I was playing in a tournament at a local pool club. Got to 1/4 finals and had this friendly italian guy as my opponent who i have played a few times before and get along fine etc

playing 9-ball in the first game i had the last 4 balls left (6 7 8 9). I had a brainfart and started hitting the 7. Instantly after I got my shot off my opponent says "sorry my friend, number 6 first" and takes his ball in hand and clears the table.

A friend who has more experience playing pool than I once told me that it good etiquette to tell a person if you notice they are hitting the wrong ball and that some people might get very pissed if it was clear that you noticed it but did not say anything

After the frame I told my opponent politely that he should have told me that I was hitting the wrong ball. It became 100% clear that he did not know about it as he was very polite to everyone in and out of the tables. He apologized like 100 times and offers to replay the frame. I also made it clear to him that it was not a rule but etiquette thing which he understood. I announced it was 1-0 to him and his break as he didn't know about it and didn't break any rules.

What do you think about this in general? Would you have taken the offer to replay the game?

also 2nd question. in the same pool club when playing 8-ball tournaments the house rules say that even if you pocket your own ball but on the same shot one or more of your opponent's balls go in too it's a ball in hand to your opponent. this makes 0 sense to me and many of the regs I have met in the club feel it's stupid rule.

Should I respect the house rules and not say anything to the owner or try to get names of people who would like the rule changed and bring it up with the owner?

No, you are clearly in the wrong. Leave the bananas alone.

Edit: I warn people, but I don't hold it against people who don't. I screwed up
Thats a standard rule, and part of the international rules. Potting your opponents ball is a foul full-stop. It makes no sense to me that potting your own ball would negate that.

Edit: For 2 shot 8 ball anyway

how are you putting "international rules" and "2 shot 8 ball" in the same paragraph? afaik no international tournament uses 2 shot 8 ball rule and is only used in the UK and in australia and mainly on the bar tables.

imo only thing that should matter is the ball/pocket that you called. if you sink that ball to the pocet you called it should be the only thing that matters (apart from cue ball going in too or 8-ball going in when you are still pocketing the first 7).

http://www.internationalpooltour.com/Rules/

these are pretty much the rules i have learned to follow

i am not sure what you meant with your comment to my etiquette question

IPT was a short lived tour run by the scammer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Trudeau. I'm not sure what the end result was, but after the first series they didn't pay half the players for the final event and I stopped paying attention.

http://www.wepf.org/index.php is the world body for 8-ball and their rules are 2 shot.

re: ettiquette. I think you did the right thing, but usually when someone is shooting at the wrong ball its because they've had to many drunks or other illicit substances.

fair enough, looks like the rule is more popular than i thought. i think the 2 shot rule is ******ed but that's just my opinion. any decent player should clear the table with one turn often and if you get 2 sometimes i can't see how it is good for the game.

i guess it is ok rule for weaker players who need several turns to run the table

and even if that guy was a scammer i like his/their rules for the tournament

re etiquette. i wasn't drunk yet, just an honest brainfart. haven't shot the wrong ball in a looooooooong time

your opponent has no obligation to point out your aloofness. if it was a friendly match i'd mention it but if anything's at stake it's on the shooter. in fact, i think it's pretty awful you told him he should have given you fair warning.

regarind the 2nd part, that is a horrible rule imo. i'd just ask the owner why it's in place and mention the majority of players aren't in favor.

I play in an 8 ball league and one of the rules states that if your opponent asks you whether they are solids or stripes you have to answer honestly. However, you're under no obligation to tell them they are shooting at the wrong ones (bar league, hehe) and can even wait until they've pocketed a few of your's in before calling a foul. I think etiquette really only comes into play when it's a friendly match.

thanks for the comments. I never said it was a rule though hence the topic's name

What I have learned though since the start of this topic that the opinions seem to be divided between not telling and telling. the person who coached me said if I did that in the club where we played people would be pissed at me and some people i have met here in phuket say that they would say in a friendly game but not when playing in a tournament or for money

i wouldn't have mentioned it to some people. This guy was an exception. first, we were playing for really small money, basically for bragging rights. the buy-in for the tournament is only 200 baht ($7) and the winner gets ~$30 in cash and $50 in drink vouchers

2nd, i got along really well with the guy. I didn't care who won the match as I wanted him to succeed too. If it was someone else I would have probably just stayed quiet. I told it to him politely and we talked about it calmly. I think even after what I have learned now I still would have mentioned it to him

this seems like a horrible rule. I was googling 8-ball rules and found this

----------

I have also learned that the rule is fairly common in england and in australia at least. the owner of the club is australian so i guess that's why the rule is in place. i will bring it up in the next 8-ball tournament though, mostly it's 9-ball there

There is absolutely no way I would ever tell my opponent that he's shooting the wrong ball in a game of 9ball if there was anything on the line (tournament, cash, etc). In a friendly game I would though.

thank you for your comment.

looks like this things had more sides than I originally thought so I am glad I started this thread

probably depends a bit on skill level too.

if you outmatch your opponent by a great degree i would think most people would let them know, but if it were close or the other way around pokerface imo

You should never interfere in a game someone else is playing as the consequences of doing it are far worse - so many filth angle shooters just start saying things on key shots and then acting like they missread the table. Don't ever talk or stop people on shots in any kind of game that matters PERIOD.

On his side afterwards, its def the right thing to do. Anytime an unknown/known player with integrity calls a rule you did not know about you should always be as polite as possible and offer to reset the game from where it was and adapt to it, or if it is ridiculous rule (as this one is IMO) try and explain in a highly diplomatic way (most likely on a different night) why it is a poor rule and that you don't want to play it for x reason(s).

Agreed, if anything's on the line you need to let them make their own mistake. They shouldn't get mad at you for not helping them beat you

That being said, I play mostly friendly tournaments, and the times I've seen new players aiming for the wrong ball I've helped out. Don't need them making mental errors when I can beat them fair and square.

thanks

your 2nd paragraph doesn't make much sense to me though. did you mix-up my etiquette question with the rule i didn't like there? they were 2 different topics

No I just meant that you calling this drew the right response from him, and if you face a similar siituation go along with it at first and then bring up the fact that etiquette/rule/whatever is no good and you don't want to play it.

thanks for clarification

i agree

In any game I play I would pretty much NEVER tell my opponent when they are about to make a mistake or commit a foul. Why the hell would I? It's up to them to know what they're doing/know the rules, not me.

This comes up in snooker once in a while too, where people start clearing the table not knowing that there aren't enough points on to win. When they do that with me I never interrupt them. Once again it's up to them to know the score, not me.

Now of course in a friendly game or a local tournament like you say you were in I might take the guy at his word and replay the game, but I'll never forgive the foul and just let him reset the balls as they were, if for nothing else then to help him learn for next time.

House rules vary at 8-ball more than at any other game, and you should always respect them no matter how dumb they are (and this is a very dumb rule and has no place in competition). No idea how it worked its way into the UK barbox version of the 'official' rules, but they play that dumb 2nd shot style anyways. In North American BCA rules, it's most certainly not a foul to pocket your opponent's ball on an otherwise legal shot ( http://www.playbca.com/Leagues/Rules/8BallRules.aspx) and nor is it in the official rules of the World Pool Association, which is the main governing body of the professional game (http://www.wpa-pool.com/web/the_rules_of_play) and both of those bodies use ball-in-hand and not 2 shot fouls.

I've played 2-shot all my life, so I have almost the exact opposite opinion to most of this thread.

Even assuming that the game is one shot, why on earth would potting your own ball change a foul into a non-foul?

Potting your opponents ball would be a foul 'normally', correct? It would be a foul if you potted your ball and the black in the same shot right? You don't continue playing if you sink your ball and the white do you?

This sounds like something a hustler came up with after accidentally potting an opponents ball in a money game.

Opponent "Foul, you sank my ball"
Huster "Ugh... um....nonono I potted my ball, so that means it isn't a foul and its still my shot - House rules" (there's one born every minute)
Opponent "..."
Huster (sucker)

Actually it comes from the original 'call shot' game, which was straight pool (or 14.1). In that game it doesn't matter what else happens on a legal shot, so long as you make the designated ball in the designated pocket (or 'bag' as you Brits like to call it ).

So if I call the four ball in the side pocket, make it, and also happen to make the five ball in the corner, I made the shot I called and I keep shooting (and I get a point for both balls). That carried over into 8 ball. Thus if I make my, say, stripe ball into the pocket I called, but happen to knock in your solid ball it's not a foul because I made the shot I called, plain and simple.
I can even use this to deal with a plugged pocket, where you hung your solid ball on the lip of a 'bag' and I shoot a stripe into it and have it follow it in. In our rules that's perfectly legal (and takes a lot of skill to execute, I might add).

Of course it's not allowed to pocket the eight ball unless all your balls are gone, but that is a difference between 8 ball and 14.1 that is specifically addressed in the rules.

Furthermore in straight pool it's perfectly allowed to call 'safe' and pocket a ball, and so that carries into 8 ball as well -- you can call 'safe' and, after legally touching a ball in your group, knock a ball in your opponent's group into the pocket, either by combo or by billiard. Perfectly legal and often tactically useful.

Thems fightin' words
Heh.

I'll rephrase:
Opponent "Foul, you sank my ball"
Huster "Ugh... um....nonono I made the shot I called, plain and simple, so that means it isn't a foul and its still my shot - House rules" (there's one born every minute)

Your description makes some sense and is in line with 9-ball (and 10-ball?), but from a snooker background a foul is a foul. If you call the blue and break the pack open sinking a red that's a foul, not a "but i potted the ball i called"

It would appear that the various 8-ball rules relate directly to either 9-ball/Straight pool or Snooker, and i'm guessing the prevalence of call-shot v world rules are directly related to the popularity of the other games. (fwiw i'm guessing opinions on jumping are also related here)

I'll argue that it at least as hard to shift the blocking ball or promote/position on the blocked ball as it is to carom a ball hanging in a bag.

You're able to deliberately pot an opponents ball without penalty? Ugh that sounds criminal.

To each there own i guess.

Sorry, I forgot Australia is an actual place. It's somewhere near Africa, right?


Actually the rules are written to get away from the goofy house rules that so many places use and more toward concepts that reward skill as opposed to random variance. They also cut down on the kind of disputes you see in some bars where you're supposed to call 'kisses' and short rails and stuff. Designated ball, designated hole, period. What could be simpler?

Well yes, but I happen to think it's a dumb rule in snooker. All it does is add a random element to the game that doesn't need to be there. I mean, I understand the reasoning but in practice all it really accomplishes is occasionally screwing a guy who makes what would otherwise be a (very) good shot.

Well it seems that the so-called 'world' rules that you quoted are specifically for pub rules eight ball played on the small tables with the snooker pockets, which to my knowledge is played pretty much only in the UK and Australia (and maybe Malta), while the WPA/BCA rules are used for pretty much the rest of the world and all professional tournaments (though of course actual pro 8 ball tournaments are really pretty rare -- it's more of an amateur game).

Sure, but sometimes those things just can't be done, in which case the guy with the hanging ball has an advantage he didn't earn.

Yeah well if you shoot at your ball and miss it, but hang it deep in the pocket and block a couple of my balls from going in, that could be a position from which there's no way any player could win the game. But what did you do to earn that? After all you missed, right? Why should you gain such an advantage for playing a bad shot?

BAGS THO

We're way off topic, but i'm finding this interesting.

Being facetious - not having to nominate at all?

I dont agree with this in snooker an really disagree with this in 8-ball.

In snooker i've seen plenty of instances where players have had to change their shots because a red they are going to run into is also a plant. In 8-ball avoiding potting an opponents ball probably occurs more often, and failing to avoid is a lack of skill imo.

And if the shot was deliberately played to block a pocket? Could that not be called tactics?

Even on an english table it is surprising hard to block a pocket. I'd go as far to say that it is harder to block a pocket _completely_ than it is to pot the ball. On an American table id suspect it is even harder.

It is very rare that you can't do something to promote your ball or jam an opponents ball out of a pocket from some spot on the table.

I had a situation last night where my opponent was in trouble with a couple of dead balls and deliberately played a tough shot to block the 8 ball from being potable, and separated the two dead balls. They played it pretty much perfectly leaving the 8 was blocked to the corner by my opponents ball separated from the 8 by less than 2 inches. It was a great tactical shot, it opened the table for them to be able to pot out next shot, and made potting out from my position low probability.

I was able to pot my first for position on a second ball that allowed me to make solid contact on the 8, and maintain position on my next ball and got out. It was a great game and I enjoyed it thoroughly, and had I lost I had to appreciate the tough spot my opponent put me in.

I'm sure equivalent alternate tactics become available using the one-shot ruleset too. I prefer the world rules because the one-shot rules seem too easy (i'm also sure i'm wrong) as it removes/changes a lot of the tactics that i've grown up learning.

i don't think you can compare snooker and 8-ball regarding this rule. the games play completely different

in snooker with reds you can pocket any red to any pocket and it's ok. pocketing a coloured ball should be a foul even if you pocketed a red imo. same goes with pocketing a red when succesfully pocketing a coloured ball

also unlike in 8-ball in snooker players share the balls as in 9-ball where it's ok to sink a ball to any pocket

imo if you pocketed the ball you nominated (ball+pocket) and as long as the cue ball or 8-ball don't go in (and you don't scratch in any physical way) it should still be your turn even if you pocket 1+ of your opponent's balls.