The PokerStars Mystery Cash Challenge is BACK this weekend for Season 2!
After the success of last year's inaugural season it's returned, and poker fans can enjoy six brand-new episodes. These will be available to watch on YouTube and released every Sunday and Wednesday starting September 22.
But what is the Mystery Cash Challenge? Who's taking part? And what are those dreaded forfeits all about? Fear not — we've got all those questions and more answered right here on PokerNews!
The format revolves around a 6-Max table full PokerStars ambassadors and other well-known players. While Parker Talbot might have been involved last year, there are five new players including Olga Iermolcheva and Wolfgang Poker. There will also be intense rivalries between Talbot and three other PokerStars Ambassadors in the shape of Lex Veldhuis, Benjamin Spragg and Barny Boatman.
If you didn't catch last season, be sure to check out our recaps of every single episode from last season, but the format is different to any other poker show. Each episode lasts ten hands, and you get to see the action from each hand.
The first nine form the "qualification phase". If you win a hand, you receive a token. Players who receive a token can then play in the 10th hand which is a bomb pot. A bomb pot is a unique variation where all players contribute a set amount of chips to the pot before the hand commences, injecting more money and intensity into the game.
The winner of each bomb pot wins a mystery prize which is one of seven prizes — some of which are more desirable than others! In addition to three Silver Passes and three Gold Passes — there's also one extra prize that is worth "considerably less" according to PokerStars commentator James Hartigan.
The innovations keep coming in the Mystery Cash Challenge. If a hand goes to showdown, whoever has the best hand receives a steal card. This continues until the end of the nine hands, or qualification phase, where the person who has the steal card can take a bomb pot token away from another player.
This means that just because you win a pot, doesn't mean you're guaranteed to play in the bomb pot in the end. Spoiler alert! This is exactly what happens in the first episode, where Barny Boatman has the steal card and uses it to steal Wolfgang Poker's bomb pot token, shutting him out of the bomb pot excitement!
Not a lot is known about what the potential forfeits are in the Mystery Cash Challenge, as only one has been revealed in the first episode. Again, spoiler alert if you haven't seen the episode but after winning the Bomb Pot, Barny Boatman selects a mystery prize and a mystery forfeit.
His forfeit? "For the next nine hands you will not be allowed to check post-flop"
What other forfeits are there? You'll have to tune into the next episode of Mystery Cash Challenge!
