Supporting Features Required by the Main Design¶

Several features are not optional once the core concept includes trading, contracts, town ownership, loss on defeat, and player-created economic activity.

Required Supporting Systems¶

optional new player tutorial
beginner protection
mail or delivery system
notifications for completed timers and market events
codex and history log
item durability and repair
contract escrow and dispute-safe settlement
anti-scam trade UX
moderation and reporting
group and guild permissions
reputation systems for contracts or commerce
event scheduling for conflict and town control

Optional Tutorial¶

New players should be offered a quick optional tutorial at first login. It should be skippable for experienced players and completable in a single short session.

The tutorial walks through the core loop:

pick up a board job in Trevalkaan
prepare a loadout and supplies
optionally select wilderness activities such as gathering, mining, or fishing
launch the expedition and wait for resolution
return, settle results, and collect coin or materials

The tutorial runs under full beginner protection rules. It should introduce wilderness activities as an optional layer by the second or third step so players understand from day one that adding them extends expedition time but increases output.

Beginner Protection¶

New players need guardrails around loss, survival pressure, and predatory trade.

What Is Protected¶

The protection window runs from character creation until the player first achieves Hall rank E and completes at least 5 board orders. These two gates together mean protection expires after meaningful engagement, not after a time clock.

During the protection window, the standard incapacitation loss rules are modified as follows. Full rules are in ../combat/injury-and-death.md.

Equipped loadout items are returned: Weapons, armor, and held focus items equipped at time of incapacitation are not lost — they are returned to the character at the checkpoint. This shields the starter kit from a first-death wipe.
Coin loss is capped at 50 coin: Any coin carried above 50 is lost as normal; the first 50 is returned. This keeps the character functional without removing economic stakes entirely.
Harvested materials and consumables are lost as normal: The risk of the expedition is preserved. Food, water, medicine, and gathered materials are not protected.
Mounts are treated as equipped items: If the character's mount was registered in the equipped mount slot at launch, it is returned alongside other loadout items. A mount carried as inventory cargo is not protected.
Safe contracts: New players can only see and accept contracts marked beginner_safe on the player contract board. These are contracts posted with no minimum rank gate, coin-escrow verified, and reviewed for fair valuation at posting time.
Recommended route labels: Map tiles marked Beginner-Safe show a visual indicator in the expedition planner. These tiles have been flagged as low-threat by the survey system and are recommended as default destinations for F-rank characters.
Predatory trade block: During the window, the direct trade confirmation step shows a tooltip warning when the incoming trade value is more than 50% lower than the estimated market value of the player's offered items. The player must actively dismiss the warning to proceed.

Protection Expiry¶

When both gate conditions are met (Hall rank E and 5 orders complete), the player receives a notification that protection has expired. The map overlay is updated. The recommended-route labels remain but the protection rules no longer apply.

Protection cannot be re-applied. Clan and guild leaders cannot extend it to new recruits — this prevents exploitation by high-rank players using protected alts.

Hall Rank Gate on Dangerous Zones¶

The zone rank system provides structural protection for all players, not just beginners. A C-rank zone requires C-rank verification to accept orders into it. An F-rank character cannot be contracted into a C-rank zone through a player contract — the board submission will reject the contract assignment even if the player manually walks to the zone. This is a permanent rule, not a beginner feature.

Mail and Delivery System¶

The mail system supports asynchronous item and coin transfer between players, and between players and NPCs that support delivery orders.

Player-to-Player Mail¶

A player can send a mail item to any character by name. Mail items include:

coin (up to 500 coin per message; larger transfers require the exchange warehouse or direct trade)
a single item from inventory
a written message (text field, up to 400 characters)

Mail is held for 14 real days. If the recipient does not collect within 14 days, coin is returned to the sender and items are returned to the sender's warehouse hold. If the sender's warehouse is full, the overflow is held for 72 hours on the server before being discarded.

Anti-Grief rule: A player can only send 5 unsolicited mails per 24 hours to characters they have never traded with or grouped with. Players who are guild-members, teacher-apprentice linked, or recent trading partners have no limit. This prevents coin-begging and item-spam campaigns.

NPC Delivery Mail¶

Some NPC commissions (Teaching contracts, Crafters Hall batch orders, work-order results) generate a mail delivery to the requesting NPC. The player completes the delivery by placing items into the correct NPC mail slot or physically delivering to an NPC in person. The board system tracks which delivery method applies.

Physical delivery (walking to an NPC) always awards a small standing bonus on top of contract coin. Mail delivery (dropping into a mail slot) skips the bonus. This encourages physical play when the player is available without penalizing async delivery.

Notifications¶

All asynchronous activity that requires player attention must generate a notification. The game is expected to run in a background browser tab for much of its playtime.

Notification Types¶

Trigger	Notification text (example)	Channel
Expedition resolution	"Your party has returned from East Briar Thicket. 3 orders settled."	In-game banner + badge
Market order filled	"Your sell order for 20 iron blooms was filled at 14 coin each."	In-game banner
Auction bid surpassed	"You have been outbid on Exceptional Hunting Bow. Current bid: 340 coin."	In-game banner
Auction won	"You won the auction for Exceptional Hunting Bow. Collect at the exchange."	In-game banner + badge
Contract filled by claimant	"A hunter has completed your wolf cull contract. Coin disbursed."	In-game banner
Mail received	"You have a new message from Kaisaarul."	Badge
Town supply crisis	"Trevalkaan food supply has dropped to Critical band."	In-game banner (all players in region)
Dynamic event starts	"A new event is active: Goblin Raid on East Road. Board updated."	In-game banner (all players in region)
Guild announcement	"Guild: new message from guild leader Arkaas."	In-game badge
Apprentice milestone	"Your apprentice Torival has reached Practiced in Smithing."	In-game notification

Notification Rules¶

All in-game notifications appear in a persistent notification panel (accessible by badge count tap/click)
Notifications are marked read individually or all-at-once
Notifications older than 30 days are automatically archived; archived notifications persist indefinitely
The system does not support push notifications outside the browser session at launch (future: optional web push if the browser permits)
No notification may autoplay audio or block the UI; all are non-modal

Codex and History Log¶

Every character maintains a persistent log of discoveries and outcomes. The codex is read-only from the player's perspective — it is written by the server, not manually curated.

Bestiary Codex¶

Each creature species the character has encountered gains a codex entry:

encounter count
first encounter location and date
noted behaviors (updated from combat resolver: rushed, flanked, poisoned, etc.)
materials extracted from this species
resistances and weaknesses noted (populated once the Knowledge check threshold is passed — see monsters-and-knowledge.md)

Recipe Codex¶

Each recipe the character has learned or unlocked is listed with:

recipe name and category
unlock source (learned from NPC, purchased, discovered on expedition, apprentice unlock)
date first learned
first use outcome (if recorded)

Expedition Log¶

The last 30 expeditions are stored in full. Each entry records:

destination tile or route name
expedition type
loadout used
outcome (success / partial / failure)
loot and materials recovered
contracts settled during this expedition
notable events (elite encounter, weather event, escort condition result)

Entries older than 30 expeditions compress to summary data (date, destination, outcome, total coin settled) and are kept indefinitely.

Contract History¶

A permanent ledger of every contract the character has accepted or posted:

contracts accepted: date, poster name (anonymized to "Community" if public), outcome, coin earned
contracts posted: date, type, claimant (shown if the contract was fulfilled), outcome, coin disbursed or returned

This history is visible to the character only, not to other players or NPCs.

Anti-Scam Trade UX¶

The direct trade window (see market-contracts-and-logistics.md) applies these rules:

Both parties open a trade request. The receiving party can accept or decline the request.
Both parties place items and coin into the trade window. Neither party's slot is confirmed until both explicitly lock in.
A 10-second review lock activates when both parties lock in. During the review window, neither party can change the trade contents. Both parties see the identical confirmation display.
If the estimated coin value of one party's offer is less than 40% of the estimated value of the other party's offer, a warning banner displays: "Trade appears uneven. Review carefully before confirming." The player must click "Acknowledge and Confirm" rather than just "Confirm".
After the review lock, both parties must confirm within 30 seconds or the trade auto-cancels. There is no penalty for auto-cancellation.
Confirmed trades are immediately settled. Coin and items transfer atomically — partial transfers cannot occur.
Trade records are logged server-side for 90 days for dispute review.

Moderation and Reporting¶

In-Game Reporting¶

Any player can submit a report on another player by selecting their character name from trade history, expedition history, contract history, or direct message history. Reports are categorized:

Category	Description
Harassment	Unsolicited aggressive or abusive messages
Suspected exploit	Behavior that appears to violate game rules for advantage
Trade dispute	Claim that a completed trade was misrepresented
Contract bad faith	Claim that a fulfilled contract was submitted with fraudulent proof
Conduct violation	General rule violation not covered by other categories

Reports are queued for review. The reporter receives a notification when the report is resolved (outcome: actioned, dismissed, or under extended review). The outcome of action taken against the reported player is not disclosed to the reporter.

Conduct Marks¶

The Trevalkaan Civic Standing system tracks Conduct Marks (see reputation-and-standing.md). Confirmed reports result in a Conduct Mark being applied. Standing penalties apply automatically; severe or repeated violations can result in exchange suspension (cannot post orders), board suspension (cannot accept or post Hall contracts), or account suspension.

A reported player can appeal a Conduct Mark once per 30 days by submitting a written appeal (text field, up to 800 characters) to the review queue. Appeals are manually reviewed. The outcome is final.

Group and Guild Permissions¶

Group Permissions¶

A temporary party (expedition group) uses a flat permission model. All members of a group see the group's shared expedition log, can view each other's loadout summary, and can contribute to shared objective tracking. Loot and coin from shared expeditions must be distributed manually — there is no automatic loot split rule at launch.

The group leader can: - set the expedition objective and departure confirmation threshold - set a minimum ready-check count before the expedition launches - remove a member from the group before expedition launch (not during) - mark a group as "closed" to prevent random join requests

Guild Permissions¶

Guilds use a tiered permission model. The default tiers are:

Tier	Label	Default Permissions
4	Guild Leader	All permissions; can promote, demote, dissolve guild, manage treasury
3	Officer	Can post guild announcements; can approve member applications; can access guild storage tier 2
2	Member	Can access guild storage tier 1; can read announcements; can use guild prefix
1	Initiate	Can read announcements; no storage access; pending full member review

The Guild Leader can customize permission grants at each tier. Custom grants can extend or restrict defaults. The system does not support per-member custom permissions — it is tier-based only.

Guild storage has two tiers: - Tier 1 (Member access): 40 item slots; items deposited by any Member+ can be withdrawn by any Member+. No coin storage in tier 1. - Tier 2 (Officer access): 20 item slots; intended for high-value materials, rare items, and crafting inputs earmarked for guild projects. Officer withdrawal is logged.

Guild treasury (coin) is accessible only to the Guild Leader and Officers with explicit treasury grant. Deposits are open to all members.

Event Scheduling and Town Control Gates¶

The following features require calendar-based scheduling and do not run on continuous simulation:

Town ownership contests — scheduled to a fixed weekly window (e.g., Saturday evening); see guilds-clans-and-town-control.md

Festival events — scheduled by the server admin or driven by a seasonal clock; player-initiated festival proposals are posted to a board but require server approval to activate

Board emergency escalation — when a village or town drops to Security band 0, the emergency board window opens and runs for a fixed 72-hour window before the system auto-generates a Resolution state regardless of player completion

Scheduled events appear in a public event calendar, visible from the main UI. Characters in the relevant region receive a notification 1 hour before the event window opens.

use beginner_trust_band tied to character-creation onboarding
default beginners to starter-board lanes and trusted low-risk contracts first
suppress harsh failure outcomes on first guided expeditions; prefer retreat, delay, or partial loss
cap exposure to predatory public contracts while trust band is active
mark safe routes, safe board items, and recommended suppliers explicitly in UI
prevent beginner confusion between system-generated civic work and risky player-created contracts by labeling source clearly

Beginner protection should expire naturally after first few expeditions or by explicit player opt-out, not stay forever as hidden handicap.

See ../world/character-origins.md for creation-linked trust-band and first-three-expeditions rules.

Mail and Delivery¶

As soon as the game has asynchronous trade and markets, players need a secure delivery path for purchases, expired auctions, contract rewards, and inter-town logistics.

Reputation and Trust¶

If players can post work, sell information, and control towns, they need visible trust signals. Reputation should not fully replace player freedom, but it should reduce fraud and spam.