Creating scene 1 part 1, "The temple of doom"

This scenes purpose is to mimic a very famous scene from the film series "Indiana Jones".
To create this scene I planned to use the reactor engine, so that the ball would look realistic when it hits the A.
Firstly, I created the A, a plane with a slight tilt, and a ball.
Using the reactor engine, I gave the objects mass and chose which ones would not react. I then built the animation from the reactor engine, taking it into the standard animation system for 3dsMax, and I added in my camera.
As you can see, from below, the basic animation is visible but theres a number of rather prominent problems, namely the letter A being transparent.