tegwick
4a72420e01
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ci / check (push) Failing after 4s
GateAttackPolicy ranks ATTACK above GROUND at the stress gate and delegates everything else. A PROBE, not a better bot: it wins 12/100 where greedy wins 60/100 under the same module, and the panel's banner says so, because a column that looks like a policy comparison will be read as one. (a) THE MODULE IS UNREACHABLE IN THE PRINTED GAME. Selected alone it still never fires: peak Stress never exceeds 2, so the gate never bites and no ATTACK is ever gated. A module can be unreachable because of an aspect it does not name -- attack_relief needs a problem_stress module before it can act at all, and nothing in its own declaration says so. (b) ONCE REACHABLE IT IS REAL. Holding the probe fixed and varying only the module: group wins 12->21, 19->28, 50->57 at 3/4/6p, and DARVO arms 299->221, 294->213, 334->164. Under flat pressure the same shape appears in DARVO alone: h1 arms 200 against flat_any_open's 300/400/600. Stated as the conditional it is: GIVEN seats that attack at the gate. Not advice to attack, and not evidence against F17. AND IT CHANGES WHAT WE TOLD GROUND-GAME. CB-EV-0030 rejected H1 with policies that never attacked, so H1-B was inert for every game behind that verdict. The rejection stands on flat pressure alone -- wins are 0 either way -- but "H1-B does nothing" was never established and is now known to be false. We owe them that correction. Sensitivity: vary only the ATTACK rank. At 10 (greedy) and +55 (module-aware) the module never fires; at 110 it fires in every game. Nothing about the module changed -- only whether any seat gave it a turn. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
329 lines
19 KiB
Markdown
329 lines
19 KiB
Markdown
# The finding register
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Design findings about **GROUND**, with their reproductions. Governed by
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[`GameDesign.md`](GameDesign.md) (admissibility, kinds, states, metrics)
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and [ADR-0012](../decisions/ADR-0012-the-design-instrument.md). Reported
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by `make design`.
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**Split out of `GroundRules.md §Underdetermined` on 2026-08-05** when that
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file crossed the ~400-line loadability limit. ADR-0012 D2 said *"no new
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file"* and this is a new file — but D2's substance was **one register, not
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a second mechanism competing with the first**, and that holds: this *is*
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§Underdetermined's register, moved, still driving off the same
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`provisional`/ruling machinery. D2 also named the awkwardness this
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resolves — a finding about the engine sitting in a document about the
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game.
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The U-items themselves, with their defaults and rulings, stay in
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[`GroundRules.md §Underdetermined`](GroundRules.md); this file tracks them
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*as findings*.
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**This section is the design-finding register** (ADR-0012 D2). It was the
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register for dataset ambiguities already; CB-WP-0022 extended it to all
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five kinds rather than building a second one beside it. Admissibility,
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kinds, states and metrics: [`GameDesign.md`](GameDesign.md). Reported by
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`make design`.
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<!-- design-register:begin -->
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| id | kind | state | reproduction | role | raised | owner |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| U1 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U2 | underdetermined | applied | scenarios/ground/gr-d01-darvo-trigger.yaml | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U3 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U4 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U5 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U6 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U7 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U8 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U9 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| U10 | underdetermined | applied | — | default | 2026-07-31 | ground-game |
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| F11 | inert | applied | scenarios/ground/gr-p05-solve-legality.yaml | counterexample | 2026-08-02 | clay-borg |
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| F12 | degenerate | note | — | — | 2026-08-01 | clay-borg |
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| F13 | inconsistent | withdrawn | scenarios/ground/gr-e01-threshold-reachable-2p.yaml | counterexample | 2026-08-01 | clay-borg |
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| F14 | unplayed | applied | games/ground/examples/attack-value.rs | counterexample | 2026-08-01 | clay-borg |
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| F15 | underdetermined | note | — | — | 2026-08-05 | clay-borg |
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| F16 | inconsistent | withdrawn | games/ground/examples/difficulty.rs | counterexample | 2026-08-05 | clay-borg |
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| F17 | degenerate | raised | games/ground/examples/attack-value.rs | counterexample | 2026-08-06 | ground-game |
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| F18 | inert | raised | `games/ground/src/edition.rs::card_text_tests::the_engine_reads_only_part_of_what_it_vendored` | counterexample | 2026-08-06 | clay-borg |
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| F25 | inert | raised | `games/ground/src/edition.rs::card_text_tests::the_engine_agrees_with_the_editions_own_numbers` | default | 2026-08-08 | clay-borg |
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| F24 | inert | raised | `games/ground/src/edition.rs::card_text_tests::the_hardcoded_deck_still_matches_the_edition` | default | 2026-08-07 | clay-borg |
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| F19 | degenerate | applied | crates/cb-render-html/src/lib.rs::overhead_table | counterexample | 2026-08-06 | clay-borg |
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| F20 | inert | applied | crates/cb-render-html/src/lib.rs::ending_page | counterexample | 2026-08-06 | clay-borg |
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| F21 | degenerate | note | — | — | 2026-08-06 | clay-borg |
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| F23 | inconsistent | applied | decisions/ADR-0017-chaos-window-2-verdict.md | counterexample | 2026-08-07 | clay-borg |
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| F22 | underdetermined | withdrawn | games_ground::edition::supply_tests::play_never_exceeds_the_components_the_box_holds | counterexample | 2026-08-07 | clay-borg |
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| F26 | inert | ruled | `crates/cb-render-html/src/lib.rs::a_scoped_table_says_what_a_scope_does` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | ground-game |
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| F27 | unplayed | reported | `games/ground/examples/scenario-panel.rs` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | clay-borg |
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| F29 | inconsistent | applied | `games_ground::edition::card_text_tests::which_scenarios_are_mechanically_distinct` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | ground-game |
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| F31 | unplayed | reported | `games/ground/examples/module-panel.rs` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | clay-borg |
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| F30 | degenerate | ruled | `games/ground/examples/scenario-panel.rs` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | ground-game |
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| F28 | underdetermined | applied | `games_ground::tests::the_mastery_rating_and_the_shared_score_count_different_things` | counterexample | 2026-08-08 | ground-game |
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<!-- design-register:end -->
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Prose for **closed** findings (withdrawn or applied) lives in
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[`FindingRegister-closed.md`](FindingRegister-closed.md); the rows above
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are the whole register and `make design` reads them from here.
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- **F31 — `attack_relief.self_soothe_ge4` cannot fire, so it has never
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been measured.** `module-panel` records **zero ATTACKs in every cell**,
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at every seat band, under both a mode-blind and a module-aware bot. The
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module only acts on an uncancelled ATTACK by a seat at Stress ≥ 4, so
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it has had no opportunity in any game this repo has run — including
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every game behind CB-EV-0030's H1 measurement, where it was half the
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package.
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The mechanism is legible: `GreedyPolicy` ranks `Ground` at 100 when the
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stress gate bites and `Attack` at 10, so at exactly the position where
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self-soothe would pay, GROUND wins the comparison.
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`ModuleAwarePolicy` raises ATTACK by 55 at the gate and **that is still
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not enough**, which is a fact about the ranking rather than about the
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game.
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**`unplayed`, emphatically not `inert`.** The kernel implements the
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module correctly; nothing has ever given it an opportunity. Reporting
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it as a null result is the error the panel now refuses to make: its
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row shows real numbers with `← never fired: UNMEASURED` attached,
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because the numbers belong to the *other* modules in the row.
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**Sensitivity:** vary only the ATTACK rank. The falsifier is a policy
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that attacks at the gate — if group success then moves under
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`attack_relief.self_soothe_ge4` and not under the baseline, the module
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is real and only our seats were hiding it. Until such a seat exists,
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**no claim about this module is supported in either direction**, and
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CB-EV-0030's H1 verdict rests on its flat-pressure half alone.
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**FALSIFIED, 2026-08-08, and the answer has two parts.**
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`GateAttackPolicy` — a probe that ranks ATTACK above GROUND at the
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stress gate, delegating everything else — was built for exactly this.
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**(a) The module is unreachable in the printed game, not merely
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unchosen.** With `attack_relief.self_soothe_ge4` selected *alone* the
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probe still never attacks and the row still reads `never fired`:
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**peak Stress never exceeds 2**, so the gate never bites and no ATTACK
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is ever gated. The baseline has no inbound Stress (F17's observation
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from the other side), so this module needs a `problem_stress` module
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before it can act at all. **A module can be unreachable because of an
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aspect it does not name.**
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**(b) Once reachable it is real.** Holding the probe fixed and varying
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only the module — the only comparison that isolates it:
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| seats | `scoped` | `scoped_plus_attack_soothe` | group wins | DARVO arms |
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|---|---|---|---|---|
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| 3p | 12 | **21** | +9 | 299 → 221 |
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| 4p | 19 | **28** | +9 | 294 → 213 |
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| 6p | 50 | **57** | +7 | 334 → 164 |
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Under flat pressure the same shape appears in DARVO alone: `h1` against
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`problem_stress.flat_any_open` arms 200 against 300 / 400 / 600 at
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3/4/6p, with group wins 0 in both.
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**Stated as the conditional it is:** *given seats that attack at the
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gate*, self-soothe raises group success by ~7–9 per 100 and cuts DARVO
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arming by a quarter to a half. The probe is deliberately poor play — it
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wins 12/100 where greedy wins 60/100 under the same module — so this is
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**not** a recommendation to attack, and the row is not evidence against
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F17.
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**What this changes about H1.** CB-EV-0030 rejected H1 with policies
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that never attacked, so H1-B was inert for every game behind that
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verdict. The rejection stands on flat pressure alone — group wins are 0
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with or without self-soothe — but *"H1-B does nothing"* was never
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established and is now known to be false.
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**Sensitivity:** vary only the ATTACK rank. At `Attack = 10` (greedy)
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and at `+55` (module-aware) the module never fires; at `110` it fires
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in every game. Nothing about the module changed — only whether any seat
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ever gave it a turn.
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- **F30 — SCN_04 is materially harder at 2 players.** 52/100 group
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success against 67 and 73, with **every other parameter held by the
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edition itself**: same deal shape, same 6 available points, same
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threshold 5, same starting Stress. The lone difference is that SCN_04
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is the only 2p deal needing **two of one suit** (Repair, Clarify,
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Repair).
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**Causation is not established** and the finding does not claim it. The
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falsifier is a deck with a doubled suit that does not lose group
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success.
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**Sensitivity:** vary only the seat band and the gap closes — at 4p
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SCN_04 is 97 against 94/99, so it is *not* the hard board there. The
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effect is specific to the 2p deal, which is the band where the deck has
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fewest cards to route around a suit it cannot match.
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**RULED 2026-08-08:** acceptable variety for now; SCN_04 stands as a
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harder board and is monitored. If table feel proves too swingy the
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first lever is priority-2's suit (dropping the double Repair), **not**
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the global thresholds — which also confirms our reading that the suit
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multiset is the operative difference, without our having measured it.
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- **F27 — the two competitive modes are scoring lenses over cooperative
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play.** `scenario-panel` finds group success *exactly* equal across
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SHARED GROUND, COMMON PROBLEM and BONDED COALITIONS in all 36 cells.
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Correct arithmetic: `GreedyPolicy` maximises the group outcome and
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never reads `state.mode`, so the same games are played and only the
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winner set is carved differently. **Whether a mode changes how GROUND
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is played is therefore untested**, and cannot be tested by any panel
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built from the current policies — it needs one that plays for personal
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score. `unplayed` rather than `inert`: the modes score correctly, they
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have simply never faced a seat that wanted to win alone.
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**Re-measured 2026-08-08 with `ObjectivePolicy`** (CB-WP-0049 T03),
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which plays its seat's own objective. The finding **splits in two**:
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- **Group success does not move.** 34 of 36 cells identical; SCN_03 at
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4p goes 99→100 in all three modes, which is the SOLVE-by-value
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refinement and not a mode effect. **Whether the table survives is the
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same game in all three modes.**
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- **Who wins does move.** Under BONDED COALITIONS at 4p, winning seats
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per game go 2.04 → 2.98 (SCN_01/02), 2.12 → 3.29 (SCN_03), 2.05 →
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3.01 (SCN_04): a seat whose score is its coalition's sum bonds more,
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and the coalitions get about half again as large. COMMON PROBLEM
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moves at 6p (1.10 → 1.17).
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So the modes **do** reach decisions — the original claim that they are
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"scoring lenses over cooperative play" was too strong, and is withdrawn
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in favour of the sharper one: **GROUND's scoring modes change who wins,
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not whether the group succeeds.**
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**Sensitivity:** vary only the seat band and the effect appears and
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disappears — 2p shows no divergence in any mode, 4p shows the largest,
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6p shows none under BONDED COALITIONS. A candidate explanation is that
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two relation slots per seat cap network growth, so at 6p the incentive
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exists and cannot be acted on; **that is untested** and is the next
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thing to vary.
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**Still open**, because the part that motivated it is untested: no
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policy models a *rival* playing their objective, so a competitive mode
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in which nobody anticipates an opponent remains a weak test of that
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mode (CB-WP-0049 "Not done here").
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**The seat-band explanation is answered, 2026-08-08.** ground-game:
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the two-relation-slot limit is an **intentional cap** on complexity and
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play time; a third slot stays an extension rather than core r0. So the
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6p flatness is designed, not a defect — and our sensitivity run is
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welcome but would be measuring an extension, not the shipped game.
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**The aspect half is closed, 2026-08-08** (CB-WP-0049 T04).
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`ModuleAwarePolicy` reads the resolved `Rules`, so "a bot that does not
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attend to a mechanism cannot test claims about it" no longer holds for
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modules. **The mode half stands**: no policy models a *rival* playing
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their objective, so a competitive mode in which nobody anticipates an
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opponent remains weakly tested. That is the whole of what keeps this
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open.
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A second limit surfaced while closing the first: the scope term is
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**inert at round-one positions**, because one Problem is face up and a
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ranking preference needs two candidates. Any measurement of
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`problem_stress.scoped` weighted toward early rounds is measuring a
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mechanism that has not started.
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- **F26 — a package that adds a FILE is invisible, where a package that
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adds a column is not.** `h2-scoped-problem-stress` ships
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`Rules_Text.csv` — twenty-two passages of player-facing rules, including
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the one passage that says what a `stress_scope` does. No reader in
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clay-borg mentioned the file, so `edition-check` could not call it stale
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(a file nothing reads is not out of date, it is unseen) and no gate
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could call it unread. The rule the table's whole layout encodes sat in
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the repo, reachable by no player, for the entire measured life of H2.
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**Inert rather than underdetermined**: nothing is ambiguous about the
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rule and the engine implements it correctly — the text simply could not
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fire. Third instance of F18's shape and the first where the unit is a
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file, which is why it is filed separately instead of folded in.
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Raised against `ground-game` because the actionable half is theirs: a
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package's manifest should name its own files, so that a consumer reading
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none of them is a detectable state. clay-borg now reads the one passage
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it needed (CB-WP-0046); the other twenty-one remain unread and that is
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the standing evidence.
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**RULED 2026-08-08:** accepted as a process ask. Catalog and modules
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will declare `consumed_files` / overlays so a consumer reading none of
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a package's files is a detectable state. Tracked on their side under
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GROUND-WP-0008.
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- **F17 — ATTACK cannot affect whether the table succeeds.** Reported
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from play as *"there is no incentive to play attacks as long as I have
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positive cards"*, and **the artifact now exists**:
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`games/ground/examples/attack-value.rs`, 200 games per cell, one number
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varied — ATTACK's rank in an otherwise identical policy.
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| ATTACK ranked | wins (2/3/4/5/6p) | attacks | DARVO armed |
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|---|---|---:|---:|
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| 10 (below all) | 132 / 165 / 190 / 200 / 200 | 0 | 0 |
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| 75 (above SUPPORT) | **132 / 165 / 190 / 200 / 200** | 315–923 | 13–218 |
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| 95 (above SOLVE) | **0 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 0** | 1400–5170 | 400–1000 |
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**The middle row is the finding: identical win counts at every seat
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count**, while attacking hundreds of times and arming DARVO. Attacking
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is not punished — it is **inert with respect to the goal**. Group success
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is a function of SOLVE alone, and ATTACK only costs anything when it
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ranks above SOLVE and displaces it.
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**So the maintainer was right and the reason is sharper than the
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phrasing.** There is no incentive because there is no *path*: ATTACK's
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effects (Stress, Rivalry, DARVO) feed nothing that decides
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`group_success`.
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**Asked in all three modes 2026-08-07, and ATTACK earns its place in
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none of them:**
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| mode | never attack | attack sometimes |
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|---|---|---|
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| SHARED GROUND | 132/165/190/200 | **identical** — free but pointless |
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| COMMON PROBLEM | 59/52/48/44 | 59/52/48/**34** — a cost at six seats |
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| BONDED COALITIONS | 131/134/132/116 | **59/52/48/34** — roughly halved |
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**The coalitions row has a mechanism the data confirms.** GR-A07 flips a
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Bond to a Rivalry on Attack, and GR-E04 scores Bond *networks* — so
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attacking destroys the thing that scores. And the attacking numbers in
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E04 are **identical** to E03's, which is exactly what that predicts:
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break every Bond and each seat becomes a coalition of one, so GR-E04
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degenerates into GR-E03.
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**Not a claim that the game is broken.** DARVO is the pattern the game
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is *about* not falling into; a self-destructive ATTACK may be the
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design. The question for `ground-game` is whether the namesake mechanic
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being unreachable in competent co-op play is intended.
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- **F18 — the engine imports one of nineteen edition files, so the cards
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cannot say what they do.** Reported as *"I don't understand the GROUND
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card"* — which is not a design gap: `Actions.csv` carries that card's
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tagline (*"Regulate. Restore the frame. Decide."*) and full rules text,
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and clay-borg never imported it. Every other card is the same: a player
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sees `Clarify` where the card reads *"Ask What Happened — Invite a
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concrete account before judging."* **`inert`**: the data exists and
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cannot fire, because nothing reads it. **Ours, and CB-WP-0028 fixes it.**
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- **F25 — the engine hardcodes numbers the edition states.**
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`GroundState::threshold` is a `match` returning 5/7/9 while
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`Scenarios.csv` carries `threshold_2_players`, `threshold_3_4_players`
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and `threshold_5_6_players`; setup writes `stress: 2` against *"All
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players start at Stress 2."*; the engine plays five rounds against a
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printed 1–5 track. **All three agree, on all four scenarios**, and that
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is the finding rather than the reassurance: these are the most contested
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numbers in the project — the whole 4/6/9 versus 5/7/9 episode turned on
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them — and the engine has been right by maintenance coincidence rather
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than by reading the file that owns them. **`inert`**, role `default`:
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green because they agree, red the moment either side moves. **Ours.**
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Same shape as F24.
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- **F24 — the draw pile is a Rust literal.** `solution_deck()` builds six
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of each suit from an array and never opens `Solutions.csv`, whose `suit`
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and `quantity` columns say the same thing. **They agree today** — 24
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rows, six per suit — so nothing is wrong now, and that is the point:
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the engine is right by maintenance coincidence rather than by reading.
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**`inert`**: the data exists and cannot fire. Role `default`, not
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`counterexample` — the reproduction is green *because* the two agree,
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which is the state GameDesign §1.3 says to expect from a documented
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provisional choice, and it turns red the moment either side moves.
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**Ours.** CB-WP-0037 T02 deletes the literal.
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- **F15 — the rules define one game, not a series.** `OutcomeView` gives
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`personal` (per seat), `group_success` (per table) and `winners`. Summing
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the first and counting the third answer different questions, and GROUND
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says nothing about how several games combine. CB-WP-0024 T04 shows
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**both, labelled**, rather than picking one and letting it become the
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score by default. `note`: no artifact demonstrates that this *harms*
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play — a unit test showing the two tallies point at different seats
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demonstrates only that they can differ, which is arithmetic, not a design
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defect. Under GameDesign §3.1 it may not be reported until one exists.
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