9 replies to this topic

[scottacus]

I've had problems with VP9 Austin Powers and Dr Who tables where a ball goes missing from the table during multiball and the tables go into an endless loop of searching for the lost ball.  Nudging the table doesn't help so the ball is truly lost or is missing.  Is there a way of adding some form of error handling section to the script of tables to allow for creation of a new ball so that the table stops the infinite loop of searching for the missing ball?

[ta2686]

You could press the B key on the keyboard and then click Yes to add a ball to the trough.

 

Not sure how you can do that with a cab though.

[scottacus]

I was hoping for setting up a timer that starts when the ball search begins and then creates a ball if the search doesn't find a ball over a period of time.  I suppose folks could use this as an extra ball hack if they trapped a ball with a flipper but it would save having a keyboard out on a cab...

[allknowing2012]

You cant interact with the rom code to implement something like this..

[scottacus]

Yes, that makes sense but the ROM is getting fed something that is letting it know that nothing is happening on the playfield.  It must have some sort of loop that looks for playfield activity and if none is seen over a period of time it cycles the toys.

[gtxjoe]

The real fix is to identify how the ball is getting lost during multiball and fix it  

 

I am assuming for ball search, the ROM tracks switch state events.  Ball search gets triggered when it senses no switch activity for a certain amount of time and all the balls are not accounted for in the trough or kickers or ball locks, and a game is in progress.

 

For the VP script to figure out that a ball went missing would take some clever coding (is game in progress, check all troughs/kickers/locks and playfield for balls, how much time has passed after a switch changed) and there is always the chance that you accidentally add an extra ball to the table when the ball is simply stuck somewhere waiting to be nudged out.  

 

The script would have to be customized for every individual table and if the table is created properly would never be used

 

 

B can always be used to add a ball back into the trough.  Post a link to the table you use, and we could provide a script change to drop a ball into the shooter lane if that is preferred

[scottacus]

Thanks gtxjoe,  you're right, the error handler code would be a bear.  I was hoping for some sort of universal block of code that could be dropped into any table script to handle this problem.  

 

You are also right that the best solution is to figure out how the ball is getting lost and fix the table, the problem is that it usually happens during multiball (Dr Who and Austin Powers) and I'm not sure which ball is lost and where (once I think it was the Austin Powers Time Machine hole).  I just know that I end up with no balls on the table and the table is still running in the post multiball state.

[DJRobX]

Yep, Joe has it right.   Even within VPM, it's not easy to identify game states.    You might be able to do something like look for a bumper solenoid trigger without an associated switch hit in the last few seconds (the table has no reason to ever fire the bumper without the switch, unless it's hunting). 

 

Perhaps slightly off-topic, but If you're running PhysMod5 versions of tables, there is an issue in PM5's physics code that make balls flying off the table more likely and hard to fix permanently at the table level.  It has to do with the ball colliding with a right angle.   Mukuste fixed it in VPX.   I back-ported that fix to Physmod5 and integrated some of the other VP 9.9.2 fixes.    No warranty, but it seems to work pretty well for me. 

 

https://www.dropbox....icsfix.zip?dl=0

[gtxjoe]

Thanks for posting this.  Will give it a go

[Koolywiz]

Does this make sense.  On vp99 Austin Powers not physmod version, when you enter the ball into the time machine it just disappears from the table.  Its suppose to just roll out to the left.  Nudging doesn't release the ball.  This only happened after upgrading to the latest vpinmame 2.8, vpinballX, backglass, etc  Everything is at the latest version.  Now when i stick in a  drive that has vpinmame 2.7, and before all the other upgrades it works just fine.  Could the latest version of vpinmame be causing this?

Edited by Koolywiz, 15 January 2017 - 12:21 AM.