8-ball vis-a-vis Chess

chefjeff

chefjeff

If not now...
Silver Member
Reading on another thread, there seems to be a number of good chess players on AZ. I'd like to ask them about chess strategies and how those might be applied to the game of 8-ball...particularly for anticipating how your opponent might make his play and what move(s) you have learned to respond to him/her.

Any chess players out there who have specific ideas for using chess moves/thoughts/stragegies/techniques/traps/etc. in an 8-ball game?

Thanks,

Jeff Livingston
 
hard to force a king/rook swap in eight ball!

Obviously it is hard to have an apples to apples comparison but the three strategies I use in chess are controlling the other players next moves, attacking in several areas at once, and launching a single attack with multiple simultaneous objectives so one has to happen. Of course all the time this is going on you have to thwart the other player's attacks. It goes a bit deeper than that and there are a few more things going on but that is the basics.

The one that applies best to eight ball is one that most players are already using: If you have to turn over the table, choose your opponent's next shot. You can also block his attacks before he can get them launched. Study your opponent's position as well as yours. How do you anticipate him trying to runout? How can you interfere with his plans if you have to yield the table?

I used to beat a far better chess player regularly. The level of competition he beat was several classes above mine. However him being my practice partner, I knew his game extremely well. I also knew that he was playing five to seven moves ahead in his mind. Therefore I deliberately took a hard left turn every three or four moves when playing him. It wore him down having to shift the direction of his thoughts every few moves and he was trying to apply logic to my play when the only real logic was to disrupt his game! Always a thought for eightball too, not talking about conventional sharking here though.

Hu


chefjeff said:
Reading on another thread, there seems to be a number of good chess players on AZ. I'd like to ask them about chess strategies and how those might be applied to the game of 8-ball...particularly for anticipating how your opponent might make his play and what move(s) you have learned to respond to him/her.

Any chess players out there who have specific ideas for using chess moves/thoughts/stragegies/techniques/traps/etc. in an 8-ball game?

Thanks,

Jeff Livingston
Click to expand...
 
chefjeff said:
Reading on another thread, there seems to be a number of good chess players on AZ. I'd like to ask them about chess strategies and how those might be applied to the game of 8-ball...particularly for anticipating how your opponent might make his play and what move(s) you have learned to respond to him/her.

Any chess players out there who have specific ideas for using chess moves/thoughts/stragegies/techniques/traps/etc. in an 8-ball game?

Thanks,

Jeff Livingston
Click to expand...

One-pocket is like Chess. 8-ball is more like... I don't know what it's more like. Tic-tac-toe with a winner?

Before anyone flakes on me, 8-ball is my game of choice.

Fred
 
Hi Jeff. I am not much of a chess player, but I know a few things about it. From my limited experience, when 8-ball games are stuck in safety battles (i.e., each player's inning is going to last one and only one shot for the foreseeable future), the concept of "time" comes in. You don't have two consecutive plays to make, exactly in chess.

This is an interesting concept to study, because this definition of time is what makes the game challenging. I am not a very good chess player, but I could easily beat Kasparov if I could make two moves to his one. I could beat him even if I could only do so a few times per game.

The key is to make your one move to your opponent's one move the optimal play in these situations. If done correctly, you'll often be forcing the action upon him, exactly as in chess.

- Steve
 
I think IPT 8-ball is going to be substantially different from your usual bar-league 8-ball (ie. fewer lengthy strategic games). I've watched about 3 hours of top-level IPT 8-ball and I've seen about 3 safeties - the rest are runouts or misses followed by runouts.

I don't care about running out from the break percentages, what I'm seeing is that the first player to the table with a shot is winning a huge percentage of the games (and the ones they are losing is usually from missing a shot or position, not from a strategic error). To me, the outcome of most games I've seen is determined by the result/layout of the opening power break (evil.....give me straight pool anyday).
 
Williebetmore said:
I think IPT 8-ball is going to be substantially different from your usual bar-league 8-ball (ie. fewer lengthy strategic games). I've watched about 3 hours of top-level IPT 8-ball and I've seen about 3 safeties - the rest are runouts or misses followed by runouts. .
Click to expand...

I agree. And it's pretty much like this in any higher level (anything above average) 8-ball tournament. It's run and gun. Hardly any safety play.

Fred
 
chefjeff said:
Reading on another thread, there seems to be a number of good chess players on AZ. I'd like to ask them about chess strategies and how those might be applied to the game of 8-ball...particularly for anticipating how your opponent might make his play and what move(s) you have learned to respond to him/her.

Any chess players out there who have specific ideas for using chess moves/thoughts/stragegies/techniques/traps/etc. in an 8-ball game?

Thanks,

Jeff Livingston
Click to expand...

I think when people relate 8 ball or 1 pocket to chess, they just mean that its a strategic game. Pool is nothing like chess when taken literally.

Chess is useful for pool players because it excerises the mind. But you can't control all of the variables in a pool game as you can in chess.
 
chefjeff said:
Any chess players out there who have specific ideas for using chess moves/thoughts/stragegies/techniques/traps/etc. in an 8-ball game?

Thanks,

Jeff Livingston
Click to expand...

Control the center.

Force your opponent to play defense while you play offense.

Know your next several moves before you get to them.

Play the opponent and not just the game. An easy shot/situation for one player may be a hard shot/situation for a different player.
 
It is very hard to correlate the two games. People liken a lengthy 8-ball game to a chess game but in reality, they are very different. Even a quadriplegic with very little muscle control could play chess as it is all mental and no physical activity. There are times during an 8-ball game where it becomes very challenging mentally, but you still have to execute using your physical ability. It's not strenuous in most instances, but you still need to finesse or control your shot. The combination of excellent physical ability and mental ability are required to play top notch pool. Chess only requires excellent mental ability. As such, I have never personally used a strategy from chess when I play pool. I think of the strategies that I use as being "pool" strategies. I'm sure that there are some parallels that could be compared in general terms (such as using blockers in front of pockets could be compared to piling up defenders in front of your king), but I really think that the two games are too different to use strategies from one when playing the other.
 
Jeff,

I love 8 ball strategy but I don't think you'll be able to apply any specific piece of knowledge from chess into 8 ball. Although there are many metaphorical connections between the strategies of two games.

Steve Lipsky's connection is most impressive.

I'd also add that in chess, the pawn structure of your pieces is decisive... Because pawns have a lower degree of mobility compared to other pieces, pawn structures change very slowly, and, sometimes, they maintain their characteristic and set the tempo of an entire game (although usually those games are either one-sided or a boring draw for reasons too lengthy to describe here). HOWEVER (and this is my point), pawn chains/structures can be upset with what's called "ruptures", moves that break the whole pawn structure at its base (the one pawn that supports the whole chain). In 8 ball strategic battles, there are sometimes similar situations where a swap in the position of certain key balls, or a cluster-break (rupture) determine the outcome of the game. Secondly, certain pawns are a liability (e.g., isolated, doubled pawns, etc.) much like problem balls...

But, again, I don't think we'll be able to go beyond the academic in the comparison of the two games. No one will play better 8 ball simply from learning chess.

For the record, 8 ball is MUCH more strategically akin to chess than One Pocket. Simply because you got two different armies vying for positional superiority. One Pocket seems to me closer to the Asian game of GO.
 
Last edited:
PoolSleuth said:
IMO NO POOL GAME is the EQUAL to the GAME of CHESS. CHESS is a Mind Boggeling GAME....
Click to expand...

Chess = Math + Strategy

Pool = Math + Physics + Strategy + Physical Execution

Not to take anything away from chess, but I believe billiards can hold its own in comparative difficulty level.
 
Chris said:
Not to take anything away from chess, but I believe billiards can hold its own in comparative difficulty level.
Click to expand...
Pool is AT LEAST as difficult as chess, if measured by how long it takes to master the game. Chess is more intellectual, but not by much. In pool there is a balance between intellect and physical execution that just makes it the most interesting game out there IMO.
 
lewdo26 said:
Jeff,

I love 8 ball strategy but I don't think you'll be able to apply any specific piece of knowledge from chess into 8 ball. Although there are many metaphorical connections between the strategies of two games.

Steve Lipsky's connection is most impressive.

I'd also add that in chess, the pawn structure of your pieces is decisive... Because pawns have a lower degree of mobility compared to other pieces, pawn structures change very slowly, and, sometimes, they maintain their characteristic and set the tempo of an entire game (although usually those games are either one-sided or a boring draw for reasons too lengthy to describe here). HOWEVER (and this is my point), pawn chains/structures can be upset with what's called "ruptures", moves that break the whole pawn structure at its base (the one pawn that supports the whole chain). In 8 ball strategic battles, there are sometimes similar situations where a swap in the position of certain key balls, or a cluster-break (rupture) determine the outcome of the game. Secondly, certain pawns are a liability (e.g., isolated, doubled pawns, etc.) much like problem balls...

But, again, I don't think we'll be able to go beyond the academic in the comparison of the two games. No one will play better 8 ball simply from learning chess.

For the record, 8 ball is MUCH more strategically akin to chess than One Pocket. Simply because you got two different armies vying for positional superiority. One Pocket seems to me closer to the Asian game of GO.
Click to expand...

Thank you, chess players for some righteous ideas.

"Rupture," huh?...I like that term and I like comparing isolated pawns to problem balls. I also like "controlling the center."

And Steve Lipsky's "time" integration....yeah!...Einstein would be so proud. Now you're talking my language...thanks.

Time to think...

Jeff Livingston
 
Williebetmore said:
I think IPT 8-ball is going to be substantially different from your usual bar-league 8-ball (ie. fewer lengthy strategic games). I've watched about 3 hours of top-level IPT 8-ball and I've seen about 3 safeties - the rest are runouts or misses followed by runouts.

I don't care about running out from the break percentages, what I'm seeing is that the first player to the table with a shot is winning a huge percentage of the games (and the ones they are losing is usually from missing a shot or position, not from a strategic error). To me, the outcome of most games I've seen is determined by the result/layout of the opening power break (evil.....give me straight pool anyday).
Click to expand...

Thanks for explaining one big difference between league pool and pro pool. One reason for this, imho, is the size of the table. I play 8-ball on a bar box, so running out usually involves more movement of existing balls and tighter lanes to move the cueball, etc. This increases the need for safety play and stategical maneuvers.

And, perhaps the pros haven't yet evolved the 8-ball game to what it may be in the future. Perhaps defense will play a bigger role as the players become even better 8-ballers than they are now, as they have in 9-ball.

Still, games always come up where strategies for multiple shots/safeties to win and these are the ones I'm looking to exploit, moreso than I do now....thus the request about chess moves applicable to 8-ball.

Jeff Livingston
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top