Hold The Horde — Equipment Catalogue

Status. Provisional 12-part SMALL-band sample, not an approved content budget, starting inventory, progression, balance model or implementation. The owner has selected connected reusable parts, shared oxygen/equipment/loot capacity, carried-property return on death, mostly automatic ordinary fire, manual specials and reset of temporary combat upgrades on every return aboard. The exact port grammar, rig growth, acquisition and every number below remain proposals.

The worn emergency cutter and suit functions are not catalogue parts: they have no ports and do not provide a second automatic weapon. Ten entries preserve the eight illustrated Build Rules parts plus the selected opening's Threat Sensor and Manual Trigger. Stride Switch and Vector Nozzle fill movement-event and spatial-control gaps without creating a stat tier.

Reading the sample

A packet contains a trigger and may carry charge, heat, force or fragments. A source creates a new external wave only when its rule says so. Descendants keep that wave. A named permanent part or temporary effect may give one sequence a finite echo budget; each authored return spends an echo and adds its stated heat. Descendants cannot refill the event's echoes, readiness or usable power. Proposed cost is written C/A: overall carrying units / active rig spaces. An installed part pays its carrying cost once, not again as cargo. An inactive carried part pays C but no A.

Each automatic actuator owns its shown reach, target rule and readiness. When its connected source offers a valid target and it is ready, that actuator commits its own launch. Several ordinary launch paths, or several compatible actuators behind Fork, may coexist when the mounted rig, carrying manifest and visible concurrent power/heat limits permit them. One refusing branch never suppresses a ready sibling. The journal preview shows each source, selected target, readiness and every demand state that can actually overlap, including effects already in flight. Mutually exclusive modes are checked as separate peaks rather than added into one impossible maximum.

For this sample, a receiver accepts a packet only when the link and type are valid, its readiness/storage can accept, and any required target is valid. Fork excludes blocked branches before allocation; a sole candidate receives the full payload, while two candidates divide whole U evenly in labelled output order 1 then 2. A later sub-threshold share dissipates rather than being copied, buffered or reassigned. A failed later receiver never rewinds an upstream commit.

Every discovery context identifies somewhere the behavior could be observed. It does not decide whether the player claims the functioning object, retrieves a damaged core, fabricates it after observation or receives an adapter. Found-part versus fabrication progression remains open.

Parts compete directly with portable oxygen and loot. Voluntary return or death brings every still-carried part aboard; consumed Cycler material stays spent, while deliberately dropped or station-installed parts remain where placed without duplication. Picking up, mounting, removing and operating a physical fixture use live-world time. Compatible link edits among mounted, accessible parts use the fully paused journal. Every chosen temporary upgrade and earned-but-unchosen offer ends whenever the astronaut returns aboard; physical carried parts remain. Whether stored Capacitor charge survives a return remains unresolved.

Twelve concise part briefs

Part	Ports and triggering behavior	Observable before a combination is known	Cost and situation-specific limit	Two candidate combinations or roles	Proposed discovery context
Threat Sensor	Source; one target-bearing trigger output. When a valid hostile is in its shown arc, it offers the trigger independently to each compatible connected automatic actuator that is ready; the target need not leave and re-enter.	Sweeping arc, target highlight and repeated output pulse beside a moving training dummy.	1/1. Needs line of sight and a valid hostile; target override remains unchosen. It supplies no damage or payload.	Sensor → Projector for ordinary fire; Sensor → Fork for two target-conditioned actions whose receivers keep their own targets and readiness.	Ship emergency rig; its arc can be checked against a dockside calibration target.
Manual Trigger	Source; one trigger output. A deliberate mapped press starts a manual external wave; it cannot bypass a downstream part's readiness.	Press, output flash and linked fixture response can be seen independently.	1/1. Occupies area that could automate another path and requires player timing.	Trigger → Barrier for faced defence; Trigger → Cycler for a chosen cargo-spending special.	Ship emergency rig beside the Barrier Plate control.
Pulse Projector	One packet input; on a valid trigger while ready, launches its payload toward the selected valid target, or a weak force pulse if none is attached. Its launch is physical output, not a signal port.	Reach, readiness and a weak pulse against a service target.	1/1. One selected target, line of sight and world-time readiness; sparse angles or obstruction waste positioning, not ammunition.	Sensor → Projector for baseline fire; Capacitor → Thermal Lens → Projector for a manually released heat shot.	Ship rig or station service cradle; distinct from the unported worn cutter.
Barrier Plate	One packet input; a trigger creates a short-lived directional barrier, while a charged trigger may create or refresh it. Enemy strikes on the plate are impact events.	Facing marker, brief wall and visible deformation when struck.	1/1. Can be bypassed, broken or faced poorly; its own barrier does not emit a new trigger.	Manual Trigger → Barrier as the opening special; Barrier impacts → Dynamo for Counterwall.	Ship emergency partition or a hospital crowd-control shutter test.
Impact Dynamo	One local sensing clamp plus one charged-trigger output. The clamp attaches to one named impact carrier: a Barrier frame, a Projector's physical-output feed or a fixture surface. It batches qualifying impacts there and emits once for that wave; it does not hear remote world impacts.	A door closer converts hits on its own plate into one charge flash even when fragments arrive together.	1/1. One attached carrier at a time; force, fragments and external strikes qualify, while arcs and heat do not unless converted. One eligible wave emits proposed 2 U regardless of how many same-wave impacts were batched. Descendants of a Thunderhead burst are ineligible to recharge it.	Projector impact feed → Dynamo → Arc; Barrier frame strikes → Dynamo → Capacitor.	Impact latch in a service door or bed-crash protector.
Fork Relay	One packet input, visibly ordered outputs 1/2. It copies trigger, payload type and wave identity. A bare trigger reaches every accepting branch. Usable whole U divides evenly between two pre-allocation candidates, output 1 taking an odd remainder; a sole candidate gets the full payload.	One service-board pulse visibly reaches two lamps, with invalid sockets refusing before commitment.	1/1. Link/type/readiness/storage/target-blocked branches are excluded before allocation. A post-allocation sub-threshold share refuses and dissipates rather than being copied, buffered or reassigned. Packed Fork gives no benefit.	Sensor → Fork → Projector + Barrier uses a bare trigger; charged release → Fork → Barrier + Arc divides usable charge between both candidate receivers.	Loose in Cargo Turn's maintenance cradle; may serve infrastructure or rig.
Capacitor	Charged-packet input, exact 0–4 U stored state, chosen release trigger and one charged output. Ordinary manual release is exactly 2 U; release caused by a rig packet retains that packet's wave. Becoming ready/full emits nothing. Temporary Thunderhead is the explicit full-store 4 U exception and supplies its own two gated modes.	Rising meter, visible saturation and a controlled discharge into a dead load; when Thunderhead is active, the currently selected charging or discharge mode is also visible.	1/1. Accepts at least 1 U up to free space and visibly vents delivered overflow; at 4 U it is blocked before Fork allocation. An ordinary release below 2 U or toward a refusing first receiver does not commit and retains charge. A refused Thunderhead command retains 4 U and charging mode.	Dynamo → Capacitor for horde-fed storage; manual release → Lens → Projector for a burst.	Defibrillator bank, door buffer or damaged core whose stored state stays visible.
Thermal Lens	One charged-packet input and one packet output. Converts charge payload to heat while preserving the trigger and wave; it does not add a trigger.	A heat exchanger accepts a charge pulse and warms one marked output surface.	1/1. Spends the packet's charge identity to make heat; heat is not impact and poor targets may resist or avoid it.	Capacitor → Lens → Projector for a stored heat shot; conductive Cycler response → Lens → Projector for cargo-fed heat.	Sterilization exchanger with inspectable input/output behavior.
Arc Emitter	One charged-trigger input; when ready, its base physical action arcs from the selected initial target across nearby valid targets. Arcs are physical effects, not new signal outputs.	A quarantine tool jumps between closely spaced conductive test points.	2/2. Expensive area/carrying footprint; weak with sparse or separated targets. Its ordinary physical arc cannot feed Dynamo, signal receivers or itself. Echoing Arc may add two finite extensions to the base action; it creates no absolute total-target cap, signal or charge.	Dynamo charge → Arc for impact-fed clearing; Cycler conductive response → Fork → Arc + Capacitor.	Quarantine grid or visibly arcing repair tool.
Salvage Cycler	Material bay, proposed activation-trigger input and one response-packet output. On valid activation it consumes the selected salvage and emits its inspected response: proposed normalized conductive 2 U charge, pressure 2 U force, or brittle fragments with amount still open.	Different scrap samples produce visibly different one-shot responses in a waste processor.	2/2. Permanently spends chosen salvage that could return home or serve projects; protected objectives refuse selection. A later receiver refusal never refunds committed material. Exact activation port is a catalogue proposal extending the source behavior.	Manual Trigger → Cycler → Projector for a chosen cargo shot; conductive Cycler → Fork → Arc + Capacitor.	Human waste processor or alien sorting machine; observation does not grant a recipe.
Stride Switch	Source; one trigger output after the astronaut deliberately traverses a shown distance while grounded and the switch is ready. Rig-produced shove, knockback and conveyor motion do not count.	A rehab gait plate pulses after measured voluntary steps but ignores a rolling bed.	1/1. Silent while stationary, displaced or below threshold; its own descendants cannot walk it into retriggering.	Stride → Projector for kiting fire; Stride packet triggers a configured Capacitor release into Barrier while relocating.	Physical-therapy gait monitor or maintenance pace counter.
Vector Nozzle	One packet input; when ready, vents along the player-set facing. It pushes eligible external bodies/objects away and gives the astronaut opposite recoil; a force payload increases both qualitatively. Collision impacts keep the incoming wave.	A decontamination air knife pushes loose covers while its frame kicks against its mount.	2/2. Needs facing and clearance; cannot move station regions, sealed machinery or designated immovable threats. Recoil and pushed motion cannot trigger Stride.	Face toward danger, Manual Trigger → Nozzle to separate astronaut and threat; Cycler pressure → Nozzle for cargo-fed lane control.	Decontamination curtain or gurney-positioning jet with a visible flow arrow.

The two new entries are behavior proposals, not implied owner choices. Their strongest value is qualitative: Stride makes deliberate movement an input, while Nozzle turns a packet into position. Neither is “the faster sensor” or “the stronger projector.”

Source reconciliation. Progression Options once says Pulse Projector “automatically launches” without naming a controller; Build Rules and the selected opening give Projector a trigger input and explicitly use Threat Sensor → Pulse Projector. This catalogue follows the latter, current contract and treats the progression wording as omitted controller shorthand. If a self-triggering Projector was intended, the opening controller relationship would need an explicit new decision.

Three legal causal sequences

Before a manual discharge, the player faces or positions the relevant actuator and sees its selected valid target and readiness. With no acceptable first receiver, release refuses before starting a wave or spending stored charge. A later refusal after release commitment does not restore charge.

1. Four-space opening branch — optional reconfiguration. Move Manual Trigger to inactive cargo, mount the found Fork in live world time, then use the paused journal to link Threat Sensor → Fork → Pulse Projector + Barrier Plate. Cost: 4 A and 4 C active, plus the inactive Manual Trigger still using 1 C. Sensor offers one target-conditioned event; Projector and Barrier check independently. Projector fires when its own target/readiness accept. A ready Barrier also acts; an unready branch does nothing and queues nothing. A different legal rig could contain two ordinary actuators if both sources, targets, readiness, carrying, active space, power and heat fit.

2. Six-space later Counterwall — defence becomes storage. Under a replaceable later 6 A assumption, install Manual Trigger (1), Barrier (1), Dynamo (1), Capacitor (1) and Arc Emitter (2). Manual Trigger → Barrier is a faced manual special. Dynamo's clamp is attached to that Barrier frame. Each later enemy strike is a separate external event; Dynamo emits exactly 2 U for that eligible wave, and Capacitor stores up to its 4 U limit. A later built-in manual 2 U Capacitor release starts a new wave only after the ready, targeted Arc accepts as first receiver. The rig trades all six spaces/units for faced defence and dense-target discharge; attacks stopping, barrier failure, sparse enemies or saturation break its payoff.

3. Seven-space Storm Choir — ordinary charge becomes a manual climax. Threat Sensor (1) → Pulse Projector (1) supplies ordinary fire. Impact Dynamo (1) is clamped to Projector's physical-output feed and sends its proposed 2 U through Fork (1) to Arc Emitter (2) and Capacitor (1). Total: 7 C / 7 A. When both branches accept, Fork sends 1 U to each: Arc acts and Capacitor stores 1 U. Four separate eligible external waves fill an empty store. Echoing Arc, if separately earned, gives each accepted Arc action two finite physical target-extension echoes; every echo adds heat and creates no signal or U.

Temporary Thunderhead gives these same six mounted parts two visible, mutually gated modes. Charging uses Sensor→Projector and Dynamo→Fork→Arc + Capacitor. With the store full, one chosen Capacitor command preflights an accepting Fork branch plus real overlapping power and heat, then commits a full 4 U release. Discharge temporarily routes Capacitor→Fork→Arc + Projector; with both ready branches it divides 2/2. The store empties, the burst adds its high heat pulse, and charging links restore automatically after dispatch—no journal round-trip is required per burst. Restoration grants no readiness and does not erase in-flight effects. A refused command preserves 4 U and charging mode; a later refusal after commitment refunds nothing. Burst descendants cannot recharge through Dynamo, so later independent eligible impacts must fill the next burst.

Why feedback stops

Repeated arcs, rebounds and explicit returns use a finite named echo budget. Arc Emitter's ordinary physical arc has no signal output. A descendant cannot refresh the readiness, echoes or usable power that created it, and Dynamo contributes at most once for an eligible external wave. Adding Capacitor does not make storage readiness an event. Only its configured manual release starts a later wave; Thunderhead's burst ancestry remains excluded from Dynamo even after charging mode restores. Enemy attacks may sustain Counterwall as distinct external waves, but only while enemies keep striking and the barrier, storage and downstream readiness hold.

Station use without hidden answers

A part may fit a visibly compatible service port: Fork can split a service pulse, Dynamo can expose an impact response, and Nozzle can test a pressure path. Installation uses world time and leaves the part outside carried property; completed work and installed state follow their owning persistence rules. Individual behavior and direct-port validity may be shown. A part name or port never translates alien text, identifies an unseen destination, proves a historical interpretation or chooses the whole-station binding mechanism.

Uncertainty, self-check and scope

The provisional stage-only reward model offers temporary effects after resolving one finite announced pressure release from an identified physical source; a stage is uncommitted, unresolved or spent for the current station arrangement. A physical closure completed before commitment prevents the release and gives no offer; lasting safety/access is the benefit. After commitment, early clear or a physical source seal resolves the stage even before its peak, while bodies already beyond the closure remain dangerous. Escape does not resolve it, and a spent stage does not pay again after a living return or reopening. The owner is still choosing this rhythm versus regular defeated-enemy growth plus larger milestone transformations. No meter, threshold, pickup cadence or interruption cost for that alternative is invented here.

Open questions include acquisition model, later active area, part shapes, port multiplicity, target override, fixture eligibility, removal consequences, discovery order, exact power/heat/echo values, retained Capacitor charge and the pending reward rhythm. The sequences above were checked against their stated C/A totals, packet ancestry, readiness, manual/automatic source, carried-versus-installed cost, fixed Fork order and storage commitment. Exactly twelve physical parts and their existing sources, roles and property consequences remain. Multiple ordinary outputs are legal within physical limits; named temporary effects are explicit finite exceptions, not new permanent parts or a global Capacitor mode.

First-pass package planning envelope: Systems authoring 10–16 role-hours, one independent review 3–5, and one bounded response 2–4; 15–25 role-hours total. The author range maps inside the Whole Game Outline's 10–18-hour author-only catalogue allowance; review/response are additional and must not be counted again as that allowance. These are planning estimates, not logged work or throughput.

Later detailed SMALL catalogue specification: Systems authoring 36–60 role-hours, review 8–12, response 4–6; 48–78 role-hours total. Unique work would define per-part port diagrams, state/overflow variants, source-placement alternatives, legal-link matrix and authored edge cases. It excludes UI-owned cue/accessibility presentation, acquisition economy, implementation, assets, numerical tuning and playtesting. TARGET/STRETCH expansion remains unestimated until reuse and per-part authoring cost are known.

Later owner-authorised implementation and real-player observation must establish whether individual parts are legible, multiple target/readiness displays remain readable, combinations remain expressive without one dominant path, costs compete meaningfully with oxygen and loot, paused link edits are usable, and rare station uses feel revelatory rather than like metadata keys. None is established here.