Dolly Parton

The first inline drop target lights your spinner - do that immediately\! If the spinner is juicy, i.e. it registers many spins per shot (ideally 20+, but at least 10-15), one viable strategy is just shoot the lit spinner all day. The other high point value option is to finish the inline drop targets to get your bonus multiplier up to 5X; the second target gets you 2X, the third 3X, the last one 5X. The stand-up target behind the inline drops scores 20K, but it’s a tight shot and misses can drain, so at that point, just use the left flipper for the spinner even if not juicy. On many Dollys you can backhand the drop targets from the right flipper; try it\!

End of ball base bonus is 2K per letter in “Dolly Parton” collected. You get Parton letters from the top saucer and the inline drop targets, Dolly letters from the stand-up targets at the upper left. If you finish them all, you get a “super bonus” of 22K locked in for the rest of the game and can start a second set of letters. There’s another lock-in at two sets for 44K. After that, completing the letters scores a special and resets them; don’t do that unless you get points for specials. Your maximum bonus is then [ [ 44K \+ 10x2K ] times 5X ] or 320,000. Since the 22K and 44K values hold from ball to ball, you’ll need to get these early in the game to get a top score in qualifying unless that spinner is really juiced. My general technique for collecting letters is just fling the ball at the slingshot left of the bumpers and try to nudge the bounces into the Dolly letters, the top saucer, or both, before the ball comes back down. Since the bumpers block direct shots at most of the Dolly letters, nudging skill can be more important than shot accuracy on this game.

Ignore the 5000 lane just below the spinner; if a ball goes through there, fine, but it’s not worth risking shots at.

Format note: in “best game” format, it’s important to get your DOLLY PARTON letters and 5X multiplier for the potential 320K end of ball bonus. In match play, assuming the spinner is reasonably active, shooting the spinner once lit is usually the better way to go rather than shooting the additional in-line drop targets for bonus multipliers.