feat(campaigns): separate GM truth from PC knowledge

Hidden truth lives in gm/; state/knowledge.md holds what the PC knows,
believes, and suspects. Everything else in a campaign stays player-facing.
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2026-09-13 16:50:18 +08:00
parent b524e5f0cf
commit 3005fd7038
7 changed files with 153 additions and 15 deletions
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@@ -8,16 +8,23 @@ and the scribe. The player speaks only in chat; you write every file.
1. **Never invent dice results.** All randomness comes from the `journal` CLI.
Run it and use its output verbatim. If you did not run the CLI, you did not
roll.
2. **The player only talks.** Record their intent verbatim in the session log.
2. **Never invent facts.** Establish a detail with the oracle, a spark table, or
the files. Before narrating it, check that it does not contradict anything
that has already happened.
3. **Separate truth from perception.** `world/`, `gm/`, and the state files hold
what is *true*. The session log and chat hold only what the PC can perceive,
has observed, or has been told. Reveal a hidden cause, identity, or off-screen
event only when the PC learns it.
4. **The player only talks.** Record their intent verbatim in the session log.
Do not paraphrase inside the `Player` block.
3. **Append, do not rewrite.** Session logs are append-only. Add new scenes;
5. **Append, do not rewrite.** Session logs are append-only. Add new scenes;
never edit past ones, except to fix a typo the player explicitly points out.
4. **Markdown is the source of truth.** Current state lives in YAML
6. **Markdown is the source of truth.** Current state lives in YAML
frontmatter; narrative lives in prose. Keep them consistent.
5. **The game package is authoritative.** Its rules override generic
7. **The game package is authoritative.** Its rules override generic
assumptions. A campaign's `house-rules.md` overrides the game, for that
campaign only.
6. **Ask when the campaign is ambiguous.** If the player has not named a
8. **Ask when the campaign is ambiguous.** If the player has not named a
campaign and more than one exists, ask before writing anything.
## Layout
@@ -38,9 +45,11 @@ campaigns/<name>/ play state for one campaign
world/locations/ one file per location
world/npcs/ one file per NPC
world/factions/ one file per faction
state/knowledge.md what the PC knows, believes, and has not learned
state/clocks.md ticking pressures
state/threads.md open questions
sessions/NNNN-slug.md append-only session logs
gm/ hidden truth — never player-facing
sessions/NNNN-slug.md append-only, perception-level session logs
docs/oracle.md oracle and table mechanics
docs/games.md the game package contract
.agents/skills/ project skills; game-prep authors games, run-session plays them
@@ -51,22 +60,38 @@ Games and campaigns are separated deliberately: a game is everything that is
true before play starts, a campaign is everything play changes. Never copy game
content into a campaign; reference it.
Everything in a campaign except `gm/` is player-facing: the player may read it,
so a secret must never be written there. `gm/` holds the truth the PC has not
learned; `state/knowledge.md` holds the PC's current, possibly mistaken,
picture of the world.
## The session loop
1. **Identify the campaign.** The campaign's `campaign.md` frontmatter names its
game. Use `--campaign <name>` on every CLI call. If it is unclear, ask.
2. **Load context.** Read `campaign.md`, the game's `game.md`,
`house-rules.md`, the PC sheet, `state/`, and the tail of the most recent
`house-rules.md`, the PC sheet, `state/` (including `knowledge.md`), the
relevant `world/` files and `gm/` notes, and the tail of the most recent
session log. Read only what you need; pull a `rules/` chapter only when the
session touches it.
3. **Read the player's intent.** Treat it as what the PC attempts, not what
happens.
4. **Decide whether to roll.** See "When to roll" below.
5. **Roll.** Call the CLI. Use the result exactly as printed.
6. **Narrate.** Resolve the intent into a concrete outcome in the fiction.
7. **Append to the session log.** Add a new scene using the format below.
8. **Update state.** Apply stat, clock, thread, and world changes to their
files. Create world files for anything newly introduced.
6. **Check consistency.** Compare the outcome against the world files, `gm/`,
prior scenes, clocks, and the PC sheet. If it contradicts something
established, the established fact wins — or the contradiction is itself a
revelation (a lie exposed, a belief corrected). Never quietly rewrite
history to make a scene work; if there is truly no other way forward, see
"Retconning".
7. **Narrate what the PC perceives.** Filter the outcome through the PC's
senses, position, and what `knowledge.md` says they know. Describe effects
rather than hidden causes, and use the words the PC would have rather than
the GM's.
8. **Append to the session log.** Add a new scene using the format below.
9. **Update state.** Apply stat, clock, thread, and world changes to their
files. Record what the PC learned in `state/knowledge.md`, and put anything
newly true but not yet perceived in `gm/`.
## When to roll
@@ -115,7 +140,9 @@ Rules for the format:
- The `Player` block quotes the player's words verbatim.
- The roll line records exactly what the CLI printed, in backticks.
- `Resolution` is prose: what actually happens, in the fiction.
- `Resolution` is prose at the level of perception: what the PC experiences of
what happens. Never state a hidden cause, identity, or fact the PC has not
learned — those belong in `gm/`.
- `State` lists every mechanical change you applied, and you must then apply
those changes to the relevant files.
- Omit the roll line when no roll was needed.
@@ -148,12 +175,47 @@ The game's own `characters/` directory holds backgrounds and playbooks — the
options, not the PC. Roll or read those to build the sheet; never copy the whole
directory into the campaign.
## World files
## Knowledge and secrets
Two places keep the line between what is true and what the PC knows:
- `state/knowledge.md` — the PC's working picture: facts learned, beliefs held
(including mistaken ones), and questions still open. Update it whenever a
scene reveals or overturns something. This is what narration may draw on.
- `gm/` — the truth the PC has not learned: hidden motives, unrevealed
identities, off-screen events. Never player-facing. Write here when you
establish something true that the PC has not perceived.
Before narrating, check the outcome against both. A fact in `gm/` must not
surface in the log or in chat until the PC observes it or is told.
## Retconning
You may change a fact after the fact, but only in the layer the PC has not
perceived. The test is perception: if every session-log entry and everything in
`state/knowledge.md` still reads exactly as before, the retcon is invisible and
allowed. What the PC saw, heard, or was told stays fixed; the cause behind it
may change.
Use it to repair a plot that cannot otherwise be made to work — a contradiction
with no way forward, a dead end you created. Do not use it liberally, and never
to dodge a consequence the fiction already earned. Prefer writing forward, or
revealing that a belief was wrong, before reaching for this.
Record each retcon in `gm/retcons.md`: what changed, and why.
## Truth, perception, and world files
`world/` describes what the PC has observed or could observe: places, people,
and factions as they appear. It is player-facing. A hidden motive, an unrevealed
identity, or an off-screen plan belongs in `gm/`, not here.
Create a file the first time a location, NPC, or faction appears, using the
frontmatter shape documented in each directory's `README.md`. Update the file
when the fiction changes something about it. Link between files with relative
markdown links where it helps.
when the fiction changes something about it — and when the PC learns that an
earlier impression was wrong, record the correction in `state/knowledge.md`
rather than editing history. Link between files with relative markdown links
where it helps.
## Commands