Magical gene / spots and rings

Duskwing Bands

Two curved bands sweeping round the barrel one inside the other, like the bands on a moth's wing. A third allele carries the same marking worked in greys instead of white - dark where the pale form is light, and the same number of steps.

What it can come out as

Outcome	Carrying
Duskwing Bands	`Dwb/Dwb` · `Dwb/Dwc` · `Dwb/n` · `Dwb/Dwk`
Duskwing Bands, black	`Dwk/Dwk` · `Dwk/Dwc` · `Dwk/n`
Duskwing Bands, coloured	`Dwc/Dwc`
Wild type	`Dwc/n` · `n/n`

How each one is actually drawn - region by region, and the layers it is built from - is on the coding tab.

Crossing two of them

Finding one

About 1 in 1,786 wild horses is born showing this. That is the whole of the supply: catch one, or make one with the carrot below. Breeds set their own pools and a breed built around this gene will carry it far more often than the wild population does.

Wild pair	Shows as	How often
`Dwb/Dwb`	Duskwing Bands	0.002% — 1 in 50,000
`Dwb/Dwk`	Duskwing Bands	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`Dwb/Dwc`	Duskwing Bands	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`Dwb/n`	Duskwing Bands	0.038% — 1 in 2,632
`Dwk/Dwk`	Duskwing Bands, black	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`Dwk/Dwc`	Duskwing Bands, black	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`Dwk/n`	Duskwing Bands, black	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`Dwc/Dwc`	Duskwing Bands, coloured	0.0027% — 1 in 37,495
`n/n`	Wild type	99.944%

Its gene carrot

The file

common/src/main/resources/horsegenetics/genes/duskwing_bands.json — a data-driven gene, not a Java class. It is listed in the index.json beside it and registered by Genes' class initialiser at startup.

Key	`horsegenetics.duskwing_bands`
Phase	magical — it adds signed colour in phase 3, after the pigment has resolved
Priority	314 — where it sits in the one `(priority, key)` paint order
Alleles	`Dwb` · `Dwk` · `Dwc` · `n`
Varies per horse	8 values drawn once off the expressing allele copy, so a foal that inherits the copy inherits the look
Built from	TOWARD, WAVES

Why it is built this way

Imported from the magic-gene intake, 2026-09-08. The source drew the two bands as RINGS at explicit centres with an arc range; this build has no centred-ring mask, so each band is a narrow WAVES band on a wavelength longer than the barrel - which gives one long curve across the flank rather than a closed circle. The look is close and the mechanism is not the same.

The black allele is the white one with the light taken out of it, and it sits one rung under white in the dominance series - so every combination that existed before it keeps the outcome it had, and only the pairs carrying Dwk are new. The re-toning is a mapping rather than a repaint: every achromatic target moves into the dark end of the scale keeping its order and its spacing, and every SATURATED one is left alone, because that colour is the gene rather than its lightness.

What it paints

Each outcome, described the way the gene file describes it, and then the layers that draw it in the order they are painted. The prose is the part a reader checks a bake against; the list underneath is what the engine actually did.

Duskwing Bands

Two arcs of pale cream across the flank, curved rather than straight because each one is a band on a long sine rather than a level line. The inner band sits lower and runs thicker; between and around them the coat is untouched, which is what makes it read as a wing rather than as a blanket.

the outer band sweeping round the barrel — WAVES, painted with TOWARD
the inner band, thicker and tighter in — WAVES, painted with TOWARD

Duskwing Bands, black

The same marking as the white form with the light taken out of it: a single near-black tone.

the outer band sweeping round the barrel — WAVES, painted with TOWARD
the inner band, thicker and tighter in — WAVES, painted with TOWARD

Duskwing Bands, coloured

The same two arcs in a colour the line carries. Fully recessive.

the outer band sweeping round the barrel — WAVES, painted with TOWARD
the inner band, thicker and tighter in — WAVES, painted with TOWARD

Wild type

No bands.

Paints nothing.