01 Prototype 08 Kit

The kit is every item the player owns. This doc covers where inactive items sit, how the player moves items between inactive and active, and the passive friendship they generate while inactive.

Dependencies: Items (08-items.md), ItemManager (08-item-manager.md), Roles (tech/06-roles.md), Venue (08-venue.md).

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Storage for inactive items

Two areas sit at the player's end of the court, as children of court.tscn. Each is both the parent for its items at rest and the drop target for deactivation.

• BallRack: inactive ball items. The court's ball manager reads from here.
• GearRack: inactive equipment. Items here are dragged onto the main character to equip.

Court items have no inactive state; they are always active on the court.

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Activate and deactivate

The player drives every transition by drag-and-drop. The gesture depends on the role.

Ball (BallRack and court)

Live drag, rally keeps going:

• Activate: drag a ball from BallRack onto the court. Ball enters play immediately.
• Deactivate: drag a live ball off the court back onto BallRack. Ball leaves play.

Court (always active)

No deactivation. On shipment arrival, the player drags the item from the box straight onto the court; it snaps to the next free Roles/Court marker. Removal is via the Tinkerer only (destroy or level-up; see 08-tinkerer.md).

Equipment (GearRack and main character)

Requires the main character to step off:

1. Player calls a timeout. Main character walks off the court to an authored equip pose. The rally plays out without a defender and ends on the next miss. (Later, if the bot is owned and active, it takes over the court via the standard idle-play handoff so the rally continues. Not in prototype scope until the bot ships.)
2. Player drags from GearRack onto the main character to equip, or from the character back to GearRack to deactivate. Equipment interaction is refused while a rally is in progress; presses on equipped items only land during timeout, between rallies, or at initial setup.
3. Player ends the timeout. Main character walks back on and resumes play at the next serve.

Drag preview

During any drag, the preview shows the item being moved. Activation has no friendship cost; the animation beat on equip is the friction.

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Passive friendship

Inactive items generate friendship over time. Rate scales with item cost and level. A well-stocked set of inactive items sustains the economy when the loadout is locked in. Active items (including all court items) do not generate passive friendship.

Signal layer (the player never has to notice):

• Partners. Partner dialogue recognises what's inactive in the kit ("you kept that?") across long runs. The inactive items belong to the partner relationships.
• The friend, once. Late in pre-break: one line. "I saw you kept that. You don't have to use it."

After The Break: the warmth was always real. The main character's memory still generating something in the absence.

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Implementation

Cadence

rate_per_second = sum over inactive items of _kit_rate_for(item)
soul_accumulator += rate_per_second * delta

Each whole-unit crossing adds 1 to the balance via add_soul. The fractional remainder stays in soul_accumulator.

Formula

@export var kit_rate_override: float = 0.0  # friendship/sec; 0 means use default

func _kit_rate_for(item: ItemDefinition) -> float:
    var level := get_level(item.key)
    if item.kit_rate_override > 0.0:
        return item.kit_rate_override * level
    return item.base_cost * level * kit_rate_coefficient

kit_rate_coefficient: float = 0.0005   # config key

Offline catch-up

On _ready, if kit_last_tick_unix > 0, award elapsed * rate in a single lump. Cap at offline_cap_seconds (see 08-venue.md). kit_last_tick_unix is updated on every save.

Save throttling

Kit-driven add_soul skips autosave; a 30-second timer flushes. User-driven balance changes save immediately.

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Testing

• Rate arithmetic (fixed delta, expected points).
• Offline catch-up and cap.
• Save throttling.
• Active items (including all court items) contribute zero.

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Rough ticket outline

Not filing yet.

1. BallRack and GearRack in court.tscn; drag targets wired per role.
2. Timeout gesture: main character walks off on timeout call, back on at timeout end.
3. Passive friendship (cadence, formula, offline catch-up, save throttling).