Williams Pinball App Data Collection

[Xanija]

So while Level 3 may not look like it offers things you'd want, the challenge rewards are entirely why you want it. You'll get an extra 13 table parts daily from it, and the above mentioned ticket drop (minus the 15 tickets per play cost). And then of course there's the visual extras.

Level 3 is only good to get for 2 or 3 tables, to have a bit of variety when it comes to the Pro Challenge. Since I bought the first 2 packs, I already have that. 3000 tickets is quite a lot, especially if I'm not willing to play all the challenges every day just to get stuff. That's what I hate about all the mobile gaming - they try to get you online every day. Some game even worse, like trying to get you back every few hours, when your "energy" is full.

And some challenges are just too difficult for me (I think the challenges are not balanced very well) - like The Getaway 5 min. or Survival.

 

[shutyertrap]

I’m not a fan of any of the 5 minute challenges in Premium, and that 15 star in Pro can be a nightmare. I tend to think survival is the easiest of challenges no matter the table, then 1 ball with a few exceptions, then 5 minute.

I can usually complete all the challenges in about an hour. Throughout a day, I can find that time. I do get though that you don’t want to HAVE to check in daily.

 

[Gorgias32]

The "practice game" is a really cool feature in FX3, where a lot of the Zen custom tables have wizard modes that are really challenging and complex to reach. For the Williams tables, I would say the value is more in practicing pinball skills like alley passes, drop catches, etc. - I could see it being worthwhile so you don't have to keep restarting the game. I have not used it myself, I'd rather spend my time grinding for table parts.

 

[shutyertrap]

I used practice mode recently on mobile to try and figure out the angle I needed to hit the left orbit on Fish Tales (because for some reason it was impossible to me). I was sick of watching ads or wasting tickets on challenges, only to fail because of that shot. Once I had that, I started watching the timer and trying to find good score combinations within a 5 minute limit. Now I have my shot and have my strategy and can complete the challenges without it being a mad dash panic.

 

[Gorgias32]

So you were able to get the feel for the left orbit on Fish Tales? I need to work on that. It seems like I can never hit that thing from a trapped ball. And when you have a ball locked in the casters club during multiball, it seems like that orbit lane contracts to the point that it's narrower than the ball...

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

So you were able to get the feel for the left orbit on Fish Tales? I need to work on that. It seems like I can never hit that thing from a trapped ball. And when you have a ball locked in the casters club during multiball, it seems like that orbit lane contracts to the point that it's narrower than the ball...

I don't think it's a Zen thing, though. That lane is tough to hit in TPA as well, typically easier from a trap than a running ball. It's been too long since I played a real Fish Tales to compare how that shot is in real life.

Making a catch from a right orbit on the left flipper is easy in the Zen version, though. The captive ball is hazardous, but that's hardly a problem in limited-time challenges with unlimited ball save. (This is one problem I have with the timed challenges - the unlimited ball save leads you to making high-risk, low-percentage shots with complete abandon, knowing you'll always get the ball back. It's entirely the wrong way to approach these shots. The captive ball in FT, force field/saucer in AFM, trunk in ToM, and so on.)

 

[shutyertrap]

I sorta kinda got a feel for that right orbit. I know close to where the ball has to be on the flipper, and can dial it in within 3 shots now which is enough to get a jackpot but often not enough to get Monster Fish. The main thing is I wanted to get that video mode, as it is essential for the Premium survival and 5 minute challenges.

These challenges do require taking advantage of the exploits in order to complete those 15 star goals. On Fish Tales with unlimited balls, I'll shoot 3 or 4 left orbit Long Cast shots and then try for the captured ball until I get video mode. Once I have that, it's on to activating multiball and then while the shoot again is activated, I'll go for the captured to get Rock the Boat going while in multiball. Inevitably one of my wild shots will hit the captured ball during that, getting me the huge 13 or 23 million bonus. Even with all that, getting the 198 million for Pro 5 minute is nerve wracking. I've yet to see it in Premium, and god that score is going to be outrageous.

1 ball FT is a completely different strategy. At ball launch, I catch on left and immediately try for the captured ball to lock in Bonus Hold before the shoot again light blinks out. Then I stay away from the center. I spam the Long Cast as much as possible, always catching on the left flipper. Missed shots tend to go to ball lock, so then it's play multiball and hope to hit a jackpot. Of course during multiball I'll try again also for the center, hoping to light Video Mode.

1 ball on all the tables has really taught me where the safe shots are and what to avoid if it can be helped. 5 minute challenges are my nightmare, and strategies that work for Basic and Advanced most assuredly need tweaking for Pro and Premium. AFM Premium 5 minute for 15 stars requires a score of 4.62 billion, and it is a royal pain to get. While tactics for 5 minute challenges often work for survival mode, it all depends on if scores build over time or not. So for instance...

You quickly destroy a saucer and get to 3 stars just like that. You however have not hit a single ramp or orbit. In survival, the score gap increases with each star level, so either you only go for more saucers to destroy and hope you have enough time to do it, or you're screwed. This is 15 star talk, btw. Better strategy is to build up the four shots needed for total annihilation, as well as getting ball locks, early in the session as the scores needed in survival for those first few stars are more forgiving. Now that you have things built up, go for that saucer. If you see the time down to 20 seconds and you are still a ways away from the goal, hit one of those lanes and then hit the center to collect the bonus. You now have a fresh minute to attack the saucer some more. By accident you'll probably activate mulitball or something, which is fine but make sure you then don't waste it by hitting nothing. Collect those jackpots!

It's funny though, I'm now so programmed into what to do for whatever the challenge is, I'm completely lost when just playing a regular game. I forget I don't have unlimited ball, I forget that I have more than 1 ball and going for extra balls is important, etc.

 

[shutyertrap]

I really hate 1 ball Party Zone.

That was my Advanced challenge for the day, and it took me for-ev-er. I actually had a much easier time with Pro 5 min JY and Premium survival ToM. Side note; secret mania on JY at 15 stars won't get you there as you'll run out of time, but Mamushka will easily.

The thing about Party Zone is it has so many cheap and unforced drains. If you don't shoot all the way to the pops with that left lane, it'll drop back down and center drain. I had the Request Time kick out to the left outlane numerous times. I had center drains off the launch as the ball came down from the pops. I had multiballs where one of the balls never touched a flipper before draining. There's just no safe way to play the table tight, not when shots you need to hit just turn around and send the ball out.

 

[shutyertrap]

Here's the summary after playing the app for 21 days

Level 33 (+2)
Tickets 11,325
Coins 7

Theatre of Magic: Fully upgraded (as of day 14)
Champion Pub: Fully upgraded (as of day 21)
Safe Cracker: 100/100 parts

Just as predicted, I was able to fully upgrade Champion Pub on day 21. That means I'm still on track for having Safe Cracker upgraded by day 35, which will then have me back to fully maxed on all tables available. In other words, so long as I play the challenges daily, there is no reason I will ever have to pay for anything in this app for as long as Zen releases tables. Considering how many videos I had to watch yesterday because of stupid 1 ball Party Zone, I'm not cheating Zen!


Percentages So Far

I've updated with another week's worth of data...

Theatre of Magic
43% of all challenges
14% of Basic
14% of Advanced
5% of Pro
10% of Premium

Safe Cracker
24% of all challenges
14% of Basic
0% of Advanced
5% of Pro
24% of Premium

Champion Pub
19% of all challenges
10% of Basic
10% of Advanced
0% of Pro
0% of Premium

Medieval Madness
33% of all challenges
5% of Basic
0% of Advanced
10% of Pro
19% of Premium

Getaway
48% of all challenges
14% of Basic
10% of Advanced
5% of Pro
19% of Premium

Junk Yard
38% of all challenges
5% of Basic
5% of Advanced
19% of Pro
10% of Premium

Attack From Mars
67% of all challenges
10% of Basic
29% of Advanced
14% of Pro
14% of Premium

Black Rose
33% of all challenges
10% of Basic
5% of Advanced
10% of Pro
10% of Premium

Party Zone
33% of all challenges
10% of Basic
14% of Advanced
10% of Pro
0% of Premium

Fish Tales
62% of all challenges
10% of Basic
14% of Advanced
24% of Pro
14% of Premium

Here's how often the challenges are coming up:

Basic 5 minute: 43%
Basic 1 ball: 19%
Basic survival: 38%

Advanced 5 minute: 14%
Advanced 1 ball: 48%
Advanced survival: 38%

Pro 5 minute: 38%
Pro 1 ball: 29%
Pro survival: 33%

Premium 5 minute: 48%
Premium 1 ball: 24%
Premium survival: 29%

Score Goal Chart

I'm still trying to fully fill out all the score goals needed for the various challenges with each table. MBeeching and Pinballwiz45b have been helping in this. The only one that is almost complete so far is AFM and it looks a little like this...

Basic Survival
5 star - 750 million
10 star - 1.95 billion
15 star - 3.3 billion

Advanced Survival
5 star - 850 million
10 star - 2.25 billion
15 star - 4.2 billion

Pro Survival
5 star - 950 million
10 star - 2.55 billion
15 star - 4.8 billion

Premium Survival
5 star - 1.05 billion
10 star - 2.85 billion
15 star - 5.4 billion

You get the idea. The only scores I'm missing on AFM are the Basic 5 minute 15 star goal, and all of Premium 1 ball. Some of these tables have some wild point spreads between Basic and Premium. Take the Getaway, where 15 stars on 1 ball Basic is 40 million, but that's what you need just to get 5 stars on Premium. If anyone is interested in seeing the up to date chart, visit https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Nnz1x_Xy3LU_qfhBQMY5l-ps5nVIHv02UOOlS_7poWc/edit?usp=sharing If you'd like to contribute scores yourself, send an email to blahblahblahcade@gmail.com with whatever you have that I don't already.

Next Time

I'm finding that since creating this thread there's been a lot less griping and more understanding here on the forum. That was kinda the purpose, as now I have real stats I can take to Zen and present an argument for certain corrections. I've already answered most of the questions I had with this app, so this next week is sorta just gonna be routine data collection without anything exciting to learn. I'm working on what my approach is going to be for the article I wanna write up, as Xanija opened my eyes to another approach with his just getting to 2 stars and using coins to unlock Pro physics, difficulty, and visual enhancements. What would you guys want to know if you were coming brand new to the app?

 

[twopossums]

This may be an unpopular opinion but here goes. Lol

I don’t mind grinding if there is a light at the end of the tunnel but earning 100 zen coins for each table is gonna take forever. I definitely think I can get everything to 3 star by grinding but 4 star is going to be crazy. I had thought about just buying the games from the beginning but that would be something like $10 a game. Which I find ridiculous quite frankly. But if I get everything to 3 starts and buy 150 coins for 4.99 then it’s essentially 3 games for $10. And that is much more reasonable to me. Not great to have to grind and pay but the grinding is kinda fun.

 

[twopossums]

Or 5 for 15 now that I think about it. Not bad.

 

[MBeeching]

This may be an unpopular opinion but here goes. Lol

I don’t mind grinding if there is a light at the end of the tunnel but earning 100 zen coins for each table is gonna take forever. I definitely think I can get everything to 3 star by grinding but 4 star is going to be crazy. I had thought about just buying the games from the beginning but that would be something like $10 a game. Which I find ridiculous quite frankly. But if I get everything to 3 starts and buy 150 coins for 4.99 then it’s essentially 3 games for $10. And that is much more reasonable to me. Not great to have to grind and pay but the grinding is kinda fun.

If I hadn't wasted approx 11000 tickets playing League Mode I'd have almost every table at 3 stars (Just need one more ToM part to drop!).

XP Level - 40
Lifetime coin earnings - 265
Estimated tickets earned - 55000 (that's £50 worth if purchased from the store).

I've only spent coins on features and still don't have any grade 4 tables. Wish Android logged total time played as that would be an interesting figure, suffice to say it has been substantial. Unfortunately XP level can't be used as a rough indicator as it's nonlinear, it takes me ages to level up!

 

[Gorgias32]

But if I get everything to 3 starts and buy 150 coins for 4.99 then it’s essentially 3 games for $10.

This is not a bad way to look at it - another option is to earn 50 coins through challenges then pay 4.99 to complete the upgrade of two tables. More palatable.

 

[MBeeching]

This is not a bad way to look at it - another option is to earn 50 coins through challenges then pay 4.99 to complete the upgrade of two tables. More palatable.

The major kick in the nuts is that all that effort basically rewards you with the opportunity to purchase tables at prices comparable to other formats. The only real benefit taking the grind route is that you can selectively choose which tables you really want.

There may be compelling discounts later in the year, I'd probably snap a few tables up. As it stands I require just 30 more coins for Pro Physics and I'm pretty much done for now, any future coin earnings can be used for a few Grade 4 promotions.

 

[twopossums]

The only reason I want level 4 is the offline play. After this past weekend with the servers going down it really cemented my want/need for that.

Plus the free play. Sometimes I just want to play around and try and beat the challenges. Maybe that's not 'real' pinball but it's fun.

 

[twopossums]

I'm thinking once I catch up by buying a few tables then it won't be so bad in the future. I'm starting behind the 8 ball with all 10 tables it would take a long time to unlock them all fully. Plus we now know more are on the way soon. Gotta keep up.

 

[shutyertrap]

I’ve sent my current findings off to Zen for a response. I have an article written on how to get the most from the app, just need to wait for comment in case changes are on the way. I’m having almost as much fun with my data as I am playing the app! Kidding. Sorta.

 

[shutyertrap]

I'm thinking once I catch up by buying a few tables then it won't be so bad in the future. I'm starting behind the 8 ball with all 10 tables it would take a long time to unlock them all fully. Plus we now know more are on the way soon. Gotta keep up.

I can give you specific numbers as to how long it will take at minimum starting from scratch. It’s kinda not good.

 

[MBeeching]

Chris has definitely mentioned it, but the challenges have (perhaps unintentionally) introduced an interesting puzzle or strategy element. I'd usually overlook modes like Survival / One Ball / 5 Minutes on other formats, at least on mobile they serve a greater purpose.

I'd also agree that this 'stupid' grind process is keeping me engaged, I'm usually not that bothered or interested by reward and achievement mechanisms but it seems to apply well to pinball.

If Zen resolve the issue with useless part collection, adjust gameplay timers and fix a few hardware specific issues I think I'd be satisfied moving forward.

 

[twopossums]

I can give you specific numbers as to how long it will take at minimum starting from scratch. It’s kinda not good.

I think I have that data. It says I'm 'effed. LOL.

A couple of bucks to my favorite app and I'll be current. It's all good. Can't wait for the next release batch!