Pay Dice! (PILOT)

[Deleted]

Loosely based on the series "Pay Cards!", this show involves two contestants trying to form hands of poker using special poker dice rather than cards.

I will explain the rules as we go along. I need two players please. Who would like to be a part of this pilot?

[bighornbattle]

Count me in of this pilot please.

[nathandiniz]

I'm in

[Deleted]

Great, thanks to you both. We will start shortly.

[bighornbattle]

Good luck to you.

[nathandiniz]

Same to you

[bighornbattle]

.

[Deleted]

(trumpet intro followed by timpani drum roll)

Mary Lou Basaraba: "It's the television dice game that everyone can play! It's Pay Dice!"

-( theme and audience applause begins )-

"And here's your host, Jack Thompson!"

-( continued applause as I emerge from around the side of the set )-

I thank you folks and you of course remember my lovely co-host who graced a similar stage back in the 1980s on a show called "Super Pay Cards!", please continue that warm applause for Mary Lou Basaraba!

-( continued applause )-

Back then, Mary Lou and host Art James used playing cards to form payable hands of poker, but on this show, we will be using the six values found on each poker die, those being the 9, the 10, the Jack, the Queen, the King and the Ace as you can see prominently displayed on our lovely set here.

Before we start playing though, Mary Lou, please tell us a bit about our two players today!

"Certainly Jack, first from Spartanburg, South Carolina we have ourselves a singer and mahjong player here, meet George Cluster!"

- (audience applauds) -

"And from Aberdeen, South Dakota, we have a cat lover and avid pinball player here, meet Nathan Diniz!"

- (audience applauds) - 

Thank Mary Lou! Gentlemen, welcome to Pay Dice! George, you play mahjong do you? Have you ever played competitively or just for fun? Do you usually win or lose at that game?

[bighornbattle]

I just play for fun for over 10 years as 1 of my hobbies. I usually win about 90% of the time.

[Deleted]

Wow, good for you. If you win about 90% of the time on this show, your opponent is in deep trouble!

- (audience chuckles) -

Best of luck to you George!

Nathan, we might have had some old intel on you there, so apologies if we got any of that wrong. Are you still into cats, pinball and the Dakotas?

[Deleted]

(Bump for Nathan)

[Deleted]

(Nathan, I saw you logged on a few hours ago, so not sure what your deal is, but you're holding up the show.  You have made no entry in the Vacations thread, so you either forgot you signed up to this or are no longer interested and you're ignoring it on purpose.  Either way, I'd like to proceed, so I'll give you another 24 hours to respond and then I'm replacing you.

I guess I have no choice but to implement a time limit.  I hate doing that, I'd rather just have active participants, but NGC is what it is sometimes I guess, so as of now, we'll have a 48-hour rule in effect where you'll get warned after 24 hours without reply and then lose your turn 24 hours after that, unless you've posted a vacation notice of course.)

[nelson21]

I'll can replace Nathan if u like

[Deleted]

Thanks Nels, but Immanuel had already sent me a PM.  I will give Nathan the time I said, otherwise I'll go with Immanuel, but thanks for offering.

[Deleted]

Well Mary Lou, one of our contestants went MIA and I see you have found us a replacement! Please tell us about him!

Mary Lou: "Sure thing Jack, he's a souvenir shop worker that's majoring in Film and Television in college, meet Immanuel Tims!"
- (audience applauds) -

Immanuel, great to have you with us and thanks for stepping in to fill our unexpected vacancy. It sounds like you want a career in either movies or television. Do you have a specific path or goal in mind? Do you want to be in front of or behind the camera ultimately?

[babytims]

So...since I was about 3, I always wanted to be on TV...I always wanted to be a TV star, and recently I made a draft, a "shell script" if you will, of what the show's gonna be. I imagined a talk show, but I kinda don't wanna spill too many more beans than that!

I wanna of course host it, maybe direct and produce it as well!

[Deleted]

That sounds really exciting Immanuel! I wish you tons of success with that and I hope that dream comes true for you one day!

- (audience applauds) -

Gentlemen, good luck to you both!

The object of our show is to build yourself the best poker hand possible using our special dice that have the 6 values that you see on our set next to our show name there.  On each show, we offer the contestants 3 opportunities to do that playing different games using those dice. I'll explain more on that later. At the end of those 3 games, whichever one of you has won the most amount of money becomes our champion and plays our bonus round game which we call "Step Up" which could pay off more than $100,000!

- (audience applauds) -

Our computer board in the middle of the set is currently blank, but it is where the computer will display the results of our dice rolls. On our show, you two won't be physically rolling dice but our computer here will roll random sets of these dice that you will choose from and that is how you will build your poker hands.

We begin each of our game segments with a mini-game we call "High 5" where values are assigned to the dice and the idea is to obtain the highest score possible -- whichever one of you does this keeps that value in cash and gets first crack at building a poker hand!

I hope that all made sense. If it didn't, don't worry, you'll get it as we go along. Mary Lou is over next to our computer board now to show you the values we use in the "High 5" mini-game.

(ding)

Mary Lou: "George, Immanuel, for our High 5 mini-games, the dice have these values. The 9 and 10 are of course valued at 9 and 10, the Jack, Queen and King are valued at 15 and the Ace is worth only 1 in this mini-game. Back to you, Jack."

Thank you Mary Lou. Now, let's have the computer setup the board with 3 random sets of 5 dice please.

(ding)

George, since you were our first contestant, we're going to start with you. In a moment, I'll ask you to select a number, either 1, 2 or 3. Our computer will reveal the 5 dice assigned to that number and then you'll have to decide whether you want to keep that total or discard it. If you discard it, you can then select one of the other 2 remaining numbers for a different set of dice. You can discard that total as well if you like, but if you get to the third number, you must keep those dice no matter what the total is. Once you've settled on a total, the computer will generate another three sets of dice and it will be Immanuel's turn to try and beat your total. Whoever has the higher total wins the mini-game and their total in cash and goes first trying to build a poker hand in our first regular game segment. If by chance we end in a tie for the score, we'll have a sudden death round where you will each select one row which will be added to your total to break the tie.

George, if you have any questions about any of that, feel free to ask, otherwise please choose a number and let's play!

[bighornbattle]

3.

[Deleted]

Computer, please show us the 5 dice you are concealing behind number 3.

(ding)

Ok, so that's 15 for the Jack and Queen is 30, plus 10 is 40, plus 9 is 49 plus 1 for the Ace totals 50.

George, in this mini-game, the absolute lowest score would be 5 if you got 5 Aces and the absolute highest would be 75 if all 5 dice were combinations of the Jack, Queen and King. This means that the average or mean value would be 40, so this total is slightly above average.

Would you like to keep your score of 50 or discard it to look at one of the other numbers?

[bighornbattle]

I am going to keep it.

[Deleted]

Very well, so you have 50 as a score for this mini-game and that's what Immanuel must beat to win it. I'm the curious type though so let's have the computer reveal the set of dice that's behind numbers 1 and 2 please.

(ding)

-( audience ohhhs )-

Well George, as it turns out, you kept the lowest of the three sets. There was a score of 56 behind number 1 and 58 behind number 2. Still though, 50 is a pretty good score and let's see if Immanuel can beat it or not. Computer, give us a fresh three sets of dice, will you please?

(ding)

Immanuel, can I interest you in a 1, or something in a 2 perhaps, or how about a 3?

- (audience chuckles) -

[babytims]

You got me at 2. I think that’s what I want

[Deleted]

You want number 2, you got number 2. Computer, show us dice set number 2 please.

(ding)

Ok, let's see, 9 and 9 are 18 and 1 is 19 plus ... oh my goodness, how close can you get, that's 49 you have there Immanuel!

- (audience murmurs) -

Man, so close to a tie, but not enough I'm afraid, so you'll have to discard those dice and try again please.

[babytims]

Eesh. They say 3's a crowd, and a crowd of numbers could be what I need. I'll take 3 please

[Deleted]

You got it, computer, show us the third row of dice please.

(ding)

Oh man, well that one's easy to add up, only 32 there Immanuel, so we'll have to hope a big total is behind number 1. Let's see that first row of dice please!

(ding)

Oh, that's close as well, but only a total of 47 in that set, so that means George wins the first High 5 mini-game!

(ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding)

- (audience applauds) -

Well George, you picked the lowest set of dice in your group, but it turned out to be higher than all three of Immanuel's sets, so you get that score in dollars and you lead the match by fifty dollars!

- (theme begins as applause continues) -

That's chicken feed though compared to our first main game we call "Best of Three" that could pay one of you as much as $2,500!  George will start us off in that game when Pay Dice continues after these messages!

- (music and clapping continues and we widen the shot and fade to black) -

[Deleted]

- (theme music and applause as we fade in) -

We are back for more Pay Dice!

George Cluster has just made history by winning the first amount of money every given away on this show. It was only fifty bucks, but that could wind up being the difference between winning and losing once this all plays out. We are about to start our first main game segment and we call this game "Best of 3" and there's Mary Lou over at the computer to highlight the payouts.

Mary Lou: "George, Immanuel, our Best of 3 game pays one hundred dollars a pair, so two hundred for two pair, two-fifty for three of a kind, five hundred for a full house, which is a combination of three of a kind and a pair. We pay one thousand dollars for four of a kind and two thousand for five of a kind. Whichever one of you finds the highest hand wins a five hundred dollar bonus!"

Thanks Mary Lou. Gents, the other thing to note there is we do not use straights or flushes in this game or any of our games for that matter, so keep that in mind.

George, by winning that High 5 game, you get first crack at building a poker hand. In a moment, the computer will show you 3 rows each concealing 3 dice. You will pick a number, we'll reveal that row of dice and you must select at least one die to be in your hand of 5 dice. You can take 2 of the 3 or all 3 dice if you like. You'll then select one of the other 2 rows and we'll reveal that row of dice. At this point, you'll have a decision to make. If you don't like the look of your hand or the dice that the computer has rolled for you, you can choose to re-roll. This means the computer will generate another 3 rows of concealed dice and your current hand will be thrown out. You can take this option twice, but no more. On the third set of dice, you must complete a poker hand of 5 dice.

That's how we play Best of 3! Computer, please do your thing!

(ding)

Good luck to you George. Which number would you like?

[bighornbattle]

I am sticking with 3.

[Deleted]

Computer, George wants to see the dice behind number 3 please.

(ding)

Well, it's colorful I'll say that about it, not much help in terms of a payoff. You must select at least one of those George, which would you like and what number next please?

[bighornbattle]

King and #1 please.

[Deleted]

(ding)

Alright, we're hoping for some more Kings behind number 1. Kings, art thou present?

(ding)

Hmm, nothing helpful there either. You would have had a pair of Queens had you chosen that die. As stated, you do have the discard option available if want to get some new dice and try again George, otherwise you need to take at least one die from row 1 which would then mean you'd have to take all 3 dice from row 2 no matter what they are. What do you think?