Dealer's Choice

The gambling game show that lasted for two seasons.

Premise
Contestants selected from the studio audience played a series of casino games. They were spotted 100 chips to start, and they can bet as much as want up to the max bet in each game.

Contestant Selections
To start, one audience member came up on stage to choose the three contestants playing that day. The audience member selected off a game board with slot machine symbols on it. He/she had four choices and for each contestant's name revealed, the audience member won $25; and if all three contestants' names were revealed, the audience member also won a prize in addition to $75.

Home Viewer Contest
Each of the three chosen contestants drew a postcard to see who their home viewer partners are. The winner of that day's game also won a prize for that home viewer.

Main Game
The game was played in four rounds.

Rounds 1 & 2
This was where the contestants can bet up to 10 of their chips; in Round 2, the maximum bet is 25 chips.

Round 3 (Blackjack)
In this round, standard casino blackjack rules apply. The idea is to get 21 or get as close to 21 without going over, going over is a bust. All 10s & face cards were worth 10, number cards are worth the number on the card, and aces are worth 1 or 11. 50 chips is the max bet, and all blackjacks paid off at 2:1 instead of the usual 3:2. The dealer for this game is another randomly selected studio audience member who also had a home partner by drawing a postcard. Like normal casino dealers, the audience member dealer must stand on 17 or more, and hit on 16 or less. Also the dealer wins the player's chips that they bet should any of them lose by busting (going over 21) or not beating the dealer. Each chip collected by the dealer was worth $1 to the dealer, and his/her home viewer partner received the same amount in a gift certificate.

Final Round (Last Chance)
The final round was dubbed "The Last Chance Round" where unlike the first three rounds, there were no max bets; so any player can go "all in". During the Bob Hastings era, the game was called "Last Chance", where 5 cards were revealed and totaled. In the home version called "Place Your Bets", this round was referred to as "Total Up".

Card Games
The hostess would ask a player to cut a deck of cards; they would then be drawn one at a time, and as long as the card met positive conditions, the contestants won double their bets. The game ended when all five cards were drawn or if a bad card was drawn. When the latter happened, the contestants who bet, lost their bets. So to prevent this from happening, each contestant had an option to stop and keep their bets. If no bad card was drawn at all, the contestants kept their bets and added them to their scores.


 * High/Low - The bad cards in this game were 7s, 8s & 9. As long as cards lower than seven or higher than nine came up, the game continued up to five. One of either the 7, 8 or 9, the game was over.


 * Ace/Face is Out - All aces & all face cards were the bad ones. Players won their bets each time any number card was drawn.


 * Any Pair Loses - So called because if any two of the five cards matched, the player(s) who was/were still in, lost.


 * In Between - The winning cards were cards between threes and queens; so kings, deuces and aces were the losers.

Mixing Machine
These game used a machine that mixes up ping-pong balls marked with numbers (usually 1, 2 & 3). It takes 3, 4 or 5 of the same number or combination of numbers to end the game.


 * Speculation - The player were faced with a "Stock Exchange Board" with three stocks. Each one has a different number of odds determined by the number of ping-pong balls representing each one (1:1 for Stock #1, 2:1 for Stock #2, and 5:1 for Stock #3). The contestants will bet on which stock will reach one point first. Now the hopper represented a "ticker-tape machine". For each one drawn, the number on the ball corresponding to one of the stocks caused that stock to go up by 1/5 of a point. As soon as a stock reached the full point, the game ended and the contestant(s) who bet on that stock won his/her/their bet(s).


 * Dealer's Derby - This was played in a horse racing format. There were three horses each one with a set number of odds (1:1 for horse #1, 2:1 for horse #2, and 5:1 for horse #3) The contestants will bet on which horse will reach the finish line first. For each one drawn, the number on the ball corresponding to one of the horses caused that horse to move one space (with five being the winning number of spaces). The contestant(s) who bet on the horse that finished first won his/her/their bet(s).


 * Baseball - The players must bet on either 4 hits or 3 strikes coming up first.


 * Bingo - The game was played a 16-number grid, not the usual 25-square grid. The players must bet which directional bingo would occur first; either horizontal (across), vertical (up & down) or diagonal. The diagonal pays higher odds since there were only two possibilities (the others had four). Number on the board were drawn one at a time and as soon a "bingo" was made, the game ended; and the player(s) who bet on the right direction won his/her/their bet(s).

Wheel of Chance
The Wheel of Chance was calibrated with various symbols each with different odds (1:1, 3:1, 5:1, and occasionally 11:1). The contestants bet on which symbol each one thought that the wheel would stop on, and of course correct predictions won the bet times the set odds.

The player with the most chips won the game, and goes on to roll the Bonus Dice. Regardless of who won the game, all contestants received a prize choice according to their final scores (0-100, 101-300, 301-), with 500 chips giving any of them a bonus prize. The prizes were chosen via the slot machine game board.

Bonus Dice
In the Bonus Dice game, the winning contestant rolled a pair of dice with dollar amounts ranging from $50 to $200 on them. Whatever the total amount landed on the dice became his/hers and added to his/her score. However, each die had one spade, and rolling a spade lost all the money from this game, which was why the winning contestant always had the option to stop and take the money after each spadeless roll. But if the winning contestant can reach $1,000 or more, not only the winning contestant can keep the cash but also won a bonus prize.

Inventors
Ed Fishman & Randall Freer

Merchandise
A home version of the game called "Place Your Bets" came to fruition in 1974. It was produced by Gamut Of Games, the same company that created the home version of The Diamond Head Game. The reason why it was called Place Your Bets was because Parker Brothers, the company that produced the popular board game Monopoly already owned a board game called "Dealer's Choice", but this was based on used car dealerships at around that same time.

Trivia
In the first season, the show was taped at the Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. Later it was moved to Los Angeles, California.

Links
Chuck Donegan's Dealer's Choice Page

Information about the Dealer's Choice Home Game

YouTube Videos
A Full Episode of the Show.

Part 1

Part 2