TORMENT Memory Fabric — v2.4.4

TORMENT is a governed memory and identity engine for building persistent AI characters and agents. It focuses on long-lived memory, identity that resists drift, provenance-aware governance, and a clear boundary between remembering and acting. It is not a generic autonomous agent stack.

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What makes TORMENT different

• Structured persistent memory — geometric kernel, half-life decay, reinforcement, and event-gated compression
• Differentiated memory ontology — semantic substrate, baton (cross-session continuity), reference (whole-object external material), environment (scoped operational facts), and closure (ratification-gated arc records)
• Identity that resists drift — character basins, seed gravity, and drift monitoring
• Provenance-aware by default — memory writes carry structured provenance and can be audited by origin
• Governed decisions through the Agent Spine — trust tiers, escalation, and structured result codes
• Multi-agent / collective support — workspace-level resonance, convergence detection, and controlled echo flows
• MCP as a governed extension layer — memory operations exposed through a narrow, audited interface

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Is TORMENT for you?

Good fit for

• persistent AI characters, companions, NPCs, and modding experiments
• memory-governed agent research
• multi-agent and hivemind identity experiments
• developers building on top of a structured memory substrate

Not a fit for

• plug-and-play general automation
• unrestricted autonomous tool execution
• a thin prompt wrapper with no real architecture

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Architecture at a glance

• Memory / epistemology — TriOcta kernel, fabric orchestration, compression, spirit return, and a differentiated memory ontology (semantic, baton, reference, environment, closure)
• Stance / modulation — advisory thinking and stance policy shaped by internal kernel state
• Spine / governance — trust-aware routing, audit trails, decision/result codes
• MCP / capability surface — governed memory operations exposed to external clients; no tool dispatch, no autonomous action

Deeper reference:

• docs/PROJECT_OVERVIEW.md
• docs/AGENT_SPINE_OVERVIEW.md
• docs/MEMORY_KERNEL_ARCHITECTURE.md

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Quick start

python -m pip install -r requirements.txt
# then follow docs/QUICKSTART.md for your platform

TORMENT runs as a local service with a governed MCP surface for clients such as Claude Desktop.

Start here:

• Quick start — docs/QUICKSTART.md
• General guide — docs/GUIDE.md
• Claude Desktop / MCP setup — docs/MCP_README.md
• Smoke test — docs/MCP_SMOKE_TEST.md
• Zero-code character creator — start/torment_character_creator.html

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Current status — v2.4.4

v2.4.4 closes the provenance-migration subsystem (step 6). Legacy memory rows can be walked through a two-gate policy — gate 1 epistemic recovery, gate 2 ancestry admission — and rewritten by a narrow append-only writer that preserves refusal state and recursion safety. The full closure sequence — export, dry-run, apply, and guard re-verification — has been validated end-to-end against a live workspace. TORMENT_ARCHIVIST_WRITEBACK remains off; enabling it is a separate later decision gate.

Recent work in the v2.4.x line:

• Post-v2.4.4 block merges (landed on main 2026-04-21) — three memory-regrouping blocks extending the ontology established in earlier v2.4.x work: Block A (baton substrate — cross-session continuity state distinct from durable semantic memory), Block B (reference + environment — whole-object reference memory and scoped operational environment memory, kept as distinct primitives rather than interchangeable context), and Block C (closure synthesis — ratification-gated arc records with deferred-or-open-items as a required structural field). See docs/BLOCK_A_DESIGN.md, docs/BLOCK_B_DESIGN.md, docs/BLOCK_C_DESIGN.md, and their PRE_BLOCK_*_PRECONDITIONS.md companions for the design and governance trail. No post-v2.4.4 version stamp yet; these are on main pending a release bundle.
• v2.4.4 — advisory retrieval shaping default-on (TORMENT_THINKING_ADVISORY=1): §2A validation confirmed across six eval runs — anchor preservation, collaborative escalation, analytical depth, and FAST guard all pass. Reinforce contract close: torment_reinforce now moves per-memory reinforcement_count, truthfully reports "reinforced" or "no_op", and applies a log-scaled retrieval boost at rank stage. Provenance migration closure (step 6), recursion guard and refusal sentinels validated end-to-end
• v2.4.3 — tool-result memory lane, governed ingest of external tool outputs
• v2.4.2 — provenance system, recursion safety policy, MCP capability boundary
• v2.4.1 — thinking controller, stance policy, first live voice-agent deployment
• v2.4.0 — memory lifecycle overhaul, Agent Spine formalization, unified observability

For the full history, see the release notes under docs/.

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Extending TORMENT — MCP tools

TORMENT exposes governed memory operations to Claude Desktop and other MCP clients through a narrow MCP server. New tools should be registered through the Spine so they inherit trust-tier enforcement, audit trails, and stable result codes.

TORMENT is a memory and cognition interface, not an unrestricted action system. It remembers; it does not decide what tools to run.

Relevant docs:

• docs/MCP_EXPANSION_GUIDE.md — adding a new MCP tool end-to-end
• docs/MCP_README.md — Claude Desktop integration
• docs/MCP_SMOKE_TEST.md — verifying a new tool
• docs/MCP_CAPABILITY_BOUNDARY.md — what belongs in the MCP surface and what doesn't

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Where to go next

Core doctrine

• docs/DOCTRINE_v2.4.x.md — 12 principles that govern v2.4.x change decisions
• docs/RECURSION_SAFETY_POLICY_v2.4.x.md — archivist write-back safety
• docs/ADMISSION_POLICY_v2.4.x.md — two-gate admission for migrated rows
• docs/MCP_CAPABILITY_BOUNDARY.md — the memory/action boundary

Setup and operation

• docs/QUICKSTART.md, docs/GUIDE.md, docs/TUNING.md, docs/TROUBLESHOOTING.md
• docs/MCP_README.md, docs/MCP_SMOKE_TEST.md

Architecture reference

• docs/PROJECT_OVERVIEW.md — comprehensive architecture reference
• docs/AGENT_SPINE_OVERVIEW.md — cognition pipeline
• docs/SPINE_CONTRACT.md — trust tiers, decision codes, exposure tiers
• docs/MEMORY_KERNEL_ARCHITECTURE.md — kernel design, compression gating, warmup
• docs/BLOCK_A_DESIGN.md, docs/BLOCK_B_DESIGN.md, docs/BLOCK_C_DESIGN.md — memory ontology design (baton substrate; reference + environment; closure synthesis)
• docs/CHARACTER_SYSTEM.md — living character identity and spirit return
• docs/HIVEMIND_GUIDE.md — multi-agent convergence and echo re-ingestion

Roadmap and release history

• docs/ROADMAP_v2.4.x.md
• docs/RELEASE_NOTES_v2.4.4.md
• docs/RELEASE_NOTES_v2.4.3.md
• earlier release notes under docs/

Research archive

• TriOctagon Toy Model — Full Diagnostics (12 versions) on Zenodo — the standalone research archive for the coupled-oscillator kernel at the heart of TORMENT's memory dynamics.

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Support this project

If TORMENT is useful to you, support is appreciated.

• Ko-fi — ko-fi.com/hilmirhalldorsson
• BTC — bc1p8g9dd2y4fgnshdsvyq5ecu22mdr5kjfw8zdcptfdhghh4a0837ssjqzgka
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• SOL — 2AmeJwpE68FbytofrUgrNtYwwtzLnjfDi1ACzkBDxBUj