rpc-cost: the three findings the audit left standing

[Flotapponnier]

Bench 282 has been gated since 2026-09-30 with two blockers and a major that nothing had been done about. All three are the same shape: a value that was never stated, read as zero or one, producing a plausible wrong number that eighteen tests passed straight over.

1. block_age multiplied the whole weighted total

Chainstack's archive surcharge is triggered by how old a block is, not by which method asked, and several methods already carry the doubled figure in their own weight — debug_traceTransaction is listed at 2 RU and the empirical pass measured 2 RU even at tip-10. Multiplying again charged trace 3.6 RU against a real 2.0, an 80% overstatement.

The surcharge raises the floor rather than scaling the bill, so a method's archive weight is now max(listed weight, chain default x multiplier): a base read goes 1 to 2, a debug call already at 2 stays 2.

The indexer profile is deliberately unchanged at 2.0 — every method in it is 1 RU, so the old multiplier reached the same answer there. A fix that moved that number would be over-reaching, and there is a test pinning it.

2. The dedicated cohort could not be billed for requests

needed = 0 for all 37 plans, so the overage and max_units branches were unreachable. AWS AMB read $97.82 at every volume against a real 1B bill of $3,097.82, and led every Dedicated cell on it.

Root cause: included_units: null means two opposite things in this cohort. GetBlock's node serves unlimited requests for its monthly fee; AWS AMB includes none and bills every request on top. Both write null.

The plan's own overage rate disambiguates, so that decides rather than the cohort: 4 of 37 meter (AMB in three regions, Shyft legacy-scale), 33 stay flat with their allowance read as unlimited rather than zero. Zeeve's published ceilings now bind too.

3. An unstated capability was read as a granted one

archive: null and trace: null passed both gates, because one tested for the string "false" and the other for a non-nil pointer. 27 of the 106 usage plans are null on each field, and NOWNodes won trace cells on a capability it makes no claim about.

Now not ranked, and the reason distinguishes the two cases: "does not serve" is the provider's statement, "not published" is a gap in this catalogue, and only the second is supportable for a null. 13 providers carry an explicit trace: true, so the cells keep a field — 20, 19 and 13 eligible plans at the three volumes.

Three published winners move

Two of them exactly as the audit predicted by hand, before any of this was written:

cell	now	was
trace @ 10M	chainstack $49	drpc $60
trace @ 100M	chainstack $499	nownodes $567.75
trace @ 1B	drpc $6,000	nownodes $5,677.50 (unstated trace)
indexer @ 1B	onfinality $3,624

Verified by discrimination, not by passing

Six tests, R5 to R7 from the audit's list. With the fixes reverted, four of the five model tests fail and R6 fails, while TestFlatDedicatedPlanStaysFlat passes both ways — which is exactly what it is for, since the 33 flat plans worked before via needed = 0 and must keep working.

The bench stays gated

Remaining audit items: the circular R1-R4 in the checks plugin, the units and free-allowance columns rendering on 4 of 90 views, and the free tier panel — which is the next piece, and the reason this PR exists first.

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