This is almost incestuous to reply and reference it back and forth, but it does look like Meera is having her own thoughts on Primal Powers and what makes one over on her Amber Bits.

Her idea is that Trump is the original, first power, THE original power. Its an interesting thought, and I could see designing a hierarchy of powers based on her concepts (go and see her link for what she is talking about).

In my games, Trumps are Art and aren't quite so much a power as a reflection of the relation between art and reality. You could argue that I am really saying the same thing as Meera, but I don't go with her flow about Trump use and the reality of locations.

Her comment about Pattern Ghosts being a tool by a sentient Pattern to figure out things is VERY interesting when you consider the Children of the Jewel Project that Arref, myself and a couple of others experimented with. http://www.fortunecity.com/rivendell/fireforge/407/cotj/.. It's a similar idea, really.

It actually does seem someone besides the writer is reading this, or checking it.

Meera (see links at left) questioned me about my definition of Primal Powers. She thinks my definition is suspiciously like her idea of a Spikard.

I replied to her that Spikards are (usually) portable. Primal Powers are not and have a fixed Locus.

The obvious question, which she asked, is WHY are they fixed in place?

Good question. I think its a matter of my scientific-oriented mindset. While I have a good depth of knowledge and appreciation for things mythological and mythopoetic, its not my field, per se, or speciality. I leave that to Arref, who has forgotten more of that than I will ever learn.

Its a bit of a tautology, but the Primal Powers have fixed loci simply because it is they which help define the boundaries of the universe. Looking at my cosmology page, at http://www.mindspring.com/~jvstin/strange/sbcosmology.html, might help illustrate what I mean but I'll explain further.

Before Pattern, and before Logrus, or any Primal Powers anywhere, the universe was not what we exactly called organized. Heck, there really wasn't much difference BETWEEN universes. The multiverse was not truly differentiated. Shadows were born, died, and born anew without much organization to them.

Primal Powers are those nodes which changed, and continued to change that. Relativity strikes again...they are fixed relative to the shadows which they create, or organize, or influence about them. For all one knows, they may wander the void of the universe, the Amberverse moving like a brane in a fifth dimensional matrix...but relative to the shadows themselves, they are the fixed poles of reality, the Alder Boles, if you will. A Power which can DO this, add this level of organization, is considered Primal. Spikards are mobile powers and do not influence the world about them in this way. Trump, Shapeshifting, Dream Magic, Sorcery...none of them do this, either.

Only things like the Pattern, the Logrus, Portals (from the Omphalos) can do this. This is why the creation of Corwin's Pattern is a big deal and worried and worries people like Fiona. Mucking about with the creation of Primal Powers has unexpected side effects, not all of them benign.

Funny, but I seem to have thought of yet another game idea from this...

Over at Shadow of Greatness, Arref has been thinking lately of what exactly MAKES a Primal Power exactly that.

It's a good question and one for me to consider here, myself.

Primal Powers

Primal Power

A Primal Power is a locus or node of energies which is powerful enough to permanently affect a section of reality greater than the shadow from
which it springs

Under my definition, The Pattern and the Logrus are two obvious Primal Powers. Under my definition, though, things like Trump are not...since Trump does not
have a physical manifestation like the spiral of the Pattern or the chaotic home of the Logrus.

Primal Powers take some work to create. The Logrus...well I don't think I have revealed just how it was constructed. The Pattern, in my games, was constructed with the aid of three Spikards bound by Dworkin to the task. Two of these Spikards you have encountered before, in the works of Roger Zelazny--Greyswandir, and Werewindle. Just as Dworkin used the Spikards in the creation of the Pattern, so too did he bind Pattern into their making, changing them from what they were, to the Pattern Swords that they are now.

Why? Perhaps the Spikards have some control over the Pattern, some say, and the Pattern itself (if you consider it sentient) does not desire to have any sort of controls on it. If you eschew the sentient Pattern theory, then Dworkin did it, to keep young scions of Amber, or anyone else, from having "keys" to the Pattern.

Does the Logrus have any such keys? If so, what are they, and what do they look like now?

Hi friends.

Since you know I am interested somewhat in dreams, and I had such a long and clear (as far as memory) one last night, I decided to share it with you all.

What this dream strongly reminds me of is the book Silverlock, by John Myers Myers.
Dream.

It began in the cemetery which I used to live right next to (our backyard adjoined this cemetery). In this dreamscape, there was a mountain, though, inside this burial park which was very popular for people to try and ascend. "One day", I apparently decided to try and climb it, too.

It started off with a minor obstacle, this little bitty ridge which proved to be harder to get over than it looked. Once I got over it and was standing up, a woman said to me that the obstacle was not as easy as it seemed. I brushed myself off and looked at my options. There were roads going up this thing and instead of taking a road that I had a feeling I had taken before (straight up the mountain and ending in a cul de sac), I took a road along the edge and made a more gradual ascent.

The ascent went well, passed through a small town and kept going up and up. There were lots of people trying to go up, too, and some people going down having given up on the thing. I stuck with it.

At some point, reality got bent, and instead of climbing the mountain, I found myself in a victorian house of some sort. Now, I was going up to the attic to where "grandma" was. I didn't question things at first but it got harder and harder to find the way to keep going up, and when I did reach what seemed to be the attic and grandma, I realized that I had been lured into a false path. Grandma did not look familiar at all, and I had a feeling her attic was a dead end.

So I headed back down a bit to find another way. I was back on the mountain, on one side of a road when there was a scene shift to this dark figure taking orders from an even more nebulous antagonist. This antagonist was upset that a record number, six, people were still doing well on the mountain. He commanded the dark figure to make sure that no one reached the top.

Back to me, this mountain road had busy traffic on it, and crossing it (which I had the feeling I had to do) was tricky, but I managed it, and it was then I saw the dark figure. I avoided him, and then found myself in some sort of palace. Somehow, someway, I was the only one of the six who had gotten past his obstacles and had gotten to its destination. There, once again, was the dark figure, who was somewhat more resigned to the fact that I had succeeded. There was a very weird bit where I had to relieve myself in this giant canal of water (with him there), and I was afraid that the canal would suck me down with my bodily wastes. I managed to get back out and once I was back in a hall, the dark figure explained that now that i had succeded and become published (!) I had to leave the palace. I could either retrace my steps back down the mountain, or else I could steal a blue magic broom from the typeface department and fly down the mountain.

I decided to go for the latter. So I found myself climbing up a spiral staircase which opened up into this 1950's era office. People, mainly secretarial women (and a couple of men) were typing on ancient typewriters. I asked if this was the typeface office and the senior secretary said yes, but to take a broom, I would have to pay for it. I opened up my jacket and took out my minidisc player and showed it to her for possible payment. As she looked over the device, having obviously never seen one, someone from my real job in real life came into the office. "Tina!" I said, turning to her, and as people were distracted by her entrance, I made my move. I subtly took my minidisc player back, and grabbed the blue broom, and before anyone could stop me, I mounted it and had jumped out the window while riding it. The end of the dream had me soaring down the mountain, back home.