Firing cues — the operator Panels

There are three Panels an operator can use to fire cues. They all share the same cue tiles, choice drawers, target controls, and Clear/Panic — they just differ in how they're framed.

The game-bound Panel

URL: /admin/showtime/panel/{game_id}. A full-screen dark cue board for one game. Bookmark it on the rink laptop, open it for the current game, fire from it.

The header has the game number, the Target stage input, Clear/Panic, and an "Open Stage" link to its sibling Stage URL. Tiles fill the rest of the page. Tap any tile to fire.

The bottom-drawer Panel on the game scoring page

On any admin Game scoring page (/admin/game/{id}), the same Panel is embedded as a bottom drawer. Click the "▲ Showtime" tab at the bottom-right and the Panel slides up over the scoring UI. Click again or click the tab to close it.

The drawer iframes the full Panel for the game you're scoring, so every feature works exactly as in the standalone Panel. It loads lazily (only on first open), so it doesn't slow the scoring page for games where the operator never opens it.

The drawer only appears if your league has set up at least one active cue button. Leagues that never touch Showtime won't see the tab at all — it stays invisible until you're ready.

The Podcast Panel

URL: /admin/showtime/podcast. A non-game Panel for podcast/show hosts who jump between games. A sticky game picker at the top shows games in the last 7 days and next 7 days, with labels like "May 27 9:15 PM — Sharks @ Wildcats · World Cup/U18A". Pick any game; the cue tiles below reload to that game's scoped buttons.

Fires from this Panel go on a separate non-game channel, so they only reach Stages loaded at /showtime/free — they never land on a rink scoreboard.

Tile types

Three kinds of tiles, distinguished by a small badge in the top-right corner:

• No badge — a plain cue. Tap, it fires immediately.
• "Choose" badge — the cue needs an option picked. Tap the tile to open a sub-drawer of options. Examples: Team Lineup (pick Home or Away), Player Spotlight (pick which player). Choice tiles show the player's headshot or team logo. Tap a choice to fire (or, for widgets that also take text input, tap to step into the input pane).
• "Type" badge — the cue needs text input. Tap the tile to open the input pane. Example: Announcer (type the message). Fill in the fields and hit Fire Cue.

The Back button in the drawer header steps from inputs back to choices, or closes the drawer if there's no choices step.

Player Spotlight — choice + inputs combined

The Player Spotlight tile shows a "Choose" badge. Tap → see every player from both teams as a tile (with their headshot, jersey, and a small team-logo overlay in the corner so you can tell teams apart at a glance). Tap a player → step into the input pane → type the Heading (e.g. "Career Milestone"), Sub-text (e.g. "100 Games Played"), and optionally tick Announce this card for an ElevenLabs TTS reading. Hit Fire Cue.

Target stage — addressing a specific Stage

The Panel header has a small free-form Target stage text input. Leave it blank to broadcast to every non-protected Stage. Type a name (e.g. livestream) to send only to Stages whose URL has ?as=livestream.

The value sticks per browser via localStorage, so your last choice survives reloads and across game switches. Anything fired from the Panel — cues, Clear, Panic — sends with this target.

See the OBS Setup article for details on how Stages declare their name and protected mode.

Clear and Panic

Four controls in the header:

• Clear Full — dismisses the cue on the Fullscreen layer.
• Clear Lower — dismisses the cue on the Lower Third layer.
• Clear Corner — dismisses the cue on the Corner layer.
• ⚠ Panic — wipes every layer and stops audio. The safety button.

All four obey the Target stage rule. If the Target is set to livestream, Clear/Panic only reach Stages addressed to "livestream" or untargeted; a protected scoreboard Stage stays untouched. To force-clear a protected Stage, type its name into Target first.

Visual feedback

When you fire a cue, the tile flashes green on success or red on error for ~1s. The drawer's Fire Cue button does the same. If a fire fails, the most common causes are an unreachable Pusher cluster or a misconfigured asset (missing graphic, missing page).

Where the cue goes

• From a game-bound Panel or the bottom-drawer Panel → the game's Pusher channel. Any Stage subscribed to that game (game-specific, location-following, or in protected/named mode) receives it subject to the Target rule.
• From the Podcast Panel → the league's free (non-game) Pusher channel. Only Stages loaded at /showtime/free receive it. Rink scoreboards never see this traffic.

Mobile / tablet use

Every Panel is touch-friendly — tap tiles, swipe up to scroll a long list. The Target input and form fields are standard mobile inputs. A 10-inch tablet is ideal for an operator running cues alongside the broadcast.