# First Playable — Old Valley, the Quarry, and the First Workshop

## FP-PLAN-01 — Purpose, authority, and the build boundary

This slice turns the approved opening into a specific playable outcome: arrive at Old Valley, restore the guesthouse's complete essential chapter project, restore the old crossing, bring the quarry into useful service, explore one representative Shallows branch, and turn a returned discovery into a practical workshop improvement. It should end with the player recognizing a home, a route, a source of materials, and something their work has changed. The completed crossing and the first moving cargo are especially important: the world must demonstrate the benefit without relying on a completion message.

Everything in this chapter is planning. Its scope status is **Planned; BUILD not authorized**. The accessible project material contains the direction document, artwork, reference catalogues, and HTML-building sources. No actual mod repository or Gradle, Java, Kotlin, Fabric, or NeoForge project markers were available for inspection in this planning workspace. Therefore no loader, Minecraft version, implementation, existing world-generation behaviour, performance result, or development completeness is verified here. A repository inspection is an explicit dependency before mod implementation. Editing this reference edition does not authorize developing the mod.

The original 36-chapter direction and subsequent industry, Moon, Mars, and Tier 1 expansions remain intact. The identifiers here add a bounded delivery target. They do not replace EAR02, SET01–SET05, TEC references, or the industrial bands. Numerical recipes, site dimensions, stock levels, and time targets below are recommended prototype defaults. They become accepted production values only after the relevant assets, native recipes, and actual play have been checked.

Sources are the approved Old Valley chapters, controller and regional-activity rules, Shallows atlas, resource economy, and IP00–IP01. Electricity, the complete workshop catalogue, the Shallows Waystation, a grain mill, a market event, and spacecraft are outside this slice. It creates no new Old Valley, Core, or deep-industry prerequisite for the first lunar expedition.

## FP-PLAN-02 — Preserve the five chapters and define the endpoint

Old Valley keeps its five authored chapters in order: **A place to stay; The old crossing; The quarry; A working settlement; The first market**. This playable includes the complete essential outcomes of Chapters 1–3 and one deliberately limited workshop service that introduces the next chapter. It does not report Chapter 4 complete. Its grain mill, connected workshop expansion, market preparations, and wider service network remain future work. Chapter 5's first market remains a distinct later payoff.

A player-built house does not substitute for Chapter 1. The required guesthouse restoration must provide its promised entrance, usable sleeping place, understandable storage, and modest common area. Optional rooms and decoration are outside that essential repair. Similarly, swimming across the river or building a personal span remains legitimate travel, but it does not complete the authored crossing project. These distinctions must be visible in the journal rather than discovered after the player has spent resources.

| Slice outcome | Canonical relationship | Evidence of completion |
| --- | --- | --- |
| A useful guesthouse | SET01; Old Valley Chapter 1 | Essential repair finished; sleeping place and assigned storage work; innkeeper remains available through a forgiving interaction. |
| An operational crossing | SET02; Old Valley Chapter 2 | Supports, deck, and transport finishing are complete; the route is actually walkable; chapter state persists. |
| A useful quarry | SET03; Old Valley Chapter 3 | Safe access, defined handling equipment, and a modest common-stone preparation service work. |
| A known underground branch | EAR02; Copperwash Channels | Player can identify the entrance, reach the survey ledge, obtain a useful find, and follow a comprehensible return route. |
| First workshop service | IP01; limited introduction to SET04 | A finite material order produces an installed improvement that changes the quarry's cargo handling. Chapter 4 remains open. |

The default ending is a quiet return to useful work. The cargo cradle delivers a larger load; the prepared stone is waiting; the innkeeper or mason acknowledges the quarry's changed role. The journal presents the grain mill, broader workshop, and market preparations as the next larger undertaking without starting them automatically. A distant or partly seen underground continuation preserves curiosity. No finale screen removes the player from the world.

## FP-PLAN-03 — Arrival and the guesthouse restoration

The first view should establish the guesthouse, a familiar gatherable landscape, and the direction of the damaged crossing. Smoke, a lit public doorway, stored timber, and a dry exterior awning show that people already live here. The initial awning offers an understandable meeting point; it is not the restored bedroom. The innkeeper introduces the actual repair, while the traveler gives a short reason to care about the road beyond. Use the established character names if the real project contains them. NPC01 and NPC02 are planning role references, not replacement identities.

The player can inspect the guesthouse project before accepting any task. Its ordinary view says what will become usable, identifies the exact room and entrance, and displays two small stages. A footprint preview distinguishes existing architecture, proposed repair, and any player obstruction. The material list uses only nearby timber, stone, and early iron. It does not require wool from a particular animal, a specialist station, the far bank, or a purchased item. The authored room retains a repairable bed furnishing as part of the site; the listed restoration stock repairs access and fittings. It does not secretly consume a new bed recipe.

The first stage repairs the essential enclosure and approach. The second commissions the room, storage assignment, and common-space access. A short visible sequence shows delivered materials becoming beams, repaired floor, and fittings. Each stage should take seconds of active construction, with the first working sleeping place available as soon as its necessary repair is complete. The chapter should never add a long ornamental wait after the useful room already exists.

The player deliberately assigns or claims their sleeping place and receives a clear explanation of personal versus shared storage. The first bed interaction follows the selected game's supported spawn rules; the prototype must verify the real result rather than assume a decorative model establishes a respawn point. Cooperative players need additional explicitly supported sleeping positions or an immediate local recovery alternative, without each group member paying for a duplicate guesthouse.

The restored common work corner retains ordinary crafting access. The dedicated Carpenter and repair bench is repaired later in the quarry work bay, once, from its listed common stock; neither the guesthouse nor the crossing needs that station first. The traveler can mention the crossing while the player gathers, but the main chapter card continues to describe the guesthouse until its full essential outcome is complete.

## FP-PLAN-04 — The old crossing as the first infrastructure lesson

The damaged crossing must explain its own problem. Existing piers, a broken deck, the far approach, and a visible path toward the quarry provide a readable composition. The player can inspect both banks through a safe, longer route. A ford, supported shallow crossing, or authored bank path can provide that route according to the selected terrain template. No mandatory inspection requires swimming through a concealed deep current or making an unmarked jump over a lethal drop.

The mason, NPC03, introduces the supported repairs. A short far-side inspection records whether the approach is usable; this is knowledge, not a unique collectible that can disappear. The journal can recognize the inspection if the player performed it before the chapter became active. It still waits for the guesthouse outcome before offering the crossing's authored construction sequence. The bridge is worth building because it supports convenient carrying and later visitors, not because the game disables every alternative way across water.

Use three material stages: stabilize existing supports; restore the usable deck and approach; complete rails and the remaining transport fittings. A partly built deck must never imply that the bridge has its final transport capability. Label the difference between an accessible work platform, a walkable surface, and an operational route. Later visitor or freight systems can depend on the finished route state. This slice demonstrates a simple authored arrival response after completion, not a fully implemented freight economy.

The recommended first template has a three-block-wide walking deck over a modest gap, with supported span variants rather than arbitrary bridge engineering. Exact block layout belongs in the build manifest after asset and terrain inspection. A player-built crossing beside it remains in place if it does not conflict with the reserved footprint. A chest on the proposed deck causes a precise blocked state before work consumes that stage's materials. A player standing where the next block would appear temporarily pauses the placement action.

Completion must change the route immediately. Walking from the guesthouse to the quarry approach should visibly use the repaired span, and the return trip should feel easier. The chapter record and the physical bridge are checked together; a flag alone cannot make an incomplete route count as finished.

## FP-PLAN-05 — Quarry restoration and the first practical service

The quarry introduces a working landscape with a clear material identity. Pale and darker worked stone, a small water pocket, old handling points, a reachable face, and an entrance into Copperwash Channels should be related spatially. The entrance is discovered through the quarry rather than appearing as an unrelated portal. The player should recognize the quarry's rim when looking back from the first underground junction.

Chapter 3 begins with a bounded inspection: follow the existing work route, check a landing, identify the usable face, and record the safe approach to the lower handling bay. The default inspection is entirely possible with early tools, ordinary light, and a dry return route. A distinctive tool trace or work record can provide atmosphere, but chapter progress is recorded as knowledge. No irreplaceable item sits in the optional deepest pocket.

The quarry work bay first restores IND-M01 Carpenter and repair bench from common stock. The required quarry repair then restores the work platform, an upper and lower loading point, and the hand-operated variant of **IND-M53 Hoist and lift installation**, within TEC10 and the EQ08 cargo-winch family. For this slice it moves cargo only. It does not carry players, invent arbitrary rope physics, excavate its own shaft, or accept a player-placed landing anywhere in the world. A short existing timber-and-metal apparatus is repaired with common stock; its authored cable and drum belong to that restored assembly. No industrial wire plant is a hidden prerequisite.

A modest common-stone preparation service also becomes usable. It exposes a small supported ordinary building recipe and requires actual supplied stone. The initial demonstration is six cobblestone becoming six cobblestone walls, with the native recipe and output identity verified during the code audit. This is an illustrative ordinary recipe service, not IND-M18 Crusher and not the Chapter 4 grain mill. It does not create stone passively, excavate the landscape, or multiply ore.

Chapter 3 completes when the safe work route, baseline cargo movement, and stone service have each been demonstrated. The Shallows branch can be inspected during the quarry work, but it does not require a later realm or the bronze improvement to make the quarry useful. The first workshop service then gives a reason to return to that branch and to the settlement. This separation protects the chapter from an incidental lost metal sample.

## FP-PLAN-06 — One complete Copperwash Channels expedition

The representative EAR02 branch is **Copperwash Channels**. Its warm seams, worn water channels, gravel banks, coarse stone, and hanging vegetation connect naturally to the quarry. The test should establish one clear habitat with a meaningful route; it need not present all five Shallows experiences at once. Rootlace, Chalkstep, Glasswell, and Drybell remain named future coverage. The first complete Shallows Waystation and Broken Waterway Passage are also later projects, not silently included in this slice's bridge budget.

The required route begins at a dry quarry entrance, descends through a recognizable sloping passage, and reaches a junction with a broad dry survey ledge. A copper-stained face shows the branch's resource identity. MAT01 tin appears in an approachable worked-stone or sedimentary exposure compatible with the catalogue. A second accessible example exists near the quarry's shallow outer workings so the material does not depend on one delicate cave layout. The player can record the seam and gather a small batch using the supported early pick capability.

The outward route contains one navigational question: follow the noisier stream downward or the dry maintenance cut above it. Both are legible, and the required route uses safe ground. A short alternate connection returns to the recognizable junction, letting the player understand the space from a second direction. The route must remain traversable without mobile dynamic lighting, a rope simulation, a mask, powered tools, an underwater module, or parkour precision. Placed torches and ordinary steps are sufficient.

The optional discovery is a small water-worn alcove visible from the dry shelf. A pale stone form, ordinary decorative specimen, or framed view into a deeper pool rewards inspection. It has a dry observation point. Entering a submerged continuation is clearly outside the required task; no unique chapter item, indispensable tin, or irreplaceable reward is placed there. A nearby future-route clue can suggest the larger Shallows without generating or promising a complete Deepwilds transition in this build.

The survey ledge leaves room for a player chest, markers, or a personal rest arrangement outside the managed route. The player can mine ordinary adjacent ground. Story knowledge records the entrance, seam observation, and return route without requiring them to destroy the most attractive exposure. A preserved sample is welcome, but not mandatory. Leaving an ore face intact should not prevent learning what it is.

On return, the journal explains one useful connection: the observed tin and ordinary copper can make bronze fittings for the quarry's cargo cradle. The player has found a resource with a visible use, not a new abstract level of mining permission. Death, a lost specimen, or an early unauthorized visit does not erase the recorded observation.

## FP-PLAN-07 — A returned find becomes the first workshop improvement

The first workshop service occupies a modest, already reserved work bay beside the quarry's handling area. It combines the repaired **IND-M01 Carpenter and repair bench** with a compact **IND-M07 Alloy hearth**. These are an early service corner within the broader future workshop programme. Completing them does not create the full SET04 workshop building or finish Old Valley Chapter 4.

Ordinary metal preparation happens through the game's supported basic smelting route. The proposed first alloy order uses three copper ingots, one tin ingot, and one supported fuel item to produce four units of the existing bronze-fittings family. That is one recipe and one meaningful output family. A separate ingot, casting blank, tiny screw, and unique bearing inventory item are unnecessary for this demonstration. A later recipe catalogue can add forms when they have a recognizable use.

The fittings travel to the Carpenter and repair bench's project order, together with four planks. The service produces and installs a wider supported cargo cradle at the existing hoist. Treat the cradle as that installation's upgrade stage, not a new unrelated machine. Its default benefit is two occupied cargo slots per trip instead of one, respecting each item's normal stack limit. Cycle time and travel route stay the same. The player can see the broader cradle and move mixed supplies more conveniently. The comparison test uses two real occupied stacks: the six prepared walls and one item from the existing spare-fuel allowance. Baseline transfer takes two trips; the wider cradle carries both in one. These goods remain real stock and are returned after the test; no extra demonstration bill is created.

The first production test uses a visible order of exactly one batch. Inputs move into custody, the hearth warms and works, the output appears at its collection point, and the bench shows the waiting cradle order. The player confirms installation when the hoist is empty and its loading bay is clear. No silent auto-consumption takes the bronze from a private chest. If output space is full, the batch waits safely with its goods preserved.

The alternate common-iron cradle uses four iron ingots and the same four planks for equivalent basic cargo capacity. It does not produce bronze or count as witnessing the alloy process. This keeps the settlement's useful improvement available after an unlucky lost sample or a preference to retain the first specimen. The default fresh-world evaluation still demonstrates the copper-and-tin chain. Bronze is a practical material choice that broadens available stock, not a permission to use a quarry that was already restored.

## FP-PLAN-08 — The three machine functions and their physical limits

| Canonical function | First-slice form | Player interaction and result | Explicit boundary |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| IND-M01 Carpenter and repair bench / TEC01 | Small restored bench with input surface, tool area, and finished-order position | Contribute common stock; select a known project order; prepare or repair ordinary structural parts; assemble the cradle upgrade. | Manual, short batches; no power network, universal fabrication, or Tier 1 rocket parts yet. |
| IND-M07 Alloy hearth / TEC03 | Small charge opening, fuel position, guarded hot-work area, and collection shelf | Load a defined alloy batch; start it; inspect state; collect four bronze fittings. | One recipe initially; no industrial chemistry, continuous fluid metals, temperature simulation, or specialist refractory gate. |
| IND-M53 Hoist and lift installation / TEC10 / EQ08 | Authored upper and lower loading bays, fixed short cargo route, visible drum and cradle | Load authorized goods, choose the destination landing, start one transfer, and collect them at the other end. | Cargo only; fixed route; no riders, arbitrary rope routing, free swinging loads, or automatic excavation. |

The recommended working-space targets are a bench occupying roughly two by one blocks with clear frontal access; a hearth in a roughly three by two work area with a guarded service side; and a two-landing cargo installation with a rise of roughly four to eight blocks. These describe the prototype's reserved working envelopes, not final bounding boxes or model dimensions. Once the actual art is built, interaction points and collisions must be measured against the player and the chosen native rendering system.

A machine explains itself through visible material movement. The bench's stored stock differs from its finished order. The hearth distinguishes empty, loaded, working, output waiting, and stopped. The hoist shows which landing holds the cradle and where goods are reserved. Symbols and labels accompany colour. Sounds and particles support the same states without being their sole indication.

The initial hoist transfer is a short, proposed ten-active-second action between fixed landings. A single accessible Start interaction is sufficient; repeated tapping or holding a button is unnecessary. Any worker or crank animation is a bounded presentation of that action, not an unrestricted NPC job system. The cargo remains in managed custody during travel. A player entering the receiving bay stops completion safely and gets a clear request to step clear.

No random wear is needed in this slice. Empty input, missing output space, a blocked route, manual stop, or regional pause provide enough meaningful machine states. Later service schedules must follow real use and a visible benefit; they should not be added merely to make the first workshop feel complicated.

## FP-PLAN-09 — Provisional construction budget and complete accounting

The following bills are proposed restoration costs for existing authored sites. They are not claims that every visible placed block is crafted one-for-one from these counts. Retained walls, foundations, furnishings, cable, and equipment remain part of the site's initial state. Each build manifest must identify retained pieces, repaired pieces, and new pieces so the player is not shown an inexplicable full new building bought with a few planks.

| Order | Planks | Cobblestone | Iron ingots | Clay balls | Other inputs |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| FP-C01 Guesthouse essential repair | 24 | 12 | 2 | 0 | None; existing room furnishings are restored with the site. |
| FP-C02 Carpenter and repair bench restoration | 8 | 4 | 2 | 0 | None; the bench does not require its own output. |
| FP-C03 Crossing restoration | 32 | 24 | 4 | 0 | Far-approach inspection; shared knowledge, not consumed stock. |
| FP-C04 Quarry baseline service and hoist repair | 16 | 20 | 4 | 0 | Surveyed work route and clear loading bays. |
| FP-C05 Alloy hearth construction | 0 | 8 | 2 | 8 | Simple accessible construction; no previous kiln or furnace made from its own output. |
| FP-C06 Bronze cradle service | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Four bronze fittings from one FP-R01 batch. |
| **Default construction total** | **84** | **68** | **14** | **8** | **Four bronze fittings.** |

The bronze batch adds three copper ingots, one tin ingot, and one hearth fuel item. Twenty-one logs at the proposed four-planks-per-log planning conversion cover the 84 construction planks. Fourteen raw iron units, three raw copper units, and one raw tin unit cover the metal inputs if the audited initial smelting route returns one ingot per accepted raw unit. Those conversion assumptions must be checked against the selected game version and actual recipes before the values become a build specification. They are a transparent budget model, not a report of implemented recipes.

The construction bills are shared once per project. A separate solo preparation allowance is 24 planks, 16 cobblestone, 16 coal-or-charcoal items, and approximately eight ordinary food portions; cooperative players each need their own suitable tools, light, food, and recovery provision, while a group may share a furnace or work surface. It supports a basic crafting surface, a personal container if needed, stone tools, a furnace, sticks, torches, and a modest reserve; it is not deposited into any project. An additional six cobblestone supplies the stone-service demonstration and remains as six usable walls after processing. Food portions are a pacing allowance, not a new universal hunger rule.

Within the 16-item fuel allowance, provisionally allocate eight to 32 torches, three to ordinary metal smelting, one to the hearth, and four as spare. The ordinary-smelting allocation assumes up to eight relevant operations per fuel item and must be reconciled with native rules, optional charcoal preparation, and any chosen fuel substitution. The display must never charge both a project and a preparation list for the same stock. If charcoal is produced, its feedstock and starting fuel are added explicitly rather than treating the 16 prepared fuel items as free.

## FP-PLAN-10 — Recipes, source guarantees, and alternatives

| Recipe or service | Consumed input | Output or persistent result | Dependency and shortage rule |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| FP-R01 First bronze fittings | Three copper ingots, one tin ingot, one supported hearth fuel item | Four bronze fittings; proposed 45 active seconds | Requires IND-M07 and output capacity. Ordinary smelting precedes alloy work. No oxygen, electricity, steel, or planetary ingredient. |
| FP-R02 Bronze cradle order | Four bronze fittings and four planks | Existing IND-M53 accepts two occupied cargo slots instead of one | Requires a working baseline hoist, IND-M01, empty cradle, and clear bay. Costs are FP-C06, not an additional bill. |
| FP-R03 Iron cradle alternative | Four iron ingots and four planks | Same basic two-slot cargo capacity in an iron fitting variant | Substitutes for FP-R02 and FP-C06. The four extra iron replace bronze demand; the four planks are not charged twice. |
| FP-R04 Quarry stone demonstration | Six cobblestone | Six cobblestone walls retained as real output | Uses the restored common-stone service; verify the ordinary recipe identity during implementation inspection. No new ore-processing machine. |

Tin is planned SUBSTELLAR content identified by MAT01; a tin ingot is its proposed smelted form. Bronze fittings belong to the existing proposed processed-product family and IND-M07, not ordinary vanilla stock. These are planning aliases with no verified implementation registry IDs.

The default solo construction-plus-preparation envelope therefore contains 108 planks, 90 cobblestone, 14 iron ingots, eight clay balls, three copper ingots, one tin ingot, 16 prepared fuel items, and the food allowance. It includes project stock, the separate 24-plank and 16-stone preparation allowance, and the six-stone service demonstration. It does not assume every reserved tool or food item is consumed. The iron alternative changes the metal line to 18 iron, with the copper, tin, and bronze batch no longer required for that cradle. An unused hearth remains an optional service rather than a narrative obstacle. Omitting the hearth on the iron-only route removes FP-C05's eight cobblestone, two iron, and eight clay: construction then totals 84 planks, 60 cobblestone, and 16 iron, with no bronze requirement. That alternate outcome does not demonstrate alloy production.

The reachable near-bank gathering area should expose enough suitable timber and mineable common stone for the opening, with candidate testing using at least 32 harvestable log equivalents, 128 stone/cobblestone equivalents, 16 early iron units, and eight accessible clay balls across reasonable local sources. This is a generation validation budget, not a chest of free materials, a depletion requirement, or a map revealing every block. Fuel needs an approachable coal source or the supported renewable charcoal path, whose extra wood and bootstrap fuel are accounted for separately. Regrowth and ordinary farming remain normal play.

Required bridge materials are on the near side before the crossing is built. MAT01 tin and the first small copper batch have at least two shallow, dry-access examples within the quarry and Copperwash service catchment. The default fresh-world path must not require a market visitor, a rare creature kill, a flooded dive, an electrical machine, or a material found beyond a locked route. Optional barter may help later, but no invisible shop stock is used to prove this dependency graph.

A player can spend common inputs elsewhere, mine with friends, or lose a batch. The journal points to known sources and explains the iron alternative. Essential discoveries are knowledge and can be repeated. Main chapter completion never depends on possessing the sole surviving tin specimen. The design does not promise to manufacture unlimited materials after arbitrary destruction of an entire world; it does require renewable common routes, multiple local examples, and no single unique collectible whose loss makes the authored campaign impossible.

## FP-PLAN-11 — World-generation envelope and placement graph

Use the established planning envelope of **512 total levels, Y -192 through 319**. A reference surface near Y 63 is descriptive, not a requirement that Old Valley appear at exactly that elevation. Do not assign permanent Y bands to the seven realms through this slice. Copperwash should occupy a shallow connected volume relative to its local quarry, leaving a later world-height and realm-packing feasibility decision intact. The prototype bands mentioned in the foundation document do not become final realm boundaries here.

Plan Old Valley as related anchors and validated routes. The required graph is arrival approach to guesthouse; guesthouse to near bridge landing; bridge to far approach; far approach to quarry rim; quarry rim to working bay; working bay to dry Shallows entrance; entrance to survey ledge and return junction. The guesthouse's ordinary work corner and the quarry's bench-and-hearth service bay connect to that graph. An optional alcove branches from the underground route and reconnects or ends at a clearly reversible viewing point. An optional landmark cannot be the only connector between required nodes.

Suggested placement targets are a two-to-four-minute ordinary walk from guesthouse to quarry, a near-bank gathering catchment broadly within a few hundred blocks of the opening, and a ten-to-fifteen-minute first underground outward journey including observation. Distances should follow traversable paths, not straight-line radius alone. These are pacing targets, not fixed teleport spacing. Exact horizontal and vertical extents are selected only after testing actual walking speed, terrain forms, and supported structures.

Provide a small supported set of terrain arrangements: a gentle valley bank with short span, a stepped bank with authored approach stairs, and a shallow ravine variant with verified foundations. Each has explicit slope, water-level, ground-depth, doorway-clearance, and route constraints. Finite rotations and approved stair or foundation modules allow variation. The generator may change natural terrain only within its declared adaptation volume. It must not bury doors, create hanging piers, drain an unrelated lake, cut through another protected structure, or erase a player's construction to solve a failed placement.

Placement fallback is sequential: search another supported candidate; try a compatible authored variant; use a validated compact fallback arrangement in suitable generated terrain. If a required graph cannot be established, the system must detect that before presenting the campaign start and choose or generate a reachable supported start. An optional alcove can be omitted. Old Valley cannot simply be omitted because it was inconvenient to place. Exact fallback mechanics and search limits depend on the real world-generation architecture and belong in the pre-BUILD investigation.

## FP-PLAN-12 — Reachability, previews, and testing generated seeds

Reachability means the required route supports the intended player capability in both directions. A geometrically connected tunnel is insufficient if it ends above an unclimbable shaft, requires a deep swim, or traps the return behind an unbuilt project. The early route must support walking, ordinary one-block steps or authored stairs, basic mining where explicitly taught, and placed light. Its essential surfaces stay readable without a shader pack. The enhanced quarry visual target remains valuable, but extra ledges, submerged plants, and cave shapes require actual content rather than a lighting promise.

Each placement manifest records required entrance clearances, safe standing points, loading bays, reserved construction areas, and nearby free-building space. The bridge approach and cargo transfer route have separate geometric checks. Route markers can suggest direction while leaving optional exploration. Resource guarantees are validated against the same reachable graph; an ore counted behind an unsupported gap does not satisfy the opening budget.

Before producing a seed set for review, enumerate the material dependency graph independently of the construction order. Guesthouse stock is available locally. Crossing stock uses ordinary preparation and does not depend on the quarry or its bench. The quarry bench is then repaired from common material before the remaining quarry restoration uses it. Tin observation and ordinary smelting precede the alloy batch. The hearth does not require bronze, technical ceramics, or electricity to build. The cradle improvement depends on the existing hoist; the initial hoist does not depend on that improvement. No Chapter 4 market service supplies a required Chapter 1–3 input.

A useful initial evaluation set includes a flat bank, a stepped bank, a shallow ravine, awkward water adjacency, unusually uneven rock, and a deliberately invalid candidate. The expected result for the invalid candidate is a safe alternative or clear rejection, not an improvised destructive structure. Add two materially different ordinary seeds after those cases. This is a focused coverage set, not a claim that a handful of seeds proves universal generation correctness.

For each example, record whether a player can walk the complete required route, whether resource minima are genuinely reachable, whether the return remains clear, and which supported variation was selected. A small set of reproducible world seeds, coordinates, screenshots, and failures should accompany the eventual implementation handoff. Their existence is currently a planned test deliverable, not evidence already collected.

## FP-PLAN-13 — Construction states and obstruction semantics

The controller follows the canonical states: Discovered, Preview, Claimed or assigned, Awaiting requirements, Ready, Building, Paused, Blocked, Complete, and Upgrade available. The main screen shows the current purpose and next action, with detail available for custody and history. It must distinguish lack of materials from a blocked footprint and lack of participation from manual pause. A complete structure can advertise an upgrade without losing its finished service.

The recommended interaction is inspect, join or claim, contribute, review the next stage, and explicitly start. Previews show real collision surfaces separately from ghost geometry. A ghost plank never supports a player. Existing solid work platforms retain their actual collision. Temporary barrier markings identify unfinished edges. Where the next stage closes a room or moves a load, verify occupied spaces immediately before the meaningful action, not only when the project was first claimed.

| Condition | Required result |
| --- | --- |
| A player chest, machine, or protected player block occupies proposed work | Mark the exact location; retain stock; enter Blocked; provide no automatic deletion or relocation. |
| A player or another obstructing entity enters the next placement space | Stop that action safely and explain the affected area; resume when valid rather than trapping or pushing through them. |
| Natural terrain differs from the supported manifest | Use only an already supported adaptation; otherwise block or reject the candidate. No unbounded digging. |
| The owner cancels before assembly commits | Return uncommitted recoverable stock to a controlled claimable output; retain a receipt. |
| A stage already consumed materials into completed structure | Keep the built stage and its costs; do not refund it as loose material through cancellation. |
| A complete supported functional component is damaged | Report the missing component; offer a finite repair; never re-award the chapter or original completion reward. |

The default protection recommendation is narrow: protect the project controller and essential managed functional components from casual mining while they own live inventory or a committed structure state. Their inspection view explains the supported owner-controlled repair or dismantling route. Nearby player builds and ordinary terrain outside the reserved footprint remain subject to normal rules. Decoration can have more permissive damage behaviour where it does not invalidate safety or custody.

For the initial slice, dismantling a completed chapter structure is deferred. Repair and cancellation of uncommitted work are supported. This keeps the first ownership model understandable without imposing a universal protected town. Administrative world-edit damage must be detected and reported, and repair must be possible without granting duplicate goods; such exceptional recovery does not justify overwriting unrelated player possessions.

## FP-PLAN-14 — Materials, interruption, and recoverable saved state

Contributing transfers real items from an authorized inventory into project custody exactly once. The receipt records project, contributor, item identity, quantity, and accepted order. Over-delivery is rejected or explicitly held as recoverable excess; it never vanishes into an unspecified counter. The interface separates Available in project, Committed to this stage, Built into the structure, Recoverable, and Still required. Private containers are not searched or drained without a deliberate supported authorization.

A construction stage has a unique operation identity and a saved relationship to its consumed stock and placed result. The implementation may choose its storage architecture after inspecting the real code. The product requirement is that interruption cannot produce both a refund and a completed stage, charge a stage twice, or award a milestone twice. If recovery cannot safely finish an interrupted action, it must stop at a coherent inspectable boundary with custody preserved.

For a production batch, reserve its input and intended output capacity before starting. A blocked or absent receiver cannot cause items to drop into the world. If the batch completes internally while collection is unavailable, its actual output remains owned by the station until collected or recovered. Cancelling a completed batch returns its product, not both product and ingredients. Reopening a screen, reconnecting, or repeating a client request cannot duplicate the result.

For the hoist, the source slot is reserved while the cargo is in transit. The destination receives that same cargo once, with a recorded delivery receipt. The visible moving crate is a representation of the managed load, not a second lootable inventory. A save during movement retains the route, progress, cargo, and destination. On load, the system either resumes from its coherent saved point or parks at a supported safe point with the same goods accounted for. A disconnected player cannot leave a duplicate crate at both ends.

Focused interruption checks should cover immediately before contribution, after custody transfer, before stage commitment, during visible assembly, after output creation, and before the completion notification. Test a full output, an occupied landing, leaving the activity region, and a server stop during the same process. The expected invariant is conserved custody and one persistent world result, not a particular database or engine technique. These checks are meaningful release gates for this slice because inventory loss or duplication would invalidate its core loop.

## FP-PLAN-15 — Regional activity and small-group cooperation

The managed Old Valley region records its dimension, horizontal circular boundary, and explicit minimum and maximum Y. The quarry or underground service region may use its own bounded envelope where that avoids activating unrelated settlements above or below. Exact values follow the final supported layout. The inspection view can reveal bounds and an approach band, with the existing approximately sixteen-block transitional-band proposal retained as a tuning reference.

Only eligible participating players sustain managed activity. Joining is explicit through a project board or an explained group setting. A nonparticipant passing overhead does not restart construction, complete a batch, or advance a visitor. When the last eligible participant leaves the relevant dimension and bounds, construction, managed production, cargo-transfer progression, and authored visitor responses pause with their state intact. There is no offline catch-up production and no absence debt.

This guarantee applies to SUBSTELLAR's managed systems. Ordinary furnaces, crops, mobs, player redstone, and unrelated Minecraft simulation continue under their own rules. In particular, the basic ordinary furnace used for initial metal preparation is not falsely advertised as part of the managed pause promise unless it is explicitly implemented as such. The prototype UI names the managed station or project it is discussing.

One participant can keep the region active for a group. Two players can contribute to the same project, but simultaneous deposits must not exceed the accepted need or double-count stock. Inspecting or contributing does not automatically grant cancellation or permission-management rights. A newcomer sees the restored bridge and can receive a concise catch-up account; the world does not demand a second bridge. Personal route observations and shared infrastructure are stored as separate facts.

The initial playtest should support solo play and a two-player group. Broader server permissions are future implementation scope, but the basic authority model must already prevent a visiting spectator from withdrawing goods or restarting work. No unanimous vote is needed for every ordinary batch. The player who owns the appropriate project permission starts a ready stage, and everyone can see who is sustaining the region's activity.

## FP-PLAN-16 — Interfaces, journal, and accessible feedback

The first interface set has four surfaces: the project controller; the machine or service inspection; the journal's return-to-play page; and small contextual world feedback. A page should answer the immediate question before presenting its full history. The first controller screen reads as a project: purpose, next stage, supplied and missing inputs, present state, and one relevant action. Boundaries, ownership, receipts, and stage history are inspectable detail.

Use actionable explanations. “Move the chest at the deck's marked position” identifies a conflict. “Two iron ingots still needed” identifies a shortage. “Work paused: no participating player in Quarry Works” identifies activity. “Output shelf full: collect the four fittings” identifies collection. Each message should offer a way to locate the relevant object or view its relationship to the route. Avoid unexplained codes in ordinary player-facing text.

The journal separates the main chapter, optional projects, and personal discoveries. Its return-to-play summary says what was completed, what is ready, what is waiting, and where to continue. It explicitly displays Chapter 3 complete and Chapter 4 not yet complete at this slice's endpoint. A player who has already observed the seam sees that knowledge recognized when the alloy service becomes available. A player choosing the iron cradle sees the bronze method remain an optional opportunity, not a failed main objective.

Basic underground guidance provides entrance names, a simple route relationship, relative height, and player markers. It does not reveal every ore through walls. Exact map rendering can use the project's supported capabilities after inspection. The first playable can succeed with a restrained diagram, coordinates where useful, and placed EQ13-style markers, rather than requiring a complete three-dimensional mapping application.

All essential states use text or symbols in addition to colour. Interfaces should remain legible at the supported UI scales and in keyboard-only navigation. Construction does not demand rapid input. Reduced motion, particles, and sound leave clear static state feedback. World cues identify where to act without requiring the player to hear water direction, distinguish subtle copper colouring, or keep a bright shader effect enabled. Screen-reader or narration support should follow the actual game's available interface hooks after the implementation audit; it is a planned accessibility requirement, not a verified integration.

## FP-PLAN-17 — Death, lost supplies, and returning after an absence

The first guesthouse repair establishes the intended sleeping and recovery arrangement before the quarry expedition becomes the main invitation. The journal records the last known safe entrance and route. Death uses the selected world's ordinary rules except for explicitly described managed quest knowledge and custody; this plan does not silently enable keep-inventory or invent automatic item retrieval for every death.

Deposited project materials remain in custody. Items still carried by the player follow normal death behaviour. Essential inspection knowledge persists. The seam can be observed again, common materials have reachable sources, and the iron cradle provides a separate practical route if the player wishes to keep or has lost the first tin. No only-copy key is hidden behind an optional submerged branch. A recovery trip remains an expedition the player can understand, with established steps and familiar landmarks.

Resident availability is forgiving. If the mason is resting, the board can accept stock and record an inspection. If an NPC route is obstructed, the resident can wait at a supported location while the project's interface remains useful. Essential chapter functions cannot depend on catching a character during a narrow daily appointment. The implementation should preserve the original role and dialogue relationship while ensuring the milestone remains accessible.

Leaving for several real days causes no managed deterioration, missed event, hidden fuel bill, or surprise completion stockpile. Returning restores the same work state and a concise account of what is waiting. Normal world damage is treated separately and explained honestly. A missing decorative wall should not invalidate all chapter knowledge; a damaged essential hoist component should suspend that service and expose a finite repair.

The prototype's main route contains no mandatory combat encounter. Ordinary difficulty remains a world setting, and optional hazards can exist where legible. New nest encounters, cave-ins, dangerous currents, oxygen systems, and rescue craft are outside this slice. Its first risk is preparation and navigation in familiar-scale terrain, with a reliable route home that the player helped improve.

## FP-PLAN-18 — Pacing and balance targets for playtesting

The proposed target is roughly 90–150 minutes of directed play for a player comfortable with ordinary Minecraft, with exploration and free building extending the session naturally. A new player may split the route over more than one sitting. These numbers are observation targets, not clocks, deadlines, or required speed. The first visible repair should occur soon after the player understands the controller, and essential guesthouse use should arrive before a large gathering grind develops.

A useful provisional allocation is 15–25 minutes for arrival and guesthouse work; 20–30 for the crossing and approaches; 15–25 for the quarry bench and restoration; 20–30 for the first Shallows expedition; and 15–25 for the returned-find workshop service. Some tasks overlap. If most recorded playtime is repeated hauling between known points, reduce needless trips, allow sensible carried batches, or improve where supplies are found before increasing inventory size globally.

Construction stages should usually last about 8–20 active seconds after their requirements are ready. Manual bench work can resolve in a short few-second batch, the first hearth order provisionally takes 45 active seconds, and the cargo transfer takes about ten active seconds. The player should spend most time noticing, gathering, choosing routes, placing preparations, and using results. A long timer is not a substitute for a satisfying activity.

Observe the whole journey: tools, fuel, food, failed trips, walking, and project stock. Record hesitation and useful recovery messages. Keep initial yields simple to distinguish navigation problems from recipe problems, and propose specific adjustments from that evidence.

## FP-PLAN-19 — Prioritised build backlog and dependencies

All tasks below are **Planned; BUILD not authorized**. Priority expresses dependency and value inside this slice, not permission to start implementation. The corresponding JSON register carries the same task identities, source references, dependencies, and acceptance criteria. No code task should begin until the user approves a scoped BUILD after the repository inspection and concrete plan are available.

| Task | Priority and dependencies | Planned result and completion criterion |
| --- | --- | --- |
| FP-B01 Inspect the actual mod project | P0; none | Identify repository, loader, Minecraft version, build/run procedure, existing features, saves, and asset formats. Report verified code status and reconcile native recipe assumptions. |
| FP-B02 Define slice manifests and material ledger | P0; FP-B01 | Enumerate supported structures, stage costs, retained assets, machine functions, source availability, and DAG. Every required input has an earlier reachable source. |
| FP-B03 Establish the Old Valley placement graph | P0; FP-B02 | Place required anchors and routes with declared bounds and supported fallbacks; invalid candidates are rejected safely. |
| FP-B04 Project custody and construction states | P0; FP-B02 | Contributions, permissions, preview, commitment, obstruction, cancellation, and saved state conserve items and produce one world result. |
| FP-B05 Regional participation and pause | P0; FP-B04 | Eligible participant presence controls only managed activity; absence preserves state without catch-up; nonparticipants do not activate work. |
| FP-B06 Guesthouse chapter and basic journal | P1; FP-B03, FP-B04, FP-B05 | Player restores the complete essential room project, sets a working recovery arrangement, uses storage, and can resume the chapter later. |
| FP-B07 Crossing chapter | P1; FP-B06 | Player inspects both approaches, supplies all stages from accessible stock, and gains a real finished route; personal alternatives remain distinct. |
| FP-B08 Quarry baseline services | P1; FP-B07 | The bench is restored once; work route, cargo-only baseline hoist, and finite ordinary stone preparation work; Chapter 3 completes without bronze or deep exploration. |
| FP-B09 Copperwash branch and optional alcove | P1; FP-B03, FP-B06 | The early player can observe, gather, optionally investigate, and return; knowledge persists and essential sources have supported alternatives. |
| FP-B10 Carpenter bench, alloy hearth, and cradle order | P1; FP-B08, FP-B09 | One bronze batch becomes the usable two-slot cradle; inputs, output, stop conditions, and iron alternative are clear and conserved. |
| FP-B11 Complete interfaces and accessibility pass | P1; FP-B06, FP-B07, FP-B08, FP-B09, FP-B10 | Every blocking state identifies the next useful action; journal separates chapters and discoveries; essential meaning survives reduced effects and supported UI scales. |
| FP-B12 Seed, recovery, and cooperative verification | P1; FP-B03 through FP-B11 | Run the explicit completion matrix on representative supported layouts, interruptions, and two-player activity; record reproducible failures and fixes. |
| FP-B13 First-playable evaluation and handoff | P1; FP-B12 | Observe a complete fresh-world journey, reconcile material/pacing findings, and publish the accepted result and remaining limitations. |
| FP-B14 Later content boundary | P2; FP-B13 and later BUILD scope | Plan the full Chapter 4 service network, grain mill, first market, broader Shallows, and IP02 without treating them as completed by this slice. |

Parallel asset and interface work shares the same manifests, IDs, and stage definitions. Prove custody and placement before decorating many variants.

## FP-PLAN-20 — Completion matrix and review evidence

| Check | Pass condition |
| --- | --- |
| Fresh-world journey | A player completes the guesthouse, crossing, and quarry, explores Copperwash, and uses the first workshop improvement with the planned early capability set. |
| Chapter preservation | Chapters 1–3 have their full essential outcomes; Chapter 4 remains incomplete; Chapter 5 has not been triggered or awarded. |
| Material accounting | Default bills sum to 84 planks, 68 cobblestone, 14 iron, eight clay, and four bronze fittings; preparation and demonstration stock are separate; the alternative does not double-charge. |
| No circular gate | The bridge needs no far-bank material; the hearth needs no bronze; the baseline quarry needs no upgraded cradle; the first service needs no market, power plant, deep realm, or space resource. |
| Construction protection | A newly placed chest and an occupying player each stop affected work; neither is overwritten, trapped, or silently displaced. |
| Interruption and duplication | Save/reload and repeated requests at critical boundaries retain one cost, one product, one delivery, and one milestone reward. |
| Pause | Absence of eligible participants stops managed progress; ordinary unrelated systems are not claimed to stop; returning produces no catch-up output. |
| Cargo scope | Fixed-landings cargo transfer works, respects slot and stack limits, preserves goods when blocked, and does not transport a rider. |
| Recovery | Lost carried material can be regathered; known inspections remain known; a blocked resident route does not hide essential progress. |
| Terrain coverage | Supported flat, stepped, and ravine variants work; unsuitable candidates produce supported fallback rather than destructive improvisation. |
| Cooperative access | Two participants can contribute without duplication; a visitor cannot withdraw or activate work; a newcomer can understand shared completion. |
| Readability | The route and key states are understandable without shader enhancements, colour-only cues, sound-only information, or rapid input. |

Evidence should include the inspected commit or source snapshot, build/run instructions, world seeds and coordinates, the final cost ledger, short recordings or screenshots of useful world changes, and the results of the focused interruption checks. The final report separates verified behaviour from known limitations. A successful test world is not proof of every future realm, machine, NPC routine, or supported server configuration.

Human review also asks whether the valley feels worth returning to, the quarry is memorable, the bronze order has a clear purpose, and the player wants another expedition.

## FP-PLAN-21 — Next image slice, planned only

No image generation is authorized by this planning slice. Existing artwork remains in place. The next proposed set contains two compact boards, each designed to answer unresolved production questions. Grouping related views controls image effort and avoids producing a separate expensive image for every state.

**FP-ART01 — Old Valley opening.** Four coordinated panels show the guesthouse's essential repair before and after, the crossing in relation to its banks and supported approach, the quarry with loading bays, and the first Copperwash entrance from player height. Preserve the established shoreline/quarry palette and distinguish requested geometry from enhanced lighting. The composition should make the walking relationships clear without pretending to be an exact map. Exact dimensions, routes, and stage labels belong in drawn overlays or authored diagrams after approval, not unreliable generated text.

**FP-ART02 — First workshop and construction states.** A small shared-work-bay view identifies the Carpenter and repair bench, Alloy hearth, and the hand-operated Hoist and lift installation at player scale. Insets show supplied stock, one active alloy batch, the finished fittings, and the baseline versus wider cargo cradle. The scene should communicate ports, access, useful workspace, and a stopped or full state. No extra machine family, powered grid, full mill, or rocket appears merely to make the picture busier.

Before either board is generated, reconcile the actual model scale and material palette with the implementation manifests. The art task is complete when it resolves those appearance questions and is catalogued against its existing SET, EAR, TEC, IND-M, and EQ references. Neither board implies every detailed asset has been designed or every depicted function built.

## FP-PLAN-22 — Recommendations, decisions, and future handoff

Proceed in planning with the defaults defined here: complete Chapters 1–3, a Copperwash expedition, a cargo-only two-landing hoist, one bronze recipe, an iron alternative, and a bounded first workshop service. The proposed 90–150-minute pacing and small material counts are playtest starting points. They do not need a user decision to finish this document. No new character names, permanent realm elevations, final machine dimensions, or loader assumptions are introduced.

Later creative decisions should present the observed problem and specific alternatives. Resolve routine implementation questions through code inspection and engineering judgment.

The next BUILD proposal should include the actual repository findings, the exact tasks proposed for execution, the bounded first-playable outcome, and any material change from this plan. A build agent should use this chapter and its JSON register together, preserve working project behaviour, record factual discoveries, and update the edition only with evidence-backed implementation status. Approval to write this plan and package its HTML is not approval to build the mod.

After acceptance, continue Old Valley with its grain mill, wider workshop, market preparations, and first market. Develop the first electrical capability and Tier 1 preparation in their own slices. Deep Earth and early lunar exploration retain parallel opportunities. Every later place should extend the opening's rhythm: leave prepared, discover, return, and make a place more useful.