# E-024 — An accepted performance debt blocked starting the next round

- Status: confirmed transition limitation, fixed with an explicit, auditable acceptance.

## Hierarchy and trajectory

Phase 1 calibration correctly preserved a `fail` latency result, but the product was authorized for a fail-open pilot. When attempting to open the next evidence round, `next-round` rejected the active baseline because the calibration contract had been registered after its baseline.

## Expected and actual behavior

The transition was not supposed to happen implicitly or rewrite the failed result. However, requiring exclusively a `pass` close to re-anchor turned an explicitly accepted debt into a permanent block for all subsequent work.

## Correction and evidence

`oguard accept-baseline --reason --actor` requires a clean tree and an existing `round-end`. It archives the previous baseline, preserves the prior status, and adds `baseline-accepted` with a reason and an actor. Only then can a normal transition open the next round. The regression covers a missing actor, preservation of the acceptance, and the subsequent transition.

## Impact on the thesis

The exception does not improve calibration or turn failed latency into success. It makes a necessary distinction visible: a signal can block promotion without necessarily blocking pilot observation or subsequent learning.

## Follow-up

Review the frozen latency result before promoting Phase 1. The acceptance cannot be used to ignore future check blocks, nor to retroactively modify a round with a pending diff.