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Sword of the Stars (2006) reverse-engineering worklog. Infra docs live in trikilli services/re-lab.md.
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alex a64673378a CB: third pinned run -- three processes, nine natural seeds, one autosave 
C5b confirms C5a: pinning the AI client seeds to an earlier run's makes the creation
turn reproducible. Three processes, each drawing its own three seeds, all pinned to
C3's, all producing d59bb9f2... with identical gates (including player 512's target
282, the value no other run has produced) and identical element records.

The only word that differs anywhere across the three is word 3 of list 23's unnamed
Population body. Three runs with byte-identical autosaves cannot differ in a word the
applier reads, so that word is noise -- localised using the pinned pair as an
instrument, which is what a control on a k>1 workload is for.

Two agreeing is a 1/k coincidence; three is 1/k^2.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01ARBgSooAfokKUy6wKUKEyZ
2026-09-08 19:26:20 -04:00
campaign board: ratchet hit on L3's trade-route saves - new unmodelled content, not a regression 2026-09-08 19:12:54 -04:00
findings CB: third pinned run -- three processes, nine natural seeds, one autosave 2026-09-08 19:26:20 -04:00
ghidra RB: replay a recorded turn's commands -- ModCount is reachable, and the rates frame's memory order is not its wire order 2026-09-08 19:01:35 -04:00
guides resolution: byte-match survives as C-exact/C-set; tie set is a draw support not equal cost; rule 26 on self-consistent controls 2026-09-08 18:38:37 -04:00
notes init commit 2026-09-07 12:31:56 -04:00
objects regenerate both headers (669 addresses); track objects/generated so the shared clone stops sitting dirty 2026-09-08 07:36:16 -04:00
scripts lane V2: vtable inversion — resolve indirect call edges image-wide 2026-09-08 12:05:05 -04:00
tools CB: the turn-command stream, captured and bound to the autosave it produced 2026-09-08 19:18:57 -04:00
verify CB: third pinned run -- three processes, nine natural seeds, one autosave 2026-09-08 19:26:20 -04:00
.gitignore lane D: automated struct recovery from the IStreamable serializers 2026-09-08 05:51:37 -04:00
README.md guides: RE how-to for 2000s MSVC/DX9 games (98 sources); queue replay-checksum, class recovery, apitrace/TTD 2026-09-07 18:05:58 -04:00

README.md

sots-re

Reverse-engineering worklog for Sword of the Stars (2006, SOTS1) — the 32-bit DX9 original + expansions. The nitty-gritty: static/dynamic analysis notes, Ghidra & ReVa scripts, function/struct maps, D3D9 call traces, decomp progress, findings.

Where this runs

Analysis lab on spicy (PVE, 192.168.3.201):

  • CT111 sots-re — Linux workspace: Ghidra + headless ReVa server, radare2/rizin/cutter, binwalk. Hosts the Samba share and this repo's working tree at /srv/re-lab/notes.
  • VM140 sots-re-win10 — Win10 runtime + dynamic analysis (x64dbg, Cheat Engine, RenderDoc/apitrace, DXVK→CPU-Vulkan for GPU-less rendering).

Infra (guests, storage, network, share, ReVa endpoint) is documented from the system-maintainer POV in trikilli → services/re-lab.md. This repo is everything else.

Layout

  • findings/ — the running findings log (append-only), one file per subsystem.
  • ghidra/ — exported scripts, data-type archives, struct definitions.
  • traces/ — D3D9 / Win32 API call captures + analysis.
  • scripts/ — helper tooling (loaders, extractors, parsers).
  • notes/ — session notes, scratch, hypotheses.

Ownership / legality

Game binaries come from the owner's own GOG/Steam copy. RE is for personal interoperability, bug-fixing, and preservation. Binaries themselves are not committed here (see .gitignore) — they live on the lab's Samba share /srv/re-lab/samples.

Campaign (how this repo is run)

A 4-agent crew (defined in ~/.claude/agents/re-*.md) runs the exploration: re-quartermaster (backlog + board) → re-analyst (maps via ReVa) → re-verifier (proves vs real data; old-vs-new differential once reimpl starts) → re-scribe (files the note, links it, commits).

  • campaign/board.md — live status board (start here).
  • Live tracking = Forgejo issues on alex/sots-re (labels status/* are the kanban columns; type/*, conf/*). campaign/board.md is the editable mirror — publish with scripts/forgejo_campaign.py bootstrap (needs FORGEJO_TOKEN).
  • campaign/backlog.md — prioritized target queue.
  • campaign/open-questions.md — unresolved threads.
  • findings/_template.md — the record format every finding follows.
  • findings/{objects,control-flow,subsystems}/ — the growing engine map.
  • verify/{parsers,traces,harness,results}/ — validation: struct parsers now, golden-trace replay + shim compare-mode for reimplementation.
  • ghidra/ — exported scripts + datatype archives.

Approach & north star: findings/00-strategy.md. Binary facts: findings/01-fingerprint.md.

Sibling repo

alex/sots-engine — the from-scratch engine source (clean-room, public-capable). This repo keeps the evidence + planning for both; binary facts cross over only via ghidra/addresses.json → tools/gen_addresses.py.

  • guides/re-windows-2000s-howto.md — annotated bibliography + how-to for RE of mid-2000s MSVC/DX9 Windows games, with our-experience call-outs.