Dune/docs/DISCOVERY_PROTOTYPE.md

Discovery functional prototype

13 September 2026. The first connected Discovery batch is Prototyped, with partial rules coverage. It connects physical components, real actions, private controls, AI choices and saved continuation. Normal public Discovery and Advanced start gates, and the publication gate, remain closed.

Source and setup boundary

The component acquisition record identifies the publisher-authored Ecaz & Moritani rulebook, pages 12–13, and the physical card scan used for all six placements. Its verified inventory is seven Spice Cards (six Discovery territory cards and Great Maker) and eight tokens. This prototype uses those identities and effects; it does not treat test outcomes as rulings.

initializeDiscoveryGameForAudit enters the real staged setup with two through six ready base factions, in Basic or Advanced, with Discoveries enabled before components are dealt. It adds the seven cards to the ordinary Spice Deck and creates one of each token behind shuffled, opaque physical identities. It rejects redealing a started or nonempty game. Other expansion decks and optional modules are outside this initializer. No ordinary player action or room endpoint can bypass the normal start gate through it. The existing backed-up local starter accepts --profile discovery for a fresh ready base-faction lobby:

node --import tsx tools/start-prototype.ts --profile discovery --db PATH --room CODE --version NUMBER --out /private/new-directory

It preserves all seats and other rooms, requires the current version and refuses to redeal a started game. The default ix profile remains available.

Connected behavior

• Great Maker: ordinary worm consequences resolve first. Every faction then votes in storm order; a strict majority creates a Nexus and a tie does not. A previous Nexus in the phase is retained. Fremen may then move any legal number of actual reserve forces to one allowed destination without spending spice, shipment or normal movement. Typed Fedaykin custody and storm/occupancy restrictions apply. Canceling protection of Fremen already in the affected territory does not cancel the separate reserve ride.
• Discovery blows: each of the six cards destroys existing forces and spice in its printed blow territory, including Fremen forces, before placing six spice subject to the ordinary storm exclusion. A random available token of the printed type is placed face down at the card's separate token destination.
• Inspection and reveal: Fremen privately see placed Hiereg faces; Guild privately sees placed Smuggler faces. During Collection, non-advisor forces in a token's surrounding territory may inspect it and then choose whether to reveal it. Other seats do not receive that private knowledge or the token's hidden supply order. An inspected token may remain face down.
• Immediate rewards: Spice Stash pays seven bank spice once. Treachery Card Stash draws one private card before checking the hand limit. Overflow requires an owned discard choice, including the new card; its saved draw/discard receipt prevents replay. Both stashes then retain removed physical custody.
• Carried token: revealing Ornithopter records its owner and acquisition turn. Spending it for movement is not implemented in this batch.
• Nested locations: the five revealed location tokens become separate, initially empty board territories inside their printed surroundings. Public reveal controls admission; a private peek alone cannot create a destination. Ordinary movement uses the parent territory, shipment uses stronghold prices, no more than two factions enter, and occupants are protected from storm and sandworms. Only Jacurutu Sietch contributes a stronghold toward victory.

Great Maker vote/ride controls and Discovery token/discard controls use the same private legal choices as the four AI profiles. Token backs expose only permitted information; authorized faces have readable explanations of all eight effects. Busy and autopilot states disable human actions. Those explanations include remaining printed effects and explicitly distinguish them from available play.

Interpretations retained for refinement

The Great Maker text instructs players to treat it as Shai-Hulud with listed exceptions. The prototype consequently applies ordinary first-turn worm skipping and Sandtrout suppression before opening its special vote and ride. Those two interactions are source inferences, not separately confirmed publisher answers or newly approved table rulings. The Discovery-only setup does not itself enable a combined Ix/Sandtrout game.

If the required token type has no physical supply remaining, the blow continues without creating another token. This preserves the eight-token inventory; the empty-supply resolution remains an implementation interpretation to refine, rather than a certified additional rule. Existing unrelated pending rulings in the decision index remain pending.

Evidence and next dependencies

Focused suites cover component inventory and private projection (tests/discoveries.test.ts), genuine setup and Collection effects (tests/discovery-runtime.test.ts), ordered Great Maker continuations (tests/great-maker.test.ts), nested board and admission rules (tests/discovery-board.test.ts, tests/discovery-admission.test.ts), and private human/AI controls (tests/discovery-controls.test.ts). They exercise immutable rejections, physical custody, hidden information and JSON restoration. They do not certify a complete module, all combined routes or difficulty strength ordering.

SQLite recovery tests (tests/discovery-recovery.test.ts) verify competing reveals pay only once, the private overflow choice survives restoration, and an already committed discard resumes without another card or reward. Independent review regressions bind worm/protection/arrival controls to their original encounter and enforce the stash's mandatory overflow discard. Two deterministic complete-game smoke tests (tests/discovery-playthrough.test.ts, seeds 2026091303 Basic and 2026091304 Advanced) preserve all components through JSON reloads with four AI profiles. These games exercise the current prototype and do not certify its explicitly missing effects.

Browser room 3RJBH26Y completed genuine human Fremen setup. Reordering one existing physical Discovery card to the front of this new QA room's deck let normal Storm and Spice Blow actions draw Hagga Basin and place a Hiereg token at Gara Kulon 8. The owning Fremen view privately identified Shrine, retained it face down, and displayed readable enlarged token and full Spice Card guidance. The room is paused at acceptance of that blow. No other saved room was changed and no server restart was needed. Required broad verification results and the source-bound report are recorded in the checkpoint commit.

1. Add the next-turn free entry into newly revealed locations, preserving typed groups, occupancy, turn order and saved pending choices.
2. Connect the five special location benefits: Jacurutu battle income, Cistern Collection income, Ecological Testing Station storm adjustment, Shrine card conversion and Orgiz collection transfer. Ordinary Jacurutu victory counting does not implement its battle income.
3. Connect later-turn Ornithopter spending to one actual movement action, then integrate combined modules and complete games before refining or opening gates.