Just got my NIB SM last week from Trent. Enjoying the new game immensely; however, one thing my wife and I have noticed is the difference in flipper strength between SM and LOTR. Our flippers on LOTR are super strong and you can nail ring shots and ramp shots consistently. However, on SM they just feel a bit weak... a good proportion of shots don't make it all the way up the ramps, etc. I have the SM set at 7 degrees and the LOTR at 6.5 (not sure the angle of the playfield would make much of a difference). Also, I'm not the original owner of the LOTR and wondering if the PO upgraded the coils (is there a way to check that?). Feedback appreciated.

Ok.. it was my hunch that all was fine. I'll lower the playfield angle to 6.5. DCFAN's comments are similar to my experience. Ramp shots on SM can be made from both flippers, but have to be dead-on. With LOTR, you can slam the rails and posts and still make all the ramp shots. I suspected that the games must have been designed slightly differently, and now knowing that the coils are different confirms it.

Power doesn't seam to be an issue for the venom shot, only my extremely poor skills (maybe 1 in 5 hits currently). Have to work on that. Also, I'm finding that it's much easier to make the Doc Oc shot from the right flipper (similar to what I found with the Sword/aragorn ramp on LOTR). Shots from the left flipper bounce back at least half the time... probably would be made even worse with stronger coils.

Do the deadening pads help significantly with the Doc Oc shots?

yeah, I saw your post on the magnet issue. Mine appears to be relatively flat (ie., not raised from the playfield).