The match walks back to centre — "unreachable" was the player, not the CPU

"every second ball is basically unreachable by an auto-run player.. are there
some hidden gestures I don't know about or is it just a very strong cpu?"

Neither. The match inherited gore-splatter's depth-only recovery — the
sidestep-protection rule — by being G.mode 'splatter'. One wide return pulled
you off centre and you stayed there, so the next ball to the opposite corner
was lost before it was struck. A player who never walks back experiences
every rally as unreachable, and it reads as CPU strength because the balls
keep landing where he isn't.

The match recovers to centre now, like tennis: real footwork, and in a rally
there is no artillery lane to protect. Gore splatter keeps depth-only — the
sidestep it protects has no role inside a rally. matchSpeedBase 1.4 -> 1.25:
it was calibrated against a player who couldn't move.

The full attacking vocabulary is recorded in PROJECT.md — nothing else is
hidden. The placement flick (aim during the swing) is taught nowhere on
touch; flagged as a ghost-hand lesson if the mode ships.

42 tests, 12 seeds clean.

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

PROJECT.md

@@ -912,6 +912,25 @@ re-diagnosing.** The serveNum reset was real and stays, but it was found by read
 reproducing the report, and the actual loop needed the exact field conditions (a zombie touch, the
 new serve position, panic-speed taps) to show itself.
 
+**SEVENTEENTH PASS — "every second ball is unreachable" was the player, not the CPU.** Oliver:
+*"the opponent is really hard to beat now.. every second ball is basically unreachable by an
+auto-run player.. are there some hidden gestures I don't know about or is it just a very strong
+cpu?"* Neither: **the match had inherited gore-splatter's depth-only recovery** (the fifteenth-pass
+sidestep-protection rule) by virtue of being `G.mode 'splatter'` — so one wide return pulled you off
+centre and you STAYED there, and the next ball to the opposite corner was lost before it was struck.
+A player who never walks back to centre experiences every rally as "unreachable"; it read as CPU
+strength because the balls kept landing where he wasn't.
+- The match recovers to CENTRE now, like tennis — real footwork, and in a rally there is no
+  artillery lane to protect. Gore splatter keeps the depth-only rule; the sidestep it protects has
+  no role inside a rally.
+- `matchSpeedBase` 1.4 -> 1.25: it was calibrated against the broken recovery, i.e. against a
+  player who couldn't move. With footwork restored the ladder starts gentler and still climbs.
+- For the record, the full attacking vocabulary — nothing else is hidden: timing quality (the ring
+  and the band), PLACEMENT by flicking/holding a direction during the swing (`doHit`'s aim — deep,
+  short, wide; wrong-footing is how points are won, the AI recovers slowly on purpose), VOLLEYS
+  (stepping in to take the ball pre-bounce carries reach x1.4 / window x1.8), and serve pace off the
+  apex. The placement flick is taught nowhere on touch — worth a ghost-hand lesson if the mode ships.
+
 **Open, and every one of them is Oliver's call after he plays it:**
 1. ~~**A ball that carries through the lane can complete two steps at once.**~~ Largely CLOSED by
    the slice removal (seventh pass) — a cut ball picking its own next victim was the main way this