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Message: <blockquote data-quote="shutyertrap" data-source="post: 275448" data-attributes="member: 134">You're new to the forum (welcome) so it's understandable that you are not familiar with discussions that were exactly like this 4 years ago. So let me break it down.When I say exploit, I don't mean in a cheaters sense. Also, this was before Steam version even existed and was happening on the PS3, so no it's not a PC only thing. Many tables used to have what we refer to as 'railroad' and 'vacuum ramps'. What that means is if the ball got sent to a certain area, often without enough force, it would magically get sucked all the way through a ramp where on a real table it would have rolled back. Railroads are when the ball will do a predictable behavior virtually every time if you aim for certain areas of a table. For instance, on RBION I used to be able to let the ball eject from the scoop and have it bounce 'wildly' 5 times only for it to always land on my right flipper. I could tell you exactly the pattern before even doing the shot. That table happened to have at least 4 exploitable railroads. They were available to anyone, you just had to recognize the pattern. The individuals I referenced were very good at identifying railroads on each table and how to best use them to their advantage. RBION has since been re-tuned, and those railroads no longer exist.The other thing these guys were good at was only shooting safe shots, meaning shots that allowed you to consistently be in control of the ball. Again using RBION as the example, they would avoid any shot that would send the ball into the pop bumpers on the left. It's an exceedingly boring way to play a table, requires an insane amount of patience, and you absolutely can't get caught up in going for certain big money shots because they are 50/50 whether you'll survive or not. There used to be a strategy thread for RBION and other tables that this stuff was thoroughly discussed on, and even knowing the secrets it still required skill to achieve. Now and then there were Twitch streams of them playing, which is how I know how tiresome it was to play like that.There were other tables, like Black Hole early on that because it wasn't emulated, FarSight got the scripting wrong and so there were scoring exploits to be had. That particular one was a case where mobile was just crushing everyone else by a stupid margin. What it really comes down to though is knowing the rules of the table, knowing how best to score. Where stacking certain modes together is more beneficial than others, where knowing how to light the extra ball ensures you'll never run out of balls.As for the keyboard, as Pinballwiz45b about it. He swears by it and a lot has to do with getting a precise nudge in exactly the direction you want every time rather than hoping your thumb bumped the analogue stick properly. There's also no delay with a wired keyboard as opposed to a wireless controller. A lot of console players have to deal with their TVs having a slight lag too, as opposed to PC monitors usually having none. The main reason I am vouching for these certain individuals I mentioned though is because they proved themselves years ago. They posted tutorials, videos, gave pointers, interacted with the forum. They helped FarSight identify people that truly were hacking the game and posting bogus scores, by recognizing certain combinations in scores that simply were impossible. They also discovered bugs that were inherent to the ROMs themselves by scoring so high, beyond what anyone could do on a real table, that the game would essentially break. Imagine playing one game for over 7 hours only to have it crash on you because of a certain combination of hits. They discovered how to avoid the roll over bug in Creature that otherwise would wipe your score (had that happen myself). These guys were just exceptional at identifying a variety of factors that created certain conditions, not by cheating but by being hyper observant.The reason they hold the top spots is because they'd devote hours upon hours on a table as soon as it was released, post an absurd score, and pretty much crush everyone else's aspirations of even trying. Imagine thinking you are good at shooting 3's only to have Steph Curry hop onto the court before you and just drill 20 in a row without missing. You'd question if you should take up some other sport.</blockquote>

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