Emerging onto a shadow

[Doughdee222]

In the Merlin books there are alternate forms of travel that seem to bypass normal shadow walking. The Spikard rings for example are just about as good as a trump deck, better maybe since Merlin uses it to go anywhere immediately and it powers his spells. (Those rings are awfully powerful, I can see why the King of Chaos would wear one. Sad, though, that Merlin had to abandon Frakir for his.)

Then there are the demons and the dark tunnels they can create, essentially a temporary subway system through Shadow.

There is also spells that open the paths such as the one Merlin finds in Julia's apartment which led to the Keep of the Four Worlds. Although, it is unclear how close the Earth Shadow is to the Keep's location.

It is never explicitly stated how demons such as the Ty'Iga travel around so quickly. I suppose being bodiless is no impediment to Shadow walking or tunnel creation.

[warp9]

I think you're missing the nature of trying to convert the material to usable mechanics in a roleplaying game, warp9.

Why do you want pattern walk to be a super-fast mode of travel?

//Panjumanju

Well, (as was pointed out by Doughdee222 in the post above) shadow-walking is nowhere near as fast as other means of travel (such as using Trumps). And I'm also just interested in keeping the cool aspects of the character's abilities as they were in the books.

For example, in both the Corwin books and the Merlin series, there were scenes where they took their girlfriends by the hand and led them to strange and exotic locations. In Corwin's case it was with Dara and the Water-Wheel of the Titians. And in Merlin's case it was with Julia.

These were fairly short walks, in both cases, and they led to strange and exotic places (that was kind of the whole point, in both cases).

To look at your statement from a few posts back. . . .

In my analysis he didn't do that because pattern walking is inconsistent - you don't really know how long it's going to take. You could try to nip into the next shadow in order to save yourself airport taxes and end up going on a two month detour.

Going by your statement, any sort of casual use of shadow-walking (as in the examples I gave above) becomes nearly impossible. Which (would seem to me) to be the effect of saying that, even trying to nip into the next shadow, let along going some place strange and exotic, could easily result in an Amberite ending up going on a two month detour.

There is no justification in the books for the "two-month detour" concept, quite the opposite (in the books shadow-walking was always fairly quick). And I don't see what one really gains by limiting shadow-walking in that way in a game. After all, there are much faster forms of travel in the Amber universe.

[jibbajibba]

Interesting coversation guys.

I think you have to say  the book is unreliable. NPiA particularly makes statements that don't show up later on.

But having said that there are a number of things that you could add to Powers in Amber Diceless. I use a powers tree so adding these type sof things is easy If you don't use a tree you would need to decide if it was part of the base or advanced power or whatever.

i) Control of Shaow Denizens - I woudl make this a 5 point power that sits off mould shadow reality (there are three base branches of Pattern, Mould Shadow reality, shdow walking and pattern Lens) . It would allow you to have more direct control over people you encounter in shadow the ability to alter peoples memories and thoughts basically. As people spend time with Amberites they become more "Real" so this ability ceases to work on them. If two people try to manipulate the same shadow denizen then the highest Psy wins but subtle use of the power could create memories or thoughts that slip through GMs discretion.

ii) Create Shadow Barriers - I would cost this as a 5 point power under Shadow walking, maybe a level "up" after create Pattern of Desire (which lets you buy objects through sahdow walking). YOu can create an obstacle to shadow walkers between 2 fixed points in shadow. So between Arden and Lorraine/Avalon or Shadow Earth and Amber. These barriers can be anything from swamps or forests full of monsters to giant machines that eat cars. Anyone travelling between the locations would encounter the barrier but it coudl be avoided by taking the long way round, the difficulty and time this would take is a comparison of total points in Pattern .  Now fixed point in Shadow is interesting as Lorraine is a shadow of Avalon which is a shadow of Amber. I think you can classify as fixed points any personal shadow or shadow where PCs spend a long time, the barrier woudl apply to the cluster of shadows of this type. The storms that wreck Corwins fleet are in this category although more powerful as the JoJ sits behind them.

iii) Shadow locks - you can lock a shadow so no one can enter or leave it (either one way locks or two way locks woudl be aloowed) a 5 point power that sits at the same level as shadow barrier. Basically a shadow can not be entered or left. If you re trying to leave a shadow the highest spend in pattern wins out. this could express itself as being unable to leave a city as you hit a road block, as being unable to get over a bridge, etc or even the corney leave town by the eastern road and come back in from the western road (called the Moebius variant)


I can see a few others there as well.