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Poker Dome in Las Vegas
https://forum.costaricaticas.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=15260		 Page 1 of 1
Author:  Witling [ Wed Jan 24, 2007 11:04 am ]
Post subject:  Poker Dome in Las Vegas
From the Las Vegas Advisor question of the day; A new concept in TV poker.

Q:
What's the Poker Dome?

A:

The Poker Dome, sponsored by mansionpoker.net and aired on FSN (Fox Sports Net) on Sunday nights at 11 p.m. is taped weekly in downtown Las Vegas in three converted movie theaters at the Crown Theater multiplex at Neonopolis, Fremont Street and Las Vegas Boulevard.
The mansionpoker.net Poker Dome Challenge began on May 28, 2006. It continues to run for 43 weeks, culminating in a winner-take-all final table with a grand prize of $1 million.

Each week, six players vie for $25,000. The contestants qualify for one of the 216 available spots by winning daily freeroll tournaments held at mansionpoker.net. Online qualifiers receive all-expenses-paid trips to Las Vegas (plus $500 in casino credit and other amenities). The winner of each weekly preliminary round takes home the $25K and advances to the semi-finals. When six preliminary rounds have been played, one semi-final round occurs. The winner of that pockets $50,000 and advances to the finals. Six semi-final winners play for the winner-take-all million-dollar first prize.

The game is Texas hold 'em, with two hole cards, three flop cards, a river, and a turn card. Bets are restricted to the size of the pot before the flop, but not after. So pre-flop it's pot-limit; post-flop it's no-limit. When it gets down to heads-up, it's all no-limit.

But one of the many wrinkles of the Poker Dome Challenge is the time limit for decisions: 15 seconds to check, bet, call, raise, or fold. This is speed poker, which has also been called "the NASCAR of poker." The players can see the countdown clock, a series of red lights in front of them; they must act before all the lights flash, otherwise they forfeit the hand. If a player is slow enough to forfeit five hands, he has to sit out for five minutes. Each player is entitled to one 30-second extension for tough decisions; the last two players get a second extension if they've used the first.

Other wrinkles: The Poker Dome Challenge has been called arena or spectator poker. The game takes place in "the world's first custom-designed poker arena." Two hundred audience members sit in stadium-style seats in the converted theaters, overlooking the sound-proof one-way-glass "dome": The audience can see in, but the players can't see or hear anything outside the bubble.

Spectator poker simply couldn't work any other way, since the poker table is ultra-high-tech and the audience is privy to all kinds of inside information, displayed in real time on 13 giant plasma monitors. The main screen shows the whole table, while each player has two dedicated screens. One of those shows a constant close-up of the player; the other reveals his hole cards and chip counts. The poker chips are embedded with radio-frequency identification (RFID) sensors, so the players chip counts are updated after every bet. In addition, instead of cameras revealing players’ hole cards, the cards themselves use RDID sensors, which means that the spectators know what cards the big blind holds even before the player does.

And in an unusual touch, the player screens display their heart rates. The players are hooked up to vital-sign monitors and the beats per minute are exhibited via a telemetry link. (Think of the publicity if a player actually has a heart attack during the game.)

Obviously, a lot of money has gone into the production values of the TV show. FOX has a three-year lease on the dome set and mansionpoker.net is obviously committed to the format. The stage boasts a couple dozen cameras and the control room reportedly contains 80 monitors. It's an MTV-generation production for sure, with the hectic pace of play, quick cuts and jumps and edits, and tons of graphics whizzing by. Whether or not you like it will depend on taste. In our humble opinion, there's an awful lot of mucking going on and there's little time for the players to interact, so not much drama builds up. But otherwise, it's as good a poker show as any other.

To see it up close and in person is easy. All you have to do is go to TVTickets.com and scroll down the list to "Poker Dome Challenge." You must print out your tickets right there, and there are no charges. Most shows are taped on Saturdays at 5 p.m., but some are taped on Sundays at 5 p.m.
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