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Characters

Each character occupies characters/<folder>/character.json.

{
  "id": "mara",
  "name": "Mara Vale",
  "aliases": ["Dr Vale"],
  "role": "playable",
  "kind": "person",
  "tier": "principal",
  "summary": "An astronomer who returned to investigate her mentor's disappearance.",
  "personality": "Patient in public, relentless in private.",
  "background": "She grew up below the observatory.",
  "appearance": "Tall, dark-haired, usually dressed for bad weather.",
  "speech": {"style": "Precise and restrained", "examples": ["Facts first. Fear later."]},
  "visual_identity": {
    "description": "A tall woman in her early thirties with dark wavy hair and grey eyes.",
    "tags": ["dark wavy hair", "grey eyes"],
    "negative_tags": ["blonde hair"]
  },
  "start": {
    "public_state": "Recently arrived from London.",
    "activity": "Reviewing her mentor's notes.",
    "inner_state": "Afraid the old rumours were true.",
    "location": "observatory-library",
    "emotion": {"baseline": {"valence": -0.1, "arousal": 0.4, "dominance": 0.2}},
    "intents": [{"id": "find-mentor", "name": "Find her mentor", "plan": "Trace his final observations."}]
  }
}

Roles and kinds​

role is playable or npc. kind is person or group. tier is principal, supporting or background. A playable character must be a person and cannot be background.

Age, gender and pronouns are optional. summary, personality, background, appearance and speech serve different prompt purposes and should not be collapsed into one biography.

Initial state​

public_state is observable, activity is what the character is actually doing, and inner_state is private. Starting placement, emotion, intents, memberships, inventory and variable values also belong under start.

Relationships and knowledge​

relationships contains directional profiles from this character to another: label, summary, familiarity, trust, affinity and tension. The reverse direction is a separate record.

knowledge seeds explicitly known locations, items, directed exits and lore. No record means unknown. Do not use knowledge edges to encode changing location, ownership or condition.

Routines​

routine is an ordered list of recurring windows. Each may specify days, from, to, activity, location, feature, position and interruptible. Times use HH:MM; a window ending before it starts crosses midnight.