Stage 17: path-conditional CI behind an aggregate gate + connector liveness probe; Grafana move-duration panel

- #10 a `changes` job path-filters unit/integration/ui; an always-running `gate` job aggregates them (success-or-skipped) and becomes the only required check
- #9 deploy adds a Telegram-connector liveness probe (docker inspect: running, not restarting, stable restart count) with a VPN-handshake grace period
- #1a Game-domain dashboard gains a 'Move think-time by phase (p50/p95)' panel
- deploy README: branch protection now requires only CI / gate

deploy/README.md

@@ -110,5 +110,8 @@ resolves both `otelcol` and `api.telegram.org`. `GATEWAY_ADMIN_*` is intentional
 - **Host caddy** route `<domain> → scrabble:80` (the in-compose caddy serves HTTP
   in the test contour; the host caddy terminates TLS). Not needed on prod, where the
   contour caddy owns TLS (set `CADDY_SITE_ADDRESS` to the domain).
-- **Branch protection** required-status-check names are `CI / unit`,
-  `CI / integration`, `CI / ui` (see [`../CLAUDE.md`](../CLAUDE.md) "Branching & CI").
+- **Branch protection** requires the single status check `CI / gate` (Stage 17).
+  The `unit` / `integration` / `ui` jobs are path-conditional (they skip when their
+  code did not change), and the always-running `gate` job aggregates them (passing
+  when each succeeded or was skipped), so a skipped job never blocks a merge. See
+  [`../CLAUDE.md`](../CLAUDE.md) "Branching & CI".