A football league that never existed, and you run a team in it.

Getting started

1. Create a league. Solo, against bots, or multi-player, with friends in some of the seats. Pick the size, the lineup and the scoring, and three things that shape the game: whether there is charisma, whether free agents go by waiver order or by swag points, and whether the first rookie class is mixed into the first draft or drafted on its own afterwards. Your world is generated in a few seconds.
2. Do your homework. Before the draft you have 3 scouting points. Browse the players, scout the ones you're unsure about, and line up your draft board. The Rookies button on the Players tab shows only the newcomers.
3. Reveal the draft order, then draft. The order is drawn at random when you ask for it. The bots pick fast. Open any player's card while you draft and the arrows on each side step through the list.
4. Set your lineup. Nothing is started for you (unless you turned on auto-optimize when you made the league). Who plays is your call, every week. Each player's projected points for the week are on his listing.
5. Play the week. All at once, or in real time through the day, with scores coming in like a game day.

Inside a league, "How it works" in the menu has that league's exact rules. The game installs to a phone's home screen, and can send you notifications.

What a week looks like

• You play one other team. Your starters score fantasy points from what they do in their games. Most points wins. The Matchup tab shows both lineups side by side, a card for each player: his points, what he was projected for, his bye week and his line for the game.
• The midweek (optional). Before you play a week, the Midweek button settles the free agents and lets the other teams make their moves. You then see the lineups you will really face, and can still change your own. Skip it and playing the week does the same things first.
• Injuries are real here. Every player has a health bar. Under 80% he's out. A serious injury to a young player can lower how good he'll ever be. A player's card lists his injuries this season.
• Bye weeks. Every pro team has one week off. A player's bye week is on his card.
• Highlights and the chat carry the week's best plays, its results, and the bots' opinion of them.

Free agents

During the season you don't simply sign a free agent: every team that wants him puts in for him, and it is settled at the midweek (or when the week is played). A league uses one of two ways, chosen when it is created.

• Waiver order. Teams are served in turn. Win a claim and you go to the back of the line, so your best pickup costs you your place.
• Swag points. Every team gets 200 or 250 swag points each season and bids them for free agents. Bids are blind: nobody sees yours until they are settled. The highest bid gets the player and pays it, and he can start for you that week. A bid that loses costs nothing. A tie goes to the team earlier in the waiver order. What you don't spend is gone when the season ends.
• If your roster is full you choose who to release when you put in for a player. He is only released if you win.
• Afterwards it is public. A player's card has a History: where he was drafted, every winning bid or claim for him and what the other teams bid, and every trade he was in.
• Out of season, signing is instant.

Trades

• With a bot. Offer a deal and it answers at once: yes, no, or a counter. Bots judge it by what it does to their lineup, now and later, and they send you offers of their own.
• With another manager. Your offer waits for their answer: accept, deny or counter. It goes through the moment it is accepted.
• Rookie draft picks can be traded, for the next drafts to come. A pick from a team that is losing is worth more than one from a team that is winning.
• Swag points can be part of a trade between two managers. Bots never trade theirs.
• Trading closes at the league's deadline week.

Game day, in real time

"Sim in real time" turns a week into a Sunday. The games are played in three sets, early, late and night, 90 minutes each with 30 minutes between. Your matchup page becomes a live scoreboard with the scores counting up, and you choose which scoring plays you're alerted to: yours and your opponent's, only yours, or none.

• A player locks when his own game kicks off. Until then you can still start him, sit him, sign him or release him.
• Had enough? "End the week now" finishes every game on the spot.
• Watch games on the league page opens every pro game of the week, each one replayable play by play.

Playing with friends

• Invite by username. Whoever creates a multi-player league is its commissioner and invites people from the league's settings. An invitation lights up the invited person's Multi-player leagues and Lobby card on the home page, where they see who it is from and the league's settings, and accept or deny it.
• The Lobby. A commissioner can make a league public, when creating it or later. Public leagues are listed in the Lobby with their settings, how many people are in and how many teams bots are running. Tap one to see who is in it, write privately to its commissioner, or join. The commissioner can take the listing down at any time.
• Joining a league that is under way. You take over one of the bots' teams as it stands, and you choose which.
• When someone leaves, a bot takes their team at once, and that bot is as hard to trade with as bots get. The commissioner can invite someone to take the team over, and can have the league's schedule pause when it happens or keep playing with the bot. If the commissioner leaves, another manager becomes commissioner.
• Report and block. On any private message, Report tells the people who run the game what happened, and sends along what that person last wrote to you; they are not told who reported them. Block ends private messages between you, hides their lines in a league's chat from you, and closes your leagues to each other. You can undo a block under Your account.
• A month away and you are out. If you don't open a multi-player league for 30 days, a bot takes your team.
• A multi-player league keeps its records only while it is alive. When the last person leaves, or the commissioner deletes it, the league and everything in it is gone.
• A pick clock for the draft: 3 minutes, 10 minutes, 1 hour, 12 hours. The clocks stop overnight. When one runs out, the pick comes from that manager's draft board, or the best player available.
• Weeks on a schedule. The commissioner can have the league play itself: any days of the week, at a set time, all at once or in real time. It carries on through the offseason too, and can be paused at any point.
• If a starting spot is empty when the week is played, the best player on your bench who can play there steps in for that week.
• Messages. Private messages between managers, and a league chat where the commissioner can remove a message.
• Notifications on your phone, if you turn them on: you're on the clock, your players score, a trade offer, a bid won or lost, a message.

The ratings

50 is an average pro. 90 is elite. Each position leans on a handful of ratings, and those are the ones starred on a player's card. Tap any rating on a card to see this again.

Physical

Speed. How fast he is once he gets going. Fast players turn a good gain into a long one, get behind the defense on deep routes, and are hard to catch from behind. A main rating for QB, RB, WR, TE.

Agility. How quickly he cuts, stops and starts. Agile players make the first tackler miss, win on outside runs and sharp routes, and slip away from pressure. A main rating for QB, RB, WR.

Strength. Power at the point of contact. Strong players push through tackles for extra yards, win at the line, and are hard to move. A main rating for RB, TE.

Stamina. How long he keeps his level through a game. A player low on stamina tires, plays below his ratings late, and comes off the field more. A main rating for QB, RB, WR.

Mental

Awareness. How well he reads the game. Aware quarterbacks see the open man and avoid sacks; aware players at any position make fewer mistakes and draw fewer penalties. A main rating for QB, WR, TE, K.

Passing

Throw Power. Arm strength. A strong arm drives the ball downfield, so deep passes arrive on time and are harder to pick off. A main rating for QB.

Throw Accuracy. Ball placement. Accurate passers complete more throws and put fewer balls where a defender can catch them. A main rating for QB.

Receiving

Hands. Catching the ball. Good hands mean more catches and fewer drops, on passes and on kick returns. A main rating for RB, WR, TE.

Route Running. Getting open. Sharp route runners create space against coverage, so the ball comes their way more often and they have room to catch it. A main rating for RB, WR, TE.

Ball carrier

Ball Carrying. What he does with the ball in his hands: seeing the hole, breaking and dodging tackles, and holding on to it. A main rating for QB, RB.

Blocking

Blocking. Run and pass blocking. Good blockers open running lanes and keep pass rushers off the quarterback. A main rating for TE.

Special teams

Kicking. Leg strength and accuracy. Better kickers make field goals from farther out, miss less, and punt and kick off deeper. A main rating for K.

And three things that aren't skills

Consistency. Steady players score about the same every week. Streaky players are boom or bust.

Durability. Fragile players get hurt more often. An iron man rarely misses a game.

Development. Fast, normal or slow: how quickly a young player grows toward his potential. It's hidden until you scout him, or until his third season.

Potential is a guess

The gold part of a rating bar is how good the scouts think a player can become. For a rookie that guess can be well off. It sharpens as he plays. A young player can also turn out better or worse than he looked: most often as a rookie, less in his second year, less again in his third. The players who beat their scouting report, and the ones who never reach it, are where leagues are won.

Scouting points

• You get 3 points at the start of every offseason, before the draft. A new league gets them before its first draft.
• You get 2 more points at the same time if your lineup accuracy averaged 75% or better in the season that just ended.
• 1 point scouts a player. You see how fast he develops, and get a much sharper read on his potential.
• Points can only be spent before the draft starts, not during it.

Lineup accuracy is your sit-or-start grade. After each week the game works out the best lineup you could have set, from what your players actually scored. If you have four running backs and two spots, did you start the two who scored the most? Finish the regular season at 75% or better and the extra scouting points are yours.

Charisma

Charisma points buy your team a push for the week ahead. It's a league option: leave it off for football with no help. Everything it buys is under the Charisma button on a player, which opens a card with each option, its price and what it does.

• Earning. 1 point at the start of every week. Streaks pay too: 2 wins in a row earns 1 point, 4 in a row earns another, 6 another, and so on. Losing streaks pay the same way, so a bad run gives you something to fight back with.
• Boost a starter for the week. It raises his main ratings: +10% for 1 point, +30% for 2 points, +45% for 3 points (he can't be injured that week, and plays 10% below his best the week after). One boost per player per week.
• Head start (1 point, one player a week). He begins the week with 5 fantasy points on the board, as long as he starts for you. It adds to a boost and to being Inspired, so an Inspired player you bring off the bench, boost and give a head start can have a very good week. Your opponent sees it on his card.
• Heal. +20 health for 3 points. Once a week for a player, and as many players as you can afford.
• Full heal (5 points, once a season for your team). An injured player is back to 100% at once, and can't be injured that week.
• Safety net (3 points, once a week, bought before the week starts). After the games, your lowest-scoring starter trades places with a bench player at his position who scored more. If nobody on your bench did, you get the points back.
• Inspired. A player nobody started, on a bench or in free agency, who was projected for 5 points or more and scores two and a half times that is Inspired the week after: his main ratings are up 5% and he can't be injured. An Inspired free agent goes to the top of the free agent list.
• The shield. A player with the top boost, a full heal or an Inspired week can't be injured in that week's game. He shows a shield.
• The bots earn and spend charisma too, most of all in the games that decide their season. Unspent charisma is lost when the season ends.

Trials

• A Trial is a solo run with an end. You draft a team and play three seasons against eleven bots, under the same settings as everyone else: 12 teams, 15-man rosters, no kickers, swag points and charisma.
• Every run is a new set of players. No two runs are the same league, so nobody can learn one by heart.
• Run as many as you like in a week and submit one. Once you submit, you are locked until the next week opens on Tuesday. The boards show how many runs each person started.
• Seven leaderboards: the Trial Rating (everything in one number), titles and record, total points, lineup accuracy, draft value, dynasty value and your biggest week. Points, draft and roster are measured against the other teams in your own league, because every league is different.
• Charisma carries over from one season to the next inside a Trial, so you can save it for the week that matters.
• A Trial league is not saved. It is deleted when you submit it, when you start another, or when its week closes. Only your leaderboard entry is kept.

Go to Trials →

The long game

• The playoffs. The best teams make them, and the Playoffs page shows the bracket. Once week 10 has been played it fills in with the teams that would be in if the season ended today. Lose and you're out.
• Then the year turns. Everyone ages, some players retire, and a rookie class arrives. The rookie draft goes worst finish first, and the picks belong to whoever holds them after trades.
• The next season starts when the last rookie pick is in. If the rookies put you over the roster limit, you have until week 1 is played to get down to size; after that the least valuable players are released for you.
• Young players grow during the season and between seasons. Older players fade. The team you have in season five is the one you built in seasons one to four.
• Nothing is thrown away. Every game, stat line and standing stays in your league's history. (A Trial is the one exception: it is a run for the leaderboards, and you are told before you start that it is not kept.)

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