Hide the racket, and light the beam all the way to its edge

The mg racket is gone, not moved. It was a procedural racket drawn over a sprite
that already holds one: straight up-court it projected onto the player's back as
a floating oval, and offset to the side it just stuck out.

The laser's far edge was pinned to the middle of the ad strip two commits ago and
nothing appeared to change, twice. The geometry was always right -- each wedge
layer faded to alpha 0 along its length, so the beam went invisible before it
reached its own far corners and the VISIBLE end sat well short of the pinned one.
The far stop is lit now, so the two are the same line. Verified by recomputing
the projection: far corners at y 113.8, the ads' middle, against 110.2 unpinned.

It also falls off with distance now, brightest at the strings and thinning down
the court -- but never to zero, which is the trap above.

Fixes a third instance of the empties-under-the-iterator bug: a rocket blast can
bank the last kill of a game, and the duel or chapter boss that follows clears
pellets[] mid-loop. shots, pellets, extras and the body loop all carry the guard.

Also records that two consecutive render() calls do not produce the same frame --
render mutates camera smoothing as a side effect -- so frame-diffing to find where
something was drawn measures the camera drift instead. It claimed the beam reached
16 px above where its own geometry could go.

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

render.js

@@ -619,13 +619,19 @@ function drawBeamWedge(dirX, dirZ, ox, oy, oz, alpha, from) {
     const w0 = wAt(u0) * L.k, w1 = wAt(1) * L.k;
     const c1 = corner(u0, -w0), c2 = corner(u0, w0), c3 = corner(1, w1), c4 = corner(1, -w1);
     c3.y = c4.y = farY;                          // ...the x's keep their perspective, the y is pinned
-    // ...and it fades ALONG its length too, so the far end dissolves into the ads instead of
-    // stopping at a hard edge
+    // It must NOT fade to nothing along its length. The far corners are pinned to the ads' middle,
+    // but a gradient ending at alpha 0 made the beam INVISIBLE for its last stretch — so what you saw
+    // ended well short of where it was drawn, and no amount of moving the geometry changed it. The
+    // far end stays lit, so the visible edge and the pinned edge are the same line.
     const g = ctx.createLinearGradient((c1.x + c2.x) / 2, (c1.y + c2.y) / 2,
                                        (c3.x + c4.x) / 2, (c3.y + c4.y) / 2);
+    // DEPTH: brightest at the strings, thinning away down the court, because that is what a beam
+    // travelling away from you does. It must NOT reach zero though — a stop at alpha 0 made the beam
+    // invisible before its far edge, so the visible end sat short of the pinned one and moving the
+    // geometry appeared to change nothing at all.
     g.addColorStop(0, `rgba(${L.col[0]},${L.col[1]},${L.col[2]},${L.a * alpha})`);
-    g.addColorStop(0.55, `rgba(${L.col[0]},${L.col[1]},${L.col[2]},${L.a * 0.75 * alpha})`);
-    g.addColorStop(1, `rgba(${L.col[0]},${L.col[1]},${L.col[2]},0)`);
+    g.addColorStop(0.45, `rgba(${L.col[0]},${L.col[1]},${L.col[2]},${L.a * 0.58 * alpha})`);
+    g.addColorStop(1, `rgba(${L.col[0]},${L.col[1]},${L.col[2]},${L.a * 0.32 * alpha})`);
     ctx.fillStyle = g;
     ctx.beginPath(); ctx.moveTo(c1.x, c1.y); ctx.lineTo(c2.x, c2.y); ctx.lineTo(c3.x, c3.y); ctx.lineTo(c4.x, c4.y); ctx.fill();
   }
@@ -809,23 +815,6 @@ function drawFallbackChar(ch, p, h) { // shown only until sprites load
   ctx.fillStyle = shorts; ctx.fillRect(x - 2.4 * u, y - 6 * u, 4.8 * u, 3 * u);
   ctx.fillStyle = skin; ctx.fillRect(x - 1.8 * u, y - 3 * u, 1.4 * u, 3 * u); ctx.fillRect(x + 0.4 * u, y - 3 * u, 1.4 * u, 3 * u);
 }
-function drawMgRacket() { // horde: the player braces the racket forward and up-court, machine-gun style
-  // HELD OUT TO ONE SIDE. Straight up-court (P.x, P.z - 1.35) projects to almost exactly where the
-  // player sprite already is, so the racket head landed as an oval painted on his back — Oliver saw
-  // it every time. Offset by facing, it reads as a racket held out beside him.
-  const f = P.facing || 1;
-  const hip = proj(P.x + 0.34 * f, 1.15, P.z);
-  const tip = proj(P.x + 0.86 * f, 1.02, P.z - 1.25); // pointing up-court, where the pellets stream out
-  ctx.strokeStyle = '#d8d8d8'; ctx.lineWidth = 2;
-  ctx.beginPath(); ctx.moveTo(hip.x, hip.y); ctx.lineTo(tip.x, tip.y); ctx.stroke();
-  ctx.strokeStyle = '#b07030'; ctx.lineWidth = 1.5; // the head, aimed forward
-  ctx.beginPath(); ctx.ellipse(tip.x, tip.y, Math.max(2, tip.s * 0.14), Math.max(3, tip.s * 0.22), 0, 0, 7); ctx.stroke();
-  const cool = G.horde ? G.horde.mgT : G.mgCool; // horde or GUN-tin pickup — same racket
-  const rate = G.horde ? G.horde.mgRate || TUNE.mgRate : TUNE.mgRate;
-  if (cool > 1 / rate - 0.03) { // muzzle flash right after a shot
-    ctx.fillStyle = '#fff0a0'; ctx.beginPath(); ctx.arc(tip.x, tip.y, Math.max(2, tip.s * 0.12), 0, 7); ctx.fill();
-  }
-}
 
 // the courtside weapon rack along the bottom: PLAIN + the four tins. Tap a tile (or 1–5) to
 // pick which one your next serve throws; empty tins dim out. Geometry is shared with input
@@ -1260,7 +1249,10 @@ export function render() {
     ctx.beginPath(); ctx.ellipse(p.x, p.y, p.s * 0.62 * k, p.s * 0.22 * k, 0, 0, 7); ctx.stroke();
   }
   if (G.mode !== 'eaten') drawChar(P); // ...the dying man is drawn with the crowd instead (drawDying)
-  if ((G.horde || G.mgT > 0) && G.mode === 'splatter') drawMgRacket(); // rambo racket over the player
+  // The braced "rambo racket" is NOT drawn any more. It was a procedural racket laid over a sprite
+  // that already holds one: straight up-court it projected onto his back as a floating oval, and
+  // offset to the side it just stuck out. The pellets streaming up-court are the feedback; the man
+  // holding his own racket is the picture.
 
   ctx.setTransform(RES, 0, 0, RES, 0, 0); // un-shake: the HUD and overlays stay rock steady
   // bomb bloom: a warm blood-orange wash, not a white-out. At 0.85 white it blinded you on a phone