World Building details

[afstanton]

Just because the world is flat with everything else going around it does not mean it need not rotate on its own, nor does it mean it is required to not be tilted with respect to the ecliptic plane. The sun in our system does rotate. I'm unsure as to if, or how much, the axis tilts.

 

[Luna_Silvertear]

Interesting Paradox42. I've got five elements like that, though they're the classical elements with "life" being the fifth. afstanton, Then how would you go about creating (or rather explaining) a flat planet that rotates wilst a small sun revolves around it, causing eight seasons? The others have given their ideas, I'd like to hear your each one of you is bringing me closer to a final product. I'm thinking that the second cycle would be colder due to the larger of the two moons absorbing some of the light. This would greatly effect planting, not to mention whole climates.


----I just lost the Game.

 

[afstanton]

If the sun goes all the way around the planet once a day, it's not entirely clear to me how a year is defined at all, actually. That does require some thought.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The idea of a "year" on a flat world that's the center of the system makes no sense. If we ignore that part of it we can make a world with two seasonal cycles that vary, though:

The "sun" is actually two stars in very close proximity, their orbital period is very close to a day but is not exactly a day--the difference is enough to add up to two days/year. One star is brighter than the other.

For one of the two cycles the bright star is the one mostly in front during the day, for the other it's mostly behind.

 

[paradox42]

Of course a year makes sense in a system where the sun goes around the world. That's how Earth humans thought Earth worked, for thousands of years, don't forget! The key point here is that the very idea of a "year" as a unit of time only makes sense in context with seasons. That was how and why ancient humans of Earth started counting years; what they were really doing was counting when seasons would start and end. The fact that we don't think of it that way today is irrelevant; the concept of a year is inextricably linked to the concept of seasons.

If this planetdisc has a sun that orbits it, but it still manages to have seasons, then the inhabitants of the planetdisc will work out what a "year" is by how long it takes the seasons to complete one cycle. That idea of having two suns which happen to be very close together is a good one, I think; you could have one white star and one red, or something similar- then one season gets named the "red winter," for example, whereas half a year later the season is the "white winter." Makes perfect sense- and then you get names for holidays to mark the seasonal shift, too. Two of the equinoxes would be "pink," perhaps.

 

[afstanton]

I am reminded of the world of Dark Crystal, with 3 suns, and the occasional triple eclipse.

 

[Aramax]

If it's flat, presumably like a pancake or wide sheet of "ground," but it's in a universe where orbits actually happen more or less as they do in ours, then clearly it's an artificial construct. No natural object the size of a planet can form a flat shape, gravity causes them to collapse into a sphere. Assuming this is the case, then you already have a major deus ex machina in your world's backstory, and can explain the seasons however you like- perhaps elemental gates open up at different times of the year, and the predominant magical energy from the gates causes the seasons.

If your world somehow is not a created thing, with that flat shape, then clearly the laws of physics are very different in your world's universe, and that means orbits and celestial mechanics work differently. Which, again, gives you an out for explaining any apparent anomalies.

Knowing why the world is flat (and precisely how it's shaped) might help us come up with a reason to explain the seasons, in other words.

You are dead WRONG!,Gravity works the way the DM says it does.Period.
Real world physics has NOTHING to do w/D&D,and has no place in it!

 

[paradox42]

You are dead WRONG!,Gravity works the way the DM says it does.Period.
Real world physics has NOTHING to do w/D&D,and has no place in it!

I can't tell whether this is sarcastic, or not. If it isn't, then I'll remind the poster that BadWrongFunning another GM is Bad Form. I'll also ask: how many times has your game reached a level where it had divine PCs going around the universe making worlds of their own, hmmm?

 

[paradox42]

I am reminded of the world of Dark Crystal, with 3 suns, and the occasional triple eclipse.

Great example! We don't even know what that world's seasons were like, but clearly the three suns would have had some effect. And the triple eclipse happened once every thousand years, IIRC? One wonders how the world's inhabitants even measured "years," for that purpose.

 

[DragonLancer]

Maybe the inhabitants mark a new year when a certain set of constellations return to the night sky? that way due to the nature of your solar system you could have two sets of seasons to a year.