The state in which all participants are tracking the same shared reality without having to explicitly negotiate it. When coherence is high, both players are in the same scene — operating within the same facts, the same emotional register, the same relationship dynamics — without needing to stop and confirm. Coherence is not agreement. Two characters can disagree violently and be perfectly coherent — they just occupy different positions within the same world.
Coherence is not planned. It emerges from the accumulation of clearly sent and accurately received signals. Every accepted offer, every honest signal, every simple choice that downloads without friction — each one adds to the coherence of the shared state.
How you feel coherence: The scene flows. Your partner's responses make sense. You don't have to guess what they think is happening. There's a felt sense of alignment — not because you discussed it, but because the signals have been clear enough that both of you built the same picture independently.
How you feel its absence: Confusion. Your offer lands wrong. Your partner reacts to something you didn't intend. You're in a boat; they're in a car. The audience senses that something is off even if they can't name it. This is fracture — the breakdown of coherence.
Coherence is a spectrum, not a switch, and it fluctuates beat to beat. You can be coherent on facts but incoherent on emotional register. You can drift apart slowly and re-cohere with a single clear offer. The work of maintaining coherence is ongoing — you are constantly re-aligning, not holding a fixed state.
Coherence requires relational meaning. Because meaning lives between minds, coherence is a property of the connection, not of individual performance. One player can be inventive, skilled, and fully committed and still be incoherent with their partner. Coherence cannot be a solo achievement. It is a property of the connection, measured between players, never within one.
Coherence is one of three systemic health indicators (alongside cumulative state and mutual recognition). It is the indicator that most directly measures whether the principles are working — because every principle, in its own way, serves the maintenance of coherent shared reality.