diff --git a/docs/pfi/erp-dpo-stage-prep.md b/docs/pfi/erp-dpo-stage-prep.md
index 6f6b854..83c9d7e 100644
--- a/docs/pfi/erp-dpo-stage-prep.md
+++ b/docs/pfi/erp-dpo-stage-prep.md
@@ -129,12 +129,76 @@ length signal by exactly the ratio its clipping creates.** The shorter the clip,
 the more turns per token of budget, the harder it teaches the clip. Check the
 turn-share/word-share split of every root before assuming a mix is balanced.
 
-⚠ **The tune landed near PIPPA's MEDIAN (67), not its CAP (123).** If it were
-learning the clip as a boundary you would expect mass piling toward 123. It
-looks more like central tendency, which is a weaker and less alarming claim than
-"it learned the limit". Not demonstrated either way — the closing test is the
-tuned arm's own rp length distribution against PIPPA's and bluemoon's, looking
-for a shoulder near 123.
+### The output-side test ran. The clip hypothesis is FALSIFIED — and the truth is more interesting
+
+Measured on the live tuned seat, n=96 rp generations (brokkr-smithy-dev,
+2026-08-26). **There is no shoulder at 123:**
+
+       0-19    18  ██████████████████
+      20-39    22  ██████████████████████   <- MODE
+      40-59     5  █████                    <- trough
+      60-79    15  ███████████████          <- PIPPA median 67
+      80-99    10  ██████████
+     100-119    9  █████████
+     120-139     3  ███                     <- PIPPA CAP 123. Three. A trough.
+     140-159     5  █████
+     160-179     4  ████
+       300+      3  ███                      max 505
+
+    <=123  79/96 = 82.3%   (PIPPA itself: 100.0%)
+    median 62 · mean 77.9 · p90 152 · p99 367
+
+**The clip-as-boundary reading is dead.** Mass would pile *under* a learned wall;
+the 120-139 bin holds three of ninety-six and is a trough, and **17.7% of
+generations cross a cap PIPPA can never cross.**
+
+⚠ **A correction to this document's earlier read.** It compared the tuned *mean*
+(88.5) to PIPPA's *median* (67) and p90 (95) and concluded "central tendency,
+comfortably inside the upper body." **Median to median it is 62 against 67** — at
+or slightly below PIPPA's centre. Mixing statistics across a comparison produced
+a more reassuring answer than the data supports; the 88.5 was a mean dragged up
+by the tail.
+
+**What the data shows instead: the distribution is BIMODAL.** A mode at 20-39, a
+trough at 40-59, a second mode at 60-79 astride PIPPA's centre, then a long tail
+to 505. The base arm has no such shape (tuned mean/median ratio 1.45 and 1.23
+against the base's 1.09 and 1.14).
+
+So the tune did not change rp length so much as change its **shape** — replacing
+one symmetric distribution with a mixture. That is what you would expect from
+roots whose length distributions do not overlap (PIPPA 67, c2-logs 256, bluemoon
+601) being learned as **distinct modes rather than blended into an average**.
+
+⚠ **And the skew is rp-ONLY.** Story sits at mean/median 0.98 / 0.95 tuned
+against 0.98 / 1.00 base. The shape change appears exactly in the family the
+clipped root lives in — the strongest support the turn-share mechanism gets from
+the output side.
+
+**What this means for pair generation:** `chosen`/`rejected` sampled from a
+bimodal generator inherit the mixture, not a mean. Sampling naively will
+over-draw from the dominant short mode. If length is not the axis being tuned,
+control for it explicitly rather than assuming a representative sample.
+
+### ⚠ The degeneracy rate is NOT yet a usable baseline
+
+Same arm, same seed block, re-run:
+
+    scored       162/192 -> 163/192
+    degenerate      7    ->   11
+    truncated      23    ->   18
+    rp VOID        no    ->  YES
+
+Distance moved 0.003, well inside the 0.0125 floor, so the gate result is not
+threatened. But **degeneracy straddles the 10% budget**, so the same arm on the
+same seed VOIDs or does not depending on the run. **A guard whose trip point sits
+at the noise boundary flips**, and it produces disagreement between honest
+observers rather than silence — a distinct defect from a gate that cannot fail.
+
+The honest statement is that **the tuned arm's rp degeneracy is AT the budget**,
+not clearly over or under it. Replicates are being run to pin it. **Do not build
+DPO pairs on the single-sample figure** — the degeneracy rate decides how much of
+the tune's own output is usable as `chosen`, so it is load-bearing for pair
+generation and much cheaper to pin now than to discover after pairs exist.
 
 **Why this belongs in the DPO prep and not just the gate record:** preference
 pairs generated *from this tune* inherit its length distribution in both