diff --git a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/css/casino/holdem.css b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/css/casino/holdem.css
index 499b7c8..ae308f9 100644
--- a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/css/casino/holdem.css
+++ b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/css/casino/holdem.css
@@ -4067,6 +4067,14 @@ textarea:focus-visible {
     min-width: 7rem;
 }
 
+/* A prompt with one thing to do gives that thing the whole row. The empty-table
+   prompt is the first control a dealer ever meets here, and a button sitting in the
+   left third of the bar reads as one option among several that haven't loaded yet. */
+.dealPromptButtons:has(> :only-child) .actionDeal {
+    flex: 1;
+    width: 100%;
+}
+
 /* The quieter half of the deal prompt: things the deal is about to do that a dealer
    would otherwise only discover afterwards. */
 .dealPromptLine.dealPromptAside {
diff --git a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/actionBar.js b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/actionBar.js
index d635143..0c3a31f 100644
--- a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/actionBar.js
+++ b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/actionBar.js
@@ -113,12 +113,19 @@ const ActionBar = {
         if (!host) return;
         host.innerHTML = "";
 
+        // A table with nobody at it used to hide this bar altogether, which meant the
+        // one moment a dealer has never used the tool before is the one moment it says
+        // nothing at all. What they got instead was a felt printing EMPTY ten times and
+        // a green Resolve Pot button that would resolve nothing.
+        //
+        // An empty table is a state with an obvious next step, so it says what it is.
         if (!this.isRunning()) {
-            host.hidden = true;
-            document.body.classList.remove("hasActionBar");
-            document.documentElement.style.setProperty("--actionBarHeight", "0px");
+            host.hidden = false;
+            document.body.classList.add("hasActionBar");
+            host.appendChild(this.renderEmptyTable());
             this.stopTankTimer();
             this.tankSeatIndex = null;
+            this.announce();
             return;
         }
         host.hidden = false;
@@ -145,6 +152,32 @@ const ActionBar = {
         this.announce();
     },
 
+    // The empty table. One sentence and one button, in the place every other prompt in
+    // this tool appears, so a dealer who has never opened it before is looking at the
+    // next step rather than at ten chairs labelled EMPTY.
+    renderEmptyTable() {
+        const wrap = document.createElement("div");
+        wrap.className = "dealPrompt";
+
+        const line = document.createElement("p");
+        line.className = "dealPromptLine";
+        line.textContent = "Nobody's at the table yet.";
+        wrap.appendChild(line);
+
+        const buttons = document.createElement("div");
+        buttons.className = "dealPromptButtons";
+
+        const seat = document.createElement("button");
+        seat.type = "button";
+        seat.className = "actionBtn actionDeal";
+        seat.textContent = "Seat a player";
+        seat.addEventListener("click", () => this.hooks.seatFirstPlayer());
+        buttons.appendChild(seat);
+
+        wrap.appendChild(buttons);
+        return wrap;
+    },
+
     // One sentence, for anyone running this by ear.
     //
     // The bar used to carry aria-live itself, and because render() rebuilds the whole
@@ -172,6 +205,7 @@ const ActionBar = {
 
     announcement() {
         const state = this.state;
+        if (!this.isRunning()) return "Nobody's at the table yet.";
         if (!state.bettingOpen) {
             const preview = Betting.blindPreview(state);
             return preview ? "Ready to deal." : "";
diff --git a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/main.js b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/main.js
index cb60916..8b00304 100644
--- a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/main.js
+++ b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/main.js
@@ -317,6 +317,16 @@ document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", () => {
         rerender: hooks.rerender,
         resolvePot: openPotWizard,
 
+        // The first thing a dealer does on a table nobody is sitting at. Opens the
+        // seat editor on the first free chair — the same panel tapping the seat gives
+        // them, so the button teaches the gesture rather than replacing it.
+        seatFirstPlayer: () => {
+            const index = state.seats.findIndex(seat => !HoldemState.seatInPlay(seat));
+            Render.toggleSeatEditor(index < 0 ? 0 : index);
+            const panel = document.getElementById("seatEditorPanel");
+            if (panel) panel.scrollIntoView({ block: "nearest", behavior: "smooth" });
+        },
+
         beginAction: label => {
             actionHistory.push({ label, snapshot: snapshotState() });
             if (actionHistory.length > MAX_UNDO_STEPS) actionHistory.shift();
diff --git a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/render.js b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/render.js
index 38f561c..d02dc96 100644
--- a/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/render.js
+++ b/JoshHeaps.Net/wwwroot/js/casino/holdem/render.js
@@ -71,6 +71,32 @@ const Render = {
         const misdeal = document.getElementById("misdealBtn");
         if (!misdeal) return;
         misdeal.hidden = !this.state.bettingOpen;
+
+        // On a table nobody is sitting at, Next Hand has no button to move and Resolve
+        // Pot has no pot — but Resolve Pot is the accent green, so the loudest control
+        // on a new dealer's first screen was the one that could do the least. It is
+        // now visibly not-yet, which puts the only green left on the felt where the
+        // actual next step is.
+        //
+        // Disabled rather than hidden: hiding them would move the header the moment
+        // the first player is named, and a control that vanishes teaches nothing about
+        // what it was for.
+        const nothingToRunYet = !this.state.seats.some(seat => HoldemState.seatInPlay(seat));
+        [["resolvePotBtn", "Nothing to resolve — nobody is at the table yet"],
+         ["nextHandBtn", "Nothing to move on from — nobody is at the table yet"]]
+            .forEach(([id, why]) => {
+                const button = document.getElementById(id);
+                if (!button) return;
+                // Next Hand explains itself in the markup, and that sentence has to
+                // survive being borrowed for the disabled reason and handed back.
+                if (button.dataset.titleWhenUsable === undefined) {
+                    button.dataset.titleWhenUsable = button.getAttribute("title") || "";
+                }
+                button.disabled = nothingToRunYet;
+                const title = nothingToRunYet ? why : button.dataset.titleWhenUsable;
+                if (title) button.setAttribute("title", title);
+                else button.removeAttribute("title");
+            });
     },
 
     // Whether this device can actually drag a seat. HTML5 drag events are never
@@ -548,8 +574,24 @@ const Render = {
     updatePuckContent(node, player, index) {
         const empty = this.isEmptySeat(player);
         const nameEl = node.querySelector(".seatPuckName");
-        nameEl.textContent = empty ? "Empty" : (player.name || "").trim();
+        // An open chair used to say so, in capitals, on every seat that had nobody in
+        // it — which on a table a dealer has just opened is the word EMPTY ten times
+        // across the felt, and it is the first thing they ever see this tool do.
+        //
+        // The puck already says it without a word: dashed instead of solid, faded, no
+        // stack under it. That reads at a glance, which is how a dealer looks at the
+        // felt, and it reads the same on the one open chair at a full table — which is
+        // the case the label was actually for. Repeating a word ten times is not
+        // emphasis, it's noise, and it was drowning the seat numbers underneath it.
+        nameEl.textContent = empty ? "" : (player.name || "").trim();
         nameEl.classList.toggle("seatEmptyLabel", empty);
+        // Dashed-and-faded is a thing you can see, not a thing you can hear, so the
+        // word an open chair no longer prints goes here instead. Anyone reading the
+        // felt by ear gets more than they had: the seat number too, which the sighted
+        // version has always shown in the corner.
+        node.setAttribute("aria-label", empty
+            ? `Seat ${index + 1}, empty`
+            : `Seat ${index + 1}, ${(player.name || "").trim() || "unnamed"}`);
 
         const cardsEl = node.querySelector(".seatPuckCards");
         cardsEl.innerHTML = "";
@@ -811,6 +853,12 @@ const Render = {
         // Safe to do on every keystroke: the bar is small, it's rebuilt on every action
         // anyway, and nothing inside it can hold focus while the sidebar has it.
         if (typeof ActionBar !== "undefined" && ActionBar.state) ActionBar.render();
+        // And the header answers the same question the bar does — Resolve Pot and Next
+        // Hand are switched off until somebody is at the table, and typing a name is
+        // exactly the keystroke that changes that. Caught by walking the first-run flow:
+        // after naming a player both stayed greyed out, still captioned "nobody is at
+        // the table yet", because this path deliberately doesn't redraw everything.
+        this.renderHeaderActions();
     },
 
     wireSeatFields(form, player, index) {
diff --git a/tests/holdem/announcing.test.js b/tests/holdem/announcing.test.js
index 88f7929..eaa196d 100644
--- a/tests/holdem/announcing.test.js
+++ b/tests/holdem/announcing.test.js
@@ -30,9 +30,19 @@ describe("before the cards are out", () => {
         assert.equal(barOn(state).announcement(), "Ready to deal.");
     });
 
-    test("and an empty table says nothing at all", () => {
+    test("and an empty table says what it is, rather than nothing", () => {
+        // This used to announce "" — silence being the honest answer when the bar was
+        // hidden on a table nobody was sitting at. The bar isn't hidden any more: an
+        // empty table is the one state a dealer meets before they know how any of this
+        // works, so it says so and offers the next step.
         const state = HoldemState.createDefault();
-        assert.equal(barOn(state).announcement(), "");
+        assert.equal(barOn(state).announcement(), "Nobody's at the table yet.");
+    });
+
+    test("and a table with one named player has moved on from that", () => {
+        const state = HoldemState.createDefault();
+        state.seats[0].name = "Ann";
+        assert.notEqual(barOn(state).announcement(), "Nobody's at the table yet.");
     });
 });