Hey everyone,

First new Stern Pin qith an AIQ Pro (not quote ready for the Premium investment, that'll be our Deadpool next) and looking to see what the best recommended mods are. Right now we're looking to add

The Thor's Hammer that lights up when multi-ball is active:

https://cointaker.com/products/avengers-infinity-quest-pinball-illuminated-interactive-thor-hammer

The lightup Captain America Shield:

https://cointaker.com/products/avengers-infinity-quest-pinball-illuminated-capt-america-shield

As well as Iron Man:

https://cointaker.com/products/iron-man-pinball-illuminated-iron-man-mod

And these ramp lights are a "must have" for my wife:

https://mezelmods.com/collections/avengers-infinity-quest-pinball/products/avengers-infinity-quest-pinball-ramp-illumination

Considering the Sanctum and Avengers Tower upgrades, but they are pricey, and considering attempting our own 3D print on those instead. Has anyone gone thagt route? Any other mods you'd say are a "must"? A lot to dig into, but we're very excited for the new machine and want to make it our own a bit.

Any specific settings you guys recommend changing such as the slingshot power or things of that nature? Trying to get my machine dialed in to the "ideal" settings as intended but finding that info seems difficult.

I had a little bit of remourse at first about the Premium Extras, but I think the Pro is a better playing game. The Spinner raising looks cool but just slows things down, and the Marvel Ramp even modded still only hits 90%. Putting that money into Toys for the Pro has been a much better investment.

What's the Black Widow Tower you speak of? I must be missing it.

I am on a Pro, doesn't seem to be any kind of Pym Lab Upgrades there since it's just a simple target. Am I correct?

It's a pretty well documented flaw that it will reject very good shots that are too strong. These aren't missed shots.

But either way I'm very happy with my pro. The extra spinner is fun, and I really like that there's no slowdown in the gameplay from the underground subway ball lock. I don't really think either machine is better, just slightly different gameplay.

My biggest complaint is that for Avengers fans I don't think there's enough "Avengers" to the table. I think this is the case even on the premium and LE. You really have to add your own toys to bring out the theme in this one. I don't get the same problem from Deadpool, Jurassic Park, Godzilla and others.

The interactive Thor hammer has been my favorite thus far, combined with the sound mod that plays immigrant song during multi-ball. Really takes it to the next level.

It changes nothing but the music. Gives it the movie soundtrack, which IMO is much better than the default one.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/avengers-infinity-quest-spider-soundmod

I only have the Pro link if you want to PM me, have to hit Spider via PM in that thread for the Prem.

I kind of want to replace the rubbers on my new pro with something more fun than the black I have currently, thinking yellow, purple, or white might look slick. Anyone with specific recommendations who has done this?

Why the different band on the third flipper? Just curiosity on my part here.

Thank you. I thought maybe there was a gameplay reason for that brand instead.

The sling ring on my relatively new AIQ Pro is suddenly loose and popping up a little bit on the playfield. Is this an easy fix or something that's going to be more problematic?

I love this game but the amount of repairs I've had to do in my short time owning it has been very disappointing.

Just not really sure what the fix is here.

My machine came without the flippers working correctly when I got it. Ended up being an issue with a node board so for now I have one of the connections disconnected on the GI lights. It just means the lower play field is a little dim, but at least it works.

When it's plugged in it just goes through an endless reboot cycle. At the moment I'm waiting on them to have the node board in stock to replace it.

You know I always just assumed that the disc was meant to represent the sling ring which is the thing in the comics that allows Doctor strange to travel the way he does. I guess they never really call it that do they?

Having an issue with the shooter Lane on my pro. It looks like a screw or something underneath here came loose, and I'm just trying to figure out the easiest way to get to that area. Can anyone advise?

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I had my machine apart last night to replace the bearing that holds the spin disc, and ended up deciding to take a look at a few other things while I was in there, including feeling like I was having a lot of trouble hitting the sanctum shot. After testing it it was requiring the ball to hit it surprisingly hard to register. After tweaking that switch I must say I'm having a lot more fun not failing at hitting the last shot during the mind gem quest in particular. Had my first run where I won the first three quests I did, though Thanos then stole the mind gem back from me and his attack, but then I was able to win it back by replaying that mode. Not my highest score, but my most "successful" game so far.

I'm really glad I chose this as my first home Stern as it just feels like it's going to take me forever to "finish".

If anyone is looking to get the interactive Thor for their machine, I ended up with an extra and rather than sell it I just like to swap it for a different mod. In particular I'm interested in the building that goes above the black widow ramp, art blades, The physical gauntlet that goes over the one on the pro, but I'd be open to offers if anyone is looking to swap anything. Shoot me a PM.

Literally nothing wrong with it I just prefer the interactive hammer versus the full figurine because of the scale versus my iron Man figure.

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I just got my upgraded gauntlet for my Pro and I really can't recommend this mod enough. Better than the one that comes with the premium by default. Pictures and video really can't do it justice, at least with my camera.

If I was starting from scratch the only mod I would probably buy before this one would be the upgraded Sanctum just for visibility of the lights. This would be #2.

https://pinside.com/pinball/market/classifieds/ad/125592

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Did you just get the disc, or the new bearing as well?

It would be nice if you got a cool light show.

Which lower playfield lights? The GI only, or all of them?

I had this exact issue and it was excess solder in one of my lower GI sockets causing a short.

My flippers also wouldn't work during the short.

That's what I was going to say. Gets more difficult because of that by design.

Does anyone sell just the sticker for the disk? I bought the upgraded disk sold here, but unfortunately the included sticker has started to bunch up a bit where the post attaches, and I'd like to get a spare or 2.

Yeah this would probably have solved the issue if I had done it sooner, unfortunately by the time I noticed it was a little bit past where that's going to entirely resolve the problem for me.

I am getting a new sticker and thank you very much all!

My guess is it's a combination of a couple things:

It being a really unfriendly newcomer pin, so when you first try a few games it's easy to have no idea what you're doing and move on to something else.

It's also kind of a boring machine when it comes to toys and such. We just got our Deadpool Pro yesterday and the difference in the visual "fun" and toys between the DP Pro and AIQ Pro is staggering. I feel like this is the case comparing AIQ to most Stern pins.

I don't think anything on the AIQ premium really solves the "boring" issue, the gauntlet is cool, and the Marvel ramp is fun, but if you put AIQ Prem next to DP Pro and asked me which I thought was the more expensive machine, DP would win hands down. It's hard for me to see AIQ as "packed" when it comes to toys at all, given the lack of any real "iconic" toys for any of the Avengers featured. No Mjolnir, no Cap's Shield, just a real lack of fun "stuff" for the average fan.

AIQ is a top 10 all time for me so don't take this as me knocking it, but combine that with the insane difficulty and I can see why sales may have slowed down now that the hardcore have theirs.

Totally Agree on Zep.

Yeah it's definitely a machine meant for the hardcore player who wants something that's going to challenge them for years, but I'd rager it's already sold to most of those people who are in the market. My casual friends dig mine now that I've made some necessary modifications (added a physical gauntlet to my pro, The interactive hammer, light up shield, stand up Iron Man, improved tower and sanctum, etc) but when it was a stock machine and we played it on location it did nothing to get them excited. I really wish Stern had sprung for a couple toys to make the machine stand out more on location.

The Pro doesn't even have that subway lock or Marvel ramp, and that's what most people will get to experience in the wild. The Pro is am amazing shooting and ultimately very boring game for casuals that needed toys.

I'm certainly not knocking it, but a few flourishes of iconic Marvel's "toys" would have gone a long way and not cost much.

Which explains why it might be readily available compared to other Sterns currently, layout doesn't appeal to as many people as fun toys.

Just to compare the two pro models, Deadpool has the little Deadpool that you get to bash with the drop targets right in front of it, The awesome looking katana ramp with the physical ball locks, a light up chimichanga truck in the background, an acrylic standee Deadpool in a hammock that swings when you hit the ramp, and fun acrylic stand-ups for all the major allies in the game and a scoop + 2 spinners and 10 standup targets and a skillshot mechanic at the top of the playfield that gives even a novice a 25% chance of hitting the skillshot by luck alone, which is more exciting.

AIQ Pro has The sling disc, a stand-up target to start modes at the sanctum, The Avengers Tower with the magnet at the top plus an upper flipper, a captive ball for Thor, and two spinners plus the crappy plastic gauntlet display and a much less interesting mechanic for its drop targets for a novice Plus the Hawkeye targets and the Ant-Man target. It feels like anyone claiming stern didn't cheap out on the toys on this one is being a bit disingenuous. The pro really has nothing for the casual or novice player.

When I'm saying AIQ is boring I'm saying this with regard to a novice player playing it on location, and the chance that it is then a pinball they would look into owning. When my casual friends have gotten to try Deadpool on location it's a machine they've asked me about the cost of and such. With AIQ that was never the case. It's an amazing shooting machine that's a lot of fun to play, but it's not fun or interesting to a casual player at all, and the mediocre sound package does it no favors. Just some acrylic standees for the various Avengers would have gone along way to make it more interesting visually to a casual player.

I'm curious what makes you sure it's a great seller? The thing I was specifically responding to is how available the machine seems to be versus other machines, Even ones that have already had more runs than AIQ has. In general it has seemed like units of this one have sat at distributors longer than DP, JP, etc, which makes me think there might be something too the market for this kind of hardcore player pin being more limited than some of the others.

If you think those 2 things are equal I think we're just using "toys" a bit differently here. There's a lot of cool shots on AIQ but there's not a whole lot of fun stuff going on or to look at on the play field. It's the exact opposite of Deadpool which is chock full.

I think all of us pinheads recognize what a cool thing the spin disc is, but your average consumer isn't going to see it that way. I think it's hard sometimes for those of us that are hardcore about this stuff to put our minds in that of the average player, but there has to be some reason that AIQ doesn't seem to move as quickly as the other pins stern currently is producing. It's something I've seen with most dealers I've checked out.

Perhaps "toys" is just the wrong term. Maybe I mean production value or something.

Yeah the most exciting parts of the game are the Iron Man and Thor malty balls in my opinion, and for me those were only made exciting when I installed the movie sound package instead of the stock one.

In reality getting one of the infinity gems should be in insanely rewarding and celebrated game-changing experience. Most of the gems don't feel like the insanely powerful tools that they should be.

i can't imagine keeping this machine without this mod. It's more important than anything else you can change on AIQ.

I'd say it's a bit more like comparing call of duty to dark souls. Skyrim is a very easy game to get into, but I understand the point you're trying to make.

You're right though that there's just a universal appeal that you would expect the Avengers license to carry, but AIQ somehow really missed the mark on that. Our local location moved on from theirs pretty quickly.

That said I don't think there is a better value to be had long-term for a homeownership pin.

I don't think you are thinking of a casual player correctly. I have a lot of truly casual players and they can't even grasp what's going on with the gem quests because the game is actually pretty bad at communicating when a quest is finished and such. The game should really yell out something like "gem Quest complete, he was right ramp to collect gem".

It's really not intuitive to a casual audience whatsoever. Casual players don't read rule sheets.

You're discussing the premium, while the Pro is almost always going to be the model on location and the one primarily being discussed here. It's the unit used to sell to new customers. Every discussion I've had here has been framed around the pro meaning the gauntlet, subway, and marvel ramp aren't part of it.

But what we're really talking about is people who approach the machine casually WITHOUT someone there to explain the nuances. It's a very unfriendly machine for casuals in that context compared to most, and isn't terribly exciting to new players compared to a lot of other Pro models with more exciting toys and features.

I want a coop mode like other machines have been getting recently. This machine begs for it IMO.

The point is the Avengers argue and insult one another and such all the time. I'm actually not sure if those comments are supposed to be Marvel or Widow but either way they feel pretty on brand for the way the group interacts.

It's a keychain of the designers dog. It's cute.

One of my favorite upgrades. Just being able to see the unlocks lit up makes the machine way better.