The skies of each setting

[Bart]

What would one see when viewing the sky at day and night, of Oerth, Faerun, Ravenloft, Krynn, Athas and so on?

Is there a place where these descriptions are gathered?

[BWR]

In general it's mostly the same as Earth. Different constellations at night, but stars.
Athas has two moons, IIRC. The sun is big and red.
FR, day and night are basically the same as Earth has a moon which is basically like Earth's.
DL day is basically like Earth, but night has three moons, a red and a silver and a black one which is mostly invisible (for some reason people didn't know about it in the Chronicles, even though it should be obvious it was there. Later on they introduced the Night of the eye when all moons line up black on red on silver and look like an eye).
I think GH day and night are more or less like Earth's.
Mystara has a sun like Earth's and probably many similar constellations. They have two moons, one is like ours, the other is invisible unless you're on it.

[Greenish]

I can't think of a place where the descriptions would be gathered, and have hard time remembering anywhere with the descriptions.

There's three moons over Krynn, one of them invisible, and a dozen over Eberron, along with a ring (and maybe a 13th, hidden moon, I forget).

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by BWR
FR, day and night are basically the same as Earth [since Toril] has a moon which is basically like Earth's.

Selûne is approximately the same diameter as our Moon, but it's ten times closer--only twenty thousand miles from Toril, as opposed to 240,000 miles for the Moon. This means that Selûne "appears no larger than a human hand held at arm's length," which is still huge in the sky, considering our Moon can be blocked out with a thumb.

The fact that Selûne orbits so close to Toril, and still takes 30.5 days for each full orbit, suggests that the Toril-Selûne system works very differently than the Earth-Moon system. I'd think that Selûne would be raising some unearthly tides around Toril, but I've never seen anything unusual mentioned in the FR supplements.

Probably there's an explanation on Candlekeep that goes into more detail--but the key point is that Selûne dominates the skies of Faerûn, day and night.

There's also the Tears of Selûne, which is an asteroid grouping centered on one of Toril's L4/L5 LaGrange points, which are probably called Elminster Points or something. Take a look at pp. 230-231 of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting for more details.

[Jeff the Green]

Selûne is approximately the same diameter as our Moon, but it's ten times closer--only twenty thousand miles from Toril, as opposed to 240,000 miles for the Moon. This means that Selûne "appears no larger than a human hand held at arm's length," which is still huge in the sky, considering our Moon can be blocked out with a thumb.

The fact that Selûne orbits so close to Toril, and still takes 30.5 days for each full orbit, suggests that the Toril-Selûne system works very differently than the Earth-Moon system. I'd think that Selûne would be raising some unearthly tides around Toril, but I've never seen anything unusual mentioned in the FR supplements.

It also must mean that it's very difficult to sleep in Toril; that means Selûne would be 100 times as bright, about that of an overcast sunset.

[Greenish]

It also must mean that it's very difficult to sleep in Toril; that means Selûne would be 100 times as bright, about that of an overcast sunset.People sleep in the far north and south of Earth, even during summers when it can be a lot brighter. With it being a constant thing, I'd imagine people would have no troubles.

[Jeff the Green]

People sleep in the far north and south of Earth, even during summers when it can be a lot brighter. With it being a constant thing, I'd imagine people would have no troubles.

There's a large difference between very long days and very bright nights. There isn't increased sleep disturbance during summer in the arctic (though there is during the winter), but light pollution causes enormous problems (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2627884/).

[Greenish]

There's a large difference between very long days and very bright nights.Do enlighten me.


There isn't increased sleep disturbance during summer in the arctic (though there is during the winter), but light pollution causes enormous problems (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2627884/).Light pollution is really recent, though, from evolutionary standpoint. Selûne's been there for a very long time.

[Jeff the Green]

Light pollution is really recent, though, from evolutionary standpoint. Selûne's been there for a very long time.

Humans haven't. Mulan humans, especially. There's almost no chance any humanoids have been around more than 40,000 years, which is how long humans have lived in the arctic, and as demonstrated by the prevalence of sleep disorders among arctic peoples during the winter, changes to sleep regulatory genes are difficult to change. The ancestors of the Mulan people have spent less than 6000 years on Toril, which is certainly not time for such change.

[Greenish]

I could say a wizard did it, but I'll rather concede the point.

[Jeff the Green]

I could say a wizard did it, but I'll rather concede the point.

Even that I'd argue with: What evidence do we have that there exists a wizard or god in the Forgotten Realms both competent and humane enough to do such a thing? :smalltongue:

[Psyren]

You could argue that she is still opposed by Shar, who attempts to obscure Selune's light as much as possible (it's even in her dogma.) So in her own perverse way Shar is actually helping.

That or Toril's moon simply doesn't reflect as much light as ours does. despite being closer. We don't know what's on it or what it's made of.

[Bart]

Faerun; earth-like except large moon, Selune, and tears of Selune, an asteroid cluster.

Oerth; earth-like except Raenei or Luna (Greater moon) and Celene or Kule (Lesser moon), its moons. The sisters, a very bright star though actually a cluster. Also the Spectre aka the wink.

Athas; two moons, big red sun.

Eberron; earth-like except a dozen moons and the Ring of Siberys.

Krynn; earth-like except three moons, with only two visible. Constellations that correspond to the pantheon.

Mystara; earth-like except two moons, with only one visible.

Ravenloft; earth like or by domain

Sigil; The buildings across the city

Golarion; earth-like. Somal (moon) with several visible planets. Castrovel the Green World and Akiton the Red Planet (second and fourth from the sun, respectively.

Kalamar; earth-like. Tellene has three moons; Diadolai, Pelselond and Veshemo.

Rokugan; earth like

Warcraft; earth-like, White Lady (large silver moon) & Blue Child (small blue-green moon).

Birthright, Aebrynis; earth like

[Ashes]

Dragonlance also has (had?) the constellations. Every deity there has and is a constellation in the sky.

[BWR]

Aebrynis: can't find any info on it so I assume it's basically like earth, sun, moon, stars, seasons
Rokugan: 1 sun, 1 moon, stars, 24 hour day/night cycle, seasons, etc.
Golarion: sun moon stars, seasons
The problem with Ravenloft is that originally the night sky differed from realm to realm. Some have a moon, some have more, some have none. At least back in the day. I think the Grand Conjunction messed with that and gave the same sky to everyone or something.

[Faily]

Rokugan has one sun and one moon (the same goes for the Burning Sands, the Ivory Kingdoms, and the Yodotai Empire, as well as the other places that connect to Rokugan). The cycle of a day is 24 hours (broken into 12), and the monthly lunar cycle is 28 days, separated into 12 months throughout the year. The seasons are more or less the same as Japan.
I think that it is very rare for the sun and the moon to be seen in the sky at the same time in Rokugan, considering the celestial nature of those, but that is more my interpretation of Rokugani heavenly bodies.

Rokugan also have some constellations similar to ours, as their fluff was taken from Japanese mythology. There are no mention of comets or asteroids that I've come across.

[Bart]

It realy feels lame that finding what the PCs would see when looking at the sky of each setting....is from hard to impossible. I can find articles on what stars and planets are here and there, but what exactly is visible to the naked eye from each planet....is another ball game. :smallfurious:

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Jeff the Green
It also must mean that it's very difficult to sleep in Toril; that means Selûne would be 100 times as bright, about that of an overcast sunset.

I would agree with you, but apparently Ed Greenwood had something else in mind: "Selûne is bright enough to cast pale shadows when full." (FRCS, p. 230.)

That's essentially a description of our own moon. Pretty sure they didn't think this part through.


Originally Posted by Jeff the Green
Mulan humans, especially. There's almost no chance any humanoids have been around more than 40,000 years….

Are you talking about Toril with that timeframe? And where did the Mulans come into it?

:smallconfused:


Originally Posted by Bart
It realy feels lame that finding what the PCs would see when looking at the sky of each setting....is from hard to impossible. I can find articles on what stars and planets are here and there, but what exactly is visible to the naked eye from each planet....is another ball game.

Not quite sure what you're looking for here. Were you hoping to find a world with a dramatic extrasolar vista, something more like this triple-star system (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/Triple-star_sunset.jpg/1024px-Triple-star_sunset.jpg)?

.

[BWR]

It realy feels lame that finding what the PCs would see when looking at the sky of each setting....is from hard to impossible. I can find articles on what stars and planets are here and there, but what exactly is visible to the naked eye from each planet....is another ball game. :smallfurious:

Unless explicitly stated, assume it's basically like our solar system. Kind of like assuming that there are seasons and weather and geography and whatnot that is basically Earth-like unless otherwise noted. Most people aren't too interested in knowing that much detail about a setting and it doesn't get get invented because the publishers have enough material to fill their products with that is more attractive to buyers.

[Palanan]

Also, as Ed Greenwood exemplifies, most game designers aren't natural astronomers.

:smallsigh:

[Bronk]

I could say a wizard did it, but I'll rather concede the point.

A wizard did do it! Selune doesn't actually reflect any light at all... the surface is covered by a moon sized illusion to hide the Spelljamming locals who live there from those on the planet.

Meanwhile, the Tears of Selune aren't just asteroids, they're chunks of the moon blown off by a magical cannon created by the dragons to get rid of the Kingkiller Star to end the dracorages...

[Bart]

Quoted the wrong thing :smallbiggrin:


We had started a campaign at a setting that i had not DMed before, and i could not find enough for its skies. That's why i wondered :)

[Bart]

Good for Faerun

http://www.candlekeep.com/library/articles/stars.htm (http://www.candlekeep.com/library/articles/stars.htm)

[EisenKreutzer]

Humans haven't. Mulan humans, especially. There's almost no chance any humanoids have been around more than 40,000 years, which is how long humans have lived in the arctic, and as demonstrated by the prevalence of sleep disorders among arctic peoples during the winter, changes to sleep regulatory genes are difficult to change. The ancestors of the Mulan people have spent less than 6000 years on Toril, which is certainly not time for such change.

I'm from northern norway, and I sleep just fine during the summer.

[Jeff the Green]

Are you talking about Toril with that timeframe? And where did the Mulans come into it?

Near as I can tell, humans arose in Toril no earlier than the Days of Thunder, which began in -35,000 DR. The Mulan humans are descendants of earth humans abducted from ancient Egypt and ancient Sumer by the Imaskari in -4370 DR. The date of the 3.5 version of the realms is 1372 DR.


I'm from northern norway, and I sleep just fine during the summer.

Good for you. Note that a) I said nothing about high latitudes being a problem in summer (the point was that sleep patterns clearly evolve far too slowly for it to fix the problem), b) as I said, there's an enormous difference between bright nights and short nights, and c) the plural of anecdotes is not data.

[Sian]

b) as I said, there's an enormous difference between bright nights and short nights

Ever heard of the concept of Midnight Sun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_sun)? ... if you are sufficiently far enough to the north (or to the south, but given the small human population of Antactic thats much less likely to happen) there is no nights, but a Sun never disappering. Svalbard (northernmost populated part of Europe) have no nights between 19'th April and 23'th August.

While there is a certain negative influence in that some people would have a harder time sleeping (although by far its most common for non-locals), its certainly not unbearable

[Psyren]

I would agree with you, but apparently Ed Greenwood had something else in mind: "Selûne is bright enough to cast pale shadows when full." (FRCS, p. 230.)

That's essentially a description of our own moon. Pretty sure they didn't think this part through.

Occam's Razor, people. If their moon is larger but casts the same amount of light, "the designers are wrong about their own setting" is not the first conclusion you should arrive at. Instead, the obvious answer is "their moon reflects less light per {visible area} than ours does" or even "less of the light reflected by Selune reaches Faerunian eyes than reaches ours from our moon."

The amount of light a moon reflects depends on a wide variety of factors, including its curvature, the materials on its surface (including how much ice and rock there is), our own atmosphere, and even the activities of living creatures (assuming any live on Selune.) Taken together, this is known as Albedo. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albedo) Since there are so many factors that go into a celestial body's albedo, you can easily rationalize why a closer object of the same size might still reflect the same amount of light as a further-away one.

In short - proper science starts at what we observe (same light) and works backwards to explain it. It does not start at our preconceptions and then work forwards to justify them.

[Greenish]

b) as I said, there's an enormous difference between bright nights and short nightsSo you claim, but what you base that on, I can't tell. Summer nights up north aren't just short, they're also bright (even when and where the sun does set, it doesn't get very dark).

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Psyren
In short - proper science starts at what we observe (same light) and works backwards to explain it.

"Proper science" in this case would require more information on Selûne, in particular detailed data on composition. Arrange a selunar expedition and then we'll talk. :smalltongue:

And since this is fantasy and we don't have data, we're reliant on quotes from the text. If you can find a source or a supplement that describes the selunar surface as markedly different than our own Moon, then we've got something to work with--something that indicates the writers actually did think about this issue.

If not, then "designers missed a detail" is the simplest and most sensible explanation.


Originally Posted by Psyren
…"the designers are wrong about their own setting" is not the first conclusion you should arrive at.

Considering they don't seem to have accounted for the hellacious tides a close-orbiting moon would raise, not to mention the atmospheric effects, I'm comfortable with my assessment.

[Psyren]

"Proper science" in this case would require more information on Selûne, in particular detailed data on composition. Arrange a selunar expedition and then we'll talk. :smalltongue:

And since this is fantasy and we don't have data, we're reliant on quotes from the text. If you can find a source or a supplement that describes the selunar surface as markedly different than our own Moon, then we've got something to work with--something that indicates the writers actually did think about this issue.

If not, then "designers missed a detail" is the simplest and most sensible explanation.

Indeed, explaining it would require more data - but that need doesn't change the observation itself, is the point.

In other words, if something is observed to be different than we expect it to be, it's our own assumptions that need to be challenged, not the thing itself. After all, the thing itself is there, plain as day night.



Considering they don't seem to have accounted for the hellacious tides a close-orbiting moon would raise, not to mention the atmospheric effects, I'm comfortable with my assessment.

Larger/closer objects do not necessarily have more gravitational force. At equal size and distance, the denser object would, because that is what will tell us its mass. So we're right back to simply not knowing what FR's moon is made out of.

Also, how comfortable you are with a concept is irrelevant if that concept is wrong. People were once quite comfortable with the earth being flat.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Psyren
Also, how comfortable you are with a concept is irrelevant if that concept is wrong.

I'm not sure why it matters so much to you to prove that I'm "wrong." I'd say the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate that it isn't a designer error.

Speaking of which, you seem to be a priori ruling out the possibility that the designers might have overlooked the whole moon issue, which seems like an assumption to me. Just sayin'.

:smallsmile:

[Psyren]

It doesn't "matter" to me really; just pointing out there's an easy explanation that doesn't require either breaking physics or rewriting the setting :smalltongue:

[Greenish]

It doesn't "matter" to me really; just pointing out there's an easy explanation that doesn't require either breaking physics or rewriting the setting :smalltongue:Booooooring.

[sktarq]

...that means Selûne would be 100 times as bright, about that of an overcast sunset.

If this taken as true, that would have significant effects in such things as stealth. Plus a full moon would allow for much greater socializing and work without artificial lights (and across much larger areas) - so evening outdoor social events, harvests, etc would all be more important but regulated by moon phase. Heck architecture would possibly be adjusted to let in moonlight in many areas.
So I'd say not boring

[Jeff the Green]

So you claim, but what you base that on, I can't tell. Summer nights up north aren't just short, they're also bright (even when and where the sun does set, it doesn't get very dark).

...I linked it to a review paper. It's really a settled scientific point.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by sktarq
If this taken as true, that would have significant effects in such things as stealth. Plus a full moon would allow for much greater socializing and work without artificial lights (and across much larger areas) - so evening outdoor social events, harvests, etc would all be more important but regulated by moon phase. Heck architecture would possibly be adjusted to let in moonlight in many areas.

All very good points indeed.

It's easy enough to imagine that Selûne has some grand hemispheric feature, maybe like Cassini Regio on Iapetus, which is substantially darker than our Moon's surface and conveniently reduces its albedo. (That said, there's a trailer for Neverwinter Nights 2 which shows a gleaming, icy-bright Selûne, so that's unlikely.)

However, there are other details that don't remotely fit--in particular the length of the month. Even though Selûne's diameter is the same as our Moon, its orbital period is nearly identical as well--at a distance of twenty thousand miles, which is a clear indication something is badly wrong. A moon that close wouldn't be orbiting so slowly.

A moon that close would also raise tides one or two orders of magnitude greater than Earth-normal, meaning tidal variation ten to a hundred times more than we're used to. That would flood every coastal city on the map, from Waterdeep to Halarahh and far beyond.

So, either there's some extreme peculiarity about Selûne that accounts for its bizarrely slow orbit, mysteriously reduced moonglow, and the complete absence of immense and scouring tides…or the folks writing the FRCS didn't think about those things.

[sktarq]

All very good points indeed....

So, either there's some extreme peculiarity about Selûne that accounts for its bizarrely slow orbit, mysteriously reduced moonglow, and the complete absence of immense and scouring tides…or the folks writing the FRCS didn't think about those things.
I thought about those but since The density (and thus mass) of Toril, Selûne, etc are unknown (and with such things like the underdark -possibly unknowable). And Newton's gravitational constant is up for grabs I figured it best to handwave periods that are indicative that the moon should crash into the planet in a time frame relevant to 1st level adventurers.

[Bart]

:smalltongue:Could we stay away from the Carl Sagan level astronomy, and venture into the good old; What do the PCs see when they look at the sky, day and night?:smallbiggrin: