Dune/docs/RULE_DECISIONS.md

Rule decision index

Updated 13 September 2026. This is the authoritative navigation index for existing decisions, not a replacement rulebook or a new ruling. Detailed linked contracts retain their source citations and exact supported boundaries. Runtime follow-ups supersede historical absence claims; passing tests establish software behavior, not publisher authority.

Recorded contracts and implementation boundaries

Topic	Decision to preserve	Detailed authority and evidence
Spice Banker battle spending	Secret own-spice commitment is separate from support; only the surviving selected disc gains strength. Core Battle Plan payment rules spend it on death/loss and waive it for a sole traitor-call winner. This payment composition is explicit; upper deferred-income custody remains pending.	Source contract and prototype
Smuggler shipping	Optional free companion is included in the actual total; apply Guild rounding to the reduced priced count. Ordinary Fremen reserves are on planet. No-Field plus a separate free force is officially permitted but still awaits integration. Legacy unstamped declarations keep their quoted full price.	Source contract and prototype
Sandmaster movement	One optional board spice per distinct entered territory on an explicit legal route; source-only repositioning earns none. Per-movement Hajr reset is a documented grammatical inference. Canceled moves earn nothing; multiple-pile collection remains guarded.	Source and connected prototype
Leader battle effects	Rihani normal peek and reshuffle precede a separate committed optional draw; ordering is an explicit printed-order inference. Unused excludes actual calls, not mere disclosure. Mentat/Bureaucrat change scores; Sandmaster adds board spice. Multiple piles and Face Dancer composition stay guarded.	Source contract and prototype
Source and readiness	Separate published rules, explicit implementation choices and unfinished interpretations; Advanced/expansion gates stay closed.	Base/Advanced audit, checklist
Setup and Fremen movement	Preserve source-ordered setup and the distinct declared-movement cancellation; do not recreate fixed historical gaps.	Setup contract, Fremen Karama
Guild payment	Rate, transport permission and income are distinct; power owner, shipper, contributors and independent rate-card beneficiary remain distinct.	Rate/cancellation sources, implemented payment routing
Truthtrance	Current facts are boolean disclosures, not promises to preserve resources. Structured Basic and base Advanced active-opportunity shipment promises bind within their documented scope (Advanced excludes Guild and optional modules); prose is not automatically enforced.	Spice facts, card facts, shipment promises, remaining audit
Truthtrance hand categories	Count current physical hand custody by explicitly named primary role; alternate battle slots and faction powers do not reclassify cards. Only an aggregate answer is disclosed.	Hand inventory
Nexus lifecycle	Twelve physical cards, phase draw/replacement and alliance forfeiture; native Cunning, absent-faction Secret Ally and Betrayal have separate effects. No blanket Karama immunity.	Common source contract, lifecycle runtime
Nexus faction effects	Preserve physical custody, original faction identity and durable effect receipts; use each printed family instead of borrowing another faction's rules by analogy.	Atreides, Harkonnen, BG, Emperor, Fremen, Guild
Expansion Nexus families	Source audit coverage does not imply every panel is playable; consult later runtime records in the status log.	Ixian Cunning, Ixian replacement, Tleilaxu, CHOAM, Richese, Ecaz, Moritani
CHOAM Secret Ally	Absent-faction Collection trade spends one actual Worthless card and the Nexus for two bank spice. It is separate from native Cunning and Auditor; the battle inspection alternative remains missing.	Prototype contract
Sapho movement	At a clean boundary, first reorders only remaining unstarted turns; completed turns stay completed. Advanced Guild must have finished or be absent. Last retains existing protection after Guild.	Existing source contract, runtime
Leader Skills	Fourteen physical cards, variant setup order, public/hidden assignment, death return, own-leader revival and captured lower-band effects are sourced. Five battle disciplines, Planetologist movement/Special substitution, Suk Graduate rescues and common lifecycle are prototyped; Rihani, lower Mentat/Bureaucrat/Sandmaster and normal Smuggler now have connected follow-ups. Remaining bands and combinations stay missing. Known skilled capture identifies the leader through its unique public card.	Source contract, capture inference, runtime, Planetologist, Suk Graduate
Discoveries	Preserve seven sourced Spice Cards and eight physical tokens, private faction peeks and Collection choices. Revealed locations are separate territories; only Jacurutu counts toward stronghold victory. Next-turn free entry, sole-occupant Cistern income and later-turn Ornithopter spending are prototyped; Jacurutu income, Testing Station and Shrine have bounded prototypes; Orgiz and contested/mixed cases remain pending.	Component authority, prototype boundary
Guild Secret Ally	One explicit Guild-priced ordinary shipment; borrowed prices/routes preserve native identity. Free Fremen reinforcement remains a separate choice.	Route contract, verified runtime
Homeworld custody and mobility	Physical home/visitor groups, population thresholds, tariffs and transport permissions retain distinct sources; Homeworld immunity is not universal immunity.	Homeworld rules, benefits, mobility, invasion, Guild transport
Homeworld effects	Keep original payment/revival/placement identities and qualification observations; observations alone do not choose an occupied-benefit owner.	Payments, card economy, Collection, revival deployment, victory reinforcement, replacement, Tupile

Pending interpretations: preserve existing questions

These are unresolved in the cited records. Do not infer an answer from elapsed time, a fixture, a related card or this index. Check subsequent recorded user/source decisions before proceeding; do not send duplicate questions.

Boundary	Still unresolved	Existing record
Sapho remaining timing	First versus unspent Advanced Guild priority, partly completed combined turns, cyclic auction duration and remaining battle timing stay guarded. Prior questions remain unanswered.	Source audit, battle review
Mirror Weapon	Whether copied Tooth/Artillery mandatory-discard rules attach to the physical Mirror remains unanswered; arithmetic helpers do not admit the full battle card.	Engine audit
Semuta Drug	Full-hand take-before-discard and the privacy-neutral immediate reaction protocol remain unresolved. Typed discard continuations already exist; they are not activation.	Source update, privacy review
Leader Skills edge cases	Capture/replacement eligibility, Banker escrow custody (user question sent), Smuggler survival settlement, Mentat empty-hand/death disclosure, Diplomat retreat ordering and simultaneous optional timing need resolution before those cases are enabled. These are newly recorded source gaps, not answered user rulings.	Material boundaries
Suk Graduate / Atreides	Whether rescued dialed casualties count toward the seven-loss Kwisatz Haderach threshold remains unresolved. The user question has been sent; Advanced Atreides rescue stays guarded.	Source and runtime boundary
Ordinary Guild cancellation	Unaffordable repricing, replacement/retry/decline, consumed opportunity, contributor adjustment and ordering with special shipment-stop. The affordability question was already sent.	Material timing
Base special Karama	Unfunded auction recovery, stopped-shipment settlement and Atreides full-plan commitment order remain provisional. Native full-plan/Voice/Prescience/Truthtrance/Ghola interactions now have genuine-setup focused evidence, but the source audit does not settle the special offer/deadline or target-first interpretation.	Explicit base interpretations, full-plan interaction audit
Guild Secret Ally/Homeworlds	Whether the reserve-return grant overrides the Homeworld return restriction. The question was already sent; that route stays guarded.	Homeworld return, checkpoint
Occupied Homeworlds	Entitlement/expiry after departure, replacement or contest; unique powers and shared income. The first-occupier/current-occupier question was already sent.	Occupation questions, lifecycle audit
Nexus responses and composition	Betrayal private-response timing, partial revival/payment choices, Emperor fewer-than-five, fresh advisor/storm cases, Duke restoration and remaining faction-specific combinations.	Common boundaries and the individual faction source/runtime documents above
Orgiz collection	User question pending: take one spice per positive board pile collected, or leave the effect pending? The publisher does not clarify stacked Spice Blows. The draft quote remains opt-in and is not enabled by the engine. Contested Cistern income also remains outside the ordinary sole-occupant prototype.	Discovery interpretations
Jacurutu physical dial	The user question asks whether the losing player should choose the physical normal/elite forces represented by its dial. When legal Advanced allocations produce different rewards, income remains explicitly unpaid; numeric wheel subtraction is not a ruling.	Discovery interpretations
Testing Station contest/timing	Only sole non-advisor occupation is prototyped. Two-occupant priority/stacking remains unresolved; opening after the ordinary storm-card window is an explicit source-timing inference. Weather Control is excluded by the printed text.	Discovery interpretations
CHOAM Secret Ally battle timing	The printed after-victory inspection is optional and the Nexus identity stays secret. No existing postbattle choice covers every winner: a pause only for a holder leaks ownership, precommitment removes the after-win choice, and a universal window makes nonholders pass. The product-exception question has been sent; no timing policy is implemented pending the answer. Ordinary Karama cancellation is also not established by the retrieved sources.	After-victory inspection audit
Discovery prototype inferences	Free entry uses storm order and ordinary source-storm restrictions; these are general-rule inferences. Great Maker currently follows ordinary first-turn worm skipping and Sandtrout suppression; an exhausted token type creates no replacement token. These preserve current source interpretation and physical inventory but are not separately confirmed rulings or complete combined-module certification.	Interpretations for refinement
Other Homeworld combinations	Population/force splitting, removal custody, replacement shortages, income accounting and placement ordering remain local to their detailed contracts.	Homeworld rules, occupation and the effect documents above

When a decision changes, record the exact source or user ruling in its detailed feature document, update affected implementation guidance/tests, and adjust this index and current status. Retain historical evidence without presenting a superseded proposal as current behavior.