Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Eldritch_Lord 11-04-07, 11:33 AM	When I was sitting down to write up my next campaign world, I decided first off that there would be a round earth, one sun, one moon, and so on because it's familiar. Then I thought, "Why go with that just because it's easy? Other campaign worlds have multiple moons. But how would messing with the moon(s) have an effect?" I'm throwing the discussion open to the boards. Most worlds, official or otherwise, have one moon just like Earth; the exceptions, most notably Dragonlance and Eberron, usually treat the moons as other planes, so their interactions with the world are ignored. However, what effect would either removing the moon or increasing the number of moons have on a world? Some examples I thought of: Physical Effects: Tides: The moon creates the tides; what effect would either having no tides (no moon) or weird tides (many moons) have on life, the oceans, etc.? Axial tilt: The moon for the most part keeps the Earth rotating around the same general axis, and if it didn't, the world would swing around wildly. What kinds of weather, natural disasters, etc. would there be? Psychological effects: Duality: In folk stories, the sun and moon are often anthropomorphized into two complementary or opposing deities or two abstract concepts. What would people's perception of the sun and stars be if there were no moon to contrast them with, or how would people think of multiple moons if you didn't have the moon goddess or the moon whatever? Culture: What kind of civilization would evolve if there were no moon to light the sky against the dangers of the night? What kind of timekeeping system would evolve if there were more than one moon by which to track months, seasons, etc.? What are your ideas? Any contributions are appreciated; they don't necessarily have to be physically or psychologically correct (if I wanted that I could Google "loss of the moon"), but rather reasonable in a fantasy context.
Kezot 11-04-07, 06:37 PM	Interesting. I thought of running a campaign where the moon was actually a notable plot element (it was inhabited, how original), so I ended up thinking of a lot of these things. Physics are a little easier to deal with because they are fairly constant. If gravity works the same way in your setting as it does here on Earth, then you can count on things working regularly. Having a bigger or smaller moon is probably easier to figure out than having lots of them. If the moon is larger, the planet and moon will start to act like a double planet, with each orbiting the other (think Pluto and Charon). Smaller, and the effect on the planet is lessened. Tides get more pronounced if the moon is bigger, while a moonless planet may have no tides at all (don't trust me on this, I'm no scientist). A smaller moon has to be closer to stay gravitationally bound, a larger one must be further to avoid crashing. A quick look into how the moon affects the Earth in real life should answer most basic physics questions that you might have about singular moon planets. Multiple moons becomes slightly more complicated. Many otherwise unimportant questions become substantial. Do all the moons orbit the same way? Which ones are tide locked (one face always shows), and which ones are not? Do any of them turn retrograde? How far from the planet and each other are they? These questions can be brushed aside a little bit (simply stating that the moons are in a stable system should be enough for your purposes), but they would matter more for the myth purposes. For example, the great moon of Yuar is like the moon of Earth, and is large enough to block the sun, while the lesser red moon of Goronarra sometimes passes in front of Yuar, creating the dreaded red nights, when monsters are said to wander the earth. It is not too much of a stretch to say that Goronarra is inhabited by Devils intent on destroying the world. Philosophical and religious issues are the more likely to change. If there is a moon god for one moon, you may have a different pantheon entirely when you add in three or four extra satellites. There may be a church of the six moons, with the six sisters of the night being worshipped equally and all granting the same domains. Or maybe Ture, god of the smallest moon, hates his sister Manula, the eldest moon. Nearly every society on Earth has myths about eclipses of the sun and moon, but what about the dreaded Dark Alignment, when all three moons block the sun at once and open the gates to the underworld? Unfortunately, I have something to deal with in real life at the moment. Should time permit, I shall continue this train of thought.
Tsochar 11-04-07, 10:43 PM	On a whim I decided to have two moons, and after a roll of the dice I ended up with 24-day months. For simplicity, I put them in 3:8 orbital resonance, 1 with a 3-day orbit and one with an 8-day orbit, so that the 24 days are when they coincide at full every month. Both are retrograde with regard to the planet's spin. To spice things up, I decided to have the real month be around a fifth-day shorter than 24 (actually 23.79664, random number). There were arduous calculations involved, but I managed to get everything going. Since in my campaign around 1% of people are afflicted by lycanthropy (i.e, you probably know a werewolf, wererat or similar), and there are ten full moons in a month rather than one (let's not forget that the month is shorter), all that adds up to, on average, 154 full moons per year, which needless to say magnifies the presence of such creatures considerably. During the course of my calculations, I found out a couple of things. First off, the amount of light that reflects off the moons is not a sinusoidal curve but a piecewise linear function. New moon, 0 light, 1/8 month, 1/4 light, 1/2 month, full light, and then it starts to go down, until it gets to 1 month, 0 light. Additionally, you have to reference Kepler quite a bit when calculating tidal effects.
Eldritch_Lord 11-05-07, 10:17 AM	Interesting. I thought of running a campaign where the moon was actually a notable plot element (it was inhabited, how original), so I ended up thinking of a lot of these things. Physics are a little easier to deal with because they are fairly constant. If gravity works the same way in your setting as it does here on Earth, then you can count on things working regularly. Having a bigger or smaller moon is probably easier to figure out than having lots of them. If the moon is larger, the planet and moon will start to act like a double planet, with each orbiting the other (think Pluto and Charon). Smaller, and the effect on the planet is lessened. Tides get more pronounced if the moon is bigger, while a moonless planet may have no tides at all (don't trust me on this, I'm no scientist). A smaller moon has to be closer to stay gravitationally bound, a larger one must be further to avoid crashing. A quick look into how the moon affects the Earth in real life should answer most basic physics questions that you might have about singular moon planets. Yeah, I'm assuming physics works the same way here as in real life; otherwise, all bets are off. After a year of AP physics I know more about single-moon systems than I ever wanted to know, so I'm good on that score. ;) Multiple moons becomes slightly more complicated. Many otherwise unimportant questions become substantial. Do all the moons orbit the same way? Which ones are tide locked (one face always shows), and which ones are not? Do any of them turn retrograde? How far from the planet and each other are they? These questions can be brushed aside a little bit (simply stating that the moons are in a stable system should be enough for your purposes), but they would matter more for the myth purposes. For example, the great moon of Yuar is like the moon of Earth, and is large enough to block the sun, while the lesser red moon of Goronarra sometimes passes in front of Yuar, creating the dreaded red nights, when monsters are said to wander the earth. It is not too much of a stretch to say that Goronarra is inhabited by Devils intent on destroying the world. I didn't even consider the effect of multiple lunar eclipses; the significance of which moon passes on which side and how often can be a great source of myths and religious stuff. Philosophical and religious issues are the more likely to change. If there is a moon god for one moon, you may have a different pantheon entirely when you add in three or four extra satellites. There may be a church of the six moons, with the six sisters of the night being worshipped equally and all granting the same domains. Or maybe Ture, god of the smallest moon, hates his sister Manula, the eldest moon. Nearly every society on Earth has myths about eclipses of the sun and moon, but what about the dreaded Dark Alignment, when all three moons block the sun at once and open the gates to the underworld? Unfortunately, I have something to deal with in real life at the moment. Should time permit, I shall continue this train of thought. The whole issue of pantheon vs. individual moons is a good one; lots of religious interactions and societal preferences could be structured off a glorified version of "My moon is better than your moon!" "Is not!" "Is too!" between churches. On a whim I decided to have two moons, and after a roll of the dice I ended up with 24-day months. For simplicity, I put them in 3:8 orbital resonance, 1 with a 3-day orbit and one with an 8-day orbit, so that the 24 days are when they coincide at full every month. Both are retrograde with regard to the planet's spin. To spice things up, I decided to have the real month be around a fifth-day shorter than 24 (actually 23.79664, random number). There were arduous calculations involved, but I managed to get everything going. Since in my campaign around 1% of people are afflicted by lycanthropy (i.e, you probably know a werewolf, wererat or similar), and there are ten full moons in a month rather than one (let's not forget that the month is shorter), all that adds up to, on average, 154 full moons per year, which needless to say magnifies the presence of such creatures considerably. During the course of my calculations, I found out a couple of things. First off, the amount of light that reflects off the moons is not a sinusoidal curve but a piecewise linear function. New moon, 0 light, 1/8 month, 1/4 light, 1/2 month, full light, and then it starts to go down, until it gets to 1 month, 0 light. Additionally, you have to reference Kepler quite a bit when calculating tidal effects. Putting way too much math into small details, eh? Someone after my own heart. :D I like your months structure and your take on lycanthropy; was the info on light during different phases available somewhere already, and if not, how did you determine how much light is given off at each step of the function? Great ideas, both of you; everyone keep 'em coming!
Arco Versipellis 11-06-07, 12:03 AM	I was interested in the same thing, and I got lucky and cauht a special on it. Aside from what you've mentioned, one man believed, as the tide, the gravitational effect of the moon caused earthquakes. Others said the effects were to small to be an influence. But with more moons, it is even more possible I would think. Also, the moon was tied to werewolves and trickery lrgely because of it's shapechanging ability. I believe it is the only heavenly body that does so. I had four moons, each a deity, created by the "Sun King." I condensed them down and added a color aspect to the shapechanging. The moon deites all dwelled on Luna within their own realm, though these domains bleed into each other. At different times throughout the year, each takes dominance over Luna, and the heavenly body glows with a tint reflecting that deity. Hope that helps.
Tsochar 11-06-07, 01:36 AM	how did you determine how much light is given off at each step of the function? Graph paper and a mechanical pencil. Seriously, though, when I realized that the light reflects all angles more or less equally, I had only to measure by the size of the angle facing the planet. Since the orbit is near-circular, the angle changes at a constant rate, so the magnitude of the light reaching the planet follows a function that looks like this: /\/\/\/\/ (easily replicated by (arccos cos theta)/180) There are minor deviations; slight eccentricity in the orbit causes the angle <theta> to deviate from the time function, stretching some areas and compressing others. This has an effect of slightly altering the slope of the graph in a predictable but complicated fashion, such that the nearer portions are less. Kepler's laws, mathematically processed, gives a planetary velocity in a single elliptical orbit as inversely proportional to the distance from the system's barycenter. Taking distance into the equation, we have the rate of change in theta as inversely proportional to the square of the distance. At this point, there is no simple means of providing a function to correct for this error, so it must be done manually after much calculation. Thankfully, the effect is minimal for most moons, where eccentricity can be approximated at 0 In addition, when one accounts for the fact that it is impossible to see exactly 180 degrees of a sphere from any real point in space, the phase tends to 'stick' until the actual angle is reached; for any planet-moon system, the moon's radius divided by the distance to the viewer is equal to the sine of an arbitrary angle a, and the complement of a equals half the visible angle, which is the angle of the moon you see at all times, usually just shy of 180. By multiplying by 180 and dividing by the visble angle while keeping the average steady, and then 'snipping off' the values exceeding full or falling beneath zero by replacing them with full and zero, respectively, this error can easily be corrected in the function. :mymy: woah, my brain surprises even me sometimes
Arco Versipellis 11-07-07, 11:53 PM	Ths is a qestion that I had thought up, but forgotten about. It popped up in response to the moon acting as a shield against meteors. The moon does not rotate, as I understand it. One side of the on continously face the earth, so that the other is shroude i arkness (the dark side of the moon). How is it that the light side of the moon has meteor impacts all over it. It seems to me that the window of opporunity would be very small.
Fireclave 11-08-07, 12:34 AM	Ths is a qestion that I had thought up, but forgotten about. It popped up in response to the moon acting as a shield against meteors. The moon does not rotate, as I understand it. One side of the on continously face the earth, so that the other is shroude i arkness (the dark side of the moon). How is it that the light side of the moon has meteor impacts all over it. It seems to me that the window of opporunity would be very small. It's actually a rather large window of opportunity. Although it only has about 13.5th the surface area of the earth, the moon is still quite a large target for stray space debris (it's diameter is about the width of the United States). And the moon is much too far away from the earth, approximately 240,000 miles, for earth to keep the moon's surface blemish free for the 4.6 billion years of the solar system's existence. Especially true when the solar system was young and planetoids were constantly colliding with other planetoids. And unlike on earth, their are no forces present on the moon to erode the presence old craters that do occur (save additional impacts), making any creators effectively permanent.
Bobfred21 11-08-07, 12:40 AM	Also, there was a time when the moon wasn't stuck in orbit around the earth. It's likely many of the craters were made before it got caught in Earth's orbit.
Fireclave 11-08-07, 12:55 AM	Also, there was a time when the moon wasn't stuck in orbit around the earth. It's likely many of the craters were made before it got caught in Earth's orbit. If you are talking about the captured moon theory, that's only one of several debated moon origin theories. Though my favorite (for no other reason than because it sounds cool) is the one where our moon was formed when a massive body collided into earth and basically tore a chunk off that became our moon. I don't remember the specifics of how that conclusion was drawn though.
Artifact 11-08-07, 06:49 AM	Check out Dragon Magazine #340. Its an issue devoted to astrology (as it pertains to D&D) and inside is an article callled "Eye of Night: The Moon and its role in D&D", written by Craig Cambell. It discusses the history and myth of the moon, how to develop a lunar calendar, the effects of multiple moons, lunar events (such as a blood moon or a blue moon), and even scetches out a Church of Linara and stats its deity. Also, the article introduces a variant Moon-Warded Ranger, and a variant Lunar Rogue. "Born under the Moon" feats are also described, as well as "Magic of the Moon" (spells). All in all, its an in-depth article and very well written. Of course, the Sun is given equal representation in the same issue with the article "The Eternal Light" by Chris Tulach. There's even an article dedicated to astrology in general (by Hal Maclean), Ecology of the Mooncalf, and also a Master Astrologer prestige class to round out the issue. If your interested, back issues can be ordered from paizo.com. /\ Art
Eldritch_Lord 11-08-07, 06:56 PM	Check out Dragon Magazine #340. Its an issue devoted to astrology (as it pertains to D&D) and inside is an article callled "Eye of Night: The Moon and its role in D&D", written by Craig Cambell. It discusses the history and myth of the moon, how to develop a lunar calendar, the effects of multiple moons, lunar events (such as a blood moon or a blue moon), and even scetches out a Church of Linara and stats its deity. Also, the article introduces a variant Moon-Warded Ranger, and a variant Lunar Rogue. "Born under the Moon" feats are also described, as well as "Magic of the Moon" (spells). All in all, its an in-depth article and very well written. Of course, the Sun is given equal representation in the same issue with the article "The Eternal Light" by Chris Tulach. There's even an article dedicated to astrology in general (by Hal Maclean), Ecology of the Mooncalf, and also a Master Astrologer prestige class to round out the issue. If your interested, back issues can be ordered from paizo.com. /\ Art Awesome! This is exactly what I was looking for! Thanks a bunch.
Anuvrix 11-08-07, 09:42 PM	GAH!!! *#&$% @*$& @#&%^* @#^!!!! :banghead: :censored: :headexplo I spent 40 min. typing a post and it glitched and didn't go through....... I'll repost tomorrow..... :weep: :raincloud
Arco Versipellis 11-10-07, 12:15 AM	It's actually a rather large window of opportunity. Although it only has about 13.5th the surface area of the earth, the moon is still quite a large target for stray space debris (it's diameter is about the width of the United States). And the moon is much too far away from the earth, approximately 240,000 miles, for earth to keep the moon's surface blemish free for the 4.6 billion years of the solar system's existence. Especially true when the solar system was young and planetoids were constantly colliding with other planetoids. And unlike on earth, their are no forces present on the moon to erode the presence old craters that do occur (save additional impacts), making any creators effectively permanent. Thanks. You guys and your statistics. The corrosion bit is something I would have never considered. Personally, I like the theory about the moon formed from the collision better as well.
Tsochar 11-11-07, 07:49 AM	If you are talking about the captured moon theory, that's only one of several debated moon origin theories. Though my favorite (for no other reason than because it sounds cool) is the one where our moon was formed when a massive body collided into earth and basically tore a chunk off that became our moon. I don't remember the specifics of how that conclusion was drawn though. Personally, I like the theory about the moon formed from the collision better as well. The moon is slowly moving farther and farther from the earth, and won't stabilize until it gets to be 600,000 miles away. From this, it follows that the earth and moon were once part of the same celestial object. Newton calculated the moon-earth system backwards from current-day to within just 5000 miles. Unfortunately, to go farther was mathematically impossible. With computer simulations, modern scientists have determined that the earth would have had to spin so fast prior to the moon's separation that it couldn't possibly have a 24-hour day. There are some possible situations in which such an impact could have formed the moon, but personally I'm not confident in that theory.
Anuvrix 11-16-07, 09:18 AM	Alright, it took longer than expected, but i can post now. My planet has 9 moons. only one of them is in a stable orbit. that moon is man-made. The other moons are natural and are spiraling slowly inwards towards the planet. eventually they will crash into it, all in a strictly choreographed fall. I want to know how this will affect life on the planet. such as tides, peoples mindsets, mythologies, and so on. it will not have a massive meteor effect to to the unusual magical nature of the moons, they will each create cracks in the worlds surface, widening with each collision, until on the 8th time, the world is f%&$ed.
Tsochar 11-18-07, 02:44 AM	What is the timeframe between collisions? Are we talking hours, days, weeks, months, or years? And for that matter, how quickly are they spiraling inward? Is it millennia from present or more like a few months? Or maybe you want to go the Majora's Mask route and make it 3 days? I would think that, given the conservation of rotational inertia, months would get shorter as time wore on, and as the planets got closer the tides would be affected to a much greater extent. Let's see... the center of mass of the water would be at the barycenter of the system, which would shift more and more according to the inverse square of the distance between them. If they came ten times closer, tides would be a hundred times higher (though I'd have to do the math to be sure). Also, once the roche limit is breached, anything not held to the surface by something other than the moons' gravity would literally fall off toward the planet, since the moons' gravitational field would be neutralized by the planet's, so expect shooting stars when the end is near.
Anuvrix 11-18-07, 08:55 AM	All 8 moons fall within 1375 years exactly, with the first moon at the start and the last at the end. They fall one every 171.someodd years. This leaves plenty of time for the people to rebuild before the next one hits, or even forget about the impending doom if they're lucky. The time system was origionally based off of the moons, but does not change. That data is exactly what i was looking for!! As the moons get closer, the tides increase, meteors fall from the sky, and such other things. My problem is what other things are there? Once all of the moons are gone (except for the stable one) there will be only one moon, with a 300 day lunar cycle. The effect on lycanthropes would be astronomical. (pun intended)
Tsochar 11-18-07, 04:20 PM	As the moons get closer they rotate more and more quickly, decreasing the time between full moons. In your world, do lycanthropes change when any given moon is full, or only when there is a combination or something? Also, what are the periods of revolution of each moon?
Anuvrix 11-19-07, 01:04 PM	Yes, the lycanthropes do change every full moon, and that is why the single moon left will have a profound effect upon the lycanthrope population. During the last few days before each fall, the sky would be dominated by the moon, at all times of the day. I have not figured out exactly what the revolutional periods are yet, but as you said, the closer they are, the faster it is. I figure that as each one gets nearer, it will assume the revolutional period of the one that was there before it. So, the farthest moons will be (appearing to the unknoledgable people) to stop having full moons.
Tsochar 11-20-07, 02:43 AM	(After looking it up, it turns out that tides are actually proportional to the inverse of the cube of the distance. The figures given in the description are rough estimates based upon widely varying data. Please note that past a certain point the tides may behave unexpectedly. Also, I did not take into account the effects of tidal locking, which at the end would be a very significant variable.) The period of revolution is proportional to the square root of the cube of the distance from the planet, so if they are drawn in at, say, a linear rate, then... For simplicity's sake, let's assume it happens to the earth-moon system. It'll crash in 1325 years. Assuming it is drawn in at a linear rate, few people would notice until a few years after when calendars begin to predict the phases late. After a century, it would be widely known that the moon is somehow moving in, since there are now 13-14 lunar months in a year and tides now vary by an additional 10 inches in either direction, for a total of 8 or 9 feet. After 200 years, years would have 15-16 lunar months, and tides would be four feet more varied. 500 years pass. Months are now only 2 weeks long, and from high to low tide the variance is over 25 feet. 700 years. Months are 10 days long, and tides vary by 55 feet. 1000; A full moon happens once per 4 1/2 days. The moon looks four times its normal size in the sky, and tides vary by 300(!) feet. At midtide the water may recede by 8 inches per minute in depth; at one point you could almost drive from Cuba to Florida, but 7-8 hours later neither of them exist significantly above water. There are 200 years until the crash. Full moons happen every other night. High tide is a quarter mile above low tide, and due to the fast rate of revolution high tide occurs only once daily. If you hurry, you could drive from Big Ben to the Eiffel tower, then just make it up to the observation deck as most of the structure is engulfed by tides. 100 years. The moon revolves so quickly, it has overtaken the earth, and now high tide occurs every 3 days. That is, of course, unless it has been tidally locked, in which case the tides would just sort of stay put. 4400 feet above and below sea level are the tidal extremes. If you live east of the Mississippi, god help you. If you don't own a house in the Alps, Europe is a poor living choice. The moon now looks ten times larger than it first did. 50 years. The moon is 18 times its original size. One month is 10 hours, which makes high tide once every 12 hours again. Elevation doesn't really matter anymore; it's just a slight deviation in the time during which your area is submerged. 20 years. The moon started to crack and warp in some places some years ago. If you open your palm in your outstretched hand, it's bigger than that. 5 hour months. 3 hours between high tides. At its greatest, the tide may rise or fall at a rate of 23 feet per second. No region, be it a tall mountain or a deep ocean trench, is free from the tide. It leaves half the planet dry and half submerged, and the transition pelts the coast with tsunamis. The sheer force of the water's travel would cause the winds to travel with great speed in their direction, and the erosion of the surface would likely cause a great deal of sediment to float around the froth, smoothing out the surface of the earth gradually. 1 year. Depending on where you live, the Moon would dominate the sky. I mean, like, if you were at ground zero it would look like the ship from independence day, except you can't discern much detail unless you're looking straight up. for the past decade meteors have been raining down on you and the whole moon looks like it's breaking apart. When it hits, it breaks apart the crust, such that it looks like.... you know those high-speed collision cameras? Where you see an apple getting shot by a bullet and there's a whole lot of matter being ejected? Like that, except smaller by comparison and A LOT slower. I mean, like, you could watch it for hours just seeing cracks spread in the crust, then slowly form irregular shapes before they are lifted and shot into the air in slow-motion. The ones nearest impact, the smallest, fly in high trajectory out into space where some are never seen again and others fly into orbit. The mantle glows dull red for a while, as do the pieces before they cool off. The larger, farther pieces of crust might re-impact the planet, crushing the inhabitants of some other geographical region underneath, or they might stay where they are. The pieces of the moon are forced down into the core of the main world, where over the millennia it will settle into a new inner earth. Left behind is a crater, roughly the size of the impacting object, which is filled rapidly over the next few years with magma. Water pours into the crater, and rapidly boils away, falling as rain and reevaporating. Thus the crater becomes a maelstrom of torrential weather, and clouds of steam, dust and smog cover the earth. The dust settles after a couple of years, and the ring around the planet thins out over a thousand or so years. The seas gradually regenerate as volcanic smog belches water vapor into the air. Most everything is back to normal by the time the next moon hits. Now this opens up a lot of opportunities for interesting postimpact societies; these suggestions are based upon a D&D campaign, and not Earth. Take one piece of crust that flipped on top of another. Now you have an enormous cavern, reasonably protected against heat to some degree, depending on how it landed, and if enough water came with the pieces, that could absorb some of the extra heat. Or maybe a piece of underdark is forced under the crust to the core, somehow surviving; sealing it and leaving the native creatures to adapt. Maybe a piece of crust has been launched into orbit, and the inhabitants must live in a magical dome. Ordinary creatures gain the ability to fly in the powerful updrafts of the maelstrom at the crater, provided they can stand the heat. (If tidal locking were to occur, the tides would act much differently, likely settling as a near-perfect sphere centered not at the earth's core but farther toward the moon. The description of tides probably falls apart within 20 years of impact, but a few of the catastrophic effects would be accurate, imo.)
Anuvrix 11-20-07, 12:24 PM	This is where wall of force and permanency come in handy :D . That would suck to live through. The only difference from that and my world is that the moon does not sink to the center, it remains broken into pieces in a generally spherical shape. and rests so that its leading edge is 20 miles beneath the surface. This occurs 8 times. One important thing to remember in my case is that the world is cracking as each moon hits. the cracks do not fill with magma, I have not come up wiht a specific reason for this yet, buit IT WILL COME!!!:D
Kelmourne 11-23-07, 06:46 PM	The whole moon thing is kinda pointless in a world of paralel universes and other planes of existence. Why not leave the whole moon/sun/solar system thing unsolved or make your world flat with infinitely large oceans around the edges?
Eldritch_Lord 11-23-07, 07:42 PM	The whole moon thing is kinda pointless in a world of paralel universes and other planes of existence. Why not leave the whole moon/sun/solar system thing unsolved or make your world flat with infinitely large oceans around the edges? First, this is more of a thought experiment than an "I'm definitely going to make a campaign with this" kind of thing. Second, look at Eberron and Dragonlance; maybe the moon/sun/solar system are the parallel universes and other planes of existence. Third, because the material plane is the baseline and where the PCs spend most of their time, changing how things work there really changes the flavor, background, and other characteristics of your campaign setting.
Kelmourne 11-23-07, 07:47 PM	I agree that it is possible to have other planets as the other planes of existence but in the end it seems a fruitless attempt to scientifically justify DnD.
Novem 11-23-07, 08:35 PM	I agree that it is possible to have other planets as the other planes of existence but in the end it seems a fruitless attempt to scientifically justify DnD. Not justify, just have science be a part of. I love this idea. All of my worlds take place of spheres orbiting stars, and, unless stated otherwise (such as by magic or rules) the laws of physics work as they normally do.
Artifact 11-23-07, 08:40 PM	Here's a little something I cooked up for my homebrew. Its a bit more fantastic and less scientific, but I like sharing ideas when I can: Most people believe there is but a single moon traveling the night skies of Everest. The elves know differently however: There are in fact, two moons that occupy the heavens. This other moon is perceived only by the elves. It is invisible and intangible to all others; its silvery radiance falling only upon the elves. The origin of this moon lies within elven history and has close ties to their religion. The elves worship a pantheon of gods known as the Seldarine. Within the Seldarine is an individual deity known as the Champion. This deity is the progenitor of the other gods and creator of the elven race. It has two aspects: one male (symbolized by a sun, which elves call Solaris) and one female (symbolized by a moon, which elves call Selene). In the homeland of Arvanaith, the elves saw these celestial orbs when they gazed into the night sky. Ages ago, when the elves first arrived in Alphere, the twin orbs, Solaris and Selene came with them. To the elves, the two were a reminder that the Seldarine accompanied and blessed them on their travels. Since the Time of Darkness however, Solaris has remained hidden. No longer do the elves perceive its light or bask in its warmth. Selene has remained with them however. After the Time of Darkness, the elves found themselves essentially in exile; the pathway to their homeland of Arvanaith was lost. The fact that Selene remains with them is a comfort of sorts, for it represents a Solemn promise: the Seldarine have not abandoned their children; the elves will one day return to Arvanaith. On the other hand, the disappearance of Solaris represents a somber warning: the elves are not of this land; they must remain separate if they are to one-day return to Arvanaith. Although non-elves do not perceive or interact with Selene, it is an actual, physical moon. It is considered a secondary moon however, holding a lesser position than its counterpart. Selene affects the tides to some extent, but it bows to the greater power of the primary moon. The few non-elves who are aware of its existence sometimes refer to it as the Solace Moon. Design Note: Elves can see twice as far as a human in starlight, moonlight, torchlight, and similar conditions of poor illumination. This is a racial trait known as low-light vision. The fact that only elves can see the moonlight from Selene might be one way to explain such ability. It is also worth noting: Elves are sometimes described as seeing and hearing things that others cannot. In this case, that is certainly true. Tell me if ya like it ;).