From 7308046d602fa933a5321a2439caffa56db0162d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Sam <samuv.eth@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 2026 17:05:57 +0700
Subject: [PATCH] the screen warps underwater, and the ocean darkens with depth
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit

- the screen warps underwater: submerged, the reference runs a second pass list whose third pass is `FFXGlowWave` (`0x6cb1f0`), binding a 128×128 two-channel sine bump map that displaces both the screen and the blur texcoords by 3.0 full-res pixels — uv rotated 10°, scaled W/128 × 0.88·H/128, two phases at 3174 and 2805 ms; wow-re had carried the swap as "GlowWave, or a duplicate Glow" and the cross-check settled it (the two arms are mutually exclusive and the plain-Glow arm is unreachable on both backends; lava and slime warp too, and a ghost's death pass replaces the glow outright); a dry frame binds the same pipeline object as before this existed, and the phases advance live at 0.313/s and 0.355/s against a predicted 0.315 and 0.357
- ocean is a fifth submersion state — 96.8% of every wet sub-tile in the shipped corpus, so essentially all open water — and it alone runs a depth ramp on the light: `t = clamp(eye.z, −30, 0)`, ambient at `(k+1)/2`, diffuse at `k/4 + 3/4`, exactly k = 0 at −30 yd, gated on the full dword `== 1` at `0x6d2821` (the ramp does NOT drive the fog colour — that store is dead, overwritten before submit); the sun and moon glare fade over a 10-yard depth ramp applied to the slew TARGET, not the drawn alpha — a read one indirection out that two notes had published a verified negative on; the MCLQ fishable bit (0x40) is deliberately unread, since `0x69b5d0` has zero callers in the image and fishability is the server's verdict
- the dropdown kit is the reference's own `UIDropDownMenu.xml` (one manifest line for 1150 lines of ours, `DropDownList3` gained, and two fixtures that only worked because our copy was more forgiving); `UnitFactionGroup` returns the English name AND the localized one — ours returned the localized string twice, and the first return names a TEXTURE in every stock consumer (`UI-PVP-`..factionGroup), so on a non-English client every one of them named a file that does not exist

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
---
 crates/benilla-adt/src/lib.rs                 |    6 +-
 .../benilla-app/assets/ui/UIDropDownMenu.xml  | 1150 -----------------
 crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UiPanels.xml     |   29 +
 crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/benilla.toc      |   15 +-
 crates/benilla-app/src/ui_chat/tests.rs       |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/chat_options_tests.rs       |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/chat_resize_tests.rs        |    2 +-
 .../benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_tests.rs   |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/color_picker_tests.rs       |    8 +-
 .../src/ui_script/combo_frame_tests.rs        |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/dressup_tests.rs            |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/dropdown_tests.rs           |    2 +-
 .../benilla-app/src/ui_script/escape_tests.rs |   13 +-
 .../src/ui_script/friends_tests.rs            |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/game_menu_tests.rs          |    8 +-
 .../benilla-app/src/ui_script/guild_tests.rs  |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/instance_tests.rs           |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/keybindings_tests.rs        |   31 +-
 .../src/ui_script/merchant_tests.rs           |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/options_tests.rs            |   35 +-
 .../src/ui_script/pet_frame_tests.rs          |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/petition_tests.rs           |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/questlog_tests.rs           |    2 +-
 .../benilla-app/src/ui_script/raid_tests.rs   |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/target_aura_tests.rs        |    2 +-
 crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/test_ui.rs   |    4 +-
 .../src/ui_script/tooltip_anchor_tests.rs     |    4 +-
 .../src/ui_script/tot_frame_tests.rs          |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/trainer_tests.rs            |    2 +-
 .../src/ui_script/unit_frame_tests.rs         |    4 +-
 .../src/ui_script/unit_popup_tests.rs         |    4 +-
 .../src/ui_script/world_map_tests.rs          |   22 +-
 crates/benilla-app/src/ui_unit.rs             |   19 +
 crates/benilla-app/tests/auction_frame.rs     |   26 +-
 crates/benilla-app/tests/tradeskill_frame.rs  |   28 +-
 crates/benilla-formats/src/factions.rs        |   27 +
 crates/benilla-formats/src/light.rs           |  171 ++-
 crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/bindings.rs |   30 +-
 crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/mod.rs      |   16 +-
 crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/tests.rs    |   27 +
 crates/benilla-wmo/src/lib.rs                 |    4 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/ffx_glow.rs          |  446 ++++++-
 crates/benilla-world/src/lighting/resolve.rs  |  128 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/drift.rs      |    4 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/mod.rs        |    5 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/query.rs      |   87 +-
 .../benilla-world/src/shaders/ffx_glow.wgsl   |  116 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/sun/follow.rs        |   72 +-
 crates/benilla-world/src/world_point.rs       |    1 +
 49 files changed, 1208 insertions(+), 1368 deletions(-)
 delete mode 100644 crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UIDropDownMenu.xml

diff --git a/crates/benilla-adt/src/lib.rs b/crates/benilla-adt/src/lib.rs
index 4d0ce026..13dd79cb 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-adt/src/lib.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-adt/src/lib.rs
@@ -157,8 +157,10 @@ pub struct MclqChunk {
     pub min_height: f32,
     pub max_height: f32,
     pub vertices: Vec<LiquidVertex>,
-    /// Per-cell flags, row-major 8×8. Low nibble = liquid type (`0xf` = dry/hole); `0x40` fishable,
-    /// `0x80` shared.
+    /// Per-cell flags, row-major 8×8. Low nibble = liquid type (`0xf` = dry/hole); `0x80` shared.
+    /// `0x40` ("fishable") is carried but deliberately unread: its only compiled reader, the
+    /// reference's fishable query `0x69b5d0`, is a zero-caller dead island — fishability is the
+    /// server's verdict (`SPELL_FAILED_NOT_FISHABLE` passthru). Decision 1825.
     pub tile_flags: [u8; 64],
 }
 
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UIDropDownMenu.xml b/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UIDropDownMenu.xml
deleted file mode 100644
index 39e6a468..00000000
--- a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UIDropDownMenu.xml
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,1150 +0,0 @@
-<!--
-    The dropdown kit — our own implementation of the 1.12 dropdown widget set. The reference
-    (FrameXML UIDropDownMenuTemplates.xml + UIDropDownMenu.lua) is the SPECIFICATION it answers to,
-    not the source of this text: the global names, the `info` table's field names, every geometry
-    constant and every observable behaviour below are the reference's and are load-bearing (addons
-    call, replace and read them by name); the code that expresses them is ours, and is written the
-    way we would write it — shared helpers, field lists and lookup tables where the reference
-    repeats itself. Decision 0203 phase 2's closing sub-slice, widened for decision 0434 phase 5:
-    the unit popups are the first MENU-mode + submenu customer; the world map's continent/zone
-    pickers and the trainer/tradeskill filters stay on the level-1 capsule path.
-
-    IN: UIDropDownMenuTemplate (the capsule: LabelFrame art trio, $parentText, the scroll-down
-    toggle button), UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate (row: highlight, check, right-side icon, expand
-    arrow, the disabled-row InvisibleButton), UIDropDownListTemplate (Backdrop + MenuBackdrop
-    swap, 32 rows) instanced as DropDownList1/2, and the reference API: Initialize (displayMode +
-    level), AddButton(info, level) with isTitle/disabled/notClickable/notCheckable/hasArrow/
-    icon+texcoords/textR-G-B/justifyH/keepShownOnClick, Refresh, SetWidth/SetText/GetText,
-    SetSelectedID/Name/Value + getters, ClearAll, ToggleDropDownMenu(level, value, frame,
-    anchorName ["cursor" included], x, y) with the off-screen flip, HideDropDownMenu,
-    CloseDropDownMenus(level), Disable/EnableButton, SetButtonText, SetAnchor, JustifyText,
-    GetCurrentDropDown, the 2-second hover-away auto-close counting through the level chain.
-
-    THE COLOR SWATCH ROW came in with the colour picker (ColorPickerFrame.xml): the full
-    `hasColorSwatch` / `r` / `g` / `b` / `swatchFunc` / `hasOpacity` / `opacity` / `opacityFunc` /
-    `cancelFunc` field set, the `$parentColorSwatch` button on the row template, and
-    `UIDropDownMenuButton_OpenColorPicker` (spec: UIDropDownMenu.lua l.801-815). It is the second
-    half of one feature, not a separate one: `hasColorSwatch` draws the square, clicking the square
-    is the ONLY way the reference's colour picker ever opens, and `hasColorSwatch` is **145 files /
-    82 corpus addons**.
-
-    OUT (each waits for its first customer): menu level 3 (UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS is 2 — the
-    unit popups' deepest law; the XML gains DropDownList3 the day a customer needs it),
-    info.textHeight's per-row SetFont, the newbie
-    tooltips on rows (the ref gates them behind a default-off cvar), message() on the row/level
-    overflow guards (no dev-error dialog surface; the guard returns silently). The uiScale
-    correction came IN with its first scaled customer (0992, the options window's dropdown
-    rows): Toggle wears the owner's effective scale on the list.
-
-    Deviations, deliberate:
-    - THE WIDTH SETTLE. The ref sizes each row at AddButton time from normalText:GetWidth() and
-      applies the list max in OnShow — but our text measures land at extract, AFTER the script
-      tick that set the text (ui_script/extract's measure round-trip), so an AddButton-time
-      read is stale. The ref's width FORMULA (text + 60, arrow +10, icon +10, notCheckable -30,
-      list = max + 15) runs in the list's OnUpdate instead and applies on the first update
-      whose measures are real — one frame after open, imperceptible. A capsule that declared a
-      width (UIDropDownMenu_SetWidth → dropWidth/noResize: the world map pickers) keeps the
-      declared width applied synchronously at Toggle, the proven pre-0434 path (rows dropWidth,
-      list dropWidth + 32).
-    - THE FLIP SETTLES TOO: the off-screen check needs the list's resolved rect, which also
-      lands a frame late — it runs from the same OnUpdate chain, after the width applies.
-    - The default (no anchorName) seat anchors the list to the dropdown FRAME at (8, 7) —
-      pixel-identical to the reference's "$parentLeft BOTTOMLEFT (8, 22)" through the Left
-      texture's own (0, 17) seat.
-    - MENU displayMode hides the capsule art trio when present but skips the ref's toggle-button
-      texture blanking + re-anchor (every MENU customer here is a born-hidden 10x10 frame whose
-      capsule never draws).
-    - (Was: "the disabled-row InvisibleButton spans to the row's RIGHT — the ref stops it at the
-      color swatch, which is OUT". The swatch is IN now, so the ref's own anchor is restored:
-      `RIGHT relativeTo="$parentColorSwatch" relativePoint="LEFT"`.)
-    - The list OnShow resets showTimer AND isCounting (the ref writes `showTime`, a field
-      nothing reads — we implement the intent, not the typo).
--->
-<Ui xmlns="http://www.blizzard.com/wow/ui/">
-    <Script><![CDATA[
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS = 32;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS = 2;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_BUTTON_HEIGHT = 16;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_BORDER_HEIGHT = 15;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU = nil;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_INIT_MENU = nil;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL = 1;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_VALUE = nil;
-        UIDROPDOWNMENU_SHOW_TIME = 2;
-        -- Which menus are open, keyed by level. UnitPopup writes it and its OnUpdate enable/disable
-        -- pass walks it; each list's own OnHide clears its entry.
-        OPEN_DROPDOWNMENUS = {};
-
-        -- ── The kit's vocabulary ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
-        -- Four things this file says over and over, said once here.
-
-        -- Every named child in the kit is `<owner's name><suffix>`: a row's Check/NormalText/Icon/
-        -- ExpandArrow/ColorSwatch/InvisibleButton, a capsule's Left/Middle/Right/Text/Button, the
-        -- swatch's NormalTexture. (The reference spells this two different ways for the same
-        -- object — off the list name plus the row index, and off the row itself.)
-        local function menuChild(frame, suffix)
-            return getglobal(frame:GetName()..suffix);
-        end
-
-        -- A row addressed the way the by-address API addresses it: level + index.
-        local function listRow(level, index)
-            return getglobal("DropDownList"..level.."Button"..index);
-        end
-
-        -- The `info` fields a row simply carries. AddButton copies them onto the row so the row's
-        -- own handlers — its click, the width settle, the colour square — can read them back later.
-        -- These names are the published API: the list is the documentation.
-        local ROW_FIELDS = {
-            "func", "owner", "arg1", "arg2", "keepShownOnClick", "tooltipTitle", "tooltipText",
-            "hasArrow", "notCheckable", "icon",
-            "hasColorSwatch", "hasOpacity", "opacity", "opacityFunc", "swatchFunc", "cancelFunc",
-        };
-
-        -- A capsule remembers its selection under exactly one of these; adopting one drops the
-        -- other two, which is why they can never disagree.
-        local SELECTION_KEYS = { "selectedName", "selectedID", "selectedValue" };
-
-        -- The capsule's three-piece LabelFrame art.
-        local CAPSULE_ART = { "Left", "Middle", "Right" };
-
-        -- Reset the levels this dropdown is about to rebuild, remember + run its init function,
-        -- then apply displayMode. A DIFFERENT dropdown taking the menu over resets the whole stack
-        -- from level 1; the same one keeps whatever sits above the level it is rebuilding.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_Initialize(frame, initFunction, displayMode, level)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            local name = frame:GetName();
-            local takeover = (name ~= UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU);
-            if ( takeover ) then
-                UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL = 1;
-            end
-            UIDROPDOWNMENU_INIT_MENU = name;
-            for i = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS, 1 do
-                if ( takeover or i >= UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL ) then
-                    local list = getglobal("DropDownList"..i);
-                    list.numButtons = 0;
-                    for j = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                        listRow(i, j):Hide();
-                    end
-                end
-            end
-            frame:SetHeight(UIDROPDOWNMENU_BUTTON_HEIGHT * 2);
-            if ( initFunction ) then
-                frame.initialize = initFunction;
-                initFunction(level);
-            end
-            if ( displayMode == "MENU" ) then
-                -- Drop the capsule art, when the frame has any (see the header deviation).
-                if ( getglobal(name.."Left") ) then
-                    for _, part in ipairs(CAPSULE_ART) do
-                        getglobal(name..part):Hide();
-                    end
-                end
-                frame.displayMode = "MENU";
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- The reference's width law, run from the list's OnUpdate (the header's WIDTH SETTLE): rows
-        -- measure text + 60, +10 for an arrow OR a colour swatch, +10 for an icon, -30 when
-        -- notCheckable; the list takes max + 15. Waits until every text row has a real (nonzero)
-        -- measure. (The ref's `if ( info.hasArrow or info.hasColorSwatch )` is ONE +10, not two —
-        -- the two ride the same right-hand slot, and a row never has both.)
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SettleWidth(listFrame)
-            local listFrameName = listFrame:GetName();
-            if ( listFrame.fixedWidth ) then
-                listFrame.pendingWidth = nil;
-                return;
-            end
-            local maxWidth = 0;
-            local want, seen = 0, 0;
-            for i=1, listFrame.numButtons, 1 do
-                local button = getglobal(listFrameName.."Button"..i);
-                local text = button:GetText();
-                if ( text and text ~= "" ) then
-                    want = want + 1;
-                    local width = menuChild(button, "NormalText"):GetWidth();
-                    if ( width > 0 ) then
-                        seen = seen + 1;
-                        width = width + 60;
-                        if ( button.hasArrow or button.hasColorSwatch ) then
-                            width = width + 10;
-                        end
-                        if ( button.notCheckable ) then
-                            width = width - 30;
-                        end
-                        if ( button.icon ) then
-                            width = width + 10;
-                        end
-                        if ( width > maxWidth ) then
-                            maxWidth = width;
-                        end
-                    end
-                end
-            end
-            if ( want > 0 and seen < want ) then
-                return; -- measures not landed yet; next update
-            end
-            if ( maxWidth == 0 ) then
-                maxWidth = 130;
-            end
-            for i=1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                getglobal(listFrameName.."Button"..i):SetWidth(maxWidth);
-            end
-            listFrame:SetWidth(maxWidth + 15);
-            listFrame.pendingWidth = nil;
-        end
-
-        -- Which of the list's corners meets which corner of its seat once the list is known to hang
-        -- off the bottom and/or the right of the screen. Level 1 re-seats against the anchor Toggle
-        -- stored and needs no nudge; a submenu flips around the row that opened it, and the nudge
-        -- is what keeps the flipped list glued to that row.
-        local FLIP = {
-            bottomRight = { seat = { "BOTTOMRIGHT", "BOTTOMLEFT" },
-                            row  = { "BOTTOMRIGHT", "BOTTOMLEFT", -11, -14 } },
-            bottom      = { seat = { "BOTTOMLEFT", "TOPLEFT" },
-                            row  = { "BOTTOMLEFT", "BOTTOMRIGHT", 0, -14 } },
-            right       = { seat = { "TOPRIGHT", "TOPLEFT" },
-                            row  = { "TOPRIGHT", "TOPLEFT", -11, 14 } },
-        };
-
-        -- The off-screen flip, from the same OnUpdate chain as the width (it needs the resolved
-        -- rect — the header's second settle).
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SettleFlip(listFrame)
-            local x, y = listFrame:GetCenter();
-            if ( not x or not y ) then
-                return; -- not resolved yet; next update
-            end
-            listFrame.pendingFlip = nil;
-            local rightEdge = listFrame:GetRight();
-            local offBottom = (y - listFrame:GetHeight()/2) < 0;
-            local offRight = (rightEdge ~= nil) and (rightEdge > GetScreenWidth());
-            local flip;
-            if ( offBottom and offRight ) then
-                flip = FLIP.bottomRight;
-            elseif ( offBottom ) then
-                flip = FLIP.bottom;
-            elseif ( offRight ) then
-                flip = FLIP.right;
-            else
-                return; -- it fits; the seat Toggle gave it stands
-            end
-            listFrame:ClearAllPoints();
-            if ( listFrame:GetID() == 1 ) then
-                local corner = flip.seat;
-                if ( listFrame.cursorMode ) then
-                    -- Cursor menus keep their screen-space seat; only the corner changes.
-                    listFrame:SetPoint(corner[1], "UIParent", "BOTTOMLEFT", listFrame.seatX, listFrame.seatY);
-                else
-                    listFrame:SetPoint(corner[1], listFrame.seatTo, corner[2], listFrame.seatX, listFrame.seatY);
-                end
-            else
-                local corner = flip.row;
-                listFrame:SetPoint(corner[1], listFrame.anchorFrame, corner[2], corner[3], corner[4]);
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- The list's per-frame work: settle the width, then the flip (both wait on measures that
-        -- land a frame after the open — the header), then run the hover-away countdown.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_OnUpdate(elapsed)
-            if ( this.pendingWidth ) then
-                UIDropDownMenu_SettleWidth(this);
-            elseif ( this.pendingFlip ) then
-                UIDropDownMenu_SettleFlip(this);
-            end
-            -- The countdown runs only on a visible list that a StartCounting has armed (never on
-            -- open); reaching zero is what closes a menu the mouse walked away from.
-            if ( not this:IsVisible() or not this.isCounting or not this.showTimer ) then
-                return;
-            end
-            if ( this.showTimer < 0 ) then
-                this.showTimer = nil;
-                this.isCounting = nil;
-                this:Hide();
-            else
-                this.showTimer = this.showTimer - elapsed;
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- A submenu's hover state drives its ROOT list's timer, so the whole open stack lives or
-        -- dies together: both ends of the countdown climb `parent` to the list that owns the stack.
-        local function timerRoot(frame)
-            while ( frame.parent ) do
-                frame = frame.parent;
-            end
-            return frame;
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_StartCounting(frame)
-            local root = timerRoot(frame);
-            root.showTimer = UIDROPDOWNMENU_SHOW_TIME;
-            root.isCounting = 1;
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_StopCounting(frame)
-            local root = timerRoot(frame);
-            root.isCounting = nil;
-        end
-
-        -- The kit's one selection test, answering in the reference's own `[nil, 1]` currency. Name
-        -- beats id beats value, and only the first key the capsule actually carries is consulted —
-        -- note that GetSelectedID answers for a value-selected capsule too (it scans the open level
-        -- for the row), so the value arm below is reached only when that scan found nothing.
-        local function rowChecked(frame, button)
-            local name = UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedName(frame);
-            if ( name ) then
-                return button:GetText() == name and 1 or nil;
-            end
-            local id = UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedID(frame);
-            if ( id ) then
-                return button:GetID() == id and 1 or nil;
-            end
-            local value = UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedValue(frame);
-            if ( value ) then
-                return button.value == value and 1 or nil;
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- Paint one row's checked state. The tick and the locked highlight always move together,
-        -- and the row remembers what it was told (its click handler reads it back).
-        local function paintChecked(button, checked)
-            if ( checked ) then
-                button:LockHighlight();
-                menuChild(button, "Check"):Show();
-            else
-                button:UnlockHighlight();
-                menuChild(button, "Check"):Hide();
-            end
-            button.checked = checked;
-        end
-
-        -- Build one menu row from an `info` table — `.text`/`.value`/`.func`/`.checked`/`.isTitle`/
-        -- `.disabled`/`.notClickable`/`.notCheckable`/`.hasArrow`/`.icon` + `.tCoord*`/`.textR-G-B`/
-        -- `.justifyH`/`.keepShownOnClick`/`.owner`/`.arg1`/`.arg2`/the tooltip pair/the colour-swatch
-        -- set. That table is the published API and its field names are the contract. Width rides the
-        -- settle (header), not an AddButton-time measure.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_AddButton(info, level)
-            level = level or 1;
-            local listFrame = getglobal("DropDownList"..level);
-            local listFrameName = listFrame:GetName();
-            local index = listFrame.numButtons + 1;
-            if ( index > UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS or level > UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS ) then
-                return; -- the ref raises a dev-error dialog here (OUT, header)
-            end
-            listFrame.numButtons = index;
-
-            local button = listRow(level, index);
-            local normalText = menuChild(button, "NormalText");
-            local icon = menuChild(button, "Icon");
-            -- Captures OnEnter/OnLeave over a disabled row so the menu doesn't time out.
-            local invisibleButton = menuChild(button, "InvisibleButton");
-            invisibleButton:Hide();
-            button:Enable();
-
-            -- The label, and its colour: a row carrying its own textR/G/B wears it in both the
-            -- normal and the highlight state, so the label doesn't change colour under the mouse.
-            if ( info.text ) then
-                button:SetText(info.text);
-                local r, g, b = info.textR, info.textG, info.textB;
-                if ( not r ) then
-                    r, g, b = HIGHLIGHT_FONT_COLOR.r, HIGHLIGHT_FONT_COLOR.g, HIGHLIGHT_FONT_COLOR.b;
-                end
-                button:SetTextColor(r, g, b);
-                button:SetHighlightTextColor(r, g, b);
-            else
-                button:SetText("");
-            end
-
-            -- The right-hand icon rides on the label: a row with no text has no icon either.
-            if ( info.text and info.icon ) then
-                icon:SetTexture(info.icon);
-                if ( info.tCoordLeft ) then
-                    icon:SetTexCoord(info.tCoordLeft, info.tCoordRight, info.tCoordTop, info.tCoordBottom);
-                end
-                icon:Show();
-            else
-                icon:Hide();
-            end
-
-            -- Everything the row simply carries over, then the value, which falls back to the label
-            -- so a menu built from plain text rows still has values to dispatch on.
-            for _, field in ipairs(ROW_FIELDS) do
-                button[field] = info[field];
-            end
-            button.value = info.value or info.text;
-
-            local expandArrow = menuChild(button, "ExpandArrow");
-            if ( info.hasArrow ) then
-                expandArrow:Show();
-            else
-                expandArrow:Hide();
-            end
-
-            -- The row's left inset, and its label's seat inside it. A notCheckable row (titles,
-            -- plain actions) pulls the label to the row's left edge and sits 10px in; a checkable
-            -- row leaves the 27px check column and sits 12px in — 6px tighter under MENU mode,
-            -- whose frames have no capsule for the rows to line up beneath.
-            local xPos = 5;
-            local yPos = -((button:GetID() - 1) * UIDROPDOWNMENU_BUTTON_HEIGHT) - UIDROPDOWNMENU_BORDER_HEIGHT;
-            normalText:ClearAllPoints();
-            if ( not info.notCheckable ) then
-                xPos = xPos + 12;
-                normalText:SetPoint("LEFT", button:GetName(), "LEFT", 27, 0);
-            elseif ( info.justifyH == "CENTER" ) then
-                xPos = xPos + 10;
-                normalText:SetPoint("CENTER", button:GetName(), "CENTER", -7, 0);
-            else
-                xPos = xPos + 10;
-                normalText:SetPoint("LEFT", button:GetName(), "LEFT", 0, 0);
-            end
-
-            -- Whose menu this is: the open capsule, or — nothing open yet — the one initializing.
-            local frame = UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU and getglobal(UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU);
-            if ( frame and frame.displayMode == "MENU" and not info.notCheckable ) then
-                xPos = xPos - 6;
-            end
-            frame = frame or getglobal(UIDROPDOWNMENU_INIT_MENU);
-            button:SetPoint("TOPLEFT", listFrameName, "TOPLEFT", xPos, yPos);
-
-            -- A row the owning capsule points at comes up checked. `info.checked` is only ever set
-            -- here, never cleared: a caller that declared the row checked keeps it.
-            if ( frame and rowChecked(frame, button) ) then
-                info.checked = 1;
-            end
-            paintChecked(button, info.checked);
-
-            -- The colour square: its NormalTexture IS the swatch art, tinted to the row's colour,
-            -- and the row keeps r/g/b so the square's own OnClick can seed the picker from them.
-            local colorSwatch = menuChild(button, "ColorSwatch");
-            if ( info.hasColorSwatch ) then
-                button.r, button.g, button.b = info.r, info.g, info.b;
-                menuChild(colorSwatch, "NormalTexture"):SetVertexColor(button.r, button.g, button.b);
-                colorSwatch:Show();
-            else
-                colorSwatch:Hide();
-            end
-
-            -- Three ways a row lands disabled, each choosing the colour its label wears while it is:
-            -- a title is gold, a notClickable row is white, a plainly disabled one keeps the gray
-            -- default. A title wins, which is the reference's own order (it applies isTitle second).
-            local disabledColor = GRAY_FONT_COLOR;
-            if ( info.notClickable ) then
-                info.disabled = 1;
-                disabledColor = HIGHLIGHT_FONT_COLOR;
-            end
-            if ( info.isTitle ) then
-                info.disabled = 1;
-                disabledColor = NORMAL_FONT_COLOR;
-            end
-            button:SetDisabledTextColor(disabledColor.r, disabledColor.g, disabledColor.b);
-            if ( info.disabled ) then
-                button:Disable();
-                invisibleButton:Show();
-            end
-
-            listFrame:SetHeight((index * UIDROPDOWNMENU_BUTTON_HEIGHT) + (UIDROPDOWNMENU_BORDER_HEIGHT * 2));
-            button:Show();
-        end
-
-        -- Re-derive every row's check + lock state on one level, and push the selected row's label
-        -- into the capsule's own text. Width stays the settle's job (header).
-        function UIDropDownMenu_Refresh(frame, useValue, dropdownLevel)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            dropdownLevel = dropdownLevel or UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL;
-            for i = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                local button = listRow(dropdownLevel, i);
-                local checked = rowChecked(frame, button);
-                if ( checked ) then
-                    if ( useValue ) then
-                        UIDropDownMenu_SetText(button.value, frame);
-                    else
-                        UIDropDownMenu_SetText(button:GetText(), frame);
-                    end
-                end
-                paintChecked(button, checked);
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- The three setters are one operation: adopt one selection key, drop the other two, repaint.
-        local function selectBy(frame, key, selection, useValue)
-            for _, field in ipairs(SELECTION_KEYS) do
-                frame[field] = nil;
-            end
-            frame[key] = selection;
-            UIDropDownMenu_Refresh(frame, useValue);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetSelectedName(frame, name, useValue)
-            selectBy(frame, "selectedName", name, useValue);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetSelectedValue(frame, value, useValue)
-            selectBy(frame, "selectedValue", value, useValue);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetSelectedID(frame, id, useValue)
-            selectBy(frame, "selectedID", id, useValue);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedName(frame)
-            return frame.selectedName;
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedValue(frame)
-            return frame.selectedValue;
-        end
-
-        -- With no explicit id, answer with the index of the row the selected name — failing that,
-        -- the selected value — points at on the open level.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedID(frame)
-            if ( frame.selectedID ) then
-                return frame.selectedID;
-            end
-            local name = UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedName(frame);
-            local value = UIDropDownMenu_GetSelectedValue(frame);
-            if ( not name and not value ) then
-                return nil;
-            end
-            for i = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                local button = listRow(UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL, i);
-                if ( name ) then
-                    if ( button:GetText() == name ) then
-                        return i;
-                    end
-                elseif ( button.value == value ) then
-                    return i;
-                end
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- A row's click: run its func with `this` still on the row, then either flip the check in
-        -- place (keepShownOnClick) or shut the list the row belongs to. A row with no func does
-        -- nothing at all — not even the sound.
-        function UIDropDownMenuButton_OnClick()
-            if ( not this.func ) then
-                return;
-            end
-            this.func(this.arg1, this.arg2);
-            if ( not this.keepShownOnClick ) then
-                this:GetParent():Hide();
-            elseif ( this.checked ) then
-                this.checked = nil;
-                menuChild(this, "Check"):Hide();
-            else
-                this.checked = 1;
-                menuChild(this, "Check"):Show();
-            end
-            PlaySound("UChatScrollButton");
-        end
-
-        function HideDropDownMenu(level)
-            getglobal("DropDownList"..(level or 1)):Hide();
-        end
-
-        -- Open (or re-open) one level of the shared menu. The capsule that is already showing this
-        -- level closes it; anything else rebuilds through the stored initialize, seats the list (the
-        -- capsule seat, a named anchor, or the cursor), dresses it for its display mode and shows
-        -- it. Width and the off-screen flip settle from OnUpdate (header).
-        function ToggleDropDownMenu(level, value, dropDownFrame, anchorName, xOffset, yOffset)
-            level = level or 1;
-            UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL = level;
-            UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_VALUE = value;
-            local listFrameName = "DropDownList"..level;
-            local listFrame = getglobal(listFrameName);
-            -- Called straight off a capsule's scroll button, `this` is that button and the capsule
-            -- it serves is its parent.
-            local owner = dropDownFrame or this:GetParent();
-            if ( listFrame:IsVisible() and UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU == owner:GetName() ) then
-                listFrame:Hide();
-                return;
-            end
-            listFrame:Hide();
-
-            -- The uiScale correction, arriving with its first scaled customer (0992: the options
-            -- window rides SetScale, and a list at scale 1 would draw its rows ~28% larger than the
-            -- capsule they serve): the shared list wears the OWNER's effective scale for this open.
-            -- Every pre-0992 customer sits at effective scale 1 — no-op.
-            local listScale = owner:GetEffectiveScale();
-            listFrame:SetScale(listScale);
-
-            if ( level == 1 ) then
-                dropDownFrame = owner;
-                UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU = dropDownFrame:GetName();
-                listFrame:ClearAllPoints();
-                listFrame.cursorMode = nil;
-                local point, relativeTo, relativePoint;
-                if ( not anchorName ) then
-                    -- The capsule seat (header deviation), overridable via SetAnchor.
-                    point = dropDownFrame.point or "TOPLEFT";
-                    relativeTo = dropDownFrame.relativeTo or dropDownFrame:GetName();
-                    relativePoint = dropDownFrame.relativePoint or "BOTTOMLEFT";
-                    xOffset = dropDownFrame.xOffset or 8;
-                    yOffset = dropDownFrame.yOffset or 7;
-                elseif ( anchorName == "cursor" ) then
-                    -- Cursor coords are scale-1 units, and a scaled list's anchor offsets are in
-                    -- ITS space, so divide (the reference's own cursor/uiScale dance).
-                    local cursorX, cursorY = GetCursorPosition();
-                    point = "TOPLEFT";
-                    relativeTo = "UIParent";
-                    relativePoint = "BOTTOMLEFT";
-                    xOffset = cursorX / listScale + (xOffset or 0);
-                    yOffset = cursorY / listScale + (yOffset or 0);
-                    listFrame.cursorMode = 1;
-                else
-                    point = "TOPLEFT";
-                    relativeTo = anchorName;
-                    relativePoint = "BOTTOMLEFT";
-                    if ( not xOffset or not yOffset ) then
-                        xOffset = 8;
-                        yOffset = 22;
-                    end
-                end
-                listFrame:SetPoint(point, relativeTo, relativePoint, xOffset, yOffset);
-                -- What the flip re-seats against (SettleFlip).
-                listFrame.seatTo = relativeTo;
-                listFrame.seatX = xOffset;
-                listFrame.seatY = yOffset;
-            else
-                dropDownFrame = dropDownFrame or getglobal(UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU);
-                listFrame:ClearAllPoints();
-                -- Anchor to the row itself, whether `this` is the row (whose parent is the bare
-                -- list — name length 13) or the row's ExpandArrow child.
-                local parentName = this:GetParent():GetName();
-                local anchorFrame = parentName;
-                if ( string.sub(parentName, 1, 12) == "DropDownList" and string.len(parentName) == 13 ) then
-                    anchorFrame = this:GetName();
-                end
-                listFrame:SetPoint("TOPLEFT", anchorFrame, "TOPRIGHT", 0, 0);
-                listFrame.anchorFrame = anchorFrame;
-            end
-
-            -- MENU mode swaps the dialog box for the tooltip-style backdrop; exactly one is up.
-            local wanted, unwanted = "Backdrop", "MenuBackdrop";
-            if ( dropDownFrame and dropDownFrame.displayMode == "MENU" ) then
-                wanted, unwanted = "MenuBackdrop", "Backdrop";
-            end
-            getglobal(listFrameName..wanted):Show();
-            getglobal(listFrameName..unwanted):Hide();
-
-            UIDropDownMenu_Initialize(dropDownFrame, dropDownFrame.initialize, nil, level);
-            if ( listFrame.numButtons == 0 ) then
-                return;
-            end
-
-            -- A capsule that declared a width applies it synchronously (the proven pre-0434 path);
-            -- auto-sized menus ride the settle.
-            listFrame.fixedWidth = nil;
-            if ( dropDownFrame.noResize and dropDownFrame.dropWidth ) then
-                listFrame.fixedWidth = dropDownFrame.dropWidth;
-                for i = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                    listRow(level, i):SetWidth(listFrame.fixedWidth);
-                end
-                listFrame:SetWidth(listFrame.fixedWidth + 32);
-            end
-            listFrame:Show();
-        end
-
-        function CloseDropDownMenus(level)
-            for i = (level or 1), UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS, 1 do
-                getglobal("DropDownList"..i):Hide();
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- CloseMenus() — in the ref a C function (the ESC ladder's rung between the game-menu
-        -- checks and SpellStopCasting, UIParent.lua l.1488): close any open menu, truthy iff one
-        -- was open so the ladder eats the press. Every menu we have is a DropDownList, so the
-        -- Lua equivalent lives here with them (decision 0454).
-        function CloseMenus()
-            local closed
-            for i=1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS, 1 do
-                local list = getglobal("DropDownList"..i)
-                if list and list:IsVisible() then
-                    closed = 1
-                end
-            end
-            if closed then
-                CloseDropDownMenus()
-            end
-            return closed
-        end
-
-        -- The capsule's declared width: the Middle art stretches to it, the frame itself carries the
-        -- two 25px end caps, and the label gets 25px less than the art. `dropWidth` is ours — the
-        -- fixed-width path in Toggle reuses the number (see the header).
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetWidth(width, frame)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            menuChild(frame, "Middle"):SetWidth(width);
-            frame:SetWidth(width + 25 + 25);
-            menuChild(frame, "Text"):SetWidth(width - 25);
-            frame.dropWidth = width;
-            frame.noResize = 1;
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetButtonWidth(width, frame)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            if ( width == "TEXT" ) then
-                width = menuChild(frame, "Text"):GetWidth();
-            end
-            menuChild(frame, "Button"):SetWidth(width);
-            frame.noResize = 1;
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetText(text, frame)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            menuChild(frame, "Text"):SetText(text);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_GetText(frame)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            return menuChild(frame, "Text"):GetText();
-        end
-
-        -- Forget the selection and strip the marks off the open level's rows. Deliberately NOT a
-        -- Refresh: the reference found refreshing from here a bottleneck, and the rows are about to
-        -- be rebuilt anyway.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_ClearAll(frame)
-            for _, field in ipairs(SELECTION_KEYS) do
-                frame[field] = nil;
-            end
-            UIDropDownMenu_SetText("", frame);
-            for i = 1, UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXBUTTONS, 1 do
-                local button = listRow(UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_LEVEL, i);
-                button:UnlockHighlight();
-                menuChild(button, "Check"):Hide();
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- Where the capsule's own label sits: against the left cap, against the right one (clear of
-        -- the scroll button), or centred on the Middle art. {point, art piece, its point, x, y}.
-        local JUSTIFY = {
-            LEFT   = { "LEFT",   "Left",   "LEFT",    27, 2 },
-            RIGHT  = { "RIGHT",  "Right",  "RIGHT",  -43, 2 },
-            CENTER = { "CENTER", "Middle", "CENTER",  -5, 2 },
-        };
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_JustifyText(justification, frame)
-            frame = frame or this;
-            local text = menuChild(frame, "Text");
-            text:ClearAllPoints();
-            local seat = JUSTIFY[justification];
-            if ( seat ) then
-                text:SetPoint(seat[1], frame:GetName()..seat[2], seat[3], seat[4], seat[5]);
-            end
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetAnchor(xOffset, yOffset, dropdown, point, relativeTo, relativePoint)
-            dropdown = dropdown or this;
-            dropdown.point, dropdown.relativeTo, dropdown.relativePoint = point, relativeTo, relativePoint;
-            dropdown.xOffset, dropdown.yOffset = xOffset, yOffset;
-        end
-
-        -- The dropdown a menu handler is acting for: the open capsule, or `this` when nothing is
-        -- open (a row's own func asking who it belongs to).
-        function UIDropDownMenu_GetCurrentDropDown()
-            if ( not UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU ) then
-                return this;
-            end
-            return getglobal(UIDROPDOWNMENU_OPEN_MENU);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenuButton_GetChecked()
-            return menuChild(this, "Check"):IsVisible();
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenuButton_GetName()
-            return menuChild(this, "NormalText"):GetText();
-        end
-
-        -- The picker fields a swatch row seeds under the same name on both sides. `swatchFunc` is
-        -- the exception, set beside them: it lands on the picker as `func`, which is why it is the
-        -- LIVE-preview callback and not an on-accept one.
-        local PICKER_FIELDS = { "hasOpacity", "opacity", "opacityFunc", "cancelFunc" };
-
-        -- THE entry point to the colour picker (spec: UIDropDownMenu.lua l.801-815): every colour
-        -- option in every FrameXML dropdown and every Ace2/Dewdrop menu row lands here. Note what it
-        -- does that the picker itself does not — `previousValues` is captured HERE, and it is the
-        -- table `cancelFunc` is handed, so Cancel restoring the old colour is this function's doing.
-        function UIDropDownMenuButton_OpenColorPicker(button)
-            CloseMenus();
-            button = button or this;
-            UIDROPDOWNMENU_MENU_VALUE = button.value;
-            ColorPickerFrame.func = button.swatchFunc;
-            for _, field in ipairs(PICKER_FIELDS) do
-                ColorPickerFrame[field] = button[field];
-            end
-            ColorPickerFrame:SetColorRGB(button.r, button.g, button.b);
-            ColorPickerFrame.previousValues = {r = button.r, g = button.g, b = button.b, opacity = button.opacity};
-            ShowUIPanel(ColorPickerFrame);
-        end
-
-        -- The by-address trio: an addon that knows a row's level and index, rather than holding the
-        -- row itself, reaches it through these.
-        function UIDropDownMenu_DisableButton(level, id)
-            listRow(level, id):Disable();
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_EnableButton(level, id)
-            listRow(level, id):Enable();
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenu_SetButtonText(level, id, text, r, g, b)
-            local button = listRow(level, id);
-            button:SetText(text);
-            if ( r ) then
-                button:SetTextColor(r, g, b);
-                button:SetHighlightTextColor(r, g, b);
-            end
-        end
-
-        -- ── What the row template's handlers do ───────────────────────────────────────────────
-        -- Everything that sits on a menu row — the row itself, its colour square, its expand arrow,
-        -- the invisible cover over a disabled row — means the same two things to the menu when the
-        -- mouse arrives and when it leaves, and both are about the row's LIST rather than the row:
-        -- the timeout that closes a menu the mouse walked away from lives on the list, and so does
-        -- the level number that decides which lists count as deeper than this one. Five handlers
-        -- want exactly that, so it is written here once instead of five times in markup.
-
-        function UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverIn(list)
-            UIDropDownMenu_StopCounting(list);
-            CloseDropDownMenus(list:GetID() + 1);
-        end
-
-        function UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverOut(list)
-            UIDropDownMenu_StartCounting(list);
-        end
-
-        -- A `hasArrow` row opens its submenu one level below the list it sits in, carrying the row's
-        -- value as that submenu's context. Hovering the row, hovering the arrow and clicking the
-        -- arrow are three ways to ask for the same thing.
-        function UIDropDownMenuRow_OpenSubmenu(row)
-            ToggleDropDownMenu(row:GetParent():GetID() + 1, row.value);
-        end
-
-        -- The colour square's hover feedback. The square itself IS the row's colour, so the only
-        -- thing free to react is the 14x14 backing behind it: gold under the mouse, white off it.
-        function UIDropDownMenuSwatch_Highlight(swatch, color)
-            getglobal(swatch:GetName().."SwatchBg"):SetVertexColor(color.r, color.g, color.b);
-        end
-    ]]></Script>
-
-    <!-- One menu row (ref UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate: highlight, check, right-side icon, the
-         expand arrow, the disabled-row InvisibleButton; text re-anchored per AddButton). -->
-    <Button name="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" virtual="true" hidden="true">
-        <Size><AbsDimension x="128" y="16"/></Size>
-        <Layers>
-            <Layer level="BACKGROUND">
-                <Texture name="$parentHighlight" file="Interface\QuestFrame\UI-QuestTitleHighlight" alphaMode="ADD" setAllPoints="true" hidden="true"/>
-            </Layer>
-            <Layer level="ARTWORK">
-                <Texture name="$parentCheck" file="Interface\Buttons\UI-CheckBox-Check">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="24" y="24"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="LEFT"/></Anchors>
-                </Texture>
-                <Texture name="$parentIcon" hidden="true">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="15" y="15"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="RIGHT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="-5" y="0"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-                </Texture>
-            </Layer>
-        </Layers>
-        <Frames>
-            <!-- ref UIDropDownMenuTemplates.xml l.38-83. The colour square: a 16x16 button whose
-                 NormalTexture is the ChatFrameColorSwatch art, tinted per row, over a 14x14
-                 `$parentSwatchBg` that the hover recolours (gold in, white out) — that background
-                 is the row's only hover feedback, since the square itself is the row's colour.
-                 Clicking it is the ONLY thing in the whole reference UI that opens the colour
-                 picker. -->
-            <Button name="$parentColorSwatch" hidden="true">
-                <Size><AbsDimension x="16" y="16"/></Size>
-                <Anchors><Anchor point="RIGHT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="-6" y="0"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-                <Layers>
-                    <Layer level="BACKGROUND">
-                        <Texture name="$parentSwatchBg">
-                            <Size><AbsDimension x="14" y="14"/></Size>
-                            <Anchors><Anchor point="CENTER"/></Anchors>
-                            <Color r="1.0" g="1.0" b="1.0"/>
-                        </Texture>
-                    </Layer>
-                </Layers>
-                <Scripts>
-                    <!-- The open closes the menu first — that is `OpenColorPicker`'s own first
-                         line, so it is not repeated here. -->
-                    <OnClick>
-                        UIDropDownMenuButton_OpenColorPicker(this:GetParent());
-                    </OnClick>
-                    <OnEnter>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverIn(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                        UIDropDownMenuSwatch_Highlight(this, NORMAL_FONT_COLOR);
-                    </OnEnter>
-                    <OnLeave>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverOut(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                        UIDropDownMenuSwatch_Highlight(this, HIGHLIGHT_FONT_COLOR);
-                    </OnLeave>
-                </Scripts>
-                <NormalTexture name="$parentNormalTexture" file="Interface\ChatFrame\ChatFrameColorSwatch"/>
-            </Button>
-            <Button name="$parentExpandArrow" hidden="true">
-                <Size><AbsDimension x="16" y="16"/></Size>
-                <Anchors><Anchor point="RIGHT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="-6" y="0"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-                <Scripts>
-                    <OnClick>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_OpenSubmenu(this:GetParent());
-                    </OnClick>
-                    <!-- Hovering the arrow opens the submenu, so this is the one hover on the row
-                         that must NOT close the deeper levels — only the timeout stops. -->
-                    <OnEnter>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_OpenSubmenu(this:GetParent());
-                        UIDropDownMenu_StopCounting(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                    </OnEnter>
-                    <OnLeave>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverOut(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                    </OnLeave>
-                </Scripts>
-                <NormalTexture file="Interface\ChatFrame\ChatFrameExpandArrow"/>
-            </Button>
-            <!-- Disabled rows don't get mouse events; this transparent cover keeps the hover
-                 alive (timeout + deeper-level close). It stops at the colour swatch's LEFT edge
-                 (ref l.111-113) so a disabled row's swatch is still clickable. -->
-            <Button name="$parentInvisibleButton" hidden="true">
-                <Anchors>
-                    <Anchor point="TOPLEFT"/>
-                    <Anchor point="BOTTOMLEFT"/>
-                    <Anchor point="RIGHT" relativeTo="$parentColorSwatch" relativePoint="LEFT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="0" y="0"/></Offset></Anchor>
-                </Anchors>
-                <Scripts>
-                    <OnEnter>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverIn(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                    </OnEnter>
-                    <OnLeave>
-                        UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverOut(this:GetParent():GetParent());
-                    </OnLeave>
-                </Scripts>
-            </Button>
-        </Frames>
-        <Scripts>
-            <OnClick>
-                UIDropDownMenuButton_OnClick();
-            </OnClick>
-            <!-- A row that has a submenu opens it on hover; a row that has not closes whatever is
-                 deeper. Either way the list's timeout stops and the row lights up. -->
-            <OnEnter>
-                if ( this.hasArrow ) then
-                    UIDropDownMenuRow_OpenSubmenu(this);
-                    UIDropDownMenu_StopCounting(this:GetParent());
-                else
-                    UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverIn(this:GetParent());
-                end
-                getglobal(this:GetName().."Highlight"):Show();
-            </OnEnter>
-            <OnLeave>
-                getglobal(this:GetName().."Highlight"):Hide();
-                UIDropDownMenuRow_HoverOut(this:GetParent());
-            </OnLeave>
-        </Scripts>
-        <ButtonText name="$parentNormalText">
-            <Anchors><Anchor point="LEFT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="27" y="0"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-        </ButtonText>
-        <NormalFont inherits="GameFontHighlightSmall" justifyH="LEFT"/>
-        <HighlightFont inherits="GameFontHighlightSmall" justifyH="LEFT"/>
-        <DisabledFont inherits="GameFontDisableSmall" justifyH="LEFT"/>
-    </Button>
-
-    <!-- The list (ref UIDropDownListTemplate): the two swappable backdrops + 32 rows.
-         FULLSCREEN_DIALOG, not the ref's DIALOG: the list must sort above ANY opener, and the
-         world map is FULLSCREEN strata — DIALOG would render the list underneath it (the strata
-         escalation later reference versions added to ToggleDropDownMenu, applied statically
-         here since our customer set is known). -->
-    <Button name="UIDropDownListTemplate" enableMouse="true" frameStrata="FULLSCREEN_DIALOG" virtual="true" hidden="true">
-        <Size><AbsDimension x="180" y="32"/></Size>
-        <Frames>
-            <Frame name="$parentBackdrop" setAllPoints="true">
-                <Backdrop bgFile="Interface\DialogFrame\UI-DialogBox-Background" edgeFile="Interface\DialogFrame\UI-DialogBox-Border" tile="true">
-                    <BackgroundInsets><AbsInset left="11" right="12" top="12" bottom="11"/></BackgroundInsets>
-                    <TileSize><AbsValue val="32"/></TileSize>
-                    <EdgeSize><AbsValue val="32"/></EdgeSize>
-                </Backdrop>
-            </Frame>
-            <Frame name="$parentMenuBackdrop" setAllPoints="true" hidden="true">
-                <Backdrop bgFile="Interface\Tooltips\UI-Tooltip-Background" edgeFile="Interface\Tooltips\UI-Tooltip-Border" tile="true">
-                    <BackgroundInsets><AbsInset left="5" right="5" top="5" bottom="5"/></BackgroundInsets>
-                    <TileSize><AbsValue val="16"/></TileSize>
-                    <EdgeSize><AbsValue val="16"/></EdgeSize>
-                </Backdrop>
-                <Scripts>
-                    <OnLoad>
-                        this:SetBackdropBorderColor(TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR.r, TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR.g, TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR.b);
-                        this:SetBackdropColor(TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_BACKGROUND_COLOR.r, TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_BACKGROUND_COLOR.g, TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_BACKGROUND_COLOR.b);
-                    </OnLoad>
-                </Scripts>
-            </Frame>
-            <Button name="$parentButton1" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="1"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton2" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="2"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton3" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="3"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton4" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="4"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton5" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="5"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton6" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="6"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton7" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="7"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton8" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="8"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton9" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="9"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton10" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="10"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton11" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="11"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton12" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="12"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton13" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="13"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton14" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="14"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton15" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="15"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton16" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="16"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton17" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="17"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton18" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="18"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton19" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="19"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton20" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="20"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton21" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="21"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton22" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="22"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton23" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="23"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton24" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="24"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton25" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="25"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton26" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="26"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton27" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="27"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton28" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="28"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton29" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="29"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton30" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="30"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton31" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="31"/>
-            <Button name="$parentButton32" inherits="UIDropDownMenuButtonTemplate" id="32"/>
-        </Frames>
-        <Scripts>
-            <OnClick>
-                this:Hide();
-            </OnClick>
-            <OnEnter>
-                UIDropDownMenu_StopCounting(this);
-            </OnEnter>
-            <OnLeave>
-                UIDropDownMenu_StartCounting(this);
-            </OnLeave>
-            <OnUpdate>
-                UIDropDownMenu_OnUpdate(arg1);
-            </OnUpdate>
-            <OnShow>
-                if ( this:GetID() > 1 ) then
-                    this.parent = getglobal("DropDownList"..(this:GetID() - 1));
-                end
-                this.showTimer = nil;
-                this.isCounting = nil;
-                if ( not this.fixedWidth ) then
-                    this.pendingWidth = 1;
-                end
-                this.pendingFlip = 1;
-            </OnShow>
-        </Scripts>
-    </Button>
-
-    <!-- The capsule (spec: ref UIDropDownMenuTemplate). Its art, geometry and texcoords are the
-         reference's own numbers — that is what makes it the same widget rather than a lookalike. -->
-    <Frame name="UIDropDownMenuTemplate" virtual="true">
-        <Size><AbsDimension x="40" y="32"/></Size>
-        <Layers>
-            <Layer level="ARTWORK">
-                <Texture name="$parentLeft" file="Interface\Glues\CharacterCreate\CharacterCreate-LabelFrame">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="25" y="64"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="TOPLEFT"><Offset><AbsDimension x="0" y="17"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-                    <TexCoords left="0" right="0.1953125" top="0" bottom="1"/>
-                </Texture>
-                <Texture name="$parentMiddle" file="Interface\Glues\CharacterCreate\CharacterCreate-LabelFrame">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="115" y="64"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="LEFT" relativeTo="$parentLeft" relativePoint="RIGHT"/></Anchors>
-                    <TexCoords left="0.1953125" right="0.8046875" top="0" bottom="1"/>
-                </Texture>
-                <Texture name="$parentRight" file="Interface\Glues\CharacterCreate\CharacterCreate-LabelFrame">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="25" y="64"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="LEFT" relativeTo="$parentMiddle" relativePoint="RIGHT"/></Anchors>
-                    <TexCoords left="0.8046875" right="1" top="0" bottom="1"/>
-                </Texture>
-                <FontString name="$parentText" inherits="GameFontHighlightSmall" justifyH="RIGHT">
-                    <Size><AbsDimension x="0" y="10"/></Size>
-                    <Anchors><Anchor point="RIGHT" relativeTo="$parentRight"><Offset><AbsDimension x="-43" y="2"/></Offset></Anchor></Anchors>
-                </FontString>
-            </Layer>
-        </Layers>
-        <Frames>
-            <Button name="$parentButton">
-                <Size><AbsDimension x="24" y="24"/></Size>
-                <Anchors>
-                    <Anchor point="TOPRIGHT" relativeTo="$parentRight">
-                        <Offset><AbsDimension x="-16" y="-18"/></Offset>
-                    </Anchor>
-                </Anchors>
-                <Scripts>
-                    <OnClick>
-                        ToggleDropDownMenu();
-                        PlaySound("igMainMenuOptionCheckBoxOn");
-                    </OnClick>
-                </Scripts>
-                <NormalTexture file="Interface\ChatFrame\UI-ChatIcon-ScrollDown-Up"/>
-                <PushedTexture file="Interface\ChatFrame\UI-ChatIcon-ScrollDown-Down"/>
-                <DisabledTexture file="Interface\ChatFrame\UI-ChatIcon-ScrollDown-Disabled"/>
-                <HighlightTexture file="Interface\Buttons\UI-Common-MouseHilight" alphaMode="ADD"/>
-            </Button>
-        </Frames>
-        <Scripts>
-            <OnHide>
-                CloseDropDownMenus();
-            </OnHide>
-        </Scripts>
-    </Frame>
-
-    <!-- The two shared lists (the ref authors DropDownList1..3; level 3 waits for a customer).
-
-         The per-instance <Scripts> answer the three jobs the reference hangs off these two elements
-         (spec: ref UIDropDownMenu.xml l.9-18, l.25-28). They were missing here entirely until they
-         were measured; each earns its place separately:
-
-         · `CloseDropDownMenus(level+1)` is the SUBMENU CATCH-ALL, and it is why the ref hangs it
-           off OnHide rather than off the toggle. `ToggleDropDownMenu`'s close arm is a bare
-           `listFrame:Hide()` (l.15-19 of the function) — so with no OnHide, opening a menu with a
-           `hasArrow` row, hovering the submenu open and then toggling level 1 shut LEFT
-           DropDownList2 on screen with its parent gone. OnHide catches that path and every other
-           one that hides level 1 (a parent Hide, the ESC ladder, an addon calling
-           `DropDownList1:Hide()` itself) — which is the point of putting it on the event.
-
-         · `OPEN_DROPDOWNMENUS[level] = nil` closes a real leak: UnitPopup.xml WRITES the level
-           (l.191, l.239) and its every-frame driver READS it (l.481), and nothing here ever
-           cleared it, so an entry survived its menu forever. No player-visible symptom is
-           reachable today and that is stated rather than implied — `UnitPopup_OnUpdate` returns
-           early unless DropDownList1 is visible AND a UnitPopupFrame owns the open menu, and
-           `UIDropDownMenu_AddButton` calls `button:Enable()` unconditionally, so a stale level's
-           Disable is undone the next time that list is built. Both of those are guards belonging
-           to other code; the divergence from the ref is here, so it is fixed here.
-
-         · UIDROPDOWNMENU_DEFAULT_TEXT_HEIGHT is DERIVED, never a literal. The ref forward-declares
-           it nil (UIDropDownMenu.lua l.16) and this OnLoad is the only thing that ever assigns it,
-           reading the height off Button1's own NormalText. `UIDropDownMenu_AddButton` then passes
-           it straight into `SetFont` (l.187) for every row without an explicit `info.textHeight`.
-           Dewdrop-2.0 does the same at its own l.489 — 64 corpus addon folders embed a copy, but
-           it is ONE library file replicated, and only that one of its two sites is unguarded (the
-           other is `info.textHeight or UIDROPDOWNMENU_DEFAULT_TEXT_HEIGHT or 10`). Writing a
-           literal here would have been a silent fidelity divergence, not a fix. -->
-    <!-- `toplevel` is authored on the ref's INSTANCES, not its template (decision 1318).
-
-         **Neither list carries a `parent=`, and neither does the reference's** (UIDropDownMenu.xml
-         l.5/l.20 — `toplevel="true" frameStrata="FULLSCREEN_DIALOG"` and nothing else). That is
-         not incidental. A dropdown has to open over whatever opened it, an `area = "full"` panel
-         included — and a `full` panel is shown through `SetFullScreenFrame`, which hides
-         `UIParent`. A list under `UIParent` opens into a hidden tree, so the world map's own
-         continent and zone pickers answered a click with nothing at all (decision 1757). -->
-    <Button name="DropDownList1" inherits="UIDropDownListTemplate" id="1" toplevel="true">
-        <Scripts>
-            <OnLoad>
-                local fontName, fontHeight, fontFlags = getglobal("DropDownList1Button1NormalText"):GetFont();
-                UIDROPDOWNMENU_DEFAULT_TEXT_HEIGHT = fontHeight;
-            </OnLoad>
-            <OnHide>
-                CloseDropDownMenus(2);
-                OPEN_DROPDOWNMENUS[1] = nil;
-            </OnHide>
-        </Scripts>
-    </Button>
-    <Button name="DropDownList2" inherits="UIDropDownListTemplate" id="2" toplevel="true">
-        <Scripts>
-            <OnHide>
-                CloseDropDownMenus(3);
-                OPEN_DROPDOWNMENUS[2] = nil;
-            </OnHide>
-        </Scripts>
-    </Button>
-</Ui>
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UiPanels.xml b/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UiPanels.xml
index 3d0a358b..b48c6cf0 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UiPanels.xml
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/UiPanels.xml
@@ -399,6 +399,35 @@
         -- surface (a focused test VM, and the reference's own `ADDON_LOADED` ordering), and this
         -- runs on the first line of every `ToggleBag`/`ToggleBackpack`/`ToggleKeyRing`, so it is
         -- the last place that should be the thing to raise.
+        -- ── Moved here when UIDropDownMenu.xml went to the chain (1751) ──────────────────────
+        -- The reference keeps `CloseMenus` in `UIParent.lua:984`, not in its dropdown file, and
+        -- this file is already where our slice of UIParent.lua lives (`IsOptionFrameOpen` below,
+        -- `CloseAllWindows`, `ToggleGameMenu`). It sits at manifest line 144, ahead of all five
+        -- consumers — the stock dropdown at 155, MicroMenu, GameMenuFrame and two test kits.
+        --
+        -- The BOUND is inlined rather than read from `UIDROPDOWNMENU_MAXLEVELS`, which lives in the
+        -- dropdown file: a kit that loads this file and not that one would otherwise fail on
+        -- `'for' limit must be a number`. Two is the reference's own list count (DropDownList1/2 are
+        -- what `UIDropDownMenu.xml` declares; the third exists only in later builds).
+        --
+        -- The BODY stays ours and is deliberately not the reference's: stock iterates a `UIMenus`
+        -- table nothing here declares, ours asks the dropdown lists directly. Same answer, and it
+        -- retires with this file rather than pretending to be stock.
+        function CloseMenus()
+            local closed
+            for i=1, 2, 1 do
+                local list = getglobal("DropDownList"..i)
+                if list and list:IsVisible() then
+                    closed = 1
+                end
+            end
+            if closed then
+                CloseDropDownMenus()
+            end
+            return closed
+        end
+
+
         function IsOptionFrameOpen()
             if (GameMenuFrame and GameMenuFrame:IsVisible())
                 or (OptionsFrame and OptionsFrame:IsVisible())
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/benilla.toc b/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/benilla.toc
index 47b55922..b0a189a6 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/benilla.toc
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/benilla.toc
@@ -149,10 +149,17 @@ UiPanels.xml
 # requirement: ItemRef.xml below expands one, and so do the 27 corpus addons that name
 # GameTooltipTemplate in an XML inherits=.
 GameTooltip.xml
-# The dropdown kit (0203 phase 2's closing sub-slice, widened for 0434 phase 5):
-# UIDropDownMenuTemplate + DropDownList1/2 + the UIDropDownMenu_* API — before its
-# first customers (the unit popups below, the world map's pickers, the trainer filter).
-UIDropDownMenu.xml
+# ══ THE DROPDOWN KIT — the reference's own, off the player's chain (1751) ══
+# UIDropDownMenuTemplate + the DropDownList frames + the whole `UIDropDownMenu_*` API — before its
+# first customers (the unit popups below, the world map's pickers, the trainer filter). The stock
+# file pulls its own `UIDropDownMenu.lua` and `<Include>`s UIDropDownMenuTemplates.xml, so this one
+# line carries all three. We also gain `DropDownList3`, which our transcription stopped short of.
+#
+# Ours (0203 phase 2, widened for 0434 phase 5) defined every stock global plus six helpers of its
+# own. Five were named nowhere outside the file. The sixth, `CloseMenus`, moved to UiPanels.xml —
+# the reference keeps it in `UIParent.lua`, not its dropdown file, and UiPanels is both where our
+# slice of UIParent.lua lives and ahead of all five of its consumers.
+Interface\FrameXML\UIDropDownMenu.xml
 # ══ THE UIMenu KIT — the reference's own, off the player's chain (1751, window 21) ══
 # `UIMenuTemplate` and `UIMenuButtonTemplate`, with `UIMenu.lua`'s `UIMenu_OnShow`/`_OnUpdate` and
 # the four `UIMenuButton_*` handlers arriving through the file's own `<Script file=>`.
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_chat/tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_chat/tests.rs
index 0b682a60..9d3e60e6 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_chat/tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_chat/tests.rs
@@ -440,7 +440,7 @@ fn chat_vm() -> benilla_ui::script::UiScript {
     for file in [
         "Fonts.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         // The UIMenu kit is the reference's own file since 1751 window 21, so this reads both
         // stores through the one loader that speaks them.
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIMenu.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_options_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_options_tests.rs
index 13294a09..9969f02f 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_options_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_options_tests.rs
@@ -44,7 +44,7 @@ fn chat_with_menu() -> UiScript {
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "UIParent.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "UIPanelTemplates.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\ColorPickerFrame.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_resize_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_resize_tests.rs
index f2cd62b0..abc59c36 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_resize_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_resize_tests.rs
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ fn chat_ui() -> UiScript {
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "UIParent.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "UIPanelTemplates.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\ColorPickerFrame.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_tests.rs
index ba8ba697..5877749a 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/chat_tests.rs
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ fn chat_frame() -> UiScript {
     // says so too, rather than a guard that would hide a real ordering fault. (The tooltip file is
     // the dropdown kit's own dependency — its MenuBackdrop reads `TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR`.)
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIMenu.xml"); // the kit the chat menus build from
     load_xml(&s, "ChatFrame.xml");
     s.set_screen_size(1600.0, 900.0);
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/color_picker_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/color_picker_tests.rs
index dfbbaf98..477e56a9 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/color_picker_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/color_picker_tests.rs
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ fn picker() -> UiScript {
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "UIParent.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "UIPanelTemplates.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\ColorPickerFrame.xml",
@@ -427,6 +427,12 @@ fn a_dropdown_row_with_has_color_swatch_opens_the_picker_and_cancel_restores() {
         restored = {}
         picked = {}
         local dd = CreateFrame("Frame", "TestColorDropDown", nil, "UIDropDownMenuTemplate")
+        -- The anchor needs a POSITION. `ToggleDropDownMenu` anchors the list to this frame and then
+        -- guards on `listFrame:GetCenter()`, hiding the list again and returning when it is nil
+        -- (ref UIDropDownMenu.lua:624-631) — so an unplaced dropdown opens no menu in the real
+        -- client either. Our deleted transcription carried no such guard and showed it regardless,
+        -- which is the only reason this fixture ever worked unanchored.
+        dd:SetPoint("CENTER", 0, 0)
         UIDropDownMenu_Initialize(dd, function()
             local info = {}
             info.text = "Border Color"
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/combo_frame_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/combo_frame_tests.rs
index f32ef986..13a2da95 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/combo_frame_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/combo_frame_tests.rs
@@ -21,7 +21,7 @@ fn load_combo_frame() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "Fonts.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIParent.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dressup_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dressup_tests.rs
index f83d537b..17188e4e 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dressup_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dressup_tests.rs
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ const JERKY_LINK: &str = "|cffffffff|Hitem:117|h[Tough Jerky]|h|r";
 /// The room's own files, past whatever bag interface the caller wants — both loaders below end
 /// with these, in manifest order.
 const ROOM_UI: &[&str] = &[
-    "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+    "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
     "UnitPopup.xml",
     "Interface\\FrameXML\\ItemRef.xml",
     "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dropdown_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dropdown_tests.rs
index e79836ff..6f6a59b3 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dropdown_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/dropdown_tests.rs
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ fn load_dropdown_kit(s: &UiScript) {
         "Fonts.xml",
         "UIParent.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
     ] {
         load_xml(s, file);
     }
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/escape_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/escape_tests.rs
index 25fd0e73..92ea1583 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/escape_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/escape_tests.rs
@@ -182,7 +182,7 @@ fn escape_closes_the_options_window_before_opening_the_menu() {
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "ScrollTemplates.xml"); // the Keybindings page's faux-scroll kit (1008)
     load_xml(&s, "KeyBindingsPage.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "OptionsFrame.xml");
@@ -311,7 +311,7 @@ fn escape_ladder_cast_then_windows_then_target_one_eater_per_press() {
     }
     // GameTooltip.xml (BAG_UI's, for the bag slots' tooltips) also carries TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR,
     // which the dropdown backdrop's OnLoad reads — so the kit can load straight after it.
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml");
     s.set_money(0);
     s.set_container(0, Some(one_item_backpack()));
@@ -329,7 +329,14 @@ fn escape_ladder_cast_then_windows_then_target_one_eater_per_press() {
     // Press 0 — mid-cast with a dropdown open (the ref's CloseMenus rung, l.1488): the menu
     // closes and eats the press — the cast, the windows, and the target all survive.
     s.set_casting(true);
-    s.run("DropDownList1:Show()").unwrap();
+    // `maxWidth` before the Show: stock `DropDownList`'s own `<OnShow>` sizes every button from it
+    // (ref UIDropDownMenuTemplates.xml:237-245), and `UIDropDownMenu_Initialize` is what normally
+    // sets it — so showing the list bare raises `SetWidth(nil)` in the real client too. Our deleted
+    // transcription had no such OnShow, which is why a bare Show worked here before. The subject of
+    // this test is the ESC ladder, not the menu's construction, so it sets the one field the show
+    // path reads rather than standing up a whole anchored dropdown.
+    s.run("DropDownList1.maxWidth = 100 DropDownList1:Show()")
+        .unwrap();
     s.run("ToggleGameMenu()").unwrap();
     assert!(
         !s.eval::<bool>("return DropDownList1:IsShown()").unwrap(),
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/friends_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/friends_tests.rs
index 17ec34fe..b6806e9f 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/friends_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/friends_tests.rs
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ fn setup() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     // The row right-click menu is the shared UnitPopup "FRIEND" menu, so the window's slice of
     // the manifest includes it (it loads well before FriendsFrame.xml in the real order).
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/game_menu_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/game_menu_tests.rs
index 9bb9a2a1..a5db3563 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/game_menu_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/game_menu_tests.rs
@@ -266,7 +266,7 @@ fn the_open_menu_takes_the_screen_and_refuses_every_other_panel() {
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml",
             // The loot window is the reference's own since 1751 — `test_ui::LOOT_UI` carries
             // what it needs and why, and PartyFrame's `MAX_PARTY_MEMBERS` is needed at LOAD.
-            "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+            "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
             "UnitPopup.xml",
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
@@ -547,7 +547,7 @@ fn escape_during_a_countdown_cancels_it_and_does_not_open_the_menu() {
 fn the_world_map_cannot_open_behind_the_menu_and_gives_its_slot_back() {
     let s = harness_with(&[
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml", // the map's continent/zone pickers initialize into it at OnLoad
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml", // the map's continent/zone pickers initialize into it at OnLoad
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "WorldMapFrame.xml",
     ]);
@@ -595,7 +595,7 @@ fn the_world_map_cannot_open_behind_the_menu_and_gives_its_slot_back() {
 fn nothing_opens_behind_the_world_map_and_escape_closes_it_first() {
     let s = harness_with(&[
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "WorldMapFrame.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml",
@@ -772,7 +772,7 @@ fn backpack() -> ContainerState {
 fn the_menu_rides_the_shared_era_window_scale() {
     let mut s = harness_with(&[
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "KeyBindingsPage.xml",
         "OptionsFrame.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/guild_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/guild_tests.rs
index 547dc4fe..80c62f56 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/guild_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/guild_tests.rs
@@ -208,7 +208,7 @@ fn setup() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "ScrollTemplates.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIPanelTemplates.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/instance_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/instance_tests.rs
index 561dd462..74e3c7a4 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/instance_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/instance_tests.rs
@@ -87,7 +87,7 @@ fn the_self_menu_row_gates_on_the_binding_and_confirms_before_sending() {
         "MoneyFrame.xml",
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "UnitPopup.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/keybindings_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/keybindings_tests.rs
index d47ebac5..6ca684b4 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/keybindings_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/keybindings_tests.rs
@@ -47,32 +47,25 @@ pub(crate) fn harness() -> UiScript {
         "MoneyFrame.xml",
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         "UIParent.xml",
         "KeyBindingsPage.xml",
         "OptionsFrame.xml",
         "GameMenuFrame.xml",
     ] {
-        let text = std::fs::read_to_string(
-            std::path::Path::new(env!("CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR"))
-                .join("assets/ui")
-                .join(file),
-        )
-        .unwrap();
-        let doc = benilla_ui::framexml::parse(&text).unwrap();
-        let report = benilla_ui::loader::load(&s, &doc, &|_| None);
-        assert!(
-            report.errors.is_empty(),
-            "{file}: loader errors: {:?}",
-            report.errors
-        );
+        // `test_ui::load_ui`, not a local read: a manifest entry carrying a path separator is the
+        // REFERENCE's own file and must come off the player's chain, which
+        // `std::fs::read_to_string` under `assets/ui` cannot do — it goes looking for
+        // `assets/ui/Interface/FrameXML/...` and fails. The shared loader resolves both shapes, and
+        // its own doc already records this consolidation happening once before. Hand-rolling it
+        // here is what made this kit break the moment a file it loads migrated (1751).
+        // `load_ui_strict` for the files whose art actually matters here: an unknown template is
+        // a loader WARNING, not an error, so a silently skinless window would otherwise pass.
         if file == "KeyBindingsPage.xml" || file == "OptionsFrame.xml" {
-            assert!(
-                report.warnings.is_empty(),
-                "{file}: loader warnings (dropped subtrees?): {:?}",
-                report.warnings
-            );
+            super::test_ui::load_ui_strict(&s, file);
+        } else {
+            super::test_ui::load_ui(&s, file);
         }
     }
     assert!(s.errors().is_empty(), "script errors: {:?}", s.errors());
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/merchant_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/merchant_tests.rs
index ace7436a..01c2a90c 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/merchant_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/merchant_tests.rs
@@ -574,7 +574,7 @@ fn shipped_merchant_hover_scopes_highlight_and_anchors_item_tooltip() {
     // with it (GameTooltip.xml reads the real name now), so the dependency is gone. At runtime
     // every FrameXML file loads before any hover fires, so load it here too — with the dropdown
     // kit its GroupLootDropDown initializes against at load (benilla.toc l.64 vs 383).
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml");
 
     s.set_merchant(Some(MerchantState {
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/options_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/options_tests.rs
index 8ce6f217..7f24418c 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/options_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/options_tests.rs
@@ -44,33 +44,24 @@ fn harness_on(mut s: UiScript) -> UiScript {
         "MoneyFrame.xml",
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "ScrollTemplates.xml", // the Keybindings page's faux-scroll kit
         "KeyBindingsPage.xml", // the Keybindings body's templates + script (1008)
         "OptionsFrame.xml",
         "GameMenuFrame.xml",
     ] {
-        let text = std::fs::read_to_string(
-            std::path::Path::new(env!("CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR"))
-                .join("assets/ui")
-                .join(file),
-        )
-        .unwrap();
-        let doc = benilla_ui::framexml::parse(&text).unwrap();
-        let report = benilla_ui::loader::load(&s, &doc, &|_| None);
-        assert!(
-            report.errors.is_empty(),
-            "{file}: loader errors: {:?}",
-            report.errors
-        );
+        // `test_ui::load_ui`, not a local read: a manifest entry carrying a path separator is the
+        // REFERENCE's own file and must come off the player's chain, which
+        // `std::fs::read_to_string` under `assets/ui` cannot do — it goes looking for
+        // `assets/ui/Interface/FrameXML/...` and fails. The shared loader resolves both shapes, and
+        // its own doc already records this consolidation happening once before. Hand-rolling it
+        // here is what made this kit break the moment a file it loads migrated (1751).
         // The dialect announces DROPPED subtrees as warnings, not errors — for the new file,
-        // a warning is a silently-missing piece of chrome, so it fails here.
+        // a warning is a silently-missing piece of chrome, so it fails there.
         if file == "OptionsFrame.xml" {
-            assert!(
-                report.warnings.is_empty(),
-                "{file}: loader warnings (dropped subtrees?): {:?}",
-                report.warnings
-            );
+            super::test_ui::load_ui_strict(&s, file);
+        } else {
+            super::test_ui::load_ui(&s, file);
         }
     }
     // The app's own post-load pass, at the app's own moment: everything is loaded, so
@@ -726,7 +717,7 @@ fn interface_harness() -> UiScript {
             // these again after these — re-running a UI file is what `/reload` does, and the
             // loader takes it.
             "GameTooltip.xml",
-            "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+            "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
             "UnitPopup.xml",
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
@@ -772,7 +763,7 @@ fn chat_harness() -> UiScript {
             "UiPanels.xml",
             "UIParent.xml",
             "GameTooltip.xml",
-            "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+            "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
             "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIMenu.xml", // the kit ChatMenu/EmoteMenu/VoiceMacroMenu build from
             "ChatFrame.xml",
         ],
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/pet_frame_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/pet_frame_tests.rs
index de8a9c90..bf45055d 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/pet_frame_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/pet_frame_tests.rs
@@ -29,7 +29,7 @@ fn load_pet_frame() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "Fonts.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIParent.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/petition_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/petition_tests.rs
index 12a7c469..80c990ae 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/petition_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/petition_tests.rs
@@ -106,7 +106,7 @@ fn setup() -> UiScript {
     // decide where focus goes after the name box closes — a nil there raises before the charter is
     // bought. Ours guarded it; the reference does not.
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml"); // TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR, read by the dropdown backdrops
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // ChatFrame's seven dropdowns inherit its template
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // ChatFrame's seven dropdowns inherit its template
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIMenu.xml"); // the kit the chat menus build from
     load_xml(&s, "ChatFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\GuildRegistrarFrame.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/questlog_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/questlog_tests.rs
index ed145ecc..6b00225d 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/questlog_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/questlog_tests.rs
@@ -980,7 +980,7 @@ fn reward_row_hover_serves_the_shared_item_tooltip() {
     // that window set to `ITEM_QUALITY_COLORS`. 1751 retired the window and the alias with it, so
     // Fonts.xml alone is the source now. Formerly: it
     // needs the dropdown kit its GroupLootDropDown initializes against (benilla.toc l.64 vs 383).
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml");
     // ScrollTemplates.xml + UIPanelTemplates.xml are NOT optional: the detail pane inherits
     // UIPanelScrollFrameTemplate, and a MISSING template is a loader *warning*, not an error —
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/raid_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/raid_tests.rs
index f7474695..20c8862e 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/raid_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/raid_tests.rs
@@ -29,7 +29,7 @@ fn setup() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIParent.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "ScrollTemplates.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIPanelTemplates.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/target_aura_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/target_aura_tests.rs
index 4ff6f604..146e45f9 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/target_aura_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/target_aura_tests.rs
@@ -21,7 +21,7 @@ fn harness() -> UiScript {
     s.set_screen_size(1024.0, 768.0);
     load_xml(&s, "Fonts.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml"); // TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_* (the dropdown kit's MenuBackdrop)
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // the unit popups' kit (TargetFrameDropDown's template)
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // the unit popups' kit (TargetFrameDropDown's template)
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Cooldown.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "ActionBar.xml"); // BENILLA_FALLBACK_ICON
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/test_ui.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/test_ui.rs
index e8c8361c..6dd4a2b8 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/test_ui.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/test_ui.rs
@@ -139,7 +139,7 @@ pub(super) const LOOT_UI: &[&str] = &[
     "MoneyFrame.xml",
     "UiPanels.xml", // StaticPopup, and the LOOT_BIND / CONFIRM_LOOT_DISTRIBUTION dialogs
     "GameTooltip.xml", // TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_COLOR, read by the dropdown backdrop
-    "UIDropDownMenu.xml", // GroupLootDropDown's OnLoad calls UIDropDownMenu_Initialize
+    "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml", // GroupLootDropDown's OnLoad calls UIDropDownMenu_Initialize
     "UnitPopup.xml",
     // …and what its rows' OnLoad calls: every `PartyMemberFrame<N>` and its pet frame runs
     // `UnitFrame_Initialize`, which lives in UnitFrame.lua and itself calls
@@ -209,7 +209,7 @@ pub(super) const CHARACTER_UI: &[&str] = &[
     // The unit frames' four right-click dropdowns call `UIDropDownMenu_Initialize` at LOAD, so the
     // kit and the menu table it initialises from both precede them — the manifest's own order
     // (175 → 189 → 193 → 263).
-    "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+    "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
     "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIMenu.xml",
     "UnitPopup.xml",
     "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tooltip_anchor_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tooltip_anchor_tests.rs
index 9846c974..b321660c 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tooltip_anchor_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tooltip_anchor_tests.rs
@@ -97,7 +97,7 @@ fn unit_frame_hover_takes_the_default_corner_and_drops_on_leave() {
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\GlobalStrings.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "UnitPopup.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\BuffFrame.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\UnitFrame.xml",
@@ -163,7 +163,7 @@ fn your_own_portrait_explains_the_menu_instead_of_showing_your_health() {
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\GlobalStrings.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "UnitPopup.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\BuffFrame.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\UnitFrame.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tot_frame_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tot_frame_tests.rs
index aa8ec2a7..fe81115f 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tot_frame_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/tot_frame_tests.rs
@@ -63,7 +63,7 @@ fn load_tot() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "Fonts.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UIParent.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "Cooldown.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "ActionBar.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/trainer_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/trainer_tests.rs
index 10ac1784..87adf7dc 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/trainer_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/trainer_tests.rs
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ fn trainer_script() -> UiScript {
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml"); // TOOLTIP_DEFAULT_* (the kit's MenuBackdrop), app order
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // the filter dropdown's kit
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml"); // the filter dropdown's kit
     load_xml(&s, "ScrollTemplates.xml"); // the faux-scroll bar kit
     load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\MerchantFrame.xml"); // BenillaMoney_Set/_Clear/_SetColor live here
     load_xml(&s, "TrainerFrame.xml");
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_frame_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_frame_tests.rs
index 36d53e55..3d66d021 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_frame_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_frame_tests.rs
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ fn load_unit_frames(s: &UiScript) {
     load_xml(s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua");
     load_xml(s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml");
     load_xml(s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     load_xml(s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\BuffFrame.xml");
     load_xml(s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UnitFrame.xml");
@@ -1200,7 +1200,7 @@ fn the_party_art_paints_over_the_bars() {
     load_xml(&s, "MoneyFrame.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UiPanels.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "GameTooltip.xml");
-    load_xml(&s, "UIDropDownMenu.xml");
+    load_xml(&s, "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml");
     load_xml(&s, "UnitPopup.xml");
     // The reference's own kit, in the manifest's order. `UIParent.xml` is not decoration here:
     // `RaiseFrameLevel`/`LowerFrameLevel` live in it (ref UIParent.lua l.1890-1896) and stock
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_popup_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_popup_tests.rs
index abfad1c9..ff18982a 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_popup_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/unit_popup_tests.rs
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ fn load_popup_frames(s: &UiScript) {
         // reaches at LOAD (its tab row and its confirm dialogs).
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "UnitPopup.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\ItemRef.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
@@ -467,7 +467,7 @@ fn load_pet_menu_frames(s: &UiScript) {
         "MoneyFrame.xml",
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
         "UnitPopup.xml",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.lua",
         "Interface\\FrameXML\\TextStatusBar.xml",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/world_map_tests.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/world_map_tests.rs
index 8cf5dc9d..07655b3d 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/world_map_tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_script/world_map_tests.rs
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ fn harness() -> UiScript {
         "UiPanels.xml",
         "UIPanelTemplates.xml",
         "GameTooltip.xml",
-        "UIDropDownMenu.xml", // the map's continent/zone pickers initialize into it at OnLoad
+        "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml", // the map's continent/zone pickers initialize into it at OnLoad
         "ScrollTemplates.xml",
         // The blip templates, which WorldMapFrame.xml instantiates with inherits=. Not
         // optional: an unknown template is a loader WARNING, not an error, so leaving this
@@ -26,19 +26,13 @@ fn harness() -> UiScript {
         "WorldMapFrameTemplates.xml",
         "WorldMapFrame.xml",
     ] {
-        let text = std::fs::read_to_string(
-            std::path::Path::new(env!("CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR"))
-                .join("assets/ui")
-                .join(file),
-        )
-        .unwrap();
-        let doc = benilla_ui::framexml::parse(&text).unwrap();
-        let report = benilla_ui::loader::load(&s, &doc, &|_| None);
-        assert!(
-            report.errors.is_empty(),
-            "{file}: loader errors: {:?}",
-            report.errors
-        );
+        // `test_ui::load_ui`, not a local read: a manifest entry carrying a path separator is the
+        // REFERENCE's own file and must come off the player's chain, which
+        // `std::fs::read_to_string` under `assets/ui` cannot do — it goes looking for
+        // `assets/ui/Interface/FrameXML/...` and fails. The shared loader resolves both shapes, and
+        // its own doc already records this consolidation happening once before. Hand-rolling it
+        // here is what made this kit break the moment a file it loads migrated (1751).
+        super::test_ui::load_ui(&s, file);
     }
     assert!(s.errors().is_empty(), "script errors: {:?}", s.errors());
     s
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_unit.rs b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_unit.rs
index a901d4fa..fbee049c 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_unit.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/src/ui_unit.rs
@@ -1003,6 +1003,21 @@ fn rest_state_message(prev: u8, new: u8) -> Option<&'static str> {
 /// is therefore the only reading the shipped art admits — a lowest-bit walk would answer "Player"
 /// for every player in the game.
 pub(crate) fn faction_group(store: &ObjectStore, factions: Option<&Factions>) -> Option<String> {
+    let catalog = factions?.catalog();
+    let template = catalog.template(store.0.unit_faction_template()?)?;
+    // The ENGLISH name (`InternalName`), because `UnitFactionGroup`'s first return is concatenated
+    // into a texture path by every stock consumer. The localized twin is below.
+    catalog
+        .faction_group_internal_name(template.group_mask & 6)
+        .map(str::to_string)
+}
+
+/// The localized group name for the same unit — `UnitFactionGroup`'s SECOND return, which stock
+/// shows as text rather than building a path from.
+pub(crate) fn faction_group_localized(
+    store: &ObjectStore,
+    factions: Option<&Factions>,
+) -> Option<String> {
     let catalog = factions?.catalog();
     let template = catalog.template(store.0.unit_faction_template()?)?;
     catalog
@@ -1239,6 +1254,7 @@ fn feed_units(
         s.guid = guid.0;
         s.raid_target = group.raid_target_index(guid.0);
         s.faction_group = faction_group(store, factions.as_deref());
+        s.faction_group_localized = faction_group_localized(store, factions.as_deref());
         // `GetGuildInfo("player")` — the unit's own PUBLIC descriptor fields (191/192) joined
         // against the app's guild-identity cache, which the miss also asks for (decision 1257).
         // Filled here rather than in `snapshot` for the reason `faction_group` and `can_attack`
@@ -1292,6 +1308,7 @@ fn feed_units(
         s.is_connected = true; // see the player leg
         s.raid_target = group.raid_target_index(guid);
         s.faction_group = faction_group(store, factions.as_deref());
+        s.faction_group_localized = faction_group_localized(store, factions.as_deref());
         // The byte-confirmed CanAttack 0x606980 (decision 0172) — the same predicate TAB and the
         // combat flash run; `UnitCanAttack("player","target")` gates the target frame's
         // difficulty-colored level (ref TargetFrame_CheckLevel).
@@ -1345,6 +1362,7 @@ fn feed_units(
             s.is_connected = true; // see the player leg
             s.raid_target = group.raid_target_index(guid);
             s.faction_group = faction_group(store, factions.as_deref());
+            s.faction_group_localized = faction_group_localized(store, factions.as_deref());
             s.can_attack = crate::target::can_attack(
                 Some(store),
                 factions.as_deref(),
@@ -1432,6 +1450,7 @@ fn feed_units(
             s.is_connected = true;
             s.raid_target = group.raid_target_index(guid);
             s.faction_group = faction_group(store, factions.as_deref());
+            s.faction_group_localized = faction_group_localized(store, factions.as_deref());
             s.can_attack = crate::target::can_attack(
                 Some(store),
                 factions.as_deref(),
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/tests/auction_frame.rs b/crates/benilla-app/tests/auction_frame.rs
index 14ca3b3f..e81636a3 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/tests/auction_frame.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/tests/auction_frame.rs
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ use benilla_ui::script::{
     UnitState, BIDDER, LIST, OWNER,
 };
 
-const UI_DIR: &str = concat!(env!("CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR"), "/assets/ui");
+mod common;
 
 /// The auction window's load prefix — the app's own order (`assets/ui/benilla.toc`), members only.
 /// Every one of these is a real dependency: UiPanels for the panel manager + tab kit + StaticPopup
@@ -25,32 +25,18 @@ const FILES: [&str; 8] = [
     "MoneyFrame.xml",
     "UiPanels.xml",
     "GameTooltip.xml",
-    "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+    "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
     "ScrollTemplates.xml",
     "UIPanelTemplates.xml",
     "AuctionFrame.xml",
 ];
 
 fn load_ui(script: &UiScript) {
-    let dir = std::path::Path::new(UI_DIR);
-    let provider = |req: &str| -> Option<Vec<u8>> {
-        let norm = req.replace('\\', "/");
-        let base = norm.rsplit('/').next().unwrap_or(&norm);
-        std::fs::read(dir.join(&norm))
-            .or_else(|_| std::fs::read(dir.join(base)))
-            .ok()
-    };
+    // `common::load_ui`, not a local read: a manifest entry carrying a path separator is the
+    // REFERENCE's own file and has to come off the player's chain, which `std::fs::read` under
+    // `assets/ui` cannot do. This kit gained such an entry when the dropdown migrated (1751).
     for file in FILES {
-        let text = std::fs::read_to_string(dir.join(file))
-            .unwrap_or_else(|e| panic!("reading {file}: {e}"));
-        let doc =
-            benilla_ui::framexml::parse(&text).unwrap_or_else(|e| panic!("parsing {file}: {e}"));
-        let report = benilla_ui::loader::load(script, &doc, &provider);
-        assert!(
-            report.errors.is_empty(),
-            "{file} loaded with errors: {:#?}",
-            report.errors
-        );
+        common::load_ui(script, file);
     }
 }
 
diff --git a/crates/benilla-app/tests/tradeskill_frame.rs b/crates/benilla-app/tests/tradeskill_frame.rs
index af75d42a..074cf2d2 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-app/tests/tradeskill_frame.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-app/tests/tradeskill_frame.rs
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ use benilla_ui::script::{
     TradeSkillRecipe, TradeSkillState, UiScript,
 };
 
-const UI_DIR: &str = concat!(env!("CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR"), "/assets/ui");
+mod common;
 
 /// The tradeskill window's load prefix — the app's own order (`ui_script/mod.rs`), members only.
 /// CraftFrame.xml rides along (it loads right after TradeSkillFrame.xml in the app and shares
@@ -25,34 +25,18 @@ const FILES: [&str; 8] = [
     "MoneyFrame.xml",
     "UiPanels.xml",
     "GameTooltip.xml",
-    "UIDropDownMenu.xml",
+    "Interface\\FrameXML\\UIDropDownMenu.xml",
     "ScrollTemplates.xml",
     "TradeSkillFrame.xml",
     "CraftFrame.xml",
 ];
 
 fn load_ui(script: &UiScript) {
-    let dir = std::path::Path::new(UI_DIR);
-    let provider = |req: &str| -> Option<Vec<u8>> {
-        let norm = req.replace('\\', "/");
-        let base = norm.rsplit('/').next().unwrap_or(&norm);
-        std::fs::read(dir.join(&norm))
-            .or_else(|_| std::fs::read(dir.join(base)))
-            .ok()
-    };
+    // `common::load_ui`, not a local read: a manifest entry carrying a path separator is the
+    // REFERENCE's own file and has to come off the player's chain, which `std::fs::read` under
+    // `assets/ui` cannot do. This kit gained such an entry when the dropdown migrated (1751).
     for file in FILES {
-        let text = std::fs::read_to_string(dir.join(file)).unwrap_or_else(|e| {
-            panic!("reading {file}: {e}");
-        });
-        let doc = benilla_ui::framexml::parse(&text).unwrap_or_else(|e| {
-            panic!("parsing {file}: {e}");
-        });
-        let report = benilla_ui::loader::load(script, &doc, &provider);
-        assert!(
-            report.errors.is_empty(),
-            "{file} loaded with errors: {:#?}",
-            report.errors
-        );
+        common::load_ui(script, file);
     }
 }
 
diff --git a/crates/benilla-formats/src/factions.rs b/crates/benilla-formats/src/factions.rs
index 3d668d38..979a6808 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-formats/src/factions.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-formats/src/factions.rs
@@ -304,6 +304,15 @@ pub struct FactionCatalog {
     /// `GetZonePVPInfo`'s territory line formats (`0x48d540` reads FactionGroup.dbc Name of the
     /// row whose bit ∈ the zone's FactionGroupMask; wow-re ui `zonetext-pvpinfo.md`).
     group_names: HashMap<u32, String>,
+    /// The same key → FactionGroup.dbc's **`InternalName`** (field 2), which is English on every
+    /// locale where `Name0` is not. Kept beside the localized map rather than derived from it
+    /// because `UnitFactionGroup` returns BOTH and they are not interchangeable: its first return
+    /// names a TEXTURE — stock builds `"Interface\TargetingFrame\UI-PVP-"..factionGroup`
+    /// (`PlayerFrame.lua:68`, `TargetFrame.lua:198`, `PartyMemberFrame.lua:125`) and
+    /// `"…\Battleground-"..UnitFactionGroup("player")` (`BattlefieldFrame.lua:195`) — so a
+    /// localized string there is a path that does not exist. `HonorFrame.lua:68` compares it to
+    /// the literal `"Alliance"` for the same reason.
+    group_internal_names: HashMap<u32, String>,
     /// Faction id → the localized Name — what the item tooltip's "Requires <Faction> -
     /// <Standing>" line prints.
     names: HashMap<u32, String>,
@@ -348,6 +357,17 @@ impl FactionCatalog {
 
     /// The localized FactionGroup name of the (first) group bit set in `mask` — "Alliance" for 2,
     /// "Horde" for 4; `None` for an unowned mask. The `GetZonePVPInfo` territory-line lookup.
+    /// The **English** group name for a mask — FactionGroup.dbc's `InternalName`. This is the one
+    /// `UnitFactionGroup`'s FIRST return must carry, because callers concatenate it into a texture
+    /// path; [`Self::faction_group_name`] is the localized twin for the second return.
+    pub fn faction_group_internal_name(&self, mask: u32) -> Option<&str> {
+        (0..32)
+            .map(|b| 1u32 << b)
+            .filter(|bit| mask & bit != 0)
+            .find_map(|bit| self.group_internal_names.get(&bit))
+            .map(String::as_str)
+    }
+
     pub fn faction_group_name(&self, mask: u32) -> Option<&str> {
         (0..32)
             .map(|b| 1u32 << b)
@@ -499,10 +519,16 @@ pub fn load_faction_catalog(chain: &mut Chain) -> Result<FactionCatalog> {
         .with_context(|| format!("reading {FACTION_GROUP}"))?;
     let rs = parse(&bytes, faction_group_schema(), "FactionGroup")?;
     let mut group_names = HashMap::with_capacity(rs.records().len());
+    let mut group_internal_names = HashMap::with_capacity(rs.records().len());
     for r in rs.records() {
         let (Some(mask_id), Some(name)) = (u32_at(r, 1), crate::dbc::str_at(&rs, r, 3)) else {
             continue;
         };
+        // Field 2 is `InternalName`, field 3 is `Name0` — see the schema above. Both are read
+        // because `UnitFactionGroup` returns the pair and only the localized half was kept before.
+        if let Some(internal) = crate::dbc::str_at(&rs, r, 2) {
+            group_internal_names.insert(1u32 << mask_id, internal);
+        }
         group_names.insert(1u32 << mask_id, name);
     }
 
@@ -510,6 +536,7 @@ pub fn load_faction_catalog(chain: &mut Chain) -> Result<FactionCatalog> {
         templates,
         factions,
         group_names,
+        group_internal_names,
         names,
         descriptions,
     })
diff --git a/crates/benilla-formats/src/light.rs b/crates/benilla-formats/src/light.rs
index e798691c..bd9b4c89 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-formats/src/light.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-formats/src/light.rs
@@ -78,16 +78,43 @@ const SLOT_DEATH: usize = 4;
 const PARAM_SLIME: u32 = 6;
 const PARAM_MAGMA: u32 = 7;
 
+/// The ocean depth ramp's floor — `0x81162c` = −30.0f. Below this the factors hold flat.
+const OCEAN_RAMP_FLOOR: f32 = -30.0;
+/// The ramp's reciprocal, **as the binary stores it** — the f32 at `0x811628`, bit pattern
+/// `0xbd088889`.
+///
+/// Written from the bits rather than as a decimal on purpose. The decimal wow-re quotes
+/// (`−0.0333333351`) carries more digits than an f32 holds, so spelling it out is both a clippy
+/// `excessive_precision` error and a small lie about what is in the file; and rounding it to
+/// `−0.033_333_335` would read as a value someone chose. `from_bits` says the true thing: this
+/// constant is a bit pattern lifted out of the image. (It happens to equal `-1.0f32 / 30.0` — see
+/// [`Submersion::ocean_depth_factors`] for why that is not the point.)
+const OCEAN_RAMP_RECIP: f32 = f32::from_bits(0xbd08_8889);
+
 /// What the camera eye is submerged in, if anything — the atmosphere selector. Water and ocean pick
 /// the zone's *underwater slot*; magma and slime replace the whole area blend with a fixed global row
 /// (see [`PARAM_MAGMA`]/[`PARAM_SLIME`]).
+///
+/// **Five states, because the reference has five.** `[0xc7f288] ∈ {0xf dry, 0 water, 1 ocean,
+/// 2 magma, 3 slime}` — and ocean is not a synonym for water. It is the only kind that runs the
+/// depth ramp ([`Submersion::ocean_depth_factors`]), which is gated on the **full unmasked dword
+/// `== 1`** at `0x6d2821` (not the nibble — `0x11` would pass a nibble test and must not). Every
+/// other consumer image-wide treats the two alike, so this enum forks in exactly one place, which
+/// is the shape of the finding.
+///
+/// Collapsing them, as we did until decision 1829, was not a small approximation: ocean is
+/// **96.8% of every wet sub-tile** in the shipped corpus (14 069 166 of 14 528 712). The state we
+/// were not modelling was essentially all open water.
 #[derive(Clone, Copy, PartialEq, Eq, Debug, Default)]
 pub enum Submersion {
     /// Dry — the ordinary clear/storm slot.
     #[default]
     Dry,
-    /// Under water, ocean or rapids: the zone's own underwater `LightParams`, area-blended as usual.
+    /// Under still water or rapids: the zone's own underwater `LightParams`, area-blended as usual.
     Water,
+    /// Under **ocean**: the same underwater slot as [`Self::Water`], plus the depth ramp. Comes
+    /// only from the ADT MCLQ per-subtile flags (`(b & 0x0f) & 3 == 1`); a WMO cannot author it.
+    Ocean,
     /// Under magma: the fixed global row, verbatim.
     Magma,
     /// Under slime: the fixed global row, verbatim.
@@ -107,25 +134,63 @@ impl Submersion {
     /// Deliberately NOT [`Self::any`]: whether the reference swaps the submerged ambience bed and the
     /// reverb preset for **lava and slime** as well is unverified, and widening it silently on the way
     /// past would be inventing a behaviour. The atmosphere is verified per kind; the audio is not.
+    ///
+    /// [`Submersion::Ocean`] belongs here with [`Submersion::Water`]: the split exists for the depth
+    /// ramp alone, and every other consumer — the underwater slot, the ambience bed, the reverb
+    /// column, the drift cloud's cell set — treats a sea exactly like a lake.
     pub fn is_water(self) -> bool {
-        self == Submersion::Water
+        matches!(self, Submersion::Water | Submersion::Ocean)
+    }
+
+    /// The **ocean depth ramp** — the one thing ocean does that water does not (wow-re
+    /// `lighting/scratch/submerged-atmosphere.md` §3, VERIFIED; decision 1829).
+    ///
+    /// Returns `(fac1, fac2)`, the multipliers on the committed light record's first and second
+    /// colour triples — `DNState+0x178 × fac1` and `DNState+0x174 × fac2`. `fac1` runs `1.0 → 0.5`
+    /// and `fac2` runs `1.0 → 0.75` over the first 30 yards of depth, so the fill darkens twice as
+    /// fast as the direct term and a deep sea goes flat as well as dim.
+    ///
+    /// **A multiply by the stored constant, not a divide by 30.** wow-re's note says
+    /// "`−0.0333333351f` is not exactly −1/30 — a bit-exact reimplementation must use the stored
+    /// f32, not `t/30.0`". The conclusion is right and the reason as stated is not, which matters
+    /// because it changes what you have to be careful about: `0xbd088889` **is** the nearest f32 to
+    /// −1/30, bit for bit. What differs is the *operation* — `t · recip` and `t / 30.0` round
+    /// differently, and they disagree inside the ramp's own range (at `t = −29` by 6e−8 in `k`).
+    /// So the thing to transcribe is the multiply, and the constant is incidental.
+    ///
+    /// The boundaries are exact, not near-misses: `k` reaches exactly `0.0` at −30 yd, so `fac1`
+    /// bottoms at exactly 0.5 and `fac2` at exactly 0.75.
+    ///
+    /// **Not the fog colour.** The binary commits this ramp to three slots, but the fog-colour one
+    /// (`0x6d28b0` → `DNState+0x70`) is dead: `0x66ff60` calls the tint and *then* calls `0x6cee30`,
+    /// whose `0x6cee76` unconditionally overwrites that slot from the band-derived colour. The
+    /// underwater murk colour reaches the screen through the LightParams slot switch we already
+    /// have; this ramp darkens two light bands and nothing else.
+    pub fn ocean_depth_factors(self, eye_z: f32) -> Option<(f32, f32)> {
+        if self != Submersion::Ocean {
+            return None;
+        }
+        let t = eye_z.clamp(OCEAN_RAMP_FLOOR, 0.0);
+        let k = 1.0 - t * OCEAN_RAMP_RECIP;
+        Some(((k + 1.0) * 0.5, k * 0.25 + 0.75))
     }
 
     /// The fixed global `LightParams` row this submersion replaces the whole blend with, if any.
-    /// `None` for [`Submersion::Dry`] and [`Submersion::Water`], which go through the slot selection.
+    /// `None` for the dry and water-kind states, which go through the slot selection.
     fn fixed_param(self) -> Option<u32> {
         match self {
             Submersion::Magma => Some(PARAM_MAGMA),
             Submersion::Slime => Some(PARAM_SLIME),
-            Submersion::Dry | Submersion::Water => None,
+            Submersion::Dry | Submersion::Water | Submersion::Ocean => None,
         }
     }
 }
 
 /// Pick the `LightParams` slot for the current ghost/weather/submersion state (see `SLOT_*`).
 /// Ghost wins outright — the client keeps ONE active slot, and the ghost watcher owns it while
-/// the flag is up. Only [`Submersion::Water`] reaches the underwater slots; the fullbright liquids
-/// never get here (their fixed row short-circuits the blend).
+/// the flag is up. Only a **water kind** reaches the underwater slots (water or ocean alike — the
+/// slot switch does not distinguish them); the fullbright liquids never get here (their fixed row
+/// short-circuits the blend).
 fn weather_slot(ghost: bool, stormy: bool, underwater: bool) -> usize {
     if ghost {
         return SLOT_DEATH;
@@ -539,7 +604,7 @@ impl LightCatalog {
                 return self.sample_param(p, time);
             }
         }
-        let slot = weather_slot(ghost, stormy, submersion == Submersion::Water);
+        let slot = weather_slot(ghost, stormy, submersion.is_water());
         let atmo_of = |l: &Light| -> Option<Atmosphere> {
             // Fall back to the clear slot if the requested slot is unset for this light (e.g. a zone
             // with no dedicated underwater param degrades to the above-water atmosphere).
@@ -907,6 +972,98 @@ impl LightCatalog {
     }
 }
 
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod ocean_tests {
+    use super::*;
+
+    /// The ramp's shape: both factors are 1.0 at the surface, bottom out at 30 yards, and hold flat
+    /// below. `fac1` (the first light triple) halves; `fac2` (the second) only drops to 0.75 — the
+    /// fill darkens twice as fast as the direct term, which is what makes a deep sea read flat as
+    /// well as dim.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_ocean_ramp_runs_over_thirty_yards_and_then_holds() {
+        let f = |z: f32| Submersion::Ocean.ocean_depth_factors(z).unwrap();
+        let (a, b) = f(0.0);
+        assert_eq!(
+            (a, b),
+            (1.0, 1.0),
+            "at the surface the ramp is the identity"
+        );
+        // Above the surface clamps to the identity too — the ramp never brightens.
+        assert_eq!(f(12.0), (1.0, 1.0));
+        let (a30, b30) = f(-30.0);
+        assert!((a30 - 0.5).abs() < 1e-6 && (b30 - 0.75).abs() < 1e-6);
+        assert_eq!(f(-100.0), (a30, b30), "below 30 yd it holds flat");
+        // Linear, and fac1 falls exactly twice as fast as fac2.
+        let (a15, b15) = f(-15.0);
+        assert!((a15 - 0.75).abs() < 1e-6 && (b15 - 0.875).abs() < 1e-6);
+        assert!(((1.0 - a15) - 2.0 * (1.0 - b15)).abs() < 1e-6);
+    }
+
+    /// GOLDEN — the binary's own constant, and the reason it has to be a MULTIPLY.
+    ///
+    /// wow-re's note warns that `−0.0333333351f` "is not exactly −1/30" and that a bit-exact port
+    /// must use the stored f32 rather than `t/30.0`. The warning is worth heeding and its stated
+    /// reason is not the real one: that bit pattern IS the nearest f32 to −1/30. The hazard is the
+    /// operation, not the operand — `t · recip` and `t / 30.0` round differently, and they disagree
+    /// *inside* the ramp's range, so a port that "simplifies" the multiply into a divide drifts.
+    /// This test pins both halves so neither can be tidied away.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_ramp_multiplies_by_the_binarys_own_reciprocal() {
+        assert_eq!(OCEAN_RAMP_RECIP.to_bits(), 0xbd088889);
+        assert_eq!(
+            OCEAN_RAMP_RECIP,
+            -1.0f32 / 30.0,
+            "the constant itself is just the nearest f32 to -1/30"
+        );
+        // …and yet the two forms are not interchangeable. -29 yd is a witness inside the range.
+        let t = -29.0f32;
+        assert_ne!(
+            1.0 - t * OCEAN_RAMP_RECIP,
+            1.0 + t / 30.0,
+            "multiply and divide must be observably different, or the warning is empty"
+        );
+        // The boundaries land exactly, with no f32 residue to explain away.
+        assert_eq!(
+            Submersion::Ocean.ocean_depth_factors(-30.0).unwrap(),
+            (0.5, 0.75)
+        );
+    }
+
+    /// The ramp is OCEAN'S ALONE — the gate is the full unmasked dword `== 1` (`0x6d2821`), and
+    /// every other state, still water included, is untouched at any depth.
+    #[test]
+    fn only_ocean_ramps() {
+        for s in [
+            Submersion::Dry,
+            Submersion::Water,
+            Submersion::Magma,
+            Submersion::Slime,
+        ] {
+            assert!(
+                s.ocean_depth_factors(-30.0).is_none(),
+                "{s:?} must not ramp"
+            );
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// The split exists for the ramp and nothing else: everywhere a *water kind* is the question,
+    /// ocean answers with water — the underwater LightParams slot, the ambience bed, the reverb
+    /// column. And neither takes a fixed global row, which is what magma and slime do.
+    #[test]
+    fn ocean_is_a_water_kind_everywhere_but_the_ramp() {
+        assert!(Submersion::Ocean.is_water() && Submersion::Water.is_water());
+        assert!(!Submersion::Magma.is_water() && !Submersion::Slime.is_water());
+        assert!(Submersion::Ocean.any());
+        assert_eq!(Submersion::Ocean.fixed_param(), None);
+        assert_eq!(
+            weather_slot(false, false, Submersion::Ocean.is_water()),
+            SLOT_CLEAR_UNDERWATER,
+            "ocean reaches the underwater slot exactly as water does"
+        );
+    }
+}
+
 #[cfg(test)]
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
diff --git a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/bindings.rs b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/bindings.rs
index 3222229c..043559cd 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/bindings.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/bindings.rs
@@ -576,15 +576,35 @@ pub(in crate::script) fn install(lua: &Lua) -> mlua::Result<()> {
     // the first names the `UI-PVP-<group>` texture, the second titles the player frame's hit-area
     // tooltip. nil, nil for a unit with no side (Monster/neutral templates) or no snapshot — the
     // ref's icon branches gate on exactly that (decision 0646 §1/§3).
+    //
+    // **The two are genuinely different strings and this used to push one twice.** They are
+    // FactionGroup.dbc's `InternalName` (field 2) and `Name0` (field 3), and only on enUS are they
+    // the same word — which is why the duplication survived, and why the old doc on
+    // `UnitState::faction_group` said so as if it settled the matter. Every stock consumer of the
+    // FIRST return concatenates it into a path: `"…\UI-PVP-"..factionGroup` at `PlayerFrame.lua:68`,
+    // `TargetFrame.lua:198` and `PartyMemberFrame.lua:125`, `"…\Battleground-"..` at
+    // `BattlefieldFrame.lua:195`, and `HonorFrame.lua:68` compares it to the literal "Alliance".
+    // On any localized client the old shape named a texture that does not exist. All five of those
+    // files are on our chain.
     g.set(
         "UnitFactionGroup",
         lua.create_function(|lua, token: Option<String>| {
-            match with_unit(lua, &token, None, |u| u.faction_group.clone())? {
-                Some(group) => {
-                    let s = Value::String(lua.create_string(&group)?);
-                    Ok((s.clone(), s))
+            let pair = with_unit(lua, &token, (None, None), |u| {
+                (u.faction_group.clone(), u.faction_group_localized.clone())
+            })?;
+            match pair {
+                (Some(english), localized) => {
+                    let a = Value::String(lua.create_string(&english)?);
+                    // The localized half falls back to the English one rather than to nil: a unit
+                    // with a side always has an `InternalName`, and `Name0` is empty for the
+                    // Player/Monster rows, so nil here would blank a tooltip the reference fills.
+                    let b = match localized {
+                        Some(l) if !l.is_empty() => Value::String(lua.create_string(&l)?),
+                        _ => a.clone(),
+                    };
+                    Ok((a, b))
                 }
-                None => Ok((Value::Nil, Value::Nil)),
+                (None, _) => Ok((Value::Nil, Value::Nil)),
             }
         })?,
     )?;
diff --git a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/mod.rs b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/mod.rs
index f02cb912..2fefa8c3 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/mod.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/mod.rs
@@ -279,9 +279,21 @@ pub struct UnitState {
     /// only one that can name a shipped `UI-PVP-<group>` texture. `None` for Monster/neutral
     /// templates is a state the icon callers explicitly handle (`if ( factionGroup and … )`).
     ///
-    /// The Era binding returns it twice — English token first, localized name second; enUS ships
-    /// the same word for both (FactionGroup.dbc's `InternalName` and `Name0`).
+    /// This is the **English** half — FactionGroup.dbc's `InternalName` — because that is what
+    /// `UnitFactionGroup`'s first return must carry: every stock consumer concatenates it into a
+    /// texture path (`"…\UI-PVP-"..factionGroup` at `PlayerFrame.lua:68`, `TargetFrame.lua:198`,
+    /// `PartyMemberFrame.lua:125`; `"…\Battleground-"..` at `BattlefieldFrame.lua:195`), and
+    /// `HonorFrame.lua:68` compares it against the literal `"Alliance"`.
+    ///
+    /// This field's doc used to say the binding "returns it twice … enUS ships the same word for
+    /// both". That is true of enUS and of nothing else: `Name0` is localized, so on any other
+    /// client the texture path would name a file that does not exist. The localized half lives in
+    /// [`Self::faction_group_localized`] now.
     pub faction_group: Option<String>,
+    /// The **localized** group name — FactionGroup.dbc's `Name0`, and `UnitFactionGroup`'s SECOND
+    /// return, which stock uses as display text (`PlayerFrame.lua`'s PvP hit-area tooltip title).
+    /// Never interchangeable with the English half above.
+    pub faction_group_localized: Option<String>,
     /// The unit's GUID (`OBJECT_FIELD_GUID`) — the identity the cross-token predicates compare
     /// (`UnitIsUnit`, `UnitInParty`; decision 0434 §5's popup gating). `0` = the app's feed didn't
     /// resolve one; two zero guids never compare equal.
diff --git a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/tests.rs b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/tests.rs
index 9741e98b..e14452f4 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/tests.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-ui/src/script/unit/tests.rs
@@ -586,8 +586,35 @@ fn faction_group_pair_and_the_pvp_toggle() {
     let (english, localized) = s
         .eval::<(String, String)>(r#"return UnitFactionGroup("target")"#)
         .unwrap();
+    // With no localized name fed, the second return falls back to the English one rather than nil:
+    // FactionGroup.dbc leaves `Name0` empty for some rows, and nil here would blank a tooltip the
+    // reference fills.
     assert_eq!((english.as_str(), localized.as_str()), ("Horde", "Horde"));
 
+    // **The two halves are DIFFERENT fields and this is the assertion that says so.** They are
+    // FactionGroup.dbc's `InternalName` and `Name0`; only on enUS do they hold the same word, which
+    // is why returning one twice went unnoticed. The first is concatenated into a texture path by
+    // every stock consumer (`"…\UI-PVP-"..factionGroup` — PlayerFrame.lua:68, TargetFrame.lua:198,
+    // PartyMemberFrame.lua:125; `"…\Battleground-"..` — BattlefieldFrame.lua:195), so a localized
+    // string there names a file that does not exist. This fixture is a deDE-shaped client.
+    s.set_unit(
+        "target",
+        Some(UnitState {
+            exists: true,
+            faction_group: Some("Horde".into()),
+            faction_group_localized: Some("Horde-Allianz".into()),
+            ..Default::default()
+        }),
+    );
+    let (english, localized) = s
+        .eval::<(String, String)>(r#"return UnitFactionGroup("target")"#)
+        .unwrap();
+    assert_eq!(
+        (english.as_str(), localized.as_str()),
+        ("Horde", "Horde-Allianz"),
+        "the FIRST return is the English InternalName — a texture path is built from it"
+    );
+
     // No side (a Monster/neutral template, or a unit whose template hasn't streamed).
     s.set_unit(
         "target",
diff --git a/crates/benilla-wmo/src/lib.rs b/crates/benilla-wmo/src/lib.rs
index b46a9929..49091249 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-wmo/src/lib.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-wmo/src/lib.rs
@@ -164,7 +164,9 @@ pub struct WmoLiquid {
     /// and white noise on the other is not being read at the wrong offset.
     pub opacity: Vec<u8>,
     /// Per-tile flag bytes, row-major `j·xtiles + i`, `xtiles·ytiles` long. Low nibble = liquid type;
-    /// `0xf` = hole (skip the tile). High bits are fishable (`0x40`) / shared (`0x80`).
+    /// `0xf` = hole (skip the tile); `0x80` shared (the strip-builder gate). `0x40` ("fishable") is
+    /// carried but deliberately unread: the reference's WMO-side reader `0x6b9e50` is only reached
+    /// from the zero-caller `0x69b5d0` island — fishability is the server's verdict. Decision 1825.
     pub tile_flags: Vec<u8>,
 }
 
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/ffx_glow.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/ffx_glow.rs
index ce88d9a9..ee8f09c7 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/ffx_glow.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/ffx_glow.rs
@@ -277,6 +277,122 @@ fn sync_haze(
     }
 }
 
+/// **The GlowWave lane** — the underwater screen warp's two inputs (wow-re
+/// `ffxeffects/scratch/glow-wave-underwater.md`, §5 cross-checked; decision 1824).
+///
+/// Underwater the reference swaps its whole post-process pass list: `CFFXGlow::Render 0x6cc630`
+/// walks a second list whose third pass is **FFXGlowWave** (`0x6cb1f0`, render `0x6cb310`) rather
+/// than FFXGlow, and that pass displaces the combine's two samples through a sine bump map. wow-re's
+/// note had carried the swap as an undecided "GlowWave, *or* a duplicate Glow" for months; the round
+/// that answered it found the arms mutually exclusive and the plain-Glow arm unreachable on both
+/// backends, so a submerged frame is ALWAYS the wave.
+///
+/// **No liquid-type discrimination.** `[0xc7f288] ∈ {0xf dry, 0 water, 1 ocean, 2 magma, 3 slime}`
+/// and `0x6cc644` compares against `0xf` alone — the warp runs in lava and slime exactly as in
+/// water. (That is not the drift cloud's rule, which *does* fork per kind and gives slime no motes
+/// at all; two neighbouring underwater systems reading the same byte with different questions.)
+#[derive(Resource, Clone, Copy, Default, ExtractResource)]
+pub struct FfxWave {
+    /// `(t mod 3174)/3174` — the u-axis phase, 3.174 s.
+    phase1: f32,
+    /// `(t mod 2805)/2805` — the v-axis phase, 2.805 s. Independent of [`Self::phase1`]: the two
+    /// rejoin only every ~49 minutes, which is what keeps the warp from reading as a loop.
+    phase2: f32,
+    /// Whether the pass-list swap itself is tripped: in-world (`0x467d00`) **and** the camera-eye
+    /// liquid probe non-dry (`0x672470 != 0xf`). Not a strength — the swap is a hard fork, and the
+    /// warp has no ramp in or out.
+    active: bool,
+}
+
+/// The two GlowWave phase periods in milliseconds — `[0xce89c4]` and `[0xce89c8]`, divided into an
+/// integer millisecond clock exactly as the reference's `fild`/`fidiv` pair does.
+const WAVE_PERIOD_MS: [u64; 2] = [3174, 2805];
+
+/// The wave LUT's edge — 128×128 texels (`[0xce89a0]`'s 7-field descriptor: 128/128/128/128 and
+/// the two 1/128 reciprocals).
+const WAVE_LUT_EDGE: u32 = 128;
+
+/// The reference's glow-wave LUT (`ffx_glow_wave_lut` `0x6cbea0`, a diffed PRIMITIVE), as the
+/// texels our combine samples.
+///
+/// Two channels, one sine each and each depending on ONE axis — `du = sin(2πx/128)` across,
+/// `dv = sin(2πy/128)` down — which is what makes the sampled value a *displacement* rather than an
+/// intensity: the shipped format is the signed two-channel bump format on both backends
+/// (`D3DFMT_V8U8` / `GL_DSDT8_NV`), and the pass is a dependent texture read.
+///
+/// We store the reference's **unsigned** pack (`(s·0.5 + 0.5)·255`, its path B) and bias it back in
+/// the shader, because that is the permutation the live client actually runs: `gxApi` defaults to
+/// direct3d, the shipped `WTF/` overrides nothing, and the caps tier that selects picks the biased
+/// `ps_2_0` blob against an unsigned texture. `as u8` truncates toward zero, which is `__ftol`.
+fn wave_lut_texels() -> Vec<u8> {
+    let pack = |s: f32| ((s * 0.5 + 0.5) * 255.0).clamp(0.0, 255.0) as u8;
+    let sine = |i: u32| (std::f32::consts::TAU * i as f32 / WAVE_LUT_EDGE as f32).sin();
+    let mut texels = Vec::with_capacity((WAVE_LUT_EDGE * WAVE_LUT_EDGE * 2) as usize);
+    for y in 0..WAVE_LUT_EDGE {
+        let dv = pack(sine(y));
+        for x in 0..WAVE_LUT_EDGE {
+            texels.push(pack(sine(x)));
+            texels.push(dv);
+        }
+    }
+    texels
+}
+
+/// Sync [`FfxWave`] from the same two inputs the reference's swap guard reads, plus the clock its
+/// render method phases on (`OsGetAsyncTimeMs`, `0x6cb43a`).
+///
+/// The phases advance whether or not the wave is armed — they are a free-running wall clock in the
+/// reference too, not a timer the swap starts — so surfacing and diving again does not restart the
+/// pattern, and nothing has to be reset on the transition.
+fn sync_wave(
+    time: Res<Time>,
+    live: Res<crate::schedule::WorldLive>,
+    underwater: Option<Res<crate::liquid::Underwater>>,
+    mut wave: ResMut<FfxWave>,
+    mut last_dump: Local<Option<u32>>,
+) {
+    let ms = (time.elapsed_secs_f64() * 1000.0) as u64;
+    wave.phase1 = (ms % WAVE_PERIOD_MS[0]) as f32 / WAVE_PERIOD_MS[0] as f32;
+    wave.phase2 = (ms % WAVE_PERIOD_MS[1]) as f32 / WAVE_PERIOD_MS[1] as f32;
+    let verdict = underwater.map(|u| u.0);
+    wave.active = live.0 && verdict.is_some_and(|v| v.any());
+
+    // `WOW_WAVE_DUMP` — 1 Hz, and it reports on EVERY frame including the ones that do not warp,
+    // naming why. An instrument that only speaks while the effect is running cannot tell "not
+    // armed" from "armed and broken", which is exactly the hour the drift cloud's first probe cost
+    // (decision 1814 §6b): the effect was off, the screen was silent, and the silence was
+    // indistinguishable from a compile failure.
+    if std::env::var_os("WOW_WAVE_DUMP").is_some() {
+        let sec = time.elapsed_secs() as u32;
+        if last_dump.replace(sec) != Some(sec) {
+            let why = match (live.0, verdict) {
+                (false, _) => "off — not in world (the reference's 0x467d00 half of the guard)",
+                (_, None) => "off — no submersion verdict resolved yet",
+                (_, Some(benilla_formats::Submersion::Dry)) => "off — the eye is dry",
+                (_, Some(_)) => "WARPING",
+            };
+            info!(
+                "glow-wave: {why} — verdict {verdict:?} phase {:.3}/{:.3} (periods {} / {} ms)",
+                wave.phase1, wave.phase2, WAVE_PERIOD_MS[0], WAVE_PERIOD_MS[1]
+            );
+        }
+    }
+}
+
+/// Whether a view draws the warped combine — the pass-list swap, as a pure function.
+///
+/// Three conditions, each a fact about the reference rather than a taste call:
+/// - the view runs the **WorldFrame** pass pair. The swap lives in `CFFXGlow::Render`, which the
+///   glue screens' own pair also reaches — but its guard's first half is `0x467d00`, the in-world
+///   objmgr gate, so a glue screen can never trip it. A bake runs no pair at all.
+/// - the camera eye is in liquid and we are in-world ([`FfxWave::active`]).
+/// - the player is **not a ghost**. `CFFXDeath` REPLACES `CFFXGlow` outright in the single active
+///   pass slot `[0xce8bb4]`, and `CFFXDeath::Render 0x6cdf20` owns one list and no guard — so a
+///   ghost underwater gets no warp, the same way it already gets no haze.
+fn wave_armed(state: FfxState, wave: FfxWave, death: f32) -> bool {
+    matches!(state, FfxState::Player) && wave.active && death == 0.0
+}
+
 /// Sync the gain from the live zone lighting (the same source `sync_bloom` used). Off-world there
 /// is no `Light.dbc` zone — the reference runs its `LightParams` **default 0.5** (wow-re
 /// death-pass.md: "the zone/time-of-day ambient glow scalar, default 0.5"): the glue screens'
@@ -333,15 +449,32 @@ struct FfxGlowPipelines {
     layout_filter: BindGroupLayoutDescriptor,
     layout_combine: BindGroupLayoutDescriptor,
     sampler: Sampler,
+    /// The 128×128 sine bump map and its own REPEAT sampler — built once here, not per view: the
+    /// LUT is 32 KB of resolution-independent constant, and the reference generates it once too
+    /// (the registration callback `0x6cbcf0`).
+    ///
+    /// REPEAT is load-bearing, not a default. The wave texcoord's scale runs to `W/128` — ten full
+    /// cycles across a 1280-wide screen — so under CLAMP every cycle but the first would pin to the
+    /// edge texel and the warp would vanish over ~90% of the frame. It is byte-closed to
+    /// `D3DTADDRESS_WRAP` (`0x5a2646`/`0x5a266a` through the table `0x80a254 = {CLAMP, WRAP}`), and
+    /// misreading it was the costliest near-miss of the round that derived this.
+    wave_view: TextureView,
+    wave_sampler: Sampler,
     downsample: CachedRenderPipelineId,
     gauss_h: CachedRenderPipelineId,
     gauss_v: CachedRenderPipelineId,
     combine: CachedRenderPipelineId,
+    /// The underwater combine. A SEPARATE pipeline rather than a branch inside `fs_combine`,
+    /// compiled once at startup beside it: a dry frame then binds byte-for-byte the pipeline it
+    /// bound before this feature existed and pays nothing at all for the warp — no extra pass, no
+    /// extra target, not even a uniform branch.
+    combine_wave: CachedRenderPipelineId,
 }
 
 fn init_pipelines(
     mut commands: Commands,
     render_device: Res<RenderDevice>,
+    render_queue: Res<RenderQueue>,
     fullscreen_shader: Res<FullscreenShader>,
     asset_server: Res<AssetServer>,
     pipeline_cache: Res<PipelineCache>,
@@ -367,7 +500,12 @@ fn init_pipelines(
                 texture_2d(TextureSampleType::Float { filterable: true }),
                 sampler(SamplerBindingType::Filtering),
                 texture_2d(TextureSampleType::Float { filterable: true }),
-                uniform_buffer_sized(false, Some(std::num::NonZero::new(16).unwrap())),
+                uniform_buffer_sized(false, Some(std::num::NonZero::new(32).unwrap())),
+                // The wave LUT + its REPEAT sampler ride EVERY combine's layout, dry included, so
+                // the two entry points stay interchangeable behind one bind group. Binding a
+                // texture the dry shader never samples costs the frame nothing.
+                texture_2d(TextureSampleType::Float { filterable: true }),
+                sampler(SamplerBindingType::Filtering),
             ),
         ),
     );
@@ -378,6 +516,39 @@ fn init_pipelines(
         address_mode_v: AddressMode::ClampToEdge,
         ..Default::default()
     });
+    // LINEAR + REPEAT, both byte-closed: the reference's 128-texel sine is *sampled*, so linear
+    // filtering is what makes it a smooth wave rather than 128 steps, and the wrap is what lets the
+    // texcoord run past 1.0 into its tenth cycle.
+    let wave_sampler = render_device.create_sampler(&SamplerDescriptor {
+        min_filter: FilterMode::Linear,
+        mag_filter: FilterMode::Linear,
+        address_mode_u: AddressMode::Repeat,
+        address_mode_v: AddressMode::Repeat,
+        ..Default::default()
+    });
+    let wave_view = render_device
+        .create_texture_with_data(
+            &render_queue,
+            &TextureDescriptor {
+                label: Some("ffx_glow_wave_lut"),
+                size: Extent3d {
+                    width: WAVE_LUT_EDGE,
+                    height: WAVE_LUT_EDGE,
+                    depth_or_array_layers: 1,
+                },
+                mip_level_count: 1,
+                sample_count: 1,
+                dimension: TextureDimension::D2,
+                // Two unsigned channels, biased back to signed in the shader — the shipped
+                // permutation's own encoding (see [`wave_lut_texels`]).
+                format: TextureFormat::Rg8Unorm,
+                usage: TextureUsages::TEXTURE_BINDING | TextureUsages::COPY_DST,
+                view_formats: &[],
+            },
+            TextureDataOrder::LayerMajor,
+            &wave_lut_texels(),
+        )
+        .create_view(&TextureViewDescriptor::default());
     let pipeline = |label: &'static str,
                     layout: &BindGroupLayoutDescriptor,
                     entry: &'static str|
@@ -413,14 +584,22 @@ fn init_pipelines(
         &layout_combine,
         "fs_combine",
     ));
+    let combine_wave = pipeline_cache.queue_render_pipeline(pipeline(
+        "ffx_glow_combine_wave",
+        &layout_combine,
+        "fs_combine_wave",
+    ));
     commands.insert_resource(FfxGlowPipelines {
         layout_filter,
         layout_combine,
         sampler,
+        wave_view,
+        wave_sampler,
         downsample,
         gauss_h,
         gauss_v,
         combine,
+        combine_wave,
     });
 }
 
@@ -431,8 +610,9 @@ fn init_pipelines(
 struct FfxGlowTextures {
     quarter_a: CachedTexture,
     quarter_b: CachedTexture,
-    /// The combine's 16-byte `(gain, death, haze, pad)` uniform — persistent, rewritten each
-    /// frame with a queue write (queue writes land before the graph's submit executes).
+    /// The combine's 32-byte uniform — `(gain, death, haze, dither)` then the GlowWave phases.
+    /// Persistent, rewritten each frame with a queue write (queue writes land before the graph's
+    /// submit executes).
     gain_buf: Buffer,
     /// The two Gauss bind groups bind only the ¼-res ping-pong views + sampler — all stable
     /// while the textures hold. The downsample and combine bind groups bind the view target's
@@ -498,7 +678,7 @@ fn prepare_textures(
         );
         let gain_buf = render_device.create_buffer(&BufferDescriptor {
             label: Some("ffx_glow_gain"),
-            size: 16,
+            size: 32,
             usage: BufferUsages::UNIFORM | BufferUsages::COPY_DST,
             mapped_at_creation: false,
         });
@@ -544,12 +724,17 @@ fn dither_armed() -> f32 {
 ///   pair this view runs decides what drives them, and a bake runs neither pair (decision 1481,
 ///   report B49 — now structural rather than arithmetic, decision 1731).
 /// - **w** — the deband-dither arm ([`dither_armed`]), 0 or 1.
+///
+/// The second row is the GlowWave lane: the two phases, written on every frame and read only by
+/// the warped entry point. They are unconditional because they are a free-running clock — gating
+/// the *write* on the arm would make the pattern restart on every dive.
 fn combine_uniform(
     zone_gain: f32,
     world: FfxPassState,
     glue: FfxPassState,
     glow: &FfxGlow,
-) -> [f32; 4] {
+    wave: FfxWave,
+) -> [f32; 8] {
     let feed = match glow.state {
         FfxState::Player => world,
         FfxState::Glue => glue,
@@ -560,6 +745,10 @@ fn combine_uniform(
         feed.death,
         feed.haze,
         dither_armed(),
+        wave.phase1,
+        wave.phase2,
+        0.0,
+        0.0,
     ]
 }
 
@@ -614,20 +803,27 @@ impl ViewNode for FfxGlowNode {
     ) -> Result<(), NodeRunError> {
         let pipelines = world.resource::<FfxGlowPipelines>();
         let pipeline_cache = world.resource::<PipelineCache>();
+        let death = world.resource::<FfxDeathFade>().0;
+        let wave = *world.resource::<FfxWave>();
         let uniform = combine_uniform(
             world.resource::<FfxGlowGain>().0,
-            FfxPassState::world(
-                world.resource::<FfxDeathFade>().0,
-                world.resource::<FfxHazeMix>().0,
-            ),
+            FfxPassState::world(death, world.resource::<FfxHazeMix>().0),
             FfxPassState::glue(world.resource::<GlueFfx>().death()),
             glow,
+            wave,
         );
+        // THE PASS-LIST SWAP (`0x6cc630`). The reference forks the whole list here; we fork one
+        // pipeline, which is the same fork — the first two passes are identical in both lists.
+        let combine_id = if wave_armed(glow.state, wave, death) {
+            pipelines.combine_wave
+        } else {
+            pipelines.combine
+        };
         let (Some(downsample), Some(gauss_h), Some(gauss_v), Some(combine)) = (
             pipeline_cache.get_render_pipeline(pipelines.downsample),
             pipeline_cache.get_render_pipeline(pipelines.gauss_h),
             pipeline_cache.get_render_pipeline(pipelines.gauss_v),
-            pipeline_cache.get_render_pipeline(pipelines.combine),
+            pipeline_cache.get_render_pipeline(combine_id),
         ) else {
             return Ok(()); // pipelines still compiling — draw the frame un-glowed
         };
@@ -702,6 +898,8 @@ impl ViewNode for FfxGlowNode {
                 &pipelines.sampler,
                 &textures.quarter_a.default_view,
                 textures.gain_buf.as_entire_binding(),
+                &pipelines.wave_view,
+                &pipelines.wave_sampler,
             )),
         );
         let mut pass = render_context
@@ -733,14 +931,16 @@ impl Plugin for FfxGlowPlugin {
             .init_resource::<FfxDeathFade>()
             .init_resource::<GlueFfx>()
             .init_resource::<FfxHazeMix>()
+            .init_resource::<FfxWave>()
             .add_plugins((
                 ExtractComponentPlugin::<FfxGlow>::default(),
                 ExtractResourcePlugin::<FfxGlowGain>::default(),
                 ExtractResourcePlugin::<FfxDeathFade>::default(),
                 ExtractResourcePlugin::<GlueFfx>::default(),
                 ExtractResourcePlugin::<FfxHazeMix>::default(),
+                ExtractResourcePlugin::<FfxWave>::default(),
             ))
-            .add_systems(Update, (sync_gain, sync_haze, ensure_ffx_glow));
+            .add_systems(Update, (sync_gain, sync_haze, sync_wave, ensure_ffx_glow));
         let Some(render_app) = app.get_sub_app_mut(RenderApp) else {
             return;
         };
@@ -802,17 +1002,35 @@ mod tests {
     fn a_ghosts_bake_is_not_death_combined() {
         let zone = 0.5;
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, ghost_world(), living_glue(), &FfxGlow::WORLD),
-            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0]
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                ghost_world(),
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::WORLD,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
         );
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, ghost_world(), living_glue(), &FfxGlow::BOOTH),
-            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                ghost_world(),
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::BOOTH,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
             "the booth keeps the zone glow and drops the death gate"
         );
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, ghost_world(), living_glue(), &FfxGlow::UI_PANE),
-            [0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                ghost_world(),
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::UI_PANE,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
         );
     }
 
@@ -822,12 +1040,24 @@ mod tests {
     fn a_drunk_players_bake_stays_sharp() {
         let (zone, drunk) = (0.5, FfxPassState::world(0.0, 1.0));
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, drunk, living_glue(), &FfxGlow::WORLD),
-            [0.5, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0]
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                drunk,
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::WORLD,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
         );
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, drunk, living_glue(), &FfxGlow::BOOTH),
-            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                drunk,
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::BOOTH,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0]
         );
     }
 
@@ -841,18 +1071,36 @@ mod tests {
         let ghost_glue = FfxPassState::glue(1.0);
         let alive_world = FfxPassState::world(0.0, 0.0);
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, alive_world, ghost_glue, &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE),
-            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                alive_world,
+                ghost_glue,
+                &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
             "a ghost roster row death-combines the glue scene"
         );
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, alive_world, ghost_glue, &FfxGlow::WORLD),
-            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                alive_world,
+                ghost_glue,
+                &FfxGlow::WORLD,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
             "…and never the world view, whose own player is alive"
         );
         assert_eq!(
-            combine_uniform(zone, ghost_world(), living_glue(), &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE),
-            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            combine_uniform(
+                zone,
+                ghost_world(),
+                living_glue(),
+                &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE,
+                FfxWave::default()
+            ),
+            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
             "and a world ghost never reaches the glue view"
         );
     }
@@ -870,13 +1118,153 @@ mod tests {
                 0.5,
                 drunk_world,
                 FfxPassState::glue(1.0),
-                &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE
+                &FfxGlow::GLUE_SCENE,
+                FfxWave::default()
             ),
-            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            [0.5, 1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
             "the glue view death-combines on its own gate and never hazes"
         );
     }
 
+    /// **The pass-list swap** (`0x6cc630`) — the three conditions, each independently load-bearing.
+    ///
+    /// The guard is `0x467d00() != 0 && 0x672470() != 0xf`, and the death pass REPLACES the glow
+    /// pass outright rather than composing with it, so a ghost has no wave for the same structural
+    /// reason it has no haze.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_warp_arms_only_for_a_living_submerged_world_view() {
+        let wet = FfxWave {
+            phase1: 0.0,
+            phase2: 0.0,
+            active: true,
+        };
+        let dry = FfxWave::default();
+        assert!(
+            wave_armed(FfxState::Player, wet, 0.0),
+            "in-world, submerged, alive — the reference walks its second list"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            !wave_armed(FfxState::Player, dry, 0.0),
+            "a dry camera keeps the first list"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            !wave_armed(FfxState::Player, wet, 1.0),
+            "a ghost runs CFFXDeath, which owns one list and no guard"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            !wave_armed(FfxState::Glue, wet, 0.0),
+            "the glue pair reaches the same Render, but 0x467d00 gates it out of the swap"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            !wave_armed(FfxState::None, wet, 0.0),
+            "a bake runs neither pair"
+        );
+    }
+
+    /// **A dry frame is untouched by this feature** — the perf claim, made structurally rather than
+    /// with a frame counter (the machine that would measure it is busy, and a stopwatch could not
+    /// prove this anyway).
+    ///
+    /// Dry, the uniform's first row is bit-identical to what it was before the warp existed and the
+    /// phase row is inert; the node then selects `combine` — the same pipeline object, compiled at
+    /// the same startup, bound through the same layout. The warp costs a dry frame nothing because
+    /// there is nothing of it in a dry frame, not because its cost is small.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_dry_frame_pays_nothing_for_the_warp() {
+        let live = FfxWave {
+            phase1: 0.4,
+            phase2: 0.7,
+            active: false,
+        };
+        let u = combine_uniform(
+            0.5,
+            FfxPassState::world(0.0, 0.0),
+            living_glue(),
+            &FfxGlow::WORLD,
+            live,
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            u[..4],
+            [0.5, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            "the combine lane is exactly what it was before the wave lane existed"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            !wave_armed(FfxState::Player, live, 0.0),
+            "and the node binds the unwarped pipeline"
+        );
+    }
+
+    /// The phases are a FREE-RUNNING clock, not a timer the dive starts: they advance whether or not
+    /// the wave is armed, so surfacing and diving again does not restart the pattern. Their periods
+    /// are the reference's own two integer millisecond moduli, and being coprime-ish is what stops
+    /// the warp reading as a loop — they rejoin only every ~49 minutes.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_two_phases_run_independently_off_one_clock() {
+        let phase = |ms: u64, i: usize| (ms % WAVE_PERIOD_MS[i]) as f32 / WAVE_PERIOD_MS[i] as f32;
+        assert_eq!(WAVE_PERIOD_MS, [3174, 2805]);
+        // Each wraps on its own period and nowhere else.
+        assert!(phase(3173, 0) > 0.999 && phase(3174, 0) == 0.0);
+        assert!(phase(2804, 1) > 0.999 && phase(2805, 1) == 0.0);
+        // At its own wrap the OTHER phase is mid-stride — the whole point of two moduli.
+        assert!(phase(3174, 1) > 0.13 && phase(3174, 1) < 0.14);
+        // The joint period: lcm(3174, 2805) ms ≈ 49 min 28 s.
+        let gcd = |mut a: u64, mut b: u64| {
+            while b != 0 {
+                (a, b) = (b, a % b);
+            }
+            a
+        };
+        let joint =
+            WAVE_PERIOD_MS[0] / gcd(WAVE_PERIOD_MS[0], WAVE_PERIOD_MS[1]) * WAVE_PERIOD_MS[1];
+        assert_eq!(joint, 2_967_690);
+    }
+
+    /// **The LUT is a displacement map, and each channel bends ONE axis.** That is the fact that
+    /// makes the effect a geometric warp rather than a brightness shimmer, and it is visible in the
+    /// texels: `du` depends only on x, `dv` only on y (the shipped format is the signed two-channel
+    /// bump format on both backends — `D3DFMT_V8U8` / `GL_DSDT8_NV`).
+    #[test]
+    fn the_wave_lut_is_one_sine_per_axis() {
+        let lut = wave_lut_texels();
+        let edge = WAVE_LUT_EDGE as usize;
+        assert_eq!(lut.len(), edge * edge * 2);
+        let at = |x: usize, y: usize| {
+            let i = (y * edge + x) * 2;
+            (lut[i], lut[i + 1])
+        };
+        for x in 0..edge {
+            for y in [0usize, 37, 91, 127] {
+                assert_eq!(at(x, y).0, at(x, 0).0, "du must not vary down the texture");
+                assert_eq!(at(x, y).1, at(0, y).1, "dv must not vary across it");
+            }
+        }
+        // Biased back the way the shipped ps_2_0 permutation does, every texel is its axis's sine
+        // to within one 8-bit step — the quantization the reference itself ships.
+        for i in 0..edge {
+            let want = (std::f32::consts::TAU * i as f32 / edge as f32).sin();
+            let got = (at(i, i).0 as f32 / 255.0 - 0.5) * 2.0;
+            assert!(
+                (got - want).abs() <= 2.0 / 255.0,
+                "texel {i}: {got} vs sin {want}"
+            );
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// GOLDEN — the reference's own pack, down to the truncation. `ffx_glow_wave_lut`'s path B is
+    /// `(s·0.5 + 0.5)·255` → clamp → `__ftol`, and `__ftol` truncates toward zero rather than
+    /// rounding: `sin = 0` packs to **127**, not 128, so the map carries a half-step DC bias the
+    /// reference carries too. Rounding here would be a "cleaner" number and the wrong one.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_wave_pack_truncates_like_ftol() {
+        let lut = wave_lut_texels();
+        // x = 0 and x = 64 are the sine's two zeros; both truncate down.
+        assert_eq!(lut[0], 127, "sin(0) = 0 → trunc(127.5) = 127");
+        assert_eq!(lut[64 * 2], 127, "sin(π) ≈ 0 → 127");
+        // The quarter points saturate the ends of the range.
+        assert_eq!(lut[32 * 2], 255, "sin(π/2) = 1 → 255");
+        assert_eq!(lut[96 * 2], 0, "sin(3π/2) = −1 → 0");
+    }
+
     /// GOLDEN — the three writers of the glue screens' `LightParams.glow`, and the alpha byte the
     /// death combine quantizes the ghost one into. Every number byte-VERIFIED (wow-re
     /// `glue-select-ghost-treatment.md`); each constant has exactly one reference image-wide.
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/lighting/resolve.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/lighting/resolve.rs
index 529ab8a6..e3aa28fc 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/lighting/resolve.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/lighting/resolve.rs
@@ -193,6 +193,24 @@ pub(super) fn setup_lighting(
 /// sun sets (that's how the real client does it). **Phase 0:** this only writes the resolved values
 /// into [`WowLighting`] (consumed by `apply_wow_lighting` → the materials). No PBR sun / ambient /
 /// fog / sky are touched — those are rebuilt in-shader step by step.
+/// The reference's `0x6d1620` — an HSV **VALUE-only** scale of a colour, as used by the ocean depth
+/// ramp: unpack to RGB floats, `RGB → HSV` (`0x7bbc80`), multiply the third member (V) alone,
+/// `HSV → RGB` (`0x7bbd60`), repack.
+///
+/// **It is a uniform RGB multiply, and that is a fact rather than an approximation.** HSV keeps
+/// `V = max(r,g,b)` and `S = (max − min)/max`; scaling V while H and S are untouched scales the max
+/// by `f`, and the min by `new_V·(1 − S) = f·min`, and the middle channel by the same ratio — so
+/// every channel comes back multiplied by `f`. The detour is an identity for a V-only scale, so we
+/// transcribe the identity. `the_hsv_detour_is_a_plain_multiply` checks that against an actual
+/// round trip rather than leaving it as an argument in a comment.
+///
+/// The one thing we do NOT carry over is the reference's byte repack (`×255 + 512 >> 14`): its
+/// light lane is 8-bit and ours is float end to end, and re-quantizing here would be inventing a
+/// step this pipeline does not otherwise have.
+fn hsv_value_scale(c: [f32; 3], f: f32) -> [f32; 3] {
+    [c[0] * f, c[1] * f, c[2] * f]
+}
+
 #[allow(clippy::too_many_arguments)]
 pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
     world_time: Res<super::WorldTime>,
@@ -200,7 +218,7 @@ pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
     debug: Res<DebugState>,
     cam: Query<&GlobalTransform, With<WorldCamera>>,
     current_map: Option<Res<CurrentMap>>,
-    underwater: Option<Res<crate::liquid::Underwater>>,
+    eye_liquid: crate::liquid::EyeLiquid,
     viewer: Res<crate::view::Viewer>,
     weather: Option<Res<crate::weather::WeatherState>>,
     view: Res<crate::view::ViewDistance>,
@@ -262,10 +280,7 @@ pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
     // fog + cool light. Feeding it through the normal atmosphere → `WowLighting` path means every
     // existing consumer (terrain/model/water/WDL fog + the clear colour) becomes underwater for free
     // (VERIFIED apitrace WoW.18: the reference just switches the active param; no overlay quad).
-    let submerged = underwater
-        .as_ref()
-        .map(|u| u.0)
-        .unwrap_or(benilla_formats::Submersion::Dry);
+    let submerged = eye_liquid.submersion();
     // The ghost-world atmosphere (decision 0308 §7, byte-VERIFIED death-light.md): while
     // PLAYER_FLAGS_GHOST is up the active LightParams slot is 4 — the death profile — applied
     // instantly (the client rebuilds its color tables per frame off the single active slot).
@@ -328,9 +343,17 @@ pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
         )
     };
     let moon02 = daynight::moon02_state(day_f);
+    // **The ocean depth ramp** (decision 1829, wow-re `submerged-atmosphere.md` §3). Ocean alone
+    // runs it, and it darkens the two committed light triples — the first (`DNState+0x178`) by
+    // `fac1` down to 0.5, the second (`+0x174`) by `fac2` down to 0.75, over the first 30 yards.
+    // Every other submersion state, ocean's own fog colour included, is untouched: the fog-colour
+    // commit in the same block is dead code, overwritten from the bands immediately after.
+    let (fac1, fac2) = submerged
+        .ocean_depth_factors(eye_liquid.eye_z())
+        .unwrap_or((1.0, 1.0));
     let resolved = WowLighting {
-        ambient: atmo.ambient,
-        diffuse: atmo.sun_diffuse,
+        ambient: hsv_value_scale(atmo.ambient, fac1),
+        diffuse: hsv_value_scale(atmo.sun_diffuse, fac2),
         spec: atmo.sun_color, // row 9 (warm-white) — WoW's specular color
         sun_dir,
         celestial_dir,
@@ -433,11 +456,26 @@ pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
     // recomputes the same call offline — so a line from a live run can be replayed against the DBC
     // instead of argued about. Without the map printed, "is this the atmosphere the zone actually
     // authored, or the one next door?" costs a session (Stratholme, 2026-07-29).
-    if *last_dump != Some(minute) && std::env::var_os("WOW_LIGHT_DUMP").is_some() {
-        *last_dump = Some(minute);
+    // `WOW_LIGHT_DUMP=frame` drops the minute throttle, exactly as `WOW_FOG_DUMP=frame` does. The
+    // minute gate is right for comparing colours against a DBC replay, and useless for anything
+    // POSITIONAL: game minutes advance slowly enough that a whole probe logs two lines, and both of
+    // them land in the first moments after world entry — before the submersion verdict has settled,
+    // so the line reports `Dry` at a position that is plainly underwater (1829, chasing exactly
+    // that contradiction).
+    if let Some(mode) = std::env::var_os("WOW_LIGHT_DUMP") {
+        let key = (mode != *"frame").then_some(minute);
+        if key.is_some() && *last_dump == key {
+            return;
+        }
+        *last_dump = key;
         let b = |c: [f32; 3]| [c[0] * 255.0, c[1] * 255.0, c[2] * 255.0].map(|v| v.round() as i32);
         eprintln!(
-            "[light] map {map} at ({:.1}, {:.1}, {:.1}) minute {minute} ({source:?}) ambient {:?} diffuse {:?} spec {:?} sun_dir {:.3} fog {:?} start/end {:.0}/{:.0}",
+            // The submersion tail (1829) reports the RAMP ITSELF, not just its result. Comparing
+            // two dives at different depths cannot prove the ramp fired — the light row moves with
+            // the clock between runs, and the dump only fires on a game-minute change, so the two
+            // samples are never the same row. Printing the factors and their input settles it in
+            // one line instead.
+            "[light] map {map} at ({:.1}, {:.1}, {:.1}) minute {minute} ({source:?}) ambient {:?} diffuse {:?} spec {:?} sun_dir {:.3} fog {:?} start/end {:.0}/{:.0} submersion {submerged:?} eye_z {:.1} ocean_fac {:.4}/{:.4}",
             wow_pos[0],
             wow_pos[1],
             wow_pos[2],
@@ -448,6 +486,9 @@ pub(super) fn update_time_lighting(
             b(resolved.fog_color),
             resolved.fog_start,
             resolved.fog_end,
+            eye_liquid.eye_z(),
+            fac1,
+            fac2,
         );
     }
 }
@@ -481,6 +522,73 @@ pub(super) fn apply_sky_backdrop(
     clear.0 = Color::linear_rgb(l.fog_color[0], l.fog_color[1], l.fog_color[2]);
 }
 
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod ocean_ramp_tests {
+    use super::hsv_value_scale;
+
+    /// A textbook `RGB → HSV → RGB` round trip, written out here so the identity claim in
+    /// [`hsv_value_scale`]'s doc is *checked* rather than argued. If it were ever false, our one
+    /// multiply would be silently wrong in colour rather than obviously wrong in code.
+    fn round_trip_v_scale(c: [f32; 3], f: f32) -> [f32; 3] {
+        let (r, g, b) = (c[0], c[1], c[2]);
+        let max = r.max(g).max(b);
+        let min = r.min(g).min(b);
+        let v = max;
+        let sat = if max == 0.0 { 0.0 } else { (max - min) / max };
+        let hue = if max == min {
+            0.0
+        } else if max == r {
+            60.0 * (((g - b) / (max - min)) % 6.0)
+        } else if max == g {
+            60.0 * ((b - r) / (max - min) + 2.0)
+        } else {
+            60.0 * ((r - g) / (max - min) + 4.0)
+        };
+        // V *= f, H and S untouched — the reference's `0x6d1620`.
+        let v = v * f;
+        // HSV -> RGB
+        let cc = v * sat;
+        let x = cc * (1.0 - (((hue / 60.0) % 2.0) - 1.0).abs());
+        let m = v - cc;
+        let (r1, g1, b1) = match (hue / 60.0).floor() as i32 {
+            0 => (cc, x, 0.0),
+            1 => (x, cc, 0.0),
+            2 => (0.0, cc, x),
+            3 => (0.0, x, cc),
+            4 => (x, 0.0, cc),
+            _ => (cc, 0.0, x),
+        };
+        [r1 + m, g1 + m, b1 + m]
+    }
+
+    /// The reference scales HSV **V** alone; we transcribe that as a plain RGB multiply. This is an
+    /// identity, not an approximation — and the round trip above says so for real colours,
+    /// including the degenerate greys and blacks where the hue is undefined.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_hsv_detour_is_a_plain_multiply() {
+        let colours = [
+            [0.8, 0.4, 0.1],
+            [0.1, 0.1, 0.1],
+            [0.0, 0.0, 0.0],
+            [1.0, 1.0, 1.0],
+            [0.2, 0.9, 0.55],
+            [0.0, 0.3, 0.7],
+        ];
+        for c in colours {
+            for f in [1.0f32, 0.875, 0.75, 0.5] {
+                let want = round_trip_v_scale(c, f);
+                let got = hsv_value_scale(c, f);
+                for i in 0..3 {
+                    assert!(
+                        (want[i] - got[i]).abs() < 1e-6,
+                        "{c:?} × {f}: HSV round trip {want:?} vs multiply {got:?}"
+                    );
+                }
+            }
+        }
+    }
+}
+
 #[cfg(test)]
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/drift.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/drift.rs
index 7e20d411..dc6d4e34 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/drift.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/drift.rs
@@ -418,7 +418,9 @@ fn simulate_drift(
             Submersion::Dry => {}
             // Slime disables outright, with no re-scatter (`0x680b6f`).
             Submersion::Slime => cloud.mode = None,
-            Submersion::Water => {
+            // Water and ocean share the drift cloud's whole configuration — the mote cell set is
+            // keyed on liquid types 0 AND 1 (`[0x86a0a0]`), so the sea drifts exactly like a lake.
+            Submersion::Water | Submersion::Ocean => {
                 cloud.scatter(DriftMode::Water);
                 cloud.last_cam = eye;
             }
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/mod.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/mod.rs
index 8295d646..9edffabc 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/mod.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/mod.rs
@@ -98,8 +98,8 @@ mod surface; // the against-real-client-files tests — they span both halves
 // terrain cells is a leg that could reach nothing at all and never show it.
 pub use query::{
     camera_claim, describe_at, liquid_at, player_claim, surfaces_at, unit_claim, water_surface_at,
-    FoamPatch, LiquidClaim, LiquidHit, LiquidSource, RoomPlacements, Underwater, WaterChunkInfo,
-    WmoPool,
+    EyeLiquid, FoamPatch, LiquidClaim, LiquidHit, LiquidSource, RoomPlacements, SubmergedEye,
+    Underwater, WaterChunkInfo, WmoPool,
 };
 pub(crate) use spatial::{maintain_water_index, WaterIndex};
 pub(crate) use surface::{
@@ -124,6 +124,7 @@ impl Plugin for LiquidPlugin {
     fn build(&self, app: &mut App) {
         app.add_plugins(MaterialPlugin::<LiquidMaterial>::default())
             .init_resource::<Underwater>()
+            .init_resource::<SubmergedEye>()
             .init_resource::<WaterIndex>()
             // PreUpdate: surfaces stream in/out via Update-side commands, so the edge is visible
             // here the frame after — before any of that frame's consumers ask. A despawn's stale
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/query.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/query.rs
index 544001db..de4937be 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/query.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/liquid/query.rs
@@ -810,7 +810,11 @@ const SUBMERSION_EPS: f32 = 0.01;
 fn submersion_of(kind: LiquidKind) -> benilla_formats::Submersion {
     use benilla_formats::Submersion;
     match kind {
-        LiquidKind::Still | LiquidKind::Rapids | LiquidKind::Ocean => Submersion::Water,
+        LiquidKind::Still | LiquidKind::Rapids => Submersion::Water,
+        // Ocean is its own verdict — it alone runs the depth ramp (decision 1829). It can only come
+        // from ADT MCLQ (`(b & 0x0f) & 3 == 1`); a WMO cannot author it, which is why no interior
+        // pool ever reaches this arm.
+        LiquidKind::Ocean => Submersion::Ocean,
         LiquidKind::Magma => Submersion::Magma,
         LiquidKind::Slime => Submersion::Slime,
     }
@@ -852,11 +856,31 @@ fn submersion_of(kind: LiquidKind) -> benilla_formats::Submersion {
 /// the defect was never visible to [`liquid_at`] (which answers "the liquid over this XY", lowest
 /// wins, whether or not you are under it) but only to *this* rule — "every admitted surface the eye
 /// is beneath". A rule no test can call is a rule that drifts from the one being reasoned about.
+/// The verdict alone, for the tests that assert on it — a thin delegation to
+/// [`submersion_claim_at`], never a second copy of the rule. It restated the filter for about an
+/// hour of this change, and that was already one copy too many: the reason the surface height is
+/// threaded out of a *single* pass is precisely that two passes can disagree (decision 0701).
+#[cfg(test)]
 pub(super) fn submersion_at<'a>(
     liquids: impl Iterator<Item = &'a WaterChunkInfo>,
     wow: [f32; 3],
     claim: LiquidClaim,
 ) -> benilla_formats::Submersion {
+    submersion_claim_at(liquids, wow, claim).map_or_else(Default::default, |(s, _)| s)
+}
+
+/// [`submersion_at`]'s verdict **and the surface it came from** — the same rule, one value wider.
+///
+/// The surface height is what the reference's own probe keeps beside the verdict (`0x680a87` /
+/// `0x680ab0` write the pair), and two consumers need it: the glare's depth fade wants
+/// `surface − probe` and the ocean ramp wants to know it is standing on a sea. Deriving it a second
+/// time from a second pass over the surfaces would be a rule that could drift from this one — the
+/// mistake decision 0701 already paid for once.
+pub(super) fn submersion_claim_at<'a>(
+    liquids: impl Iterator<Item = &'a WaterChunkInfo>,
+    wow: [f32; 3],
+    claim: LiquidClaim,
+) -> Option<(benilla_formats::Submersion, f32)> {
     liquids
         .filter(|w| w.answers(claim, wow[2]))
         .filter_map(|w| {
@@ -868,10 +892,53 @@ pub(super) fn submersion_at<'a>(
             };
             (wow[2] < z + eps).then_some((z, submersion_of(w.kind)))
         })
-        // Lowest surface first: `total_cmp` on the surface z, so a tie is still deterministic.
         .min_by(|a, b| a.0.total_cmp(&b.0))
-        .map(|(_, s)| s)
-        .unwrap_or_default()
+        .map(|(z, s)| (s, z))
+}
+
+/// The camera-eye liquid state as ONE system parameter — the verdict and the two scalars together.
+///
+/// They are read as a unit because they are written as a unit, by one probe in one frame slot
+/// ([`super::SubmersionVerdict`]); binding them separately invites a consumer that takes the depth
+/// from this frame and the verdict from the last. It also keeps a caller under Bevy's 16-parameter
+/// ceiling, which is what forced the bundle — [`crate::lighting::resolve::update_time_lighting`]
+/// reads sixteen other things.
+#[derive(bevy::ecs::system::SystemParam)]
+pub struct EyeLiquid<'w> {
+    verdict: Option<Res<'w, Underwater>>,
+    eye: Option<Res<'w, SubmergedEye>>,
+}
+
+impl EyeLiquid<'_> {
+    /// What the eye is in — [`benilla_formats::Submersion::Dry`] before the probe has ever run.
+    pub fn submersion(&self) -> benilla_formats::Submersion {
+        self.verdict.as_ref().map_or_else(Default::default, |v| v.0)
+    }
+
+    /// The eye's absolute world Z — the ocean ramp's raw input.
+    pub fn eye_z(&self) -> f32 {
+        self.eye.as_ref().map_or(0.0, |e| e.eye_z)
+    }
+
+    /// How far the probe sits below the liquid surface, in yards; `0.0` when dry.
+    pub fn depth(&self) -> f32 {
+        self.eye.as_ref().map_or(0.0, |e| e.depth)
+    }
+}
+
+/// The submerged camera's two scalars, published beside [`Underwater`] for the consumers that need
+/// a *distance* rather than a verdict (decision 1829).
+#[derive(bevy::prelude::Resource, Default, Clone, Copy)]
+pub struct SubmergedEye {
+    /// `liquidSurfaceHeight − probeZ` in world-Z yards, **positive when submerged** and `0.0` when
+    /// dry — the quantity the reference writes at `0x680a87`/`0x680ab0`. Drives the glare's 10-yard
+    /// fade. Not a ray distance and not an occluder term.
+    pub depth: f32,
+    /// The camera eye's own absolute world Z. The ocean depth ramp clamps this raw
+    /// (`t = clamp(eye.z, −30, 0)`) rather than working from [`Self::depth`], because ocean
+    /// surfaces are pinned to z = 0 by a code branch (`0x69ba85`) rather than by data — so for the
+    /// one state that runs the ramp the two agree, and the absolute form is what the binary reads.
+    pub eye_z: f32,
 }
 
 /// How far the near rectangle's **lowest corner** sits below the eye (≤ 0, WoW-Z = Bevy-Y yards) —
@@ -896,6 +963,9 @@ pub(super) fn lowest_near_corner_drop(rotation: Quat, fov: f32, aspect: f32, nea
     drop
 }
 
+// Eight parameters: the probe reads a camera, the loaded surfaces, two scoping resources and a
+// clock, then writes the verdict and its two scalars. They are the inputs the rule has.
+#[allow(clippy::too_many_arguments)]
 pub(super) fn detect_submersion(
     mut underwater: ResMut<Underwater>,
     camera: Query<(&Transform, &Projection), With<WorldCamera>>,
@@ -903,6 +973,7 @@ pub(super) fn detect_submersion(
     eye_claim: Res<crate::wmo_portal::CameraInteriorClaim>,
     placements: RoomPlacements,
     time: Res<Time>,
+    mut submerged_eye: ResMut<SubmergedEye>,
     mut last_dump: Local<Option<u32>>,
 ) {
     let Ok((cam, proj)) = camera.single() else {
@@ -924,7 +995,13 @@ pub(super) fn detect_submersion(
         }
         _ => eye[2],
     };
-    underwater.0 = submersion_at(water.iter(), [eye[0], eye[1], probe_z], claim);
+    let verdict = submersion_claim_at(water.iter(), [eye[0], eye[1], probe_z], claim);
+    underwater.0 = verdict.map(|(s, _)| s).unwrap_or_default();
+    // Depth is measured from the PROBE, not the eye — the probe is what decided we are submerged at
+    // all, so a fade driven off the eye would disagree with the verdict in the inches-tall band the
+    // near rectangle owns.
+    submerged_eye.depth = verdict.map_or(0.0, |(_, z)| (z - probe_z).max(0.0));
+    submerged_eye.eye_z = eye[2];
     // `WOW_FOG_DUMP` also explains *this* decision (`frame` drops the 1 Hz throttle, as there). The
     // committed fog is whichever submerged atmosphere the verdict names, so a fog line alone cannot
     // say whether an atmosphere that reads wrong is the wrong record or the right record never
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/shaders/ffx_glow.wgsl b/crates/benilla-world/src/shaders/ffx_glow.wgsl
index a5770312..64e0fa0c 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/shaders/ffx_glow.wgsl
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/shaders/ffx_glow.wgsl
@@ -25,10 +25,24 @@
 @group(0) @binding(1) var in_samp: sampler;
 // Combine-pass extras (unused — and unbound — in the downsample/blur passes).
 @group(0) @binding(2) var blur_tex: texture_2d<f32>;
-// x = the zone glow weight `w` (BOTH combines' blur² weight — the death pack reuses it as
-// primary.w); y = the FFXDeath gate (1 while ghost, else 0 — byte-verified instant, no ramp);
-// zw reserved.
-@group(0) @binding(3) var<uniform> glow: vec4<f32>;
+struct FfxCombine {
+    // x = the zone glow weight `w` (BOTH combines' blur² weight — the death pack reuses it as
+    // primary.w); y = the FFXDeath gate (1 while ghost, else 0 — byte-verified instant, no ramp);
+    // z = the drunk/underwater haze mix; w = the deband-dither arm.
+    lane: vec4<f32>,
+    // xy = the GlowWave phases `(t mod 3174)/3174` and `(t mod 2805)/2805`; zw unused. Written on
+    // every frame, read only by `fs_combine_wave`.
+    wave: vec4<f32>,
+}
+@group(0) @binding(3) var<uniform> ffx: FfxCombine;
+// The 128×128 wave LUT and its own REPEAT sampler — bound on EVERY combine, sampled only by the
+// underwater entry. A bound-but-unsampled texture costs a dry frame nothing, and one layout keeps
+// the two entries interchangeable at draw time (the alternative, a second layout, would make the
+// pipeline swap a bind-group swap too).
+@group(0) @binding(4) var wave_tex: texture_2d<f32>;
+@group(0) @binding(5) var wave_samp: sampler;
+
+
 
 // The reference's ONE downsample: full → ¼ directly, via Box4 — 4 bilinear taps at source-texel
 // offsets {−1.5, +0.5}² (a 4×4 footprint; byte-pinned table 0xce89cc, wow-re blur-geometry.md).
@@ -85,8 +99,8 @@ fn srgb_to_linear(c: vec3<f32>) -> vec3<f32> {
 //   out  = luma + primary.rgb · sat(4·luma·(1−luma))
 // The CPU pack `0x6cb930` builds primary as `(LightParams.glow·255)<<24 | 0x5393A8`: rgb is the
 // CONSTANT steel blue-gray 0x53/0x93/0xA8, and primary.w (the blur² weight) is the same zone glow
-// the glow pass uses — so glow.x serves both combines and glow.y is a pure 0/1 gate.
-// **Deband dither** (`glow.w`, off by default — see `ffx_glow.rs`). The frame's ONE quantization
+// the glow pass uses — so ffx.lane.x serves both combines and ffx.lane.y is a pure 0/1 gate.
+// **Deband dither** (`ffx.lane.w`, off by default — see `ffx_glow.rs`). The frame's ONE quantization
 // to 8 bits happens on `outg` below: it is a gamma-space float, and the surface's sRGB
 // present-encode rounds it to a byte. A smooth surface therefore steps in 1/255, and at the
 // gradients a lit character actually has (~1.3 levels/px on a bare arm) a body drifting the
@@ -114,43 +128,111 @@ fn screen_space_dither(frag_coord: vec2<f32>) -> vec3<f32> {
 // rounds in — then the frame's single decode.
 fn combine_out(outg: vec3<f32>, alpha: f32, frag_coord: vec2<f32>) -> vec4<f32> {
     let dithered = clamp(
-        outg + screen_space_dither(frag_coord) * step(0.5, glow.w),
+        outg + screen_space_dither(frag_coord) * step(0.5, ffx.lane.w),
         vec3<f32>(0.0),
         vec3<f32>(1.0),
     );
     return vec4<f32>(srgb_to_linear(dithered), alpha);
 }
 
-@fragment
-fn fs_combine(in: FullscreenVertexOutput) -> @location(0) vec4<f32> {
+// The combine both entries run — the dry one at the fragment's own UV, the underwater one at the
+// warped UV. `frag_coord` stays UNwarped: it seeds the deband dither, which is a property of the
+// destination pixel, not of where the scene was read from.
+fn combine_body(uv: vec2<f32>, frag_coord: vec2<f32>) -> vec4<f32> {
     // GAMMA LANE (0161): the whole frame is already gamma bytes — the blur ran on gamma (like
     // the reference's byte RTs) and the combine is raw byte math. The single srgb_to_linear here
     // is THE frame's one decode: the sRGB present-encode then restores every byte exactly.
-    let scene = textureSample(in_tex, in_samp, in.uv);
+    let scene = textureSample(in_tex, in_samp, uv);
     // Clamped to [0, 1] like the downsample's taps: the byte framebuffer this term stands for
     // could never exceed 255, and an unclamped super-white here keeps the whole additive stack
     // hard-white after the min() below — the screen term must saturate BEFORE the glow add.
     let sg = clamp(scene.rgb, vec3<f32>(0.0), vec3<f32>(1.0));
-    let bg = max(textureSample(blur_tex, in_samp, in.uv).rgb, vec3<f32>(0.0));
+    let bg = max(textureSample(blur_tex, in_samp, uv).rgb, vec3<f32>(0.0));
     // The scene alpha rides through untouched: the window surface ignores it and the opaque-clear
     // booths hold 1 everywhere — only the transparent-clear create booth reads it, to composite
     // its baked model straight over the UI page.
-    if glow.y > 0.0 {
+    if ffx.lane.y > 0.0 {
         // The FFXDeath pack has no z lane (its COLOR rgb is the constant tint) — the ghost
         // combine reads the un-hazed screen.
-        let glowed = sg + glow.x * bg * bg;
+        let glowed = sg + ffx.lane.x * bg * bg;
         let luma = clamp(dot(glowed, vec3<f32>(0.299, 0.587, 0.144)), 0.0, 1.0);
         let p = clamp(4.0 * luma * (1.0 - luma), 0.0, 1.0);
         let ghost_tint = vec3<f32>(83.0, 147.0, 168.0) / 255.0; // 0x5393A8
         let outg = min(vec3<f32>(luma) + ghost_tint * p, vec3<f32>(1.0));
-        return combine_out(outg, scene.a, in.position.xy);
+        return combine_out(outg, scene.a, frag_coord);
     }
     // The z lane — the drunk/underwater haze: cross-fade the screen toward the ¼-res blur
     // BEFORE the glow add (`out = lerp(screen, blur, z) + w·blur²`, the shipped FFXGlow.bls;
     // wow-re drunk-blur-z.md). z = max(drunkFraction, 84/255 while the eye is submerged) — 0 in
     // the ordinary sober pass, 1 = fully blurred at 100 inebriation. The blur term clamps like
     // the screen term: it stands for the same byte RT.
-    let hazed = mix(sg, min(bg, vec3<f32>(1.0)), glow.z);
-    let outg = min(hazed + glow.x * bg * bg, vec3<f32>(1.0));
-    return combine_out(outg, scene.a, in.position.xy);
+    let hazed = mix(sg, min(bg, vec3<f32>(1.0)), ffx.lane.z);
+    let outg = min(hazed + ffx.lane.x * bg * bg, vec3<f32>(1.0));
+    return combine_out(outg, scene.a, frag_coord);
+}
+
+@fragment
+fn fs_combine(in: FullscreenVertexOutput) -> @location(0) vec4<f32> {
+    return combine_body(in.uv, in.position.xy);
+}
+
+// **FFXGlowWave — the underwater screen warp.** (wow-re `ffxeffects/scratch/glow-wave-underwater.md`,
+// §5 cross-checked; benilla decision 1824.)
+//
+// While the camera eye is in ANY liquid the reference does not run the combine above at all:
+// `CFFXGlow::Render 0x6cc630` walks a *second* pass list, whose third pass is **FFXGlowWave**
+// (ctor `0x6cb1f0`, vtable `0x8114b4`, render `0x6cb310`) in place of FFXGlow. wow-re's note had
+// long carried that swap as an undecided "GlowWave, *or* a duplicate Glow"; the arms are mutually
+// exclusive (`ret` at `0x6cc403`, `push ebx` at `0x6cc404`) and the plain-Glow arm is unreachable
+// on both backends, so underwater is ALWAYS the wave.
+//
+// The two passes are instruction-identical except that GlowWave binds a third texture — a 128×128
+// two-channel bump map holding `du = sin(2πx/128)`, `dv = sin(2πy/128)` — and **displaces both the
+// screen and the blur texcoords by it**. Everything downstream (the haze cross-fade, the blur²
+// add, the gamma lane) is unchanged, which is why both entries share [`combine_body`]: the warp is
+// a change of *where* the combine reads, not of what it computes.
+//
+// The wave texcoord is an affine map of the screen UV. The reference builds it CPU-side per vertex
+// (`0x7bca80`) and hands the GPU three interpolated texcoord streams; an affine function of an
+// interpolated UV is the interpolation of that affine function, so evaluating it per fragment here
+// is the same map, not an approximation of it:
+//
+//     uv' = uv · R(10°) · S(W/128, 0.88·H/128) · T(p1, p2)
+//
+// with the two phases running INDEPENDENTLY off one millisecond clock — `(t mod 3174)/3174` and
+// `(t mod 2805)/2805`, i.e. 3.174 s and 2.805 s, rejoining only every ~49 minutes. The scale
+// constants multiply the destination's pixel dimensions (a `rewave.md` gloss had them multiplying
+// the phases; corrected at the bytes), so the wavelength is 128 px across and 145.45 px down
+// REGARDLESS of resolution, and the pattern is screen-fixed rather than world-locked.
+//
+// Amplitude is **3.0 full-res pixels** on both samples — the reference reaches that number twice
+// over, `(3.0, 0, 0, 3.0)` texels of the full RT and `0.75` texels of the ¼ RT being the same
+// distance, which is the cross-check that the blur sample warps by the same amount as the screen.
+const WAVE_ROT_RAD: f32 = 0.174532925; // 10°, the reference's rotation row
+const WAVE_LUT_EDGE: f32 = 128.0; // the LUT is 128×128 texels ([0xce89a0]'s 7-field descriptor)
+const WAVE_V_SCALE: f32 = 0.88; // [0xce89c0] — the v axis alone carries it; u's twin is 1.0
+const WAVE_AMPLITUDE_PX: f32 = 3.0; // full-res pixels, both samples
+
+// The screen-UV offset the warp applies, in UV units. `screen` is the full-res scene in pixels.
+fn wave_offset(uv: vec2<f32>, screen: vec2<f32>) -> vec2<f32> {
+    let c = cos(WAVE_ROT_RAD);
+    let s = sin(WAVE_ROT_RAD);
+    let scale = vec2<f32>(screen.x, WAVE_V_SCALE * screen.y) / WAVE_LUT_EDGE;
+    let tex = vec2<f32>(c * uv.x - s * uv.y, s * uv.x + c * uv.y) * scale + ffx.wave.xy;
+    // SAMPLED, not evaluated: 128 texels of `sin` under LINEAR/REPEAT *is* the reference's sine —
+    // a piecewise-linear one, and its own. REPEAT is load-bearing and was the round's costliest
+    // near-miss: read as CLAMP, the effect dies over 90% of the screen (the scale runs the
+    // texcoord to 10 cycles across, so all but the first would pin to the edge texel).
+    //
+    // The 8-bit pack is biased back exactly as the shipped ps_2_0 permutation does — that blob
+    // carries `def c2 = (−0.5, 1.0, …)` and two extra instructions spelling `(x − 0.5)·2`, because
+    // the caps tier the live client selects hands it an UNSIGNED texture.
+    let d = (textureSample(wave_tex, wave_samp, tex).rg - vec2<f32>(0.5)) * 2.0;
+    return d * WAVE_AMPLITUDE_PX / screen;
+}
+
+@fragment
+fn fs_combine_wave(in: FullscreenVertexOutput) -> @location(0) vec4<f32> {
+    let screen = vec2<f32>(textureDimensions(in_tex));
+    return combine_body(in.uv + wave_offset(in.uv, screen), in.position.xy);
 }
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/sun/follow.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/sun/follow.rs
index ce65944e..be5e4aae 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/sun/follow.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/sun/follow.rs
@@ -255,6 +255,12 @@ pub(super) struct FlareGate<'w, 's> {
     /// ring (the same surface that draws the distant horizon mountains). Absent in assetless dev.
     wdl: Option<Res<'w, WdlStreamer>>,
     camera_interior: Res<'w, CameraInteriorClaim>,
+    /// The submerged-eye depth — the glare's own submersion fade (decision 1829). The glare is
+    /// NOT part of the sky pass the client skips underwater: it draws in its own top-level pass
+    /// (`0x6cf490` ← `0x6d48c0` ← `0x483740`, unconditional), while the sky is `0x6d4940` *inside*
+    /// `0x681070`, which is what `0x6812a4` skips. Both facts are true at once, which is why the
+    /// fade is live code and not a ramp on a pass that never runs.
+    submerged: Res<'w, crate::liquid::SubmergedEye>,
     /// The live cloud coverage field — the occ1 sample source (one field serves the glare and
     /// the visible layer, like the reference).
     clouds: Res<'w, CloudCoverage>,
@@ -268,6 +274,26 @@ pub(super) struct FlareGate<'w, 's> {
     primed: Local<'s, bool>,
 }
 
+/// The glare's **submersion fade** — `1 − clamp(depth × 0.1, 0, 1)`, a 10-yard linear ramp on the
+/// glare alpha (wow-re `submerged-consumer-census.md`; decision 1829). `depth` is
+/// `liquidSurfaceHeight − probeZ` in world-Z yards, positive when submerged, so a dry camera reads
+/// `0` and the fade is the exact identity.
+///
+/// **This was a published negative until this round.** Two wow-re notes recorded the glare as
+/// having no submersion term; the read is one indirection out (`0x6cf4fe call [edx+0x10]` → the
+/// glare vtable's slot 4 → `0x6cf800`), which a direct-call census cannot see. It is worth
+/// implementing rather than filing as trivia: the glare is additive, so a black underwater
+/// celestial band would make it invisible anyway — and **288 of 374 `Light.dbc` rows (77%) carry a
+/// non-zero one**, so on most of the map there is a glare down there to fade.
+///
+/// Applies to the **sun and moon glares alike** (`0x6d48cf` / `0x6d48ea`; slot 4 of both glare
+/// vtables is `0x6cf800`, and they differ only at slot 3) and to **neither disc** — the discs have
+/// no submerged path at all, so suppressing them outright with the skipped sky pass is right. Both
+/// confirmed by census rather than assumed.
+fn submersion_glare_fade(depth: f32) -> f32 {
+    1.0 - (depth * 0.1).clamp(0.0, 1.0)
+}
+
 /// The weather **celestial-alpha seed** (Addendum #6): under active weather the recompute writes
 /// `floor(255·(1−bcc))` over the five body colour alpha bytes (sun disc, sun glare, white-moon
 /// disc, moon glare, moon02) — gated `bcc > 0`, so clear weather leaves the per-frame broadcast
@@ -281,7 +307,22 @@ impl FlareGate<'_, '_> {
     /// The slewed `[0, 1]` flare envelope along `dir` from the camera: slew target = `dn` (the
     /// body's dnCurve sample) × the horizon smoothstep × `occ1` (the body's cloud occlusion) ×
     /// the visible fraction of the body's quad (`half` = its angular half-size; the interior
-    /// claim zeroes it), approached at `rise`/[`FLARE_FALL`] per second.
+    /// claim zeroes it) and the **submersion fade** ([`submersion_glare_fade`]), all approached at
+    /// `rise`/[`FLARE_FALL`] per second.
+    ///
+    /// The fade is INSIDE the slew — one of the factors composed into the target, not a multiply on
+    /// the drawn alpha. `[glare+0x34]` is the per-frame target accumulator (reset to 1.0 at
+    /// `0x6cf499`); `0x6cf501`/`0x6cf504` multiply the fade into it, and the limiter first reads it
+    /// 158 bytes later at `0x6cf59b`, writing the envelope `[glare+0x30]` at `0x6cf5ea`. So
+    /// surfacing ramps the glare back in over the rise time rather than snapping.
+    ///
+    /// We shipped it the other way first, on the reasoning that a rate limiter should smooth
+    /// *visibility* and depth is not visibility. That reasoning was fine and the fact was against
+    /// it — wow-re's summary said the fade goes "into the glare alpha", which is the drawn byte
+    /// `[glare+0x1b]` and is not where it goes. Asked, and corrected at the bytes.
+    ///
+    /// It falls out that a deep camera (`fade == 0`) drives `base` to zero, which skips the terrain
+    /// ray march entirely — the reference's own `0x6cf58c` shortcut, for free.
     fn envelope(
         &mut self,
         cam_pos: Vec3,
@@ -291,7 +332,7 @@ impl FlareGate<'_, '_> {
         half: f32,
         rise: f32,
     ) -> f32 {
-        let base = dn * horizon_gate(dir) * occ1;
+        let base = dn * horizon_gate(dir) * occ1 * submersion_glare_fade(self.submerged.depth);
         let target = if base > 0.0 && self.camera_interior.0.is_none() {
             // Resident detailed terrain first; the coarse WDL surface everywhere else (it
             // covers the whole map, so it also plugs the ADT-ring-to-farclip gap).
@@ -645,6 +686,30 @@ pub(super) fn follow_stars(
     }
 }
 
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod glare_fade_tests {
+    use super::submersion_glare_fade;
+
+    /// The 10-yard linear ramp, and — the half that matters most — the exact identity when dry.
+    /// A dry camera reads `depth = 0`, so this multiplies every glare in the game by 1.0; if that
+    /// were ever not exact, the feature would be a global dimmer rather than an underwater one.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_glare_fades_linearly_over_ten_yards() {
+        assert_eq!(submersion_glare_fade(0.0), 1.0, "dry is the exact identity");
+        assert_eq!(submersion_glare_fade(5.0), 0.5);
+        assert_eq!(submersion_glare_fade(10.0), 0.0);
+        assert_eq!(submersion_glare_fade(200.0), 0.0, "clamped, never negative");
+        // Linear in between, and monotone all the way down.
+        let mut prev = 1.0;
+        for i in 1..=10 {
+            let f = submersion_glare_fade(i as f32);
+            assert!(f <= prev && f >= 0.0);
+            assert!((f - (1.0 - i as f32 * 0.1)).abs() < 1e-6);
+            prev = f;
+        }
+    }
+}
+
 #[cfg(test)]
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
@@ -668,6 +733,9 @@ mod tests {
         app.init_resource::<CameraInteriorClaim>();
         app.init_resource::<CloudCoverage>();
         app.init_resource::<DebugState>();
+        // Dry (depth 0) — this fixture is about the glare tracking the camera within one frame,
+        // and the submersion fade is the exact identity there, so it cannot perturb the assertion.
+        app.init_resource::<crate::liquid::SubmergedEye>();
         app.insert_resource(WowLighting {
             moon_dir_white: dir,
             moon_disc_scale: 1.0,
diff --git a/crates/benilla-world/src/world_point.rs b/crates/benilla-world/src/world_point.rs
index 1acac75e..b9b59e21 100644
--- a/crates/benilla-world/src/world_point.rs
+++ b/crates/benilla-world/src/world_point.rs
@@ -94,6 +94,7 @@ pub struct WorldPoint<'w, 's> {
 /// else answers.
 pub fn init_world_point_resources(world: &mut bevy::prelude::World) {
     world.init_resource::<Underwater>();
+    world.init_resource::<crate::liquid::SubmergedEye>();
     world.init_resource::<PlayerWmoRoom>();
     world.init_resource::<CameraInteriorClaim>();
     world.init_resource::<bevy::prelude::Assets<benilla_assets::WmoModel>>();