How to encourage a social player to improve their game

acesinc wrote:

Prop wrote:...
Tbh the thread was more about discussing games like Scrub (I keep calling it that and I might be wrong). Things that might feel like a novelty to him but take the potting out of the game.
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Hi, Prop. I never heard of Scrub before, but I have an interest in alternative forms of the game. On an American Pool forum once, a member once describes a billiards table well I think as being akin to a deck of cards....there are many variations that can be derived using the same simple tools. It might have been BadSnookerPlayer on this forum that I am thinking of.

There used to be a website dedicated to the variations, now sadly defunct as the keeper decided it was time to retire. Fortunately for us, some genius came up with the concept of the "Wayback Machine" which, if you haven't heard of it before, maintains copies of websites for posterity. I have no idea how this works technically, but here is a link that I hope will take you directly there....

[url=http://web.archive.org/web/20190926084343/http://www.snookergames.co.uk/games5.html/url]

If that doesn't work, Google "wayback machine" then just put "snookergames.co.uk" in its search box, then go to the "Games" pages to find Scrub. There are two different rulesets there....first "official" rules from the author's website, then he also posted a commenter's alternate rules for the game. Maybe one of them is the one you remember.


For my part, at a pub, I learned a variation from a bloke that I think was very helpful to me to learn control of the White. It was name "Call Colours" or something like that. The idea is very simple. BEFORE playing at your Red, you must verbally declare WHICH COLOUR you will be playing at should you pot your Red. You can also declare "safety" if you have no intention of potting Red (or just don't say anything), but if you happen to fluke a Red on such stroke, you have lost your turn (but you do get the 1 point for Red). Lastly, there are times that maybe two colours are close together so your intent is to place White somewhere near them and pick whichever happens to be best for the situation. With that in mind, you also get up to three "double calls" in the frame....for instance, you can call "Pink or Blue", then play either of those if you pot Red. ONLY THREE TIMES, though, even if you miss your Red, you have used one of your double calls. I think this puts you in a mindset to always be cognizant of the path of the White and where it is likely to come to rest, so that eventually, the muscle memory will learn the path and strength required.