Shaman Trophy Guide by skippycue

Kickbacks and Ball Save –The kickbacks are easily enabled on this table by spelling “MAGIC” in the lanes, once for each. The ball save on this table is pretty useless unfortunately. Ball save is enabled by spelling “CAST” at the top of the table, but this is only before you trap a ball up there. It is after you trap a ball up there that you really need ball save enabled so I honestly never bothered with it. That’s one of the reasons this table was so hard to complete...

Rave (Bronze)
Activate any of the magic spinners during any game mode!

This is definitely the easiest trophy for this table. Simply take out the 3 drop targets in front of the guy playing the drums and then hit the ball into the hole revealed behind them.

Doom Bringer (Bronze)
Summon a disaster for the unbelievers!

This is definitely not an easy trophy, but I’d say it’s doable. Here are the steps involved with casting a disaster:

1. Hit the ball into the left or right sink hole to lower the ramp for the mini playfield. These holes are outlined with flames so they should be easy to spot. I find the left hole is much easier to hit from a caught position consistently if you wait until the ball is almost falling off the right flipper to hit it.
   
   
2. You then have 10 seconds to hit the ball up the jump that was lowered into the mini playfield. The jump is marked by a red spear-head light to the right of the guy playing the drums. You’ll have to figure out the timing for this, but after the ball comes out of the sink hole you should nudge it to the right flipper and then nudge it back to the left flipper to get it in a caught position (it’s going too fast to simply catch with the left flipper and timing your shot while the ball is moving is tougher). From a caught position you should be able to develop decent timing to getting the ball up the jump before the 10 seconds is up.
   
   
3. Once in the mini playfield you have to spell out “ELEMENT” by hitting all the letters using the upper flippers. This takes a bit of practice to do without losing the ball down the center. As with the V12 table, hitting the ball later does a nice job of getting it from one flipper to the other. The toughest letters are the center ones because hitting these can make the ball tough to catch, but you should get used to it.
   
   
4. Once you have spelled “ELEMENT” successfully, the letters will be replaced by 4 elements, Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. You have to hit one of these elements with the ball until it is outlined with a box. I found that hitting these can be troublesome and doesn’t seem to register sometimes. If you hit one of the center ones they tend to register right away and then hitting the outer ones seems to work fine. After you have selected an element you can let the ball drain down to the main table.
   
   
5. The next thing you have to do is shoot a ball up into one of the sink holes at the top of the table. These holes are located right above the word “CAST”. It’s essentially the same shot you used to get the ball up into the mini playfield except this time you’re going under that jump. If you do this successfully, some bars will pop up and trap the ball at the top of the table (you should be able to see it resting between 2 bars). There are 2 positions the ball can rest in while it is stuck up there because there are 3 bars holding it in place. I’ll refer to these positions as left or right.
   
   
6. Once you have trapped the ball, a new ball will be launched for you automatically. What you have to do now is spell out “CAST” by hitting the trapped ball into one of the sink holes behind it. You have to hit it into a sink hole 4 times to cast the selected disaster. There are several techniques for this.

• I found that I had the most success by hitting the left ramp and then hitting the ball with the left flipper as it was moving. This did not lead to many scary center drain problems, but did take a bit of practice to do relatively consistently. For this maneuver you want to make sure you nudge the upper ball into the right slot or you won’t be able to get the right angle off the flipper.
  
• The other method I used was nudging the upper ball to the left slot and then shooting directly at it from a caught position on the left flipper. I was able to hit it pretty well doing this, but unfortunately slight missed led to immediate ball drains so I gave up on this technique.
  
• The last method suggested to me by sb59 was to hit the ball straight up from the right flipper when it was in a caught position. Apparently this works well and usually drops the ball right back down onto the flipper. This sounds promising so I thought I’d mention it as well. Since I have not done this, I can’t say which slot the upper ball should be in.

Once the disaster is cast you will receive the trophy. I should mention that on occasion the game seems to get confused as to which ball you are actively using and the camera gets a little screwed up so you can’t actually see your ball. If this happens you can change the view so that it’s zoomed out or nudge the table a little and it should correct it.

Spirit of the Wilderness (Bronze)
Make a Super Combo!

I found this trophy to be quite difficult to do legitimately. A combo starts when you hit 2 ramps in a row before the lights go out after hitting the first ramp. You have to ramp grind about 6 or 7 times to get a super combo and that requires learning when to hit the ball when it’s moving. The problem is it starts moving progressively faster so there becomes an element of luck involved. At the time I got this trophy, I did know the technique for nudging the ball from one flipper to the other. I believe using this technique you could easily hit the same ramp over and over for an easy super combo.

Domination (Silver)
Rule the tribe by summoning all of the natural disasters!

This is one of the 2 toughest trophies in the game! I’d say this and “Master Mind” are equally difficult and incredible accomplishments for anyone who achieves them! The trophy description for this is accurate, but misleading… There is actually a fifth disaster that you can only cast after you cast and successfully complete the other 4 disasters. All disasters are completed by getting a ball in all three juggler’s holes (the sink holes on the left and right and the one behind the drummer), so I won’t repeat that in every disaster description. Once you hit a sink hole, the lights will go out so you don’t have to hit it again. Of course it’s not as easy as that… each disaster has other requirements as well. When you complete a disaster you will see a corresponding light on the shaman’s staff turn on so you know you’ve completed it.

Tip: When you successfully complete a disaster ball save becomes enabled, and you immediately go into multiball where you can score mucho points… but I would highly recommend avoiding this. Points is not what you are going for here and multiball can get out of hand very quickly losing all the balls and wasting a real ball. If you’re feeling brave you can play multiball until the ball save is used or times out, but then you have to worry about catching one of the balls without letting them all drain. I got burned by this too many times so when multiball began I literally caught one of the balls and just let the others drain.

Let’s go through each disaster one at a time:

• Volcano
This disaster isn’t too bad. When you cast it you’ll see a light indicating that you have to go into the volcano. The right ramp will lead into the volcano if you get a strong clean hit, otherwise it will just take the lower path to the right lane. Once in the volcano you should nudge the ball to try to hit as many little metal triggers as you can before leaving (of course don’t tilt because you can always go back in and you’ll need to). I generally only nudge a little while I’m in there. I think hitting the flippers must shift the lights around because when I go back in there they seem shifted making it pretty easy to light them all up and spell “VOLCANO”. After you’ve successfully spelled “VOLCANO” the lights will flash and the ball will come out orange (it’s hot!). At this point you have to hit the ball into the 3 juggler’s holes. This may involve clearing the drop targets in front of the drummer again. The ball has to be orange or it doesn’t count and it only stays orange for a short time. Fortunately, every time you go into the volcano the ball comes out orange (you don’t have to spell out “VOLCANO” again).

• Flood
The flood is the second hardest disaster to complete. When you cast it you’ll see that the left and right orbits are lit up. You have to hit 3 orbits to raise the flood waters and then you can hit the juggler’s holes. This may sound easy, but the flood waters slow the ball down a lot! You can hit the left orbit starting from a caught position on the right flipper with some practice (the positions are slightly different with the slow ball speed), but the right orbit is tricky. You can’t hit this directly from a caught position on the left flipper. You have to build up enough speed to hit the orbit with enough force to make it all the way around. I was able to do this by hitting the left ramp and then hitting the ball as it was still moving on the left flipper. This is still by no means an easy shot and I was never able to do it consistently. You’ll have to figure out the timing for yourself with some practice. Keep in mind that even nudging the ball is different so it’s not even as easy to get the ball from one flipper to the other unless you nudge relatively hard. I would recommend hitting the left orbit, then the right and then the left orbit again. After that the juggler’s holes should light up and you can finish the disaster.

UPDATE thanks to steviej: for flood, the easiest way to hit the right orbit is to start with a clean left ramp shot straight into a right orbit shot. When you get to the point where the ball can fall through to the bumpers (which it probably will do) give it a firm nudge to the left. Worked every time for me.

• Tornado
This is not too bad if you’re careful. All 3 spinners come on and they drastically affect the ball flight if you get too close to them. If you hit the ball hard and clean enough then it should be fine generally. For this disaster you’ll have to hit the left ramp and the right ramp (hitting the right ramp must not go into the volcano or it won’t count). I’m not entirely sure how many times you have to hit them, but hitting them changes the direction and speed of the spinners so I know it has something to do with that. I basically just hit them while they were lit up until the juggler’s holes lit up. Finish the disaster by hitting the juggler’s holes when they are lit up.

• Earthquake
This is definitely the hardest disaster to complete. When you cast this the view zooms out and the table immediately goes to 3 ball multiball. You have to hit the juggler’s holes while keeping at least 2 balls alive. The table periodically shakes due to the earthquake making it even more challenging. I would start out by focusing on hitting the balls as they are on the edge of the flippers (typical side sink hole shots) and making sure that you don’t let anything drain down the center. The more balls you hit, the more you’ll hopefully have accomplished. If you get down to 2 balls try to catch them on one or 2 flippers. At this point you can assess what you have left to do and try to focus on that. Be careful though because if they are both on one flipper the earthquake could shake one of them free so pay attention. If you managed to get them on opposite flippers you can shoot one up a ramp and make an aimed shot with the other. Don’t try to hit a left or right sink hole if there is a ball on the opposite flipper because you will slam right into that flipper and probably lose your ball. There’s not much else that I can say for this, it just takes some practice and a lot of good luck! Fortunately the only thing you have to do here is get the balls in the juggler’s holes to complete the disaster.

UPDATE (thanks to steviej): Well I can now confrim that for the Shaman Earthquake you have to hit all 3 holes twice.
Guess they thought once was too easy...Bastards!


After completing all 4 disasters you’ll need to get back up to the mini playfield one more time to select the final disaster. This time you won’t be presented with 4 disasters, but instead you will see some sort of picture with a spooky creature that looks like an owl… I’m not even sure you have to hit it with the ball, but I did a few times to make sure. Cast that disaster like all the rest and you will have the trophy. Now feel free to go crazy for points since you don’t have to complete this disaster for the trophy!

Tip: I’d complete the disasters in order of difficulty so you don’t waste time completing the easy ones when you want to focus on the hard ones. I started of with earthquake, then flood, then tornado, then volcano.