git:20260912.3ac5afd to git:20260912.6a4e943

4 added, 1 removed. Audit A to A.

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name: combo-design

- description: Strings, links, cancels, juggles. Ask which graph you are shipping. Use for fighters, character-action, and brawlers. Do not mix a 20-hit juggle graph onto a commit-whitelist hunter.

+ description: Strings, links, cancels, juggles. Ask which graph you are shipping. Use for fighters, character-action, and brawlers.

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# Combo design

Ask the column:

| Column | What connects |

|---|---|

| strict-link | next button during a tight post-hit window |

| cancel-chain | cancel graph on whiff or hit, authored windows |

| launcher-juggle | air state + gravity + priority |

| action-string | style / rank, long cancel into guns and jumps |

| lock-on-brawler | target magnet, few true links |

## Rules

1. Write a directed graph. Nodes are moves. Edges are windows + conditions (hit, block, whiff, jump, instrument).

2. Damage falls off with length. An infinite that does not fall off is a bug unless the column is a training toy.

3. Starter, confirm, ender. If a route has no ender, the opponent never gets a turn.

4. Hitstun and launch height are data on the attack, not a side effect of animation length.

5. Dropping a combo must look like a drop. Hidden magnets that finish the route after a miss belong only to lock-on-brawler.

6. Stack under action-feel. Combo-design does not own the clock.

+ 7. Charge edges (start / full / hold-cost / release / cancel) are named nodes, not a side animation.

+ 8. After hitstun, weapon swap, or lost focus, the graph re-enters idle or a published recover. It does not keep a phantom confirm.

## Accept

- Designer can draw the graph on one page

- A dropped combo returns turn to the opponent inside the published recovery

- Changing one edge does not require rewriting every character

+ - Pose, box, and SFX share the same logical frame on every node