I tried all the suggestions, including a replacement button from JJP. Only thing that worked for me was switching to the Stern button. Perfect ever since.

I had a monster (for me) game today! At least an hour. Two wizard modes. At least a couple superjackpots on curse of the black pearl multiball (that ones hard for me to manage the canon shot while not draining other balls). Wow. This scallywag is my dude right now!

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Well done! My high score is a pitiful 1.3mil at the moment!! Still getting the hang of the game! My biggest conundrum seems to be figuring out how to best utilise the Pirate lane completions...

How long/hard is the chest mod to do?

Not hard and well worth the money. It really is cool to see it open and close as you lite lock and then lock balls.

I just completed some upgrades on my Pirates. I was late to the party and was actually calling around about JJPGNR when I was offered a deal on a Pirates SE. I figured it would be a mistake to not jump on the opportunity. I really much prefer the stainless armor to the black crackle paint, but otherwise I did want some of the LE features and other popular add-ons. Here are some of the more significant upgrades I installed:

ModCouple - Devil's Triangle
ModCouple - Kraken
PinballModCo - Lighted Opening/Closing Chest
PinballModCo - Lighted Starmap Backboard
PinballModCo - Spinning Jack Pop Bumper
PinballModCo - Custom Apron Decal
Invisiglass

Now for the lighting I had to get a little creative, since the color changing GI is the one feature of the LE that can't be added (to date). I actually used small squares of painters tape under the playfield to change some of the GI lamps to a light blue color. I also used some old green rubber bulb caps I had lying around to change the spot lamps to a seafoam green color, and a white one to dim the spotlamp for the Black Pearl. Since all of the inserts, spinners, pop bumpers, flashers and lanterns still change color on the SE, this went a long way to completing the look.
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On another note, does everyone seriously have their game setup to the factory pitch of 6.5 degrees? If so, I can see why the Stern fanboys think JJPs play slow and floaty. I have mine at 7.5 degrees like all of my B/W games and it plays awesome with just the default flipper strength.

Awesome score! But thou shalt not use "scallywag" and "dude" in the same sentence!

Not long, the newest kit makes one of the trickiest elements quite simple. I would say it was less than an hour between glass off and back on.

Duplicate post.

Same - maybe more like 7.1 but there's always that "widebodies are slow" stigma. Which is clearly BS

My best Bud and amazing Mod maker is having a birthday this week. To celebrate he is having an amazing blow out birthday sale. Go check out all of his amazing mods!!!

Happy Birthday Lior!!!!

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Ordered a set of cliffys before looking at the videos and photos on this string. Installing Tortuga hole protector looks complicated.

Map hole? Frightening. I probably would need to hire a local tech if I wanted to get the ship off and on.

I would like to keep the game long term. Worth it? Thanks for your opinions.

You can do it! It isn’t that hard. Do your homework to build confidence.

In Liar's Dice, are 1s wild?

Nope, not wild

Actually, should have known that since the max bid is 10... if 1s were wild, the max would be 20...

Actually, that's bullshit... max will always be 10

Any code update? No? Didn’t think so..

^Heavy sigh^. GnR just got their first update. Still none for POTC. I know its coming but still......SIGH! I'm sure it will make an epic game even more epic.......but...........SIGH!!!!!!

Don't take this the wrong way... My GnR is on it's third update since I've received it. POTC update should be epic!

SIIIIIGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH! Lol!

Sighhhhh!

I'm pretty over this. keefer is certainly occupied, so I don't want to throw shade on him, but WTF DUDE you are turning this into a WOF situation. Took Stern years to recover from that.

BY THE WAY: due to Eric's usually-awesome-but-more-frequently-a-drain-suck-Letter-I-gate draining balls immediately from The Depths, there should be a ball save there. You talk shit about how nobody will get to the Final Wizard mode but don't have basic accommodations for mechanical issues? That's amateur hour.

There’s gotta be a mechanical fix for that? Mine literally never happens. I wish we could figure that one out for the people who have that problem.

Now coming off the post from the mode start... that needs a freaking ball save.

I never have this happen either. I have had balls hop the gate from the direction of the flippers a few times, though.

All I can say is yep. year and a half without an updates. Meanwhile there has been time to update almost their whole other lineup. Its pretty fucking sad we cant even get bug fixes done. Picture this "lazy ass" finally gets everything where he wants it and we get an update, but because of the massive changes that were done a ton more bugs pop up. How long should we wait to get the second round of bug fixes? By this point surely there will be a new game to program and focus (or lack thereof) will shift.

Sorry but if your referring to Keith as "Lazy ass" not dam cool at all! This guy doesn't write crap comic book scenes, he writes code stories most Wish they could! Yes it's taking more time then we like but he Too is an employee of a Company not an independent do as we wish guy. Sorry if you weren't referring to him but shame on you if you were.

With the current code it’s still a top 5 all time game. Enjoy it as is for now.

Geez, With the current code it’s still a top 5 all time game. Enjoy it as is for now.

It absolutely is. The only reason I'm so frustrated with the situation is that the code has been worked on and a beta was released - so it can't be THAT much more work.

I'm not blaming Keith,
But I do think JJP should prioritise this and get it done. Keith did say e wouldn't release an update until the final wizard mode was done, so he's at least got some control over the situation. Perhaps he should rethink that and do an interim release and at least fix ball search,
Add one or two ballsaves as mentioned, and maybe the other known bug.

Well I’ll be rejoining the club soon! It will sit next to the other best old school wide body (IJTPA) and next to that my personal favorite wide body alien. Considering wides are almost all but done with I’m happy to have the three to represent.

And yes looking forward to the code update but what’s there is impressive as is although as a former GB owner I get it

This "we're not issuing POTC code until the final wizard mode is done" attitude by JJP is to me the crappiest and most telling thing about the whole situation. That message just comes across as a a big f-you to the customers who bought POTC when JJP is well aware that are plenty of things to address in the code besides the final mode: Inner loop opto code adjustment, Liar's Dice soul bet bug, placeholder animations on mini-wizard modes... there's a lot of polish, fixes, and enhancements to do and their silence on it all continues to say the most about their attitude toward this machine. They've put it in their rearview mirror. If it were truly important to them I'd think sometime in the past year someone at JJP would have issued a message along the lines of "It's important to us to get the POTC code out, we care about it, and we're working on it". I think it's very telling that they haven't even done that. And that's completely putting aside the fact that JJP had originally said the game would be feature complete when it shipped, it didn't ship feature complete, and they don't seem to care too much about that.

Is the code good to play now? Yes. Is the physical design of the game absolutely amazing? Yes. But none of that can excuse the way they've pushed POTC customers to the side for so long (except to tell us they're not issuing code until the final mode is done). All of the other JJP games have received multiple updates over several years. But POTC has been treated completely differently by them for whatever reason, and the reason shouldn't matter because it's just not acceptable for them to ignore their product like this. It's been pretty clear for at least a year now that they've just buried this game way down on the priority list, and the statements by the designer and programmer about not releasing code until the final mode is done just confirms that they don't seem to care too much about getting any updates/enhancements out to their customers.

Does GNR have the final wizard mode coded in?

If yes, that’s total f’ing horse shit!

Do you think Pinside brigading and tanking the sales had anything to do with it?

Nah

No

Agree pretty much 100% here, although I do want to make sure it's clear that Keith was speaking for himself about the final wizard mode - it wasn't an "official" JJP statement. I interpreted that more like he just wanted to do 1 final update, which wasn't going to come until the final wizard mode was done. I mean WOZ didn't' have a final wizard mode for years either - but as noted, the Hobbit, DI, WOZ, Wonka, GNR updates have been coming pretty rapidly of late.

Shouldn't matter. They have a responsibility to their customers regardless. If JJP messed up their communications on the game's pre-release issues and didn't effectively address potential customer concerns then that's JJP's issue and failing. If they mis-read demand and sales weren't up to expectation early and then they pulled the plug on the game (rightly or wrongly) just before sales and interest started to increase, that again is JJPs problem and failing. None of that should matter though because they still have the software team in place to do the job on POTC updates if they care to do it.

If the brigading and tanking sales meant they had to let the people go so there wasn't anyone to do the code work then that would be a different story. This is just an issue about piss poor communication by JJP to the people who did support the game by buying it and and a lack of any sort of priority for the work that JJP should feel obligated to do for their customers.

Whether or not he's "on the clock" when he writes or says something, as an employee and a lead programmer for JJP he is absolutely speaking as a representative of JJP whenever he talks about or posts about their product. And it wasn't just him. The designer also said on a stream the same thing about code coming when the final mode is done. So it's a unified JJP message.

People like to excuse JJP and its employees as just being fellow hobbyists. But as Yelobird noted above he's an employee of the company. As much as some people may want to feel some sort of connection to JJP or support JJP in their "hobby", when it comes down to it they're just running a business, we're their customers, and when it comes down to making choices all the good feelings in the world won't stop them from shafting a set of customers if they feel it's in their best interest to do so. And that's been made pretty clear in how they've given POTC the stiff arm.

patience guys, update will be amazing, and they will probably implement wifi modes like GnR

The answer to additional code seems clear. It is not worth the investment, at least the immediate investment, for just 1000 units. The fact that LEs now sell for nearly 15 probably also signals the company that the market is satisfied with the existing code.

Now, if they could just do something to make it easier for me to hit the Maelstrom ramp....

Try hiking up your skirt a bit more Dan lol. Glad you found a game. Wizard mode or not I Love this game!!!

Respectfully... how much longer should we be patient? This game came out in -2017- !

I did, though technically I am still in the market for a one-of-a-kind prototype with three spinning disks...

As long as you know and love keefer and are familiar with his body of work. I mean just my opinion but GnR launched so close to being code complete that should tell you something.

Hm... I THINK I know where you can get one of those... if you're really really quiet and willing to drive to Illinois... LOL

I haven't been waiting nearly as long as many of you have, and I get your frustration, but I do believe a code update will come. I read *every* *single* *post* in this thread over the last month (I may have a problem), and there are many statements to suggest JJP still has every intent of pulling through. I can't say it's likely their highest priority, but it isn't abandoned either. Sure it sucks, but there is a long list of games that had late (year+) code updates that elevated them to a whole new level. It's not uncommon in the world of pinball and this game has really only been out of production for a little over a year now. Eric himself confirmed in this thread just 6 months ago that it's still in the works...

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-pirates-of-the-caribbean-official-owners-and-fan-club/page/301#post-5647211

Honestly, I appreciate you chiming in from JJP but for me that doesn't say something. Wasn't Wonka also launched close to code complete? So on the face of things I don't see where GnR being launched close to code complete can provide a hint that POTC would therefore be getting updated soon.

I mean, 6 months ago the designer posted that he's looking forward to getting code out and now here we still are 6 months later with no other communications or indications. I hope it is somewhere higher on their priority list now and I hope an update (any update) comes out soon, but I'm not seeing any more reason to have confidence now than what we've seen for the past year. Just my feeling though.

Eric only said "looking forward to getting it out..." The beta was distributed to a handful of owners MONTHS ago.

And by comparison: GnR has already had EIGHT updates. Wonka has had NINETEEN. DI has had at least 20.

Pirates? Has had 6. And unless I'm mistaken, games weren't even shipped with 0.90 code (the first release). Last update was in April of -2019! That's WAY more than a year. The prior update was in December 2018.

Nobody's arguing that the game isn't awesome as-is, and I'm really glad to have what we have. the 0.99 code is phenomenal. But the longer we wait, the less likely something will be released. As I said before, it's not like they're starting from scratch here. AN update is out there. Working code. Maybe they found some bugs in the beta, but I mean seriously. April 2019. That's not " a year plus". That is 19 months - over a year and a half!

I know Keith had a heart attack, which is hella scary, and not a joke, and don't for one second let me imply that the game is more important than the dude's health.

Here's one of the last things he posted, back in MAY 2019, which included changes which had *already* been made:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-pirates-of-the-caribbean-official-owners-and-fan-club/page/186#post-4998088

So that's part of what I'm getting excited about.