Blaseball: the fantasy sport you need to get into

Here’s how it works

For the yet uninitiated, Blaseball seems unapproachable. But in a time when people are looking for connection and missing the experience of rooting for their teams, it is easy to see why it has the passionate and creative following it does. 

Blaseball is part fantasy baseball league, part experiment in collaborative story-telling. You sign up on a very unassuming and suspiciously generic website: no flashy graphics, no live video chattering away, no clips or pop ups. The most obvious dynamic element is the ticker at the top, which this morning is informing me that “THE FEEDBACK IS LOUD” and that we are honouring “IN MEMORIAM: SO SO MANY”. 

After you sign up, you select a team. You may pick one based on the funny name, or choose a place close to where you grew up. Your rationale doesn’t matter much; the team you’re drawn toward is fate’s decision, not yours.

The Blaseball season is fast, and weird, and while you’re not on the field and the field is never actually ever seen, you’re still as much a player as, say, the Houston Spies’ rising star Comfort Septemberish. You start off with a small number of coins and you bet those coins on games during the season and use your winnings to alter the game along with everyone else. 

For some more insight into the meta-game of lore and speculation involved in Blaseball (which is alive and well on the Discord server), I recently hovered roughly near local sorcerer and blaseball ethusiast, Uel Aramchek. Uel spends his time casting about for the weather for Blaseball using his incredible skills and insight with the tradition of tarot. These Blaseball weather forecasts and so much more of his work can be found at his home at compoundeye.substack.com

First off, the most important question, who is your team?

The Yellowstone Magic, of course. As above, so below.

And your arch nemesis/nemeses? 🙂 

Amusingly, the archnemesis of the Yellowstone Magic is a single player, King Weatherman, who is a pitcher for the Boston Flowers. The origin of this conflict is a closely guarded secret, though we, the fans, can often sense when our misfortune is in some way his doing (every time).

What new elements/twists/limitations on players (natural disasters, demonic or angelic possessions, etc.) would improve the overall Blaseball experience, in your opinion?

Doppelgangers seem like a natural choice. Alternate reality versions of players are known to exist, after all. Several are playing right now. It would be interesting if two were present at once on different teams. Would both survive such an encounter? Only one way to find out.

Do you have any investment strategies you use when engaging, so to speak? Or are you not technically allowed to play because of future knowledge…

I don’t usually use tarot to play the betting game, especially with the sheer volume of games happening each day. For betting strategy, at the bottom of each hour I’m awake, I put the maximum amount on all ten games to diversify investment based on past performance and who’s pitching. This offers roughly linear growth.

How did you decide to start using your skills in relation to Blaseball? Divine inspiration? Answered a Craigslist ad?

I already owned a copy of Angelica Bamundo’s wonderful Arcana League tarot deck, which portrayed the four suits as occult-flavored teams in the style of classic baseball cards. When Blaseball premiered, it felt as though the deck had emerged for this particular cultural event.

Could you tell me about your process for preparing for the weather forecast?

I try to stay active in the community, as well as cognizant of upcoming decrees and which players are most dangerous. That way, when I pull the cards, it becomes a bit more clear who and what is being referred to in each spread position. Blaseball is chaotic, with a minimum of 999 games happening in a single week. Tarot helps to sort through that volume, identifying the legends being told and the general outlook of trends in the season ahead.

Anything skeptics of the game should know?

The Blaseball community is built around discovering and telling stories together. In spite of the lack of physical or even visible athletes, the energy from the audience is very real. Everyone has a stake in whatever happens next, and anything could happen. Hop into the Discord watch party, and you’ll quickly realize that there’s never been anything quite like it.