You should have your dice and your cards ready before you begin playing; make sure the cards have been shuffled, and that you have four six-sided dice with sides numbered 1 through 6.

The Adversary’s Dice

When the rules direct the Adversary to roll the dice, gather the specified number of dice, and roll them onto a surface until they rest still, each with one numbered side facing up. The highest number shown on the top of all the dice is the result.

For example, the Adversary rolls three dice, with the following rolls: 3, 5, 2. The highest roll is a 5, so the result is 5.

The Weaver’s Cards

When the rules direct the Weaver to draw a card from the deck, the card should always be drawn face-up from the top of the deck. When the card has been drawn, it should be placed together with the rest of the cards that have been drawn. You can keep these cards in a neat stack, or a messy pile, or a box. You will need to keep them available for the Tear.

The Echo’s Journal

Throughout your journey, keep a record of the places you explore, the things you find, and your mistakes and defiances. You might find it helpful to record your discoveries together with the notes you make about each place, in order to remind you where you found them later.

Keys, Secrets, Relics, & Heroes

In their journey, the Echo will find objects and beings that provide them with tools they will need in order to prevail on the paths before them. These things are found in the places created by the four face cards of each suit: Jack, Queen, King, and Ace.

When you record the details of these things, be sure to include the card that created them. That will help you to keep an accurate record of your journey, so that others may follow the path you took.

The Map

Throughout the game, you are expected to keep track of the world’s shape, but how you choose to do so is up to you. Some players might prefer to draw their map as a grid with squares marking out the dimensions of each new place; others might draw a series of sketches outlining the features of important areas.

You can just write a paragraph describing each of the new places you explore. You don’t have to write or draw anything; you could trust your own memory, or make audio recordings of everything you find. You are the only one who will use the map; how you draw it is up to you.

Four Suits, Four Regions

Each of the four suits is meant to represent a part of the world that is either familiar or foreign to the Echo.

Before you begin, you may want to discuss and agree on what each of the four suits represents, so that when the Weaver describes a new place, they have some touchstones to draw on.

Recording Failure & Success

When the Echo enters a dangerous or dark place, there is always the chance that some ill fate will befall them, that they will make a critical error that results in failure. What that failure looks like within the Echo’s story is up to you; perhaps they fall into a pit that has no bottom, or they get trapped in a cave full of biting things, or they simply lose their way in the dark.

No matter what happens to the Echo, they always come back, wiser for the lessons of their own mistake. Maybe someone back at the Tower told them how to bypass an obstacle, or maybe they tried over and over again until they finally got it right. How you persevere, just as how you fail, is entirely up to you.

When you fail as a result of a roll, the Echo’s story still continues. In your journal, record a short sentence describing how you failed. Then, record a short sentence describing how you persevered. Remember to keep these descriptions short; they will be used in the Confrontation at the end of the game.

If you need inspiration, here are some examples of each you can use or modify as you like, or you can map them to the cards that created the places where they occurred: