Ideas for use — proven Showtime setups

Four setups that take advantage of Showtime's targeted-stages model. Each describes who runs it, what the Stages look like, the URLs, and the cues that pay off.

In-rink scoreboard graphics & announcements

Setup: a TV at the rink running the Automatic Gameday Scoreboard, the Overlay Scorestrip, and the Showtime Stage layered together — three browser sources stacked in one OBS scene, or three scenes on a stream key.

Stage URL: /showtime/location/{location_id}?as=scoreboard&protected=1. Protected mode is the point here — the in-rink screen is the safety surface and shouldn't be touched by accidental untargeted fires.

Operator: the scorer. The bottom-drawer Panel on the admin Game scoring page makes this turnkey — between plays, click the ▲ Showtime tab, fire a cue, get back to scoring. The scorer sets the Target stage field to scoreboard at the start of the night so all their fires reach the rink TV.

What plays well here:

• Sponsor cards during stoppages — image cue, fullscreen layer, 8-second hold, set as a combined cue with an audio jingle.
• Goal celebrations — fullscreen image + the team's goal horn audio. Tap once when the goal is logged.
• Sponsors slideshow during intermissions — auto-rotates through your sponsor logos for the full break duration.
• Stars of the Game widget — set this button to Automatic with the Game Complete trigger. The Stars appear over the just-finished scoreboard before the rink auto-advances to the next game.
• "It's time for your CITGO Power Play" — image of the sponsor card on screen, announcer voiceover at the same time. One button = one tap.

Game-day livestream broadcast

Setup: the broadcast laptop running OBS with the team's livestream — camera feed, scoreboard overlay, and a Showtime Stage layered on top as a second browser source.

Stage URL: /showtime/location/{location_id}?as=livestream. Non-protected so it accepts both targeted ("livestream") cues AND broadcast cues for things that should appear on both the rink and the stream.

Operator: a dedicated broadcast operator, OR the scorer running double duty. The Target stage field sets the granularity:

• Type livestream for cues that should appear ONLY on the broadcast (lower-third lineup cards, on-air talent name supers, broadcast-only sponsor reads).
• Clear the Target field for cues that should appear on the broadcast AND the rink (big sponsor takeovers during commercial breaks, goal moments).
• Type scoreboard for cues that should appear ONLY on the rink, not the broadcast (in-arena promos for upcoming home games).

What plays well here:

• Pre-game lineup lower thirds — Team Lineup widget, one team per fire, slides up from the bottom over the opening camera shot.
• Player Spotlight with TTS announcer — "Career Milestone — 100 Games Played" over the player's headshot, with the TTS reading "Career milestone. Number 22, Tomas Langer. 100 games played." Fires from the Player Spotlight tile with the Announce checkbox ticked.
• Custom Announcer messages — the broadcast host types whatever they want said and the Announcer widget reads it. Useful for ad-hoc moments where pre-recorded audio doesn't exist.
• Power-play sponsor cards — corner layer, 30-second hold for the duration of the penalty.
• Goal replays — video asset on fullscreen.

Recap show / podcast

Setup: a weekly recap show host opens /admin/showtime/podcast on their laptop, and /showtime/free?as=podcast as a browser source in their OBS scene.

Operator: the host (or a producer). The sticky game picker at the top of the Podcast Panel shows games in the last/next 7 days with helpful labels: "May 27 9:15 PM — Sharks @ Wildcats · World Cup/U18A". Pick whichever game the host is currently talking about.

What plays well here:

• "Stars of the Game" from a recent matchup — pick the game, fire the Game Awards widget, it pulls that game's awards live.
• Player Spotlight on a featured player — pick any game that player appeared in to source their headshot and team; fire with a custom Heading like "Featured Player" and Sub-text "Top scorer through 12 games".
• Podcast-only cues — create buttons in the Manager with scope = Podcast for show graphics that shouldn't appear at any rink (the show's intro card, segment dividers, sponsor reads specific to the podcast's sponsors).
• Lineup cards for talking through a recent matchup.
• Custom announcer reads — type any message; ElevenLabs speaks it. Good for "And now from the booth, here's our co-host..." type moments.

Everything fired here lands ONLY on Stages at /showtime/free. None of it reaches the rink scoreboards even when the operator's Target stage field is blank — the channel separation is enforced server-side.

Multi-venue tournament

Setup: each rink runs its own Automatic Gameday Scoreboard + Showtime Stage at its ?as=scoreboard&protected=1 URL. A separate broadcast crew runs a multi-camera livestream covering whichever matchup is featured. A tournament info display in the lobby runs a third Stage with a tournament-wide name like ?as=lobby.

What plays well here:

• Each rink's scorer fires cues to their own protected Stage. Cross-talk is impossible — only the rink-specific Target name reaches that rink's screen.
• The tournament operator can use the Podcast Panel + a /showtime/free?as=lobby Stage to push tournament-wide announcements ("Round of 16 standings now live", "Closing ceremony in 30 minutes") without ever touching the live rink games.
• The broadcast crew runs /showtime/location/{featured_rink}?as=livestream on their stream and addresses cues there independently.
• Sponsor rotations can be staggered: rink Stages get a rink-friendly sponsor slideshow; the livestream Stage gets a broadcast-friendly one; the lobby Stage gets a third tailored to the lobby audience.

A few patterns worth knowing

• One operator, multiple stages, one Panel. The single Target stage field lets one operator address different Stages by typing different names. They don't need separate Panels.
• Bookmarked Stage URLs. Each broadcast crew/venue should bookmark their exact OBS URL (with all params) and use the bookmark to spin up OBS scenes each session.
• Test before going live. Open the Stage with ?debug=1 on a second monitor to confirm cues are arriving while you build out a new event.
• Combined cues for one-tap moments. If a sponsor card always needs an audio sting, bind them on a single Button (image asset + sound asset). One tap = one cue card visual + the audio.
• Auto cues for hands-free moments. Game-end Stars of the Game is the obvious one. The auto-cue path is also a good fit for anything you want to happen exactly the same way every time without operator dependency.