Interesting. And creative idea!

Personally, I wouldn't like these adhesive nubs because -- outside of tournaments -- I think that deathsaves are awesome. Similar to @85vett, as long as someone isn't kicking the legs or bashing adjacent cabinets, people are free to deathsave on the pins in my collection. I have my tilts set pretty tight, that even a smooth deathsave will usually get you two warnings on default debounce settings. On a rare occasion, you'll only get one. So it's similar to the ability to do a massive slide save for SDTM or wicked shimmy: if you haven't used up your dangers, then you can attempt to save the ball by making a big move.

We even have a group started locally here called Death Save Disciples (DSD for short), along with a sweet sweet T-shirt showing the grim reaper trying to take your ball in a R outlane drain situation.

Time for the drain hole to be expanded to 6 inches across.

I'd be worried about these coming loose and ending up in the trough. Not an issue?

It’s happened a couple times, only lost around 4 out of like 50 in a couple years.
And usually they make it to the bottom of the cab. Maybe 2 that got stuck, and they fail in the first week or so it seems, past that you’re good.
My death save skills are probably fading tho...

Mine too - go for it! I'll even congratulate you when you're successful. While trying to deathsave, most people will damage themselves long before damaging the machine.

- Gerry
https://www.multimorphic.com

Nah... it's like riding a bike.

I still remember the first major tourney I went to, seeing you play for the first time, and marveling at how good you were at nudging the pin -- and how much I had to learn.

I'd worry on playing a game without PF glass installed. One air ball could destroy the BG.

i throw out all the glass for my games. not needed. i also put my lunch on the playfield, just above the flippers. usually a ham and cheese sandwich, lots of mustard.

As for why death save is illegal, a TD could just tighten down the tilt - any at top level tournaments they do. That makes the whole thing moot. No death save possible without at least a tilt warning. And with a tight bob, that's an automatic tilt. I think I'd rather have a looser bob, and have death save illegal.

Now, there are nuances I am not 100% on. First, a ball that goes STDM but bounces back into the field of play, is a Lazarus. That is legal, and you may play on. If the ball goes down the outlane, and without nudging miraculously finds its way back into the field of play, that too would be a Lazarus (IMHO), even if the ball travels along the path of a traditional death save. When a ball is going down the outlane (specifically the right outlane), a nudge that occurs as it's reaching the trough opening, is a death save attempt move. It only becomes a violation if the ball makes it back into the normal field of play, and a switch is triggered. No switch triggered - no violation (I'm not 100% sure on that - but it would be my ruling).

Here is where it gets tricky...if a player is in multiball, and makes a nudge that results in a death save, is that disqualification? Or is it just considered a Lazarus. Does it have to be intentional? What if there were 4 balls bouncing around, and one death saves? If I were to witness the move, and there were another plausible reason to nudge the machine at that moment, I'd probably let it go. If however, the player was at 2 balls, one was cradled on the left, the other drains out the right, and a death save is performed - THAT's a DQ.

Just my thoughts.

Was playing TFTC with my wife a few weeks ago and she got a death save.

The ball traveled so quick down the right outlane, it hit the apron and continued on to the left outlane and was kicked back into play by the crypt kicker.

A funky tune played and the DMD displayed a death save animation.

Just curious why the game would recognize/celebrate a death save if it was considered cheating?

Any thoughts/insight into this would be appreciated.

When you tilt, games will also play funky tunes and display custom animations.

Death saves are illegal in tournaments because we don’t want games to go on forever if the tilt isn’t set tight enough or the tilt bob has fallen off.

Manufacturers can do whatever they want in the code, but I wouldn’t want those decisions to automatically override tournament rulings.

If Rick and Morty were to award you a free 1,000 points for restarting your game in the middle of it, that wouldn’t suddenly legalize restarting your game in the middle of a tournament.

Rick and Morty may not award points for a death save, but it does play a super cool animation for it!

A well executed death save can be done with only a slight nudge in the right situation, I've pulled it off without as mush as a danger warning on a machine with rubber feet and a reasonable bob setting.

The "death save" and "bang back" are just more skills like a "slap save" or a "nudge" in my opinion...some people can do it, others can't.
Honestly, if you don't want your machine pushed around, tighten up the bob and put it on rubber feet...that's the greatest deterrent.

In competition, a death save is a DQ, regardless of whether you're in single ball or multiball play. Enforcing it could be more difficult, as you suggested, since a player could be nudging simultaneously to influence balls still in play. It comes down to sportsmanship. Like some of the other infrequently encountered rules in pinball comps, if the potential infraction can't be assessed with certainty, then as a TD, I would ask the player, "Did you nudge it to try to death save the outlane-drained ball?" If yes, then DQ. If no, then play on... and I'm then watching the player's remaining ball or game to ensure there aren't any other gray areas that he/she is attempting to circumvent.

Mr./Mrs. Tournament director I'd like to plead the 5th

Being more serious, that is one good thing about Pinball is it's extremely rare to see someone actively trying to cheat in a competitive situation and those that do generally get caught pretty quickly. In my 5 years of competitive pinball I think I've only seen two instances that I could say were intentional and not just an accident or lack of knowledge by the player in question.