You can find it here.

While I'll enjoy and appreciate any kind of feedback there are a couple specific things I'd like to hear back from anyone who reads it over. 

As you read the text do you have any difficulty understanding the intent of the rule or rules being presented?  I'd like to think I have a strong reason for every rule presented so far. 

I don't think I included anything just out of habit without strong consideration as to if that rule or system should be included in FH8.  So, if you see something in the text that makes you wonder if it should be there at all I'd like to hear about it.

As you read the text can you imagine the game that would spring forth from these rules?  I often find that I'm turned off to a game as I read it because I just can't imagine what's supposed to be going on in it.  I really don't want that to be an issue with FH8.

In fact, is there any point where you would wonder "What am I supposed to do here?"

FYI
If you're interested in my first thread on FH8 you can find it here.
If you're interested in what type of game FH8 is in Forge-speak (before reading the PDF) follow the link in my Sig.
Credit where credit is due;  I ripped off tons of good stuff from DitV and Trollbabe as I started work on FH8.  The influences are still quite apparent.

-Eric

Please, please re-format the .pdf without the SMALL-CAPS and, preferably, in a serif font. The opening text interested me, but I'm just not going to read that much text formatted that way without a very good reason - it's too hard on the eyes.

Thanks Jack.  I'm on it.  I blame the wifey.  She said that it looked good.  :D

Fix-ed.

-Eric

Hey, I'm liking this a lot so far.

One too-slow-brain question: regarding Hero/Villain, am I reading correctly in that you have one Hero Trait and one Villain trait?

Do they need to be named or defined in any way? (I'm thinking not)

If the answers are "yes" and "no" respectively, then I'm all good. If the answers are different from that, then I'm all confused and will have more questions.

Best,
Ron

Ha.  You got it Ron.  Yes there are two traits and no you don't need to define them.  But thanks for asking.  I could probably make that more clear in the text.  I kept writting Hero/Villain (or HV scale) while I was making my notes because I always knew in my head what it was.

As an aside, I've gotta say; Ya made me nervous, Ron.  When I saw that you'd posted to my thread I figured there were two possible reasons for you to post to a thread like this one.  Either you found the game interesting or you were about to go Moderator on my ass for some etiquette infraction. 

And I couldn't imagine that you'd be interested in FH8...  :D

-Eric

I concur with Ron, in that I really like the game thus far (but you knew that I have an interest in it from previous threads on it :).

My questions:

1) Re pain. The table gives three different pain indicators (low, medium, high), and then mild, severe or extreme consequences based on a numerical amount of pain. So... how does low/medium/high pain translate to a number?

2) Do I understand this right that the only way to earn tokens is through being a Setting Director?

3) Re bidding with currency. So, one side puts forward one coin. The other side puts forward two coins. Now side one needs three coins.
a) Is that three additional coins, or just raising their pile to three?
b) Does only the winner lose currency?

I apologize in advance if I missed the answers to these on my read-through.

Thanks for the questions Christian.

1)  Ha!  I forgot to bring that forward when I worked out the new versions of the charts.  Silly me, I'll have to scribble that in.  Low Pain = 1 point.  Medium Pain = 3 points.  High Pain = 5 points. 

2)  Yes, the only way for the Character Players to earn Currency is through the position of Setting Director.  (I assumed you meant Coins, not Tokens, which I think I only use 'tokens' for Conflict Resolution)

3)  Okies.  I knew that the write-up for that sucked, but I only got it from my brain into the compy a day or two before I brought it all to PagePlus.  Imagine, if you will, an Auction.  What you're buying is the right to get what you want at that moment.  You start the bidding at one Coin.  The oppsoing side has to beat your bid.  Then, you get the opportunity to beat their bid.  The winner of the Auction pays their coins and gets their way.  The looser of the Auction didn't get their way but still has coins for fucking with the other players later on.  Did that make sense?  I really need to work on clarifying that bit.

-Eric

Sure, that works, and that's how I thought it would...

I like that you have to earn coins not through character achievements, but through player creativity.

And I'm really not sure I'd still consider this a fantasy heartbreaker. It goes far beyond putting a few new ideas into an old casing.

Maybe it's time for a name change =)

Ha!  Yeah.  A name change.  I've been thinking of that a lot.  I think I really want to give the feeling of Hero Vs. Villain in it.  See, while there's only the one mechanism for the HV conflicts and discussion right now, I've got it in my head that I can spread the HV stuff to PI PrepWork and to Creating Setting. 

But, as for it not being a Fantasy Heartbreaker...

Well, technically all I've attacked on my own is the issue of intentionally creating setting and color.  The conflict system is pretty well torn from DitV and the episode prep work is very much taken from the Town rules in DitV and the episode rules from Trollbabe.  The currency comes from my weak understanding of Uni.  So, while I'm not re-packaging the works of 30 years past, I am re-packaging.

Not that I'm trying to rag on my own system.  :)  I don't think anyone else has package these goods in this order with this goal in mind yet.  I just like to acknowlege what it is as honestly as possible.

How many of the other games that were inspired by the Fantasy Heartbreaker essays are truly heartbreakers still?

-Eric

[edited for Hukd on Fonkis]

Fair enough. It doesn't really matter what it's "categorized" as, in any case. :)

One more thought: I understand that quick-create NPCs are all going to be the same, but is there a reason (PI power balance wise, maybe) that all NPCs are going on the same stats?

I assume you've been inspired by Dogs there, but Dogs does not need to worry about whether the PCs win every single conflict with ease. It doesn't need strong adversity. Is that true for FH8 as well?

Well, two reasons for the same-stat thing.  The first is PI power.  One of my design objectives is to keep the power of the PI to shape the story about on par with any of the other players.  I don't think that having a different form of authority over the game needs to mean a different level of power.  The second is high-speed prep.  DitV is already pretty fast, but I'm looking at shaving a few minutes off of that time.  If all your NPC sheets are the same then all you need to do is fill in the text of the Advantages and decide if this character is worth of using some of your Coins to boost it up a bit.

Also;  It's my opinion that the interesting bits of NPCs will come from their Advantage text, not from how many points they get for each one.  That'll probably hold true for both the PI and the rest of the players.  So, I don't think anything is really lost by pre-defining the numbers.

Strong adversity...

*ponder*

I don't think that DitV or FH8 need strong adversity.  As both games are strong with Nar and making players make choices then it's not all about the adversity.  But, as Tony was able to point out with Capes, adversity does not overshadow Nar.  And more than once I've been dissapointed during a DitV conflict because I knew that the Dogs would win and I knew it would cost them very little.  A lot of that had to do with the fact that we weren't very strict with each other on how good our narration had to be.

I'm going with the idea that if the PCs win, it should be interesting.  If the PCs loose, it should also be interesting.  And when the PCs win against overwhelming odds the conflict has a little more resonance with the players.  So yeah, I'm expecting that, every so often the PI is gonna drop a hammer down on the PCs and bring out some kind of conflict that he really dosen't think they have any chance of winning.  But, if I know my players, then so long as there's some way to win the conflict they'll hang on tough.  They'll decide if it's worth the Pain to try and overcome.

Hell, I won't be surprised at all if my players cheer when I dump a bucket of Coins into a conflict.  Getting your ass whooped in this game should be pretty darned entertaining. 

-Eric

Edited To Summarize;

I don't think FH8 needs strong adversity, but the possiblity of strong adversity exists, by way of Coins.  And I do not believe that any strong adversity introduced by the PI will adversly affect play.

I've thrown together a quick character sheet.  You can find it by way of the link in my sig.

-Eric

I see now that the PI can spend coins to make stronger NPCs. Okay.

Is the PI also bound by the 3 coin per session earning limit?

*grabs a copy and flips it open*

Crap.  It does still say that players are limited to three coins per session.  I thought I'd dumped that rule. 

*ponder*

Yeah, I guess I never got from my discussion about it with Lisa back to the compy. 

Here's the lowdown on earning Coins.  Apparently this is all just in my head right now.

The PI has no limitations on earning Coins, but can only earn coins by way of the other players activating Twinings.  When the PI plays the SD he does not earn Coins for doing SD work.  *flipping through my copy*  I can't seem to find any of that in my current version.  I wonder if I lost it during the transfer from one format to another.  Ok, lemmie explain how the PI earns coins real quick;

During a conflict, when a PC's Twining is 'activated' by the player (meaning the player draws the card for a Twining) then the PI earns a single Coin.  If the Twining happens to be worth 4 or more cards to the player then the PI earns a second Coin for that particular activation.  This is the only way that the PI earns new coins.  The intent here is to create a system where the PI can earn the ability to shape the story through the NPCs when and only when he provides the players with the conflicts that they've requested. 

The other players may earn as many as 5 coins per scene.  That's one point each for introducing a new People, Place, or Things element that is not part of the base assumptions of the current setting and two points if, at the end of the scene, everyone agrees that the base assumptions were held up for everyone to see in a new & interesting way.

So, two points per scene for upholding the statis quo in an interesting way and up to three points per scene for introducing new elements that no one already assumed were there.  All five points accessable by playing the SD for the scene.

*grabs a highlighter to mark my playtest copy*

I'm so glad you asked me that question.  The relationship of the how the PI earns coins to how the PI spends them is so important to this design.  It wouldn't be the same without it.

-Eric

Great. I like that much better. It should also encourage the PI to work together with the players when they create their characters.

So you have streamlined it in that the currency remains the same from setting creation throughout the game, which is good. However, you do write about both "tokens" and "coins" in different places throughout, that might need some cleaning up to avoid confusion. (Players get coins in Preparation but put forward tokens in Altering and Negotiating.)

Dang.  Another missing item.  Check the last line of Prelude just above Preparation.  Then, skip to the end.  Under Advancement, second paragraph second line.  It hints at something I neglected to make explicit.

Before the beginning of an Episode it's use 'em or loose 'em time for Coins.  You'll be 'reset' to exactly five Coins for the beginning of the Episode, so you may as well use what you have left.  This means that the initial five you get in Creating Setting are also good for the Preludes but then are lost.

I'm just going to have to update the whole Currency section to include all these thoughts that I incorrectly thought were scattered around the rest of the text.

And thanks for the editing work in finding 'tokens' under Altering and Negotiating.  Obviously that bit's from before the Coins were connected.

-Eric

Hiya,

You might hate this, but ...

... I think it needs a setting. Or rather, some Explorative focus. I tend toward relationships and/or specific character types, personally, as you can tell from all my games. Others tend toward a neat combination of time & place, and still others toward "adventure type."

But something. Give it an imaginative identity; if people want to apply it to some other such identity because it "could" or because it "fits," they'll do it anyway.

Best,
Ron

Hate it?  No no.  I'd only hate it if you were saying that I needed to come up with a map and place names and a history for the setting and shit like that.  And I don't think that's what you're saying.

If I read you correctly, you're talking about setting elements like the relationship between humans and trolls that the Trollbabe has to deal with.  Or the relationship between Sorcerors and their Demons, right?  That kind of setting.

Tell ya' the truth, I think FH8 is halfway there.  And I totally stole it from Trollbabe.  Accidentally.  The relationship is that between the Heros and the Villains and where the PCs fall on that scale.  And, I don't remember if I posted this somewhere or if it's all just in my head right now, but I was considering earlier the idea of making the Episode and maybe the Creating Setting rules get in line with the HV thing.

For the Creating Setting mesh with HV I've only got a twinkle in my eye.  For Episodes + HV, I've got something a little stronger in mind.  I was considering setting it up so that when the PI is authoring the conflics he should always include a force that wants the PCs to be Heros and a force that wants the PCs to be Villains.

Is that what you're talking about Ron?

-Eric

Oh, close enough. I think I'd like to see the hint of Color suggested by the terms like Moon get developed into a more specific array of Exploration.

But yeah, you're on target about what I'm looking for.

Best,
Ron

Ron wrote: I think I'd like to see the hint of Color suggested by the terms like Moon get developed into a more specific array of Exploration.

GAhhh! No! It's your game.

OK, here's some help. You started with this as "my Fantasy Heartbreaker," right? And I'm assuming that in dog-eared notebooks or in the back of your mind, you have an old game notion that you always wanted to "do right" someday. Maybe it had kitty-people and an elaborate weapons-list with "Glaive-Guisarme" on it. Whatever.

Well, I'm suggesting (suggesting! not "saying") that you might mine all that imagery for the stuff that today seems most interesting, that you'd still like to play. Maybe a person with this set of imagery looks at his or her old notes of lizard-men with really cool colored-scale subraces and groans ... but hey, that notion of winter-magic that was tacked onto the Frost Giants was pretty cool, and the person feels some ownership over it and actually would like to see it in play somehow.

If so, then good. Find that stuff, isolate it, and never mind how you think others will judge it, make it the Explorative Center of this game. That's what Clinton did with the goblins for the Shadow of Yesterday, for instance. I don't know that the Moon/etc terminology is some vestige of your original ideas for the Perfect Fantasy RPG, but hey, it might be.

Again, I really hope you're not getting hot & bothered about the simple reality of me, personally, interacting with you about this game. Don't toss and turn at night over anything I'm talking about. It's OK to disagree with me and say, "Ballocks, I like it all generic like this."

Best,
Ron

Hot & bothered?  Nope, just trying to make sure I understand what you're saying 100%.  And I think I do.

I'd selected the Sun/Moon/Stars thing kind of on a flavor whim.  You'd like to see it tied into the focus of the game more.  Gotcha.  Yeah.  I guess I can admit that I did put something in FH8 that isn't tied down well;  the titles of the Auspices.  I can dig that.

I think there is an explorative focus in the game right now.  It's just not strong yet.  I'm going to make it stronger.  Not because you said so, but because your suggestion makes sense to me and I realize that it's what I want from the game.

I'm going to ask you to extend me a little more credit Ron.  You can fire off suggestions to me without coming off overbearing or with any threat of writing the game for me.  I've spent a lot of time lurking here at the Forge.  A lot of time absorbing the good things that has come out of it recently and a lot of time wincing at the n00b errors.  Some of them my own.  So, yeah, I leaned the lesson that I can't create a good game unless I create what I want to create.  I dig it.  I'm hip to the program.  But I'm still not quite on the same page as all the other big theory heads of the Forge so I'm occationally not going to understand exactly what you mean by things like "Explorative Center" and I'll need further explination.  Please feel free to send me in the direction of threads that explain what you mean or to give me examples.  I'm ready to learn more.

And now I'd like to ask a question about the Explorative Center of Trollbabe (I don't know SoY, so I can't relate) and how I see it's parallel in FH8.

In Trollbabe, the explorative center is the relationship between a mixed-race person and how they relate to being an outsider of both races while being part of both.  Is that right?  If not, I have to learn more.  If it is right, then I have more to say.

-Eric

Hiya,

In Trollbabe, the explorative center is the relationship between a mixed-race person and how they relate to being an outsider of both races while being part of both.  Is that right?  If not, I have to learn more.  If it is right, then I have more to say.

Oh, ok.  So Trollbabe is about women of power.  I can dig that.  I don't see it in the text, so I'm looking forward to that re-write you mention.

You're right, it doesn't stonewall me.  And I'm guessing that you have an idea where I'm going with this since you knew that. 

If Trollbabe is about women of power then there are a multitude of setting and situations where that issue can be expored.  The Trollbabe setting just happense to be one of them.

So if (I say 'if') FH8's explorative center is about Heros and Villains and what they're made of then a specific setting could certainly be made to guide the players down that path.  I could probably come up with something colorful too.  That's cool.  But I chose to step up on this one.  And I'm not ready to step down yet.  I say that I can have the strong explorative center without dictating the setting specifics.  I theorize that all I have to do is guide the players into creating Heros and Villains in the story and then talk about what it is that makes those characters Heros and Villains.  And the more the players are forced to talk about it the more that exploration occurrs.

-Eric

Eric,

I whiffed through the text really quick, mainly because I'm not gaming at all right now, so my chances of actually playing are pretty slim. I did come across one thing at the end that struck me and is sticking with me that I'd like to discuss:

the Pain and Consequence rules don’t allow for a character to die unless their player chooses to narrate that death. There are plenty of reasons for this design. The most important reason being that all the PCs are the central characters to our story. If they die then part of the story ends. That should be neither random nor meaningless.

I'm not really sure what you're saying Greyorm.

That the quote is redundant?  It might be.

That when a character dies during a meaningful scene then the death is automatically meaningful too?  I suppose that might be true.  But all I see happening there is turning a meaningful statement about the character into a final meaningful statement about the character.

Ok.  That's not true.

I see the meaningful statement being stronger.

Know what?  That line does suck.  I think that was one of those instances of the two gamers living in my head talking about character death.  I can do better than that.  I will do better than that. 

-Eric

These are playtest rules but did you write them specifically for playtesting or do you think a lot of the text is going to be in the final product. The reason why I am asking this is it seems that you are trying to write two texts in one. One text is rules and instructions for the very first time you sit down with some friends to play the game. The other text is the actual rules. It might be that I am a bit dumb but in some parts of the text it really confuses me. One thing I am confused about is the PI.
I am also confused about things like Prelude and Opening Scene, are Preludes played out for all characters before the Opening Scene? Does this happen every session?

After the prioritising, start writing out your
Advantages. If you want don’t assign them to an Auspice
yet. Just make up a half dozen or a dozen Advantages that
you think fit your character, then assign them to the
Auspice you think that’s most appropriate. You can assign
up to three points to a single Advantage, but you’ve got to
assign at least one point to any advantage that you leave
on your sheet. If, after you’ve written down a bunch of
Advantages you’d like to re-think your Auspice priorities,
that’s ok.

One person sitting at the table will take on the role of
the Primary Instigator for the night and the rest will be
Character Players.

If you’re in conflict with, about, or alongside a Twining
on your character sheet, let everyone know about it
before you draw the appropriate number of cards.

Hiya Lars,

Thanks for your questions and for taking the time to read through those playtest rules.  I know they seem pretty wonky right now but that's mostly because they're not even close to finished.  Most of those confusing bits that got to you are due to big holes I left in the text based on my assumptions as to where the players in my group would be able to read my mind.  :D

But, a few of those confusing places you've found are confusing because I'm planning to write this game with zero assumptions left in it when I'm done.  I want this game to be a step-by-step instruction manual for playing the game with no former knowlege of gaming required to play.  That's why there seem to be those two different sets of instructions right now;  The "sitting down to play tonight" rules and the rest of the rules.  It's my intention to eventually blend it all together with a "subsequent nights of play" section.

All the characters' preludes are indeed played out before the opening scene, but each character recieves one and only one prelude.  So, subsequent sessions won't have any more preludes unless there's a reason for a new PC to be introduced (new player to the game, previous PC killed off, etc)

The points that you can assign are equal to the value of the Auspice that the advantages are assigned to?

Does the twining affect the number of cards that you draw. Or is the "appropriate number of cards" just your H or V score.

Okies, I'm back.

Pain and Consequences
Why do the specific consequences take place when you get the different amounts of pain? What's your argument for changing your H/V score, Advantages, Twinings ? I can think of some arguments, but I think you need to put them in the rules because now the changes just take place with no real explanation of why.

Hey Eric, I realized that I didn't really throw any compliments your way. I think the game looks very interesting and I would really like to actually playtest it.

Yeah it makes sense. And I kinda knew that would be your reply, there are just some of the consequences that I don't find completely logical. I will read them again and get back to it.

Looking at your actual play thread with the lizards gave me a much better understanding of specifically how the SD and the PI work together.(and I will post a couple of questions in that thread as well)

I still don't quite understand the switching of the position of PI. This means that the one who was PI would have to make a PC to play. But what about the PC that the new PI has been playing. Does he become an NPC controlled by the PI. I think that could bring some problems.

Plus you wrote this at the end of the pdf

The CPs become connected to their PCs and the PI becomes connected to his favorite NPCs.

Advantages of the Sun show us how your character hurts people. It’s the Auspice of causing pain and suffering

Lars,

I'm really flattered that you'd like to playtest FH8 for me.  I think that would be fantastic.

The switching PI thing is so simple that it's crazy-complex.  An Episode is like a stand-alone story.  Once the Episode is done and this particular piece of story wrapped up then there's nothing really standing in the way of bringing in new characters and putting the previous PCs off to the side.  The shelved PCs aren't in the current Episode because they're just not part of this particular story.  They're not perminantly discarded, they're just 'off stage' for an extended period.  So, in a situation like that there's no reason why the PI from the previous Episode can't be a player in this one with a PC of their own.  And, come to think of it, there's no reason why a PI can't bring in their old PC, from when they were a player, and use that old PC as an NPC. 

Does that set off warning bells for you?  The ol' "GM brings in their favorite NPC or ex-PC to run the party with."-type bells?  Well, let me assure you, it's impossible for that particular bit of dysfunction to occurr with FH8.  The first element of FH8 that prevents this problem are the Episode prep and Good Stuff rules.  Or at least these will be the rules that prevent this problem once they're fleshed out proplerly.  No where in those rules does it say that the PI is supposed to create conflict then solve the conflict with an NPC.  What it does say is that the PI should use the NPCs to create conflict that the CPs and PCs are going to have to resolve.  The second bit is the GM NPC and currency rules.  No matter how kewl your PC was in the previous episode their numbers are reset to NPC-levels when they're used as an NPC. 

You want to bring in your UberKewl SuperSwashbuckler from the previous campaign?  That's dandy.  But you'll probably have to invest all sorts of Coins to make them as Uber as you remember them and then they're still going to be in the scenes just to cause trouble for the PCs, not to solve it for them.

So, in conclusion, the PI is encouraged to have favorite characters, just like everyone else.  And the system should prevent them from abusing that favoritism.

Plus you wrote this at the end of the pdf

The CPs become connected to their PCs and the PI becomes connected to his favorite NPCs.

which conveys to me that position of PI isn't switched, or at least not very often.

I did not really give the whole NPCs with fixed scores a thought. You are right(of course).  It is not such a big deal.

I will have to say that you are completely wrong about me only developing emotional ties with characters over long periods of time.

I totally agree with you that it is a matter of the character being fleshed out. This can be done by answering questions like yours(disagree with me if you will, but won't more questions be answered over time and so with time the bond thickens), but for me personally I become more attached to a character if he is more attached to people (or things) in the setting .

But I would say that time is an important factor. Whether this time is spent during character creation, during play or thinking about some dilemma or emotion the character faced/ might face in tonights session on the way to/ from a game.

Other things are also factors, for me playing it like I mean it(as Tony calls it in his thread in actual play) is very important. Especially if the whole group is doing it, it will of course get me very involved in the characters.

I have another more FH8 specific question:
Why preludes? What is it that you want to achieve with preludes that can not be achieved during normal play?
>>edit<<
ok in the rules you say this:

In the Prelude we are going to discover what career path your character is on when we meet him in the story

Sure, time is still a factor in emotional investment, no matter how you look at it.  All my theory says is how I think I can pack more emotional investment into less time.

Why preludes? What is it that you want to achieve with preludes that can not be achieved during normal play?

In reply to your edit, Lars.

But couldn't that just as well happen in character creation?

a. Some major action and drama is played out in just one scene, that is limited, by the rules, to having only one PC in it.

b. A lot of plot emerges. Plot that the PCs might find very interesting. The problem being that the CPs might not become involved in the episode because the plot from the preludes is just that much more exciting. I can especially see this happening when the PC loses the conflicts in the prelude and takes the other path. What would be more natural than for the CP to put all her energy into getting back onto her own path and possibly getting revenge.

c. The CP was really looking forward to playing a specific character. Then the PI puts forward "the other path" and the CP thinks that's actually a lot cooler and wants to "loose the prelude". This would be especially a real shame if it happened to inexperienced CPs.

Based on the feedback of this thread and the actual play thread combined with the feedback of my play group, I've done a bit of updating to the pdf file.  Things like Creating Setting, Auspices, and Currency have been tweaked.  Especially Auspices.  They're under the heading of Temptations now.  I haven't changed what I wanted those categories to be, only the handles I've attached to them to remind the players what they're supposed to be.

I also did some tweaking to the Consequences.  I tried to show a greater amount of change to the character for each stage of Consequence.  I also got over the idea that changes to Twinings should be reserved for the higher levels.

I suspect that there may be something inherently broken with the conflict resolution system.  On each individual play a player often has to choose between earning more Pain or loose ground on winning the stakes.  But I've been tying the Consequences to the idea that more Pain = More Change = Interesting no matter what.  Therefore earning Pain isn't really a bad thing to the player.  Therefore why not earn tons of Pain AND go for winning the conflict.  The hard choices I was looking for in the system seem to have been drastically softened.

-Eric

Remember:  The PI doesn't write a plot for the Episodes.  He writes conflicts and problems.  As the CPs use their PCs to resolve those conflicts the plot emerges as a result.  Therefore the PI and the CPs can never disagree on what the plot should be, only on what the next conflict should be.  And that's resolved in the Scene Framing rules and the Settling Everything Else rule

Connections
Before you’re done writing the prep work for the
episode you need to make sure that every PC is
somehow connected to the Subject. If you can’t
connect them directly to the Subject then you should
use their Twinings to connect them to one of the forces
of change for the Subject. There’s only one Subject for
every episode and every player should have some
reason for caring how it turns out.

Don't sweat the titles of the Temptations.  They're being dumped & simplified.

-Eric