settled-reach/docs/sprints/sprint-34/copy.md

Sprint 34: Pulse — Copy Tasks

Goal: Close Phase 2 — wire the economics simulation into the live game, expose price history and trade flows in the implant, and make the economy observable and tweakable at runtime.

Branch: sprint-34/copy Agents: Mellanie (author), Paula (narrative)

New Tickets

#	Title	Blocked by
#814	Rail infrastructure corporation gap	—
#695	Author overheard conversations for remaining 24 zone types	—

Key Decisions

• decisions/economics.md — D-182 (TOML source of truth — all economics content lives in wiki/economics/), D-175 (corporation taxonomy — Tier 1/2/3 structure)
• decisions/content.md — D-142 (zone-type template architecture — 31 zone types defined), D-139 (composable behavior primitives — overheard conversations are Layer 2 cultural flavor)

Notes

#814 — Rail infrastructure corporation gap

Context: The corporation validation pipeline (tooling/economy-db/import_economics.py) flagged a gap: no existing wiki corporation produces the rail_infrastructure commodity. This is a lore-world gap as much as a data gap — rail is the primary intra-continental transit system on inhabited worlds (see decisions/architecture.md D-093 for Sova Transit context, wiki/economics/production_chains.toml for chain definitions).

Deliverable: Either (a) assign rail_infrastructure production to an existing Tier 1 or Tier 2 corporation (MVG — Marvian Gravity Works — is the most plausible candidate given its Tier 1 infrastructure mandate) or (b) create a new corporation if no existing corp fits. Update:

• wiki/economics/corporations.toml — add production entry
• Corresponding wiki corporation page (if new corp: wiki/corporations/<name>.md)
• Verify make economy-db passes after the change

Do not assign to a Tier 3 regional corp — rail infrastructure is a systemic commodity that should have Tier 1 or Tier 2 backing.

#695 — Overheard conversations for remaining 24 zone types

Context: server/content/global/overheard.ron currently covers 5 of 29 zone types (~17% coverage). The remaining 24 types need 2-4 role-pair conversations each. These are the passive ambient dialogue lines that play when NPCs are overheard by the player without direct engagement (D-078).

Format: Each conversation entry in overheard.ron follows the existing pattern — two role slugs, a setting line (terse, 1 sentence describing where/when), and 3-5 lines of dialogue. Lines should feel naturalistic for the zone type; the NPC pair should be plausible co-workers or passers-by given the zone's economic activity.

Zone types to cover: Check server/content/global/zone-types/ for the full list. Currently covered: the 5 types already in overheard.ron (verify by reading the file). Write 2-4 conversations per remaining zone type. Prioritize the zone types most likely to be visited first in a playthrough: residential_dense, commercial_retail, transit_hub, office_district, industrial_light.

Lore anchors: Use the wiki cultural pages (wiki/cultures/) for voice and slang. Zone types that map to specific planetary environments (agricultural, wilderness) should reflect the relevant culture. Avoid generic SF clichés — these lines should feel like they belong in the Reach.

Volume: 24 zone types × 3 conversations average × 4 lines each = ~288 lines total. Work zone-type by zone-type; commit partial coverage. Do not block on completing all 24 before committing.

Dependency Chain

#814 (rail corp gap) — standalone
#695 (overheard conversations) — standalone, parallel

Both tickets are independent and can run in parallel.

PR Workflow

tea pr create --repo jpmschweitzer/settled-reach --login schweitz \
  --title "content(economics): rail corp gap and overheard conversation coverage" \
  --description "Sprint 34 copy work" \
  --base main --head sprint-34/copy