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Valenar Canon

This page records the current documentation canon for Valenar's progression, system boundaries, and behavior vocabulary.

When support docs lag, gd-glossary.md and this page win. Older prototype wording may still appear in support contracts, but it is not the live canon surface.

Progression Frame​

  • Acts are the canonical progression structure.
  • The approved act ladder is:
    • Act 0: Arrival and Core
    • Act 1: First People
    • Act 2: First Outpost
    • Act 3: Settlement
    • Act 4: Banner Network
    • Act 5: Province
    • Act 6: Crown
    • Act 7: Reclamation

Canon By Early Act​

  • Act 0 is Arrival and Core. The MC arrives alone in a constrained nearby pocket inside the failing starting anchor's pull radius rather than directly on the Nexus itself. The first visible multi-part thread is Survive: waking, water and shelter, food and fire, lost hours, and the first night. Repeated patterns can later be surfaced as reusable plans, but the early game still teaches the player through individual activities. Old stones, leyline hum, and the buried ruin chain go from observation to earned lead to identified Wardheart/Nexus. Act 0 ends when the MC establishes the Core. Establishing the Core does not create a Settlement. These beats are state-gated: extra camp, training, or scouting days do not auto-advance the thread until the required survival or investigation state resolves. (See lore exposure: lh-game1-world-hooks.md — Starting Nexus row, Afterwar period state row)
  • Act 1 is First People. The Core and Camp are used to find, rescue, escort, and house the first named people. Guest quarters, household or retinue support, and the first character assignments begin here. This is not yet the full Settlement or anonymous population layer.
  • Act 2 is First Outpost. The first population-bearing site and the first Settlement-tier foothold appear here. Outpost is the first rung of the Settlement layer. The Core remains the MC's personal anchor; founding an Outpost does not redefine the Core as the Settlement.
  • Act 3 is Settlement. The first Outpost grows into stable settlement-scale play with connected footprint, districts, buildings, labor, and administration.

Core Distinctions​

  • The Core is the MC's fixed personal anchor at the starting Nexus/Wardheart. It is not the Settlement and it is not a player-facing Realm birth trigger. (See lore exposure: lh-game1-world-hooks.md — Nexus manifestation row, Starting Nexus row)
  • The preferred physical-area term for the MC's personal anchor compound is Core Grounds. Acceptable alternates: Nexus Grounds, Wardheart Grounds, Core Enclave, Anchor Grounds, Core Homestead.
  • The Camp is the MC's mobile infrastructure. It supports expeditions, rest, repair, surveying, ward work, and longer-range travel. It is not a Settlement.
  • The first Outpost is the first Settlement-tier foothold. Outpost is a Settlement tier, not a separate world type.
  • Settlement, Banner Network, Province, Crown, and later realm-scale play grow on top of the Core/Camp layer. They do not replace it.

Detail: systems/gd-core.md.

Realm And Polity Canon​

  • Founding the Core does not create the Settlement.
  • Founding the Core does not create a player-facing Realm.
  • Current docs support a polity ladder that scales through Settlement, Banner Network, Province, and Crown.
  • Until support docs commit a stronger trigger, canon should describe polity emergence as a ladder of expanding holdings, routes, authority, and administration rather than as one single realm-birth moment.

Territory And Site Canon​

  • The starting Territory is special because of the Nexus/Wardheart anchor, not because generic settlement suitability picked it.
  • The start pocket sits inside the failing anchor's pull radius; nearby-arrival is Game 1 canon and does not require the MC to spawn exactly on the Nexus.
  • Sites are first-class content in the Territory model.
  • Dungeons are treated as a site family once they are discovered or entered.
  • Feature rewards stay causal. A ruin, shrine, mine, dungeon, or Nexus unlocks outcomes because of what it is, not because the UI needs a generic bonus.

Character Model Canon​

  • Named characters are skill-bearing assignable individuals, not fixed jobs.
  • Valenar does not collapse people into generic attributes. Skills feed resolved channels through modifiers and formulas.
  • Conditions and injuries are not traits by default. Traits describe identity; conditions and injuries describe current mutable state.
  • Players act through techniques, missions, assignments, and higher-level planning surfaces. Runtime execution still resolves as activities and policies.
  • Detail lives in gd-glossary.md, systems/character-skills.md, systems/characters-and-retinue.md, and ux/character-screen.md.

Planning And Behavior Canon​

  • Objective, clue or lead, mission, and activity stay distinct.
  • Objective -> clue or lead -> mission -> activity is the authoritative player-facing planning stack.
  • Quest Thread, Local Quest, and Act Arc are story and content-authoring layers. They do not collapse into a generic runtime subquest noun.
  • Higher-level planning can group likely activities for a mission or routine, but it stays context above the queue rather than a separate runtime noun.
  • Journal is the structured persistent memory layer: stable entry ids, sequence, class, title, readable prose, linked ids, tags, branch key, and preconditions. Day labels organize reread; they do not gate story.
  • Objectives, clues, missions, and Journal beats advance by explicit state gates rather than by absolute calendar day. The player may camp or train across multiple days without auto-unlocking later beats.
  • Chronicle remains the separate combat readback surface.
  • Live behavior vocabulary uses activity and policy for executable and delegated work.
  • Lagging support docs should rewrite old shorthand to activity rather than present a competing behavior noun.
  • The current prototype runtime and UI still flatten some higher quest and log surfaces. That is implementation drift, not canonical terminology.
  • Objective language remains explicit:
    • Objectives are high-level goals or arcs.
    • Clues are uncertain evidence. Lead may still appear as shorthand.
    • Missions are planned operations.
    • Higher-level planning can group likely activities above the queue.
    • Activities are runnable atomic work the queue can execute.
    • Policies choose among activities when the game needs higher-level control.
  • The Saga Arc has seven cross-act Quest Thread lanes. Each generated mission from the dynamic quest pressure system must declare which lane it feeds. Lane owners live under quest-threads/. The dynamic generation rules are documented in systems/gd-dynamic-quest-pressure-model.md.
  • World-state mutations from ignored quests (taint escalation, route danger, settlement shortage growth, faction claim shifts) are readable via Journal, Current Plan, Objectives, and Territory Dossier. No consequence is hidden.

World And Reclamation Canon​

  • The current executable map is a stepping-in prototype fixture, not the final world-scale commitment.
  • Reclamation starts early as frontier pressure, ward work, scouting, local cleansing, and stabilizing threatened ground.
  • Full reclamation and other-Zone reach remain the last-act, world-scale loop, not an early-act assumption.

(See lore exposure: lh-game1-world-hooks.md — Afterwar wound-fields row, Afterwar period state row)

Scope, Channel, Enum, And On-Action Canon​

The following names are canonical at the SECS-level surface. Each names a scope, channel, enum, event, contract, or on_action label that is committed in the design docs and will be authored as .secs source plus Generated stand-ins by the named closure wave. Owner docs are cited; the owner doc is the single authoring authority for any rule or transition shape.

Quest Thread And Mission Scopes (ad-0007, Wave 5a)​

  • scope QuestThread — running quest-grouping container; owner systems/gd-quest-thread-and-mission-state-machine.md.
  • scope Mission — runtime planned-operation row; owner same.
  • QuestThreadLifecycleState — seven-rung enum (Proposed, Active, Stalled, Completed, Failed, Resolved, Abandoned); owner same.
  • MissionLifecycleState — seven-rung enum (Proposed, Offered, Accepted, Active, Resolved, Failed, Cancelled); owner same.
  • ActScopeKind — Act-bucket enum; concrete value list deferred to Wave 5a; owner same.
  • DefinitionTemplateId — template-id reference field on both scopes; owner same.
  • ScopedList<Mission>, ScopedList<ClueRef>, ScopedList<ActivityBeatRef> — typed-collection fields on the two scopes; owner same.

Pressure And Front Emergence Scopes (ad-0008, Wave 5a)​

  • scope ThreatSource — pressure-rooted threat entity; owner systems/gd-front-emergence.md.
  • scope FrontCandidate — Realm-scoped clustering proposing a Crown Front; owner same.
  • ProvinceThreatPressure, ProvinceWardIntegrity, ProvinceRouteSafety — Province-level contributory channels; owner same.
  • ThreatSource.DiscoveryState — four-rung enum (Hidden, Suspected, Confirmed, Reported); owner same.
  • ThreatSource.Kind — enum; value list deferred to Wave 5a; owner same.
  • ThreatSourceMaterialized, FrontCandidateRaised, FrontDeclared — on_action transition labels (working names); owner same.
  • AnchorTerritoryId, AnchorSiteId, AnchorRouteId — anchor fields on scope ThreatSource; owner same.
  • CoveredProvinceIds, ProposedHqTerritoryId, AggregatedSeverity, ProposedCampaignGoals, DismissedByCrown — fields on scope FrontCandidate; owner same.

Act Progression Scope And Events (ad-0010, Wave 5a)​

  • scope ActState — saga-scoped singleton; owner systems/gd-act-progression.md.
  • CurrentAct — base channel on ActState carrying the 0..7 Act index; owner same.
  • PreviousAct — field on ActState; owner same.
  • EnteredOnDay — recorded-fact field on ActState, not a gate input; owner same.
  • ActProgression (system) and ActProgressionSystem (host class) — owner same.
  • OnActStarted, OnActCompleted — events with trigger on_action; owner same.
  • ActStateContract — contract carrying the two lifecycle hooks; owner same.
  • ActProgressionArgs — typed args struct for both events; owner same.
  • CampaignEnded — follow-on event fired at Act 7 completion; owner same.
  • Phases.Progression — game-vocabulary phase declaration; not a SECS keyword; owner same.

Realm Polity Scope And Transitions (ad-0009, Wave 5a)​

  • scope Realm — saga-scoped singleton; owner systems/gd-realm-ranks-and-polity.md.
  • PolityRank — enum (PreRealm, Outpost, BannerNetwork, Province, Crown); orthogonal to Settlement.Stage; owner same.
  • PolityRankAdvanced, PolityRankRegressed — on_action transition labels (working names); owner same.
  • RouteCoverage — runtime predicate over the Realm's claimed Routes; owner same.

Defense Zone Plan State (Foundation Hardening R4, Wave 5a)​

  • PlanState — five-rung enum (Unplanned, Drafting, Committed, Failed, Recovered) on ProvinceDefensePlan; owner systems/gd-defense-zones.md.
  • Unplanned is the explicit starting state — there is no "missing plan" code path. Owner same.

Combat Contact Engagement (ad-0013, Wave 5a)​

  • scope ContactEngagement — persistent multi-phase engagement entity; owner systems/gd-combat-rules.md.
  • EngagementState — six-rung state channel (Spotted, Engaged, Resolving, Resolved, Disengaged, Lost); owner same.
  • ContactEngagementSpotted, EngagementResolved, ForceDisengaged — on_action transition labels (working names); owner same.

Character Conditions And Injuries (ad-0012, Wave 5a)​

Labor And Capacity Channels (ad-0008 closure, Wave 5a)​

  • Population partition: AvailableWorkers, DependentPopulation, SpecialistWorkers; owner systems/gd-labor-and-capacity.md.
  • Settlement-scope labor channels: AssignedWorkers, LaborDemand, UnfilledLabor, IdleLabor, OverassignedLabor; owner same.
  • Shortage signals: LaborShortageSignal, CriticalShortageSignal; also dynamic-quest-pressure source facts; owner same.
  • Province-scope aggregate: ProvinceLaborShortage; owner same.

Generation Validation Primitive (Wave 5a)​

  • ValidationReport, ValidationViolation, ValidationPredicate, ValidationRegistry — host-runtime types backing the fail-loud generation validation contract; owner generation/gd-generation-validation.md.

Adjudicator Vocabulary​

State-Machine Hub Markers​

  • The 12-column transition-row schema and the canonical greppable markers <deferred-to-Wave-5a-runtime-backing>, <deferred-to-wave-7>, <screen not yet authored>, (working name) are committed by systems/gd-state-machines-and-transitions.md.