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178 articles.

A

• Act I: The Long Wake In the alpha The first act, where the Evening Pair starts to drift and the Ranger learns that an irregular signal is not always something to remove.
• Act II: The Boundary Is Not a Wall Approved The second act, where the story reaches Starwell and Vessel Margins and shows a model-inspired stress relay beside a case with the same symptom but no relay.
• Act III: What Stays After the Signal Approved The third act, about revisits, history and later challenges, with the Quiet District repair and Mote's optional field invitation.
• Act IV: The Interval Approved The fourth act, a sincere calm with good days and unresolved days, final preparation and Pip's keeper handoff.
• Act V: The Break Approved The finale, a sudden focal mechanical injury at a familiar crossing that the community answers with shared, limited work.
• Acute brain injury Approved The science behind the Act V finale, a sudden focal mechanical injury that starts a different immune process from stress.
• An Errand That Was Already Underway Approved Rill's one-episode story, in which a capable microglial stranger shares a single room with the Ranger and then goes their own way.
• An Hour Without a Request Approved Stella's side story about the difference between being asked for help and having the capacity to give it.
• Anchor & Pull In the alpha The Sentinel's bonus action that anchors a process and flows the Ranger along a straight open line, or drags a debris clump toward it.
• Apothecary In the alpha The Threadway building that deals in signalling, with nothing bottled; it tunes your own signal, lets you rest once per outing and arranges the calming visit.
• Arborwake alpha In the alpha The lead's integrated alpha on the Placeholder branch, joining the overworld, the 3D Threadway, turn-based rooms and one save; incomplete, with the story ending after II1.
• Arborwake rename Accepted game The 31 October 2026 rename of the whole project to Arborwake, with old saves and skill kits still recognised through one compatibility module.
• Arborwake: The Long Wake Approved The main campaign of Arborwake, a prologue, five acts and an epilogue about a cellular community that learns to read changing signals.
• Archive In the alpha The Cartographer's Archive & Observatory on Threadway, which keeps field notes and research entries and is planned to chart the next outing.
• Art direction Approved The visual rules of Arborwake, set by the user directly - flat toon pixel art in the Threadway B08 style, cute slime-like 2D cells, and state changes that read at 1x.
• Aster Approved Starwell's anchored astrocyte, a brisk negotiator of support arrangements between neighbourhoods.
• Astro VFX In the alpha The astrocyte opening - a hole in the ground, one astrocyte process rising, sparkles - used for Link in turn rooms and for the calming visit at Hearth.
• Astrocyte In the alpha Star-shaped support cells; in Arborwake they are anchored residents whose help is spatial and finite.
• Attune In the alpha The Warden's passive that makes Link a bonus action and spreads supported ground one tile further.

B

• Basic actions In the alpha The actions every class has in a turn-based room: Move, Tend, Care, Inspect, Link, Settle, Call, Release and Wait.
• Board grid In the alpha The square-tile grid that turn-based rooms are played on, drawn as tilted 24×20 ground squares with a heavier border around the playable area.
• Border-associated macrophage Approved Immune cells that live at the brain's borders rather than inside the tissue; Bram is one, and they are not microglia or invaders.
• Bram Approved A border-associated macrophage at Vessel Margins who cares about place names and refuses to certify a report from looks alone.
• Bramble Retired The mentor microglia of Claude A's retired expedition tutorial; removed on 30 October and not part of the main game.
• Breach Retired A real-time injury climax with spreading waves and fast visitors; its Breach-first campaign role was withdrawn, and injury is now a separate Act V event.
• Build VFX In the alpha The construction and repair effects - built versus in use, a banked road stretch, "later" for one stretch per return, and a shortcut that opens only when it can really be walked.

C

• Calming visit In the alpha An Apothecary service in which an anchored astrocyte's process reaches up through an opening at Hearth and calms every resident.
• Care In the alpha The basic action that restores a connection's function, in a fast form that keeps a lingering response going and a recovery form that makes it fade.
• Care VFX In the alpha The turn-room effects for Care, recovery Care, Tend, Engulf, Trim, Process and Settle - three results with three shapes, timed to the rope's contact frame.
• Character sprites In the alpha How Arborwake's cell characters are drawn and animated, from the original Ranger sheets to the six named-cast production sheets installed in the alpha.
• Circuit Ranger prototype Accepted game The original three-minute opening on main, technically accepted in October but declared an unapproved prototype by the user on 29 October; still playable in the wiki's snapshot.
• Clear Interval In the alpha Mote's Imprint, which shows a lingering response's full fade timer and keeps it readable one round longer.
• Common Hall In the alpha The Threadway hall on the first terrace, whose blackboard shows the current story chapter and the community requests.
• Companion stress In the alpha A 0–4 level on each microglial resident that rises only from play, never from time, and never causes permanent harm.
• Composure In the alpha A unit's in-room steadiness in turn-based encounters; at 0 the unit is Overwhelmed and loses its next action.
• Controls In the alpha Keyboard, pointer and touch controls of the Arborwake alpha in the world maps, in the 3D Threadway and in the Places dialog.
• Coordinator In the alpha The specialisation that delegates to a companion, with Direct, Swap and Huddle; it stays locked until the first companion is recruited.
• Cress In the alpha A microglial resident who crosses the Quiet District with an ordinary record and argues with Wick about when a repaired road is safe.

D

• Delivery tray In the alpha A ceramic basin below Hearth's rosette that holds a finite community delivery of Supply.
• Dendritic Gardens In the alpha The first run location, reached from Nearfield Glade, where the Ranger cares for connections through telegraphed pressure fronts.
• Direct In the alpha The Coordinator's bonus action that gives its companion an extra move-and-act now, toward any target it can reach.

E

• Economy In the alpha An overview of how Supply, finds, outings, home buildings and services fit together, with the design rules that stop farming.
• Encounter backgrounds In the alpha The painted room shells behind Arborwake's turn-based boards - sixteen approved "3D made 2D" rooms whose floor fits the 24×20 grid, with round obstacles and per-room ground passes.
• Endurance In the alpha The outing budget: 6 points from home, 1 spent per room, restored fully only at home.
• Engulf In the alpha A flex skill that clears debris on a tile and all around it and draws the next ring in, after which the Ranger cannot move that turn.
• Ensemble scenes Approved Three optional shared scenes and a handful of small unrewarded episodes that keep Hearth Grove's residents present between their quests.
• Environment art In the alpha How Arborwake's places are made - concept studies, Meshy models and Blender renders finished as layered pixel art - and the history of the rejected first packages.
• Epilogue: The Next Ordinary Day Approved The closing scenes of The Long Wake, where Hearth Grove shows only the changes the player actually earned.
• Evening Pair In the alpha The paired evening pulse on Hearth Grove's north connection, the motif that ties every act of The Long Wake together.
• Exchange In the alpha Aster's single counter in Starwell, where you pack provisions and drop carried Supply before the Vessel Margins gate.
• Expeditions (real-time prototype) Retired The earlier real-time room system, with seconds-based hazards and six encounter families, retired on 1 November 2026 for turn-based encounters.

F

• Fen Approved A microglial resident who arrives with Hearth Grove's first growth, prefers moving work and can join the Ranger as a roamer.
• Field gear In the alpha One-use items from the Workshop that you carry in a two-slot satchel and use once per outing as a bonus action.
• Flex Ward In the alpha A flex skill for the Sentinel and Coordinator: a small one-round ring on a tile and its four neighbours.
• Flow In the alpha The Ranger's overworld travel look, version v002 "melt and move", in which the cell folds its processes in and flows forward on a membrane wave.
• Food Hall Proposed A designed Threadway service where a free shared meal uses the return's one recovery step; it has a menu but no building in the scene.
• Full Length In the alpha Wick's Imprint, which makes the Ranger's Support count twice in tract preparation at the cost of weaker Care.

G

• Glide In the alpha A flex skill for the Warden and Coordinator that flows the Ranger up to 4 tiles in a straight open line without touching surfaces.

H

• Hearth boards Dev prototype Turn-based home-disturbance boards cut from the Hearth map, with six disturbance types that start only when the player presses Ready.
• Hearth buildings In the alpha The three home projects (Arbor, Recovery nook and Relay node) built on Hearth's plots, plus the two new home connections.
• Hearth Grove In the alpha The Ranger's home base, an open field round a fire bowl where residents keep home duties, buildings go up and every outing starts and ends.
• Hearth podium In the alpha The outing podium by Hearth's exit - press it and squares float up in the world for the Imprint, the companions and the run records; it is not a shop and not a HUD panel.
• Hearth strain In the alpha A 0–4 bar for how hard the home was worked while the Ranger was away; at 4 the next home disturbance overreacts, but nothing locks.
• Home art In the alpha The art of Hearth, the player's home - the H15 map with home layout A, the neurons' own axon lines, the buildings, podium, delivery tray and scorch marks, and the growth lines still under review.
• Home duties In the alpha The watches and contacts that residents hold at Hearth; cover is arranged automatically at departure, and each duty is covered, stretched or a gap.
• Home VFX In the alpha The home effects - the Hearth podium's floating squares, Imprint equip at home, the companions board, departure and return, and rest at the Apothecary.
• Huddle In the alpha The Coordinator's passive reaction in which an adjacent companion takes a hit meant for the Ranger.

I

• Icon labels In the alpha Arborwake's rule for words in the interface - a short title on hover, focus or press-and-hold, and a click card with the details and an "in the brain" line.
• Imprints In the alpha Seven passive keepsakes, each earned once by finishing a resident's side story and equipped at home before an outing, like Hades keepsakes.
• Inventory HUD In the alpha The town and home interface - a Stardew-style parchment inventory, the 54-icon set, the themed shop menus and the Hearth strain bar - made on the claude/hud-inventory branch.

K

• Kit history In the alpha How the Ranger's classes and skills changed from the legacy two-class kit through kit v1–v5 to the turn-based kit installed in the alpha.
• Known Turns In the alpha Fen's Imprint, which gives an extra move when a turn starts on a tile already stood on, at the cost of reach in round 1.

L

• Lessons In the alpha The nine one-lesson tutorial rooms that teach turn-based play, replayable in Memory Meadow.
• Link In the alpha The basic action that asks an anchored astrocyte to support its territory, turning the tiles around its socket into supported ground.
• Live preview site In the alpha The publicly reachable Arborwake page, built from Placeholder commit 82c3add0d; an incomplete first alpha slice that is older than the lead's local integration.
• Location verbs In the alpha Actions that exist only where a room offers them: Seal in Vessel Margins, and Trim and Process in the Quiet Tracts and the Tag Garden.
• Long Reach In the alpha The Sentinel's passive that raises its reach from 3 tiles to 4.

M

• Many Hands Retired A real-time cooperation family around a hidden vessel leak; its injury version is kept for Act V and its non-leak version is on hold.
• Market stalls Proposed A designed Threadway service that buys surplus finds for fixed Supply, one way only; it has a menu but no stalls in the scene.
• Memory Meadow In the alpha A hippocampus-inspired dawn meadow north of the Glade where you replay free lessons and try specialisations, and the planned Act V refuge.
• Microglia In the alpha The brain's resident immune cells; in Arborwake, the Ranger and every recruitable companion are microglia.
• Monocyte In the alpha Blood immune cells that, in some rodent stress models, are recruited to the brain's vessel walls; in Arborwake they appear only in model-labelled Vessel Margins rooms.
• Mote In the alpha A small microglial neighbour who records tiny changes in Mote Pocket and can become the first optional field companion.
• Mote Pocket In the alpha A small, dim, rock-walled dell off the Glade where Mote keeps a tidy nook and the first story observations take place.
• Movement VFX In the alpha The overworld movement effects - a short dot trail behind walking, a finer trail behind Flow, and a body shake when a walk is blocked.
• Myelin, demyelination and repair Approved The science behind the Quiet District's optional road repair, kept separate from the stress story on purpose.

N

• Nearfield Glade In the alpha A woodland crossroads east of Hearth that links home, Memory Meadow, Mote Pocket, the Threadway road and the Dendritic Gardens.
• Nell Approved A rooted home neuron at Hearth Grove, linked to the Evening Pair, who does not want one irregular afternoon to define them.
• Neural Highway Proposed A white-matter tract that runs above Threadway inside a walkable glass tunnel, planned as a fast-travel network with porthole stops.
• Neuron In the alpha Nerve cells that carry signals; in Arborwake they are rooted gold residents whose pulses the player learns to read and must never lose.

O

• Oligodendrocyte In the alpha The cells that wrap axons in myelin; in Arborwake they are anchored and only extend, and only they can repair the Quiet District road.
• Oligodendrocyte precursor cell In the alpha The young cells that can mature into new oligodendrocytes; in the Quiet Tracts they mature in place and wrap by extension.
• Orders VFX In the alpha The turn-room effects for a companion's orders - Direct, Swap, Huddle and Call - where Call is drawn as a signal that residents choose to answer.

P

• Palettes Approved The colour rules of Arborwake - the shared B08 palette, a distinct ramp per district, the lighter oligodendrocyte ramp and the fixed rope and outline colours.
• Panels VFX In the alpha The menu and inventory effects - hover corners, a pressed button that sinks, tab and item markers, equip and unequip - with one shape for each state and no words.
• Pericyte Approved Cells wrapped around small blood vessels; in Arborwake, Vessa is a pericyte who reads the vessel border.
• Pip In the alpha Hearth Grove's keeper, a microglial resident who covers the east bend and can become a late field companion after a real handoff.
• Places dialog In the alpha The map picker that lists Arborwake's places as picture buttons; in the alpha it walks the player toward the right exit instead of teleporting.
• Pneumatic tube In the alpha A glass tube in Threadway's station that carries you between the street and the upper deck, where the road to the Quiet District starts.
• Pressure & Aftermath In the alpha The Dendritic Gardens encounter module, in which forecast pressure fronts strike connections and the Ranger protects them, then helps them settle.
• Pressure Front (real-time) Retired A real-time family about stress "weather" over four tissue patches; its ideas were folded into Pressure & Aftermath and the turn-based pressure front.
• Pressure front VFX In the alpha The animated pressure front in turn rooms - coming, striking, resolving one at a time, lingering and held overload - restyled to the painted rooms and approved by the user.
• Prologue: The Last Regular Evening In the alpha The opening of The Long Wake, where the Ranger learns a calm Hearth Grove, meets Pip and Mote and first sees the Evening Pair.
• Pull and Glide VFX In the alpha The turn-room effects for Pull, Glide and dragged debris - anchors and landings while aiming, a gripping diamond and clamps, a body that flows tile by tile, and a still trail under reduced motion.

Q

• Quest scroll In the alpha The quest tracker - one narrow parchment scroll that winds open below a rolled header, with named rows, square progress pips and red and blue unread marks.
• Quests VFX In the alpha The quest and pickup effects - tracking a quest, evidence found at its cell, a finished side story, the first permanent unlock, and taking something from a pickup source.
• Quiet District In the alpha A night-blue side-on district round an elevated myelinated road with five repairable stretches, the Wrapping Depot and the gate to the Quiet Tracts.
• Quiet Handoff In the alpha Pip's Imprint, which makes a paid Call answer in the same round at the cost of weaker Care.
• Quiet Tract (real-time) Retired The real-time tract-repair family, in which the Ranger led a precursor cell to a bare axon segment; replaced by the Quiet Tracts wrap rooms.
• Quiet Tracts In the alpha The third run location, gated by the Quiet District, where the Ranger clears debris so an anchored oligodendrocyte can wrap a tract.

R

• Ranger In the alpha The player's microglial cell, a resident of Hearth Grove with no forced name, gender or destiny.
• Recovery parcel Retired A removed piece of field gear that carried recovery into rooms; the user ruled that calming signals cannot be bottled, and supported ground replaced it.
• Recruitment In the alpha How companions join: only by completing a quest step in their side story, never through a menu, button, shop or the podium; one companion per outing.
• Relay Chain Retired A real-time family about alarm that recruits monocytes at a cost; its science became the Vessel Margins monocyte surge and reactive walls.
• Relay post Approved A late home project (30 Supply, from Act IV) that covers Pip's keeper watch so Pip can be recruited for field outings.
• Rest In the alpha A paid Apothecary service during an outing that restores 2 endurance, never above 4, once per outing; it replaced resting at Starwell and the Depot.
• Review process Approved How work is checked before it reaches the game - workstreams decide small calls, fresh blind reviewers test readability, and only looks, reversals and big changes go to the user.
• Rill In the alpha A microglial resident of the Dendritic Gardens who shares one room with the Ranger and never joins the roster.
• Room assembly Dev prototype How turn-based rooms are made: hand-made sections and rooms, a strict assembler, a shuffle engine and a bot "difficulty oracle" that checks each variant.
• Run HUD In the alpha The interface for turn-based rooms - goal strip, action bar, unit cards, tutorial prompt, result screen and endurance chip - made by the Run HUDs session and approved piece by piece by the user.

S

• Saving and save migration In the alpha How each Arborwake build stores progress, what session.game v1 holds, and how older saves carry over after the Arborwake rename and between alpha versions.
• Science guardrails Approved The rules that keep Arborwake's biology honest; its classes and abilities are fictional mechanics, not clinical claims.
• Sentinel In the alpha The specialisation that finds and reaches, with Survey for hidden threats, Anchor & Pull for movement and the Long Reach passive.
• Services v3 In the alpha Version 3 of Claude B's district services module, which added Hearth strain to the turn-based gear, signal tuning and companion stress of version 2.
• Settle In the alpha The basic self-calming action that restores Composure, more on supported ground.
• Shared Boundary In the alpha Aster and Vessa's Imprint, which shows visible telegraphs one round earlier at the cost of one move in the first round.
• Signal tuning In the alpha An Apothecary service that sets one of the Ranger's own signals to level 0–3 for a whole outing, following an inverted U.
• Sleep and stress research Retired Research on sleep, phone use and accidents that once informed a human "owner" storyline; the user excluded that storyline, so sleep is background only.
• Someone Else's Shift Approved Pip's side story, in which a real relay-post handoff lets Hearth's keeper step away for the first time.
• Stand Fast In the alpha The Warden's stance action that roots the Ranger until its next turn, wards its own tile and makes the first hit cost no Composure.
• Starwell In the alpha A side-on support and staging district at Threadway's east end, with the Exchange, the Star Well and the gate to Vessel Margins.
• Stella Approved Hearth Grove's anchored astrocyte, who supports one home connection and is rarely visited when nothing is wrong.
• Stress-associated neuroinflammation Approved The research theme behind Arborwake's central story, presented as model-specific and context-dependent, never as a single stress meter.
• Stress-associated neurovascular relay Approved The rodent finding behind Act II's Relay scenes, in which microglia, blood monocytes and the vessel lining pass an inflammatory signal, and its necessary counter-example.
• Studios In the alpha The Threadway training building, planned to hold a class lobby and one floor of advanced drills per specialisation; in the alpha it points you to Memory Meadow.
• Studios drills Proposed Eight training drills on the Studios floors that unlock run-upgrade and flex-skill eligibility once each; designed by Claude B but not connected in the alpha.
• Studios interior Approved The lobby of the Skill Studios on Threadway, a sci-fi research-station room built from a concept, pixelised, cleaned and projected so cells can walk in depth.
• Supply In the alpha Arborwake's one currency, carried as cargo in the field and banked at home, spent on home buildings, gear, provisions and Apothecary services.
• Supported ground In the alpha Tiles around a linked astrocyte socket that restore Composure and strengthen Care; it replaced the recovery parcel as in-room recovery.
• Surfaces In the alpha Tile states on a turn-based board, such as debris, inflamed, supported and scorch, that change movement, Care and Composure.
• Survey In the alpha The Sentinel's action that reveals hidden things within 5 tiles and shows every telegraph two rounds ahead until its next turn.
• Survey ribbon In the alpha One-use Workshop field gear that sweeps 3 tiles around the Ranger for anything hidden, as a bonus action for any class.
• Survey VFX In the alpha The turn-room effects for Survey - a scan tint over the exact area, two sweeping scan columns, an evidence frame and lens on each revealed front, and a hollow return when nothing is found.
• Swap In the alpha The Coordinator's bonus action that trades places with its companion along an open line.

T

• Tag Garden Approved An optional Dendritic Gardens side room about pruning, where the Ranger gathers evidence with Inspect and then Trims quiet inputs under tags that are only hints.
• Tea House In the alpha A terrace café on Threadway where a shared tea answers a resident's open visit request.
• Tendrils In the alpha The thin rope-like processes that microglia, astrocytes and oligodendrocytes extend only during actions, drawn under the body by one shared rope module.
• The Border of an Agreement Approved The joint side story of Aster and Vessa, who agree on a clearer way to report what happens at the vessel border.
• The Five Stretches Approved Wick's long optional arc, in which five banked repairs restore the Quiet District's old road and open a ridge shortcut.
• The Names at the Edge Approved Bram's short local story about three names for one border place; it improves the map and reports but gives no Imprint.
• The Part Between Approved Nell's side story, in which a rooted home neuron objects to being treated as an emergency after one irregular afternoon.
• The Space Between In the alpha Nell's Imprint, which keeps the "working again" sign readable one round longer but forbids Caring the same connection twice in a row.
• The Stretch Between Neighbours Approved Cress's short story about carrying an ordinary record across the Quiet District, and about whether a repaired stretch is safe to cross.
• The Uninteresting Ones Approved Mote's side story about keeping ordinary observations, correcting a doubtful report and learning to stop an investigation honestly.
• Threadway In the alpha The town street, a live 3D scene with flat 2D cells, where the Threadway buildings stand and the roads to the Glade, Starwell and Quiet District meet.
• Threadway 3D scene In the alpha The art side of Threadway - the P24 Blender scene with frozen painted projections, a hazed back row and a glass tract, shown live in 3D with flat 2D cell sprites.
• Threadway residences In the alpha The Home and Apartments on Threadway, closed façades for recurring characters whose interiors are still placeholders.
• Threats In the alpha The telegraphed processes that act on a turn-based board each round, such as pressure fronts, jolts, debris flows and the monocyte surge.
• Travel and movement In the alpha How the Ranger walks the world: free continuous movement, collision-aware click routing, fades between maps, the 3D Threadway's measured navigation and the pneumatic tube.
• Turn-based encounters In the alpha Arborwake's room combat since 1 November 2026, a side-based tactics system inspired by Into the Breach and Baldur's Gate 3.
• Typography In the alpha Arborwake's two original pixel fonts - Canopy for titles and short labels, Fieldnotes for reading text - approved by the user and used across the game except in painted signs.

U

• Upgrades In the alpha Run upgrades that reshape a class's action economy, each with a real cost; eight exist in the turn-based kit.

V

• Vessa Approved A pericyte at Vessel Margins who knows familiar border traffic from unusual adhesion, and is tired of visitors calling everything an invasion.
• Vessel Margins In the alpha The second run location, gated by Starwell, where the Ranger reads vessel walls and answers each with the right partner.
• Vessel VFX In the alpha The Vessel Margins effects - a visible monocyte surge countdown along the vessel's centre line, and adhesion where a monocyte sticks to the wall.
• VFX In the alpha Arborwake's visual effects - quiet, tactile pixel feedback with no words and no popups, built as eight turn groups and five overworld groups, all approved by the user.

W

• Ward In the alpha The Warden's action that plants a 3×3 ring for 2 rounds, holding back 60% of the harm to everything inside it, never all of it.
• Ward stake In the alpha One-use Workshop field gear that wards a single tile for one round, as a bonus action for any class.
• Ward VFX In the alpha The turn-room effects for Ward and Stand Fast - five plates per tile, three solid and two empty, so a ward visibly shares 60% of a hit and never reads as immunity.
• Warden In the alpha The specialisation that protects what the room threatens, with the 60% Ward ring, Stand Fast and the Attune passive.
• Who Takes the New Road? Approved Fen's side story about which home routes suit a mobile resident, opened only after the player grows Hearth Grove.
• Wick Approved An oligodendrocyte-lineage resident of the Quiet District who has worked on the old road long before the Ranger arrived.
• Withdrawn story directions Retired Story ideas that the user withdrew or replaced, from the Circuit Ranger opening and Breach-first campaign to the Hearth refuge and the free helper.
• Within Reach In the alpha Stella's Imprint, which makes Care stronger on supported ground and slightly weaker elsewhere.
• Workshop In the alpha An open ground-floor shop on Threadway that builds and fits permanent tools and makes one-use field gear.
• Workshop tools In the alpha Three permanent Workshop tools (Steady grip, Quick hands, Reaching frame), each a sidegrade; one is fitted at a time.
• Workstreams Approved Who works on what in Arborwake as of 2 November 2026 - the Codex lead and integrator, and the Claude sessions for rooms, rules, art, effects, interface and the wiki - with their branches and latest tips.
• Wrapping Depot In the alpha The Quiet District workshop that turns wrapping spools from the Quiet Tracts into repairs of the district's road, one stretch per return.