Basically to start a rack when playing a friendly or ranked game both you and your opponent must press the rack balls button. After this point you are comitted to this game, if you leave you lose the game. (This replaced the 3 shots grace period).

You also need to confirm before leaving a game that you really want to leave and hence lose points.

And the final change is it shows the number of incomplete games on your profile. Now you can see which people leave the game early (note that this could also be due to internet or PC problems).

great changes, hopefully put a stop 2 ppl jst hunting golden breaks

thats great nick but the first one to press the rack button gets to break isnt that a little bit unfair

Edited at 15:56 Tue 13/06/06 (BST)

If that’s true then I think it’s a good thing.

It will encourage people to start the game quicker, and add a quick draw western feel to the proceedings!

Is it true? I'm off to check...

Not true as far as i can tell.

i think its just random now like in tournaments.

its not doing that for US but it is for UK or it was earlier

It's the same as before. Alternate breaks. First player in the room breaks for normal games, first drawn player breaks for tournament games.

It's a great feature!

R u sure nick? Not that I care either way, whether its random, push button or alternate, but I entered somebody else's 9ball game earlier, pressed button first and got break. Then I broke in the next frame too.

well i entered a game earlier i got the break and the nxt game i got the break then on the 3rd game my opponent got it

I just joined a game and broke off.

Nick, if somebody creates a game and an opponent enters, what happens if the person who created leaves before accepting a game, leaving the person who entered still in the room?

If i then entered would the person left in the room still be treated as the 2nd player to enter, meaning I get the break?

Also with the tournaments, do the players have a time limit in which to press the break button?

Cheers.

u dont have to press it in tournys at least i dont think u do

Oh right, I’ve not entered one yet so wouldn’t know.

Can anybody who’s entered a tourney since the change confirm this?

Thanks.

that's right - u don't press it in tournys.

Silly me, accepting an invite is the same thing!

D'oh...

lol, didn't occur to me at all that that was the reason

personally i dont like this idea

It's not an idea. It's already been implemented and was neccesitated by ppl who break and leave, or leave after a couple of balls are down coz things don't look promising.

It's one press of a button to eliminate all those problems. The only ppl who could possibly object to that are the ppl who won't be able to use the three ball rule to cheat anymore.

like the new changes mate gud job