Running your league.

You made the league, so you’re the commissioner. The job takes about four minutes a week. Here is the whole thing.

1. Get the chat in

Paste this in the group chat with your invite link. It works better than explaining.

new game for the chat: we predict each other’s love lives with points. questions are only about us, nobody’s date gets rated. tap, pick a name, that’s it →

Four people is enough to start. Twelve is the ceiling. Mixed groups are fine; the rules are the same for everyone.

2. Post the first one yourself

The league copies the commissioner. If your first post is honest and a little funny, theirs will be. A date is the obvious one, but a text you are not answering or a thing you keep saying you will do works just as well.

• Give them a codename (“Pottery Class Guy”). Their name, photos, or a voice note about them are optional and encrypted; only the league can see them and they expire after the reveal.
• Three or four questions. More than that and people skim.
• Picks close before it happens. The app defaults to 15 minutes before a date.

3. Sunday card

Every Sunday, post one line in the chat: “Sunday card. What’s happening this week?” Anyone with something coming up posts it. Dates are rare; texting, situationship deadlines, and quests happen every week, and that is what keeps the league alive between dates.

Home hands you the line, Saturday to Monday. Friends who turn on pings (You → Pings) also get it on their phone, along with “picks close in an hour” and every reveal. The chat line still matters for everyone who hasn’t.

Questions that work on a quiet week:

• Will I hear back within 48 hours?
• Will I delete the app by Friday?
• Will I have “the talk” by the 1st?
• Quest: I will ask someone out this week. Will I actually do it?

4. Reveal the same night

The person it is about reveals it. Do it on the way home while it is still funny. The result card goes back to the chat; that is the moment people screenshot. Revealing earns you 50 points when friends picked, so it pays to be fast.

If something did not happen, or you would rather not say, mark it “didn’t happen.” Everyone gets their points back and nobody asks.

5. The rules you enforce

• Questions are about the person, never about who they are dating. The app blocks the obvious ones; you catch the rest.
• Nothing leaves the league. Screenshots stay in the chat.
• Anyone can delete their post, or leave and take their data with them, any time. No questions.
• Points are not money. There is nothing to settle up and nothing to buy.

If someone asks “isn’t this gambling?”

No. Nobody can buy points, win money, or trade them. It is a fantasy league with imaginary points, and the only person who decides the outcome is the person it is about. If someone says the app lets people bet on their date without consent, that is also wrong: you can only post about yourself, the questions are only about you, and anything about your date is encrypted so nobody outside the league, including us, can read it.

Week two

If the chat asks for the next Sunday card before you post it, you have a league. If you have to nag, tell us; that is the most useful thing we can learn right now.

Create a league · Swooned is a social game, not a gambling product. Points have no monetary value. 18+.