Add The Frontier, a second setting, and a picker to choose between them
Cold Fork is a freight yard: 29 events across two stages, a four-day cycle, and its own relationship and skill vocabulary. src/engine/ was not touched. Adding it needed three changes outside the engine: one save slot per pack, app.js holding the current pack, and turn.js no longer naming the mailroom (DECISIONS #34). build.js now handles imports wrapped across lines. A conformance suite runs over every registered pack. DECISIONS #35 records three calls on open questions. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01RxdJFbLq1rBKsUeticGV1g
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JesseMarkowitz
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Claude Opus 5
Claude Opus 5
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// The Frontier — the second content pack for The Ladder.
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//
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// Cold Fork, a freight town at the end of a stage line. You are a hired hand
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// in Vane & Co.'s yard; the town has a marshal who is tired and a road that is
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// not safe. Two rungs, the same as Corporate Ladder, and not one line of
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// engine code between them.
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//
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// This pack exists to prove the split holds. Everything that makes it a
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// different game from Corporate Ladder is in this directory: a four-day cycle
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// instead of a week, money that arrives from work rather than from a wage,
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// relationship stats named for a place where being owed a favour matters more
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// than being liked, and a skill pair of nerve and trade.
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import { characters } from './characters.js';
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import { events } from './events/index.js';
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export const frontier = {
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id: 'frontier',
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name: 'The Frontier',
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blurb:
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'Cold Fork, at the end of a stage line: a freight yard, a road that is ' +
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'not safe, and a marshal who has been six years retiring.',
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version: '0.1.0',
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turnUnit: 'day',
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startingStage: 'hand',
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peopleHeading: 'Cold Fork',
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stages: {
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hand: { label: 'The Yard', title: 'Hired Hand' },
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deputy: { label: 'The Office', title: 'Deputy Marshal' },
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},
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// Not a week. The stage comes every fourth day, and the whole town runs on
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// that: the outfit settles up when the stage comes in, the boarding house
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// collects on the rest day before it. A pack that wants a seven-day week
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// says seven here; the engine has no opinion either way, and Corporate
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// Ladder's calendar is the same field with different numbers in it.
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calendar: {
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cycleLength: 4,
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cycleName: 'Run',
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unitNames: ['Stage day', 'Haul', 'Yard', 'Rest'],
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},
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// Money is smaller here than in Corporate Ladder by a factor of about
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// fifteen, and it behaves differently: the settlement covers board and room
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// and very little else, so the difference between a good run and a bad one
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// is what you took from the work. See `tuning` below for the arithmetic that
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// is actually asserted.
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state: {
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'money': { initial: 40, min: -400, max: 100000 },
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// The store ledger. Named for what it is rather than for a loan: nobody in
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// Cold Fork lends money, they let you carry a balance.
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'owed': { initial: 0, min: 0, max: 100000 },
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'standing': { initial: 50, min: 0, max: 100 },
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'skills.nerve': { initial: 5, min: 0, max: 100 },
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'skills.trade': { initial: 5, min: 0, max: 100 },
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'flags.carries_iron': { initial: false },
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'flags.owes_the_store': { initial: false },
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'flags.covered_for_dutch': { initial: false },
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'flags.sworn_in': { initial: false },
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'flags.spoke_for_dutch': { initial: false },
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'notable': { initial: [] },
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},
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// A different vocabulary from Corporate Ladder's likes/fears/helps, and the
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// reason the vocabulary is content's to choose. Out here the useful question
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// about a person is not whether they like you: it is whether they will take
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// your word, and whether they are carrying a debt to you they mean to pay.
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relationshipStats: {
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trusts_you: { label: 'Takes your word', initial: 45, min: 0, max: 100 },
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owes_you: { label: 'Owes you', initial: 10, min: 0, max: 100 },
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wary_of_you: { label: 'Wary of you', initial: 15, min: 0, max: 100 },
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},
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// The economic shape, and the thing that makes this pack a real test of the
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// engine rather than Corporate Ladder in a hat: there is no wage worth
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// living on. Vane settles up when the stage comes in and it covers the room
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// and the feed and four dollars besides. Everything else you earn, you earn
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// on a turn, by choosing to — and what the choices cost is where the
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// pressure comes from, not an unexplained drain.
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//
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// Keep this arithmetic honest when tuning. Per four-day run:
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// hand: -12 board -8 room +24 settlement = +4
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// deputy: -12 board -8 room +38 pay = +18
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// Both are asserted directly by the conformance suite against `tuning`
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// below, so a number changed here without re-deriving it fails the build
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// rather than trapping a player forty turns in.
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upkeep: [
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{ label: 'Board and feed', effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -3 }] },
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// Turn 1 is a Stage day, so offset 3 is the first Rest day and offset 4
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// the next Stage day — the room is collected the night before the outfit
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// settles up, which is the boarding house's whole business model.
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{
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label: 'Room at the Cordwood',
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every: 4,
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offset: 3,
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -8 }],
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},
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{
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label: 'Settlement',
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every: 4,
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offset: 4,
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requires: [{ path: 'stage', op: '==', value: 'hand' }],
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 24 }],
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},
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{
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label: 'Deputy pay',
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every: 4,
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offset: 4,
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// The town pays a real wage, and it is still not much of a living. What
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// changes with the star is not the money; it is what the days contain.
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requires: [{ path: 'stage', op: '==', value: 'deputy' }],
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 38 }],
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},
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// Store credit costs more the deeper in you are, the same step function
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// Corporate Ladder uses for its loan — a shape, not a setting.
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{
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label: 'Store credit',
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every: 4,
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offset: 4,
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requires: [{ path: 'owed', op: '>', value: 0 }],
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -3 }],
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},
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{
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label: 'Store credit (carried)',
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every: 4,
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offset: 4,
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requires: [{ path: 'owed', op: '>=', value: 60 }],
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -3 }],
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},
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{
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label: 'Store credit (posted)',
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every: 4,
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offset: 4,
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requires: [{ path: 'owed', op: '>=', value: 120 }],
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effects: [{ path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -4 }],
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},
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],
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// What the conformance suite holds this pack to. Declaring it here rather
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// than writing it into a test is the same principle as the rest of the pack:
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// the numbers a setting must hit are the setting's business. See
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// DECISIONS.md #31.
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tuning: {
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// Net movement of `money` from upkeep alone, per calendar cycle, at each
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// stage. Upkeep is the floor a player plays against: barely above water in
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// the yard, and a real if unremarkable living with the star.
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baselinePerCycle: {
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hand: [0, 12],
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deputy: [10, 30],
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},
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},
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display: {
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'money': { label: 'Money', format: 'money', order: 1 },
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'owed': { label: 'Owed at the store', format: 'money', order: 2, hideWhenZero: true },
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'standing': { label: 'Standing', format: 'meter', order: 3 },
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'skills.nerve': { label: 'Nerve', format: 'meter', order: 4 },
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'skills.trade': { label: 'Trade', format: 'meter', order: 5 },
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'notable': { hidden: true, inLedger: false },
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'flags.carries_iron': {
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label: 'The scattergun', hidden: true,
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whenTrue: 'You are carrying Vane’s scattergun on the box.',
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whenFalse: 'The scattergun is back under the office counter.',
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},
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'flags.owes_the_store': {
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label: 'The store ledger', hidden: true,
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whenTrue: 'Your name is in the book at the store.',
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whenFalse: 'You are square with the store.',
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},
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'flags.covered_for_dutch': {
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label: 'Dutch’s run', hidden: true,
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whenTrue: 'Dutch owes you a run.',
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whenFalse: 'You and Dutch are square.',
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},
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'flags.sworn_in': {
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label: 'The star', hidden: true,
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whenTrue: 'You are sworn in.',
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whenFalse: 'You are back in the yard.',
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},
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'flags.spoke_for_dutch': {
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label: 'Dutch’s name', hidden: true,
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whenTrue: 'Dutch’s name is in for the good runs.',
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whenFalse: 'Dutch’s name is not in for the good runs.',
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},
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},
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characters,
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events,
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};
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export default frontier;
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