8-ballRace to 3
DanaTo play2
TheHustler1
turn by turn · 3 variants
Pool is played turn by turn. So is the tracking.
Every potted ball is logged during the game, so there is nothing to reconstruct at the end. You pick the variant before you break, and the room ranking follows.
Free · nothing to install · the pool ranking stays separate from the other sports
Rules and settings
What the room decides.
The defaults are there so you can start without setting anything. All of it can be changed afterwards, room by room.
- Formats
- Turn by turn
- Solo or in teams
- Variants
- 8-ball · 9-ball
- Or blackball, the room picks
- Tracking
- Ball by ball
- Tracked during the game, not after it
- Ranking
- Separate
- Specific to pool, apart from the other sports
In play
One turn each, ball by ball.
At pool the two players never play at the same time: you pot until you miss, then the table passes. Ryvaals follows whose turn it is and the balls potted in each group, and counts games won until the race is over.
A reproduction of the in-game screen, with sample nicknames.
Why it works
Three reasons to follow the table.
01
The game tells its own story
The table follows the play ball by ball. What is left at the end is the whole game, not just its result.
02
Three variants, one ranking
8-ball, 9-ball and blackball all feed the same pool ranking. You pick before you break, and Elo makes no distinction.
03
Nobody has to recount
The current turn is shown to the whole room. No more disagreeing about whose shot it was, or about what had already gone down.
The maths
The same calculation, one setting per sport.
The factor that sets how wide the swings are does not depend on the sport, but on your experience: it is generous while you have few games on the clock, which lets the ranking find your level quickly, and then it settles down. What does depend on the sport is how uneven team sizes are handled.
K = 32 under 30 games played, then K = 16. That factor is the same in every sport.
How Elo worksTeam-size handicap
0
The game being turn based, being short-handed is no disadvantage: the team-size handicap stays at 0, unlike sports played at the same time.
The questions
What people ask us about pool.
Which variants are supported?
8-ball, 9-ball and blackball. The variant is chosen when the game is created and holds for the whole game.
Do we really have to log every ball?
That is the whole point: every potted ball is logged during the game, which gives you the full timeline. If nobody is following along, the final score is enough.
Does pool have its own ranking?
Yes. Every sport keeps its own ranking within the room, and you still have one account: you can perfectly well lead at table football and bring up the rear at pool.
The other sports
One account, three rankings.
Table football
The king of the coffee break. Play it 1v1 or 2v2, and switch on the bonus-point rules if your room counts them.
- 1v1 · 2v2
- first to 10
A mid-field goal is worth 2, a three-bar one 3, when the room says so.
Table tennis
Singles or doubles, with the serve drawn before the first point so nobody gets to argue about it.
- 1v1 · 2v2
- first to 11
Eleven is only a default: the room sets the points per game.
Table taken tonight?
Create the room, send the link, break. The ranking exists from the second game on.
Free, no card needed.