How to play snooker
Score more points than the other player by potting a red and then a colour, again and again, and then the colours in order. A frame is won on points, not on the last ball.
- Players
- 2
- What you need
- A snooker table, a cue, fifteen reds, six colours and a white cue ball
- How long
- A frame of fifteen reds takes fifteen to thirty minutes, six reds under ten
What snooker is
Snooker is played with fifteen red balls worth a point each and six colours worth two to seven: yellow 2, green 3, brown 4, blue 5, pink 6 and black 7. You strike the white cue ball with a cue, and it knocks the other balls into the pockets.
Nepal's halls keep a snooker table or two beside the pool tables, and the WPBSA counts about a hundred thousand players in the country. Two play, taking turns at the table.
Here you can play bots at four levels, a friend online, or two people passing one phone.
The table
A championship table is 3.6 metres of cloth, and its balls are too small to see on a phone. So the table here is the size of a hall's pool table, 198 by 99 cm, with every marking scaled down from the full table's and the balls at their real 52.5 mm. The pockets are snooker's, tighter than pool's.
A line across the near end is the baulk line, and the half circle on it is the D. Each colour has a spot: the yellow, brown and green on the baulk line, the blue in the middle, the pink halfway to the top cushion and the black near it.
Setting up
- The reds go in a triangle with its point just behind the pink.
- Each colour goes on its own spot.
- The player breaking off puts the cue ball anywhere in the D.
- The break-off goes back and forth from frame to frame.
A red, then a colour
The ball on is the ball you have to hit first. While reds are left, you are on a red. Pot one and you score a point and you are on a colour: any colour you like, and the one you hit first is the one you are playing.
Pot the colour and you score its value, it goes back on its spot, and you are on a red again. Keep going as long as you pot. The points you score in one visit to the table are your break.
Miss, and the other player comes to the table on a red.
The colours in order
Once the last red is down, and the colour after it, the colours are taken in order and they stay down: yellow, green, brown, blue, pink and black.
With all fifteen reds and a black after each, then the six colours, the most anybody can score in one break is 147.
Fouls
It is a foul to hit the wrong ball first, to miss every ball, to pot a ball that is not on, or to put the cue ball in a pocket.
A foul gives the other player points: the value of the ball on or of the ball hit or potted, whichever is highest, and never fewer than four. A colour potted on a foul goes back on its spot, and a red stays down.
After a foul the other player plays from where the cue ball lies. If it went in a pocket, they put it down in the D.
Winning a frame
A frame ends when the black goes down at the end, and the higher score takes it. With only the black left, a foul ends the frame too.
If the scores are level when the black goes down, the black goes back on its spot and the player who did not break off plays at it from the D. The first to score or foul ends the frame.
A match is one frame, or the best of three or five. Here the free ball and the miss rule of the full game are left out.
Playing here
To aim, press on the table and the cue points from the cue ball towards your finger. Move slowly to aim finely. To shoot, pull the power bar back as far as you want and let go.
When the cue ball is in hand, at the break-off or after it has gone in a pocket, it pulses. Drag it anywhere in the D and then aim.
The four buttons beside the power are where the cue meets the cue ball: high for topspin, the middle, a touch low for a stun, and low for backspin, which is how a player leaves the cue ball for the next red.
On a computer, A and D or the arrow keys turn the cue, W and S set the power, and Space shoots. On a sideways phone the table lies across the screen, where it is biggest.
A few tactics
- Take the black after a red when you can: seven points instead of two.
- Pot the ball and think about the cue ball. A break is built by leaving yourself the next red.
- When there is no pot, play safe: roll the cue ball behind a colour so the other player cannot see a red. That is a snooker.
- Break off softly, clipping the side of the pack and bringing the cue ball back to baulk.
- Count what is left. Once the other player needs more points than are on the table, they need fouls from you.
Settings
Every setting is on the game's page before you start. These are the defaults, and what changing each one does.
| Setting | Standard | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Who is playing | Against a bot | Play a bot, a friend online, or two people on this phone |
| Difficulty | Medium | How many shots a bot looks for, how it plays for position, and how steady its aim is |
| Match | One frame | The best of three or five for a longer match |
| Reds | Fifteen | Ten or six for a shorter frame |
| Aim guide | To the ball the cue ball hits first | Shows where both balls go after the hit, or nothing at all |
| Speed | 1× | Plays the shots and the pauses faster |
Words
- Cue ball
- The white ball, the only one you strike with the cue.
- Ball on
- The ball you have to hit first: a red, a colour, or the next colour in order.
- Break
- The points you score in one visit to the table.
- Break-off
- The first shot of a frame, from the D.
- The D
- The half circle on the baulk line, where the cue ball goes when it is in hand.
- Baulk line
- The line across the near end of the table, with the D on it.
- Safety
- A shot that leaves the other player nothing to pot.
- Snooker
- A position where the ball on is hidden behind another ball, so it cannot be hit straight.
- Frame
- One game of snooker, from the break-off to the last black.
Every rule on this page is the one the app plays by. Change any of them on the game's own page before you start.