Four Crafts — Anchor, Rigger, Double, Stoker¶

Status: Proposed — not implemented. Written 2026-08-30. Owner: delan Scope: a from-scratch class slate of four, grown from bible physics, not from genre archetypes. Names are working titles. Canon boundary: this proposes. It does not rule. Class origin remains WO-A1. Nothing under story/ was touched. If adopted, it supersedes the class half of docs/proposals/demo-card-set.md and the five-kit revisions in docs/proposals/class-mechanic-lean-in.md. The five Houses are canon and stay five. Ruled in conversation, 2026-08-30: there is no required class count. Four well-made crafts beat a 5×5 grid.

The finding in one line¶

Four crafts, five Houses. The fifth class was a spreadsheet cell. Cut it. Spend the budget making four turns that only work in this world.

Houses are doctrines. They already own the five surviving jobs. A class is not a sixth House. It is a craft for living in the wreck — which piece of the broken physics you can work with your hands.

The axis (do not reopen)¶

Class = how you spend a turn: one illegal verb, one death that is the same verb.
House = what that turn costs: obedience, commitment, blood, the present, attrition.

Cover test still holds. Class cards may never invoice a House price. House cards may never introduce a stacking class resource.

The old four (Drifter, Conduit, Machinist, Catalyst) are genre costumes. They do not appear in the bible. They are not in this slate.

Why four¶

The wreck has four pieces of physics that did not exist as a way to fight before that night. That is the count. It is not a product target.

Physics	Bible	Craft
One reality, held	Chaotic possibility in, one reality out. You do that locally, with mass.	Anchor
A place arriving	Realms dock and undock. The order that knew how died at the docks. Nobody remembers there were six.	Rigger
Company	First contact was not debris. Other versions of the corridor arrived, some tangible enough to kill.	Double
The only honest instruments	Telemetry shrugged that night. Pressure, temperature, strain, static did not.	Stoker

Fitter (wear-as-a-class) is cut. It collapses into the Censors’ discard or into Anchor’s persist, and it existed to fill a fifth chair.

Asymmetry is load-bearing. Six orders became five Houses because the world forgot one. The class list does not have to repeat the lie.

The four¶

Working names, downstairs-register, none of them rhyme with Valerii. Rename in a sitting. The verb is the class.

1. Anchor — the mass that pins a corridor¶

Keep. The only class already sold.

Verb: Density. Block retained between turns.
Rule-break: Counterweight — hit with Block, keep the Block.
Death: Grav-Lock at 10 (hand size −1). Vent clears it.

The turn. Load mass. Keep the shield. Swing the shield. Get heavier. Vent before the room won’t let go.

Turn 1: Block + Density. You do not hit hard yet.
Turn 2: yesterday’s Block is still here. Counterweight smash.
Turn 3: you are a loaded spring. Vent, or ride Grav-Lock.

HUD: Density pips on the Block bar. When it hits 10, the bar locks.
The ×4 card is Counterweight. Density-scaling damage is Ironclad. Illegal in the core.
Refuse: Drag (Valerii), generic Block that never mentions Density.

Photograph: a person who has become furniture, and then furniture that hits back.

2. Rigger — you borrow a place, then it leaves¶

The Harbormasters ran docking. They died with the docks. A Rigger found a scrap of that craft. The world would call it illegal knowledge.

Verb: Berth. Two slots. A Berth is not a turret and not a stance. It is a fragment of another place, docked onto this fight. While it sits, its rule is the room’s rule — for you and the enemy.
Rule-break: you change the physics of the arena, not your stats.
Death: Undock. Every fragment has a printed leaving. Duration 2 turns, then it goes, or you overwrite the slot. You never keep a place.

The turn.

Turn 1: dock Hot Berth (all damage +50%; Block halved). The room is a furnace.
Turn 2: dock Exile Berth on the elite (they are not here). Finish the small one in the furnace.
Turn 3: something must leave. Undock Hot and you are thin when the elite returns. Undock Exile and the elite walks into the furnace. That decision is the class.

Authored fragments (demo needs ~6, not 20):

Fragment	While docked	When it leaves
Quiet corridor	Nobody attacks. Draw 1 less.	You discard 1.
Hot dock	All damage +50%. Block halved.	Take 4.
Exile slip	One enemy is not here.	They return. If this overwrite-undocks, they return with 1 extra Intent.
Wrong ceiling	End of turn: lowest-HP unit (any side) is sent to the other Berth if empty	That unit slams back for 6.
Dead berth	Exhausted cards sit here instead of gone	They return to discard, not hand. The past comes back in the wrong pile.
Still water	Intents freeze. Cards cost 1 more.	The next Intent doubles.

HUD: two frames on the arena floor, each with a timer pip (2, 1, gone). The room looks different while a Berth sits — that is the trailer.
The ×4 card docks a fragment. “If you have a Berth, deal 8” is Machinist with a hat. Illegal in the core.
Refuse: Constructs with HP. Those are pets. A Berth is a place. Enemies do not shoot it; they live in it.

Photograph: a second ceiling locking onto this one, then tearing off and taking the furniture.

Doctrine ban: Valerii. Their grief is that chaos got in. A Rigger invites a second place on purpose. Do not soften this into a Trade. The wall does not rent rooms.

3. Double — you fight beside last-you¶

The Unraveling’s horror was company. A Double has learned to keep one.

Verb: Stand-in. A figure beside you. At the end of your turn, the last Attack or Skill you played becomes its trick (an icon on the ghost). Next turn it performs that trick first, then you act.
Rule-break: a delayed second body you wrote yesterday and cannot edit today.
Death: Thickness. If you do not dismiss at end of turn, Thickness +1 and the trick stays. At 3, if you still have not dismissed, the Stand-in flips — same trick, now an enemy. Company became tangible enough to kill. That is the bible, as a toy.

The turn.

Turn 1: strike. A ghost arms with that strike.
Turn 2: the ghost repeats it. You play something else, or dismiss (0-cost, in the core). If you keep it, Thickness 2 — next repeat hits harder.
Turn 3: Thickness 2 is the greedy turn. Cash it and dismiss, or hold for 3 and risk the flip.

HUD: a translucent you, one step behind, with the imprinted card on its chest and 1–3 pips. When it flips, the tint goes hostile. Anyone who has seen an echo in this game already knows the read.
The ×4 card is an Attack that wants to be imprinted (clean, single-target, worth repeating). “Gain 3 Block” as the staple teaches the wrong ghost.
Refuse: marking the enemy (that was Drifter). Scry (Axiom). A summon you steer this turn (that is a pet, not company).

Core needs four shapes, not twenty:

The strike that wants repeating.
The 0-cost Dismiss.
A card that imprints without resolving (write tomorrow, do nothing today).
A card that pulls the trick now (desync on purpose — the ghost is empty next turn).

Photograph: a translucent you repeating the swing, then turning its head.

Doctrine ban: Valerii. Company is the breach.
Hard Trade: the Axiom. The Stand-in is a second account of the same turn, unverifiable. Legal, and it should feel like heresy they cannot quite forbid — the House of proof living next to a ghost it cannot attest.

4. Stoker — the fight is a boiler¶

Alden knew because the physical plant told him. Skin, then pitch, then the board. A Stoker still fights by those gauges. Not by official telemetry. That shrugged.

Verb: Strain. A needle on the room, 0–9, shared. Your cards add it. Thresholds vent power. High Strain makes everyone’s attacks hit harder.
Rule-break: you are not spending your mana. You are riding a machine that will feed the enemy as gladly as it feeds you. The night’s lesson as a toy: the core obeyed everyone.
Death: Tear. If you end a turn at 9, the room tears. An echo arrives as an extra enemy (first contact, in miniature). Whistle is the valve: spend all Strain as damage to all enemies, needle to 0. Whistle late is skill. Whistle early is cowardice. Never Whistle is how the Spire died.

Thresholds (printed on the HUD, not hidden in a glossary):

Strain	The room
3	+1 Energy next turn
6	All attacks +2 (both sides)
9	Must Whistle this turn, or Tear

The turn.

Turn 1: chip, Strain 2–3. The first pip lights.
Turn 2: push toward 6. You hit harder. So do they. Spend the energy.
Turn 3: 8 or 9. Whistle into a crater, or greed the +2 and pray you kill before the needle sticks.

HUD: a gauge. Not a stack of icons. Anyone who has watched a boiler knows this class before they read a card.
The ×4 card adds Strain and hits. “Gain 1 Overload, draw 2” was a token. Illegal here. Strain is not a resource in your pocket. It is the room.
Refuse: personal energy-debt (old Conduit). Self-harm as a bill (Syndicate already invoices HP). Naming the dump Vent — that word stays on Anchor.

Photograph: needles in the red, static lifting hair, then the whistle.

Watch Gift: Syndicate. Both want the room hot. Keep the House invoice in HP, not in Strain, or the pairing becomes two meters in one currency.
Hard Trade: Valerii. The House pays you for a clean turn. Strain 6 means the enemy hits harder. Obedience and a hot boiler do not want the same turn — that is the pairing.

Pairings — lopsided, not a grid¶

Five Houses stay. Four crafts. Bans are doctrine, not balance patches. Empty cells are allowed.

	Valerii · stillness	Axiom · the plan	Syndicate · blood	Censors · the present	Salvari · ruin
Anchor	Gift ⚠ — sharpen the Valerii price so a tank still pays	Trade	Trade ★	Trade	Trade ★★ — hoard Block, get paid for breaking it
Rigger	Banned	Trade ★ — dock the turn you already Scryed	Trade	Trade ★ — Dead Berth vs Recall, two pasts	Trade ★★ — a place breaks when it leaves
Double	Banned	Trade ⚠ — unverifiable company	Trade	Trade	Trade ★ — dismiss is you breaking your own gear
Stoker	Trade ★★ — hot room vs clean turn	Trade ★ — Whistle on the predicted turn	Trade ⚠ — two heats, different bills	Trade	Trade

★ works · ★★ showcase · ⚠ needs the House price to actually bite

Showcases (four, not five):

Anchor + Salvari — mass as a weapon you are paid to shatter.
Rigger + Salvari — every undock is a wreck. Trailer material.
Stoker + Valerii — the boiler against the wall.
Double + Axiom — a plan written yesterday, executed by a ghost, attested by no one. The House should hate how well it works.

Do not also chase a fifth golden path. That was the 5×5 habit.

What each induction has to teach¶

Same acquisition idea as the demo card set: a dense duplicated core, then singletons. The ×4 card is the craft. If the copies are riders, the class is a sticker.

Craft	Combat 1 must fire	Combat 3 must fire
Anchor	Counterweight, once	Grav-Lock, then a Vent that clears it
Rigger	A Berth that changes the room	A forced Undock with a real leaving
Double	The ghost repeats a strike	A dismiss, or a Thickness-3 flip
Stoker	The needle moves, both sides hit harder	A Whistle, or a Tear

If the kit never hurts you, it is a buff.

Demo consequence¶

Dropping the fifth class is a scope cut, not a feature cut.

4 kits, not 5. Same 9+3 shape per kit if the acquisition curve holds.
House packs stay five Houses × five cards. Those are canon.
Legal mix is ~16, not 18, with two Valerii bans. Quick Play still proves composition.
Catalyst’s Anomaly pool (WO-C2) dies with Catalyst. That was a hard blocker on a class this slate does not have.
Latch Turret honesty, Overload-as-global-keyword, Echo-Lock exact-5 — work that existed to serve crafts we are not shipping.

The identity lock (one verb per owner) is easier with four verbs, not harder.

What this document refuses¶

A fifth class to keep a matrix pretty.
Mapping crafts 1:1 onto the five surviving orders. That duplicates Houses.
Un-banning Rigger or Double for Valerii “so every cell is playable.”
Keeping Drifter / Conduit / Machinist / Catalyst as alternate specs. This slate replaces them.
Chaos Shards, a sixth resource, or a class that Scrys, freezes, pays HP for gold, or recalls discard. Those are House prices.
Polishing these in WPF. Select and honesty-gate here; Unity carries the feel.

Open (design, not bible)¶

Names. Anchor is kept. Rigger / Double / Stoker are working titles.
Double’s flip: extra enemy with the trick, or the Stand-in deals its trick to you once and leaves. First is more photographable. Second is less board-clutter. Pick in playtest, not on paper.
Rigger fragment count. Six for the demo. Do not grow the list before the two slots feel cramped.
Stoker Tear. Spawning an echo is the lore-true fail. A 5-unblockable is the cheap fail. Prefer the echo if the HUD can show a third body.

Class origin (why the world produces a Rigger) still belongs in the bible sitting. This file only says what the crafts do.

Companion to docs/proposals/mechanics-lore-fit.md (Houses as the price of grief; class-origin gap) and docs/proposals/demo-card-set.md (acquisition curve and House packs, whose class kits this would replace). Sources: story/bible/00-pillars.md, 20-decoupling.md, factions/00-origins.md. Feeds WO-A1 and WO-C1. Does not feed WO-C2 unless Catalyst is restored.