Intel skill: scout players and planets

Information is the cheapest weapon in Structs — queries are free and instant. Before you commit hours of proof-of-work to a raid or a build, scout. The most valuable single fact for a raid is whether a target's shields are vulnerable — its owner's fleet is off-station, or their Command Ship is offline or destroyed: a planet can only be raided to completion while its shields are vulnerable (see structs-combat). Intel that isn't written down dies with your context window — persist it to memory/intel/.

Conventions are in conventions.md. Everything here is read-only (queries) — no transactions, no charge, no risk.

When to use it

• Evaluating a raid/attack target's defenses and shield status.
• Profiling an opponent's playstyle, growth, and guild ties.
• Surveying the galaxy for opportunities or threats.
• Refreshing standing intel before a strategic decision.

Decisions

Scout before you commit. A raid is ~hours of PoW; a single query tells you if it's even possible. Always check, in order:

1. Shield vulnerability — is the owner's fleet off-station, or their Command Ship offline/destroyed/absent? If yes, an opportunistic raid is on the table. If no (Command Ship online, fleet on station), an opportunistic raid can't complete — but this is not a dead end: it's a siege decision (can you reach and destroy their Command Ship?). See structs-combat. Note: idle is not vulnerable — a dormant owner's powered Command Ship keeps defending, so never read raidability off an inactivity signal.
2. Defenders — Planetary Defense Cannons, Tanks, generators (armoured: damage-reduction 1), shield contribution. Can your fleet out-damage the defense within the vulnerability window (and, for a siege, kill the Command Ship before an active defender rebuilds it)?
3. Reward — unrefined ore on the planet (stealable) vs. your cost. Refined Alpha can't be raided.
4. Power — is the target online at all? An offline/power-starved owner is already vulnerable and can't react — the ideal target; but confirm there's ore worth taking.

Read playstyle, then counter it. Map observations to an archetype with playbooks/meta/reading-opponents and pick a response from playbooks/meta/counter-strategies.

Freshness matters. Power/fleet state changes block-to-block; a "vulnerable" reading minutes old may be stale. Re-scout immediately before fleet-move on a raid.

Procedure

1. Target a player/planet

structsd query structs player [player-id]
structsd query structs planet [planet-id]
structsd query structs fleet [fleet-id]                   # owner's fleet: commandStruct id + on-station/away
structsd query structs struct [commandStruct-id]          # Command Ship status/ambit (from the fleet's commandStruct)
# Defenders/generators by planet and player charge are NOT structsd CLI commands
# (they route through the Guild Stack / webapp query API — see scripts/BASELINE.md):
#   Guild Stack: select id,type,operating_ambit from struct where location_id='[planet-id]';

Determine: Command Ship online? defenders & armour? ore present? Use scout.sh for a one-shot bundle when available.

2. Profile a guild

structsd query structs guild [guild-id]
structsd query structs reactor [reactor-id]               # commission, total infusion = strength
structsd query structs guild-membership-application-all   # pending applications only, all guilds
# The member roster is NOT a structsd query — membership lives on the player record:
#   Guild Stack: select id, guild_rank, ore from player where guild_id='[guild-id]';

3. Survey the galaxy

structsd query structs planet-all
structsd query structs guild-all
structsd query structs reactor-all
structsd query structs provider-all                       # market pricing/supply

4. Persist to memory

Write structured findings to memory/intel/ so the next session inherits them. Suggested shape:

// memory/intel/targets/<player-id>.json
{
  "playerId": "1-42",
  "scoutedAtBlock": 1284551,
  "commandShipOnline": false,
  "shieldsVulnerable": true,
  "defenders": [{ "id": "5-310", "type": "Planetary Defense Cannon", "hp": 6 }],
  "orePresent": 1200,
  "guildId": "0-7",
  "archetype": "turtle",
  "notes": "CS offline 3+ checks; raid window open"
}

Keep a memory/intel/galaxy.json for guild/market snapshots and memory/intel/targets/ per-target files. Record the block height with every reading so staleness is obvious. Memory schema conventions: memory/README.

Advanced: Guild Stack (PostgreSQL)

The CLI is enough for targeted scouting, but galaxy-wide or repeated intel is far faster against the Guild Stack's Postgres mirror — sub-second joins across all planets/structs/players. Deploy via structs-guild-stack; schema and query patterns in knowledge/infrastructure/database-schema. Typical wins: "all planets with ore and an offline Command Ship," "defenders by planet," "providers sorted by price." Pair with structs-streaming (GRASS) for live fleet/raid/attack events instead of polling.

Query catalog (read-only)

Requires structsd on PATH (no key needed for queries).

Verification

Intel is only as good as its freshness. Confirm a raid window by re-checking the owner's Command Ship status (struct [commandStruct-id]) and fleet position (fleet [fleet-id]) immediately before acting, and compare the new block height to your stored scoutedAtBlock.

Errors

• Empty/old results — the public RPC may lag; re-query or use a Guild Stack mirror for consistency.
• Entity not found — wrong ID format; use -- before IDs and confirm with an -all query.
• Stale read — power/fleet changed since you scouted; re-scout before committing PoW.

See also

• structs-combat — turn intel into raids/attacks (shield-vulnerability doctrine)
• structs-streaming — live events vs. polling
• structs-guild-stack + knowledge/infrastructure/database-schema — fast bulk intel
• playbooks/meta/reading-opponents · playbooks/meta/counter-strategies
• awareness/threat-detection — turning intel into early warning