The lob is out: a gesture the opponent's position redefines is unpredictable

Oliver, on the build: "all good but the lob. please remove it - this is
totally unpredictable."

Reverted in full — oppAtNet, farBody, TUNE.lobArm, TUNE.lobApex,
SHOT_DEPTH.lob, the branch in doHit and its two tests. The forward flick is
the smash it always was. Everything else from that commit stays: the pace
feedback (streak, crack, camera kick) and the death match's blood alignment.

The reason is worth more than the code, and PROJECT.md carries it as a rule:
a gesture whose MEANING depends on where the opponent is standing is
unpredictable however well the shot is tuned. It is the same objection
input.js already states about the slingshot — the direction you moved is the
thing you asked for, no invisible modes — and the written comparison let
option (c) past it on the argument that context cannot mis-fire. It can: you
do not track where the far body is standing while a ball is coming at you, so
one thumb movement produced two shots for reasons you were not watching. The
LOB word at contact explained the surprise; it did not prevent it.

If it comes back it needs a gesture of its own. The ballistics are solved and
are in the history at 4f4534e.

111 tests pass.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

PROJECT.md

@@ -491,44 +491,41 @@ zombie (now an occasional opponent, `TUNE.racketEvery`, not the every-game fixtu
   `RETURNED`, `DOUBLE KILL`) is a footnote to something you already watched happen. Sharing the loud
   FACE with the milestone cards is right; sharing their SIZE made every footnote read as a milestone.
 
-## Session log: THE LOB, AND TWO THINGS THE MULTIPLAYER TEST FOUND (2026-08-22, same day)
+## Session log: THE LOB (BUILT, THEN CUT) AND TWO THINGS THE MULTIPLAYER TEST FOUND (2026-08-22, same day)
 
-### THE LOB IS THE FLICK YOU ALREADY HAVE — option (c), picked by Oliver after a written comparison
+### THE LOB WAS BUILT AND REMOVED THE SAME DAY — and the reason is the useful part
 
 Oliver: *"when you're close to the net in a duel with another player there should be a gesture
 allowing to make a ball flying high from below (lupfen)... this likely needs to be discussed."*
-Three candidates were put to him — (a) slow drag vs fast flick, (b) a down-then-up hook, (c) context
-arms it — and he picked (c): *"i think this is the easiest. no additional gesture to learn."* He also
-corrected the premise: *"the opponent should come to the net too — in zombie tennis the zombie often
-comes to the net"*, and he is right (racketAI chases up to `COURT.svcFar`, the classic CPU to z 9.5).
+Three candidates were put to him — (a) slow drag vs fast flick, (b) a down-then-up hook, (c) let
+CONTEXT arm it: the forward flick keeps its one meaning ("put it deep behind him") and the game
+picks the trajectory that does that, which with a man at the net is over his head. He picked (c):
+*"i think this is the easiest. no additional gesture to learn."*
 
-**The rule: a forward flick means "put it deep behind him", and the game picks the trajectory that
-actually does that.** With him on his baseline that is the smash it has always been; with him in, it
-is over his head. `oppAtNet()` in gameplay.js is the whole switch. Four things it rests on:
+It was built, measured and shipped. It worked exactly as specified — armed at `TUNE.lobArm` 7 m
+(the distance at which a lob peaking at `lobApex` still passes over `CONTACT.maxY`), pace derived
+from the height so the arc was the same from the baseline and from mid-court, target deeper than
+`SHOT_DEPTH.deep`, and the word LOB popped at the contact to say which shot had just been asked for.
 
-1. **It reads the BODY, not O.** In the duel and the match the opponent you play is the racket
-   zombie; O is the invisible tennis body the serve machinery is driven off and it only moves
-   between points, so asking O would have answered "on his mark" all rally, in the one mode Oliver
-   plays most. `farBody()` picks the 'r' zombie whenever there is one and is not netplay.
-2. **`TUNE.lobArm` 7.0 m is not taste.** A lob peaking at `lobApex` passes a man 7 m from the net at
-   almost exactly `CONTACT.maxY` (2.3 m, the height above which nothing can be struck) — so the shot
-   arms EXACTLY as far out as it can still clear him. Measured, not guessed; the numbers are in the
-   suite. Move one of the three and re-measure the other two.
-3. **The pace is DERIVED from the height, never chosen.** `vy = sqrt(2g(apex - y))` fixes the hang
-   time and the ground still to cover fixes the speed, so the same arc comes off the baseline (9.5
-   m/s) and off mid-court (5.8 m/s). A fixed speed was tried on paper first and is a fine lob from
-   one place and a flat drive from the other. It also carries NO topspin multiplier — the dive that
-   makes a hard flat ball land in would pull a lob into the net.
-4. **`SHOT_DEPTH.lob` is DEEPER than `deep` (2.0 vs 3.0 m).** At the ordinary deep target the ball
-   passes only a metre or two behind the man it is going over, and at the far edge of the arm band
-   that was 2.05 m — inside his reach. The shot is defined by where it comes DOWN.
+**His verdict, within the hour: *"all good but the lob. please remove it — this is totally
+unpredictable."*** It is reverted in full: `oppAtNet`, `farBody`, `TUNE.lobArm`, `TUNE.lobApex`,
+`SHOT_DEPTH.lob`, the branch in `doHit` and its two tests are gone, and the forward flick is the
+smash it always was.
 
-Measured, nominal (no scatter), from the baseline: over a man at the far service line it passes at
-**3.25 m**, lands 2 m inside his baseline, 2.17 s of hang. Over one at z 9.5 (a real net-rusher):
-5.4 m. The AI can and does run it down — a lob is not a free point in tennis either — but it pulls
-him off the net, which is what the shot is for. The word `LOB` pops at the contact: (c) buys "no
-gesture to learn" by letting context change what the flick means, and something has to say which
-shot you just asked for.
+**THE LESSON, AND IT IS A RULE NOW: a gesture whose MEANING depends on where the opponent is
+standing is unpredictable, however well the shot itself is tuned.** This is the same failure the
+input layer already names in its own words — *"No timing window and no invisible mode: the direction
+you moved is the thing you asked for"* (the slingshot's sidestep-vs-pull comment). The written
+comparison put that objection against option (a) and let (c) past on the argument that context can
+never mis-fire. It can: the player does not track where the far body is standing while a ball is
+coming at him, so the same thumb movement produced two different shots for reasons he was not
+watching. The word at the contact told him WHICH shot he got, but a label after the fact does not
+make a gesture predictable — it only explains the surprise.
+
+**If the lob is ever asked for again, it needs its own gesture** (option (b), the down-then-up hook,
+is the only candidate left that cannot be confused with an existing one) — and the mechanics above
+are all still correct and are recorded in the git history at 4f4534e, so the shot itself is a
+half-hour's work. The question was never the ballistics.
 
 ### "THE OPPONENT SEES THE BALL REALLY FAST — THE PLAYER BARELY SEES THE SPEED INCREASE"
 
@@ -4033,9 +4030,12 @@ Nothing here is broken; these are known gaps and unverified risks.
       from a tin). At 12 rounds/s a per-pellet sample will machine-gun the mixer, not just the wave.
     - **boss sounds** — footfall, wind-up, throw, wound, death. Three designs in `BOSS_ART`; decide
       whether they share one set or get one each before recording anything.
-14. ~~**THE LOB ("lupfen")**~~ SHIPPED 2026-08-22 as option (c) — see the session log. The rest of
-    this entry is the discussion it came out of, kept because the two rejected options are the
-    argument for the one that shipped.
+14. **THE LOB ("lupfen") — asked for, built and CUT on 2026-08-22. Do not rebuild it as option
+    (c).** Oliver played the context-armed version and removed it the same hour: *"totally
+    unpredictable."* See the session log for the rule that came out of it. What is left open is the
+    shot with a gesture OF ITS OWN — option (b) below is the only candidate that cannot be confused
+    with something already in the language. The ballistics are solved and are in the history at
+    4f4534e; do not re-derive them, and do not re-propose (c).
     **~~asked for 2026-08-22, UNDER DISCUSSION, do not build it yet.~~** Oliver:
     *"when you're close to the net in a duel with another player there should be a gesture allowing
     to make a ball flying high from below... I don't know how to implement this gesture wise — this