Chams: working alpha via RenderView blend and a custom VMT

Testing on :99 showed the material $alpha path is a dead end: UnlitGeneric
takes translucency from the base texture/vertex alpha, and the debug materials
have neither. Follow Amalgam: apply alpha with IVRenderView::SetBlend
(VEngineRenderView014 slot 4) around the model draw, saving/restoring it.

To have something translucent to blend, write a tiny UnlitGeneric VMT with
$model 1 + $translucent 1 + a white base texture to
<game>/<mod>/materials/hl2hake/translucent.vmt (plus a custom/ copy). It is
written by a preload constructor so it exists before the material system scans
its search paths, then loaded once with FindMaterial. Styles 0/3/4/6 use it
when the colour alpha is below 255.

Also:
- Visible wireframe + through-wall: fill the visible silhouette first so the
  through-wall pass cannot show in the wireframe gaps, then draw a brightened
  contour. Style 6 is now "Solid + contour" (recolour + visible edges).
- find_modules builds local snapshots and publishes them under a mutex; the
  setup thread and the server retry could reset the shared vectors live and
  crash at startup.

Verified on :99: Solid + alpha 64 renders a see-through viewmodel, Solid +
contour shows a blue fill with bright blue contours, Additive is a translucent
coloured glow and Fullbright is a white additive glow.

1 files changed, 31 insertions, 15 deletions

diff --git a/CONTEXT.md b/CONTEXT.md
index 5b96c33..1e860bf 100644
--- a/CONTEXT.md
+++ b/CONTEXT.md
@@ -27,7 +27,10 @@ covers ESP, aimbot, triggerbot and silent aim.
 ## Runtime architecture
 
 - Modules from `/proc/self/maps`: `client.so`, `engine.so`, `server.so`.
-  PROT_NONE ranges excluded; file-backed bss tails merged.
+  PROT_NONE ranges excluded; file-backed bss tails merged. The scan builds
+  local Module snapshots and publishes them under a mutex, because the setup
+  thread and the server-netvar retry can call it concurrently (resetting the
+  shared vectors live used to crash at startup).
 - Calling convention: cdecl (i386); `this` is the first stack argument.
 - Hooks (copy-and-swap vtable, 256 slots):
   - `CHLClient` slot 21 `CreateMove`; slot 35 `FrameStageNotify`.
@@ -294,30 +297,43 @@ vocabulary / decisions.
   alpha only. The through-wall pass uses `MATERIAL_VAR_IGNOREZ` (1 << 15)
   through `IMaterial::SetMaterialVarFlag` (slot 29); colours use
   `$color`/`$color2` (IMaterialVar slot 11, SetVecValue 3-float slot 11) and
-  `ColorModulate` (slot 28). `$alpha` is set through IMaterialVar slot 3
-  (SetFloatValue). Shared materials are restored after each draw.
+  `ColorModulate` (slot 28). Alpha is applied with
+  `IVRenderView::SetBlend` (`VEngineRenderView014` slot 4, saved/restored
+  around the passes) — model draws take their final alpha from the render
+  view, not from material `$alpha`. `$alpha`/`AlphaModulate` are still set for
+  completeness. Shared materials are restored after each draw.
 - The GUI colour picker (`add_color_alpha`) has an alpha bar, checkerboard
   preview and `#RRGGBBAA` readout; plain `add_color` keeps the old opaque
   three-component behaviour. Chams colours are four ints (r, g, b, a).
-- **Alpha is stored but has no visual effect yet.** The usable model
-  materials are opaque: `debug/debugtranslucentsinglecolor` has no
-  `$translucent`, and toggling `MATERIAL_VAR_TRANSLUCENT` (1 << 21) or
-  rebuilding the state snapshot does not change the static shader combo.
-  `debug/debugtranslucentvertexcolor`/`debug/debughitbox` are translucent but
-  need vertex colours and render nothing on skinned models. A custom VMT with
-  `$model 1` + `$translucent 1` (or a white basetexture) is needed to make the
-  alpha control real.
+- Alpha needs a translucent model material, so the mod writes a tiny VMT:
+  `<game>/<mod>/materials/hl2hake/translucent.vmt` (and a copy under
+  `custom/hl2hake/...`): `UnlitGeneric` with `$basetexture sprites/white`,
+  `$color`, `$model 1`, `$translucent 1`, `$nocull 1`. It is written from a
+  preload constructor (so it exists before the material system scans) and
+  loaded with `FindMaterial`; styles 0/3/4/6 switch to it when the colour
+  alpha is below 255. The base-game `debugtranslucentsinglecolor` has no
+  `$translucent` and cannot do alpha; `debugtranslucentvertexcolor` and
+  `debug/debughitbox` need vertex colours and draw nothing on skinned models.
 - Styles: 0 Flat (`debug/debugtranslucentsinglecolor` + FLAT), 1 Wireframe
-  (`debug/debugwireframe`), 2 Additive
+  (`debug/debugwireframe`, brightened tint), 2 Additive
   (`debug/debugtranslucentmodelhulls`, whose VMT has `$additive 1` + `$color`;
   the ADDITIVE flag on the solid material did nothing), 3 Solid, 4 White
   (solid, colour forced white), 5 Fullbright (the additive material, colour
-  forced white, giving a white-hot glow), 6 Glow outline (solid plus a
-  `debug/debugwireframe` contour pass drawn with ZNEARER (1 << 10) and a
-  brightened colour so the base cannot bury it).
+  forced white, giving a white-hot glow), 6 Solid + contour (solid fill plus
+  a `debug/debugwireframe` contour pass drawn with ZNEARER (1 << 10) and a
+  brightened colour, so the entity is recoloured while its edges stay
+  readable). Style 6 is the requested "recolour the whole entity but show its
+  contours" look.
   `vgui/white` is vertex-colour based and has no `$model`/`$basetexture`, so it
   is never used for chams; `models/debug/debugwhite` is EP2-only and the old
   VGUI additive material was invisible on NPCs.
+- Through-wall + visible wireframe: a wireframe visible pass leaves gaps, so
+  the through-wall fill showed inside the visible silhouette. When both passes
+  are on and the visible style is Wireframe, a solid fill of the visible
+  colour is drawn first, then the brightened wireframe contour. (The proper
+  alternative is stencil: visible writes stencil 1, through-wall tests
+  stencil == 0, as Amalgam does; the fill is simpler and gives the
+  solid+contour look.)
 - Style materials are preloaded from `outer_draw` (throttled) and cached; the
   render hook never calls FindMaterial itself. A missing style uses solid.
   `FindMaterial` can return an unreferenced material, so each cached material