War-game a knowledge base cutover before redirects, ownership, and search rankings harden into how every agent and customer finds answers.
Knowledge base cutovers fail when old URLs 404 without a mapped replacement, when "migrated" articles still quote retired product names, when search ranking drops the day the old domain dies, and when support macros still link into the graveyard. A neat content inventory spreadsheet is not evidence.
What must be frozen
State the cutover date, the redirect map coverage target, who owns each article family after launch, the rollback trigger if search or ticket volume breaks, and the success metric for week one. Attach the inventory of high-traffic URLs, the redirect test plan, the macro and in-product link audit, and the kill criteria if any top article lacks an owner. If support, product marketing, and docs disagree on which articles must survive day one, reconcile before seating.
Name the decision you will make if the war game finds nothing new, and the hold criteria if any top-traffic URL still lacks a verified redirect or a living owner.
Failure modes
- Redirect gaps: high-traffic paths that land on a generic homepage or a 404.
- Stale truth: articles that still describe retired pricing, features, or owners.
- Search cliff: ranking and internal search that cannot find the new homes.
- Macro bleed: support replies that still paste old links after cutover.
- Ownership blur: article families with no named editor after launch week.
Optional counsel seat if regulated claims or privacy notices live in the library. Optional SEO or growth seat if organic traffic funds acquisition.
Run it
Feed Pingpong the cutover plan, redirect sample, and open risk list. Early passes steelman the migration. Later passes attack from support, docs, product marketing, SEO, and skeptic seats. End with a pass that turns surviving objections into a tighter redirect map, a phased cutover, or a hold. Delete invented "everything is already mirrored" claims and dual-counted rewrite hours.
Ask support and docs seats to price the first week of tickets under the proposed cutover. If day-one language promises zero broken links while the redirect test still shows gaps, customers will treat every 404 as a product failure. Write the intended coverage bar, the owners, and the articles you will refuse to leave orphaned, then attack whether trust still holds under that discipline.
Force a day-after narrative: what happens if a partner bookmarks the old domain, if Google still ranks a retired article, or if an agent pastes a dead link into a priority ticket. If those stories are stronger than your mitigation plan, fix the package before you flip it. Related: war-game a docs overhaul, stress-test a support macros overhaul, stress-test a migration plan, pretend you are the support agent, and the war-game decisions hub. Process: how to run a Pingpong.