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I've been doing my damndest to reach Civil War's wizard mode (i.e. Wedding Party) a second time in the same game, and I just can't seem to do it no matter how well I play. And I don't feel like the issue is me anymore.
At first, I thought it was just because of the increased difficulty after switching alignment—every potential ally is on your enemy's team, combo hit requirements for supers are often near or at max, recruiting during a Fight is incredibly risky due to being overwhelmingly outnumbered initially—and the fact that your own allies and neutral characters seem to side with your enemy after some sort of hidden timer expires (I'm still not 100% sure how this mechanic works) unrelated to in-lanes, safe house hits, or Raft drop-targets. All of that stuff makes round two a serious challenge, and I'm okay with that; in fact, this struggle is what makes this table my favorite Zen table ever at 23 hours played. Yet I've never made it to a second Wedding Party wizard mode.
I started paying closer attention to what was happening in round two today. My (theoretical) strategy is to first play as Iron Man, rack up popularity and the significantly easier multipliers (easy to do during an Ambush multiball), avoid as many Super Combos as possible in order to more easily chain them for "recruitment barrages" as Captain America, then switch to Cap. At this point I immediately aim for the Raft on ball launch to steal Iron Man's popularity before the drop-targets fall, simultaneously attempt to rack up Godlike extra balls and Super Combos, and avoid Fights for as long as possible. And most importantly (and the whole reason I felt like playing the heroes in this order made sense) I focus on keeping Iron Man frozen at all times so that he can't gain back the people I recruit and neutralize. But all I kept hearing, repeatedly, was "Spider-Man has joined the Pro-Registration forces."
After the first couple of back-and-forths with Spider-Man, I realized something weird was happening. I hadn't Raft nor Safe House nor Registration hurry-ups active (I know when these things are active without the dot matrix, I'm not mistaken). There hadn't been much "inactivity" between the last character leaving my side, the kind that seems to encourage losing allies in round two. And most importantly—Iron Man is frozen. How the hell is he gaining allies? How the hell is he stealing my allies? And then I noticed that all of this was happening when I was in the middle of accruing combo shots for Super Combos.
Rewind to immediately before I noticed this. I had been playing for about ten minutes. I was still on my first ball, with an extra ball in reserve, and was up to 120 million. I was ecstatic that I had managed to quickly start and win an Ambush, getting the ally-enemy ratio closer to my favor, at 2 to 5. I was having a great game and felt like I was actually going to reach a second Wedding Party. I started to focus back on Super Combos, playing frantically and recklessly as past experience dictated I should in order to prevent ally hemorrhage, having a damn good time. Iron Man was basically a block of ice, ballsave was blinking, and I had just activated two Super Combos in the same set of combo shots! I followed that up with yet another super, and realized I had heard the same thing twice now in ten seconds: Spider-Man joining PRO-Registration.
The haze of (lucky) amazing combo chaining mania washed away, and I checked the character board: ZERO Allies, SEVEN Enemies.
This has been a long post, I realize that now, so I'll start to close this out by asking: what the hell is going on? Does anyone have any insight for me on this? I feel like I could write a thesis paper about this table and all of its hidden features and mechanics. I'm not near some sort of pro player, but I'm in the top 100 single-play leaderboard (and number 2 for Weekly at the moment!), and I know how to work this table and make the ball dance and sing all day long. Yet I can't seem to tame this particular beast.
At first, I thought it was just because of the increased difficulty after switching alignment—every potential ally is on your enemy's team, combo hit requirements for supers are often near or at max, recruiting during a Fight is incredibly risky due to being overwhelmingly outnumbered initially—and the fact that your own allies and neutral characters seem to side with your enemy after some sort of hidden timer expires (I'm still not 100% sure how this mechanic works) unrelated to in-lanes, safe house hits, or Raft drop-targets. All of that stuff makes round two a serious challenge, and I'm okay with that; in fact, this struggle is what makes this table my favorite Zen table ever at 23 hours played. Yet I've never made it to a second Wedding Party wizard mode.
I started paying closer attention to what was happening in round two today. My (theoretical) strategy is to first play as Iron Man, rack up popularity and the significantly easier multipliers (easy to do during an Ambush multiball), avoid as many Super Combos as possible in order to more easily chain them for "recruitment barrages" as Captain America, then switch to Cap. At this point I immediately aim for the Raft on ball launch to steal Iron Man's popularity before the drop-targets fall, simultaneously attempt to rack up Godlike extra balls and Super Combos, and avoid Fights for as long as possible. And most importantly (and the whole reason I felt like playing the heroes in this order made sense) I focus on keeping Iron Man frozen at all times so that he can't gain back the people I recruit and neutralize. But all I kept hearing, repeatedly, was "Spider-Man has joined the Pro-Registration forces."
After the first couple of back-and-forths with Spider-Man, I realized something weird was happening. I hadn't Raft nor Safe House nor Registration hurry-ups active (I know when these things are active without the dot matrix, I'm not mistaken). There hadn't been much "inactivity" between the last character leaving my side, the kind that seems to encourage losing allies in round two. And most importantly—Iron Man is frozen. How the hell is he gaining allies? How the hell is he stealing my allies? And then I noticed that all of this was happening when I was in the middle of accruing combo shots for Super Combos.
Rewind to immediately before I noticed this. I had been playing for about ten minutes. I was still on my first ball, with an extra ball in reserve, and was up to 120 million. I was ecstatic that I had managed to quickly start and win an Ambush, getting the ally-enemy ratio closer to my favor, at 2 to 5. I was having a great game and felt like I was actually going to reach a second Wedding Party. I started to focus back on Super Combos, playing frantically and recklessly as past experience dictated I should in order to prevent ally hemorrhage, having a damn good time. Iron Man was basically a block of ice, ballsave was blinking, and I had just activated two Super Combos in the same set of combo shots! I followed that up with yet another super, and realized I had heard the same thing twice now in ten seconds: Spider-Man joining PRO-Registration.
The haze of (lucky) amazing combo chaining mania washed away, and I checked the character board: ZERO Allies, SEVEN Enemies.
This has been a long post, I realize that now, so I'll start to close this out by asking: what the hell is going on? Does anyone have any insight for me on this? I feel like I could write a thesis paper about this table and all of its hidden features and mechanics. I'm not near some sort of pro player, but I'm in the top 100 single-play leaderboard (and number 2 for Weekly at the moment!), and I know how to work this table and make the ball dance and sing all day long. Yet I can't seem to tame this particular beast.
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