Knowledge threads

Main rule

A thread follows one question across several ages. The basic explanation is always simple. Afterwards, any player can choose “Tell me more”, regardless of age.

Each character advances only as far as their time and experience allow. On reaching that limit, they acknowledge what they do not know. The Atlas saves the point reached and the open question.

Who does each part

• Current character: explains what they observe, practise or understand in their world.
• Tracekeeper: tells the new character what was learned before.
• Atlas: stores the thread, summarises the previous point and identifies an open question. It does not reveal the answer in advance.
• Later character: adds only what can be known in their own age.

Two characters separated by centuries do not remember or know one another. The player's journey creates the link.

What limits a character

Five things are checked before writing extra depth:

1. Date and place: what existed there and then.
2. Work and experience: what this particular person could know.
3. Tools and materials: what they could observe or test.
4. Historical sources: what is documented and what is reconstruction.
5. Safety: what can be shown without giving dangerous instructions.

The character does not express modern ideas in ancient words. Nor do they know later people, inventions or results. If a question goes beyond the limit, the answer resembles: “I can tell you what I have seen, but I cannot explain that part.”

The checkpoint saved by the Atlas

Each encounter records:

• thread identifier;
• mission and character;
• date and place;
• last completed step;
• observation learned;
• question left open;
• historical limit reached.

When another character continues the thread, they receive only a summary from the player or the Atlas. They never receive impossible memories or knowledge.

How to present a continuation

1. Recall: “With the previous character, you learned…”
2. Open question: “What remained unknown was…”
3. New context: “This tool now exists, or this new problem appears…”
4. Reason for progress: explain why the earlier character did not need or could not observe this aspect.
5. New limit: the current character states how far they can go.

The text does not say “people before were ignorant”. It may say: “Kael tended an open hearth; this potter needs to hold heat around several vessels. They are different problems.”

Active threads in the Prehistory campaign

0. Materials, choice and shared work — Mission 1.0

• With Lorn, Ena and Luma: four small stone pieces come from different map areas. Lorn compares colour, texture and visible hardness before choosing which pieces work; Ena composes and strings a modest necklace for Luma, who chooses the irregular bead.
• How far they go: Lorn knows how to choose and work the materials of his experience; Ena explains how she wants to compose the necklace and Luma says which piece she likes. They do not know modern mineralogy or how to interpret every archaeological bead.
• Saved question: “What lets us know what an ornament was used for?”
• Planned continuation: no later character has been approved. The Atlas preserves the question until a documented mission can advance it through objects, context and a suitable voice without inventing a meaning.

1. Fire and heat — Mission 1.1

• With Kael: thin, dry material catches more easily, thick pieces last longer, and an ember needs air and attention.
• How far he goes: he can compare what he sees, hears and smells. He does not know the composition of air, the chemistry of fire or measured temperatures.
• Saved question: “How does fire change when we enclose heat more effectively?”
• Planned continuation: in Mission 2.1, a potter in Uruk begins with the memory of Kael and works with vessels and a firing space. She can advance because her craft requires distributing heat around clay; she stops before modern chemistry. Much later, Hero may open another branch involving hot water and movement.

2. Clothing and joining materials — Mission 1.2

• With Tala and Lorn: covering is not enough; gaps, dampness and the way pieces are joined change how well a garment protects.
• How far they go: they compare hide, bone, sinew and fibres they know. They do not discuss looms, metal, modern insulation measurements or industrial clothing.
• Saved question: “How could we make many lengths of thread and cross them to form a surface?”
• Planned continuation: no later textile mission has yet been approved. The Atlas keeps the exact checkpoint and does not invent a linking character.

3. Animals, risk and cooperation — Mission 1.3

• With Bora: a track, the wind, terrain and the group's behaviour help decide whether to approach or retreat.
• How far he goes: experience tells him how animals in his surroundings react. He does not know modern theories of evolution, behaviour or domestication.
• Saved question: “Why do some animals eventually live close to people?”
• Planned continuation: no later character has yet been approved. The answer remains closed until a domestication mission has its own date, place and sources.

4. Wild plants, selection and change — Mission 1.4

• With Sira: shape, smell, place and season help identify familiar resources; choosing what to gather also changes what remains.
• How far she goes: she recognises plants from experience. She does not know scientific names, botany, medical properties or organised agriculture.
• Saved question: “What happens if we repeatedly save and sow the seeds that suit us best?”
• Planned continuation: in Mission 2.2, a Sumerian farmer returns to the question from already cultivated fields. She can advance because she deliberately sows and compares harvests; she does not treat Sira as less intelligent. Mission 4.3 may later add the problem of farming a slope.

5. Pigments, surfaces and preservation — Mission 1.5

• With Oru: grinding a material produces colour, but powder behaves differently on different surfaces and does not always remain.
• How far he goes: he compares ochre, charcoal and pale stone by observation. He does not know formulae, microscopes, synthetic pigments or laboratory analysis.
• Saved question: “Why do some mixtures stay on a surface while others fall away?”
• Planned continuation: in Mission 3.4, a person who prepares kohl in Egypt receives Oru's summary. They advance because they work with other materials for another purpose; they still do not explain modern chemistry or turn a prehistoric reconstruction into fact.

6. Food, work and reserves — Mission 1.6

• With Sira: finding food, preparing it in time, sharing it and saving some are different problems when more people arrive than expected.
• How far she goes: she knows local wild foods and their everyday preparation. She does not know modern nutrition, microbes or industrial preservation.
• Saved question: “How does a large community keep track of what arrives, what is shared and what remains?”
• Planned continuation: Mission 2.3 may return to it through the records of a Sumerian store. That character counts and marks deliveries because they serve a larger population; they still do not know the whole history of writing or economics.

7. Sky and direction — Mission 1.7

• With Bora: observing over several nights, comparing the horizon and recognising repeated movement can help maintain a direction.
• How far he goes: he recognises patterns in his sky without Greek names or modern maps. He does not know models of the Solar System or later instruments.
• Saved question: “How can we carry those signs far away from the places we know?”
• Planned continuation: in Mission 5.3, a Phoenician navigator takes up the limit while travelling beyond familiar landmarks. Sea routes and experience allow progress, but do not give the navigator modern astronomy or navigation.

8. Traces, comparison and evidence — Mission 1.8

• With Bora: one mark allows several stories; combining footprints, branches, ground and wind supports one explanation more strongly.
• Unverified news: Bora may repeat that travellers from the south spoke of wolf-like animals that remained beside some people and their fires. He has not seen those communities and does not know whether the animals helped, obeyed or simply shared food.
• How far he goes: he interprets everyday traces and distinguishes what he saw from what he heard. He does not know forensic science, genetics, modern measuring instruments or theories of domestication.
• Saved questions: “What do we do when two groups of signs support different stories?” and “What changes when an animal begins to stay beside people?”
• Planned continuation: this thread belongs to the Atlas's general method. It will not be assigned to another figure until a historical mission is found where comparing evidence was part of that character's real practice, not a modern lesson placed in their mouth.

9. Vessels and changing materials — Mission 1.9

• With Lorn: hide, basketry, stone, wood and clay meet different needs. He carves a stone bowl, tests a small tool for stirring or serving, and sees dried clay fail again in water.
• How far he goes: he can carve, shape, dry and compare. The spoon-like piece is a playable reconstruction; he does not claim to know a particular find. He does not make functional pottery or smelt metal.
• Saved question: “How can clay keep its shape even when it becomes wet?”
• Planned continuation: the potter in Mission 2.1 begins by recalling the stone bowl and Lorn's failed attempt. She can advance because her community has pottery and her craft controls shape and firing; she does not attribute that knowledge to Göbekli Tepe.

10. Belief, ritual and evidence — Mission 1.10

• With Oru and Tala: a meal, voices, percussion, light and a shared action can calm, unite and give meaning to fear; that does not prove they control weather, illness or luck. Oru's link between aurochs, sheep, memory and ancestors belongs to his fictional group.
• How far they go: they express only their group's fictional and plausible beliefs. They do not know later religions and do not speak for everyone at Çakmaktepe.
• Saved question: “How can we know what a community believed when it left no texts?”
• Planned continuation: no character is assigned. A future character with texts may explain what their own society wrote, but must still acknowledge that this does not automatically reveal the beliefs of a prehistoric community.

Planned chains for future missions

These chains organise the catalogue but do not mean that the missions are implemented:

Before activating any link, define its character, sources, previous checkpoint, permitted advance, historical reason and new limit.

Expanded twenty-five-volume literary route

This route belongs to the books and the museums. It does not by itself approve new playable missions. Each master manuscript states the thread it receives, the point it reaches and its historical limit; books/civilizaciones/catalogo-libros.json keeps the exact sentence that passes from one volume to the next.

Five cross-cutting threads

1. Material and transformation: stone → clay → metal → architecture → travelling object. Final limit: no material comes with a single built-in meaning.
2. Water, food and work: reserve → canal → river → cultivation → city. Final limit: efficiency alone does not decide a fair distribution.
3. Mark, writing and memory: trace → tally → inscription → recitation → partly legible text. Final limit: preserving one voice does not preserve them all.
4. Name, border and identity: group → city → kingdom → empire → archaeological label. Final limit: the name in the archive may not be the name of the people who lived there.
5. Authority and revision: agreement → law → treaty → monument → distributed archive. Final limit: a claim stays reliable only if it keeps its source, its doubt and the possibility of correction.

Mission template

Thread:
Character, date and place:
What the player already learned:
Basic explanation:
Optional depth 1:
Optional depth 2:
Maximum the character can explain:
What they cannot know yet:
Question saved by the Atlas:
Possible next character:
Why that character will be able to advance:
Sources: