2026-09-15 13:23:30
Anonymous:
Clarify the player journey, current growth rules and onward reading
hold the flood/the game.md ..
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# The Game
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*A direction for the whole game, with one example expedition. The rooms, people, numbers and story details are examples of the shape and remain revisable.*
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## The pitch
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You are an astronaut with a broken ship, forced to dock at a station whose only message was *stay away*. Its air is gone. Its corridors are full of things that used to be patients. Somewhere inside is the reason you wake up back on your ship every time you die.
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You go out balancing oxygen against equipment and room for what you find. You bring home salvage you can rebuild into something absurd, people still alive behind sealed doors, and — the part that matters most — the answer to a question you did not know how to ask that morning.
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Crossing this station means crossing crowds. That is the ordinary texture of every trip. On top of it, the station **rewards curiosity by waking up**: work out what something does, do it, and it answers at a scale you were not ready for. The flood comes, your build turns over, and in the light of it you see how much bigger this place is than you thought.
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## One expedition
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**Hold The Horde is a survivorslike about fighting your way toward an extraordinary discovery.** You assemble equipment that turns dense crowds into opportunities, carry just enough oxygen to pursue a question, and return with parts, people and a different understanding of the place. Then your temporary combat power resets, fresh hordes occupy the next expedition, and you try something new with what you learned.
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**You want something.** On an earlier trip you passed a window you could not reach. Behind it: a ward with its pressure light still green, a number painted by human hands, and someone knocking. You have thought about it since. Today you are going.
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The following expedition illustrates the direction. Its particular rooms, person and reveal remain revisable.
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**You pack, and it costs you.** Air, equipment and space for what you find come out of one carrying capacity. A spare canister lets you push deeper, but costs you either the spare part you meant to try or the room to carry anything home. Take the part instead and you are betting on a shorter, cleverer route. Neither is the right answer. Today you take a small manual switch you want to try, leaving less room for spare air.
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## A person behind the glass
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**Getting anywhere means getting through.** The concourse between you and the ward is inhabited, and crossing it is the ordinary work of the game. Bodies wake in ones and twos, then in a slow crowd across the broad lane; faster things take the side routes; something heavy shoulders through and makes you change your line. Your projector fires on its own throughout — you are choosing ground, not aiming. At the thickest point you take the dense line deliberately, because your rig eats dense lines. When the ward's announced release is cleared, the silence is enormous. You choose Echoing Arc: your electrical discharge can now jump to more nearby bodies. That temporary change lasts until you return aboard.
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On an earlier trip you passed a window you could not reach. Behind it: a ward with its pressure light still green, a number painted by human hands, and someone knocking. You have thought about it since. Today you are going.
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**The lull is where you look.** In that quiet you find a service main running the length of the spine, dead at a pulled fitting — and the missing fitting is the Fork Relay (the splitter) in your rig. It currently lets one sensor signal reach both your automatic gun and your protective barrier. You have been carrying the answer all along.
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**Packing is your first decision.** Equipment, spare oxygen and whatever you find share the same carrying space. Another canister would buy more time, but would require leaving part of your machine at home. You take your later electrical rig and one spare canister, leaving little room for a large find.
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The discovery is **that your fighting equipment and the station machinery use the same kinds of parts.** A familiar object suddenly has much greater possibilities.
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Your rig is a set of connected, mounted parts. This one starts with a gun that fires automatically; its impacts power electrical chains and charge a store. It works best where enemies are close together. You still have to put yourself where it can work.
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**Borrowing it changes the fight.** In the sheltered recess, you remove the splitter and fit the small manual switch you carried. The paused journal lets you reconnect the sensor directly to the projector and the new switch to the barrier. Your gun still fires automatically, but protection now depends on choosing the right moment yourself. You have traded automatic coverage for a route into the station.
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The concourse is already moving when you arrive. Slow bodies fill the broad lane, faster things take the side gallery, and something heavy shoulders through the middle. You choose a line through the crowd while your gun keeps firing. Ordinary fighting earns a temporary upgrade before the whole concourse is clear. You open the paused journal and choose **Echoing Arc**, which lets the electrical attack branch into more nearby bodies. A dense knot that made you retreat now looks useful.
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**You seat it, and the station answers.** The main goes live and keeps going: contactors slam down the corridor one after another, further than you can see. Lights come up a hundred metres into a dark you had assumed was a wall. Doors that have not cycled in years begin to cycle. It is beautiful for a few seconds — until you understand what the lights are showing you. The far end of that corridor is not empty. It is *full*, and it is coming.
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You push through it, shut an answering grille and clear the bodies already on your side. The silence is enormous.
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**Keeping the route open demands a fight.** You need the main live to reach the ward; kill it and the doors seal again. So you hold ground you would never have chosen while the crowd closes from a direction you only just learned existed. You trigger the barrier too early, against the first ranks, because you panicked. Its brief protection ends while more bodies are still coming. This is going badly.
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## The part you have been carrying
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**Your rig turns over.** An impact collector attached to the barrier has banked energy from separate incoming strikes in a capacitor. The meter is full. You turn toward the packed lane and press the stored discharge: blue-white arcs spread through the front ranks, including the extra jumps you chose earlier. A line of bodies buckles and a gap opens where you had been trapped. There is another pulse in the store. When the emitter is ready again, you can spend it to widen that opening or save it for the fast pack circling behind. The visual goal is a violent reversal from being surrounded to forcing a path through the tide.
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In the quiet, a dead service main disappears along the station's spine. Its pulled fitting matches the **Fork Relay** in your rig: the part that divides charge between your electrical attack and its store. You have been carrying a way to reach farther into the station.
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The crowd gives the build its payoff: the pressure that nearly trapped you becomes energy for a spectacular clear. You chose the parts and the moment to release them.
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The discovery is simple and powerful: **your fighting equipment and the station machinery use the same kinds of parts.** That familiar object suddenly has much greater possibilities.
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**And then you see it.** With the spine lit you look properly. The ward is not where you remember — it moved after you died, three trips ago, and you have been navigating from a memory of a station that no longer exists. But the light reveals a span you had no idea was there: a scaffold of rooms above the corridor, and something in it large enough to have a shape, which turns toward the light.
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You remove the Fork in a sheltered recess. In the paused journal you reconnect the remaining parts: the gun's impacts now fill the charge store directly, and its manual release feeds the electrical attack. Your ordinary gun still works, but its automatic branching support is gone. You will have to choose when to release those arcs yourself.
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At the far end of the span, the light catches a socket with the same shape as the one beside you. You could power the next stretch from there. Your notes now point toward a place you can reach and a machine you know how to try. Something much larger has noticed you, too.
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You seat the Fork in the service board. Contactors slam down the corridor one after another, farther than you can see. Lights reach into a dark you had assumed was a wall. Doors that have not cycled in years begin to move.
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**One more decision.** Air low, main live, the way to the ward now visible across an exposed walkway. Spend your remaining air clearing the immediate danger and preparing the short crossing, or pull the fitting, let the route go dark, and walk home with what you know.
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It is beautiful for a few seconds. Then you understand what the light is showing you. The far end of that corridor is full, and it is coming.
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You stay. Once the ward's release is cleared, you personally walk the short crossing and confirm that it is quiet. The woman comes out through her own door and follows that prepared route under her own power. You bring her aboard with the air warning still lit. The pressure was in making the route possible before you ran out of air; the transfer itself is short and quiet.
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## Hold the line long enough to see
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**Home.** The airlock closes and the noise stops. Because you walked back alive, the station keeps its arrangement and the ground you cleared stays clear. The main is still lit because you left your splitter installed there; that part is not in your pack. Your temporary boost is gone. There is a woman sitting on your floor who has not spoken to anyone in a year, and a plan for tomorrow.
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The main must stay live to hold those doors open. You fight on ground you would never have chosen, keeping the automatic gun working while you back toward a useful angle. You turn too late at the first obstruction. The faster pack reaches your side, and the line is closing.
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## The player's experience
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The charge display shows a release ready. You face the packed front and press. Blue-white arcs spread through nearby bodies, branching with the upgrade you earned earlier. A line buckles and a gap opens where you had been trapped. You move through it while the gun keeps working and later impacts replenish the charge you spent.
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| Event | Player choice or pressure | Intended pleasure | What could make it fall flat |
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|---|---|---|---|
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| Packing | Air, a useful part or empty carrying space | Anticipation and commitment to a plan | One loadout is always best |
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| Crossing the concourse | Follow the dense line the build wants or avoid encirclement | Competence and growing power | Crowds become a repetitive toll |
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| Recognising the fitting | Try a familiar part in an unfamiliar machine | The surprise of discovering a new use | The connection is too obscure to notice |
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| Borrowing the splitter | Open a route while taking manual control of protection | A choice with an immediate cost | The equipment change is hard to perceive |
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| Waking the spine | Face the larger crowd released with the new route | Awe turning into dread | The reveal feels disconnected from the player's action |
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| Charging and releasing | Hold a dangerous line, then choose the moment | Expression, mastery and overwhelming power | Effects obscure whether the build achieved anything |
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| Seeing the span | Recognise something worth investigating next | Astonishment and curiosity | Threats and visual clutter hide the discovery |
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| Preparing and completing the rescue | Commit remaining air to making and checking a short safe route | Tension, then relief and attachment during the quiet transfer | Preparation becomes repeated busywork or the crossing becomes a long escort |
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| Returning home | Bring a person and a new plan into a familiar place | Safety, belonging and anticipation | Home feels like a menu with no human response |
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The crowd gives the machine its opportunity. Density lets the attack reach farther; a side approach can still force you out of position. The payoff is a reversal from being surrounded to making a path through the tide.
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The journal pauses enemies, oxygen and the rest of the world whenever it is opened, including during combat. Players can inspect a clue or consider an upgrade without losing survival time. Closing it returns them to the danger they paused.
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With the spine lit, you finally look properly. The ward is not where you remember: it moved after you died three trips ago. But above the corridor is a scaffold of rooms you had no idea existed. Something large within it turns toward the light.
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## Returning and trying again
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At the far end of the span, the light catches a socket with the same shape as the one beside you. You could power the next stretch from there. You make a record while the world runs, then use the paused journal to study it. This is a place you can reach and a machine you know how to try. Something much larger has noticed you, too.
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A living return preserves the station's current arrangement and the ground already cleared. You can plan another trip toward the same ward or follow a clue along a route you know.
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## One more person aboard
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Death returns the astronaut and carried equipment and loot to the ship. Unconnected areas shift; selected permanent changes and room connections endure. Your notes remain useful for recognising familiar places, even when their neighbours change. A shift can interrupt a route you were pursuing and reveal a new possibility. Eventually, learning to connect the whole station becomes one of its deepest puzzles.
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Air is low. The lit route to the ward crosses an exposed walkway. You can pull the Fork, let the route go dark and return with what you know, or spend the remaining time making a short rescue possible.
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Temporary combat upgrades reset whenever an expedition ends aboard, alive or revived. Physical parts carried home remain available; parts left installed in the station remain there. Power must be earned again in occupied spaces, so a return through cleared corridors can begin quietly. Home gives you a chance to choose another combination and a new frontier.
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You stay. After clearing or separating the immediate threats, you personally walk and check the short crossing and its prepared retreat. The woman opens her own door and walks the quiet route under her own power. The tension was in making that route possible before your air ran out; the transfer itself is short.
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The current growth model awards a temporary choice for clearing an announced horde release or sealing its access after it begins. Closing the source before it releases instead buys lasting safety and access. [Build Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Build%20Rules) explains this model and its costs.
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The airlock closes. The noise stops. The main is still lit because you left the Fork installed there; that particular part is not in your pack. Your temporary upgrade ends. The station keeps its current arrangement because you returned alive, while the next expedition will bring fresh combat around the permanent work you completed.
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## How this keeps working
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There is a woman sitting on your floor who has not spoken to anyone in a year, and a plan for tomorrow.
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The first time, you wake a main by accident and survive it. The tenth time, you walk to a specific junction *intending* to wake it, because a lit corridor is the only way to see a whole region at once — and you bring a build designed to eat a dense line.
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## What keeps pulling you forward
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That is the campaign's shape: **the thing that nearly killed you becomes a tool.** Early, the station's answer is a disaster you endure; later it is an instrument you aim; later still you wake two things at once to see what happens where they meet, and that is where the deep secrets live.
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| Moment | What you decide | Intended pleasure |
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|---|---|---|
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| Preparing to leave | More equipment, more air or room for a discovery | Anticipation: this is the trip your plan makes possible |
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| A crowd thickens | Seek the dense line your build rewards or protect your position | Growing competence and the thrill of becoming powerful |
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| A familiar part fits the station | Give up some fighting ability to try it | Surprise followed by an experiment you chose |
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| The spine wakes | Hold the new ground or shut it down | Awe turning into urgency |
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| The hidden span appears | Follow the new route or bring the question home | A larger world and a reason to return |
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| A survivor comes aboard | Make room for a person in your plans | Relief, attachment and a changing home |
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Discovery escalates alongside it, in more than one kind. Some is a corridor lighting up; some is a capability you did not have; some is a name in a ward log that quietly changes what a room you already walked through meant. All three belong here, and the biggest discoveries combine them: *this fitting also works over there* → *this corridor connects to that one, permanently* → *this wing was built by someone with different hands* → *the thing that turned toward the light is what you have been asking about since the first hour*. Each rung reframes the last.
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The journal pauses the whole game, including enemies and oxygen, even in combat. It gives you time to examine existing records, consider an upgrade or change equipment links. Capturing new evidence, fitting a physical part and operating a machine happen while the world runs.
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Rescued people are the counterweight that keeps it from being only noise. They are the reason to come back rather than push, they remember what you told them, and they are the only voices in a place that has none.
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Every return ends temporary combat upgrades. Physical equipment and loot you carry come home even after death. Permanent doors, completed work and selected room connections remain changed; new hordes must occupy the station consistently with those changes. Walking home keeps the arrangement. Death shifts its unjoined areas, so an old route becomes something to check again. Eventually, connecting the entire station becomes one of the deepest puzzles.
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## Rhythm across the game
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Discovery can grow through scale, capability or meaning. A light reveals another corridor; a part does something unexpected; a name in a ward log changes what an earlier room meant. The campaign needs all three. Repeating the same noisy reveal would make curiosity routine, and constant fighting would hide the thing you came to find. Quiet, readable threats and discoveries worth pursuing give the spectacle its shape.
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Regular travel crosses occupied spaces. Larger events can be triggered by operating machinery, while quiet rooms and earned breaks leave room for clues, salvage and conversation. Discoveries can change the station, give a new capability or alter the meaning of something already seen.
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The people aboard give those journeys a human purpose. They remember what you brought back, contribute observations and practical help, and give you reasons to return before you have answered every question.
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The design challenge is variety: crowds need different movement patterns and spaces, and each major discovery needs a payoff worth anticipating. If every revelation requires the same noisy machine sequence, curiosity becomes routine. A cautious player should still encounter meaningful discoveries and substantial combat, while someone who deliberately wakes a larger danger can pursue a more dramatic reward.
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## Keep reading
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## Open questions
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Follow [three expeditions into the observation ward](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Expedition%20Proposal), then [Coming Home](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Coming%20Home) and [Discovery in a Changing Station](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Connecting%20The%20Station) for the main journey from a clue to a home and a larger mystery.
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- The stored discharge's reach and damage still need design and testing.
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- An alternative growth model is under consideration: regular upgrades during fighting and larger transformations at milestones. Both models reset aboard.
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For the combat detail, read [Hordes and Builds](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Hordes%20and%20Builds), followed by the alternative directions in [Build Comparison](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Build%20Comparison). [Build Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Build%20Rules) and [Fighting the Horde](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Combat%20Rules) hold the current equipment and growth proposals; the [Owner Brief](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Brief) records the confirmed direction.
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Continue with [Hordes and Builds](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Hordes%20and%20Builds) for three concrete equipment combinations and their power growth.
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These scenes describe intended pleasures and pressures; fun, pacing and practical scope still need later validation.
