# tongue.lines — the script of the translation beat `require("tongue.lines")` Every written line the tongue slice owns, in one table, so the voice bake can harvest the whole script in a single pass. ```lua local Lines = require("tongue.lines") Lines.LINES -- every line, in play order Lines.all() -- the same, rebuilt from the book as it stands Lines.core() -- only the lines the game cannot do without Lines.get(id) -- one line Lines.at(station, role) -- e.g. Lines.at("eelbank", "call") Lines.budget() -- lines, core/extra split, characters, by speaker Lines.SPEAKERS -- the six voices, with how each one reads ``` ## A line | field | | |---|---| | `id` | stable key, e.g. `tongue.eelbank.call` — built from station + role, never an index, so re-harvesting after an edit does not re-buy the script | | `who` | `lingster` · `ithkeel` · `haalwen` · `skerr` · `vrannock` · `oonhraa` | | `lang` | `english` or `hernsew` | | `role` | `call` · `bird_right` · `bird_wrong` · `lingster_right` · `lingster_wrong` · `lingster_hint` · `lingster_hail` | | `station` | which post it belongs to | | `priority` | `core` — the game is not itself without it · `extra` — colour | | `text` | **what a screen prints.** For a hernsew line this is the romanised call, beside the glyphs — never an English translation, because the translation is the puzzle. | | `speech` | what a text-to-speech service is handed. For English it is the same string; for hernsew it is a respelling that makes an English reader produce the right sounds — `throop`, not `thrup`. | ## Keep the text `text` is what the game says. The audio is how it says it. A line whose generation fails still ships: print it, report the missing audio, and never delete the line. ## The six voices The Lingster is northern, dry, tired, sixty-odd; talks to birds and sheep because there is nobody else. The five hernsews are distinct on purpose — Ithkeel flat and incurious, Haalwen clipped and bored, Skerr low and territorial, Vrannock old and slow, Oonhraa quieter than the rest and the only one that ever asks a question. `SPEAKERS[who].note` carries the direction.

# rules <!-- zero:scaffolded-readme --> <!-- Replace the line below with what this module provides and who consumes it, then delete both comment lines. --> TODO: describe this module.

# tongue.book — Hernsew, and the phrasebook that grows `require("tongue.book")` Hernsew is the tongue the herons of Yowe Fen speak, and this module is all of it: twelve glyphs, one rule of grammar, five calls built out of them, and the phrasebook the Lingster fills in as the run goes on. It is a **model**. It draws nothing. `screens` renders what is in here. ## The tongue Twelve morphemes. Six are **roots** — things. Six are **affixes** that hang on a root and change it. A word is built by one rule: ``` [prefix-] root [-suffix] ``` and a phrase is words in the order they are meant. | | | | |---|---|---| | `kraa` | water | the tide, the sea coming in | | `sinn` | bird | a hernsew; a bird says it of itself | | `wold` | walker | the two-legs. You. | | `mell` | flock | the many | | `thrup` | stands | a standing-place, a stage-post | | `gis` | shelter | a fold of stone; the high ground | | `-eth` | rises | that thing rises, comes, grows | | `-ok` | falls | the mirror of `-eth` | | `-un` | not | alone, with nothing to hang on: *no* | | `-ar` | ? | makes a question of the phrase | | `ha-` | my | belonging to the speaker | | `ne-` | your | belonging to the one spoken to | So `ha-kraa-eth` is *my-water-rises*, and it can be read by anyone who has met `ha-`, `kraa` and `-eth` separately. That is the whole design: **meaning composes, so a fifth glyph can be reasoned about from four.** The Lingster begins the run knowing `kraa`, `sinn`, `wold` and `-eth`. The rest are earned at the posts. ## The five posts | post | call | teaches | |---|---|---| | The Reedgate | `Sinn thrup. Kraa-eth.` | `thrup` | | The Sluice | `Mell-ok. Kraa-eth.` | `mell`, `-ok` | | The Drownway | `Ha-thrup. Ne-mell-ok.` | `ha-`, `ne-` | | The Eelbank | `Ha-kraa-eth. Ne-thrup-ok.` | **nothing new** | | The Last Post | `Wold. Kraa-eth. Ha-gis ne-gis-ar?` | `gis`, `-ar` | The Eelbank is the point of the game. Every scrap of that call was earned at the three posts before it, so the reading is *deducible* rather than remembered — and a player who gets it can say why. ## The glyphs are marks, not letters Roots are pictographic — `kraa` is two running waves, `wold` is two legs under a head, `gis` is a roof over a base, `sinn` is a bill, an S-neck, a body and two legs. Affixes are single strokes: a rise, a fall, a cross, a hook, a stem with one dot or two. Every glyph record carries the mark two ways: - **`svg`** — a complete SVG document, already stroked in the phrasebook's ink. Hand it straight to an `svg` widget: `{ type = "svg", props = { svg = g.svg } }`. It carries only a `viewBox` (120 × 150), so it scales to whatever box it is dropped into. In a gloss, an **unearned** glyph's `svg` comes back dimmed — it is on the page, and it is the thing the player cannot read yet. - **`path`** — the bare path data in a 0–100 box, for restyling. It is meant to be **stroked**, never filled. `Book.glyphSvg(id, { stroke, width, size, opacity })` builds the document with your own ink. An open encounter carries `glyphs` — the marks of the call, in order, as full glyph records — and `glyphIds`, the same list as bare ids. ## The interface ```lua local Book = require("tongue.book") Book.open(stationId) -- open the beat at a post -> Encounter? Book.answer(optionId) -- give a reading -> boolean (true = right) Book.close() -- drop the open encounter Book.current() -- what is open, or nil Book.gloss(enc?) -- word by word, with `?` where a glyph is unearned Book.learned() -- the phrasebook, in the order earned Book.alphabet() -- every glyph, `known` flagged Book.glyph(id) -- one glyph Book.glyphSvg(id, o) -- one mark as a ready-to-draw SVG document Book.knows(id) -- boolean Book.encounters() -- all five, unopened, for the voice bake Book.state() -- { encounter, learned, attempts, total } Book.reset() -- back to the starting phrasebook ``` A **right** answer teaches that post's glyphs, closes the beat and raises `ANSWERED(stationId, true)`. A **wrong** one raises `ANSWERED(stationId, false)`, marks the option tried and **leaves the post open** — the bird is still in the way, and the tide has just cost you. After two wrong readings the encounter's `hint` is worth putting on screen. `Book.gloss()` is what a screen draws: one entry per word, each carrying its glyph parts, their marks, and `meaning = nil` where the player has not earned the glyph yet. That hole is the puzzle. ## What it writes `Rules.state[Rules.KEY.ENCOUNTER]` — the open station id, or nil. `Rules.state[Rules.KEY.LEARNED]` — how many glyphs are in the phrasebook.

# sound.voice The one call the rest of the game makes to be heard. ```lua local Voice = require("sound.voice") Voice.line("tongue.reedgate.call") -- a written line, spoken Voice.say("Walk on, then.", "The Lingster") -- free text, spoken if it was baked Voice.sfx("answer_right") -- a one-shot, flat Voice.sfx("sfx_splash", { x = 0, y = 0, z = 84 }) -- a one-shot, out there Voice.ui("click") -- the interface answering ``` ## A spoken line always has its text on screen Every call that speaks also raises `hernsew:say` with the text, the speaker's name, and **the clip's real length**, read off the payload's own header. The screens slice's caption queue listens on that signal, so the words are up for exactly as long as the voice is — and a line whose clip was never baked still goes up, unvoiced. The return value says only whether it was *heard*. ## Everything here is guarded A clip that was never baked, an anchor that has not spawned yet, a slice that loaded before the mix did — each of them makes this quiet, never an error. A game taken down by a missing noise is a worse failure than a game missing a noise. ## Surface | Call | Does | |---|---| | `line(id, opts?)` | speak a line of the written script by id | | `say(text, who?)` | speak free text; matches it against the script | | `sfx(name, at?, opts?)` | a one-shot from `sound.clips`, flat or placed | | `ui(kind)` | `"click"` / `"hover"` / `"back"` / `"page"` | | `lines()` | the whole spoken script, for anybody baking or listing it | | `clipFor(id)` / `lengthOf(id)` | the clip and its true length | | `isSpeaking()` / `lastLine()` / `stop()` | what is being said right now | | `ready()` | whether the mix is up and holding emitters | `__attach` / `__detach` are the mix component's own; nothing else calls them.