# Reconvene & the Paper Trail

> Why a finished board is reconvened, not continued — how Round N+1 opens from the delivered call plus what changed, and how the chain of rounds becomes a decision's paper trail.

**Canonical URL:** https://www.synthboard.ai/docs/reconvene
**Markdown source:** https://www.synthboard.ai/docs/reconvene.md

## Why not just keep chatting?

When a board terminates, it has delivered a call: a verdict, a confidence level, the conditions that would flip it, and the strongest dissent. Appending "one more message" to that board would quietly mutate a delivered decision — you would lose what the board actually said at the time it said it.

Reconvening keeps the record honest. Round N stays exactly as delivered; Round N+1 is a new linked session that opens *from* the delivered call plus what changed since.

## How a reconvene runs

1. **Open from the call.** The new round starts with Round N's verdict, its flip conditions, and its dissent on the table — nothing is re-litigated from scratch.
2. **State what changed.** You tell the board what is different: a result came in, a competitor moved, a number shifted, a deadline passed.
3. **Re-brief and run.** The change re-briefs the board — the same or an adjusted bench — and the round runs to its own memo, linked to its parent.

Flip conditions are the trigger list: every decision memo names the conditions that would flip the call. When one of them happens in the real world, that is your cue to reconvene — the board pre-committed to caring about it.

## The paper trail

Because each round is its own session with its own memo, a decision you revisit three times leaves four linked records: the original call and every revision, each stamped with what was known and what changed.

- Each round's memo is preserved exactly as delivered.
- Rounds link parent to child, so the chain reads in order.
- Outcomes you record later attach to the round that made the call — the board learns from how its calls played out.

## Where you reconvene from

- **The memo page** — reconvene directly from the delivered verdict.
- **The dashboard** — decided sessions carry a reconvene action on their cards.
- **The API and MCP** — the `synthboard.session.reconvene` tool opens Round N+1 headlessly; a `session.continue` call against a current-engine board redirects here by design. See https://www.synthboard.ai/docs/changelog for the wire contract.

Consults are different on purpose: a Consult is a conversation with one named expert, so follow-ups simply continue the conversation, billed per turn. Reconvene is a board concept — it exists to protect delivered board decisions.

## Grounded rounds compound

When a round runs grounded, what it learns writes back to your World Model (https://www.synthboard.ai/docs/world-model). By the time you reconvene, the board already knows the context the last round established — so Round N+1 spends its effort on what changed, not on catching up.