Content pipeline — ground files, the loader, presets, and the six painted Areas

done priority 1 estimate M

ground-types/005 · created 2026-08-17 · updated 2026-08-18

What to do

Get real ground into the authored Areas through the same reviewable-file path the world map uses.

New game/director/src/groundContent.ts: zod schema for the ground file (format in game/README.md, from task 001), parseRows / formatRows, and validateGround(area, portals, ground) — dimensions equal the world file’s, values 1..64, passable at (1,1), the hub entryCell, every portal from/to cell (a two-way portal’s return leg included) and the home landing cell; 8-way reachability from (1,1) and the entry cell to every portal cell using movement.gd’s corner rule. Errors, not warnings.
worldContent.ts loadWorldContent(pool, content, { ground }) → setAreaGround; loadWorldCli.ts reads sibling areas/<slug>.ground.json files; a missing file leaves the database as it is. The loader is strict on dimensions — cropping / padding is the editor’s job.
groundPaint.ts presets: river(seed) — a winding line of Water through the middle plus sprinkled grass — for the Village of Lor; a deterministic, hand-laid Badlands — patches of all eight types: a Mountain cluster with a peak core, a volcano, a lava pool, deep water, snow, sand, a Heaven-tiled plaza around the portals — keeping (1,1), (0,0), (2,4), (58,31) and the portal cells passable and reachable (deterministic beats random: reviewable, no re-rolls); sprinkle for the other four.
New CLI npm run paint-ground -- <slug> --preset plain|sprinkle|river|badlands [--seed N] (src/paintGroundCli.ts) writes the file. Commit the six files under game/content/areas/; load-world applies them locally.

Definition of done

Tests: the six committed files validate; loader round-trip; the validator rejects a mountain under a portal and an unreachable portal.
Local game: the Village shows sprinkled grass and a river; the Badlands shows every type.
Committed and pushed in land-of-lor.

Where the work lands

land-of-lor/game/director/, game/content/areas/.

What was done (2026-08-17, laptop session)

director/src/groundContent.ts: file schema, parseRows / formatRows / makeGroundContent, protectedCells, reachableFrom (8-way with the corner rule), validateGround, resizeGround, readGroundFiles. loadWorldContent(…, { ground }) validates the files with the graph before writing and applies them after ensureAreaGround; loadWorldCli reads areas/*.ground.json beside the world file.
groundPaint.ts presets river / paintVillage / paintBadlands (hand-laid) + rect / ellipse; new npm run paint-ground. The six files under game/content/areas/ committed (Village: sprinkled grass + river; Badlands: every type incl. a peak-cored range and a volcano; the other four sprinkled). Rendered and eyeballed via _shots.gd.
Tests: test/groundContent.test.ts (10) — codec, each refusal, the corner rule, resize, the six files validate against the world file, presets deterministic, load round-trip and refusal before write; loadWorldContent.test.ts still green.

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