Happy New Year 2022 !

To start this new year, a new mod for Stern's 2020 AIQ (Avengers Infinity Quest)
The Ant-Man Secutity Solutions truck to put in the right place. It is naturally illuminated with the GI (General illumination).

You will find all the information here:

https://pinside.com/pinball/market/shops/1338-pino-pinball-mods-shop/05695-ant-man-security-solutions-truck

A video here :

Have a good day !

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$75 shipped.

Unused, Black Panther mod with lit eyes.

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Just the disc. Spins fast and for a long time.

When I first got this pin(almost 2 weeks ago)I really didn’t get a good feeling about it but once I started to wrap my head around the rules/modes it’s definitely a fun but challenging pin. I had a decent game last night and put up a new GC. If you’re having trouble getting deep into this pin try focusing on what’s needed for extra balls which helped me get to the final wizard mode. I was happy to get to “Battle THANOS” but I almost felt like I missed out on a cool mode since I had all the gems and killed him instantly…but sure didn’t mind that billion point spot.

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For #1, On a premium/LE there is a post with rubber on it at the entrance to the BP orbit. It's there to kick the ball over to the left flipper when balls come back down the orbit. The thing is though, a ball rolling down the orbit and hitting that rubber will very slightly unscrew that post each time it hits it. So gradually over time that post becomes a bit loose. That means that instead of the post being set in position so the ball bounces firmly off the rubber, the post instead gives a little bit on contact & so the ball bounces off weakly and often SDTM. This happened on mine. I fixed it by unscrewing the post and putting blue Loctite on it to keep the post screwed in. After doing it the balls were bouncing perfectly over to the left flipper and it hasn't been an issue since.

For #2, On mine a ball coming slowly back out of the orbit will slightly graze the top of the sling but not enough to trigger the sling. Faster moving balls either slightly graze the lower part of the sling or miss it entirely, but again it's only a slight graze so not enough to trigger the sling. I'd suggest trying one or a combination of these things to get it playing the way you'd like it to: 1) Check the left to right level setup of your game, and maybe try changing the pitch/steepness of the playfield a bit, 2) slightly bend out the end of the ball guide where the ball exits the orbit, or 3) adjust the gap in the sling switch to adjust the sensitivity of when it fires. On mine I've never changed the factory setup on the sling and it doesn't fire when the ball grazes it out of the orbit.

I'm not sure about #3

For #4, yep, misses from those ramps are dangerous. In a lot of pinball games a missed ramp shots lead to danger. For the Black Widow ramp, if you're getting true rejections from the ball hitting the plastic above the ramp then try adjusting the pitch of your game and/or the flipper power. That should reduce how often it happens. In my experience more steep = more Black Widow rejections (at least I think that's the way it was working, could have been the other way around though). The Marvel ramp isn't an easy shot. A little bit offline is a miss and it will often come back SDTM as a penalty for it.

For #5, it's going to happen sometimes depending on how fast and at what angle the ball exits the pops. If it's happening a lot then you might try adjusting pitch. But it will still happen sometimes because no matter how your game is set up there will be some combination of ball speed and exit angle that will take it SDTM occasionally.

For your last point, as soon as the ball hits the sling you need to nudge to try to change the angle off the sling. Or, as you get familiar with the game, you'll start to see a bounce or two ahead where the ball is going so you can instead nudge on the bounce that would have sent it into the slings.

To add or confirm Eaglepin:

1. That post....it has enough wiggle when tightening where its either enough to the left where it'll nudge to the left flipper on the way back down or go to the right flipper if its tightened at its farthest right position. Somewhere in the middle of those two extremes you'll get HUGE amount of SDTM returns. I have mine more towards the right, and only about 5% of the return shots I have issues with. I've gotten used to its return speed and trajectory where if it feels like it would be an issue, I just give it a nudge...else I dont worry about it.

3...Not sure what you mean by stuck ball. the free one thats supposed to hit the target? the fixed one should always be stationary, so not sure what consitutes as stuck. Outside of that, never had an issue with return hits from the fixed ball unless at a VERY specific angle.

4. Ramp rejections....yeah its a risk when not hitting a clean shot but the better question is if you feel like clean shots are getting rejected. If they are, something with flipper alignment or power needs adjustment. Currently my biggest issue is the slightly bouncy-ness of the plastic on the black widow ramp. Too strong of a shots will hit the plastic on the way up and reject it when it shouldnt. I need to add in a little bit of re-enforcement.

5. To reinforce what eaglepin mentions, its speed and angle specific. Shouldnt happen often though. I know it rarely happens with my shots. It has to be going into the pop bumper at a very specific speed to skip all the bumpers and posts to go SDTM. This can be adjusted by pitch and side-to-side tweaks.

Hey guys, I bought a Pro over the holidays and am loving the game play, especially after reading the in depth rules on Tilt Forums. Question for your guys, as the only thing I can't stand is the sound quality. Speakers are super crackly, especially out of the main speakers. Sub seems to be fine. Most common on the call outs and Tilt sound effect as it diminishes.

Does a speaker upgrade fix all this? I heard it may not fix it. I really don't want to go F'ing around with amps and replacing wires and crap. Hoping this is a quick fix. Thanks!!!

For sure. My first 2-3 weeks it was a drain monster with so many little issues (rejects, slings, etc), but after addressing them all it's been a dream to play and haven't had to mess with anything for months. Game seems to be more sensitive than average.

Depending on the type of rejection you're getting, lowering flipper power can sometimes help also.

Nice job and very quick from first getting the game to defeating Battle Thanos!

It is a bit of a letdown getting to Battle Thanos with all 6 gems and not having to do anything... points are great and you do get Super Victory laps which is fun! There is also Computer Frenzy and Trophy Mania.

Learning the different gem strategies and how to best use them to advance and score more is part of the fun with this game! I do love that Captain Marvel ramp! AIQ can be a little loose on awarding extra balls once you get the hang of it with factory settings. I have my single longest game played on any pinball machine on AIQ... clocking in right at 90 minutes!

Speaker upgrades do help, but not fully eliminate the "static" sounds... usually Thanos talking is where I notice it most.

For $40 - $50 total you can get replacement upgrade 4" 2 or 3 way speakers and an 8" Woofer from Amazon or Parts Express.

The avengers I have came with a full pin woofer speaker kit and the game still sounds like ass with the stock sounds. This weekend I plan on moving the pinwoofer system over to my Aerosmith where properly belongs. There is no way you need to amplify any of the shit stock sounds. It’s not gonna change the source material.

I replaced a lot of video and added attract mode videos. Love the way that all looks, but last time I tried to import and replace music it kept coming in way too low. I’ve done this before I know what I’m doing and I couldn’t get the sound to get up to stock level. Now that version eight of Pinball browser is out I’ll give it a shot again.

I agree this pin hands out extra balls pretty easily but it’s fun to play wizard modes and extra balls usually get you there. I actually played computer frenzy also during that long game. It looks like my next adjective would be Trophy Mania. On a side note I really like the feeling of hitting the Marvel ramp…it’s pretty challenging but super cool.

The sound package is easily the weakest aspect of this pin. Would be very interested in anyone sharing their custom pinballbrowser sound mods

Love the game but I need the space:
https://pinside.com/pinball/market/classifieds/ad/127512

A few years ago I started documenting all of my Pin's total plays each New Years day.

Received my AIQ in early November 2020 and here's total plays from 1/1/21 & 1/1/2022...

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Wait, the static sounds are part of the sound files themselves??? That's ridiculous! How has Stern not addressed this yet? Or have they and just haven't released the proper code update yet?

Yeah, it seems to be the files themselves. May be a file compression issue or I think a couple people have bypassed the Stern amp and had improved results. I haven't tried that - but my Deadpool sounds fine...

The way to eliminate the static sound is by plugging a wiring harness directly into the CN5 spike 2 board. Bypassing the stock connections for both sub and back box speakers. The connection is direct and very clean that way and improves the sound significantly.

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If the pinwoofer kit is hooked up this way, then it didn’t do squat.

I went straight to that connection and added an amp. Made everything stand out so much better, including the crackles. Made that several times more noticeable

Question… is the song from the trailer (the one that starts after the plunge) in the game? I kind of like that song, high energy yet epic.

Took a quick video just now of a few attract mode scenes I added. The 1:28 mark starts gameplay and shows my new opening scenes and music. You can hear a replacement gameplay audio track, but notice it is lower than the stock audio tracks. Will revisit that audio importing now that I've upgraded to Pinball Browser 8 and see if anything changed.

Otherwise I'm very pleased with the videos I added, especially the Hulk Gamma hurry up (not shown) - WAAAAAY cooler than the stock Hulk eyeball animation. The Iron Man ball lock animations are so much better too.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/DJ6nRgBuEfhrakZs7

Looks awesome. Love the animated as it fits the art style better than the movie scenes.

For sure. This is a comic based theme and to shoehorn movie clips just doesn't make any sense.

Yes - surprised I can't say when/where off the top of my head since I've played this game so much - you can hold both flippers in to go to DJ mode to find it and play it as well. It is one of the better tracks in AIQ... most are slower than I would prefer.

Very nice work!

The audio/video are the only things not top notch in this game in my opinion.

Do you know if your changes will work with the latest (and possible future) code releases that allow Insider Connected to work?

I'm going to use the latest code available since my current version is from an earlier one, pre-Inside Connect.

That's some amazing work there - you should be working for Stern! The game is crying out for a full custom package like this.

Hopefully this will appeal to you AIQ owners. A bit of gameplay, a review and some mods.

Got Insider connected kit this weekend. It was a nice surprise as distributors website said first batch would go to operators, so wasn’t expecting until Feb/Mar.

All installed fine no issues, love the achievements so far. I love the unexpected changes in 1.03 code, like volume changes via external volume knob (headphone Jack kit) no longer interrupt entire screen.

If you want to follow me, search for “Timmy” on the website.

Question: does anyone know if you can auto-login yourself at game power on? Thinking of printing my QR to avoid logging onto website every time.

Can you play 4 games as yourself? (I don’t think I tried scanning QR code multiple times. Will try next time I play.)

Holy moly…..this was fun! Everything finally came together for one game, never lost a gem, a battle, or a mini-mode. Got to the end with all gems so didn’t even have to battle thanos just got a 1B bonus and 6 ball victory laps. Tripled my prior best score, love this game!!

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I'm having a bit of an odd issue on the Captain Marvel ramp on my premium

When you hit the shot, you hear the 'whoosh' and it will show the graphic on the screen, but it's not incrementing # of loops (on the loops toward binary mode) and it's also not counting for lit shots, which of course sucks for many things in the game.

Does this ramp have multiple optos to qualify the shot and maybe it's getting picked up by one and not the other? Just curious if anyone else has seen this and knows where to start looking

There is the entry opto, which I believe is the woosh sound, then there is the switch on the ramp right before the ant man up kicker that is used to validate the marvel shot. Maybe that switch is flakey?

^ yup if its not qualifiying other shots as well, def the switch above the ant-man scoop. I know in my ant-man ejects it hits the little metal switch lever thing, so could have the potential of bending it where it has issues with triggering the switch. Guess first do a switch test to make sure you can manually trigger it, and if you can, then check the position and mounting of the whole thing to make sure a ball passing through triggers it.

Thank you - I didn't see that switch when looking it over. Checking it now. I thought it was still supposed to increment on the partials that come back down the ramp though

*edit*

Registering correctly after adjusting the switch a bit. Thanks again!

I have all four Elwin Pros and AIQ hadn't been getting much love recently. Fired it up this week and was reminded how awesome this game is. So many strategies and so many shots.

Wow, lots to read. I just got the Pro model and can’t wait to dive in. Where to even begin?

Make it steeper and lean slightly right.

WOW. I love this pin. The best code and playfield layout. So addicting. Which gem do u go for first?

Where can I get the Tesseract Cube mod for the right flasher?

Always mind gem to black widow out of the gate for me! This game I got time gem next with widow level 1 then soul, reality, power, space.

Is this your first pin? If so congrats!

On new pins I take my time and learn rules on the fly and then reference rule sheets periodically and take my time doing so. AIQ is deeeeep! If you are newer keep hitting start to sharpen your skills! AIQ is a good shooter and fast and will make a good player. Other games you play will seem like they are in slow motion after you put in a lot of games on AIQ!

So I still don’t know what I am doing on AIQ yet but since the shots feel so good to hit, flow is great and the game is fast I still have so much fun on it! I will take my time with rules.

I think all the time when I play “I still don’t know the rules yet since the game is so deep but I am having a blast anyway!” I love it!

Enjoy!

Just play the shit out of it and enjoy it.

I purchased the spinning disc mod and installed it over the weekend. It's a pretty nice addition, much more satisfying to hit the disk and watch it spin. Wish stern would add some cool sounds to it like they do for the EM spinner on LZ. Install was much easier than I thought it would be, took me 45 mins, but I went slow (and wasted time looking for tools I literally had just put down, but apparently misplaced). Two things to keep in mind when installing, clean the disc with alcohol and go slow on the decal to avoid bubbles (noted in the instructions), and you'll need a set of pliers to hold the metal threaded rod that adjusts the disc height to keep it from moving while tightening the white plastic nut. Definitely recommend it!

https://pinside.com/pinball/market/shops/1341-precision-pinball-prod/05285-dr-strange-disc-mod-kit

Hey Lermods ! Did you buy both the mod kit “and” the Barring Carrier part also? Probably mentioned here already somewhere but wanted to ask. Thanks

i didn't buy the baring carrier.

Spinning disc is great on its own...as long as the stock carrier is operating as its should. My OG carrier's copper bushing ends were both falling off and causing the disc to become uneven and not spin correctly at times, so that needed replacement. It was my first pin and wasnt sure how long Stern would take for a service request so had ordered the carrier along with the disc. Well, both carriers came in around the same time so tested both. Disc upgrade+working stock carrier was a great improvement, and using both part upgrades was even way more smoother. I only have one issue with having such long spin times and its during the mind gem. You dont deal damage till the disc stops spinning and if you're constantly shooting and hitting it, you can go a long time without progressing. Sure the points are great, but I'm still very prone on bad shots and draining. After a good return after spinning it, I end up trapping the ball till damage is done before continuing on.