Getting the Most Out of Shapeshifting

[jibbajibba]

That's essentially what I just said. I was agreeing with you, I just didn't say it very well.

Trump captures essence. QED. It must. That's easy....but the facial hair issue is a much bigger deal for me.

Facial hair is a complicated and oft-overlooked issue in Zelazny's Amber. It took Corwin 3 years to grow that beard. Seriously, read the thing again keeping track of the implied time passing from Corwin's perspective, no mention of shaving (even as Zelazny often considers food and sleep) and yet he remains clean shaven, save for when he was imprisoned 3 years.

Amberite ability: slower beard growth.

We know the Amberites are descended from Chaoisites and therefore the potential for shapeshifting resides within them - is this a minor side effect, like slower (or as some people believe a 'perspective') ageing?

And yet all this does not seriously interfere with trump. So, we solved trump....but beards are still perplexing.

//Panjumanju

Trouble it's a book (no really it is )  and the autor is falible.
So leaving amber and heading to Remba Corwin, Random and Diredre walk for 2 or 3 days or something they have some encounters but mostly its a walk. So when random later says he hadn't had tiem before to explain why he had been followed to New York etc, its untrue because obviously they had 2 days of strolling along and doing nothing. Of course in narrative terms that was 1 page and inserting the whole fleeing guys on flying rocks and looking for Brand would have ruined the pacing of the book.
So when we learn that beards grow really slowly they grow at the speed of plot along with how fast Shadow walking works and how fast Superman can fly....

[Panjumanju]

So when we learn that beards grow really slowly they grow at the speed of plot along with how fast Shadow walking works and how fast Superman can fly....

Oh, sure, anything can make sense with the "author as human" approach.

OR, subtext states that all Amberities have limited shapeshifting control, specifically over facial hair.

What the author intended? Bah! What has enough internal consistency to answers the questions of over-scrutinising Amber DRPG players? Victory!

//Panjumanju

[RPGPundit]

My thought is that the image on the Trump would be the last image of the character when he/she was last being contacted. E.g. if the person looked green with blue hair, that image would stay there until the next time the Trump was used.

I always assumed that the image on the trump would always look like whatever the picture was the trump artist painted when he made the trump!

That is, until such time as the trump was activated.

RPGPundit

[Sydius Mendoza]

I always assumed that the image on the trump would always look like whatever the picture was the trump artist painted when he made the trump!

That is, until such time as the trump was activated.

RPGPundit

This

[jibbajibba]

I always assumed that the image on the trump would always look like whatever the picture was the trump artist painted when he made the trump!

That is, until such time as the trump was activated.

RPGPundit

Oh yes for sure but my question was more about what is a valid image so if the Demonic or human forms are both fine then are any other common forms fine too? so if a shapeshifter spends a lot of their time in a lion form or a giant eagle?
Then the question comes up which is what on the trump matters if its a psychic image of the subject could I paint anything.
I ask this beucase Hugo my own original Amber character has advanced trump artistry and used to paint all sorts of trumps. For example a set of Characiture trumps where all the other amberites were painted 'cartoon' characitures, a set of Cubist trumps where everyone looks liek a Picasso.
I played with concepts in order to move towards the idea of abstract trumps and the concept that you could create a shadow, object or being through the act of creating a trump, I tied it to conjuration as a methodology.

Also  it allowed me to mock other PCs but using trumps of them that looked like

or in one case for fun somethign more like (those these are totally great )

More here - http://www.south-amber.dzaba.com/photo.html

[Sydius Mendoza]

That is fucking brilliant! I laughed so hard I may have hurt something...... something important. Nice one Jibba!

[RPGPundit]

I guess the real question to me is whether artistic "realism" matters; just how close the Trump artist has to get to what a person actually looks like at the time he's drawing a trump.

I think the most significant part of it all is that the Trump artist has to be concentrated on the visual or mental image of the person in their own mind while they draw the trump, as they're creating a kind of magical link.  It would be up to debate just how abstract the actual trump drawing can get and still function.

I mean, if someone draws Bleys and really concentrates on Bleys' image, but draws it as a post-modern bunch of swooping squiggly golden lines, would that still work as a trump of Bleys?
Its an interesting question.

RPGPundit

[Panjumanju]

I mean, if someone draws Bleys and really concentrates on Bleys' image, but draws it as a post-modern bunch of swooping squiggly golden lines, would that still work as a trump of Bleys?
Its an interesting question.

It is. How important, too, are background images?

What the heck is the white horse Brand is sitting on in his trump card? Did we ever know him to have a horse? I don't think he was ever even ON a horse in the books. How important is this horse, really?

I assume the horse would sit in with the squiggly lines in order of relevance.

//Panjumanju

[RPGPundit]

I think that the other stuff in a trump is just background detail (though it could be "magical correspondences", things that are connected to the "archetype" of the person that establish a magical link), but it brings up an interesting point: all of the people who do trumps are artists.

That sounds obvious, but I think what it means is that in fact in the Amber universe, there IS such a thing as "objective art". And Trump is actually the capture of the One True art (even though there's rooms for varied styles in it) of which all other artistic endeavours are but pale shadows...

RPGPundit

[Panjumanju]

That sounds obvious, but I think what it means is that in fact in the Amber universe, there IS such a thing as "objective art". And Trump is actually the capture of the One True art (even though there's rooms for varied styles in it) of which all other artistic endeavours are but pale shadows...

Now that is an interesting idea - that Amber as the objective art, and realism and impressionism and all other artistic movements are but offshoots of the great mind's eye sign of "Visual Art'.

I sometimes wonder how much Zelazny knew about semiotics, because it seems to be in his work a lot.

//Panjumanju

[jibbajibba]

well you know my old opinion that the universe only exists because Dworkin drew the Patern. Ipso facto the Pattern is an abstract drawing of the universe, but also things aren't real unless they are drawn in trump so the Amberites and their Chaos kin only exist because they have been drawn.
The Logrus is obviously an abstract trump of the the chaos of not-universe (for want of another term) which is why I refer to the throne of Chaos as The Fractal throne.

Through shadow walking an Amberite draws in his mind a mental image of a thing which causes it to be. It is a mental trump but because its just mental it has no permanence.

This is the Last of Dworkins Lore .


The abstract v photo realist art question was an extention of that idea if all the drawings of Corwin showed him with a beard would he eventually have a beard etc ... How abstract can a thing be to still work as trump is the image a mental one? A realistic one.
Hugo once made a tapestry for his mother, a queen in Chaos,  of the City of Amber  viewed from above. If you focused really hard you could see the reality of that little section of the city . too big, too detailed to focus on the whole thing. ...that is not relevant by the way just occured to me

[Sydius Mendoza]

well you know my old opinion that the universe only exists because Dworkin drew the Patern. Ipso facto the Pattern is an abstract drawing of the universe, but also things aren't real unless they are drawn in trump so the Amberites and their Chaos kin only exist because they have been drawn.
The Logrus is obviously an abstract trump of the the chaos of not-universe (for want of another term) which is why I refer to the throne of Chaos as The Fractal throne.

Through shadow walking an Amberite draws in his mind a mental image of a thing which causes it to be. It is a mental trump but because its just mental it has no permanence.

This is the Last of Dworkins Lore .


The abstract v photo realist art question was an extention of that idea if all the drawings of Corwin showed him with a beard would he eventually have a beard etc ... How abstract can a thing be to still work as trump is the image a mental one? A realistic one.
Hugo once made a tapestry for his mother, a queen in Chaos,  of the City of Amber  viewed from above. If you focused really hard you could see the reality of that little section of the city . too big, too detailed to focus on the whole thing. ...that is not relevant by the way just occured to me

This seems a bit off. While I agree that Trumps can add a measure of permanence to people/shadows/etc. I don't think they are the yard stick of what is real in the universe. The books mention at times that walking the pattern was a sort-of coming of age ritual for Amberites. Princes and Princesses were real prior to walking. Receiving ones first deck of Trumps is both a symbolic, and at the same time very real, very tangible proof of this birthright of power. Random talks about his first set at one point. IIRC, Dworkin gave him a quick how-to instructional and then cut him loose. I like your line of thinking about the Trumps in general, but I don't think the Trumps are what make an Amberite "real".

[jibbajibba]

This seems a bit off. While I agree that Trumps can add a measure of permanence to people/shadows/etc. I don't think they are the yard stick of what is real in the universe. The books mention at times that walking the pattern was a sort-of coming of age ritual for Amberites. Princes and Princesses were real prior to walking. Receiving ones first deck of Trumps is both a symbolic, and at the same time very real, very tangible proof of this birthright of power. Random talks about his first set at one point. IIRC, Dworkin gave him a quick how-to instructional and then cut him loose. I like your line of thinking about the Trumps in general, but I don't think the Trumps are what make an Amberite "real".

Ah you see you have fallen for Dworkin's trick

Walking the Pattern is trivial the real question is how come all the trumps are in all the decks. If Dworkin drew the trumps and gave a pack to each noble as they walked the pattern then all the other packs wouldn't include a picture of them yet they do drawn in the same way.
The Obvious answer is that Dworking drew the trumps thus causing the Princes and princesses to come into being with memories of how they had once assailed the Pattern and been given a pack of cards. It's obvious when you think about it

[Sydius Mendoza]

Ah you see you have fallen for Dworkin's trick

Walking the Pattern is trivial the real question is how come all the trumps are in all the decks. If Dworkin drew the trumps and gave a pack to each noble as they walked the pattern then all the other packs wouldn't include a picture of them yet they do drawn in the same way.
The Obvious answer is that Dworking drew the trumps thus causing the Princes and princesses to come into being with memories of how they had once assailed the Pattern and been given a pack of cards. It's obvious when you think about it

6 of 1, half a dozen of the other. Nothing states if the Trump was drawn pre-Pattern walk or post. While I can see your logic here, I think we've run into a classic chicken-or-the-egg paradox.

[RPGPundit]

Now that is an interesting idea - that Amber as the objective art, and realism and impressionism and all other artistic movements are but offshoots of the great mind's eye sign of "Visual Art'.

I sometimes wonder how much Zelazny knew about semiotics, because it seems to be in his work a lot.

//Panjumanju

I would guess quite a lot. The man was extremely well-read, and he put so much of his studies and practices into Amber.  As I pointed out in the past, you could track Zelazny's evolution of interests and hobbies as they show up in the Amber novels: when he was into fencing, when he got into kendo, when he started smoking a pipe, when he was excited about computer programming, etc.

RPGPundit