Small Clarification on Trait Use

[Shreyas Sampat]

I'm reading on Traits now, and I'm a little confused; the rules that govern them are a bit difficult to locate. I'm posting a little synopsis below; is this all correct?

[*]You can use a Trait once for free.
[*]You can refresh one Trait by having a scene in your protagonist's Personal Set.
[*]You can spend fanmail to use a previously-used Trait.[/list:u]I'm also wondering, the mechanics for the two ways to reuse Traits are different. Is this deliberate?

[Matt Wilson]

Shreyas:

Didn't I mail your book an hour ago? You sure got it fast.

On to your questions...

First, a trait can be used a number of times per episode equal to the protagonist's current screen presence. It's on page 12.

Second, yes you are absolutely correct about refreshing a trait. If I were able to write clearly, it would specifically say that you can refresh one free use of a trait. So if your screen presence is 2, and you use a trait twice and then have a scene on the protag's personal set, you get an additional use of that trait. How come I can say it now?

Third, that bit about fan mail being used to roll traits that have been spent (also on p. 12 if I'm not mistaken) is another example of my quality writing at work. It's just plain old extra dice. In that paragraph I'm trying to say that if you wanted a used-up trait to apply to a conflict, you could spend fan mail and describe it as the trait, but you don't have to do that.

Hope that helps. And thanks for the feedback.