diff --git a/internal/check-packet-render.mjs b/internal/check-packet-render.mjs
index 432099abd..5aa962774 100644
--- a/internal/check-packet-render.mjs
+++ b/internal/check-packet-render.mjs
@@ -247,6 +247,19 @@ const r = await page.evaluate(() => {
     prayBoxes: document.querySelectorAll('.pray-box').length,
     funnelTip: document.querySelectorAll('.funnel-tip').length,
     lifeShaded: document.querySelectorAll('.lc-grid .lc-reached').length,
+    // ★ THE SHADED CELLS' VERTICAL SPREAD, as a fraction of the grid's own height. A COUNT cannot tell a
+    // scatter from a bar — 32 shaded is 32 shaded whether they are spread through a life or stacked in
+    // row 1 — so this measures the SHAPE, which is the thing the page is actually claiming.
+    lifeSpread: (() => {
+      const grid = document.querySelector('.sheet-christian .lc-grid')
+      if (!grid) return null
+      const on = [...grid.querySelectorAll('.lc-reached')]
+      if (on.length < 2) return null
+      const gb = grid.getBoundingClientRect()
+      if (!(gb.height > 0)) return null
+      const tops = on.map((el) => el.getBoundingClientRect().top)
+      return (Math.max(...tops) - Math.min(...tops)) / gb.height
+    })(),
     funnelEq: document.querySelectorAll('.funnel-eq').length,
     funnelSteps: document.querySelectorAll('.funnel-mine').length,
     // ★ MEASURED SO THE GATE CAN REPORT WHAT IT ASSERTED. rega: "the gate prints no funnel line, even
@@ -672,6 +685,18 @@ if (r.lifeSheets) {
       + `but rendered ${perGrid} — the grid changed size, so the page no longer shows a human life`)
   }
 }
+// ⚠ AND THE SHADE MUST BE SCATTERED, NOT STACKED — the assertion that would have caught what three gates
+// and a passing suite did not. rega's contact sheet (2026-09-28) showed page 3 reading as ONE SOLID BAR:
+// 32 contiguous cells fill most of row 1 of 52, so the page said "a big green block" where the Driver's
+// intent is "32 boxes lost in 5,200". Every assertion passed, because they all measured the COUNT.
+// Half the grid height is a deliberately loose floor: a genuine scatter of even a few cells spans most of
+// the page (measured: 32 cells over 26 rows, 95% of the height), and a bar spans ~1%. Anything in between
+// is worth a human look.
+if (r.christianSheets && r.lifeSpread !== null && r.lifeSpread !== undefined && r.lifeSpread < 0.5) {
+  fails.push(`the christian-share page's shaded cells span only ${(r.lifeSpread * 100).toFixed(0)}% of the `
+    + 'grid height — they are stacked, not scattered, so the page reads as a bar rather than as rare marks '
+    + 'in a whole life. Shade by a deterministic scatter, not a contiguous run.')
+}
 // ★ THE SHADED SHARE MUST BE NON-ZERO AND NOT EVERYTHING. 0 shaded means the percentage never
 // reached the page (a null christian-share file renders the page with an empty grid, which reads as
 // "nobody is reached" — a false claim rather than missing data); 5,200 means the maths inverted.
diff --git a/library/packet/packet-render.js b/library/packet/packet-render.js
index 44daef2cc..af29796da 100644
--- a/library/packet/packet-render.js
+++ b/library/packet/packet-render.js
@@ -518,14 +518,49 @@ export function createPacketRenderer({ strings, lang = 'en', fontData = null })
   // ★ 5,200 IS NOT ROUNDED OR CHOSEN FOR LAYOUT: 100 years x 52 weeks, the Driver's own numbers
   // ("a 100 year life in weeks"). Everything else here is derived from it, so the two pages cannot
   // drift apart into two grids that merely look alike.
-  function lifeGrid({ shaded = 0, shadeClass = 'lc-on' } = {}) {
+  function lifeGrid({ shaded = 0, shadeClass = 'lc-on', seed = '' } = {}) {
     const YEARS = 100, WEEKS = 52, TOTAL = YEARS * WEEKS;
     const n = Math.max(0, Math.min(TOTAL, Math.round(Number(shaded) || 0)));
-    // Row-major, so the shaded run reads as a contiguous block from the top — a scattered
-    // shading of the same COUNT would be honest arithmetic and an unreadable picture.
+
+    // ⚠ SCATTERED, NOT STACKED — and the comment that used to sit here said the opposite. It read:
+    // "Row-major, so the shaded run reads as a contiguous block from the top — a scattered shading of the
+    // same COUNT would be honest arithmetic and an unreadable picture." That was reasoning about a picture
+    // I had never looked at, and it was exactly backwards.
+    // ★ WHAT THE RENDER ACTUALLY SHOWED (rega's contact sheet, 2026-09-28): 32 contiguous cells fill most
+    // of row 1 of 52, so the page reads as ONE SOLID GREEN BAR across the header — the ordinary chart the
+    // whole life-grid idea exists to avoid. The Driver's intent is "32 boxes lost in 5,200"; rarity is the
+    // message, and a bar cannot say it. Scattering makes the eye hunt for them, which IS the point.
+    // ⚠ AND NO GATE COULD SEE IT. check-packet-render asserts the shaded COUNT is strictly between 0 and
+    // 5,200 — true of a scatter and equally true of a bar. A count cannot distinguish a distribution.
+    //
+    // DETERMINISTIC, NEVER Math.random(): the same packet must print identically every time, or two copies
+    // of one zone disagree and neither is reproducible. A 32-bit FNV-1a hash of the seed (the zone id) feeds
+    // a mulberry32 PRNG, so the pattern is stable per zone and DIFFERENT between zones — which also avoids
+    // every packet in a print run carrying the same constellation.
+    let h = 2166136261;
+    for (let i = 0; i < String(seed).length; i++) {
+      h ^= String(seed).charCodeAt(i); h = Math.imul(h, 16777619);
+    }
+    const rand = () => {
+      h |= 0; h = (h + 0x6D2B79F5) | 0;
+      let t = Math.imul(h ^ (h >>> 15), 1 | h);
+      t = (t + Math.imul(t ^ (t >>> 7), 61 | t)) ^ t;
+      return ((t ^ (t >>> 14)) >>> 0) / 4294967296;
+    };
+    // Partial Fisher-Yates over the index space: pick n distinct cells without materialising a shuffle of
+    // all 5,200. Sparse by construction, so a large n degrades gracefully rather than clumping.
+    const picked = new Set();
+    const idx = [];
+    for (let i = 0; i < TOTAL; i++) idx.push(i);
+    for (let k = 0; k < n; k++) {
+      const j = k + Math.floor(rand() * (TOTAL - k));
+      const t = idx[k]; idx[k] = idx[j]; idx[j] = t;
+      picked.add(idx[k]);
+    }
+
     const cells = [];
     for (let i = 0; i < TOTAL; i++) {
-      cells.push(`<i class="lc-c${i < n ? ' ' + shadeClass : ''}"></i>`);
+      cells.push(`<i class="lc-c${picked.has(i) ? ' ' + shadeClass : ''}"></i>`);
     }
     return { TOTAL, YEARS, WEEKS, shadedCount: n, html: `<div class="lc-grid">${cells.join('')}</div>` };
   }
@@ -560,7 +595,7 @@ export function createPacketRenderer({ strings, lang = 'en', fontData = null })
   function christianPage(zone, christian) {
     if (!christian || !Number.isFinite(Number(christian.pctEvangelical))) return '';
     const pct = Number(christian.pctEvangelical);
-    const g = lifeGrid({ shaded: (pct / 100) * 5200, shadeClass: 'lc-reached' });
+    const g = lifeGrid({ shaded: (pct / 100) * 5200, shadeClass: 'lc-reached', seed: zone.id || zone.zoneKey || 'upg-100' });
     const lostPct = 100 - pct;
     // ⚠ TWO DECIMALS ON BOTH SIDES, not rounded above 10. The reached share is 0.61% and rounding the
       // other side to "99%" loses the asymmetry that is the whole point: 99.39 and 0.61 sum to 100, while