2026-09-10 17:27:22
Anonymous:
Remove review history and align superseded prose with current design rules
hold the flood/build comparison.md ..
@@ 4,7 4,7 @@
## Requirements and shared proposals
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The brief requires limited carried oxygen, meaningful hordes and powerful combinations, with equipment competing against salvage. Discovery leads; enemy manipulation is secondary. Detailed build rules and oxygen quantities remain undecided.
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The brief requires limited carried oxygen, meaningful hordes and powerful combinations, with equipment competing against salvage. Discovery leads; enemy manipulation is secondary. The current proposed connection rules are in [Build Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Build%20Rules), and part behaviour is defined in [Equipment Catalogue](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Equipment%20Catalogue). Their quantities and balance remain unselected.
For this comparison, the following are **proposals**:
@@ 12,11 12,9 @@
- Equipment, ordinary salvage and spare oxygen canisters share one visible carry-capacity interface, as the owner accepted. Active oxygen and estimated time remaining are always readable; no exact quantities are asserted.
- The head begins in a readable powered rack and reserves its full shared capacity from the moment it is lifted, whether in hand or stowed; a full pack must first make room. **In hand**, it travels immediately but overrides equipment form: both builds lose their full functions and retain only basic defence. **Stowed** on the carry frame, it still occupies full capacity but restores full build use after a deliberate, exposed transfer. **Dropped**, it frees capacity and restores handling immediately, but stays where placed. In-hand carriage is transitional during release, transfer or emergency re-pickup; once safe stowing is possible it is not intended as a competing long-return strategy. Ordinary hordes remain active during the return.
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The Design Lead’s expedition should match these carrying, extraction, and hazard properties or identify a replacement before review.
-
## Approach A: Relay Cascade Array
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The player finds an energy-tool chassis and useful modules: a branching emitter, impact coupler, and heat-release module. Each occupies space. With ordinary fire launched mostly automatically under the owner's control choice, hits branch through a dense horde, impacts charge the coupler, and stored heat shapes a later special discharge started by a manual activation or a valid external event. Descended effects keep their original causal wave, under Build Rules and Combat Rules. The chain may overwhelm ordinary hordes; it is not capped to manufacture a weakness.
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The player assembles a linked rig from reusable parts. An ordinary automatic weapon's physical impacts can feed an Impact Dynamo; compatible connections send its charge to an Arc Emitter or Capacitor storage. A Thermal Lens can convert released charge into a heat payload. Each part occupies space, and each connection follows the current catalogue's port, readiness and receiver rules. Descendant effects retain their causal sequence and finite allowances under Build Rules. A powerful legal chain may overwhelm an ordinary crowd; power, heat and physical routes still limit its effects.
Commitment happens before reaching the salvage. Each module improves the cascade but displaces salvage or a spare canister. The player can keep a reliable partial combination or detour while oxygen falls. Returning with the full array and target is an aggressive bet: exceptional lane clearing, little room, and narrow oxygen margin.
@@ 24,15 22,15 @@
## Approach B: Cargo-Cycler Rig
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The player instead finds one compact industrial launcher/recycler. It converts ordinary salvage into attacks: conductive scrap might arc, a pressure vessel shove, and brittle composite fragment. Sequencing pieces creates combinations without permanent modules—for example, shove a wave together before an arc and fragment burst. These are examples, not a fixed catalogue.
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The player instead uses a Salvage Cycler linked to compatible output parts. Chosen conductive, pressure or brittle material produces its inspected charge, force or fragment response; the linked receiver determines the action. Sequencing material inputs can create combinations—for example, a shove followed by an arc or fragment burst—while consuming those inputs. The Cycler and its linked parts remain reusable equipment with their own carrying and rig costs.
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Commitment is economic. Free capacity holds canisters, the target, and varied inputs, but combat spends colony-bound salvage. The player chooses ammunition, return value, and whether to search longer for a useful response family. The designated target cannot be consumed accidentally.
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Commitment is economic. Capacity left after the Cycler and its linked parts holds canisters, the target, and varied inputs, but combat spends colony-bound salvage. The player chooses ammunition, return value, and whether to search longer for a useful response family. The designated target cannot be consumed accidentally.
-
Deliberately collected materials can produce a ridiculous sequence anywhere. Careless firing empties the pack; a poor mix lacks control or damage; hoarding starves the weapon. A lighter equipment load creates oxygen margin, but input searches spend it. Power trades future return value for present survival.
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Deliberately collected materials can produce a ridiculous sequence anywhere. Careless firing empties the pack; a poor mix lacks control or damage; hoarding starves the weapon. A configuration with fewer carried equipment units leaves more oxygen margin, but input searches spend it. Power trades future return value for present survival.
## Reusable discovery
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Before discovery, item inspection states verified individual behavior or material traits: an emitter branches, a coupler stores impact charge, scrap is conductive. It does not list all cross-object combinations. A local preview confirms only a proposed direct link between accessible endpoints; learned families help predict unfamiliar objects and plan what to carry before that check is available. Acquisition is readable without giving away the family pattern.
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Before discovery, item inspection states observed individual behaviour or material traits: an Arc Emitter chains through nearby bodies, a Capacitor stores charge, scrap is conductive. It does not list all cross-object combinations. In the paused journal, the current link preview checks compatible ports and shows the power and heat demands of possible operating states, including temporary modes. Learned families help predict unfamiliar objects and plan what to carry before their ports can be inspected. Physical mounting and removal still take running time under Build Rules.
Near the target, alien service glyphs group components into **relay**, **sink**, and **isolator** families. During the rack’s readable shutdown, a visible power trace passes through a relay-stamped junction, drains into a sink-stamped buffer, and stops at an isolator-stamped contact. The clustered marks and observed behavior support the player’s inference. Every mark was already visible; a proposed notebook records only a chosen facsimile and location, without naming families, highlighting matches or translating.
| Acquisition | Several compatible modules | One rig plus varied salvage inputs |
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| Acquisition | Several compatible reusable parts | Cycler, compatible linked parts and varied salvage inputs |
| Commitment | Equipment space before the objective is understood | Return value consumed during combat |
| Power payoff | Impact-fed cascades through dense hordes | Player-sequenced material bursts |
-
| Oxygen/return | Full power leaves little carrying or oxygen margin | More initial capacity; input searches spend oxygen |
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| Oxygen/return | Full power leaves little carrying or oxygen margin | Remaining capacity depends on linked parts; input searches spend oxygen |
| Actual limits | Broken chains, sparse targets, committed pack | Empty or mismatched cargo; hoarding starves it |
| Reusable learning | Recognized original glyph predicts module compatibility | Recognized original glyph predicts salvage response |
@@ 51,4 49,4 @@
Shared capacity is an accepted direction, not a remaining branch. Its unresolved risk is oxygen dominance: if another canister is usually correct, equipment and loot choices narrow despite sharing one interface. Exact capacity, canister value and encounter pressure remain untuned and unvalidated.
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Death does not undo the carrying choice by confiscating the load: everything still carried, including the compressor head and unused salvage, returns aboard with the astronaut. Material already fired through the Cycler is consumed, and anything dropped or installed in the station was not carried. Returning by death may therefore be useful; no replacement penalty is added here.
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Death does not undo the carrying choice by confiscating the load: everything still carried, including the compressor head and unused salvage, returns aboard with the astronaut. Material already fired through the Cycler is consumed, and anything dropped or installed in the station was not carried. A living return preserves the current station arrangement and cleared ground; death shifts unconnected areas and resets transient crowds under Combat Rules. Both end temporary combat upgrades. Returning by death may therefore be useful; no replacement penalty is added here.
