# HANDOFF — ZOMBIE TENNIS, making it a real mode **TEMPORARY FILE.** Written 2026-08-12 because a session ran out of context mid-slice. When the work below is done, fold anything durable into `PROJECT.md` (the only planning document) and **delete this file**. It is deliberately not in the Dockerfile COPY — docs are not served. **Read `PROJECT.md` first, as always** — especially "How to work on this", the invariants, and the drill/match session logs (passes 13-23), which carry the reasoning behind every number named here. --- ## Where things stand Zombie tennis is a **back-room prototype that plays well on a real phone** ("big improvement on real mobile"). Entry: splash → five taps in the top-left corner (`#hot`) → **MATCH TEST**, or `#match`. Sibling prototypes there: WEAPON TEST, BOSS TEST, DRILL TEST (the abandoned cognitive mode — see below). 49 tests green, seeds clean. Last commit `9b9f18d`, `index.html` at `?v=176`. **What it is:** real tennis against the racket zombie. One game per opponent, tap-and-timing controls, the deuce/ad serve positions, and **the score is the body** — each point you win takes a quarter of its pool and walks it through its wound stages; the game-winning point fells it and a fresh opponent shambles on. Its points draw your blood (`matchPlayerHp` 8, `matchHeal` 2 per game won). It runs on a PERMANENT interlude — `G.interlude` is what makes serving tennis-like, hides the rack and wakes `racketAI` — and the only change is in `resolveInterlude`, which feeds `matchPoint` instead of ending anything. All of it is ~120 lines in `beats.js`. **The ladder** escalates in `racketAI`, not hp: speed (`matchSpeedBase`/`Per`), whiff (`matchFlub`/`FlubKeep`), width (`matchWideBase`/`WidePer`), pace (`matchOppPace`/`PacePer`). Player side: `matchAssist`, `matchReach`. --- ## THE DECISION JUST MADE — scoring model A Oliver picked **A: blood-only**, of three options offered: - **A (chosen)** — the run is one long bleed across opponents; losing a game costs nothing but the blood already spent, and heals are how you last. **The measure becomes OPPONENTS FELLED.** - B — tennis-true: a lost game ends the run. Rejected for now (worth one playtest someday; it might be the mode's real personality). - C — hybrid, a lost game drops you an opponent. Rejected. **Important context for whoever implements this:** Oliver believed losing a match killed him ("i really die losing one match"). It does not — he was bleeding out during deuce wars and hitting zero at their game point. **That misreading is itself the bug to fix**: the mode is not communicating its own rules. Model A only works if the player can see they are bleeding, not losing. --- ## The build slice, in order 1. ~~**Run summary + the measure**~~ **DONE** (2026-08-12, staging). The measure is OPPONENTS FELLED, in play (`OPPONENT n · m FELLED` under the board) and on the death screen (`BLED OUT.` / `FELLED n OPPONENTS · m GAMES`). No second localStorage key: a match run is banked through the same `endRun` with a mode tag — see "The record shape" below. The blood also got a readout, one pip per hit left beside the board, because the vignette says "worse" and never says "how many". 2. ~~**Named opponent list**~~ **DONE, partly.** Opponent N takes design N's name off the chapter roster (`matchFoe` in config, rows in `config.OPPONENTS`) plus a personality that is DIALS — pace, width, flub, speed scalings on numbers `racketAI` already reads. Name plate on the walk-on, the board names it (`short`), and the kill files under it so the OPPONENTS FELLED screen can list it. *(The word "ladder" was retired — it had come to mean the opponent list, the wound stages AND a stats screen. One word per thing now: OPPONENTS, WOUND STAGES, and a sprite FAMILY.)* **Still open, and still the cheapest depth in the mode:** `shots[]` and the PARRY are fully built and completely unused here. A body-shot thrower is a personality no dial can express. 3. **Wound-driven play** *(small, big payoff)* — the injuries should MEAN something: a one-armed opponent loses reach, a headless one flubs more. Score-is-the-body becomes score-changes-the-game. Read the fraction the way `drawZombie` and `bleed()` do (never literal hp). *The art is now there for it:* every wound stage has its own ready stance, shuffle pair and forehand (`z_rw1*`, `z_rw2*`), so a wounded opponent still plays rather than reverting to a walk. 4. ~~**The fall animation**~~ **DONE** (2026-08-12). Point won → the body COLLAPSES → drags itself up minus the limb. `beats.tickMatchFall`, on its OWN clock beside the horde's warning (a beat that moves the phase under a latch strands it — the mgT lock, again); the 'over' beat it also sets is only there to keep the court quiet and is deliberately set to OUTLIVE the fall, so it cannot expire into `setupPoint()` mid-collapse and hand the player a serve over a body on the ground. The contract, and the whole point of the beat: **the three collapse frames wear the stage it STILL WAS, the rise wears the stage it has BECOME.** Frames are named through `zb.showFrame` (the bench's own override, which already degrades a missing stage to the healthy frame). **Only when the stage actually moved** — a quarter off a full pool is 0.75, so point one crosses nothing and a second of collapse for nothing is a beat the player waits out. 5. ~~**Menu entry**~~ **DONE.** Three modes on the setup screen, from `config.MODES`. The back room keeps its door (MATCH TEST still works) — the menu did not replace it, it just stopped being the only way in. 6. **Teaching** *(small)* — a ghost-hand lesson for the PLACEMENT FLICK. It is the counter-attack (flick during the swing aims the return; wrong-footing is how points are won) and it is taught nowhere on touch. The placement ring (`G.placeMark`) already shows the result; nothing teaches the cause. 7. ~~**Opponent serve games**~~ **DONE** (2026-08-12), and it was almost entirely switched off rather than missing. `setupPoint`'s tennis branch already placed a non-player server behind its own baseline and armed `G.aiServeT`; `update()` already tossed and struck for O. Both were gated on `G.mode === 'tennis'`, and the match runs in splatter under a permanent interlude — one condition. What was genuinely new: **service alternates at each game boundary** (the match calls `advancePoint` directly, and the flip lives in tennis's `pointTo`, which the match bypasses — the same shape as the `G.serveNum` bug above), the zombie takes O's mark when it serves so the picture and the ballistics agree on where it stands, and the serve POSES are named onto it (`bounce` → `toss` → `serve`, held briefly after contact) because O is invisible here. *Known simplification:* the interlude's line-call branch has no serve box and no second serve, so a missed opponent serve is simply the player's point. Add faults when it matters. --- ## What the 2026-08-12 session added beyond the slice **CLASSIC TENNIS is a real mode, not the opener with the turn switched off.** Oliver: *"if the core tennis is good everything else is good."* Six games with a two-game lead is a set, `TUNE.classicSets` is the match, no tiebreak (marked `ponytail:` — add it when a real match actually stalls at 6-6). The CPU stops rubber-banding there: `aiFlubLoss` exists to get a new player PAST the opener and would have him in pieces by the second set. **A second ENDING, with no corpse in it.** `G.done = {won, t}` — same summary and gated tap as the death screen, its own words, the man still standing. All three endings share one render block; three copies of it would drift the first time one moved. **THE RECORD SHAPE — read this before touching stats.js.** One character `m` on the run record (`g`ore / `z`ombie tennis / `c`lassic; absent means gore, so no migration). The record's two headline slots carry each MODE's own two numbers: | mode | `g` | `s` | `dead` | |---|---|---|---| | gore | games survived | sets banked | died | | zombie tennis | **opponents felled** | games played | died | | classic | games played | sets won | **match LOST** | `g` is what everything ranks on, so each mode's real measure goes in that slot and there is no second best stored anywhere to drift. `read(period, runs, mode)` filters; the stats screen is one function with three sets of words (BODY COUNT / OPPONENTS FELLED / THE RECORD). The world board stays the gore mode's — it ranks kills in a run, and a five-body match would post a "5 kills" row next to a 300-kill massacre. A tennis board would rank FELLED with points won as the tiebreak; that is a server change. **THE MATCH OPPONENT HAS ITS OWN SPRITES** (`z_r*`), drawn off the living opponent's poses: ready stance, shuffle pair, forehand, at each wound stage, both tours. `z_c*` (the turned CPU) is untouched and keeps its shamble — in the gore mode shambling is the right thing for it to do. The frame is picked off `racketAI`'s own `pose`, so the picture cannot drift from the behaviour. Expansion ideas that survived discussion, in `PROJECT.md`'s LATER: the **tournament frame** (QUALIFYING → ROUND OF 16 → THE FINAL vs THE CHAMPION — gives the run a destination), the Hawk-Eye **challenge** as an earned continue, sudden-death deuce past a given opponent, doubles, and **item 7: multiplayer** (ghost match first). --- ## THE TOOL THAT MATTERS: the flight recorder Four rounds of "still the same behaviour" were ended by watching Oliver play, not by measuring with an autopilot. **Autopilot measurement lied for three passes straight** because the autopilot set `autoAssist` by hand and therefore had legs the real player did not. Recipe — inject into the Browser pane, let him play, then read it: ```js window.__rec = { losses: [], wins: [], trail: [] }; let lastPts = '0-0', lastHp = null; setInterval(() => { const T = window.T; if (!T || !T.G.match) return; const G = T.G, ball = T.ball, P = T.P; window.__rec.trail.push({ pts: T.score.pts.join('-'), phase: G.phase, hp: G.hp, bx: +ball.x.toFixed(1), bz: +ball.z.toFixed(1), bAct: ball.active, bLast: ball.lastHit, px: +P.x.toFixed(1), pz: +P.z.toFixed(1), swing: P.swingT >= 0 }); if (window.__rec.trail.length > 100) window.__rec.trail.shift(); const pts = T.score.pts.join('-'); if (pts !== lastPts) { const wasO = pts.split('-')[1] !== lastPts.split('-')[1] || (pts === '0-0' && G.hp < (lastHp ?? G.hp)); (wasO ? window.__rec.losses : window.__rec.wins).push({ at: pts, from: lastPts, trail: window.__rec.trail.slice(-30) }); lastPts = pts; } lastHp = G.hp; }, 16); ``` Then classify each loss by: minimum player↔ball gap, whether he swung at closest approach, how far he ran, where the ball died. That triple diagnosed every defect in the contact chain. - **Sample at 60 Hz, not 20** — a 20 Hz sampler overstates closest approach by up to ~0.5 m on a 20 m/s ball, which is the entire size of the effect being measured. - It is passive. Do not "help" the player from inside it. - A page reload wipes it. Re-arm after every module refresh. --- ## THE FLICK WAS LOSING THE POINT (fixed 2026-08-12) Oliver: *"when returning a ball with a spin on the screen that seems to be too sensitive, 8/10 times the ball lands out."* It was arithmetic, not feel. The singles line is **4.115 m**. An aimed shot targeted a flat `ax * 3.3` and THEN added `err()` on top — up to `±aimError` (2.4 m) at quality 0 — so a flicked return landed as wide as **5.7 m**, and the only clamp in the path was at ±5, outside the court. An UNAIMED return targets `0 + the same scatter` and is therefore always in. **Aiming was the thing that lost the point**, which is exactly backwards for the mode's one act of skill. `TUNE.flickReach` (0.45) scales the aim width by the same quality the scatter shrinks with, so the two can never sum past the line: worst case `1.49 + 2.4 = 3.89` at quality 0, and a perfectly timed flick still gets the full 3.3 with no scatter left on it. A test asserts that sum across the whole quality range rather than sampling rallies. **Not named `aimReach`** — that key already exists further down TUNE (the slingshot's aim-ray length, 22 m) and the duplicate silently won, which a test caught. The placement ring carries `q` now and reads as the flick's receipt: **tight and hot when your timing earned the full width, wide and dim when you barely got a racket on it.** Without it the new rule is invisible — the shot simply goes less wide and nothing says why. ## Traps this mode has already sprung (do not re-learn these) - **`autoAssist` is 0 on `pointer: fine`.** The desktop pane has no auto-run. The match floors it with `matchAssist`, and `assistK()` is shared by the mover AND `intercept` — computing reachability with the raw knob made the planner answer "run home" forever. - **The contact chain is three separate things**: LEGS (`matchAssist`) → DESTINATION (`assistK` in `intercept`, plus the `anyHit` short-ball candidate that chases dying rollers) → REACH (`matchReach`). Each was a separate defect found in a separate recorded session. - **`ball.lastHit` must be stamped by `tossBall`.** A stale `'O'` on a toss from behind the baseline read as the opponent's passing shot: a point and blood PER TAP. Fixed, but the shape recurs — anything that revives the ball must own it. - **`G.serveNum` is only reset by tennis's `pointTo`**, which the match bypasses. `matchReady()` resets it; a new mode with its own point boundary must too. - **A 20 Hz snapshot of a population that legitimately empties is not a measurement** (this cost a flaky test that blocked the pipeline). The suite is **seeded** — `SEED=1234 node test.js` fuzzes; a fixed seed can silently turn a guarded test into a no-op, so check guards still run. - **`?v=` in index.html on every push, or phones keep the old build.** Bump `SPRV` too if sprites change. - **`stats.banked` is only cleared by a KILL**, and classic tennis has none — so the second and every later classic match of a session was silently swallowed by the double-bank guard. `beginRun()` is the reset now and `restartRun` calls it. Any future mode with no kills in it needs that path. - **`_fine.py` used to key EVERY magenta pixel, not just the background** — and the generator paints racket strings in the backdrop colour more often than not, so sheet after sheet installed a body holding an empty hoop. Fixed (flood from the border; interior magenta is repainted pale grey), but check a new sheet's rackets anyway. While fixing it: `Image.fromarray` images are READ-ONLY and PIL's `floodfill` swallows the write error and returns having filled nothing. - **The regen detail bar RATCHETS against the file being replaced.** A repose of art that is already fine (`check: 'same'`) can be rejected for not out-detailing a redraw; `'loose'` is the right bar for that job, and resetting the placeholder to the coarse original resets the bar. ## The art pipeline A new opponent FAMILY is now **one API call and one script** — read **PROJECT.md, "THE ZOMBIE FAMILY PIPELINE"** before generating one. The one-line version: ask for all 31 figures in a single sheet (one roll, one character, by construction), poses from an existing family and identity from one reference frame with each image's JOB named in the prompt, then `assets/_zsheet.py` cuts it back down with ONE global scale and ONE global palette. The older nine-batch flow (`_regen.py`, `_master.py`) is still right for single sheets, remasters and the boss roster, and **PROJECT.md, "THE ART PIPELINE, corrected"** still governs it. Run `python3 assets/_regen.py --verify ` before trusting any chained batch: it is what proved 27 of the parked brute's 31 frames were never art. The match opponent's own art is complete — 31 frames, three wound stages, the serve and the fall — and the BRUTE is live beside it (`ZFAMS` has `'br'`, the KEEPER wears it), generated by the new path. ## Do not - Re-add regicide to the match (killing the body with a smash) — removed deliberately; it made every hard serve a free unaimed kill and smeared the score-is-the-body relationship. - Turn `drillOneShot` on as a default — it skips every `ZWOUND` stage, so the roster's best art never renders. - Touch the gore mode's contact/recovery rules while tuning the match. `matchReach` and the centre-recovery are match-only ON PURPOSE; gore splatter's tight contact and depth-only recovery protect the sidestep. - Revive the TRIAGE DRILL without a new idea. It is still in the back room and it works exactly as designed, but it failed the only test that matters: *"i think the normal player does not grasp this."* Four designs died learning that **an invented rule needs teaching; the rules a scene already implies do not.** That is why the match is tennis.