can be huge (highest I've had so far was 132m = 3m @ 44x) so shooting the mine is never a bad idea. also work on ur ramp shots cuz Polly will give u 5x after the first extra ball.

Stacking showdown is huge again for multiple reasons. It allows you to start with three balls in showdown making the targets worth 50% more, it allows to continuously add a ball when down to two, and makes the normal shots worth something and therefore increases the potential scoring of both multiballs all at once. Personally I feel that stampede is far better to stack with than gold mine, because it makes every shot worth 250 and a rotating one of 500, which means you dont have to shoot anything specific to keep scoring the normal shots.

skill shot - full plunge scores the one next to the original position. nudge with timing to choose a different reward. it's nearly impossible, for me at least, to get any other reward without nudging as any less than full power rarely makes it up the ramp.

my reward preference order:
extra ball (pinball), rank up (star), light bounty (money bag), QuickDraw, bonus x3, then the river ramp (far more difficult for me to hit than any other shot).


wanted to note just scored 470m and was 2 shots on the Bart to lighting a third high noon.

 

[splatterthrash]

Can you complete the ramps and the loops during multiball?

 

[DJWhoDunnit]

if ur referring to making progress towards stampede, the answer is no, u also cannot advance during Polly's perill

 

[Paul Petrissans]

I keep it simple. On the left flipper I shoot for Bart. On the right I shoot for gold mine. The rest takes care of itself.

Doesn't it make more sense to shoot for Bart with right flipper and gold mine with left? Those shots are almost automatic from those angles.

 

[Kolchak357]

Doesn't it make more sense to shoot for Bart with right flipper and gold mine with left? Those shots are almost automatic from those angles.

Not for me. On an ipad the backhand shots seem tougher to hit consistently. But that might just be me.

 

[fenderbendr]

Not for me. On an ipad the backhand shots seem tougher to hit consistently. But that might just be me.

It's not just you. I have an easier time hitting Bart with the left flipper and the mine with the right.

 

[ostrich2]

My best score thus far is 716m - I agree with most of DJWhoDunnit's points above. I managed to complete 3 High Noons in that game, those and large amounts from the end of ball bonuses were the biggest contributors. Boy I wish this game had a hold bonus reward somewhere but I haven't seen one.

- the effect of your rank level on the point awards from High Noon is something that is easy to miss from the instructions, it doesn't really make that clear. The instructions mention a $1 million award per drop target going up to $2.5 million per on subequent High Noons, but doesn't explain the ranking. I had noticed that some High Noons seemed to award a lot more than others but it wasn't clear to me why.

During High Noon since balls are relaunched until the timer ends, I tend to launch balls with light to medium force so that if they miss a drop target they'll come back down to the flippers quickly for another shot. I concentrate on making sure I get the required number of drops - the other awards are inconsequential.

- the unpredictable kicking out of the ball on the right and left orbits are aggravating, but I try to remain ready for it with the flippers - if the ball come down normally I will usually trap on the flipper. I find it's easy to shoot Bart from the left flipper. The left ramp I find to be by far the toughest shot on the table so I'll go for this from a trapped right flipper if I still need it to get Stampede.

- particularly when you're trying to setup later High Noons it takes a lot of hits on Bart to get that star, so if I've got everything else I'll try to keep trapping on either flipper as much as possible. From the left flipper I'll take another shot at Bart, from right I'll shoot the mine to set up more mine multiballs along the way. Even when you've already got the mother lode star, multiballs have got a lot of value on a good ball as ways to keep jacking up the bonus multiplier as much as possible. When I've got the mine multiball going, I'll often pay more attention to getting the ball up there to the top rather than actually working about the mine jackpots. When the ball is up at the top and in the bumpers, I'll generally toggle so that the left side is unlit, because I've found most of the time when the ball pops up off the bumpers it comes up the left one.

- starting Polly's peril with the mine multiball ready to go and then starting the multiball I find often works reasonably well. The right loop shot is much much easier than the left ramp and with the multiball you tend to get a fair amount of balls coming down to the left flipper with a good line at it. And if you miss you've got a better chance of finding another ball to try again to stop the train with, unlike doing this with a single ball. Aside from the first time when you have the chance to earn an extra ball I don't really worry a whole lot about this mode though.

 

[ostrich2]

I managed a score just above 1 billion today - but boy the actual top posted score on the leaderboard of 1.9 billion looks incredible. I managed 3 complete High Noons in that game and got close to a 4th, but I've never managed to actually get to 4. A lot does have to do with end of ball bonuses in terms of turning what would otherwise be a good scoring game into an exceptional one - in that game I had at least 2 bonuses which were close to 200m each.

Does anyone know exactly whether anything else other than points are awarded for gunfights won after you've already advanced all the way to Marshall? The instructions don't really seem to say much specific on it, and aside from whatever points it awards, I'm not sure if there's any other reason to really go for these once you've maxed out to Marshall.

 

[Clawhammer]

I managed a score just above 1 billion today - but boy the actual top posted score on the leaderboard of 1.9 billion looks incredible. I managed 3 complete High Noons in that game and got close to a 4th, but I've never managed to actually get to 4. A lot does have to do with end of ball bonuses in terms of turning what would otherwise be a good scoring game into an exceptional one - in that game I had at least 2 bonuses which were close to 200m each.

Congrats! 1 billion is a great score.

 

[ostrich2]

I'm also wondering how much exactly are the values that contribute to end of ball bonus - the instructions say only that most targets on the table accumulate the EBB, but it doesn't specify exactly which ones or how much each adds. The only other specific item listed is the +1 mllion EBB that you can get as a bounty reward, and it mentions that the bonus multiplier maxes out at 99x. It seems like the instructions for CC are a little less specific/comprehensive as compared to some other tables.

 

[netizen]

here's the Keith Elwin strategy guide for Cactus Canyon:

You should combine Lost Mine multball and Showdown MB as
follows:

Clear first three show down targets (4th starts showdown). Get 2
Lost Mine locks and have the 3rd one ready to go so that you would
start Lost Mine multiball if you were to shoot the Lost Mine shot. Now
raise show down target (by first hitting one of the side orange stand-up
target banks twice which lights the return lane and then shooting the
appropriate ramp to feed the return lane). Then with the Show Down drop
target raised shoot Lost Mine to start Lost Mine multiball. Once LM
mulbll started shoot SD drop target and you now have combined multiball
which you can perpetuate forever since when you shoot all drop targets it
adds a ball (maximum of 3 in play) and keeps ball save on. Just make sure
when you're down to two balls that you start to focus on drop targets to
add a 3rd. Or if you have 3 balls shoot all drops but one, so that if you
get down to two you just shoot the drop target to re-add a 3rd. Then you
can keep hitting jackpot shots (every set of jackpots consisting of the
ramp and orbit shots increase the multiplier of the Lost Mine super
jackpot collected at the Lost Mine, so two sets of five gives 2*Super and
so on - using this combined multiball strategy Hal completed 5 sets to
collect a 5x Super Jackpot). Alternatively just keep shooting left orbit
during this combined multiball to get bonus X way up there. A lot of
times Hal will just keep trying to combine multiballs instead of trying
to finish High Noon. I prefer to do a little of both. On a good game a
player should be able to get four/five High Noons plus a few combined
multiballs to get a > 1B score (Hal got a 850 M on two different CCs
using this strategy). Note that Stampede could be combined w/ SD multball
but not anywhere near as lucrative as Lost Mine (a left shot during,
stampede results in an orbital feed rather than falling into rollovers for
bonus X whereas in LM it doesn't orbit unless the jackpot is lit on that
shot). Also note that when trying to set up combined LM/SD multi that you
are collecting a lot of bounty awards (lit by getting the SD drop target)
which could incidentally advance Rank or give EBs or light Quick Draw on
left outlane and so on.