Card Types

A card is the smallest complete unit of the record that fits one hand. A Card Type names what kind of thing it holds — and every type shares one anatomy, so whoever can read one card can read them all.

The anatomy. A card has a face — its few fields: what it is, whose it is, where it stands. A record — every event that has happened to it, dated, nothing deleted. A thread — what has been said about it, by whom, when. And links — the cards and pages it depends on, serves, or is discussed in, which serve as its attachments. A card belongs to exactly one deck and one body's record; a view never copies a card, it points at it. The paper floor is a card file with the same four parts in ink.

The first types. The Playcard is what a Player or a Cell holds and plays. Work Card is one piece of work, with its address, its dependencies, its float and its stage. The TEA card is a Player's own daily account of time, energy and attention (TimeEnergy). The Concept Card is one concept of the language in card form, so an idea can be dealt and sorted beside the work that uses it.

It is load-bearing because it is what makes every surface of the Game the same object seen differently. The Board, a person's own hand, a wall of cards moved by hand, a dashboard: all of them are sorts of one deck rather than separate lists that must be kept in step. Keeping lists in step is where most of the administrative labour of an organisation goes, and it is entirely avoidable (Work Deck, The Deck Standard, The same card shape).

Types are added when the Game meets a thing that wants holding in one hand, and a type earns its place only when the same fields keep recurring and a hand wants to sort by them. That is a deliberately high bar: a type invented in advance of use produces fields nobody fills, and fields nobody fills are how a record quietly becomes fiction.

Also called: cards · the anatomy of a card Stands on: The same card shape · The Record · Screens and paper Opens onto: The Playcard · Work Card · Work Deck · The Concept Card · The Questcard · Pattern Card · The Deck Standard · Top card · TimeEnergy In play: the table — every object the Game holds is one of these Sources: Card Types.md (wiki root; frontmatter marks it a a proposal, unreviewed) · Projects/the term pages/Work Card.md, Work Deck.md (drafts) · The Playcard, Little Book chapter (current best understanding) · lionsberg.wiki: Card Types Open: The Playcard's two live senses — received and never filled in, or filled at each Turn — mean the type's own definition is unsettled (The Playcard stack). · The page names further types as near (a Story Card, a Request Card, a Role Card) and none exists.