You know, it makes me think of the feeling I get when I hold a really large, dense, polished stainless steel ball bearing...I just have an irresistible urge to see how it acts as a projectile!
So...yeah. That aspect of the game you describe (Pétanque) would appeal to me. Doing it within the rules, of course! I imagine the object must be to hit at exactly the right angle and amount of force so that your ball goes as far into the distance as theirs does...
And because they are made out of steel instead of wood, the transfer of energy to their ball is going to have far less loss in the handoff as would be greater in two softer substances like wood. Changes the dynamic, I’ll wager.
Yes. So at first you draw a throwing line from which the players have to stand behind. One player throws the little ball. Then the first team pretty much wants to roll the ball towards the little ball. The first ball is always the closest so the other team gets the second try. There are all kinds of philosophies on rolling technique. Some try to bounce and roll like a bowling ball, I prefer to try a backspin roll... which doesn’t really roll the ball backwards from the bounce it just slows the roll down. If you put tons of spin then, yeah, on a sandy court it will plop down pretty much.
But when there are already 6 balls crowding the field (sometimes they are spread out leaving plenty of room), things change. Some of the strategy is to try to block the other team, or if you already have one well placed ball to try to edge out the opponents ball, in which case you can either try to place it between, or nudge their ball out of the way just a hair (or both). But if you are down 2 or 3 balls then bomb the hell out of the pile and move the little ball!
In my 20’s we parties with a group of French people. We’re all still close friends but everyone has moved to different parts of the country. But for a decade there it was eat, drink tons of wine, and play Petanque!
This is more or less what we played with. My set is all silver but with different patterns. Some have 4 silver color and 4 brass color. All of ours is in a nicer case though :-)