I hate to say it, but delivery difficulties has pushed my pin back into late May or early June. No worries here, it was my choice. Darin, you'll be getting yours first. Congrats!

What happened?

The Smaug SE would be ready, but I need delivery that includes taking it apart and moving it upstairs. My distributor is some distance away, and his people are not available to travel to my locale for a while. He offered to drop ship it and cover all the costs, but I told him to wait until his people could bring it. He has good people ... my WOZ has had few problems in part IMHO because it was only handled by pinball people and not drop shipped. It was my call. I am happy.

I like my distributor and know he is taking care of me.

This guy gets almost 1MM in the hobbit. I hear sounds that i have never heard before.

I have to admit to avoiding videos for just that reason. I am already getting sick of the Smaug multiball sounds, and I have yet to play Hobbit. I wish there were some other orchestrated music options.

I don't see any european coindoor on them.....so none of those is my precious. I would like to know how many they are building per week. I contacted my distributor and he told me he has no information from JJP so far when my game will be ready.

Does anyone have pics of the LE armor up close? The Hobbit spot I'm going to get is the LE model.

Update: Found some, looks pretty slick.

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Is this close enough for you?

le armour'

I'd love to see closeup pics of le cab with standard decals vs one with glossy radcals. Betting there is not much difference to the eye.

That's pinball porn right there....

Tremendous difference.

I got the Radcals on my SE. Not like anything I've seen before.
More like laminate or formica than a sticker or painted image. Much thicker than a sticker. Glossy, smooth to the touch. It is so thick that it almost HAS to go on smoothly - like I said, like gluing down a thin layer of plastic-like formica.

Pretty neat.

I'm not sure if the name "Radcals" is misleading: it is NOT a decal at all. It's basically a laminate. It is too rigid/thick for wrinkling/bubbling. It goes on as if it were a flat layer of thin plastic. I'm not sure if the image goes through the entire thickness in case of scratches (and have no desire to try and find out), but wouldn't surprise me.

Look at what I will have Friday night to play. My hobbit will be landing tomorrow.

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It's a week early.

Are they shipping with the reinforced wire forms now on the left side or do you know?

Not sure. I can ask tomorrow when I see Jack.

I was on the fence about the radcals when I was given the opportunity to purchase them (non refundable purchase).

Would have loved to have seen/touched even a small demo piece (like the formica samples) to compare before purchase.
I also guess it would be potentially too late to change my mind.

In my own mind i tell myself i'm just wasting money on them as they will be mostly hidden anyhow *sigh*

If your Hobbit were in between two other pins, I wouldn't upgrade to the radcals. I plan to put mine on the end where it will be the first thing you see walking into the room...so I ordered the radcals.

Thanks! That looks awesome.

Here is a few.

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Thanks! Looks amazing and very high quality. Easily the best powder coated armor coming on a pin today.

Friday April 15th at 3AM to 7PM but she's home.. WOW, what a great game. I love it..

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Congrats! Your Smaug toy looks more gold than others from the pics..

I have a special Smaug Hobbit.

Thanks. Stayed up to 3 am last night. I'm tired.

Nice pics, Skyemont. You live in a beautiful neighborhood.

Thanks statsdoc. The neighborhood is great except i need to power wash and stain my deck.

I'm curious about everyone's opinion on the game so far that own one. I'm really on the fence between hobbit and ghostbusters. Love my woz and would love a hobbit, but I'm not sure. Any idea how jjp is doing as far as long term stability? Anybody wish they would have waited for GB instead? Just looking for opinions of hobbit owners. Thanks, and congrats to you all on a beautiful game.

I responded to the other thread but i will add a little comment to it. The HOBBIT is FANTASTIC. I love my AFG, AFM, MB, SS, TZ, etc.. But when i played The Hobbit when i got it home this weekend, it blew me away. Just a totally diff game than Stern, Williams & Bally. But, it does play like a Williams i think. And, that's a great thing..

I agree 100%!!!!

That is reassuring to hear.

I'm to receive my LE Hobbit in late May/early June. What are the radcals? Are they the super-thick replaceable artwork option for $400?
Do they include the front of the cab. and the sides of the backbox? Should they be factory installed, or can one get a set and self- install? I'd prefer factory installation, but I'm worried if I contact Jen for said upgrade, my shipment may be further delayed. I've waited long enough!

I was able to see the rascals and touch them. They are super nice and very thick. If 400 won't hurt the wallet, do it!

I surmise that the radcals are for the cab. only, not the back box or front. It would be nice if it included the sides of the back box.

Another question? How many LE's are they making and are they finishing & shipping the Gold LE Smaug first. I ordered my LE Hobbit on 12/13 (bad luck?)/2013. At that time, Jen said I just missed the $7500 order including shipping. At that time, they were only making 1000 LE's and I opted for #1000 (#'s 666, 43, 15, 20,etc.,were taken). Later, I was informed via Pinside that the LE number had increased to 1500 and the Gold Smaug edition was introduced. Are they making 1500 LE Hobbit's and an additional number of Smaug LE's?

Has any pinsider received the LE Hobbit, not the LE Smaug Gold addition?

I've been really enjoying my Hobbit. It really is a unique game for lots of reasons. Don't have anything quite like it.

The most interesting thing to me so far is deciding when to make the right ramp a BALL LOCK shot, or a START MODE shot.

By setting it up this way, the Hobbit really can be very entertaining for both the pinhead and the casual player. It's not that hard to enable multiball for the casual player just by not using the RING button and hitting the right ramp basically. But players who know what's going on, know that they can disable the loading of the locks for multiball, and play one of the many, many, many modes. Just figuring out the three VOLUMES of modes (Bilbo Volume, Gandalf Volume, and Radagast Volume) is a treat for pin players. But not the overload it might be for the casual players.

Ring ball-save is cool. The variety with the modes is impressive.

Just scratching the surface at this point.

This sounds awesome ! I'm really looking forward to mine. Never played ever! And really have no idea clue of how to play it but. Vids and u guys talking gots me pumped.

Had a question .... Any mods yet??

Radcals are for all cabinet sides (including front and head).

Played the Hobbit at Automated in Connecticut. Had a blast and didn't want to leave. It was a bit floaty and had a few issues right out of the box but I really believe it was the way it was set up and like Jack said " Once it leaves and gets to its destination its your to set up however you want. " There were a few issues with the PoP ups and the ball got hung up once or twice. but the machine was just pulled out of the box and quickly set up. Even with the minor issues I couldn't get enough of the game. Had a great time exploring the machine with the new code. I noticed how when hitting certain targets the value had changed giving hints as to not hit those targets. For example when your told to hit left ramp to change the page on the book it will score at 500 points but then when your directed to hit a specific target afterwords and you hit the ramp again it would score 11 points basically telling you, YOUR DOING IT WRONG, change your target. Also got to the mode where you were not supposed to hit any drop targets and when you get through it a riddle pops up and figuring it out tells you a specific drop target to hit and all others do not count. It's definitely not easy to multi task trying to read the LCD and the display to get instructions all while following that damn silver ball. But With a high score of 260 K I got to learn a lot. I can tell you this, It's a very deep game and will only grow like WOZ. The Game is a true work of art and the sound system is outstanding. After playing this game for a few hours I can say it is getting harder and harder to wait for the arrival of my machine.

They should be an in stock item. No delay I don't believe. Call Jen to verify but in my eyes they are worth it.

Are RADcals for smaugs only? Or LE too? What exactly are they again, just higher quality decals?