PROCITY/docs/V7_THE_GAME.md

PROCITY v7 — THE GAME (epoch charter — DRAFT for John)

Fable (m3), 2026-07-17. From THE_FRONTIER's headline gap: the world is built, the game isn't. v7 is the smallest set of systems that makes a stranger play twice. Design principle: every system below rides machinery that ALREADY EXISTS — nothing here invents a new world layer.

The fantasy, one line

You're a crate-digger in 90s Australia: build the collection, learn the prices, work the towns — and be home in time for the gig.

The loop

Wake (save point) → plan the day (shops shut per their real hours; the gig starts at night — the clock finally matters) → dig shops, spot the gems (priced below the guide), spend scarce cash → sell the flips (keeper today; the auction tomorrow) → sleep = save, the day advances, stock rotates → the collection grows → the wantlist points at another town → travel costs a day. Repeat, richer and one gem wiser.

The systems (each with its existing foundation)

1. PERSISTENCE — the foundation stone. Save = THE DELTA ONLY: cash, owned items, town, day number, wantlist, stats. The world is never saved — it regenerates from seed (the seeded-everything law finally pays its biggest dividend: saves are tiny and can't corrupt the world). localStorage, schema-versioned, JSON export/import for moving machines. Foundation: item identity is already stable — parody items are seeded, real/mint carry skus (the R25/R26 sku fences were built for exactly this, before we knew it).
2. THE COLLECTION. Your crate, as a UI: cover, title, artist, price paid, where and what day you found it. The trophy case of the whole game. (A walkable home-room shelf is v7.x — UI first.) Foundation: the atlas indexes already carry every field the card needs.
3. THE GUIDE + THE GEM (the thrill loop). An in-game price guide — thriftgod's BIBLE concept — gives a VALUE BAND per item (imperfect, like the real 90s guide books). Shops price with seeded variance around it → a gem is an item priced under its band. Skill = spotting them. Foundation: mint() gem/price bands exist as data and drive nothing; real items have real dealgod prices; the dig card already shows asking price.
4. SELLING — where cash comes back. v7.0-alpha: sell to a keeper at the counter (below guide, always — the no-money-pump law). v7.0: GodBay — list an item, a SEEDED offline auction resolves NEXT DAY (the come-back-tomorrow hook; thriftgod's auction brain, G's lane, offline tier first per the proven tier-ladder pattern — a live tier is v7.x and rides the G3 rails).
5. THE DAY. Sleep advances the day; stock rotates per (shop, day) — seeded, so day 3 in Bendigo is the same for every player on that seed (parody/mint rotate; the real shop's real stock stays real); gigs already run a 7-night week — day % 7 plugs straight in; hours already exist — now closing time costs you something. Foundation: the segment spine, isOpen, and plan.gigs are all sitting there waiting.
6. THE WANTLIST + TRAVEL. Mark items/artists you're hunting; seeded rumors surface hints ("saw one in Castlemaine" — a keeper line, a gig-crowd mutter: D's citizens finally gossip for a reason); travel costs a day → 23 towns become a strategy map instead of a dropdown. Foundation: the selector, the pack, the personas.
7. THE FIRST FIVE MINUTES. You arrive with $50 and a want. Three toast-beats: dig, buy, sell. A real splash. (Smallest system, biggest stranger-facing payoff.)

The stages

• v7.0-alpha — THE SAVE AND THE CRATE: persistence + collection UI + sell-to-keeper + sleep/day cycle + stock rotation. ONE town plays as a complete (small) game.
• v7.0-beta — THE THRILL: the guide bands + gem variance + wantlist + rumors + travel costs a day. The 23 towns become the map.
• v7.0 — THE AUCTION: GodBay offline tier, onboarding, the tour ("day one to first gem" as the money shot), docs freeze, tag.

The laws (new ones this epoch earns)

1. The delta law: a save NEVER contains world state — only player deltas. A corrupted save can cost you your stuff, never the town.
2. The no-pump law: every sell price < the buy-side guide band, structurally. The economy gets a GATE (an agent plays N seeded days and asserts net-worth growth is bounded by finds, not arbitrage loops).
3. Game money is game money: the write-back law extends — no bridge to real money, ever, in either direction.
4. Classic stays pure: ?classic=1 boots the v2 town with NO game layer (no save, no HUD additions) — the covenant is untouched. The game layer defaults ON for normal boots (the v3.1 flip precedent) with ?game=0 as the opt-out.
5. Rotation is seeded: stock rotation draws from (citySeed, shopId, day) — deterministic, gate-checkable, same for everyone on a seed.

Lane map (first cut)

F the save core + gates (delta law, no-pump gate, save/load determinism) · B the UI surfaces (collection, wantlist, day clock, splash — hud.js territory) · C the counter sell interaction + dig-card guide hints (+ the home room, v7.x) · A the day/rotation seeding contracts (new sub-streams, goldens untouched — rotation rides runtime, not plan gen... A verifies that boundary) · E guide-band data baked into packs/atlases (mint bands, real prices) · D rumor lines through keepers/citizens · G GodBay (the auction brain, offline seeded tier) + real guide prices from dealgod.

Risks (named now, v4-style)

1. Economy balance — pumps, dumps, degenerate flips. The no-pump gate is the fence; a playtest-bot (an agent that greedily arbitrages for N days) is the adversarial verifier.
2. Save schema drift — versioned from day one, migration-or-reject, never silent.
3. Item identity across re-emits — a re-baked atlas must not orphan owned items (the sku IS the identity; E's validator grows an owned-item stability check).
4. Scope gravity — the game wants everything (housing! romance! a phone!). The stage gates are the fence: alpha ships ONE town playing well before beta touches 23.
5. v6 collision — none by design: v7-alpha is systems/UI (F/B/C-heavy); v6's spikes are clips/ultra (E/D/G-heavy). They interleave; Fable sequences the rounds.

Sequencing

v7.0-alpha can start now — it's unblocked (v6 waits on footage; the two don't collide). Recommended: R30 = v7.0-alpha wave 1 (F save core + B collection UI + C sell counter contracts first). John ratifies this charter (or amends the fantasy — it's your shop, your era, your game) and says go.