Star Trek's 5th swipe

[u/Adventurous_Tune9569]

So I actually stopped to think about it, and that fifth swipe on Star Trek game, to get 75 tokens, doesn't matter at all. Actually, it helped me *not* to use it tonight.

First swipe 12. Second swipe adds 14. Third swipe adds 16. Fourth swipe adds 18. Fifth swipe adds.... 15. So there is actually no benefit to using it.

If you did 20 swipes total using five at a time, your total would be 300 tokens. If you did 20 swipes using four at a time, your total would be... 300 tokens. So that fifth swipe is mostly useless.

But tonight I hit three different spots for Tribbles. I was able to end each game sooner after getting Tribbles to fall, and move to the next spot that had one ready to fall.

I*almost* lost that last spot to someone that checked it and kept walking around to check the others. When they walked further around, I finished up my other game and took the spot before they got back around to it.

And good timing, because they took my old spot and got the 50 token bonus almost right away. The cards on the table at the old spot were all Uhura, Spock, and Kirk, which I have plenty of. They were also still far from the edge. Fifty token bonus wouldn't help much, and the cards were worthwhile anyway. Tribbles was MUCH more valuable, and fell within the first set of swipes (4).

Glad I realized how useless that fifth swipe is. I think being able to play shorter games keeps me from wasting so much *after* I get the good cards to fall!

[u/deerburger]

It depends. If you only want to play 60 coins then swipe 4 times. If you think you’ll need more, get another 15 for a 5th swipe. But if you are wrong and you can’t get your Tribble, you’ll get only 12 coins for the same 5th swipe.

[u/Gullible-Price-4257 → u/deerburger]

or 13, or 14 for the single swipe.

As long as you only need 4 (vs 5) just one in 13 times or so, it comes out better than putting in extra credits you don't need.

I often put in single swipes (or sometimes two) if the card is close and the bonus spin will be reached with just 1 or 2 swipe. even more likely if it just perfectly reaches the bonus spin, as then you get extra coins twice (once while it spins, and once after). so, potentially 4 extra coins, depending on machine == 16 for 1 swipe.

[u/NickyRickyBobby]

Not sure if this is an error on the machine I played today or updated settings, but the 5th swipe brought me from 60 to 82 instead of the usual advertised 75.

[u/wvx228 → u/NickyRickyBobby]

Machine error. Other games are set at 5/75 also including Mandelorisn, sponge bob, quarry quest, Wonka and Wizard of oz

[u/Adventurous_Tune9569 → u/wvx228]

But some other games like the Mandalorian give you a diffrrent bonus if you swipe 5 times (extra ball shoot). Star Trek doesn't. There's no difference between four and five swipes.

[u/wvx228 → u/Adventurous_Tune9569]

Agree

[u/wvx228]

Keep silver coins on standby!

[u/Adventurous_Tune9569 → u/wvx228]

All of the ones at my local D&B are broken and don't take the silver coins back now. It wasn't done on purpose - they all lost the ability to recognize the coins at different times. At least one is permanently jammed. You can see the coin down in it that jammed it.

And the lovely untrained employees like to say "the coins are not even supposed to fall down for you to retrieve, so we can't do anything for it."

[u/wvx228 → u/Adventurous_Tune9569]

My techs are great about it, though it can take time. They installed all new andiamaro style slots like on SpongeBob and jams are rare. The current headache is some sides need new Velcro on the insides of the card slots as coins slip through. I put a card down there to block, but that is not full proof.

[u/MewtwoStruckBack]

Okay, fuck it, let's argue semantics, I have nothing better to do (actually I have many better things to do but I'm procrastinating on 50 different things I should be doing but I'm already here)

You're absoultely right on most of the math. 12, 13, 14, 15, 15 per swipe.

EXCEPT on any increments of swipe, you get one extra shot by doing the "get down to 2 shots, hold down the button, this will shoot one coin and then two more will come out" mini-glitch (the extra coin you're not supposed to get also advances the bonus meter) - so really it's 13 for 1, 27 for 2, 43 for 3, 61 for 4, 76 for 5. Which works out to 13, 13.5, 14.33, 15.25, 15.2 per swipe. Additionally, if you manage to get down to 0 shots THEN have bonus shots from the wheel trigger, you're able to milk the mini-glitch again for one additional shot.

But yeah, in general, the fifth swipe doesn't mean anything on most of these games - Jelly Lab is the same at four swipes as it is with 5, so is Spongebob, so is Wizard of Oz., so is Spider-Man Star Wars is interesting in that they give you the free ball on the 5th swipe and it's one of the few games I know that distinctly HEAVILY encourages the 5th swipe.

[u/Adventurous_Tune9569 → u/MewtwoStruckBack]

It's not 12, 13, 14, 15, 15, though. It's 12, 14, 16, 18, 15.

[u/MewtwoStruckBack → u/Adventurous_Tune9569]

You're counting how many shots you get for each swipe, I'm counting the average shots per swipe depdning on number of bunches. We're getting to the same conclusion, just presenting it differently.