Talk:English billiards

Ball return after potting
Question: how are the balls returned to play once they are sunk?


 * The cue balls are not returned until the round ends. The other (red) ball goes back to a spot on the table. Leon 00:04, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * The opponent's cue ball remains off table until the end of inning, the striker's cue ball after going in-off is in-hand, which means it can be placed anywhere inside the D. Balls out of baulk can be played directly, balls inside the baulk area can only be played after contact with a cushion (rail) outside the baulk.CWSteiner (talk) 16:36, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikified
Wikified! --144.132.75.11 12:31, 20 May 2005 (UTC)

Picture
I'm going to remove the image from this article; it's confusing since the balls are all wrong Leon 00:04, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * What's wrong with them? &mdash; SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 01:38, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Er.. well it's a picture of a snooker match, which is a completely different game. BennyFromCrossroads 15:02, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

U.S. terminology on Commonwealth game?
To follow up my ill-advised digression at the stub proposals page (which seemed to have something of a cascade effect) in a more appropriate location: Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that this game 'is known as "English billiards" in the U.S.' (and Canada?), rather than suggesting that's it's only known as "billiards" in "England" (which is certainly too narrow)? On the "what's it called by the people that actually play it" test, I'd suggest this be moved to billiards (now 'freed' by the move of the article formerly at that title), or at any rate to billiards (game), or billiards (), and the use of terminology be flipped correspondingly. Alai 02:57, 12 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmm, interesting. Not really sure.  The reference materials I have call it "English billiards" (Shamos, etc.), and the very best bio article to date in all of WP:CUE's purview, Walter Lindrum (which was a great article long before that WPP even existed) was already using "English billiards" (in the para. beginning "It was not till 1929...")  I'm not sure how to get around the ambiguity issues otherwise.  "Billiards (game)" would perhaps make sense to UK readers but not to a lot of other people, even Commonwealth people. "Billiards (English)" just seems to be the same as "English billiards", but hard to find.  I honestly don't have a better idea, especially not a "Billiards (something)".  Isn't "English billiards" just like WP's use of "American football", a necessary disambiguation-through-specificity?  Actual Americans at-large, and certainly the game's players, don't actually call it that.  I get the feeling there is an extant organization that still sanctions/organizes English billiards tournaments, though I am not certain of its name; do they have a site, rule books, and stuff that we can turn to? &mdash;  SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 03:32, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
 * PS: I agree with you that the text is Yank-centric and overly-narrow in saying "England"; just to be clear. Am uncertain of what the replacement text should be, because some non-US, non-UK speakers of English use "billiards" in other senses, especially carom billiards, particularly three-cushion. What to do? &mdash;  SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 03:37, 12 February 2007 (UTC)


 * So far as I know, even United Statesians do call the NFL/pigskin/gridiron game "American football" (however resolutely they'd otherwise prefer and claim exclusive use of the unqualified term "football", too) -- see whose corporate website one gets if one googles for the term. Or at any rate, recognise and acknowledge the term, if not actually active "use" in their own speech until such time as they have to introduce "no-not-that-football" qualifiers.  It's also until very recently only been played in the United States, and where it is played elsewhere these days, it's invariably referred to explicitly as "American football".  (If one considers the Canadian game distinct, at least.) It's fair clearly not possible to have the NFL game article at football, due to the massive name clash.  None of those things are true of "English billiards".  "Billiards (English)" would be highly illogical, but I don't see any force to the "hard to find" argument:  English billiards would still redirect to, well, wherever the article ends up.  "Billiards (English billiards)" would be getting into Stroke City territory.  Isn't the use of billiards to mean the carom variety basically a French thing, and accordingly a Francophone one?  Which English speakers use it in that sense?  I think the simplest what-to-do is simply to move to "billiards", on the basis of it being the common name for the subject, and the predominant sense of the term;  to billiards-with-some-parenthical-qualifier would be my second preference (by a distance proportionate to the unnaturalness of the term involved).  "Billiards (all-in game)" would be a little quaint-sounding, but not utterly infeasible.  Alai 12:29, 12 February 2007 (UTC)


 * The fact that US people don't say "American football" was kind of my whole point. It's not a term in general usage by the people to whom it applies (a criterion you raised), but WP has settled on it as a disambiguator, which is basically what I'm saying about "English billiards", a term that's so far sourceable while alternatives so far aren't. (And the Candian version of the rugby variant that North Americans mean by "football" dates to 1861 so it's hardly "very recent".)  Agreed strongly that football should not go to some specific game, due to the widespread ambiguity.  But I don't see that this leaves us in a different situation.  "Billiards" presently redirects to cue sport which is evolving into a summary-style article that forks off in various directions.  Given the quadruple ambiguity of "billiards" this seems to be a Good Thing to me.  A radically different way of looking at it: If I lived in Botswana, and we played a game there in which one tried to intentionally scratch the cue ball, to score points, by caroming it off of an object ball into a pocket, and we locals uniformly referred to this game as "billiards", and called other cue sports by other names, would it be fair to insist that Billiards be the article for our game?  Or shouldn't wikipedia have an article about this game at Botswanan billiards instead?  Agree strongly that Billiards (English) and Billiards (English billiards) are non-starters. Re: "the French connection" - I'm not sure I get the point.  We get the word "billiard" from French to begin with, as wel as the game-class itself, ultimately, but I don't quite see what that has to do with what the Wikipedia articles ought to be called.  I guess the real question comes down to, "Should Billiards stop redirecting to Cue sport, because one group of people use it to mean a specific game with specific rules, despite the fact that another group of people use it more generically"?  I honestly don't think this really is a US vs. Commonwealth English usage issue, because not all non-US English speakers use the term to mean "the game sometimes called English billiards" particularly.  I guess I'm coming right back to "I don't know how to address your concern, but don't like the proposals to do so, so far".  What is it about "English billiards" as a term (cf. "American football", "Canadian football") that bothers you, in the WP context, whatever some geographically-limited usages might be?  Related anecdote: The Irish (real Irish, not umpteenth-generation Irish-American) owners of an Irish pub I know in San Francisco, use "pool" and "billiards" about 50/50 to refer to pocket billiards, and never mean English billiards when they say "billiards", despite speaking Hibernian-inflected Commonwealth English, if you see what I mean.  Anyway, I think the article itself could use a de-'Mericanizing edit, per related concerns you raised.  Maybe that by itself would be enough? &mdash;  SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 22:03, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
 * If I might chime in, billiards and similar spellings, is used by a large portion of the world to refer to all cuesports (as well as historically). In some places, I have read (but never seen any citation of a reliable source), that billiards refers to a specific game and does not at all have a generic usage (I have actually no idea if this is really true across the whole of the UK). In the US it is often use loosely, most commonly by the public as a generic term for all games (but then again even this is deceptive; I would be willing to wager that more than 20% of the entire U.S. population only knows of eight ball and think pool and billiards are synonyms for just that game). By contrast, many aficionados mean any carom game, and a subset of those only know of three cushion so call that "billiards". Billiards alone more properly refers to all games than anything else, so it would not make sense to make it into the article title of one country's usage (which I'm not sure is even accurate). The move to cuesports was organizational (or so I thought), but for instance, if we have an article on (history of ____) it should be called History of billiards because that is the umbrella term most properly across the world, and very much so historically.--Fuhghettaboutit 22:45, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I'll try and dig up a suitable source, but it most certainly has the meaning I've suggested throughout the UK, and in Ireland, at least that I've encountered. See this page for an indication of the usage down-under.  Come to that, if you google for "snooker and billiards" (or vice versa, with quotes), it's a decent bet that the user intends "billiards" in the "English" sense (if annoyingly hard to confirm).  I think you have it entirely backwards as to what's "one country's usage", and what's the "proper" reference -- I don't see any argument for that beyond "it's what they're called in the U.S.", but they're not even their primary descriptors there, either.  McC, I said at length, and by way of a number of itemised points, why I don't think the "football" case is at all comparable;  I don't think you've addressed those at all.  And no, I don't believe it's a "good thing" that "billiards" redirects to "cue sport" (which should surely be "cue sports"?), since that's to assert that the two are synonymous, which is specifically the U.S. usage, and makes no sense in the context of the UK (et al) usage.  If it's not an article on the singular game, it should at least be a disambig page (which purpose is also served by having the former article, with a disambig strapline).  Your "Botswannan billiards" example is a little off-the-point, to put it (disproportionately) mildly.  I'd point out why in detail, but that didn't seem to get me very far with your "football" analogy.  (And, I think I'd suggest it be called "Billiards (Botswanna)", though not before asking to see the reliable sources for your hypothetical.)  Ask yourself:  what does the term "billiards" mean, to those English speakers who use it systematically to mean anything in particular?  And, what is "English" billiards called, by those why have cause to call it anything?  I mention the French only because you mentioned people to whom the term primarily means "carom billiards":  if not they, then who?  (Didn't I just say that?)  I ask again, what 'non-US English speakers' don't 'use the term to mean "the game sometimes called English billiards"'?  (OK, I admit I came across some Canadian instances...)  Are you citing the SF pub owners as representive of a "non-US" class of speakers?  (I can readily conduct a vox pop of non-US-based Hiberno-English speakers...)  I'd strongly prefer we stayed away from the whole family of "why does it bother you?"/ILIKEIT types of discussion, since I have have some residual hopes of articles being at the names they conventionally should be at, rather than what an super- (or not-so-super-) majority decide their personal prefences are, notorious counterexamples like the "U.S. Highways naming convention" fiasco notwithstanding.  I also don't see how anything but a token de-'Mericanizing edit would be even possible (setting aside its insufficiency), if it continues to be obliged to use the U.S. descriptor throughout.  Are you in effect just suggesting expanding the list of places that call the game "billiards"?  (And explicitly or implicitly, the implication as to where it's called "English billiards"?)  Alai 03:51, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I thought I had addressed the "football" issues; to be clear, Americans do not say "American football", unless they absolutely must, e.g. in a context like Wikipedia where disambiguation is needed; . And in that sort of case I think it would be plausible to call the game in question here "English billiards", even if you were English.  Cue sport is called that instead of Cue sports (which redirs to it) because of WP naming conventions.  You'll note that the article text itself uses the plural.  "Billiards" remains ambiguous because there are way more players of carom billiards games than of English billiards, throughout the world, and they tend to simply use the term "billiards" unless they are being very specific (i.e. "I play three-cushion").  I honestly don't think that calling the present article is an Americanism, it's simply disambiguation.  I'm not sure I can say anything else without just repeating myself.  I'm sorry that I don't have better ideas that would satisfy everyone.  I'm guessing this needs more input from other people over a longer time. &mdash;  SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 20:31, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Shakespeare wrote the line for Cleopatra: "let us to billiards" (Julius Caesar) 200 years before [whatever we are to call this game] had developed. The Illustrated Encyclopeda of Billiards states that the word was in use in English printed works by 1591 with the modern spelling by 1598, and defines it as: "1. (game) A generic term for any game played on a billiard table, specifically one employing small solid balls... 2.=Carom Billiards... 3. In Britain, the game of English Billiards." Meanwhile, from the British English Cambridge University Press: "Billiards: a game played by two people on a table covered in green cloth in which a cue (= a long pole) is used to hit balls against each other and into pockets around the table." This is not to mention that all the numerous versions of the word in other languages, all meaning either the game in general or a specific other game (biljart (Dutch); billards (French); biliardi (Italian); biljard (Maltese) etc., ad nauseum). I am curious what the OED has to say but I don't have access.--Fuhghettaboutit 23:45, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * And further, the Asian Games use the term "English billiards", despite the fact that any English speakers particpating would very likely come from a Commonwealth or Commonwealth-influenced English speaking pool (Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, etc.), unless someone from Guam or Samoa showed up. There's the real-world non-UK, non-North American evidence Alai wanted.  I think this debate has kind of concluded, on the facts if not the feelings; though again, the article text itself should probably be written from a British perspective, leaving us with still that to-do item. &mdash;  SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 07:53, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * More discussion at stub naming guidelines.Her Pegship  (tis herself) 15:45, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Discussion never materialized there, actually. &mdash; SMcCandlish &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 07:36, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


 * &#91;outdent&#93;
 * Solid demonstration that English people call it "English billiards", too, just like everyone else, when they have a need to disambiguate: ["The largest break ever recorded at English billiards was..." (non-HTMLized original version here). Wasn't even looking for it (was looking for info on the game of Indian pool instead); bet there are hundreds more if anyone actually did bother to look for them.  &mdash;  [[User:SMcCandlish|SMcCandlish]] &#91;talk&#93; &#91;contrib&#93; ツ 07:36, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

What if the red spot is blocked?
I've not come accross this very often, but have done on occasion in my time playing billiards - what happens if the red spot is obscured after a pot red (i.e. one of the cue balls occupies the spot, by coincidence of landing there)? Anyone know? &#91;The previous unsigned comment was posted by, 19 April 2007 (UTC)&#93;
 * In every other billiards-family game of which I am aware in which balls are spotted and a similar situation sometimes arises, with one exception, it is placed behind the blocking ball (i.e. on the center line, between the spot and the foot rail, which I believe is called the top rail in UK/Aus. usage) as close to that ball as possible without touching it. (The one exception I encountered was some game in which it is instead spotted against the foot rail.)  Anyway, it would need to be sourced to add it to the article. —  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93;  ‹(-¿-)› 17:14, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

In Case the Spot is occupied the red will have to be spot on the "Pyramid"-Spot (Pink in Snooker)--84.112.100.169 (talk) 11:10, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Two-pot rule, three-pot rule
Bob Marshall (billiards player) mentions a (historical) "two-pot" rule. What is this rule, with source(s)? Need to be added here in detail, menioned in summary form at Glossary of cue sports terms and linked to either here or there at the Marshall article, which presently has a redlink to a Two-pot rule which should not be its own article, and at Geet Sethi which mentions the three-pot rule but links to nothing. —  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93; ‹(-¿-)› 17:07, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Two different scoring methods
The two radically different scoring methods used need to be explained here, in a linkable section, so that results like the scores in the following (partial) chart can be easily explained to non-experts (and same goes for the "up" aspect):

These different scoring methods reflect the different modes of play. The first match obviously has been a timed game(probably 4 hrs of play). The second must have been a set of games to 150-up, best of 11, whereas the fourth one has been a very short format game, first to reach 50 scores (50-up), best of 21.CWSteiner (talk) 17:22, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Sources to plunder
The English Amateur Billiards Association provides three pages of trascribed old materials that may be of use, esp. with regard to the history of the game:
 * http://www.eaba.co.uk/books/book-index.html
 * http://www.eaba.co.uk/articles/article-index.html
 * http://www.eaba.co.uk/mags/mag-index.html

—  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93; ‹(-¿-)› 01:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Triple, quadruple, etc., centuries
Are there any jargon terms for quadruple centuries and the like? ("Quads", or something like that?) Just want to make sure that Glossary of cue sports terms accounts for them if so. —  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93; ‹(-¿-)› 02:28, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

All-in vs. spot-barred
The terms all-in and spot-barred are used and discussed a little bit at World Professional Billiards Championship, but not defined, and are very likely to be impenetrable to users unfamiliar with the topic. —  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93; ‹(-¿-)› 04:17, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

External links removed
I agree that eaba.co.uk is not an Organisation reaching for European or even Worldwide relevance, BUT it still contains a fantastic compendium on English Billiards history, with facts, figures, articles from books and magazines, certainly the rules and holds the calendar of scheduled events of the current and past seasons with their results. Therefore the EABA external link seems more than worth mentioning in WP.

Secondly, what in an Organization called 'English Billiards Open Series - European Tour' does not reach out for European/Worldwide level? If you'd checked the current ranking you'd find players from Poland, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Austria, Spain, England, and even from Singapore, Thailand and India as participants, reflecting the Open character of the series and its Worldwide relevance is underlined by the fact that the IBSF already had allowed three or four EBOS players a definite space in the IBSF Amateur World Championships starting from 2008 onwards. EBOS as well is organizing the European Championships in conjunction with EBSA, Duffel, Belgium June 11-13, 2009!

The billiard-junkies forum is a worldwide open playground for the community of billiards enthusiasts. If you checked the forum categories you had seen the tabs Amateur, Professional, Worldwide, Asian, European and Oceania Billiards very well reflecting the unlimited access and widespread field of interest. And in its uniqueness it certainly deserves a mention in WP.

Regarding the coaching site, I put up a link to, I have to admit the coach speaks solely English and only is six-times English Amateur Champion, but for the game of 'English Billiards' these circumstances should also be sufficiently effectual to earn a display in WP. The user has to register, though, but still it is free and non-profit-oriented with the mere intention to foster the game of English Billiards. Additionally, it is the best coaching one could get, and again, it's the only one.

Thanks for probably reconsidering putting up these enhancements as suggestions to every Billiards player.--CWSteiner (talk) 10:08, 7 May 2009 (UTC)


 * HI, I've reinstated the EABA site, as a national governing body (NGB). All the best, bigpad (talk) 13:04, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Dickens on billiards
See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cue sports/Archive 1 for details.

Unusual occurance?
I've read up on these rules. There is one situation which I cannot find the scoring system for, or if it is not scored. I strike my cue ball and it hits my opponent's cue ball, my opponent's cue ball then hits the red ball and the red ball is pocketed. If this occurs, do I get the 3 points for a winning hazard even though my cue ball did not come in contact with the red ball? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 27.32.52.240 (talk) 09:12, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

This is an old question, but the answer is "yes": 3 points are scored. Billsmith60 (talk) 23:35, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Snooker Table vs Billiards table
In the USA in 1915 billiards hall owners bought more snooker table? Snooker didn't exist then? Surely that they bought more 'billiard tables' is more appropriate? The article also says "(and in many venues, both games are played on the same equipment)" - in ALL venues both games are played with the same equipment because there is no distinction between the two - they are played on EXACTLY the same equipment. All snooker is played on a billiards table, technically there is no such thing as a snooker table although the term has entered common parlance as snooker has become the dominant format. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.254.146.4 (talk) 09:43, 30 November 2012 (UTC)


 * You are correct on the name of the table, but "billiard table" carries confusion with it, because of the preference among some Americans including the body who govern pool to call pool "pocket billiards". If we were to use the term "billiard table" instead of "snooker table" then some readers would be confused--just as Commonwealth readers are confused if pool is referred to as pocket billiards. As to the second one what happens if only one game is played at a venue (ie a snooker hall that has no billiard balls)? -- PBS (talk) 09:55, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
 * More to the point, "billiard table" or "billiards table" means carom billiards table.  The term is hopelessly ambiguous.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  03:21, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Western Europe and carom billiards
From the history of the article @SMcCandlish: Britain and Ireland are in Western Europe. Where is your source that says carom or carambole billiards, is popular in Western Europe and not specific countries within Western Europe. -- PBS (talk) 21:02, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Revision as of 10:56, 15 March 2015 SMcCandlish (Reverted to revision 650967617 by Thryduulf "Um, no, it's also popular in Spain, Italy, etc., etc."


 * No one ever made any claim that carom is popular in in Western Europe. Let's not be silly. The English language doesn't work that way. If I say I lived in the UK that does not mean I have lived in every county of the UK. There is no source that it's only popular in France, and that's a ridiculous notion. See Five-ball, as just one example, for a carom sport popular in Italy and Spain, and see the list of world champions of three-cushion billiards, most of whom are from various Western European countries, or Asia.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  01:56, 21 March 2015 (UTC)


 * I've revised the text with an accurate and reliably sourced statement that carom billiards was largely "popularized by" France, and clarified "Western Europe" to "western Continental Europe". That should be the end of it.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  03:18, 21 March 2015 (UTC)


 * PS: This isn't the place to get into the origins of billiards, but there is no proof of where it came from, nor where pocketless vs. pocket games originated; both kinds were known throughout Europe historically. "Sources in Europe generally ascribe the invention of the game to other European countries.  The Académie des Jeux, a French work, stated that the game appeared to have been invented in England.  The Great Soviet Encyclopedia credits the game to India or China. ..." Src:   If you go back far enough, the game bears little resemblance to either modern pocket or pocketless billiards, and was played with croquet-like hoops and pins on the table.  See Billiards and Snooker Bygones (Norman Clare, 1996, Shire Pubs., ISBN: 9780852637302) for period images illustrating pocket, pocketless, and pin billiards all over post-Mediaeval Europe. There's a lot of this also in: .  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  03:41, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

"If I say I lived in the UK that does not mean I have lived in every county of the UK." No but if you say that cricket is popular in the UK you will soon have people correct that, because it is only popular in one country in the UK (and one border county in Wales). Above you wrote above "See Five-ball, as just one example, for a carom sport popular in Italy and Spain," but we are not talking about five-ball we are only talking about three-ball, and where it is popular now is irrelevant to this article, all that is relevant is that it was popular in France at the time that billiards was developing in England. So why have you added "(and today also popular in many parts of Asia and South America)" to this article? -- PBS (talk) 16:44, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Citation cleanup
I undid recent changes that changed inline references of the form:

to

for three reasons:


 * 1) It's unnecessarily duplicative and redundant.
 * 2) The Template:Sfn footnoting system is unnecessarily complicated (as is the half-baked attempt at Harvard referencing being used in this short article for no apparent reason, but that's another matter).
 * 3) It makes the poor state of the references even worse, by inserting in the text at every citation point to this source the claim that the fact in question at that point is sourceable to  of those pages, which is false.

The present situation is that we're citing, in text, one source, and in one footnotes listign all the relevant pages. This is poor sourcing, but better than nothing. I've started using Template:Rp to identify specific pages for specific facts, but it will take a while to clean up the entire article to properly cite which pages it's getting what information from. Replacing every  call with a call to  in the above manner is a step backward. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  03:58, 21 March 2015 (UTC)


 * I do not think it unnecessarily duplicative and redundant. I agree with your third point but using   exacerbates the problem. What is needed is someone with the source to split the page numbers up between the inline citations. the advantage of using sfn over ref pairs is that it automagically takes care of duplicates (one less thing to do manually). rp is a change is style an unacceptable without consensus and I do not agree to it usage. -- PBS (talk) 15:44, 23 March 2015 (UTC)
 * If you give me a few days, I will attempt to clean this up with specific page numbers using sfn.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:03, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

In the article, there is a link with text "billiard mace". The link takes you to a glossary of terms in which the term billiard mace is not defined. In the glossary, there is one mention of a mace, but this does not define the term. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.184.194.59 (talk) 19:32, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Too obscure for beginners
Like many descriptions of games and sports, on Wiki and elsewhere, this article will be too obscure for beginners or other people just trying to understand the game. For example, technical terms like 'in hand' are used without explanation, and crucial matters like how each player's 'turn' is ended are not covered at all. It will also be confusing to most people who are more familiar with snooker that an 'in-off' pot appears to score points for the perpetrator, rather than being a foul, though this is not clearly stated, and I have seen other accounts of billiards where it is said that points are awarded to the opponent. Any article of this kind should really be 'road tested' on people with no prior knowledge of the subject.2A00:23C8:7907:4B01:242F:76F9:6275:CD6E (talk) 23:56, 1 February 2023 (UTC)