Thanks for the real life reference - that requires a game with human referee's though, and is in any case a bad idea since it leaves entirely too much room for interpretation imo.




Lets not talk about "gaining an advantage". It's never a matter of gaining an advantage, it's a matter of keeping the advantage gained by the player blocking the pocket to a minimum. It's never desirable to pot an opponent ball and implicitly fouling. It's a matter of choosing the lesser among evils.

cheers, this was the point i was making


i think this could be a good idea. on this site, us8 is still easily my favourite game, but in my opinion, the advantage for such deliberate fouls is one flaw i don't appreciate.

end of the day everyone's going to have a different take on this. i'm glad to see im not the only one who finds this factor in us8 frustrating

Again, don't turn things upside down here. Fouling is always about minimizing a disadvantage. It's never ever an advantage. You would 100 times out of 100 prefer not having to.

You should have seen all the very similar, and equally ridiculous discussions we've had over the years on the opposite side to this coin: players blocking the pocket. You'd be amazed how many players actually manage to think of THAT as unsporting. Of course *I* don't - it's a perfectly legitimate strategy, just like the response of sinking blocking balls.

The bottom line you seem to be missing is that you think the player fouling is gaining an advantage. By blocking a pocket he later in the game will need to use, you have put him at a very real, partially deserved disadvantage. When he then proceeds to choose the lesser evil and pot the ball, you STILL have him at a disadvantage, just a slightly smaller and more balanced one.

Dedicate my second tourney win in us 8 ball to my deliberate foul and to jonnyveggie


Oops wrong thread


Peace

again? when did i turn things "upside down" before? "fouling is always about minimizing a disadvantage"? i think you've made a bit of an error with "always". and there is nothing wrong with putting your own balls wherever you want on the table. the game certainly has no issue with this, its perfectly within the confines of what youre allowed and expected to do in pool.


heh



how is it the lesser evil? blocking a pocket is not against anything in pool. even us8, aslong as you touch a cushion its "perfectly legitimate" as you would say. sinking someone elses ball is a foul, it is discouraged.

"partially deserved"? lol. why only partially?


ahuh

aw shucks

thats still rubbish when talking of a situation where your opponent who has done the foul only has one ball left, and so you cannot then sink theirs in return because they will get a free shot on the black in us8. or else, if you have more than 1 ball near that same pocket that they now have blocked, because they chose to purposely foul sinking one of your balls, when most likely you havent fouled purposely during the entire game.

lesser evil? balls

Because as I tried to teach you earlier, and clearly miserably failed to accomplish, reward has to match effort.

Blocking pockets is already a sufficiently efficient strategyfor US 8 ball to be all about just that. Which is perfectly fine with me. But it would be very bad for the game if the efficiency of blocking were to be further increased by outlawing one of the few efficient counters.

Just to be clear here: I'm not at all opposed to the idea of blocking pockets - on the contrary, any strategy beyond merely trying to pot is a big bonus for any pool game. But things need a balance, both effort vs reward, and offense vs defense. For every action there needs to be a balanced reaction.

You are basically asking to have one side of a currently balanced equation removed - which would pretty much ruin the game type completely.

A few related threads by the way:

http://www.funkypool.com/thread/13029/8-ball-us-free-table-after-deliberate-foul

http://www.funkypool.com/thread/14052/the-spirit-of-the-game

http://www.funkypool.com/thread/15503/just-why-do-people-play-like-that

IMO, its only because u think that us8's penalty isn't harsh enough. even in uk8, players can still do a deliberate foul and not give the opponent anyway of potting a ball. in this case, you wouldn't mind it because you can just ram the white and hope to get a shot in the next turn, right? so this all comes down to you accepting uk8's rules more.

also, when an opponent does those kinda shots you shouldn't be spamming that he's a cheater and stuff, but make full use of the time and think of a way to clear the table or something to put yourself back in the advantage.

Edited at 16:57 Fri 15/01/10 (GMT)

I appreciate that we don't have a system on Funkypool capable of stopping deliberate fouling, but it's completely wrong to say that if we did have, the loss of deliberate fouling would 'ruin the game type completely.' It would just make it more realistic.

8 Ball Pool in the real world allows pockets to be blocked, but not the use of deliberate fouls. So what you're actually saying above is that 8 Ball Pool, worldwide, isn't a balanced game and that its rules don't work? And you'd introduce legalised deliberate fouling to the world's top pool competitions to make the game more 'balanced'? I think the world's pro's would be pretty glad you're not in charge.

Also, you've stated a few times here that deliberate fouling doesn't provide an advantage. How can a deliberate foul not provide an advantage, when it's often the sole reason a frame is won? Surely winning the frame because of the deliberate foul is an advantage. No? Okay.

Forgive me for not agreeing with your opinions here, no matter how many times you repeat them on one thread, but I prefer the views and ideas of the game's leading players and its governing body. They seem to have worked fine for quite a while now...

I agree with justforplay's post though, bringing us back to the title of the thread. The idea of a cheat list on your profile is wrong, especially as nobody is cheating.

Edited at 17:41 Fri 15/01/10 (GMT)

haha thx martin

Oops, sorry. Spamming now

Edited at 17:33 Fri 15/01/10 (GMT)

Surely by delibrately leaving your balls over the pocket, you aren't a 'purist'
purists would only play to pot the balls wouldn't they?

If you dont want people potting your balls dont delibrately put them over the pockets or you leave them with the option to deliberately foul to minimized their chances of losing

I think he means that by removing the ability to counter the pocket cover, you force people you employ that tactic as well which would slow the game down.

If you want to remove deliberately fouling then you should remove deliberately missing which would remove a lot of the need to deliberately foul, but then too much is removed from the game

That's a matter of opinion. Yes, it might bring it more in line with RL pro rules for the game (if that indeed is the case), but this isn't RL pool. Not referring to this being supposed to be "funky", but more the fact that it is a computer game, where the challenges and level of control is quite different than in real life. (range not mattering for example)

My point about it would ruin the game is simply based on blocking pockets being by far the dominant mode for that game already. Removing the prime counter would be very bad indeed.

Anyways, time to move on. As I pointed out earlier we do get these debates now and then, where people expect their opponents to do less than the full range of the rules allow. Which I find lame regardless of what the topic is.

Don't get me wrong, of course I don't like it when people do things I find lame too, but the difference is I bite my tongue, remind myself they are perfectly in their right to do whatever they did, and move on without making a fool of myself.

It would change from being *a* very common mode of play to being *the* mode of play, yes.

In fact no, you are looking at this from the wrong side. Look at it from the perspective of the player blocking the pocket and it's a little easier to stay on track here:

Blocking the pocket builds an advantage for that player, there and then. Or put another way, you put your opponent at a planned disadvantage. When the opponent proceeds to put that block, he is reducing the disadvantage you have already given him through your own, sound tactic. If everything else in the frame is otherwise equal, he is still at a disadvantage after the foul - removing the block, sure, but at the cost of bringing yourself a little closer to a frame win.

IF the opponent who fouls to remove your block ends up winning the frame he does so DESPITE the disadvantage you played on him by playing your block.

The important message to get across here is that a block isn't worthless by a long shot, just because the opponent immediately removes it. It's still a cost for your opponent, bringing YOU closer to the frame win. If you still manage to lose it, that's for entirely other reasons than your opponent fouling.

A reduction in disadvantage = an increase in advantage.

Thats the fact of the matter no matter what viewpoint you have

Yes, this topic comes up a lot, which shows the strenght of feeling regarding it. It is more than just an annoying strategy because of the real life rules, to which many people on here may well be used to playing. Do remember, also, that pools governing bodies clearly considered it enough of an issue to impliment a solution, and in our case, a "funky" solution has been suggested and would work quite well :



No, it is not any closer to the real life rules than the current system, however it is closer to the ethos of the real game.