{ "about": "One recurring event per group in groups.json, written by hand (Claude) as a comparison target. Descriptions are variants of one event (DESIGN.md: 'several descriptions, sharing one general option set'); each names the scenes it was drawn from. Options follow the DESIGN.md recipe: 1-3 fixed archetypes, 1-3 drawn from scenes in the group, and 'filled' only where the corpus gave no option. Effects give a path and a direction only. Magnitudes are the numeric search's job, and no number is chosen here. Role tokens ({spouse}, {rival} ...) are meant for code substitution, per the DESIGN.md finding that a model should not do entity substitution.", "effect_notation": "dir '+' or '-' is an add of unknown size; 'set' is a flag; 'push' adds a line to notable. relationships.. uses the labels in setting.json.", "events": [ { "id": "tainted_money", "group": "tainted_money", "stage": "inside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{patron}", "{spouse}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "{patron} has read what you wrote and taken it exactly the wrong way, and is offering a great deal of money to go on taking it that way in public. All you have to do is say nothing.", "from": [ 12, 14 ] }, { "text": "The advance would cover the household for a year. It is for more of the same thing you swore, six months ago, you would never do again.", "from": [ 27, 28 ] }, { "text": "You have found out where the money comes from. It is the same money that has paid for everything you like about your life.", "from": [ 230, 232 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "take_it", "label": "Take it, and tell yourself it changes nothing.", "source": "scene 14", "result": "It changes nothing for a while. Then it changes what you are asked to do next.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "owed", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.took_the_money", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "take_it_once", "label": "Take it this once, to pay for the thing you actually care about.", "source": "scene 28", "result": "You buy what you needed for the real work. The real work is put off by exactly as long as the other thing takes.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "owed", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "refuse", "label": "Refuse, and say why.", "source": "archetype", "result": "{patron} is not offended, only puzzled, and offers the same terms to somebody else by the end of the week.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.patron.obliged_to_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "money", "dir": "-" } ] }, { "id": "say_nothing", "label": "Neither sign nor refuse. Let it lie on the desk.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It is printed anyway. Silence, it turns out, was the only thing they needed from you.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "notable", "op": "push", "value": "Let it go to press without a word." } ] } ] }, { "id": "strings_attached", "group": "strings_attached", "stage": "outside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{patron}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "There is a place for you. It is also, you are told quite frankly, the kind of place people leave.", "from": [ 89 ] }, { "text": "{patron} will back you, gladly and at once, once you have done one more thing first.", "from": [ 26 ] }, { "text": "There is a way out of this, and you will not like what it costs. You are asked to hear it without looking at the person telling you.", "from": [ 256, 257 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "accept_terms", "label": "Accept the terms.", "source": "archetype", "result": "You are out of the hole and into the arrangement, which is a different hole with better furniture.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "owed", "dir": "+" } ] }, { "id": "take_warning", "label": "Take it anyway: you have been warned, and you need it.", "source": "scene 89", "result": "Being warned turns out to be worth less than you thought, and needing it exactly as much.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "flags.took_the_hard_place", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "haggle", "label": "Ask for the help without the condition.", "source": "filled", "result": "{patron} explains, kindly, that the condition was the help.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.patron.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ] }, { "id": "walk_away", "label": "Do without.", "source": "archetype", "result": "You manage. It is not the same as being all right.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "old_attachment", "group": "old_attachment", "stage": "inside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{spouse}", "{former}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "{former} has a right, written down by a court, to come into your house once a week. This is the week.", "from": [ 33, 34 ] }, { "text": "Your {spouse} pours your coffee exactly the way {former} used to take it, and blushes when you say so.", "from": [ 39 ] }, { "text": "You are engaged now, and you have called on {former} as you always did, as though nothing had changed. {former} does not seem to think so.", "from": [ 199, 204 ] }, { "text": "You find yourself outside {former}'s door, with no appointment and no good reason, and you ring anyway.", "from": [ 168, 169 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "be_civil", "label": "Be civil. Offer a chair and a cigar.", "source": "scene 54", "result": "It is easier than you expected, which is its own kind of trouble.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.former.resents_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -1 }, { "id": "stay_out", "label": "Be out of the house when it happens.", "source": "scene 35", "result": "You are out of the house, and run into a different piece of the past on the way.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 }, { "id": "ask_spouse", "label": "Ask your {spouse} what it was really like, before.", "source": "scene 48", "result": "You get tears instead of an answer, which is an answer.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -4 }, { "id": "laugh_and_pour", "label": "Laugh, and take the third cup.", "source": "scene 57", "result": "Everyone is very pleasant. Nobody mentions it afterwards, and you find you have stopped minding.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "notable", "op": "push", "value": "Took tea with all three of them." } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 2 } ] }, { "id": "what_they_hid", "group": "what_they_hid", "stage": "any", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{spouse}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "Somebody who has no reason to lie mentions, in passing, a thing your {spouse} told you had not happened.", "from": [ 46 ] }, { "text": "Your {spouse} has been kinder than usual all week. You have started to wonder what it is in aid of.", "from": [ 159 ] }, { "text": "You learn that the person you are about to marry went, alone and by appointment, to ask someone else about you.", "from": [ 205, 206 ] }, { "text": "It dawns on you, halfway through being thanked, that the whole thing was arranged, and that you were the one it was arranged for.", "from": [ 259, 260 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "confront", "label": "Ask straight out.", "source": "archetype", "result": "You get the truth, or enough of it, and you cannot give it back.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" } ] }, { "id": "let_it_lie", "label": "Say nothing. It is done now.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It is done. It is also always in the room.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.knows_and_says_nothing", "op": "set", "value": true } ] }, { "id": "find_out_quietly", "label": "Find out for yourself, quietly, before you say anything.", "source": "scene 47", "result": "What you learn about the other side is all to their credit, which makes it worse.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 }, { "id": "pay_and_go", "label": "Pay what it takes to be out of it, and go.", "source": "scene 260", "result": "It costs you money and a certain opinion of yourself. The money was the cheaper part.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true } ] }, { "id": "keep_their_secret", "group": "keep_their_secret", "stage": "outside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{employer}", "{spouse}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "You are sent on an errand before the house is up, and asked to be back before the master of it is. On the way back, he is waiting.", "from": [ 105, 107 ] }, { "text": "You hold the only proof of something that would comfort a grieving woman and ruin the man she has never met. You are asked to tell no one, not even her.", "from": [ 197 ] }, { "text": "You could clear yourself in a sentence by showing what is in your pocket. The person it would expose is looking at you and very slightly shaking her head.", "from": [ 251, 252 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "lie", "label": "Lie for them, looking straight back.", "source": "scene 107", "result": "It comes out ready-made. You had not known you had it in you.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.employer.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "flags.lied_for_them", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "refuse_to_say", "label": "Say you do not show your private affairs to strangers.", "source": "scene 253", "result": "It is perfectly true and perfectly useless, and it is taken as a confession.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.employer.obliged_to_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 }, { "id": "give_it_up", "label": "Tell what you know.", "source": "archetype", "result": "You are thanked by the person who asked, and never again by the person you were covering for.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.employer.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ] }, { "id": "keep_it_forever", "label": "Keep it, and never tell anyone you kept it.", "source": "scene 198", "result": "It is the most generous thing you will ever do, and nobody, including the person it was for, will ever know.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "notable", "op": "push", "value": "Burned it." } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 } ] }, { "id": "exposed", "group": "exposed", "stage": "inside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{patron}", "{spouse}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "The first review has come. Your {spouse} is delighted, and means to read it aloud, now, in front of {patron}.", "from": [ 70, 73 ] }, { "text": "The speaker is circling closer and closer to a name, and every head in the room is turning towards you.", "from": [ 84, 85 ] }, { "text": "The book is everywhere. People quote it at you. They quote the parts you meant as a joke.", "from": [ 17, 18 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "brazen_it", "label": "Sit still and look pleased.", "source": "archetype", "result": "Nobody can tell anything from your face, which is exactly what they will say about you afterwards.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ] }, { "id": "stop_it", "label": "Stop it: take the paper out of their hands.", "source": "filled", "result": "It stops. So does the conversation, and several invitations.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ] }, { "id": "own_it", "label": "Say, out loud, that it is yours and you meant it.", "source": "archetype", "result": "For a moment it is very quiet. Then somebody asks you to dinner.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.owned_it", "op": "set", "value": true } ] }, { "id": "hide", "label": "Leave, and let them talk.", "source": "scene 17", "result": "They talk. You are not there to hear it, which helps less than you hoped.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true } ] }, { "id": "civil_to_them", "group": "civil_to_them", "stage": "outside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{patron}", "{former}", "{employer}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "{patron} is laid up and asks you, as a favour to the firm, to handle a piece of business for the one man in town you would cross the street to avoid.", "from": [ 40, 41 ] }, { "text": "The master of the house is home for two days. Everyone below stairs has gone quiet, and you have been told to keep out of his way.", "from": [ 96, 98 ] }, { "text": "You are left alone over tea with {patron}, who wants to talk about the one subject you most need to keep off.", "from": [ 64 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "do_it_well", "label": "Do it, and do it better than they would.", "source": "scene 41", "result": "You come out of it the more composed of the two, which is a small thing to be proud of and you are proud of it anyway.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.patron.obliged_to_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "money", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "flatter", "label": "Turn the talk to them, and keep it there.", "source": "scene 64", "result": "It works until you get the name of their last book wrong.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.patron.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "keep_out_of_sight", "label": "Keep out of the way until it passes.", "source": "scene 96", "result": "It passes. It will come back.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "decline", "label": "Decline, and let them find someone else.", "source": "archetype", "result": "They find someone else, and remember that they had to.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.patron.obliged_to_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ] } ] }, { "id": "plead_their_case", "group": "plead_their_case", "stage": "any", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{ward}", "{spouse}", "{former}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "The person you love most asks you to go and talk someone round on their behalf. You are not at all sure they are in the right.", "from": [ 218, 219 ] }, { "text": "{former} asks you, very politely, to remind your {spouse} of a right the court gave him. Your {spouse} will not thank you.", "from": [ 47 ] }, { "text": "The match is made. You could warn the young man what he is getting. If you do, there may be no match.", "from": [ 141, 142 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "plead_hard", "label": "Go, and plead it with everything you have.", "source": "scene 222", "result": "You argue well. The other side tells you that is exactly why they cannot agree.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.ward.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 2 }, { "id": "pass_it_on", "label": "Pass it on exactly as it was given to you.", "source": "scene 47", "result": "You are the messenger, and treated as one.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.former.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "warn_them", "label": "Tell the truth, even though it spoils your own hopes.", "source": "scene 142", "result": "You are told you never understood them. Things turn out rather well.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "notable", "op": "push", "value": "Told him what she was like." } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "refuse_errand", "label": "Say it is not your place.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It is not, and they do not ask again.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.ward.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "own_words_back", "group": "own_words_back", "stage": "inside", "recurs": false, "roles": [ "{spouse}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "Your {spouse} reminds you of the promise you made each other: either could go, freely, when it was over. It is over, apparently, for one of you.", "from": [ 160, 161 ] }, { "text": "You kept her secret on your honour. Now, you are told, honour requires you to marry her within the hour.", "from": [ 253, 254 ] }, { "text": "You urged compromise on someone younger. They answer that your own life is the best argument against it.", "from": [ 222 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "keep_your_word", "label": "Keep your word. Wish them luck.", "source": "scene 162", "result": "You do it perfectly. Afterwards, the house you are standing in does not feel like yours.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.kept_the_bargain", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 }, { "id": "go_back_on_it", "label": "Go back on it. You did not mean it to apply to you.", "source": "scene 164", "result": "You are allowed to. You are also told, gently, what you once said about people who did.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "argue_the_terms", "label": "Argue that the circumstances are different.", "source": "scene 152", "result": "They are, and you cannot say how without saying what has changed in you.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -8 } ] }, { "id": "give_it_up", "group": "give_it_up", "stage": "any", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{former}", "{ward}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "There is a way to save the person who used you: say that you lied, and let your own name take it.", "from": [ 210 ] }, { "text": "You could stop a younger person making the mistake you made. It would mean telling them what it was.", "from": [ 229, 236 ] }, { "text": "You could get out of here tonight, if you let someone else pay for it.", "from": [ 258 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "give_it", "label": "Give it up for them.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It costs you exactly what you thought. They may never know what it was.", "effects": [ { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.former.obliged_to_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "notable", "op": "push", "value": "Gave it up and said nothing." } ] }, { "id": "tell_all", "label": "Tell the whole story, and let them choose.", "source": "scene 236", "result": "You leave before they answer. It is the only part you could not bear.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.ward.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "refuse_sacrifice", "label": "Refuse to let them do it for you.", "source": "scene 211", "result": "You will take what is coming yourself. It turns out less is coming than you feared.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.former.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "keep_it", "label": "Keep what is yours.", "source": "archetype", "result": "Nobody blames you. That is not the same as nobody noticing.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.former.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "keep_the_peace", "group": "keep_the_peace", "stage": "inside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{spouse}", "{ward}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "Your {spouse} wants something from you again. The fastest way to an evening's quiet is to give it.", "from": [ 21 ] }, { "text": "The household has grown around the new arrival until there is only one small room of it left for you.", "from": [ 130, 131 ] }, { "text": "Your {spouse} offers, very sweetly, to do whatever you like about it. You realise they would say the same to anyone.", "from": [ 50, 51 ], "outside_group": { "50": -1 } } ], "options": [ { "id": "give_way", "label": "Give way. It is easier.", "source": "scene 21", "result": "It is easier. You notice, later, that you have stopped keeping count.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "money", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "dig_in_small", "label": "Hold out on something small.", "source": "scene 128", "result": "You win the small thing, and discover it was the only one left to win.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -2 }, { "id": "dine_out", "label": "Dine at the club.", "source": "scene 135", "result": "The club is very comfortable. You are there most nights now.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -1 }, { "id": "have_it_out", "label": "Say what you actually want.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It is not a pleasant evening. It is the first honest one in a long time.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "unseen_at_home", "group": "unseen_at_home", "stage": "inside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{spouse}", "{confidant}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "Your {spouse} admires everything you do and understands none of it, and has just told the whole room so.", "from": [ 71, 72 ] }, { "text": "For twenty years there has been a room upstairs papered for someone who never came. You had not noticed that anyone was waiting.", "from": [ 122, 123 ], "outside_group": { "122": -1 } }, { "text": "The only person you can talk to about what you care about lives two miles off, and calls in the afternoons when your {spouse} is away.", "from": [ 97 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "make_amends", "label": "Give them the thing they have wanted, however foolish.", "source": "scene 125", "result": "They are happy for the first time in years, and you are the one who has to get used to it.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.spouse.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.made_amends", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -1 }, { "id": "look_elsewhere", "label": "Find your company elsewhere.", "source": "scene 97", "result": "It is a great comfort. It is also, you are beginning to notice, being noticed.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.confidant.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.spouse.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "provoke", "label": "Do something they will have to object to.", "source": "scene 72", "result": "They are delighted with it.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "live_with_it", "label": "Live with it. Most people do.", "source": "archetype", "result": "Most people do.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "new_and_warned", "group": "new_and_warned", "stage": "outside", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{employer}", "{confidant}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "There is a door on your corridor that must be kept locked, and nobody will tell you why, and the cook has gone white at the question.", "from": [ 91, 95 ] }, { "text": "You mention where you are working, and an old acquaintance pulls a long face: four have left it in six months.", "from": [ 101 ] }, { "text": "A pleasant stranger who speaks your language has offered to show you how things are done here. He knows everyone.", "from": [ 241, 242 ] }, { "text": "Everyone who likes you has warned you against this marriage, and you have gone ahead, and it is going well.", "from": [ 31, 32 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "ask_straight", "label": "Ask straight out what is going on.", "source": "scene 94", "result": "You are told you are imagining it, in a tone that says you are not.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.employer.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": -1 }, { "id": "watch_quietly", "label": "Say nothing, and keep your eyes open.", "source": "scene 108", "result": "You learn more that way, and sleep less.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "flags.watching", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 7 }, { "id": "trust_the_guide", "label": "Accept the help, gratefully.", "source": "scene 242", "result": "It is a wonderful afternoon. You pay for most of it, in the coin he chooses.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "give_notice", "label": "Leave while you still can.", "source": "archetype", "result": "You leave. You never find out, and you think about it often.", "effects": [ { "path": "money", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.employer.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" } ] } ] }, { "id": "the_rival", "group": "the_rival", "stage": "any", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{rival}", "{confidant}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "You have found, in an old file, a paper that would finish {rival}. Nobody else knows it exists.", "from": [ 188, 189, 190 ] }, { "text": "Your {spouse} has said, quite calmly, that {rival} interests them.", "from": [ 153 ] }, { "text": "Across the room {rival} is enjoying a coffee and a brandy as though none of this had touched him at all.", "from": [ 37 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "use_it", "label": "Use it.", "source": "scene 191", "result": "It lands exactly where you aimed. The person you did it for defends {rival} better than you could have imagined.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.rival.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.confidant.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "flags.struck_at_the_rival", "op": "set", "value": true } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 1 }, { "id": "hand_it_over", "label": "Hand it over, and let them judge.", "source": "scene 193", "result": "You were honest. It does not feel like honesty from the inside.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.confidant.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": false, "offset_from_nearest_member": 3 }, { "id": "sneer", "label": "Say what you think of them, to the one who loves them.", "source": "scene 186", "result": "That is the end of that.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.confidant.confides_in_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "relationships.confidant.resents_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "let_it_go", "label": "Put it away.", "source": "archetype", "result": "It stays put away. You know where.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "owning_up", "group": "owning_up", "stage": "any", "recurs": false, "roles": [ "{former}", "{ward}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "It has happened to you now, the thing you once did to {former}, and you find you have walked to {former}'s door.", "from": [ 171, 172 ] }, { "text": "Someone younger is about to do exactly what you did. The only thing that would stop them is the truth about you.", "from": [ 227, 228 ] }, { "text": "Somebody you trained to hide their feelings has just told you, plainly, what you cost them.", "from": [ 209 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "ask_forgiveness", "label": "Say you understand now, and ask them to forgive you.", "source": "scene 173", "result": "They say there is nothing to forgive, which is kinder than the truth and less use.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.former.resents_you", "dir": "-" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "admit_it", "label": "Admit it, all of it.", "source": "scene 227", "result": "It is easier than you expected to say and harder than you expected to have said.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.candour", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "relationships.ward.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "keep_face", "label": "Say something graceful and go.", "source": "archetype", "result": "Nobody could have done it better. Nothing has changed.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ] } ] }, { "id": "waiting_on_them", "group": "waiting_on_them", "stage": "any", "recurs": true, "roles": [ "{ward}" ], "descriptions": [ { "text": "The offer has been made. The answer has been deferred for a month, and there is nothing whatever you can do about it.", "from": [ 139, 140 ] }, { "text": "You can tell from the way they walk up the street that they are coming home to tell you something.", "from": [ 212 ] }, { "text": "The house has gone very quiet. You have the feeling that tonight something is going to happen.", "from": [ 116 ] } ], "options": [ { "id": "hurry_it", "label": "Try to hurry it along.", "source": "scene 140", "result": "Your ruses are seen through and the date does not move.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.ward.resents_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "pretend_calm", "label": "Pretend not to notice anything at all.", "source": "scene 139", "result": "You are very good at it. It is exhausting.", "effects": [ { "path": "skills.tact", "dir": "+" } ], "source_in_group": true }, { "id": "wait_up", "label": "Stay up, and be ready.", "source": "scene 116", "result": "Nothing happens tonight. You are no less tired for that.", "effects": [ { "path": "relationships.ward.confides_in_you", "dir": "+" }, { "path": "standing", "dir": "-" } ], "source_in_group": true } ] } ], "provenance_note": "An option whose source scene is outside its group carries source_in_group=false and offset_from_nearest_member: the signed scene distance to the nearest group member in the same story (+1 = the scene right after). These are the scenes where a member's predicament is resolved: the option is what that character did next." }