One of the most beat-up books I own is a hardcover of the First Chronicles of Amber. I've read it probably more than any other book I own, despite the fact that I don't really like them all that much. You see, I like the setting. I don't like the characters and don't find Zelazny a particularly great writer....but he came up with a fantastic setting.
I game Amber Diceless all the time, attending at least one Ambercon a year and playing with local friends. So, this book is one of my most used gaming books. I find I refer to it for information more than the actual Roleplaying Books.
Starting Amber-in-Exile, I'm starting the second Amber game I've run set where the first book and most of the second book is canon, so I'm re-reading the books and I found this:
Corwin writes in chapter six of Nine Princes that there are three ways to travel in shadow, as far as he knew, that only the children of Amber could do.
The first is shifting of shadow or walking. He says nothing of this power coming from the Pattern, but actually says this power comes from the blood.
The second is use of the cards, created by Dworkin.
The third was the Pattern, also created by Dworkin for the family and according to him and it initiated the walker into, according to Corwin, "the system of the cards" and at its end could give the user the abililty to "stride across shadows."
Now, some could argue that this means that someone needs to have walked the Pattern to "stride across shadows," to shadow walk...which is what Wujick says in the rulebook, but unless there is another passage that says one has to initiate to the Pattern to walk shadow, I read this as saying that ending it, you can teleport across shadow but to simply walk, you need only be a child of Amber. I also read it this way: To create trumps and use them with any degree of skill, you have to walked the Pattern, since it initiates you in to the system of cards.
So, I begin to think that Wujick got it wrong. Does anyone who knows the novels better than me, know of a passage in the first series that infers that one need to walk the Pattern to be able to shadowshift?
Posted by Nuadha at September 3, 2006 2:11 PMI've often seen it played where you can walk in Shadow uncontrolled without Pattern, but the Pattern gives you the ability to reliably go from place to place. That was the compromise we settled on for House of Cards.
Posted by: Ginger Stampley at September 3, 2006 2:57 PMThere are a few comments in the book that imply that you can travel through Shadow without walking the Pattern. The section you cite is a little confusing. Because it says that a prince or princess of the blood can travel through Shadow, and then it describes the Pattern as something that grants that power but can only be walked by a prince or princess of the blood.
I think the safest answer overall is that the Amber books could have done well with better editing.
However, searching the text online (through one of those bootleg Russian sites), I turned up this quote, also in NPiA:
“Rebma is the ghost city.” be told me. “It is the ref!ection of Amber within the sea. In it, everything in Amber is duplicated, as in a mirror. Llewella's people live there, and dwell as though in Amber. They hate me for a few past peccadilloes, so I cannot venture there with you, but if you would speak them fair and perhaps hint at your mission, I feel they would let you walk the Pattern of Rebma, which, while it is the reverse of that in Amber, should have the same effect. That is, it gives to a son of our father the power to walk among Shadows.”
There are a couple implications in the Merlin series that you need Pattern, but you asked for second series.
There are stronger cases for walking through Shadow sans Pattern than the quote you listed above.
Random in SotU:
"As I went, I played the Shadow game we all learned as children. Pass some obstruction-a scrawny tree, a stand of stone-and have the sky be different from one side to the other."
Corwin in GoA:
“Because,” I said, “you dreamed a thing that is inscribed in your very genes. Why, how, I do not know. It demonstrates, however, that you are indeed a daughter of Amber. What you did was walk in Shadow. What you dreamed was the Great Pattern of Amber. By its power do those of the blood royal hold dominion over shadows. Do you understand what I am talking about?”
***
Like Ginger, I usually go with the latent shadowshifting ability. It's a bit stronger than what she describes. In my cosmology, the "royals" of Amber and Chaos are descended from either the Serpent or the Unicorn, and as such they have a touch of, for lack of a better word, the divine. Merlin notes that some magical creatures can travel through Shadow, and the royals are just such creatures. It's much slower than having a power to back it, but it's doable.
The kids in my game are all about finding alternate ways to get through Shadow, because simple Shadow travel with their own non-Pattern initiated abilities is a pain in the ass.
Posted by: Bolthy at September 4, 2006 1:30 AM