PIPE-WORKS

Goblin Law #3 — "On Walking"

You do not learn to walk before you run.

You flail. You lurch. You fall forward with enthusiasm and no plan.

This is not failure. This is motion.

Walking is not a beginner’s skill. Walking is what emerges after you have fallen often enough to recognise balance. Any system, project, or person that demands “walking” before flailing is lying about how learning works.

They are mistaking composure for competence and stillness for control .

Corollary

Running too early produces injuries that are later mistaken for experience.

Marginal Note

Infants do not walk. They bounce violently until gravity negotiates.

This law exists to protect early motion, awkward prototypes, unfinished thinking, and people learning in public.

Goblin Law #5 — "Raise the Fist"

A goblin never bows to silence, nor bends to those who would chain the song. When the hall is dark, the fist is raised, for solidarity , for movement , for defiance .

It is not a hand for meddling (that’s Law #37’s warning), but a hand for saying: “we build together, we resist together.”

Corollary

If a goblin’s work does not carry a spark of resistance, then it is just tinkering, not craft.

Goblin Law #6 — "The Rule of Rules"

Some laws live only in one burrow: about pipes, or pots, or trade. But when a law echoes across many halls, from mushrooms to markets, from code to chords, it must be carved into the Foundational Stones (1–19) .

Thus the goblin lawbook stays lean and sly, not bloated with copies. One carving, many echoes. This keeps creativity uncrushed.

Corollary

If a law wears more than one hat, it belongs among the first nineteen.

Goblin Law #7 — "No Fat Orcs"

A goblin, or a goblin’s work, must do one thing well, and only that . Catch, calculate, display, export, persist — but never all at once.

A pot that tries to be a drum, a helmet, and a cooking pan ends up dented and burnt. Each piece, like each goblin, stays lean and fast , carrying just enough to fulfil its promise. The heavy lifting belongs to other goblins down the chain.

Every Fat Orc slows the Bus.

Corollary

If you wouldn’t carve it on a single stone tablet, or carry it on your back up a mountain, it’s trying to do too much.

Goblin Law #8 — "All Goblins Are Boundary Guards"

No goblin is excused from the edges. Every goblin meets the Outside — raw bytes, strangers at the gate, shifting weather. But the test is not in the meeting; it is in how swiftly and cleanly they pass the news to the Bus .

Delay breeds drift. Hoarding breeds shadow. Side-channels breed chaos. The Bus must always be the first place the Outside is written down .

Corollary

If you don’t hand it to the Bus, you’ve already failed your watch.

Goblin Law #13 — "Keep the Guest List Clean"

A goblin hall is only as orderly as its guest list. If every goblin scrawls their own marks, soon the page is torn and the ink smudged. So one scribe keeps the book, and all goblins read from it.

Thus clans share a single, trusted record of who’s present, what’s owed, and what’s been played. Not a dozen half-scribbled ledgers, but one clean list that all can trust.

Corollary

If two goblins argue over “what’s in the book,” you need a cleaner list.

Goblin Law #14 — "The Last Goblin Learns Quietly"

A goblin does not refuse new ways. They simply continue surviving with the old ones until the noise dies down.

Many goblins adopt tools late, not from stubbornness, but because the old tool still feeds them. This is not senility. This is robust sufficiency .

Corollary

Late adoption reveals where the system failed to teach, not where the goblin failed to learn.

Marginal Note

Some goblins fight dragons for years before discovering the shield has a strap.

Goblin Law #15 — "You Don't Get to Pick Only the Nice Bits"

Every action carries its whole weight.

Not just the praise. Not just the outcome you meant. Not just the slide that went well. You do not get to keep the cheers and discard the side-eye.

If you do a thing, you own all the consequences , including the boring ones, the embarrassing ones, the expensive ones, and the ones that arrive years later wearing someone else’s face.

Corollary

If you are telling a story that removes discomfort, you are editing the evidence.

Marginal Note

This law exists to protect scribes, whistle-scratches, post-incident reports, uncomfortable appendices, and anyone told “that’s not relevant anymore.”

Relevance does not expire just because it’s inconvenient.

Goblin Law #32 — "Never Patch a Monkey"

When goblins strap new tails onto old monkeys, the beast runs wild, stealing fruit and smashing pots. So it is with code: patching another’s functions makes the whole hall brittle.

If a goblin must change a thing, they raise a new module with its own name and song, never disguising mischief as another’s work.

Corollary

• Extend, don’t overwrite.
• Compose, don’t contort.
• A monkey patched is a monkey enraged.

Goblin Law #37 — "Never Meddle in Another Goblin's Guts"

When one goblin module pokes about inside another’s squishy bits, chaos follows. Boundaries blur, secrets spill, and soon the whole den stinks of burnt mushrooms.

Wise goblins use the Bus: speak your need, let the message travel, and let the other goblin respond in their own way.

Corollary

If goblins bypass the message system and meddle directly, it always ends in burnt mushrooms.

Goblin Law #41 — "Only One Drumbeat of Readiness"

From the pit there comes but one count-in. The drummer’s quiet tap, the conductor’s nod — that is enough to set the hall in motion.

Let not every goblin shout their own “ready,” for a dozen false starts tear the tune to rags. Thus in any system: the Base Class alone beats the lifecycle drum.

Corollary

Silence before the song. One clear beat to begin. Then play on.