The official rules

Fantasy General Election is a fun, parliament-themed fantasy football game.

It's like normal fantasy football, except we're using general election candidates instead of gangly Norwegians.

Instead of goals, we're counting votes.

In a rare moment of seriousness, this page contains the official rules of Fantasy General Election 2024

The rules were last updated at 18:00 on 09/06/2024

1. General Rules

You must be a registered user to play Fantasy General Election 2024. Registration is free, and you can sign up here
The deadline for signing up, and selecting your team, is 9pm on Thursday 4th July 2024
The player with the most points at the end of the game will win an incredible prize: The official Fantasy Election 2024 mug. In the event of a tie, multiple mugs will be issued
This page should cover everything you need to know, but in case it doesn't, the organisers' decision on anything rules-related is final
If you have any questions, please email admin@fantasyelection.co.uk

Fantasy Election is just supposed to be a bit of fun. While you are of course allowed to get political with your user and team names, you can't use your team name to slag off other people
For example, you can call your team "Labour Forever" or "I Love Rishi Sunak", but you cannot call your team "Candidate A is a prat"
We would also ask you to avoid using any language which could be considered offensive, obscene, or vulgar. This includes swear words. For our full policy on teams and usernames please take a look at our terms of use
If your team or username is deemed to be unacceptable, you will be sent a very polite email asking you to change it. You will not show up in any leaderboards until your name has been changed

Your team must consist of 11 parliamentary candidates.
Position Minimum Players Maximum Players
Goalkeeper 1 1
Defence 3 5
Midfield 2 5
Attack 1 3
Each candidate you choose will cost £1 (in virtual money) for each vote in the sitting MP's existing majority. If the current MP's majority is 10,000, any candidate running for that seat will cost £10,000
You may only spend a maximum of £100,000 on your team
You may only choose a maximum of five candidates from the same political party
Your team must represent all four nations of the United Kingdom. You must pick at least one candidate from each of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales
You may only choose sitting candidates in goal or defence, because they are defending their seat
Conversely, You may not choose sitting candidates in attack
Anyone can play in midfield
You can make as many changes to your team as you like, but all teams will be locked in at 9pm on Thursday 4th July 2024
You will lose 10,000 points for every position in your team which has not been filled by the team selection deadline

In order to score points, your candidates must win their seat. There are no points for finishing second
You will receive one point for every vote in each candidate's new majority. If your candidate wins by 10,000 votes, you will receive 10,000 points
If your candidate is able to defeat the sitting MP, they will also receive one point for every vote in the previous MP's majority.
If the previous MP had a majority of 10,000, and your candidate has a new majority 5,000, you will receive 15,000 points for winning that seat
Your team captain will score double points

Since the last general election, some constituency boundaries have changed, and some brand new constituencies are being contested for the first time.
In most circumstances, the cost of selecting a candidate is therefore based on the Rallings and Thrasher notional results of the 2019 general election
We will also use this information to calculate the number of points scored when compiling the results
If, since the 2019 election, a seat was contested in a by-election, we will use the by-election result - even if the boundary has changed for 2024
We will only use by-election results if the seat name has not changed since 2019. If the seat has been technically abolished, we'll use Rallings & Thrasher for the new seat
If a seat's MP has changed parties, or become an independent, since the last general election, we will use the party they represented in May this year, as of the dissolution of parliament

Much of the points scoring in Fantasy Election is determined by 'the incumbent' or 'sitting MP'. We define the sitting MP as follows:

The most recent MP to hold the seat, as of the dissolution of Parliament
Where the most recent MP is standing down, the sitting MP will be the constituency candidate from the same party.
For example: Michael Gove is standing down in Surrey Heath, so Conservative candidate Ed McGuinness is considered to be the incumbent
Where a new constituency has been created, the sitting MP will be the representative of the party who the notional results suggest would have won the seat in 2019
Where a candidate is standing down, and there is no like-for-like replacement from their own party (for example, if they were an independent candidate), every candidate in the seat will be considered to be the sitting MP, for points-scoring purposes
There are no points for overturning a majority in this scenario
If an MP is contesting a different seat to the one they held in 2019, they will only be considered the incumbent in their new seat if it was held by the party they are standing to represent
Their majority will not carry over from their previous seat
In some rare cases, the boundary review has meant that, according to the notional forecasts, the MP who won the seat in 2019 would not have done so under the new constituency boundaries.
In this case, the party who would have won the seat under the notional results is considered to be the incumbent, meaning that the person who is actually the sitting MP is deemed to be challenging for the seat.

Results will be updated as quickly as possible during or after election night
The winner will be announced on the Fantasy Election website, and will be contacted by email, once all 650 seats have been declared