I plan on going Refinery pro over a premium. Although the caveat to this is that I won't be buying until after XM and MET code updates come out. No updates, no NIB for me. Sticking to my guns. But that doesn't mean I'm not "prepared" for the scenario should my self imposed "embargo" be lifted.

I really was at war with myself about whether I wanted to go pro or prem with ST, just like the op. But for what it's worth, I've ended up at a refinery pro, and I'll explain why; in my usual long-winded verbose way.

The ONLY things really killing me between the two were the kickback and the color changing inserts all around. IMO, after playing both the LE and the pro, the VUK has a minimal at best impact on the game's flow overall, the wireforms don't make a difference either way really; from my experience the left ramp wireform is just as buttery smooth on the return as its plastic cousin on the pro, so that was never an issue for me. The Vengeance "crashing" motion is completely moot as a "feature" in my opinion; no impact on gameplay. Apron lights for shields are underwhelming and kinda useless (at the moment at least), and I much preferred the custom laser cut aprons that pinball Refinery have.

The Enterprise toy, the asteroids (only a matter of time) and the warp ramp chase lights (again, only a matter of time a before Hemi or someone else find a way to make a modded one more interactive) can/are be modded onto the pro; so I'm not worried about that. Heck, even the laser field could find its way onto a pro playfield eventually down the line. In the mod realm, the money talks, and if someone was able to make a competent laser field mod for the pros (as unlikely as it is) I'm sure they'd sell quite a few to pro owners, and everyone seems to be getting ST, and a lot of them pros, so it's not THAT crazy to hypothesize that a mod could be in the distant future for that.

The lack of the kickback? I'm admittedly taking a huge leap of faith on this, but I'm banking on that in a future code release the shield targets in the pro will activate some kind of virtual kickback, like mnemonic recovery in JM, because if they don't, then the shield targets are useless on the pro, which is a massive design fail, and if don't think Ritchie is going to let that happen. Although I am going to deeply miss the possibility of being able to do a kickback-->Away Team shot combo, lol. So the lack of kickback I don't think will be THAT big a deal.

The lack of color changing inserts? This is the undeniable feature of the prem/LE. If you HAVE to have that lights how, then obviously prem/LE is the only way to go. It's gorgeous. It's what all pins should be from this date forward, on ALL models of pins IMO. Un-defendable for the pro, this was really difficult for me to "give up", but I take solace in the fact that the inserts where color changing actually matters from a functionality/gameplay point of view, the insignias, are color changing in the pro so I at least have the functionality there for gameplay so that doesn't get sacrificed. So I only sacrifice some neat-o light show stuff on the pro inserts as opposed to the prem, so again, I sided with the pro.

I dig the art package on the pro a bit more as well, I like the color palate in contrast with the playfield. The prem package looks great as well, but the blue just seems to fit ST better than the reddish tones of the prem art package. But the prem does look great. Again, edge given to the pro, 5 points to Gryffindor.

Bluntly stated: my Refinery pro, with all my requested add-ons WILL cost me just a little bit MORE than a stock premium (I will not disclose how much, don't ask), but I get so much stuff on it that it'll FEEL like an LE to me. For my Refinery pro, at that price point, I get:

-the custom powder coated armor, with custom laser etched backlit side armor with the enterprise logo and "the final frontier"
-custom coated matching apron with custom laser etched logos and interactive lighting mod
-interactive under cab lighting
-over the top backbox lighting Kit
-pinblades decals inside w/custom refinery lighting
-custom cointaker color LEDs throughouts GI
-Refinery interactive color changing lighting in backboard of playfield
-shaker
-Mezelmod's Enterprise, colored shooter rod, lighted 3-D vengeance kickback mods
-pinbits vengeance protectors installed
-lighted speaker panels w/pinball topper's acrylic custom ST inserts
-blue xpin DMD display
-matching powder coated playfield service rails
-topper

I might be missing a couple things, but that's the gist of it. I can get all of that for the same price of a stock premium. May seem crazy, but to add on all that stuff to a premium (minus the stuff that's already on the premium ) would put me over the 7k mark, so I'm fine with losing out on the color changing inserts, VUK, kickback and laser field in order to get all that plus an art package that I like more. It works for me, won't work for others; just wanted to voice my opinion to the op's topic in case this helps .

....now on to that MET/XM code embargo.....

All points taken. I shall ponder some more. I must waffled back and forth a million times so far as to whether I want the pro or prem now, haha. Thanks for the input guys, no offense taken; advice considered. ^_^

Correct. That's why I was leaning to the pro, because I could do all the ridiculous mods that I wanted to the hilt, whereas if I go premium, I wouldn't have to add AS much stuff to it because I love the lighting mods, but it would still be more $$ to full load the premium than if I went with the pro.

But perhaps I should have an exercise in self control and consider a premium with extremely light mods from refinery, and then just add all the stuff I know I can do gradually down the line.