The Ward is played in the moment (rules rev 31)

'When a player picks up one of your treasures, you may play at that
time (out of turn) this card on him' — the owner read the card and is
right: no arming ahead. When a treasure whose owner holds WARD is
grabbed, the grab hangs (new wardPending phase, outranking all other
input) and the owner alone answers: spring it (3 damage, card spent)
or let them go (card kept, silence). Automatons always spring it on a
thief of their gold. The arming mechanic is refused at rev 31 and its
button hidden; rev 3-30 games keep their armed wards and rev 1-2 keep
the automatic spring, replaying unchanged. The window does reveal that
the owner holds SOMETHING - as it would at any real table when the
room turns to look at them.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_0138A8CjeQRpvzKxuMfz1Bqc

packages/engine/src/view.ts

@@ -84,6 +84,8 @@ export interface GameView {
   chaosPending: { casterId: PlayerId; queue: PlayerId[] } | null;
   /** Whether YOUR ward is set to spring. */
   yourWardArmed: boolean;
+  /** A grab hangs while the treasure's owner decides their Ward (rev 31). */
+  wardPending: { ownerId: PlayerId; takerId: PlayerId } | null;
   /** YOUR armed ambushes. Other players' ambushes are invisible. */
   yourAmbushes: AmbushState[];
   /** Once the game is finished, every hand goes face-up on the table. */
@@ -168,6 +170,7 @@ export function viewFor(state: GameState, playerId: PlayerId): GameView {
       ? { casterId: state.chaosPending.casterId, queue: [...state.chaosPending.queue] }
       : null,
     yourWardArmed: state.wardArmed.includes(playerId),
+    wardPending: state.wardPending ? { ...state.wardPending } : null,
     yourAmbushes: state.ambushes
       .filter((a) => a.ownerId === playerId)
       .map((a) => ({ ...a, numbers: [...a.numbers] })),