I have LOTR and GOTLE. LOTR has a little more depth, but GOT has more breadth with the multiple scoring multipliers, WIC hurry-ups, etc. I prefer the way modes are implemented on LOTR - they have a little more shot variety.

Art and audio quality are much better on Spike than Whitestar, but I think Whitestar is more robust and easier to repair yourself. I'm very concerned about how few fuses there are with Spike. My node 1 board failed and it's not even fused! Expensive little board too.

Finally, mods: LOTR supports ColorDMD now, and it looks fantastic. It's easier to mod the audio in Spike, using Pinball Browser. But I've never had the desire to change the LOTR callouts, because they're perfect.

I took the outlane posts out of my LOTR. Long ball times are no longer a problem.

Forgot to mention gameplay. Very similar layouts, but you'll have a lot more stop-and-go with LOTR with the Ring, the Path of the Dead and the Shire. And the Gimli and Ring shots can be frustrating to younger/newer players. I don't have anything negative to say about GOT gameplay, but it's newer to me.

Disagree. The verdict is still out on Spike. Whitestar is very reliable, and it's easier to change a transistor if one blows. Whitestar has far more circuit protection (fuses), and everything is through-hole so I can work on. I don't even know if anybody does Spike node board repairs yet. It's nice that Spike is modular, but if one node goes out the game is unplayable - so, same result. It's just easier to ship the boards because they're smaller.

So, all of the flow in the game is in that one ramp leading to the upper playfield? Interesting.

GOT has one of the best mini-playfields in pinball (THE best, in my opinion). It's not an add-on; The Prem/LE is the game that Steve Ritchie designed; he deleted it for the Pro.

Going back to the reliability/cost discussion (which I think is a really good one)...

I got curious about the replacement cost of the 10 node boards in GOTLE. The 7 that are available are currently about $1200. If I assume the three Serial LED boards are about $70 each, that takes the cost up to ~$1400. LOTR has 2 boards to implement all of this, at a total cost of $765. This may be kind of academic, since you'd only have to replace all the boards if something catastrophic happened, like a lightning strike.

I agree that connectors get flaky as they age. Old PCBs are surprisingly robust, though. Most of my 80's games are still running their original boards. As long as you avoid battery acid damage and shorting things out, they'll last forever.

I have my fingers crossed for Spike. I love the reduced wiring, and the creative options that it opens up for designers. I hope that diagnosing problems becomes much easier, but I also hope every repair doesn't become "replace the node board".

Optos connections are a common point of failure for all generations of Sterns. Other than one transistor failure on LOTR, I think all of my Stern repairs have been re-soldering wires to optos. They're really reliable.

For me, the upper playfield makes the game play faster. The ball is back to a flipper (an upper one) just as fast as it is on the Pro, and the smaller playfield is of course very fast with the stationary targets, the turnaround (a SR signature) and the exit lanes. It really reminds me of my Black Knight, and I jokingly call it "BK2016".

^^^ This was a big factor for me in picking GOT. I had 3 Gomez pins (LOTR, RFM and JM), 2 Borgs (IM, MET) and no Ritchie. In a large collection, it's a sin not to have at least one Steve Ritchie pin, and GOT checks all the boxes for me.