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Too late now, but multi-player 70s EMs are the most complicated EMs out there. When you start on one of these, expect a steep learning curve. A better choice for a noob who wants to do the whole "tear down and rebuild" process - which I think is NOT a problem for noobs, contrary to many - would be to start with a single player game from an earlier era.
BUT! When you do get done with a complicated EM as your first game, you're further ahead than people who listen to me. lol
Sean
Quoted from goingincirclez:Are multi-player games really THAT much more complex though? I mean they have the same features as a single-player version. Now add a stepper and a cam I guess, to count and switch to the next player: all other functions are still essentially unchanged from the single player version. You just have another stepper (similar to others) and extra swiches. And of course there are additional score reels to deal with, but again using the same principles and same functions, just more. It's not really more complex logic or wiring per se... Just more of a potential PITA total number of parts. The game can be just as broke for p1 as p2-4. Fix it for p1, it will work for the others so long as the player count works properly too.
I agree, but we are both experienced EM dudes. The extra steppers, and the theory behind that, is all new to someone new, and that added complexity makes it even more daunting. Like the OP's title, this is the reaction you'll get from anybody who has never looked inside one before. And the more jam packed it is, the more intimidating it seems. So that little bit of added complexity to us, is a bigger hill for someone still trying to figure out a relay.
Like I said...you can certainly start on any game, but it would definitely be less intimidating on a simpler design. But overall the important thing is new people getting interested in EMs...the noobs drive this hobby, or at least the image of it on this forum and others before it. So if you're thinking of getting an EM, just do it! So much cool...
Sean
Quoted from goingincirclez:Again, it amazes me that anyone who has no problem whipping out logic probes and o-scopes and checking meter ranges and signal traces and swapping chips and such on solid state boards can look at an EM and balk for even half a second. An EM is just a mechanical computer; a circuit board made entirely visible with wires and metal in place of silicon. The digital and operative concepts are still the same.
EM schematics can be a different language, though. It's taken me a while to get comfortable with them and even still it takes me a while to puzzle them out sometimes.
<nodding enthusiastically> I recently went the other way when I started restoring a GTB Totem - I'd never "done" a SS game before, except for a failed attempt at a another GTB Sys1 game CE3K - back before Clay even wrote a System 1 guide and there were no replacement boards available yet. I traded it to a SS guy for an EM he couldn't get working(best trade EVER! lol). But anyways - I felt that same intimidation, although probably to a lesser degree, that a SS to EM person most likely feels. But then you realize you're making too big a deal over it, and you find that the thought process and troubleshooting are the same, and it gets better.
As far as reading schematics...yeah, that is a slow burning wick. When you're new, whatever you happen to understand about them stays the same for a long time, then slowly but surely, over years and what seems like hours at each sitting pouring over them, little things dawn on you..."OH! Now I see what they're saying" moments occur periodically, and that feeling is one of the greatest feelings in pinball for me... 
)
Sean
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Binghamton, NY