Design and Development: Cosmology

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Ooooh, enchanted ships pushing thru the planar barriers to get to the Astral Sea -- and being the only safe way there! Hmmm, this gives ideas, yesssss.

At least until the Epic levels of 4e, when plane jumping magic could be available.

 

[Daztur]

Hate to point this out, but one of the 4e designers did work on the Exalted setting, too.

What's funny is that I've seen people talking about the similarities between the new cosmology an WoD, Exalted, Birthright, Ars Magica and a dozen others. They're not ripping off any one setting, they're just using very common mythological themes.

 

[Reaper Steve]

Well, Rich Baker just upadted his blog, saying that the Abyss is the size of 'Jupiter thousands.'
He states that Jupiter has a 80,000 mile diameter, 300 times the size of Earth.

A quick internet perusal shows that Jupiter is almost 89,000 miles in diameter (bigger than he thought), but that is just over 11 times that of Earth, not 300 (relatively much smaller.)

Garnted, it is a whole order of magnitude bigger, which is much better, but I have two issues:
1) 'Thousands' typically implies 1000-9000, so I would instead state 'the Abyss is tens of thousands of miles across.' Even better, state 'The Abyss is an almost unfathomable 100,000 miles across.'
2) Best: Go one more order of magnitude... "The Abyss is an unfathomable hundreds of thousands of miles across.'

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

A quick internet perusal shows that Jupiter is almost 89,000 miles in diameter (bigger than he thought), but that is just over 11 times that of Earth, not 300 (relatively much smaller.)

300 (or so) Earths fit inside Jupiter. Diameter is not volume.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Well, Rich Baker just upadted his blog, saying that the Abyss is the size of 'Jupiter thousands.'
He states that Jupiter has a 80,000 mile diameter, 300 times the size of Earth.

A quick internet perusal shows that Jupiter is almost 89,000 miles in diameter (bigger than he thought), but that is just over 11 times that of Earth, not 300 (relatively much smaller.)

Garnted, it is a whole order of magnitude bigger, which is much better, but I have two issues:
1) 'Thousands' typically implies 1000-9000, so I would instead state 'the Abyss is tens of thousands of miles across.' Even better, state 'The Abyss is an almost unfathomable 100,000 miles across.'
2) Best: Go one more order of magnitude... "The Abyss is an unfathomable hundreds of thousands of miles across.'

11 Earths by diameter, but 300 Earths by volume. Rich Baker got it right. Jupiter is so huge that you could fit every other planet and the whole asteroid belt inside of it, including the other big cloudy ones.

Of course, I don't understand why the Abyss has to be so big, myself. It seems ridiculous. I would much rather have an Abyss which a bunch of PCs could reasonably put a dent into. I hate the idea of planar things which are so vast that PCs can't affect them...

 

[Sir Brennen]

A quick internet perusal shows that Jupiter is almost 89,000 miles in diameter (bigger than he thought), but that is just over 11 times that of Earth, not 300 (relatively much smaller.)

I think it's about 300 times the mass of Earth. It's about 1300 times the volume. 120 times the surface area.

Okay, done now.

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

Feywild (or Fey Wilderness) and Shadowfell(s), apart from ungainly names, are an enormous improvement to D&D. In fact, Gary Gygax apparently had something like Feywild in mind from the beginning. He wrote recently:

Admittedly I actually like the Feywild and Shadowfell as names, but either way you look at 'em, they're better than making a fantasy world and calling it Oerth. And then making another one and calling it Aerth. There's a reason that Futurama's "Universe A and Universe 1" gag was a gag, after all.

 

[Reaper Steve]

300 (or so) Earths fit inside Jupiter. Diameter is not volume.

What I'm saying is that Jupiter's diameter is 11 times the diameter of the Earth. As Sir Brennan stated, 1300 Earths could fit inside Jupiter.

After rereading his blog he does state 'Jupiter's like 80,000 miles across and 300 times the size of the Earth.' I misread...I thought he thought the diameter was 300 times Earth's. (To be correct...Jupiter is 1300 times the size, 300 times the mass...so he still didn't pick the best reference.)

So that's good news...he's aware of the size he's suggesting and is fine with it.

But I still stand by my opinion that stating 'the Abyss is thousands of miles across' does not properly convey that it is meant to be able to swallow Jupiter. 'Thousands of miles across' means it can swallow one Earth at a time. 'Almost 100,000 miles across' means it can swallow over a 1000 Earths at once, with room for tens of thousands inside.

 

[helium3]

Admittedly I actually like the Feywild and Shadowfell as names, but either way you look at 'em, they're better than making a fantasy world and calling it Oerth. And then making another one and calling it Aerth. There's a reason that Futurama's "Universe A and Universe 1" gag was a gag, after all.

Blasphemy!!!

 

[Mouseferatu]

Blasphemy!!!

Well, burn me along with him, then.

I love a huge amount of what Gygax did--I don't think I'd be doing what I do for a living if I didn't --but his naming conventions were always hit-and-miss with me. He had some diamonds, absolutely, but there was also a great deal of rough to dig through to find them.