Figured I’d start this thread up so that its ready to go when I make the inevitable switch to my new system… 
Not sure if I will stick to Lance’s exact layout for his Trochee System or if I will dive into my modifications. At the moment, I’m leaning towards the latter. I’ve got a few tweaks that make it really intuitive for me, while maintaining almost all of the phonetic advantages that Lance’s use of vowels in certain picture card pairs confers. This system also encourages minimal sub-vocalization and encourages blending down to single syllable words wherever possible. I’ve filled out all 1352 entries following my rules and there are no three+ syllable words.
Side note on word construction for ease of reading, visualization, and speed… Less syllables per image is better than more syllables. Literal word to image translation is better than abstract association, No leading vowels are better than leading vowels when using Major. Full words are better than partial words. (I know that I always caution everyone on using absolute or subjective terms like “best” “better” etc, but I feel I can justify these statements.)
All of the images are either one or two syllables and are very easy to read intuitively from the card indices. (I have a ton of single syllable literal images now with this system!) It also allows me to retain the suit pair phonetic mapping that I’ve gotten incredibly fluent in via shadow.
While this system isn’t as rigidly structured as Lance’s is shaping up to be, it is way more guided than shadow and is much easier to read. Lance’s strict rules are pretty appealing, but I’m willing to trade a little bit of exact structure for flexibility to retain instinctive mappings for myself.
I’m holding off jumping into switching completely until Lance finishes his write-up so that I can fairly evaluate the two options, and I also want to achieve a sub-60 time with my Expanded Shadow P/O system. I’m going to focus on deck attempts with that from now on, but am planning no more recognition review. I feel that the more I ingrain those reading structures the harder it will be to overwrite them with the new system. I’ll comment more on why I’m planning a u-turn back to a 2-block system in the other journal, but basically I think there is a cap on speed when using the P/O approach because of that recognition parsing (and some of the picture card phonetics via shadow are still super annoying and slow to read even after 18 months of training.)
For a sneak peak at Eclipse, here’s the rules I’m intending on following for the new system. (Since Lance isn’t using the name “Eclipse System” for his new approach, I’m going to claim it for mine. I came up with it, after all!) 
(Note, if you ever want to try this system, its possible to map the Jack and Queen phonetics to whatever you want. Just realize that whatever phonetics are used for Jack and Queen will not be available to use for suit combos. I stuck with “F/V” and “R” mappings for Jack and Queen because I’m very used to those associations and I’m used to having J/SH/CH as a suit combo phonetic. If I was starting completely from scratch or teaching someone this system fresh, I’d recommend J/SH/CH for Jack, and R for Queen since that is what those actual value indices read “best” as visually. The Jack index is literally a J and the Q of the queen looks like an uppercase R just without the left side leg. Mapping things that way would mean replacing the suit combo association that is currently mapped to “J/SH/CH” for “F/V.”)
ECLIPSE SYSTEM: PAIR CONSTRUCTION - PHONETIC RULES:
-
If a pair contains two different numbers (A-10), [#x][#y], read the numbers first, left to right. The suit phonetic goes last.
-
If a pair contains two of the same number [#x][#x], modify the suit with a leading “ih” vowel sound. Pronounce the number sound once, then “ih” + the suit sound.
-
If a pair contains only one picture card [#][P] or [P][#], the number is pronounced first, the suit second, and the picture third.
-
If a pair is picture/number [P][#], pronounce the number first, then the suit, then the picture card’s vowel sound (ah, oh, ee) at the end.
-
If a pair contains two different value picture cards [Px][Py], pronounce the suit first, then left picture vowel, then right picture consonant.
-
If a pair contains two matching value picture cards [Px][Px], pronounce a single picture vowel (ah, oh, ee), then the suit.
-
If a pair is number/picture [#][P], pronounce the number first, then the suit, then the picture card’s consonant sound at the end.
(exception): In [#][K] pairs, the King is silent, and the suit is modified with a leading “oo” vowel sound. Pronounce the number first, then “oo” + suit.
| [#] Value | Phonetic |
|---|---|
| 10 | S/Z |
| Ace | T/D |
| 2 | N |
| 3 | M |
| 4 | R |
| 5 | L |
| 6 | SH/CH/J |
| 7 | K/G |
| 8 | F/V |
| 9 | P/B |
| [P] Value | [P][#] | [#][P] | x [Px][Py] | y [Px][Py] | Left [Px][Px] | Right [Px][Px] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jack | ah | F/V | ah | F/V | ah | silent |
| Queen | oh | R | oh | R | oh | silent |
| King | ee | silent | ee | silent | ee | silent |
| Primary Suit Combo | Alt Suit Combo | [P][#] | [#x][#y] | [#x][#x] | [Px][Py] | [Px][Px] | [#][J/Q] | [#][K] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
 |
S/Z | S/Z | ih S/Z | S/Z | S/Z | S/Z | oo S/Z |
| |
|
T/D | T/D | ih T/D | T/D | T/D | T/D | oo T/D |
 |
 |
N | N | ih N | N | N | N | oo N |
| |
|
M | M | ih M | M | M | M | oo M |
| |
|
L | L | ih L | L | L | L | oo L |
| |
|
SH/CH/J | SH/CH/J | ih SH/CH/J | SH/CH/J | SH/CH/J | SH/CH/J | oo SH/CH/J |
| |
|
K/G | K/G | ih K/G | K/G | K/G | K/G | oo K/G |
| |
|
P/B | P/B | ih P/B | P/B | P/B | P/B | oo P/B |
| Pair Structure | Phonetic Structure | Example |
|---|---|---|
| [#x] [#y] | (#1)+(#2)+(suit) | [3 ][4 ] / [3 ][4 ] = M-R-N |
| [#x] [#x] | (#)+(ih/suit) | [3 ][3 ] / [3 ][3 ] = M-ih-N |
| [JACK] [#] | (#)+(suit)+(Ah) | [J ][4 ] / [J ][4 ] = R-N-Ah |
| [QUEEN] [#] | (#)+(suit)+(Oh) | [Q ][4 ] / [Q ][4 ] = R-N-Oh |
| [KING] [#] | (#)+(suit)+(EE) | [K ][4 ] / [K ][4 ] = R-N-EE |
| [#] [JACK] | (#)+(suit)+(F/V) | [3 ][J ] / [3 ][J ] = M-N-F/V |
| [#] [QUEEN] | (#)+(suit)+(R) | [3 ][Q ] / [3 ][Q ] = M-N-R |
| [#] [KING] | (#)+(oo/suit) | [3 ][K / [3 ][K ] = M-oo-N |
| [JACK] [QUEEN] | (suit)+(ah)+(R) | [J ][Q / [J ][Q ] = N-Ah-R |
| [QUEEN] [JACK] | (suit)+(oh)+(F/V) | [Q ][J / [Q ][J ] = N-Oh-F/V |
| [JACK] [KING] | (suit)+(Ah) | [J ][K / [J ][K ] = N-Ah |
| [QUEEN] [KING] | (suit)+(Oh) | [Q ][K / [Q ][K ] = N-Oh |
| [JACK] [JACK] | (Ah)+(suit) | [J ][J / [J ][J ] = Ah-N |
| [QUEEN] [QUEEN] | (Oh)+(suit) | [Q ][Q ] / [Q ][Q ] = Oh-N |
| [KING] [KING] | (EE)+(suit) | [K ][K ] / [K ][K ] = EE-N |
This differs from Lance's Trochee System in a few important ways:
- The Ay/Ah distinction is eliminated for Jacks (all Left-side Jacks now sound as “ah”)
- Instead of splitting hard/soft sounds to differentiate between some pair structures, I’ve added unused vowel sounds to indicate them (“oo” and “ih”)
- Number are ALWAYS read first, and Pictures are ALWAYS read last. This means that suit phonetics will be read second in a few structural situations (when a pair contains number and picture cards.)
I wasn’t going for “maximum structural efficiency” or pure consistency… that is the goal of Lance’s Trochee System. I wanted a way to simplify in a natural way and I’m pretty happy with how it looks for my brain!