Scarred Lands: Ask the Sage [This keeps up, I'm gonna need a bigger notebook!]

[JoeGKushner]

The Return of the Masters mentioned in Echoes of the Past seems pretty comprehensive. Has there been any nodd to that in the newer products? I know not many have come out but thought I'd ask.

Speaking of which, are there any plans to update the information of how Psionics fit into the SL setting now that the Expanded Psionics Handbook has come out? The SSS website really needs to start putting some bonus material and errata out there.

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

The hardbacks do not give any idea of the size/scale of the world, or the color of the sun. Blood Sea: Crimson Abyss, does detail the distance between Shelzar and Termana. There's no exact location yet but we'll see maybe down the road as Asherak and the rest of the world gets more detailed. As for how I imagine it, Termana is southwesterly of Ghelspad, with Shelzar being the closest port and Rahoch the next closest. The sun is a red giant like our own. It also has two moons, 16 constellations and that's it.

Thanks!

I knew there was a reason I dislike off the shelf DnD worlds. The level of research, the map accuracy, the physical geography and the cosmology are truly staggering!

So, how do the two moons affect the tides?

Exactly how is the sun a red giant like our own? Have I missed something?

GOM

 

[Nightfall]

Joe,

There was some mention about what happened in Echoes in Edge but not very detailed. Mostly just that optional part involving what was mentioned there.

Regarding updating to 3.5 psionics, I'm not sure there will be anything in the near future, but maybe down the road we'll see another set of PG guides designed for 3.5 psionic classes.

Grumpy,

I was mistaken about the red sun. I meant yellow. As for how the moons affect the tides, so far they just keep things about normal. Well as normal as you can have it with a sea of blood. Also it's Southeasterly from Shelzar to Termana. My bad. Otherwise there's not like a great deal of details regarding "real world" physics.

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

I was mistaken about the red sun. I meant yellow. As for how the moons affect the tides, so far they just keep things about normal. Well as normal as you can have it with a sea of blood. Also it's Southeasterly from Shelzar to Termana. My bad. Otherwise there's not like a great deal of details regarding "real world" physics.

Red Sun/Yellow Sun, moons that don't affect the tide, Seas of Blood, Southeast or Northwest, who cares! And I thought that Greyhawk was geogrphically challenged!

Congratulations on your sterling sales pitch. Next you'll be telling me that there are no Orcs (gasp) but 200 new monsters. Not sold, sorry!

GOM

 

[MDSnowman]

Red Sun/Yellow Sun, moons that don't affect the tide, Seas of Blood, Southeast or Northwest, who cares! And I thought that Greyhawk was geogrphically challenged!

Congratulations on your sterling sales pitch. Next you'll be telling me that there are no Orcs (gasp) but 200 new monsters. Not sold, sorry!

GOM

Umm okay thank you for shopping with us and have a nice day

 

[Nightfall]

Uhm didn't realize I was selling anything either MD. I guess if you want geographically sound places, Kingdoms of Kalamar is more your style.

If you want a world where the Players have fun, orcs aren't the only troublesome things, and the fact arcane spellcasting makes sense, then yes Scarred Lands is for you.

In any case Joe, I do want stress the maybe part of SL psionic class books. I am hopeful but we'll see.

 

[eryndel]

Red Sun/Yellow Sun, moons that don't affect the tide, Seas of Blood, Southeast or Northwest, who cares! And I thought that Greyhawk was geogrphically challenged!

Congratulations on your sterling sales pitch.

First off, Nightfall knows a lot about the Scarred Lands and has quite bit of love for and devotion to the Scarred Lands, but he's not a salesman. I'd suggest making a decision on purchasing through other sources like reviews or actually skimming the book.

Furthermore, I made a post either here or one of the other three "Ask the Sage" threads about scientific realism and the Scarred Lands. SL is as scientifically realistic as you want it to be, constrained by the fact that Gods actually walk around and magic exists. The sun is yellow star, about 1 solar mass happily living on the main sequence. It has two moons, one closer (Belsameth's orb) and larger, the other farther away and smaller (the Forbidden orb). Because the second moon is more distant, the tidal contribution would be a second order pertubation. The tides on this scientifically plausible Scarn would be mostly like those on Earth, save for perhaps greater variations between how high "high tide" is or how low "low tide" is. These extremum would fluctuate throughout the cycle of the Forbidden Orb. Since this is a four-body system, we would expect to see resonances between the Sun-Scarn, Belsameth's Orb-Scarn, Forbidden Orb-Scarn cycles and interaction terms. This resonance is likely what causes the periodic Blood Monsoons that rage along the eastern half of Scarn. This is ignoring general relativistic effects which are notoriously difficult to handle in the four body case. The nonlinearities inherent in these effects might predict dispersive terms which would mitigate the differences between Scarn tides and Earth tides.

Or maybe it's just Kadum splashing around down there.

Werner

 

[Nightfall]

Werner,

Thanks for the support. (Though I do try the occasional fan boy rant about how good the setting is, I just can't sell any. I just don't have that kind of clout)

Also I think it's Kadum swishing around myself.

 

[eryndel]

No problem Nightfall, next time just let me field the science questions.

 

[Nightfall]

No problem Werner. I'll be more than happy to do so from now on.