Amber, the Eternal City
Legendary Cast

"I am going to tell you something Benedict should have told you long ago," I said. "Never trust a relative. It is far worse than trusting strangers. With a stranger there is a possibility that you might be safe."

"You really mean that, don't you?"

"Yes."

"Yourself included?"

I smiled. "Of course it does not apply to me. I am the soul of honor, kindness, mercy, and goodness. Trust me in all things."

-- Corwin to Dara, The Guns of Avalon

It was a name from a fantastical tale: Amber.

Maybe it was the True Realm, the Eternal City. Maybe you thought it was your parents' heart and soul, that for it they would lie, cheat, steal and sacrifice each other -- and sometimes you.

"We were both wonderfully drunk that night, and it seemed but a brief while that you talked - weeping some of the time - telling me of the mighty mountain Kolvir and the green and golden spires of the city, of the promenades, the decks, the terrace, the flowers, the fountains... "

-- Ganelon, The Guns of Avalon

Maybe you loved this place called Amber. Maybe you hated it. Maybe you wished your parents would forget the place ever existed, as unlikely as that seemed.

"We had spent much of our time in wandering in Shadow, or in our own universes; It is an academic, through valid philosophical question, as to whether one with power over shadow could create his own universe. Whatever the ultimate answer, from a practical point of view we could "

-- Corwin, Nine Princes In Amber

But Amber in some form was a constant in your life, its existence as firm a part of your foundation as your parents themselves. Amber has some hold on you and you can deny it no more than you can deny yourself. Or can you?

First things first, these pages would not exist but for the creative and inspiring work of Michael and Ginger on the House of Cards game.

The Legendary Cast pages are an indulgence for a long time Amber GM and movie fan. Here you will find images, irony, and mystique for the legendary characters that people my vision of Amber.

In some states and countries, suggesting legends of the Silver Screen for various roles in the myths of Amber can get you hung, or five to ten years in an isolation booth. I use black and white images so your mind can paint the vivid colors of Amber on the person. I use faces from the entirety of film history because what's popular today is a very narrow base without legendary status. This is a living document. I make changes here from time to time. The shadows lie for Amberites, and sometimes a revealed quality in a single image clue me to something important about cast characters.

So if you want to make a suggestion, send it along to arrefmak at yahoo dot com.

In the Eternal City story, members of the next generation of the royal house of Amber, the so-called Youngers, attempt to deal with the new dynamic -- personal, political, metaphysical, and otherwise -- of the complex family relationships left from the Patternfall War and the immediate years after. Our story started twenty years after the reign of King Random began, with the introduction of the children hidden or offstage during Patternfall.

Our game began immediately following the events recounted in the entire canon of Zelazny's published works on Amber (including the five short stories that follow Merlin's adventures).

The events of Zelazny's works are true where two or more surviving people have confirmed those events. There are also the fictional versions of Prince Corwin's Chronicle in the Amber castle library. It has been noted elsewhere that some specifics of Corwin's account are incomplete or deliberately misleading.

There is much work to be done to return Amber to her former surety— and even as the younger generation takes up its duties, Amber's enemies await, new and old, from without and within. This game has run since 1996 and over fifty sixty sixty-five years of Random's reign have now passed. Children (and grandchildren) of the original Player Characters are now entering the game.

Legendary Cast News

29 Oct 2006
CSS tweaks, casting changes Julian, Rinaldo, up-size base font

29 April 2003
Ginger and Michael homage moved to paragraph one and highlighted. Title altered to "legendary" and exposition added about "silver screen".

17 October 2002
CSS tweaks. Edits. Main menu links have hover hints.

13 August 2002
CSS tweaks.

27 June 2002
Added the 'secret' link to the dirt on Oberon's Queens. Included notes on the Blood Circumstance of each line. Tweaked the front page to give more visible credit ot Michael and Ginger. Tried a CSS tweak to make front page more readable and updated text.

07 June 2001
Cleared with Ginger. Showed to Jvstin. Getting ready to 'publish' to players. Youngers done for all current PC's.

04 June 2001
Finished Queens, and Kin, not sure how far/if I will take the Youngers section.


---page design by Ginger Stampley.
---inspiration, lots of prose, and permission granted to copy and modify from the House of Cards campaign.
---design adapted by Arref for the Eternal City campaign