We specialise Aronszajn trees by an $\omega ^\omega $ -bounding forcing that adds reals. We work with creature forcings on uncountable spaces. As an application of these notions of forcing, we answer a question of Moore, Hrušák and Džamonja whether ◇(b) implies the existence of a Souslin tree in a negative way by showing that "◇∂ and every Aronszajn tree is special" is consistent relative to ZFC.

A forcing poset of size 221 which adds no new reals is described and shown to provide a Δ22 definable well-order of the reals . The encoding of this well-order is obtained by playing with products of Aronszajn trees: some products are special while other are Suslin trees. The paper also deals with the Magidor–Malitz logic: it is consistent that this logic is highly noncompact.

We consider various versions of the ♣ principle. This principle is a known consequence of $\lozenge$ . It is well known that $\lozenge$ is not sensitive to minor changes in its definition, e.g., changing the guessing requirement form "guessing exactly" to "guessing modulo a finite set". We show however, that this is not true for ♣. We consider some other variants of ♣ as well.

We study combinatorial principles known as stick and club. Several variants of these principles and cardinal invariants connected to them are also considered. We introduce a new kind of side by-side product of partial orderings which we call pseudo-product. Using such products, we give several generic extensions where some of these principles hold together with ¬CH and Martin's axiom for countable p.o.-sets. An iterative version of the pseudo-product is used under an inaccessible cardinal to show the consistency of the club (...) principle for every stationary subset of limits of ω1 together with ¬CH and Martin's axiom for countable p.o.-sets. (shrink)