Dune — Arrakis Table

An unofficial multiplayer adaptation of Gale Force Nine’s classic 2019 Dune, built with React, TypeScript, Vinext, and Cloudflare Workers/D1. Development is ongoing; this is not yet a complete rules implementation. The six classic factions can use a clearly labeled Advanced preview; unfinished expansion starts remain disabled. Start with current status for implemented systems, remaining requirements and release gates; detailed historical evidence remains in the implementation log.

Run locally

Use Node.js 22.13 or newer and npm. Install the locked dependencies and apply local migrations before starting the server:

npm ci
npm run db:local
npm run dev -- --host 0.0.0.0

Open http://localhost:3000. Create a room, share its eight-character invitation, and add human or AI seats. The host can configure Easy, Medium, Hard and Brutal AI opponents. Current calibration demonstrates a substantially weaker Easy policy; it does not yet demonstrate a consistent ordering among the upper three levels.

For Advanced play, choose Rules → Advanced preview before creating a room, or use the same selector as host in an existing base-game lobby. Everyone must ready again after changing rules, then the host chooses Begin Advanced preview. This mode is unfinished; see preview scope and limits.

Before starting, open Configure on an AI seat to change its difficulty, faction or player circle without replacing it. Changes save immediately and clear human readiness. See lobby AI configuration.

Full AI implementation and tuning wait until all non-AI game features are complete. The AI development plan then targets approximately 75% higher-tier wins for Medium/Easy, Hard/Medium and Brutal/Hard. Until that stage, AI work focuses on minimal legal participation and critical playability fixes.

Choose Learn to play for the interactive introduction at /learn. Practice storm dials, spice blows, alliances, charity, bidding, revival, shipping, movement, battle plans, Traitor calls and collection before entering a room; lesson progress stays in your browser and does not change saved games.

Local games persist in .wrangler/state. Keep this directory across restarts. Apply new additive migrations before running code that depends on them. Never delete the local database to resolve a connection or rules problem. .openai/hosting.json belongs to the existing Sites project; do not recreate the hosting project.

For private NAS hosting and manually applied checkpoint image updates, see the TrueNAS container guide. Its separate persistent storage starts with new games; the requested host port is 33046.

The Administration link opens /admin, with separate administrator sign-in, session controls and a searchable room directory. Room controls lets owners and operators pause/resume rooms and lock/unlock new joins. The NAS container prints a newly generated initial owner access key in its log only if there are no administrator accounts. Save it privately: log readers can use it, and later starts do not print it again. See room controls and initial owner setup. Owners/operators can create a configured lobby with an explicitly owned new host seat and initial AI players. Configure lobby manages supported rules, AI seats and host assignment without private seat access. Remove or restore recoverably removes selected rooms; use the Directory filter to find them for restoration. Close or reopen stops further play while preserving readable tables and history, then resumes the same saved position. Archive or unarchive organizes closed rooms while retaining their tables and history; unarchiving leaves play closed. Participant AI supports an absent human in a paused game while preserving their seat and takeback control. Discussion controls mute or unmute new messages from a human seat while preserving history and gameplay. Permanent deletion, further participant support and backup tools are still being built.

Saved seats and reconnecting

The room cookie identifies your seat. Refreshing or reopening the invitation with that cookie restores your private hand and pending decisions. A failed restoration offers an explicit retry. Requests time out after 15 seconds; uncertain game actions are reconciled with a read rather than automatically repeated.

Use Protect your saved seat to generate and privately save a recovery kit before enabling its key. Keep the complete kit separate from the invitation. Recover a saved seat uses that kit to restore the same faction after cookie loss and revokes the previous browser sessions for that seat. Recovery keeps existing forces, resources and sealed commitments. Anyone holding the kit can control that seat and see its private information.

If recovery receives no confirmed response, keep the page open and retry the same recovery request. The server recognizes the receipt and does not rotate twice. Replacing the recovery key invalidates the older kit. Host-initiated takeover remains unfinished. An owning human seat can enable or disable its own AI control during a started game.

For a planned absence, Let a player start AI for your seat grants one named human player permission to start your chosen difficulty once within 24 hours. They can activate it while you are online, but receive no private seat access. You can revoke unused permission or take back control. Recovering or transferring either seat invalidates the grant. See AI permission for saved retries and limits.

New create/join requests save a private, tab-scoped retry record before sending. If the response is uncertain, keep the tab open and use the explicit retry; refresh preserves the same request. Confirmed success removes that record. Clearly rejected first requests return to the form for correction. A retry can recover the original room and seat without creating duplicates, but closing the tab or clearing its data can lose the proof. This record is separate from the long-term seat recovery kit.

Normal creation/join shows brief progress; recovery instructions stay open when attention is needed. Completed-action notices wait for Continue so their text can be read at your pace. Seat recovery and handover confirmations also wait for Continue; admin and seat-control requests show recovery instructions only when needed. See readable notices.

An uncertain saved-kit recovery keeps its exact retry details in memory and prevents conflicting navigation. If that recovery has become obsolete, deliberate abandonment releases the controls after explaining that it cannot undo a completed recovery. Keep a valid saved kit before discarding retry details.

Use Pass your seat to another player for a voluntary one-time transfer. The private offer lasts 24 hours; acceptance preserves progress and revokes the old owner’s sessions and recovery kits. The recipient uses Accept a seat handover on the home page, then creates their own recovery kit. Keep the tab open until acceptance is confirmed; exact private retry details survive refresh in that tab. See seat handover for cancellation, retry behavior and current limits.

Use Table discussion below the board for public conversation or private messages to another human seat. Messages survive refresh; exact retries avoid duplicates. Private history follows the seat through recovery or handover. Messages do not execute game actions, and AI opponents do not answer them yet. See table discussion.

Use Bribes beneath the table to pay a non-allied faction. The recipient's share becomes spendable at the next Mentat Pause; the panel shows your own incoming bribes and the current payment limit. See bribe controls.

At a Nexus, an unanswered alliance offer names its recipient and offers Withdraw your alliance offer. Formed alliances keep the separate Break alliance action. See Nexus offers.

Use Inspect forces under any player to enlarge their counters and read public reserves, Tanks and deployed groups, including Homeworld reserve breakdowns. See force inspection.

Use Inspect faction under any player for public powers and alliance guidance. The sheet starts in the table’s rules mode and offers an Advanced preview without changing the game. Browse all twelve in the faction-sheet gallery.

In new Advanced Ecaz development games, Loyalty shows the publicly set-aside Traitor Card before dealing. Inspect it without making a game choice; its identity persists through refresh. See Ecaz Loyalty.

The local Leader Skills prototype also supports Basic Moritani with base opponents and the full fourteen-card deck. See entry, connected interactions and remaining boundaries. Basic Tleilaxu also supports the full deck, native Rihani exchanges and saved revival choices; see its integration boundary. Basic Ixians now connect cyborg movement, HMS routes and battle aftermath through the same full deck; see Ixian integration. The existing Basic CHOAM setup now connects ordinary skill actions and saved market/revival choices; see CHOAM integration.

Above the board, Treachery draw pile and Spice draw pile show live card counts separately from hands, auction cards and discards. See draw-pile counts.

Truthtrance's Current physical forces question compares counters in reserves, the Tanks or an exact board location. It supports normal, elite and total counts where recorded; see force questions.

After both battle plans are revealed, Compare revealed battle plans opens the shared dials, leader portraits and played card faces. Inspect any component, then return to the pending decision. See battle components.

In Your private hand, search card names, filter by printed category or change the display order. Show all cards clears filters. Inspectors and card actions stay with each physical card. See hand browsing.

The table header offers optional Sound effects, with mute, volume and a test sample. Short cues mark phase changes and automatic action notices. Sound starts off; preferences stay in your browser. See table sounds for activation, background behavior and prototype limits.

Automatic action notices briefly identify completed actions in house colors. Bursts summarize older notices while retaining their details in the chronicle; see completed-action feedback.

In Advanced development games, Your Harkonnen inspection preserves the cards seen during the special-Karama exchange. A return with only one legal selection completes automatically; see private exchange history.

Verify changes

Use the development guide for architecture, focused tests and the repeatable verification tools. Tests are discovered automatically; the default suite includes in-memory persistence recovery and needs no server:

npm test -- ecaz-collection ecaz-spice
npm run check
npm run build

Run npm run test:integration against a development server for HTTP/session changes. npm run test:multiplayer remains available for recovery plus HTTP checks; npm run test:recovery runs only in-memory persistence tests. All test commands accept filename fragments and --list after --.

The production build is written to dist. npm start runs that build with Wrangler; apply its database migrations to the intended storage environment before use. The included local migration command targets the development database, not a remote deployment.

Reproduce the current AI study with:

node --import tsx tools/ai-calibration.ts --games 120 --seed 20260907 --out /tmp/dune-ai-calibration.json

See AI calibration, multiplayer audit, component inventory, and visual playtest for scope and limitations. Passing subsystem tests does not certify every rules combination.

Development maintenance

The user-authorized 13 September 2026 local reset established a fresh saved-game baseline; see the reset record. Preserve all games created after that checkpoint.

Reuse the running development server. Restart only when a code or configuration change, or an observed server condition, makes leaving it running likely to cause issues; use judgment rather than an hourly schedule. Preserve database state, warn before interrupting human play, and defer until a safe decision point. Verify server health and restoration after a necessary restart. No recurring automation is installed; the user requested leaving it removed. Fix causes of crashes and lost progress rather than relying on restarts.

The application bundles its artwork, fonts and rules guidance. Source provenance and third-party notices live in developer documentation; the player-facing reference uses internal links. Publication remains gated on completion and integrated verification of the requested rules, expansions and critical player journeys.