Settle identity, lifecycle and authority before mapping any cut

Re-cutting came from questions answerable on day one and asked on day three,
not from maps that lacked detail. A model table now precedes every cut map,
one row per persistent kind, and no cut is mapped while a cell is empty. The
operator's forks are gathered once rather than discovered across five cuts.

In the other direction, the per-file anchors are required only where the code
exists and they say what not to touch. Transcribing the body of code nobody
has written yet is a map at full scale, and the only spec complete enough
there is the code. Cutting faster means less prose per cut, not more code.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>

SKILL.md

@@ -70,6 +70,32 @@ finished when Hands can go straight to the cut.
   pipeline.
 - Dispatch the Mind Steward before the first consequential action.
 
+### 0b. Settle identity, lifecycle and authority before any cut is mapped
+
+Re-cutting is not usually caused by a map that was insufficiently detailed. It
+is caused by a question that was answerable on day one and got asked on day
+three. In the Eureka pipeline-state campaign every backtrack was one of three
+questions, and none of them needed a line of source to answer:
+
+- **Identity.** The key grammar was redesigned after three patches because ids
+  had no namespace. Every earlier cut specified behaviour over an unnamed
+  space, so the same invariant kept reappearing one level up.
+- **Lifecycle.** Cut 6d exists because the shape of each document was specified
+  and its life was not: a subject that is resolved, withdrawn, resolved again,
+  and transferred to another steward. Sequences had to be retrofitted into
+  keys that were already landed.
+- **Authority.** The repo-owned store died whole in Cut 4 because who owns a
+  mind was never asked before the store was specified.
+
+So produce one table before mapping any cut, with a row per persistent kind and
+three columns: what names it, what happens to it over time, and who decides.
+**No cut is mapped while a cell is empty.** This costs a page and an hour.
+
+Assemble the operator's forks in the same pass, as one batch. In that campaign
+they surfaced across five cuts instead, so rulings kept landing on code that was
+already written. Discovering that the operator wants something different is not
+waste; discovering it after the code lands is.
+
 ### 1. Imagination maps the cut
 
 Brief an Imagination agent to produce the **cut map**: an ordered list of cuts
@@ -79,13 +105,26 @@ against the current Body. Each cut carries:
 - **deletes first**, with exact paths and line counts;
 - keeps and moves;
 - adds;
-- per-file changes with `file:line` against a named HEAD;
+- per-file changes with `file:line` against a named HEAD, **for code that
+  exists**;
 - an **authority map** for anything that changes ownership: owner, inputs,
   outputs, derived state, forbidden writers, shared paths, deletion line;
 - **verification**: exact builds, tests with the rule each one pins, negative
   greps, and what only the operator can check;
 - a subtraction-ledger estimate.
 
+**Spend the detail where the map can be wrong, not where Hands will rewrite it
+anyway.** Anchors against existing code earn their length: they say what to
+delete and what not to touch. Transcribing the body of code that does not exist
+yet does not. A cut section that runs to eight hundred lines against a crate
+nobody has written is a 1:1 map, and the only spec complete enough at that scale
+is the code itself. Soul catches a wrong function body cheaply; it cannot catch
+a missing namespace. So for new code, name the types, the rules that must die
+under their own mutation, and the boundaries, then stop.
+
+Cutting faster means less prose per cut, never more code per cut. Small commits
+stay small.
+
 **Subtraction comes from a consumer audit of the public surface,** not from
 taste:
 

references/briefs.md

@@ -13,6 +13,32 @@ short form rather than pointing at a long document the agent may skim.
 
 ---
 
+## Imagination: settle identity, lifecycle and authority
+
+Run this once, before any cut is mapped. It answers the questions that cause
+re-cuts, and it needs almost no source.
+
+```
+You are Imagination for <migration>. Produce the model page in <path>. Do not
+map cuts, do not write code, do not commit; the root agent commits.
+
+Read <target doc> and enough of the Body to enumerate the persistent kinds.
+
+Give one table, a row per persistent kind:
+- Identity: what names it. Is the namespace stated? Is the name injective? Can
+  two different things collide? Is any part of it derived, and from what?
+- Lifecycle: what happens to it over time. Created, revised, superseded,
+  withdrawn, reinstated, transferred, deleted, replayed. For each, what the
+  record looks like afterwards and what is now in force.
+- Authority: who decides. One owner per decision. Name the forbidden writers.
+
+Then, in one batch, every question only the operator can answer, each with
+options and a recommendation, and what depends on the answer.
+
+An empty cell is the finding. Say so plainly rather than inventing a plausible
+value. Report the cells you could not fill and the source you checked.
+```
+
 ## Imagination: map or refresh a cut
 
 ```

references/changelog.md

@@ -2,6 +2,48 @@
 
 Record each change to the skill together with the evidence that motivated it.
 
+## 2026-09-16: front-load the invariant layer, thin the spelling layer
+
+Evidence: the operator's read of the Eureka pipeline-state campaign, that the
+design kept being discovered as the work went, producing re-cutting and
+repeated Imagination passes with no good reason for the map to diverge that
+far. The campaign's own record agrees, and says which layer was at fault.
+Every backtrack was identity, lifecycle or authority, and every one was
+answerable before a line of source was read:
+
+- The repo-owned store was specified before anyone asked who owns a mind, and
+  died whole in Cut 4: 1,302 lines deleted.
+- The key grammar was patched twice and redesigned on the third occurrence,
+  because ids had no namespace to be specified over.
+- Cut 6d retrofitted sequences into landed keys, because each document's shape
+  was specified and its life was not.
+- The operator's forks surfaced across five cuts, so rulings kept landing on
+  code that was already written. Two of them reversed defaults the agents had
+  already implemented.
+
+None of that was a shortfall of `file:line` detail. The maps had plenty:
+Cut 10's section ran to roughly eight hundred lines against a crate that did
+not exist. The operator named the trap for what it is, a 1:1 map, where the
+only sufficient spec is the code.
+
+- **Added step 0b.** A model table before any cut is mapped, a row per
+  persistent kind, three columns: what names it, what happens to it over time,
+  who decides. No cut is mapped while a cell is empty. Operator forks are
+  assembled in the same pass as one batch.
+- **Added the model-page brief** to `briefs.md`, before the cut-mapping brief.
+  An empty cell is the finding; inventing a plausible value is the failure.
+- **Qualified the per-file anchors.** They are required for code that exists,
+  where they say what to delete and what not to touch. For code that does not
+  exist, name the types, the boundaries and the rules that must die under their
+  own mutation, then stop.
+- **Stated what cutting faster means:** less prose per cut, never more code per
+  cut. Small commits stay small.
+
+Not treated as waste: the operator changing their mind. Learning that the
+intent differs is the job. It is only expensive when it is learned after the
+code lands, which is an argument for surfacing forks earlier rather than for
+mapping deeper.
+
 ## 2026-09-16: the loop was burning tokens on gaps, not defects
 
 Evidence: one day of the Eureka pipeline-state and TypeScript QUIC campaigns,