Start a fresh franchise & keep your server

A new chapter, not a season advance #

Use a franchise restart when your league is starting a different Madden save. Advancing into the next season of the same save does not require this command. /madden connect reconnects the existing franchise and refuses to silently switch saves. /league reset is a different teardown workflow and can remove Discord resources.

Start the new chapter #

Create the fresh online franchise in Madden and make sure the connecting EA account can see it. Finish or reconcile active paid Media Center jobs first. No data changes when you simply request a setup link.

1. Run /madden restart teams:Keep all team assignments (or Reopen team selection) season:<first calendar year> archive-name:<old chapter name>.
2. Open the private setup link, authorize EA and select the new franchise. The old save must not be selected.
3. Review the old chapter name, target franchise, first year and team policy. Type ARCHIVE AND RESTART and confirm. Closing the page cancels without changing the league.
4. Wait for the bot to refresh team roles and selection panels, then run /madden refresh scope:all-weeks. Open the dashboard league picker again if your old tab points at the archived chapter.
5. Open League Memories to view the archived chapter's trophy room, season standings, completed scores, earned prediction rewards and published stories.

/madden restart teams:KEEP season:2027 archive-name:Original dynasty

What stays and what starts over #

Kept: the Discord server, configured channels and categories, scheduling and feature preferences, saved staff and trade committee memberships, paid plans, owner AI allowance, and remaining AI credits. Monthly AI usage stays attached to the server and is not replenished by restarting.

Archived: all old imported Madden data, games, standings, player stats, rosters, ownership records, trades, activity, economy ledger, contests and rewards. The new chapter has a different internal league identity, so source player IDs, season numbers and matchups cannot collide with the old save.

Fresh: Franchise Credits wallets, gameplay markets, pending upgrades, unused rewards, trade negotiations, claims, waitlist, schedule and imports. Nothing is applied to the new Madden franchise automatically. Old backup Companion export links are invalidated; direct EA credentials are replaced with the newly authorized franchise.

Keep teams or let people choose again #

Keep teams copies every saved assignment, including multi-team GMs and their active team, to the matching teams in the new chapter. It does not attempt to infer ownership from EA display names.

Reopen team selection clears team assignments in the fresh chapter and sets Open team selection. GMs stay members, staff and committee access stays assigned, and team roles are reconciled. A commissioner can later change selection to Request or Commissioner-only in settings.

If something interrupts the restart #

Before confirmation commits, a failure leaves the existing chapter active. A current Madden refresh, unresolved paid generation, expired setup link, or revoked commissioner membership blocks confirmation. Create a fresh setup link if authorization expires; do not use /league reset to recover.

After confirmation commits, the archive and new connection are saved together. Discord repairs run separately and retry automatically after bot restarts or permission failures. League Memories shows commissioners any pending repair warning. Fix the bot's role hierarchy/channel permissions; do not create another chapter to retry repairs.

The archive is read only in the application. There is no restore-as-active button. Only imported, completed Super Bowl scores produce a trophy; missing finals, MVP awards or other facts never imported cannot be invented. Reward team labels reflect ownership at archive time, not a guaranteed historical owner at the time of every game.

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