Why Empowerment, Or Why Not

It is possible to obtain creatures and items with Qualities and Powers by several means, namely The Pattern, The Logrus and Empowerment Magic. However, the time take for each of these powers to give you what you want varies considerably:

• Pattern: One day per point of Quality and six days per point of Power for things which are cross-shadow stable, and roughly half this time for things which are only stable in the shadow in which they are found.
• Logrus: Four hours per point of Quality and one day per point of Power for things which are cross-shadow stable, and roughly half this time for things which are only stable in the shadow in which they are found.
• Empowerment: One hour twenty minutes per point of Quality, ten hours per point of Power to make them cross-shadow stable; one-tenth this time in a single shadow only.

So of these three methods, Empowerment is by far the fastest. In that case why bother to use the Pattern or Logrus to obtain creatures or items at all?

As I see it there are several reasons why someone may not wish to use Empowerment:

• Firstly, there is ease of use. Empowerment is an entirely separate power which must, of course, be learnt before it can be used. With Pattern or Logrus one need only use a power which one has already acquired.
• Secondly, there is the availability of the power, and of the Qualities and Powers one may want. Empowerment does not work anywhere, and not every Quality and Power can be Empowered in any case (for example, Shadow Manipulation and Shadow Movement Powers cannot be Empowered), while only Trump-based Powers cannot be found using Pattern or Logrus.
• Lastly, there is the permanence of the thing one wants. All Empowered things require some maintenance to avoid their magic simply fading away. They are also vulnerable to the effects of non-magical and anti-magical shadows. These disadvantages are generally not the case with things found out in shadow using the Pattern or Logrus.

So, it would seem that both ways of acquiring things with Powers and Qualities have their advantages and disadvantages. Precisely which one is chosen by someone would therefore seem to be a matter of personal preference alone...

On To Empowerment Magic

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