Storm Choir runs toward a connected knot and watches its charge meter. Ricochet Foundry circles for hard angles, watching several discs cross the room. Gravity Furnace stays just ahead of a tail, preserving a rhythm of glowing footsteps. All three can become absurd; they do not ask the player to watch, move or press for the same reason.

These are **proposed directions**, not settled recipes or balance. The [Owner Brief](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Brief) selects connected reusable parts, mostly automatic ordinary fire, regular temporary growth through fighting with major transformations, fresh hordes each expedition, and loss of temporary power on every return. Physical carried parts remain. Exact growth cadence and numbers stay open. Common connections are in [Build Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Build%20Rules), parts in the [Equipment Catalogue](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Equipment%20Catalogue), encounter rhythm in [Hordes and Builds](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Hordes%20And%20Builds), and current limits in [Mechanical Interfaces](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Mechanical%20Interfaces%20And%20Opening%20Quantities).

In ordinary combat, Sensor keeps Projector firing. Its impacts feed the locally clamped Dynamo; Fork divides each charge between Arc and Capacitor. The player reads the crowd as a circuit, crossing toward mutually visible bodies so one arc keeps finding the next. That dangerous move also fills the store.

Regular growth first lengthens or branches the local song: **Echoing Arc** turns one useful route into several. At a major transformation, **Thunderhead** keeps the current full-store rule. The player sees three chain heads and a pressure-lance corridor previewed across the crest, then chooses whether to spend now on a merely good knot or risk holding for the dense centre. At its peak, blue-white routes tear open a lane while ordinary fire later rebuilds charge.

The six parts use seven carrying units and seven mounted spaces, requiring the later eight-space rig. One two-unit canister brings carrying to nine of ten, leaving one unit for discovery. The build has no Barrier. Wide spacing, hard cover or a moving gap can strand its branches, and crossing toward density can put the astronaut inside the horde before the store is ready.

The same Fork can be seated in Cargo Turn's service board, where one pulse visibly reaches two lamps. That station discovery teaches branching and branch refusal, but not the finished combat recipe.

At expedition start, Sensor fires ordinary Projector pulses—not discs. Manual→Nozzle moves eligible bodies or loose cover while the modest automatic fire holds a lane.

Regular fighting can grant **Rebound Disc**, changing later accepted shots into bounded banking flights. **Fragment Wake** then gives each normal terminal a shown fan. The player starts circling and deciding whether Nozzle should shape the crowd, move cover or preserve an escape.

The proposed major **Foundry Drop** changes the current rule: remove Dynamo, Capacitor and the full-store master disc from this direction. Instead, a Nozzle pulse that visibly intersects a friendly disc may force that disc to take its normal terminal immediately. At the peak, the player waits until two or three automatic discs cross different sides of the horde, faces one pressure cone through them and presses. Several existing fans open together from player-chosen points. Pressing early wastes the geometry; waiting too long lets the discs terminate naturally. Nozzle still does not steer a flight.

Seated in a decontamination air-knife mount, the same Nozzle accepts the local control and pushes a loose shield away from a hard service face. The revealed reflection mark suggests a possible bank without listing every useful angle.

Stride→Nozzle rewards deliberate movement; **Inward Draft** later turns each qualifying traversal into a rear pull. Sensor→Projector supplies modest automatic pressure while the player kites a tail. The player watches spacing and cadence, not an impact-fed battery.

At the major **Furnace Burst**, temporary behavior pauses the Sensor's automatic path and lets Manual→Thermal Lens→Projector draw from those three live embers. The press consumes them into one lance and bloom, then ordinary Sensor fire restores without a journal edit. Three is a proposed readability target: the first mark teaches the response, the second makes a pattern, and the third creates a recognizable “turn now or lose it” moment without a long count. It is not a tested optimum; the number and lifetime can change.

At the peak, three hot seams glow behind a gathered tail. The player must turn and fire before the oldest fades, but turning early may put the bloom behind the mass. Hard cover divides it, a missed stride breaks the rhythm, and Bellback's pressure can scatter the wake. Replacing Dynamo and Capacitor with Manual makes six parts use seven carrying and mounted spaces, requiring the later eight-space rig. One canister brings carrying to nine of ten. It has no Barrier and cannot bank a burst while standing still.

A station gait rail fitted with Stride ignores a conveyor-carried pass but answers deliberate steps; a sterilization exchanger shows Lens turning a valid input into heat. Those observations reveal ingredients, not the Heatstep sequence or best combat route.

Storm asks **which crowd is connected and when to spend stored power**. Ricochet asks **where moving paths will end and when to collapse them together**. Gravity asks **whether the player can maintain movement cadence, gather pursuit and turn before the window closes**. Fresh hordes let those skills face new crowd shapes each expedition; regular fighting supplies incremental transformations, while major milestones supply Thunderhead, Foundry Drop or Furnace Burst without this page choosing thresholds or pickups.

The accepted cost is three clearer fantasies but two new temporary exceptions and more preview work. Current shared Mechanical rules continue to govern until these replacements are separately reconciled; this comparison does not silently change their power, heat, flight-slot or finite-route safeguards. Written scenes cannot prove that any direction is fun, balanced or sufficiently discoverable.

- Are Ricochet's forced terminal and Gravity's three-ember heat rule understandable without turning the journal into a recipe list?