Dune/docs/NEXUS_MORITANI_RULES.md

Moritani Nexus: placement source audit

Source audit, 10 September 2026. This establishes the supported Cunning contract and remaining combinations; it does not certify runtime support, all Terror effects, or the complete Nexus module. See common Nexus rules and Grumman stacking rules. The coordinator’s combined interpretation question is recorded below.

Authority

The Moritani face was inspected again in the photograph of the twelve publisher-authored Nexus cards, using the original local inspection image /tmp/dune-nexus-cards.jpg. Cunning is native Moritani only. It modifies a Terror placement to permit any Arrakis territory, expressly including a territory already containing Terror. It does not print a phase restriction, grant another placement, or say that the modification lasts for the turn.

The GF9 Ecaz & Moritani rulebook, printed pp.5–6, 11, 14 and 16, supplies the native placement, entry, Nexus and cancellation rules. The inspected local PDF/text came from a mirror of the publisher-authored rulebook, not a successful official-domain download. Page 5 distinguishes placing a supply token from moving a board token during Mentat. Ordinary destinations are empty strongholds, with an express Hidden Mobile Stronghold exception; storm is permitted. Opposing shipment/movement, including advisors, can trigger Terror. Page 11 describes Cunning as a native advantage enhancement and requires discarding a used Nexus card. Page 14 preserves Terror through storms/explosions and distinguishes new concealed No-Field entry from later revelation. Page 16 prohibits Homeworld placement and permits Karama to prevent Terror placement or movement.

The Grumman component photograph supplies its separate high-population Collection addition/removal and four-spice award. Its wording and unresolved removal custody are recorded in the linked Grumman audit. Bounded fresh publisher/designer searches found no additional authenticated clarification of Cunning relocation, Hidden Mobile Stronghold placement, or Cunning combined with Grumman. Search results from community discussions were not adopted as rulings.

Resolved effect and ordinary composition

1. One earned placement. A native unallied Moritani holder can spend this card when making an otherwise earned placement. Ordinary Mentat supply placement is a concrete supported source in Basic and Advanced. The selected physical token must actually be available; no removed or front-of-shield Extortion token becomes supply. Spending the card neither creates a seventh token nor creates another Mentat action.
2. Static Arrakis destination override. Every printed Arrakis territory is within the positive destination grant, including deserts, rock, Polar Sink, occupied territories and an existing Terror stack. Do not add a force-occupancy requirement or a storm exclusion. A Terror token is not a force and placing it neither enters forces nor triggers existing Terror, Ambassadors or advisors. Homeworlds remain excluded. The separate mobile-territory question is below.
3. One committed native attempt. Bind the chosen token and destination to the original placement opportunity, spend the Nexus card once, and use the ordinary Terrorize cancellation response. If canceled, no physical token moves and the attempted Mentat opportunity is consumed. This is composition of the native cancellation and used-Nexus rules, not an additional printed Nexus cancellation rule. It does not imply that every borrowed Secret Ally effect can be canceled as a native advantage.
4. Placement does not expire. Nothing instructs removal of the placed token at phase or turn end. Subsequent loss of Grumman's high population, an alliance change, or another Nexus draw cannot undo the physical placement. Native current-population and ally restrictions still apply when a later entry is evaluated.
5. Future entries must work at the broadened location. Reading native entry language literally as strongholds only would make the added non-stronghold destinations unable to Terrorize. Apply the ordinary entry opportunity to a Cunning-authorized token in its actual Arrakis territory. This is necessary effect composition, not a separate FAQ sentence. Preserve original arrival counts and causes, current low-Grumman checks, own/ally exclusions, No-Field privacy, and the existing effect-specific guards.
6. Stacks use the existing single-entry choice. The owner chooses one physical candidate for a given entry; resolving it does not invent another entry for its neighbor. Refusal, Enemy of My Enemy cancellation, accepted alliance supply return, and card-discard children must retain that chosen identity. Other tokens remain where they were. See the Grumman audit for the distinction between singular-trigger composition and an explicit stacking FAQ.

Ordinary later relocation can move a Cunning-placed token out to a native-legal destination. Its unusual original location does not change its placed custody status or grant an enlarged destination for the later move. Returning a token to hidden supply ends that placement's custody interval; redeployment requires its own authorization and the existing supply-ID rotation.

Material boundaries

Relocation is not expressly placement. The native rule deliberately offers placing a token or moving one, whereas Cunning names placement. Treating the card as a blanket modifier on the current combined place/move UI would silently include a second source category. No inspected primary clarification establishes that extension. Preserve ordinary relocation; do not present enhanced relocation as a settled printed right.

Hidden Mobile Stronghold has a named native exception. Cunning's broad Arrakis language could be read to replace that destination restriction, while the native exception could be read as surviving the generic grant. Unlike Homeworlds, it is not settled by the explicit Homeworld FAQ. The physical mobile stronghold is also a distinct territory from its pointed-to Arrakis sector. Static Arrakis support must not claim to resolve placement on the mobile stronghold itself or move a token with the mobile counter by accident.

Grumman is a separate earned placement source. Cunning has no Mentat-only wording, so a reusable source contract should represent Collection addition as well. A high-Grumman addition from supply is naturally a placement. The unresolved interaction is its destination condition: does Cunning replace Grumman's requirement for a stronghold already containing Terror, allowing an empty territory, or does that requirement establish an eligible addition before Cunning modifies the destination? The former follows a broad destination override; the latter follows an underlying-opportunity prerequisite. No inspected source explicitly chooses between them. Do not silently gate all Grumman use by inventing a Mentat restriction, or describe either destination composition as a publisher ruling. An enhanced Collection integration also needs to preserve its own once-only outcome and four-spice transaction, separate from Mentat usage and its cancellation source.

The coordinator has now asked one combined question about enhanced relocation, the mobile stronghold and Grumman; its answer is pending. The already pending question about unrevealed Grumman removal custody remains unchanged. Cunning places a token; it does not answer removal custody. Other incomplete Terror effects and combined reaction boundaries remain independent release limitations.

Smallest complete integration for the resolved source

Implement a full ordinary Mentat supply-placement path over static Arrakis territories, with saved cancellation and all supported later entry effects. Keep the unresolved source/destination combinations explicit; a destination-only UI patch is insufficient.

Use a separate Cunning placement quote and receipt instead of widening ordinary placeTerror. Suggested original evidence: version, event, owner, turn, phase, source kind and source event, physical token, original custody, destination, roster, and original Terror-state commitment. Keep pending/completed/canceled stage evidence outside mutable current token custody. A completed placement authorizes the corresponding non-stronghold custody interval; a historical receipt alone must not authorize arbitrary later relocation, a returned token's new ID, or another token.

Current adapters requiring coordinated review:

• grumman-collection.ts validates every placed token against the five ordinary strongholds even when merely quoting unrelated Collection choices. That registry validation must accept independently authorized Cunning custody without widening Grumman's ordinary addition quote.
• terror-entry-receipt.ts and moritani-alliance-cancellation.ts restrict entry territories to those same five locations. Broaden intrinsic territory validity and separately prove the live token's authorized location. Preserve candidate and selected-token signatures through all children.
• placement-cancellation.ts likewise restricts both registry locations and the pending destination. Its current denial quote intentionally does not require that a placement can still succeed: cancellation moves no token. Preserve original declared-source proof and canceled-custody semantics when adding the modifier; do not weaken them into a successful-placement replay.
• engine.ts already finds all placed tokens matching an entry destination in openTerrorEntry; the downstream validators and effect continuations must accept the same authorized territory. Its Mentat declaration and allowed/canceled settlement currently use the ordinary source only.
• Moritani controls, bots and placement previews need a shared modifier-aware option quote. Board markers already group by territory. Public views may show location and stack size, but only Moritani receives token faces, selectable physical supply identities or a held-card-dependent action offer.

Required integration evidence includes genuine Basic/Advanced placement, cancel/allow with unchanged token custody on denial, non-stronghold stacked entry, current low-Grumman entry thresholds, accepted-alliance return, cross-turn ordinary relocation, JSON/SQLite recovery and every-seat privacy. Deterministic saved-state signatures detect inconsistent records; they are not cryptographic protection against coordinated rewriting of all state and proofs. This source audit makes no runtime or verification claim.

Pure implementation checkpoint

nexus-moritani.ts now provides the initial Mentat-only historical receipt and immutable supply-placement quote. Its receipt fixes source mentat and phase 8; it does not represent a Grumman grant. The quote admits static Arrakis destinations and stacks, validates the six physical faces and custody zones, and leaves ordinary placeTerror unchanged. Current source ownership, phase, held Nexus card, authorization of prior non-stronghold custody and allowed/canceled progress remain engine responsibilities.

The five focused cases in nexus-moritani.test.ts cover every static destination, stacks and later ordinary relocation, physical-inventory rejection, historical privacy and altered proof rejection. npm test -- nexus-moritani and focused type-aware lint passed. Local links and whitespace were checked. Full checks and integrated runtime verification remain the coordinator's pending work; this pure-module evidence does not lift release gates.

Opposing Betrayal token return prototype

The separate printed Betrayal panel lets an unallied holder return one board Terror token to Moritani without revealing it. The current runtime quote offers public placed token IDs and locations only to that holder. At a clean play boundary, the accepted choice spends the physical Nexus card and calls the existing hidden-supply return: the selected token joins Moritani's available supply, all supply IDs rotate, other placed tokens remain, and Moritani's Mentat placement allowance is not consumed. Moritani receives the returned face privately. The chronicle names the location and action, never the hidden face.

The printed panel specifies no phase; using a clean boundary rather than interrupting another unresolved response is a development serializer, not a new printed phase rule. Pending Terror, placement, battle and card continuations are not interrupted. Focused engine cases cover actual placement custody, spent Nexus, rejected/stale actions, JSON view continuation and hidden-face projection parity. Other Betrayal effects with secret reaction timing, the unresolved Grumman removal, complete Nexus effects and public module starts remain gated.