Relating Scenarios

Scenario Relationships covers the three axes Scenarios can relate along — Nested, Chained, and Cross-cutting. This page covers the controls in the editor that set them: the Parent and Uses feature pickers in the Relationships section, and a Condition’s Grounding choice down in the path. All of them live on the same editor described in Writing a Scenario.

Parent (nesting)

Use the Parent picker to search for and select another Scenario describing the same fact at a coarser boundary. A child’s place must be the same vantage as the parent’s or one step deeper — Product → Client → Service — so a Product-vantage Scenario never appears as a nested child. Clear the picker from the same control to remove the relationship. A Scenario with a parent renders indented under it in Explore, and drops out of top-level lists while the Nested display axis is on.

Uses feature (cross-cutting)

Use the Uses feature picker to attach one or more shared cross-cutting Features — rate limiting or audit logging are typical examples — that this Scenario relies on. Selected Features show as removable chips; click Add to search for more. The Feature’s own Scenario renders inline wherever it’s declared, without duplicating its signature into every Scenario that uses it.

Grounding (chaining)

Every Condition is grounded one of two ways. Own evidence is the default: you attach the artifacts yourself. Switch it to Chain from result to have the step inherit its evidence from another Scenario’s Result — pick the producing Scenario, then one of its Results. The step shows as Chained once linked; switching back to Own evidence detaches it.

Use chaining when one Scenario’s Result is literally the parameter another Scenario consumes, rather than just a similar fact at a different layer — that’s what Parent is for. A chained link is a direct reference to the other Scenario’s Result row, so it stays correct even if either Scenario is later edited or its path reordered.

Writing the other outcome

A Scenario carries one execution path, so a fork is written as a second Scenario that chains from the Result where the paths diverge. When the editor spots a fork stated inline — a conditional inside one step’s text, or a Result naming both sides of an outcome — it offers an add outcome action that creates that sibling for you, chained from the right Result and sharing whichever opening steps you select.