[4thVariety]

What we know about Tyria

(1) It is round! Why? Because we have volcanoes and plate tectonics. If Tyria was flat with borders, the pressure would force the magma to the sides, not upwards. Since the magma pressure is directed upwards we can say that this is the direction of least resistance. If that is not enough for you then the nail in the coffin is Tyria having a magnetic north and Aurora Borealis. Let's assume Tyria was flat with a giant ACME magnet stuck beneath, then all compasses would point to the middle of "flat Tyria", i.e. point below which is giant magnet. Only there could Aurora Borealis occur, because only there the magnetic field does not repell the solar wind. Since the compass does not always point to the Shiverpeaks, the point at which we observe Aurora Borealis, we can rule that out as a possibility. Hence magnetism is created at the core of a round planet called Tyria.

(2) Tyria is tilted to its side. Because Tyria has seasons, the planet requires to have a tilt. It is that simple. Before anybody argues, distance to the sun has NOTHING to do with seasons. Exact measurement on the axial tilt are impossible as GW's world simulation is not exact enough.

(3) Tyria has a moon, albeit with a highly erratic orbit. The difference in size the moon appears to the eye indicates a stable orbit with highly variable distance. In contrast to the nearly constant orbit of Earth's moon, we can say Tyria's moon is not the result of a collision, but that it was most likely trapped while crossing Tyria's gravitational field. How the moon got trapped by a mage or someone would make for one wild piece of background lore.

(4) Tyria revolves around a sun. This is especially tricky since the sun appears to be in the same spot in the game all day. Except when it is night, then we see the moon in the sun's position shining brightly, hence the sun must be on the other side. Something therefore revolves around something. But I have an ace up my sleeve why Tyria revolves around the sun. The heavier body will always circle the lighter one! The gravity of Tyria is not high enough for an hydrogen ball of that weight to ignite into a sun. Hence the sun is the heavier object, hence Tyria is revolving around the sun.

(5) No Space Aliens for now. Look up into the night sky and you will see.... ...no stars. No other planets. Nothing. Quite unsettling if you ask me. But there is pan-dimensional travel, not only to parallel planes, but also to /root, i.e. the mists. That has to count for something.

(6) Magic can be filtered. So the magic flows from the mists, into the planet, but the gods installed a system of Bloodstones, so whoever draws from that magic cannot tap into it directly. Depending on how absolute that filter is, humans have either some serious disadvantage against the dragons or the awakening dragons will find their power is less absolute. In any case I doubt they are clever enough to compete with this "magic filtering technology" made by the gods, even if the Dragons are more powerful on paper. They are simply not sentient enough. Aspect magic is another puzzle within a puzzle. It seems that only objects with more than one aspect can materialize, since the Mursaat use deconstruction into aspects as a trick to hide. Worst case scenario is the Dragons being single aspect creatures able to manifest on Tyria thus circumventing the magic filter of the gods.

Edited by 4thVariety, 17 November 2009 - 06:25 PM.

[Thalador]

4thVariety said:

(5) No Space Aliens for now. Look up into the night sky and you will see.... ...no stars. No other planets. Nothing. Quite unsettling if you ask me. But there is pan-dimensional travel, not only to parallel planes, but also to /root, i.e. the mists. That has to count for something.

Travel to The Astralarium and take a look on the sky...

[Konig Des Todes]

4thVariety said:

So the magic flows from the mists

Unconfirmed. All we know is that the ability to use magic can be reduced. We don't know what the true nature of the bloodstones is - or the origin of magic (should it have one - if I'm correct, magic is just a means to use external energy, like science, and thus would have no origin, beyond evolution of the brain and training of the mind; and how the bloodstones would then work, is limiting how much magic can be used not by filtering, but by absorbing).

[4thVariety]

Thalador Doomspeaker said:

Travel to The Astralarium and take a look on the sky...

ahh, there they were hiding; thanks. Odd distribution though. And it looks more like a collection of galaxies than stars. Who cares, so there are other stars after all. It's not too late for Space-Shiro and his ragtag band of Astro-Pirates.. eh.. ...Pironauts, no.. ..Starminions, or something like that.

Konig Des Todes said:

Unconfirmed. All we know is that the ability to use magic can be reduced. We don't know what the true nature of the bloodstones is - or the origin of magic (should it have one - if I'm correct, magic is just a means to use external energy, like science, and thus would have no origin, beyond evolution of the brain and training of the mind; and how the bloodstones would then work, is limiting how much magic can be used not by filtering, but by absorbing).

There was an interview question why the Dragons happen to be beneath Arah and the Central Transfer Chamber and the answer was something down the line of both places being build on places of great energy. But that makes it semi-official at best. So either the Dragons rested at places on which energy leaks into the world, or they leak magic energy themselves.

I am also not sure on what the Bloodstones do literally. All we have is the observation that they can absorb power directly as well as limit access to magic on a global scale, therefore my comparison to a filter. If magic originated in the mind, then why is it filtered? In channeling magic, the magician can only access the filtered product it seems. Tapping into the raw stuff is off limits after King Doric's plea. The Bloodstones are also used as batteries by the Mursaat, suggesting that you can convert one person totally, and/or the things that are filtered from the stream are not lost but stored as well.

My magic cascade looks like this:
(1) Mists - The origin of everything, by that logic the origin of magic. From here the mana flows.
(2) Aspects - If magic was multi-dimensional just like space has more than one dimension, then aspects are the "spatial components" of magic so to speak; the dimensions of magic. If your aspects are not in tune with Tyria's "aspect coordinates", things vanish much like the Mursaat. Path to Revelations indicates six dimension that do not cross. Death in Tyria alters one of your aspect dimensions so to speak, which is why you will materialize in the Underworld, the place that will then have the same aspects coordinates than you.
(3a) Dragons - After flowing from the mists and getting a dimensional spin so to speak, the magic then accumulates in the form of Dragons. Degree of sentience unknown, powerlevel unknown. They appear to be tied to Tyria and its "aspect coordinates".
(3b) Bloodstones. Mabye they are above the Dragons, maybe they are not, we only know that they limit our use of magic, hence all magic has to pass them somehow. Beyond this point the magic user will do his work.

Man, I should write some esoteric BS books from this and sell them to the UFO community.

Edited by 4thVariety, 17 November 2009 - 07:42 PM.

[Legion]

4thVariety said:

There was an interview question why the Dragons happen to be beneath Arah and the Central Transfer Chamber and the answer was something down the line of both places being build on places of great energy. But that makes it semi-official at best. So either the Dragons rested at places on which energy leaks into the world, or they leak magic energy themselves.

Actually this is confirmed ingame:

Central Transfer Chamber said:

Polestar to the vast wheel of Asura Gates, the Central Transfer Chamber is a magical and architectural marvel constructed atop a major pocket of magical energy. The Asura channel that raw power to fuel all the gates in the network and link them together via this great crossroads of transport. Most of the major gates across Tyria lead to this location.

Vekk said:

"I've been to the Central Transfer Chamber. That cavern is adjacent to it. The big statue practically bleeds magic. It's why we built the chamber there in the first place."

[4thVariety]

This seems to indicate the possibility of tapping into the power of a Dragon, similar to tapping into the power of a bloodstone. We know that all magic appears to go through the "bloodstone restrictions", question is if all magic has to go through the dragons as well; and in which order

Magic working outside of Tyria the same way as on Tyria then becomes sort of a plothole, except everything up to the Hall of Heroes is also affected by the bloodstones. Still it would mean magic powers do not have to pass through dragons. Especially since there are beings from another worlds, such as the Seer and the Mursaat, the issue of these fundamental rules of the world has to be resolved. Which rules apply to which planet, plane or region?

And if Dragons are these magical blood clots, then we might not need to kill them, we could simply drain them. They too get their power from somewhere, cutting them off would work.

Aunt Edit:
Some more thoughts on how the lore might have been arranged.

The Path to Revelations quest divides between six aspects of magic. Spirit, Destruction, Existence, Death, Illusions, Creation. Maybe each Dragon corresponds to one of these basic aspects. Zhaitan is Death, Primordus is Destruction, we know little about the rest, but we might assume that they also take their aspect and turn it into a weapon.

Glint deconstructs into Light (Spirit), Nature (Creation), Chaos (Illusion), Darkness (Death), Elements (Destruction), Strength (Existence). Not a perfect match, but I'd say close enough. The art in Glint's design is her status as a multi-facetted "crystal" Dragon instead of a more primal version. Dragons effectively are very powerful one-trick ponys. Zahitan rules death absolute. Primordus is the destructive force of the elements, hence his Great destroyer was an elementalist. Jormag (Drakkar Lake Beast) represents strength, hence the rabid Norn bear. We know too little about Kralkatorrik, except that he corrupts, which all Dragons do sort of.

If you think of magic as a vector starting at the Mists (0/0/0/0/0/0) then Zhaitan would bend it to (1/0/0/0/0/0), while Primordus would force it into (0/1/0/0/0/0). As a result of six aspects you get six Dragons or vice versa, each Dragon can only accumulate magic in one dimension. The Bloodstone would more or less filter against corrupting effects and the sentient species would have the power to bend magic into any direction at any time, even though at far smaller output levels. A Dragon might only have merely one dimension to bend magic in, but crank that up to a gazillion.

Edited by 4thVariety, 18 November 2009 - 12:30 AM.

[Konig Des Todes]

4thVariety said:

ahh, there they were hiding; thanks. Odd distribution though. And it looks more like a collection of galaxies than stars. Who cares, so there are other stars after all.

You also forgot Nahpui Quater and the Celestials of Cantha. Celestials are beings who exist in the stars - and stars form their bodies (i.e., living constellations) - who can come down from the stars every now and then (at least once every 12 years).

4thVariety said:

There was an interview question why the Dragons happen to be beneath Arah and the Central Transfer Chamber and the answer was something down the line of both places being build on places of great energy. But that makes it semi-official at best. So either the Dragons rested at places on which energy leaks into the world, or they leak magic energy themselves.

Er... you got it wrong, the dragons are the sources of energy. Vekk explains this. As Legion pointed out.

With this in mind, is it really magic going through the bloodstones and dragons, or is it energy just seeping out of the dragons because it had no place to go while the dragons did nothing? If magic is just the act of channeling energy, then the energy that seeped out of the dragons would stop seeping out once the dragon awakens and was only seeping out because the dragon was doing nothing.

So really, it isn't semi-confirmed.

4thVariety said:

This seems to indicate the possibility of tapping into the power of a Dragon, similar to tapping into the power of a bloodstone. We know that all magic appears to go through the "bloodstone restrictions", question is if all magic has to go through the dragons as well; and in which order

Regarding a dragon's magic - it appears to be a fifth kind of magic. Where "bloodstone magic" is linked to four schools - Preservation, Denial, Destruction, and Aggression - the "dragon magic" is not like any, as far as we know, and is more like a fifth school of magic - Corruption (could also be called Domination, Mind Control, Twisting, etc.). Of course, if my theory is correct, then schools of magic is just a description of what the magic does, and now a "kind" or "type" of different magics.

[4thVariety]

Konig Des Todes said:

Regarding a dragon's magic - it appears to be a fifth kind of magic. Where "bloodstone magic" is linked to four schools - Preservation, Denial, Destruction, and Aggression - the "dragon magic" is not like any, as far as we know, and is more like a fifth school of magic - Corruption (could also be called Domination, Mind Control, Twisting, etc.). Of course, if my theory is correct, then schools of magic is just a description of what the magic does, and now a "kind" or "type" of different magics.

Revised Magic Unification Theory: Mists, Aspects, Dragons, Schools.

The schools of magics are not the aspects of magic. Each of the four schools (Preservation, Denial, Destruction, Aggression) is made from the final product. The casters do different things, yet they all use the same final product grade energy.

Aspect magic takes one "energy unit" of final product and subdivides it into something else. One unit of magic might be channeled into any of the four schools, but the unit itself consist of six aspects regardless. Imagine one magic unit like a brick of Lego. You can assemble anything you want from more than one brick, those would be the schools of magic. But even the brick itself is a three-dimensional object. That you can never take from it, but allows for further deconstruction.

Our planet is made from atoms, but we can smash them up and see what they consist of. In the same way each unit of magic can be smashed and this process reveals the six aspects. From a procedural point of view, the mists radiate six aspects. Accumulate each aspect enough and you get a Dragon. Even if you kill it, the mists would still continue to radiate this aspect into the world. It would accumulate again and result in the same dragon made from one aspect only.

The Dragons then either "bleed" power into the world or simply do not catch anything leaving the mists. The space affected by this process has this magic field having six aspects. Dip into the field and you get one unit of magic you can bend in four ways (schools). In contrast to the elder Dragons, we have to assume most other life consists of more than one aspect, making it more intricate, but also a lot weaker initially. Glint is a sentient life form made up from aspects. The same goes for Lazarus.

That puts my theory on the workings of magic somewhere around here:
(1) Mists radiate aspects creating a six dimensional field
(2) Each aspect on its own can accumulate into a dragon, a creature of mono-dimensional aspect energy.
(3) If all six aspects are present in one location we can tap into what we call the magic field. It is then possible to draw one unit of energy from the field. This unit is made up from the six aspects and can be used to wield magic.
(4) In this revised theory the Bloodstone comes into play here. It puts a limit on the amount of directions the magic can be shaped. The four schools are created.


I somehow still managed to cramp everything into place. The Mists remain the origin. Dragon magic is different, since their base energy unit is not made from all six aspects, but merely made of one supercharged one. Critters on Tyria tap into the magic field made from all six aspects and the Bloodstone limits the way they can use this magic. Glint and Lazarus still get to deconstruct themselves.

The theory is heavily inspired by Atoms and Quarks. Imagine the smallest unit of magic a human in Tyria can use as the equivalent an atom. The four schools represent those intricate spells made up from many atoms, yet one point of magical energy is still sub-dividable like one atom is. Atoms are made from Quarks. Coincidentally six types of Quarks exist. Since humans casting magic access the Atom, all sort of Quarks get to used in Tyrian magic. That magic is made up of even smaller stuff is of no concern to the user. Only a few such as Glint or Lazarus even seem to know and be able to practice it. For the Asura aspect magic is cutting edge. For Dragons on the other hand aspect magic is the only thing they can do something with this energy from the mists. They can't access all aspects at once the way Tyrians do. Hence their magic has a totally different flavor. It is the same as if you tried to construct an atom only from Up-Quarks. Makes no sense in the real world of science, but the world of BS magic with scientific influences might call the accumulation of a single magic aspect (Quarks) into a giant structure a Dragon.

Funny how one can structure seemingly random pieces of lore into something. I really doubt any of that was intentional by ArenaNet.

[draxynnic]

4thVariety said:

What we know about Tyria

(1) It is round! Why? Because we have volcanoes and plate tectonics. If Tyria was flat with borders, the pressure would force the magma to the sides, not upwards. Since the magma pressure is directed upwards we can say that this is the direction of least resistance. If that is not enough for you then the nail in the coffin is Tyria having a magnetic north and Aurora Borealis. Let's assume Tyria was flat with a giant ACME magnet stuck beneath, then all compasses would point to the middle of "flat Tyria", i.e. point below which is giant magnet. Only there could Aurora Borealis occur, because only there the magnetic field does not repell the solar wind. Since the compass does not always point to the Shiverpeaks, the point at which we observe Aurora Borealis, we can rule that out as a possibility. Hence magnetism is created at the core of a round planet called Tyria.

Actually, I can think of other ways to explain this, from "maaaaaag-iiiiic" to actual physical reasons (the ACME magnet is a long bar magnet with the north pole far to the north of any zone we've reached, and the south far to the south...)

Quote

(2) Tyria is tilted to its side. Because Tyria has seasons, the planet requires to have a tilt. It is that simple. Before anybody argues, distance to the sun has NOTHING to do with seasons. Exact measurement on the axial tilt are impossible as GW's world simulation is not exact enough.

In a universe ruled entirely by science as we know it, this is true. It is NOT necessarily true in a world with supernatural influences, however - there are lots of ways you could have seasons without a tilt if you allow for the existance of supernatural forces. In fact, we have ingame confirmation that the gods can influence the seasons, in the Wintersday contests between Dwayna and Grenth. This tells us that the seasons are at least influenced by supernatural forces, and once we have a confirmed influence, it's possible that they are caused entirely by supernatural causes.

Quote

(3) Tyria has a moon, albeit with a highly erratic orbit. The difference in size the moon appears to the eye indicates a stable orbit with highly variable distance. In contrast to the nearly constant orbit of Earth's moon, we can say Tyria's moon is not the result of a collision, but that it was most likely trapped while crossing Tyria's gravitational field. How the moon got trapped by a mage or someone would make for one wild piece of background lore.

Or it could have multiple moons... or magic can be involved. (Might be worth checking the angle that the moon is at - the moon actually can appear larger when it's close to the horizon.)

Quote

(4) Tyria revolves around a sun. This is especially tricky since the sun appears to be in the same spot in the game all day. Except when it is night, then we see the moon in the sun's position shining brightly, hence the sun must be on the other side. Something therefore revolves around something. But I have an ace up my sleeve why Tyria revolves around the sun. The heavier body will always circle the lighter one! The gravity of Tyria is not high enough for an hydrogen ball of that weight to ignite into a sun. Hence the sun is the heavier object, hence Tyria is revolving around the sun.

How do we know Tyria's sun follows physics anything like ours does? There's nothing saying it can't be a magical lantern that floats only a few hundred kilometres up - and likewise for the moon(s), albeit weaker.

In short, applying real-world physics is nowhere near enough to prove any of these points when magic could have caused things to behave in ways completely different to what modern science tells us is needed in our universe.

4thVariety said:

Especially since there are beings from another worlds, such as the Seer and the Mursaat,

Not confirmed.

4thVariety said:

The Path to Revelations quest divides between six aspects of magic. Spirit, Destruction, Existence, Death, Illusions, Creation. Maybe each Dragon corresponds to one of these basic aspects. Zhaitan is Death, Primordus is Destruction, we know little about the rest, but we might assume that they also take their aspect and turn it into a weapon.

These aren't aspects of magic, but facets of the Six Gods.

4thVariety said:

Funny how one can structure seemingly random pieces of lore into something. I really doubt any of that was intentional by ArenaNet.

Since the facets are known to be representative pieces of the gods and not of different forms of magic (except in that some gods have dominion over some types of magic), then no, it probably isn't.

[4thVariety]

I'd like to think of facets/aspects as dimensions such as height, length, width, time, etc. If you alter one aspect, it does nothing to the rest. The gods being masters in their department does severely limit their dominion over the other dimensions/aspects/facets so to speak. We also know they are weaker than the Dragon, meaning that if you offset your balance to 100% in one facet, then you most likely end up like a dragon. Most prominent example being Abaddon. It required more than one god to take him down and his tendencies in his heightened power state are similar to that of a Dragon, even if he retains a bit more coordination.


On the topic of Tyria, we should not be willing to attribute things to magic too quickyl. Especially the magnet thing would definitely not work the way you described, since you would then have no Aurora Borealis at the Shiverpeaks. Except you are willing to attribute that to magic as well, which is not an argument. The idea here is to make the universe of GW work. You can't do that on a purely magical level, because that would require too much micromanagement on part of the gods and we KNOW they left. So whatever they left behind has to work on its own without constant input of magical energy from the gods to tinker with effects. The machine has to run on its own.

The moon is just a funny detail, an oddity arising from limitations of the GW 3D engine. In the GW engine the sun is always in the same spot no matter which daytime. It always has the same distance to the horizon only being replaced by the moon during night scenes. And the shadows are always cast in the same direction. We should know when to call Lore and when to overlook engine limitations.

I am on the side that the world itself is a world of physics, hence it follows the same rules as out world. Magic is an element put on top of that, explaining additional effects in nature. But the world was fine before humans wielded magic, which is the reason why it probably was fine before the gods wielded magic. And in order for Tyria to be sustainable without EXCESSIVE MAGIC MICROMANAGEMENT at all time, it needs some solid physics.

[4thVariety]

Tyrian Humanity:
The closer you live to the equator, the darker your skin will be. That's the simple rule. It will take thousands of years until the skin of your children's children will either be pitch black or toast white, but eventually you will get there. During the last 1000 years the traveling reach of the individual and technology messed that order up quite a bit, but given time, the human genome will always adapt to the latitude of the place it lives.


Tyria has very white people and very black people. Question is which place on Tyria did force the development of different skin colors? Because latitude is not getting us anywhere. A few thousand years of recorded history is not enough to have caused such differences. We are told the planet was empty, then Glint was made, then the Forgotten. Humans appear in the order of Canthans, Elonians&Tyrians, Margonites. As options we either have divine creations, although nobody mentions that, or displacement from some other planet even.


Tyrian Creation
Traces of Giganticus Lupicus tell us there was life long ago and everything got extinct. After that we have the quote

Quote

She [Glint] was the first creature placed on the continent of Tyria by the gods to oversee the new world.

This seems to tell us that the gods came to Tyria and decided to play a round of "Sim City" or something. This heavily favors the idea of humans not being of Tyrian/Canthan origin, but imported from another place/planet/etc. They developed different skin colors and basic culture there, then were displaced around the bronze age. When the gift of magic exploded into the face of the gods, they bailed. Most likely the gods realized why that patch of land was empty to begin with. Though unconfirmed, Dragonic corruption getting the better part of Abaddon, like it did with Swafnir, is the best guess of what really happened.

Planet Creation:
Nothing on that anywhere, but the Dragons are not the planet itself. We have no hints of some Final Fantasy "Gaia" style world myth being put into place. The only thing about this hierarchy in the world of GW is this: If you die, you don't. Even peasants such as Gwen's mother end up somewhere with their consciousness intact. Which is why Abaddon's corruption not only had to be contained on the planet, but required a special prison in the after-life.

[draxynnic]

4thVariety said:

On the topic of Tyria, we should not be willing to attribute things to magic too quickly. Especially the magnet thing would definitely not work the way you described, since you would then have no Aurora Borealis at the Shiverpeaks. Except you are willing to attribute that to magic as well, which is not an argument. The idea here is to make the universe of GW work. You can't do that on a purely magical level, because that would require too much micromanagement on part of the gods and we KNOW they left. So whatever they left behind has to work on its own without constant input of magical energy from the gods to tinker with effects. The machine has to run on its own.

The moon is just a funny detail, an oddity arising from limitations of the GW 3D engine. In the GW engine the sun is always in the same spot no matter which daytime. It always has the same distance to the horizon only being replaced by the moon during night scenes. And the shadows are always cast in the same direction. We should know when to call Lore and when to overlook engine limitations.

I am on the side that the world itself is a world of physics, hence it follows the same rules as out world. Magic is an element put on top of that, explaining additional effects in nature. But the world was fine before humans wielded magic, which is the reason why it probably was fine before the gods wielded magic. And in order for Tyria to be sustainable without EXCESSIVE MAGIC MICROMANAGEMENT at all time, it needs some solid physics.

Perhaps, but you can't go making broad statements of "We know this" or "We know that" based on physical arguments. They may be the most LIKELY conclusions, but it is a magical world, and things that have physical explanations in our world may well have supernatural explanations in Tyria.

And magic doesn't necessarily need to be 'micromanaged' to have an influence. Consider the seasons, for instance - that could be the result of an autonomous cycle of magic that has fire magic dominant in summer (causing high temperatures) and water magic to be dominant in winter. It could be because the Sun itself is getting stronger and weaker in the cycle - possibly because it's powered from the Mists, and the power it receives waxes or wanes over a yearly cycle. Etc. There's a way to test this theory - If the seasons are due to an axial tilt, different hemispheres will have different seasons like in the real world, while if it's due to a magical cycle, they'll probably be the same.

Now, it's often theorised that Elona is close to the equator, with (most of) Tyria being north and Cantha south (since Tyria and Cantha both appear cooler). However, Tyria and Cantha both seem to have summer (the Season of Fire) at the same time, and Elona also has a summer (which equatorial regions generally don't have, instead having a wet and a dry). This actually seems to imply that Tyria doesn't have seasons derived from an axial tilt.

As for magic being available before the gift was given to mortals - all indications seem to be that magic did exist before the gift, it's just that it wasn't available to mortals. Maybe because it was in a form that they couldn't use, or maybe just because the races that the gods gave magic to hadn't been taught.

4thVariety said:

Tyria has very white people and very black people. Question is which place on Tyria did force the development of different skin colors? Because latitude is not getting us anywhere. A few thousand years of recorded history is not enough to have caused such differences. We are told the planet was empty, then Glint was made, then the Forgotten. Humans appear in the order of Canthans, Elonians&Tyrians, Margonites. As options we either have divine creations, although nobody mentions that, or displacement from some other planet even.

Actually, there does seem to be a correlation between temperature and skin colour. Elona is the hottest region, and people there have the darkest skin colour. You then have subtropical Kryta, then Ascalon and Cantha (in the latter, skin colour seems to be dependant on the degree of exposure - the Kurzicks being the palest and the Luxons being the darkest).

[4thVariety]

Actually temperature has nothing to do with it. If Norway was 30 degrees all year round, people would be just as pale (even paler because the snow would not be there winter and nothing worse than a snow induced sun burn in winter, trust me). The rays of the sun hit the surface at different angles, meaning different intensity. The human body requires sunlight to produce vitamin D. Take the blackest person on the planet, put him on the arctic circle and then watch him suffer from vitamin D deficiency. Professional German football clubs will advise their black personell to take supplements to be on the safe side.


Right now there is no proper scale to the world of GW. If you took the the dimensions of the world and measured Tyria, it would be 14 miles across, which is awesome for a game, but ludicrous for a real continent. In any event it's an approximation with arbitrarily placed zones inspired by the real world. Better to turn a blind eye on those things, than to make them proof of everything being caused by magic.

For most of the part Lore is entertainment. Piecing together things, finding spoofs, finding the lore revisions un-spoofing some spoofs. It's an own game-mode, like farming, grinding or PvP are. From that perspective blaming everything on magic and be done would destroy that fun. Uncertainty is part of the game.

There is also the "problem" of developers being people. No matter what they throw in there, they can't escape the fact that they are from planet Earth. This planet has some rules, so every copy&paste job on something minor will cause planet Earth rules to bleed into the world of Tyria.

Look no further than Harry Potter. Supposedly a magic world, but the way people wield magic is utterly and totally scientific. Say this, wave here, combine this. Potter Magic is not magic at all, it is BS science. Most other modern fantasy is the same too. You can't escape the grasps of reality. You can only try. Which is my excuse to rather apply science to the orbit of the moon and the occurrence of seasons, than to just blame it on magic. That's be kind of boring, because that would end the inquisitive Lore gameplay right there.

[Konig Des Todes]

Due to the vast difference in the topic, I split the discussion into two threads - as on is about the origin and nature of existence in relation to dragons, and the other - this - is on the world itself.

Now then:

I would just like to note that we shouldn't make too many connections to Earth and common knowledge. Right now, I'll list what is confirmed:

• There are 360 days in a year - as such, the Tyrian year is shorter than ours, as is the planet's revolution around the sun (if that works the same way as Earth)
  
• There are four seasons - as such, again assuming Tyrian works in the same manner as Earth, there must be a difference in revolution and rotation (or else half the planet would always be in day and summer, and the other would always be in night and winter), the axis is always the same way (such as like Earth), and/or there is some sort of tilt (i.e., the poles are not facing the sun - they can go straight upwards though)
  
• There are days, and there are nights - this can mean one of two things: the rotation is faster than the revolution - or there is a tilt in the axis.
  
• We know how long the seasons last (90 days each) - due to the manual, we know how long these seasons usually last, as such, we can produce an estimation on position of the planet to the sun in various different models - these models giving different situations for the tilt, rotation/revolution speeds, etc.

What we do NOT know:

• We do not know how long days and nights are - we are never given a specific time. We just know they are within reasonable times within each other (therefore, the rotation is faster than the revolution).
  
• We do not know if there is a tilt or not - we can assume there is, but there could be other explanations
  
• We do not know where the poles are - we cannot assume the poles are simply "north" and "south" on Tyria, it may be different. The poles are the two ends of the axis, as we don't know whether how "north" and "south" are considered in relation to the axis - assuming there is one - we cannot place them.
  
• We do not know if the weather mirrors Earth's weather - this is to 4thVariety's comment on skin color - we do not know that the closer to the poles means colder - if the tilt is different enough, the coldest spots may be in relation to where our equator is even (though in a solar system map, the over all image will be the same - I'm just saying the poles may be tropical, while Tyria's equator may be arctic).
  
• Most importantly: We do not know if Tyria orbits the sun, or if the sun orbits Tyria - or if neither orbit each other - in the third, they could be going in two completely different paths (for instance, Tyria is still, but revolving, and the sun is creating halo motion "above" Tyria - with the right tilt, and right speed of rotation, there can still be reasonable seasons and day/night - I think)
  
• Lastly: We do not know if the time of Tyria's seasons go in relation to North America's seasons - that is, due to there being a whole week less, and no leap year, on Tyria, is wintersday always going to be during our (Northern Hemisphere's) winter?

I would like to ask, since I am not an astrologist and it has been a LONG time since astrology lessons - but there can be a day and night with the axis being perpendicular to the revolution - no? That is, excluding the poles. But seeing how we don't know where the poles are, we can assume the axis can be perpendicular to the revolution - if I am correct, that is.

[damkel]

Interesting thread, applying real-world physics to a fictional universe.

Minor correction.

Konig Des Todes said:

I would like to ask, since I am not an astrologist and it has been a LONG time since astrology lessons -...

Most of us had astronomy lessons in school, not astrology lessons.

[Thalador]

Konig Des Todes said:

I am not an astrologist and it has been a LONG time since astrology lessons...

Wrong!

Astronomist and astronomy. Astrology is the "science" which studies celestial bodies and constellations to make predictions, horoscopes and other stuffs...

[Konig Des Todes]

I think you only proved my point that it has been a while. :p

I now have a desire to create multiple possible models of Tyria's relation to its sun (i.e., various images with different tilts, rotations, revolutions, positions, various forms of orbits, etc.)

[draxynnic]

4thVariety said:

Actually temperature has nothing to do with it. If Norway was 30 degrees all year round, people would be just as pale (even paler because the snow would not be there winter and nothing worse than a snow induced sun burn in winter, trust me). The rays of the sun hit the surface at different angles, meaning different intensity. The human body requires sunlight to produce vitamin D. Take the blackest person on the planet, put him on the arctic circle and then watch him suffer from vitamin D deficiency. Professional German football clubs will advise their black personell to take supplements to be on the safe side.

Looking at your own diagram, however, the correlation isn't exact - look at inland South America, for instance, and central Africa. I'd guess that this would be due to some difference in climate, terrain, or lifestyle that means that while the sunlight itself is no weaker, people in those areas have less exposure - because it's clouded over more, because people are more undercover, or some other reason.

Quote

Look no further than Harry Potter. Supposedly a magic world, but the way people wield magic is utterly and totally scientific. Say this, wave here, combine this. Potter Magic is not magic at all, it is BS science. Most other modern fantasy is the same too. You can't escape the grasps of reality. You can only try. Which is my excuse to rather apply science to the orbit of the moon and the occurrence of seasons, than to just blame it on magic. That's be kind of boring, because that would end the inquisitive Lore gameplay right there.

While there's a certain amount of truth in this, this still allows for some things to be due to "magic physics" rather than the physics we know - and maybe that will prove to be more interesting.

This isn't to say that it can't be due to our physics*, but neither does it have to be.

Konig Des Todes said:

I would like to ask, since I am not an astrologist and it has been a LONG time since astrology lessons - but there can be a day and night with the axis being perpendicular to the revolution - no? That is, excluding the poles. But seeing how we don't know where the poles are, we can assume the axis can be perpendicular to the revolution - if I am correct, that is.

I remember discussing this in another thread. In short - if the planet is "on its side" you can still have days, but the lengths of those days will vary widely depending on the time of year.

*On that note, I'll have to partially withdraw my comment about seasons earlier - I'd misread the section on the Canthan calendar, and there actually isn't any indication that their seasons match with Tyria's - while we know they have summer and winter, we don't actually have anything (that I've found) to correlate them with Tyria's. That Elona still has seasons is suspicious if it's close to the equator, however.

[Konig Des Todes]

draxynnic said:

I remember discussing this in another thread. In short - if the planet is "on its side" you can still have days, but the lengths of those days will vary widely depending on the time of year.

Not on its side - upright, I was asking on the day/night in the pole if it was completely perpendicular, not parallel like you explained, to the revolution.

[4thVariety]

This is going to be an astronomy binge. Bottom line: If GW2 is to simulate the day and night cycles of a planet properly, it is going to be a rough ride.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
There are 360 days in a year - as such, the Tyrian year is shorter than ours, as is the planet's revolution around the sun (if that works the same way as Earth)[/Quote]
IF the seasons are based on planetary tilt! If they are based on "magic" as Draxynnic suggests, we would count the tides in magic, not the rotation around sun as made visible by a tilt.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
There are four seasons - as such, again assuming Tyrian works in the same manner as Earth, there must be a difference in revolution and rotation (or else half the planet would always be in day and summer, and the other would always be in night and winter), the axis is always the same way (such as like Earth), and/or there is some sort of tilt (i.e., the poles are not facing the sun - they can go straight upwards though)[/Quote]
Rotation of the planet around itself = day and night
Rotation of a tilted planet around the sun = seasons
Rotation of a non-tilted planet around the sun = only evergreen climates and icy deserts.
Rotational axis =! magnetic poles (tendency to align if life is not to be wiped out by solar radiation, more further down)

BUT there are birches in the Shiverpeaks. They need a vegetation period WITHOUT ice and snow to grow. In summer the Shiverpeaks must be a green lush area.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
There are days, and there are nights - this can mean one of two things: the rotation is faster than the revolution - or there is a tilt in the axis.[/Quote]
Day and night only means the planet is rotating around itself. If the days all have the same length there is no tilt. If the sunshine duration in winter is less than in summer, there is tilt. Without tilt we could circle around the sun ten times during a day and not be the wiser. (as long as there are no other stars in the sky that is) But it is safe to say that rotation is faster than revolution. Day and night is only proof that tilt is not 90 degrees compared to the rotational axis. Zero tilt is a proper solution, so day and night do not prove presence of a tilt. They prove the absence of a 90 degree tilt.

Synchronized rotation with a tilt creating day and night would abolish seasons since it abolishes one of the variables. So rotation > revolution BECAUSE there are day/night AND seasons, however exact tilt unknown.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
We know how long the seasons last (90 days each) - due to the manual, we know how long these seasons usually last, as such, we can produce an estimation on position of the planet to the sun in various different models - these models giving different situations for the tilt, rotation/revolution speeds, etc.[/list][/Quote]
Sorry, we can only measure the tilt by finding the Northern and Southern tropic or taking exact measurement of the shade. More tilt would result in more extreme sun angles that change more quickly, not in different lengths of seasons. If one revolution around the sun is 360 days, then it always takes 90 days per season, no matter how hard you tilt the planet. Although tilting it beyond 45 degrees would cause certain areas to be permanently dark and 90 degrees result in a dark side and a bright side. Beyond our current tilt, there are also some gravitational forces from the sun that come into play. At our distance, planets do not get to face their rotation away from the sun. Earth is still "swinging" from an impact that also created the moon, but gyroscopic effects force that rotation not to tilt too much towards the sun.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
What we do [U]NOT[/U] know:
We do not know how long days and nights are - we are never given a specific time. We just know they are within reasonable times within each other (therefore, the rotation is faster than the revolution).[/Quote]
We know Earth's fast rotation is a result of a collision early in its life also creating the moon. Since then the moon has slowed us down from a 6h day to a 24h day. We also know Tyria's moon does not have an stable orbit. Sometimes its closer, sometimes further away WITHOUT being closer to the horizon. That means the moon is relatively new. Sure, for such a orbit the moon would not be allowed to always show the same side towards us yet, but we need to throw the graphic department a bone here. Chances are, Tyria rotates slower than Earth.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
We do not know if there is a tilt or not[/B] - we can assume there is, but there could be other explanations[/QUOTE]

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
We do not know where the poles are - we cannot assume the poles are simply "north" and "south" on Tyria, it may be different. The poles are the two ends of the axis, as we don't know whether how "north" and "south" are considered in relation to the axis - assuming there is one - we cannot place them.[/QUOTE]
The magnetic poles are the magnetic poles, look on your compass and you will find them. Rotation of the planet will play a role in their creation. Magnetic North or South facing the sun directly would make for a planet size Aurora Borealis. We do not see that on Tyria and so the magnetic poles will be far away from the equator and near the rotational axis. No surprise there since rotation creates them! Also means they are opposite each other, as any decent magnet. The magnetic compass also proves the planet rotates around itself and not the sun around the planet. No rotation -> no magnetic field -> violent death by the sun's rays. [Please no argument for Dwayna's secret ACME magnet in the center of Tyria]

What we do not know is if the poles are covered with ice. To determine that we would need to travel to the poles. But there is no need for ice on the poles. During he dinosaur age, Earth had no ice on the poles, that is merely a result of weather, not necessarily astronomic facts.


[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
We do not know if the weather mirrors Earth's weather - this is to 4thVariety's comment on skin color - we do not know that the closer to the poles means colder - if the tilt is different enough, the coldest spots may be in relation to where our equator is even (though in a solar system map, the over all image will be the same - I'm just saying the poles may be tropical, while Tyria's equator may be arctic).[/QUOTE] Tilt or no tilt, people on the equator would still be black and people near the poles more white. Hotspots depend on land mass distribution and the weather, but generally the sun intensity gets lower the further away you get from the equator. Today that is the difference between -50 and +50 degrees, but rewind a few hundred million years and you would see +60 and the equator and +30 on the poles. Skin color is just a matter of the angle the sun hits your face long enough, temperature is a matter of how the sun's energy is shifted around by the atmosphere and the oceans. Which is why human effects on the atmosphere are no laughing matter.



[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
Most importantly: We do not know if Tyria orbits the sun, or if the sun orbits Tyria - or if neither orbit each other - in the third, they could be going in two completely different paths (for instance, Tyria is still, but revolving, and the sun is creating halo motion "above" Tyria - with the right tilt, and right speed of rotation, there can still be reasonable seasons and day/night - I think)[/QUOTE]
Sun revolving around a tilted planet = This would mean seasons are bound to locations and do not change. At that point people would stop observing a seasonal change in their place. The whole idea of seasons would be alien to Tyrians if that was the case. There would be only be places with different lengths of days. Tyria would be considerably heavier than its sun for that to work. Light objects won't revolve around heavy objects for long.

Sun revolving around non-tilted planet = Tyria is still heavier than its sun. But not to repeat myself, balls of hydrogen that size would not ignite into suns! Not into a yellow sun for sure. And not while orbiting another stellar object for sure.

Sun on wobbling orbit around non-tilted planet = would totally work. Insult to every physical law though. Suns do only get to rotate around other suns or black holes. Suns do not rotate around planets. If a planet is heavy enough to trap a sun in its orbit it is heavy enough to ignite or form a black hole.

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
Lastly: We do not know if the time of Tyria's seasons go in relation to North America's seasons - that is, due to there being a whole week less, and no leap year, on Tyria, is wintersday always going to be during [U]our[/U] (Northern Hemisphere's) winter?[/list][/QUOTE]
If ArenaNet seeks to synchronize Tyrian events to our planet, then it needs to match astronomy details as well. That is one thing better not to look too deeply into.


[quote name='Konig Des Todes']
I would like to ask, since I am not an astrologist and it has been a LONG time since astrology lessons - but there can be a day and night with the axis being perpendicular to the revolution - no? That is, excluding the poles. But seeing how we don't know where the poles are, we can assume the axis can be perpendicular to the revolution - if I am correct, that is.[/QUOTE] Not sure where you want to go with this but Earth is perpendicular twice each year. 20th of March and 22nd of September. The latter being the date where the North Pole goes dark for 6 months due to tilt. Without tilt, we would still have regular days. The only way to stop day and night cycles is for the planet to stop its rotation.


After reading it once more, I reckon we only have two solutions. Adapt the Earth model of things, or blame everything on crackpot magic theories that add up to bottled insanity. It also goes to show you want all went into Earth for it to turn out the way it did.

[4thVariety]

draxynnic said:

Looking at your own diagram, however, the correlation isn't exact - look at inland South America, for instance, and central Africa. I'd guess that this would be due to some difference in climate, terrain, or lifestyle that means that while the sunlight itself is no weaker, people in those areas have less exposure - because it's clouded over more, because people are more undercover, or some other reason.

Sorry for the double post but this improves reading imo:

Africa is where humans were made. That is why we have our default skin color there: black. People then ventured north and got paler. AFTER being pale they went into North and then South America (Mitochondrial DNA proof ftw). After arriving there, the process of getting darker again started. It never finished, technology slowed it to a halt, global travel in the 1500 ruined it completely.

But look at the South American West coast. There you have deserts, without cover from rain forests the process accelerated in contrast to the rain forest tribes.

[Briar]

*Waves copy of Tyria: Its Flat*

You cannot use the seasons excuse for saying the world is spherical. Human wintersday lore states that the seasons are manipulated by the gods.

Old Nickoles said:

"Why hello there, <character name>! A happy Wintersday to you. Yes, it is that time again, a time of cold conflict between Grenth and Dwayna. Each one wishes to claim the season, and with it the coming year. Should Dwayna be victorious, the year is begun with warmth and light...but should Grenth emerge the victor, a darkening chill will shroud the months to come. Which will you support? The warm embrace of life, or the icy grip of death?"

If Grenth wins the cold of winter continues into the spring, if Dwayna wins spring warms faster.

It be the gods that control the seasons, not your fancy spancy astronomy flaming space objects.

*Gets knocked out by an astronomy teacher*






Ahem terribly sorry about that flat world theorist escapee, please continue.

*Drags body out of sight*

[Konig Des Todes]

In humanity's view, the gods affect the seasons. The gods' battle and the victor affecting the season is the Tyrian version of groundhog day. For all we know, the outcome is predetermined and the whole battle is a ploy to keep humans believing in the gods' power (i.e., in this specific case, the Charr are right).


Though you are correct in that we shouldn't state the planet is a sphere. It may be flat with a magical force keeping things such as magma from going along the sides (or straight down). Or it may be a oval, or some other geometric shape (would be interesting to see a cube planet....).

4thVariety said:

IF the seasons are based on planetary tilt! If they are based on "magic" as Draxynnic suggests, we would count the tides in magic, not the rotation around sun as made visible by a tilt.

Yes, I know. I am going under the assumption that the planet is a sphere, and things such as the season are natural - not magical.

4thVariety said:

BUT there are birches in the Shiverpeaks. They need a vegetation period WITHOUT ice and snow to grow. In summer the Shiverpeaks must be a green lush area.

Which is interesting to not as all lines point to the Shiverpeaks always being cold and frosted. "Celebrating the end of winter where winter never ends" etc. etc.

4thVariety said:

Day and night is only proof that tilt is not 90 degrees compared to the rotational axis. Zero tilt is a proper solution, so day and night do not prove presence of a tilt. They prove the absence of a 90 degree tilt.

That is what I meant, that it is not parallel (or near parallel) to the revolution (i.e., the axis does not point directly at the sun) - as there are reasonable distances between night and day.

4thVariety said:

Sorry, we can only measure the tilt by finding the Northern and Southern tropic or taking exact measurement of the shade. More tilt would result in more extreme sun angles that change more quickly, not in different lengths of seasons. If one revolution around the sun is 360 days, then it always takes 90 days per season, no matter how hard you tilt the planet. Although tilting it beyond 45 degrees would cause certain areas to be permanently dark and 90 degrees result in a dark side and a bright side. Beyond our current tilt, there are also some gravitational forces from the sun that come into play. At our distance, planets do not get to face their rotation away from the sun. Earth is still "swinging" from an impact that also created the moon, but gyroscopic effects force that rotation not to tilt too much towards the sun.

What I meant, as I believe you misunderstood me, is that because we know of the length of the seasons (along with how long the year lasts), we know one variable (how long a revolution is - and where, during the revolution, Tyria is positioned *though that is forced into an estimate due to not knowing the whole globe's look*), and can create various diagrams based on different tilts, different kinds of positions between Tyria and the Sun, and the like.

That is, we're guessing on the tilt and the like.

4thVariety said:

We know Earth's fast rotation is a result of a collision early in its life also creating the moon. Since then the moon has slowed us down from a 6h day to a 24h day. We also know Tyria's moon does not have an stable orbit. Sometimes its closer, sometimes further away WITHOUT being closer to the horizon. That means the moon is relatively new. Sure, for such a orbit the moon would not be allowed to always show the same side towards us yet, but we need to throw the graphic department a bone here. Chances are, Tyria rotates slower than Earth.

The lunar theory is just that, a theory. We're not sure how the Moon came to be how/where it is now.

4thVariety said:

The magnetic poles are the magnetic poles, look on your compass and you will find them. Rotation of the planet will play a role in their creation. Magnetic North or South facing the sun directly would make for a planet size Aurora Borealis. We do not see that on Tyria and so the magnetic poles will be far away from the equator and near the rotational axis. No surprise there since rotation creates them! Also means they are opposite each other, as any decent magnet. The magnetic compass also proves the planet rotates around itself and not the sun around the planet. No rotation -> no magnetic field -> violent death by the sun's rays. [Please no argument for Dwayna's secret ACME magnet in the center of Tyria]

What we do not know is if the poles are covered with ice. To determine that we would need to travel to the poles. But there is no need for ice on the poles. During he dinosaur age, Earth had no ice on the poles, that is merely a result of weather, not necessarily astronomic facts.

The poles I meant were the axis poles - the two ends of the axis. Not the Magnetic poles.

4thVariety said:

Tilt or no tilt, people on the equator would still be black and people near the poles more white. Hotspots depend on land mass distribution and the weather, but generally the sun intensity gets lower the further away you get from the equator. Today that is the difference between -50 and +50 degrees, but rewind a few hundred million years and you would see +60 and the equator and +30 on the poles. Skin color is just a matter of the angle the sun hits your face long enough, temperature is a matter of how the sun's energy is shifted around by the atmosphere and the oceans. Which is why human effects on the atmosphere are no laughing matter.

Not quite - the people with more sun would be black, and the people with less song would be white. Depending on the tilt, the normal placement of skin colors would be in different locations. So black does not always mean equator - but instead it means warmer climate, as warmer climate (assuming it is nature, mind you) means more sunlight - likewise, colder climate means less sunlight.

This is void, of course, if the warmth is unnatural.

4thVariety said:

Sun revolving around a tilted planet = This would mean seasons are bound to locations and do not change. At that point people would stop observing a seasonal change in their place. The whole idea of seasons would be alien to Tyrians if that was the case. There would be only be places with different lengths of days. Tyria would be considerably heavier than its sun for that to work. Light objects won't revolve around heavy objects for long.

Sun revolving around non-tilted planet = Tyria is still heavier than its sun. But not to repeat myself, balls of hydrogen that size would not ignite into suns! Not into a yellow sun for sure. And not while orbiting another stellar object for sure.

Sun on wobbling orbit around non-tilted planet = would totally work. Insult to every physical law though. Suns do only get to rotate around other suns or black holes. Suns do not rotate around planets. If a planet is heavy enough to trap a sun in its orbit it is heavy enough to ignite or form a black hole.

What I was thinking wasn't the simple two-way theory that either the planet orbits the sun or the sun orbits the planet. No, my thought was that neither orbit each other. But one does move

This can work two ways:

Tyria orbits its moon, which orbits the sun (i.e., Tyria is the moon). Or, Tyria orbits an object, which is not the sun, and is in place like the sun (three bodies, one orbit).

This isn't reality, so physics may not apply (though I'd prefer if they do! I'm just bringing other possibilities).

4thVariety said:

If ArenaNet seeks to synchronize Tyrian events to our planet, then it needs to match astronomy details as well. That is one thing better not to look too deeply into.

Tyria's year is shorter. So we know the events cannot be on par to how we experience them. If we were to say New Years Day of 05 was on par to Tyria's Day 1 of the year, we have now 26 days difference between the '10 New Years and Tyria's next Day 1 - with Tyria's being sooner. I.e., in lore, the Wintersday celebration and the whole winter season would be occurring now - in the middle of winter, to be specific.

4thVariety said:

Not sure where you want to go with this...

Just wanted to clarify my thoughts on the day/night system of poles upon a perpendicular axis.

[Arson]

I've never really understood this...

What is the name of the planet that they live on, it's not Tyria is it? I was always under the impression that Tyria was only one of three known continents. The other two being Cantha and Elona with Elona and Tyria being connected continents in the same sense as Europe and Asia are. Like Gwen says in the EOTN trailer "Ascalon was the gem of Tyria, this was my world." She's not refering to her planet, she's refering to a continent and the city of Ascalon. In the trailer for Nightfall the speaker says "Elona; land of the golden sun" and he is talking about a seprate place than Tyria and a totally different continent than Gwen.

So two questions

1. What is the name of the planet?

2. We know of three continents on this planet, could there be more that are as of yet undiscovered?

[Konig Des Todes]

The world is called Tyria, and the continent is called Tyria. And there easily (and most likely must be) more and unknown continents. If there weren't, well, the planet would look very interesting, unless it is flat...

[Muan]

Let me first say I don't know that Tyria is flat or that it is not tilted or that there are not other suns, but I think the evidence provided is deficient in the ways I point out. I am not saying these things are wrong, only that we do not know they are right.

I would also like to point out that if you look at the geography of Tyria, the climates of certain areas (Ascalon in particular) either do not make any sense or indicate that the sun rises in the west. It is possible that some if not most of the geographic features of Tyria really do mean nothing.

4thVariety said:

(1) It is round! Why? Because we have volcanoes and plate tectonics. If Tyria was flat with borders, the pressure would force the magma to the sides, not upwards. Since the magma pressure is directed upwards we can say that this is the direction of least resistance. If that is not enough for you then the nail in the coffin is Tyria having a magnetic north and Aurora Borealis. Let's assume Tyria was flat with a giant ACME magnet stuck beneath, then all compasses would point to the middle of "flat Tyria", i.e. point below which is giant magnet. Only there could Aurora Borealis occur, because only there the magnetic field does not repell the solar wind. Since the compass does not always point to the Shiverpeaks, the point at which we observe Aurora Borealis, we can rule that out as a possibility. Hence magnetism is created at the core of a round planet called Tyria.

Plate tectonics has been demonstrated only from the dragon's raising of orr and the proceeding sinking of other landmasses. This type of behavior, however might not be indicative of plate tectonics but rather fantasy elements. Our idea that landmasses cannot simply fall into the sea is crated from our education on plate tectonics. However, in Tyria, it may be possible for the sea to just swallow up islands when it is too violently disturbed. Volcanoes only appear in one known place on Tyria (maybe two) and this is not what you would expect from a world with plate tectonics. You would expect many more than are known to exist. Lava existing in the CTC is a better indication that all of Tyria might be floating on lava,however as volcanoes never indicated a round world to the ancients it should not indicate it in a fantasy game. Volcanoes may function very differently here. The Aurora Borealis, likewise has many fantastical explanations from ancient times. It was called "Dance of the Spirits." by the Cree peoples and seen as a sign from god by medieval Europeans. There is no reason to think it is caused by the same forces which cause it on Earth. Also, the Far shiverpearks may be near the center of the world if it is flat. It also may just be a pretty effect the devs added in to make the Far Shiverpeaks look nice without putting much thought into it.

4thVariety said:

(2) Tyria is tilted to its side. Because Tyria has seasons, the planet requires to have a tilt. It is that simple. Before anybody argues, distance to the sun has NOTHING to do with seasons. Exact measurement on the axial tilt are impossible as GW's world simulation is not exact enough.

Well, distance to the sun could cause seasons on an untilted world as could the gods or some the supernatural influence, but, if the world is round then I'd just as well believe it is tilted.

4thVariety said:

(4) Tyria revolves around a sun. This is especially tricky since the sun appears to be in the same spot in the game all day. Except when it is night, then we see the moon in the sun's position shining brightly, hence the sun must be on the other side. Something therefore revolves around something. But I have an ace up my sleeve why Tyria revolves around the sun. The heavier body will always circle the lighter one! The gravity of Tyria is not high enough for an hydrogen ball of that weight to ignite into a sun. Hence the sun is the heavier object, hence Tyria is revolving around the sun.

Unless Tyia's sun is not a giant thermonuclear ball of mostly hydrogen in which case it may simply be a much smaller luminous body orbiting Tyria. Also, the mass of the sun did not concern ancient Geocentric thinkers. Its element kept it high in the sky and gravity had no affect on it (or did not exist). If Tyria is flat, then it is difficult to imagine it revolving around the sun. As with so many things on Tyria, since we have no information on Tyria's sun or moon (where it came from what it is), it is impossible to know whether we should try to explain it mythologicaly or go with our scientific assumptions. Therefore, any knowledge not confirmed from ingame sources or Anet is only speculation. Also, we see the sun in the RoT, but that does not mean the RoT orbits a sun. Personally I think it's just a lighting effect.

4thVariety said:

(5) No Space Aliens for now. Look up into the night sky and you will see.... ...no stars. No other planets. Nothing. Quite unsettling if you ask me. But there is pan-dimensional travel, not only to parallel planes, but also to /root, i.e. the mists. That has to count for something.

We do see stars but we do not know that they are suns. In fact, it is much easier for me to believe they are tiny holes in the membrane which separates us from the mists or luminous bodies fixed to a crystal sphere. Indeed the Canthans at least speak of the stars with religious overtones suggesting they might be magical bodies as they create projections on Tyria's surface. However, while we do not know if there are other suns, we can assume there are probably other planets in our system as there are objects in Napuhi Quarter (outpost) which seem to depict several smaller spheres above a larger one which we can only assume is Tyria (this might be seen as proof Tyria is considered by the Canthans to be round though we cannot be sure of their reasoning).

4thVariety said:

(6) Magic can be filtered. So the magic flows from the mists, into the planet, but the gods installed a system of Bloodstones, so whoever draws from that magic cannot tap into it directly. Depending on how absolute that filter is, humans have either some serious disadvantage against the dragons or the awakening dragons will find their power is less absolute. In any case I doubt they are clever enough to compete with this "magic filtering technology" made by the gods, even if the Dragons are more powerful on paper. They are simply not sentient enough. Aspect magic is another puzzle within a puzzle. It seems that only objects with more than one aspect can materialize, since the Mursaat use deconstruction into aspects as a trick to hide. Worst case scenario is the Dragons being single aspect creatures able to manifest on Tyria thus circumventing the magic filter of the gods.

I think I'll let everyone else concern themselves with tearing this paragraph apart, but I'll say that all we know is that magic has been divided using the Bloodstones and we have instructions on how to put the Bloodstones back together which implies magic can be recombined.

4thVariety said:

Sorry for the double post but this improves reading imo:

Africa is where humans were made. That is why we have our default skin color there: black. People then ventured north and got paler. AFTER being pale they went into North and then South America (Mitochondrial DNA proof ftw). After arriving there, the process of getting darker again started. It never finished, technology slowed it to a halt, global travel in the 1500 ruined it completely.

But look at the South American West coast. There you have deserts, without cover from rain forests the process accelerated in contrast to the rain forest tribes.

Actually, it depends. We don't know what the first Homo Sapiens looked like, but it is likely that dark skin, at least the tones which are common today throughout Africa, did not evolve until after humans had lost most of their hair. Earlier versions of humans than the Homo Sapien very likely had lightly colored skin, but darker tones may have evolved by the time Homo Sapiens came around.

[4thVariety]

Of course we could simply say, "hey, look at the GW2 logo", Tyria is round case closed, but that would be boring. It's also not an argument to say "well, Tyria could be flat" and not offer any examples as to why that might be. Same goes for geocentricity.

I thought the idea was to take something we observe in the game and then apply some sense to it. Taking something from the game and then venturing off into "here is my story how magic did it, some god or some ancient Earth culture did it" is not proof of anything. Even characters in the game do not have to be right, they are not all-knowing either. That leaves close observations.

Now back to some facts about Suns:
The sun in Tyria is yellow, which goes to tells us a lot about its size. For it to be yellow like that (little atmospheric discoloration happening in Tyria), a "dwarf" class star requires a diameter (!) of a million kilometers. So no, it is not possible for the sun to be a "smaller luminous body". The color does not fit! The sun also contains roughly 99.7% of all the matter in this solar system, so anything else is just a speck of dirt (hence our problems finding other specks of dirt in neighbouring star systems).

But hey, lets look for other smaller stars to fling around Tyria. We got brown dwarfs, who would be very bad suns since they do not support fusion. Those things can be 80 times the size of Jupiter and not ignite. Let's go bigger. Red dwarf stars are at least ignited, but they also sort of suck since they are not very bright. Already, they can go up in size to almost 70% of our sun. In terms of mass and which object circles around which the case is pretty much closed already. Earth would be a Jupiter moon, not the other way around.

Let's even go one step further, let's take some hydrogen the size of the moon, let's spin it around Tyria in all the ways you want and now let's set it on fire magically, so it classifies as a proper sun. Happy? Because that would work, provided we make the sun work that size by magic. Only problem is, that such a sun would be short lived. REALLY short lived. Let me do the math. How does 384 years lifetime sound? Because after that time a sun the size of our moon would have depleted its fuel. Btw, our sun will burn 10 billion years, don't let that scare you.

You see, Geocentricity needs one thing more than anything else: the willingness to kill people who doubt it. Because else nothing in the sky makes sense. Geocentricity did not even make sense for most of the Greeks. But it fit the story of the Bible nicely and so it was made canon. All the books of Greek philosophers who did not agree were simply not copied as the Church had the monopoly on knowledge, especially after Alexandria burned down. And as some recovered Greek math books recently proved, the Greeks did know much much much more. Their math could compete with all of the 19th century. Whoever knew that much must have laughed very hard at geocentricity. No matter how right he was, he was declared wrong for not being in line with the Bible and hence his book was erased and turned into a prayer book. Thank God for un-erasing chemicals.


Seasons
No, they cannot be created by varying your distance from the sun, mainly because that would require an orbit that would slingshot the planet out into space.

The Shiverpeaks are green in Summer because of two things: It's snowing and we can still see trees, bridges and dungeon entrances. If the snow did not melt, more snow would be falling until it would bury the entire landscape beneath the snow. 1-2m of snow a year is relatively normal for such areas, so even if there was one summer without melting the trees would vanish beneath 4m of snow. Then 6, then 8 and soon all we would see is snow and rocks. No trees, no frozen lakes (although that one is magically frozen I am told), no Droknar's Forge. All gone within years beneath snow falling and not melting. Sure GW is a game and games, for the most part, do not simulate seasons like that. It would also require a lot of time to redo most assets for each season. Sure, the payoff would be spectacular, but we want that game before 2020. As a result we have to say, yes the Shivepeaks melt, no the game is not able to simulate that really.

Enough for now. Just remember, you do not get a sunburn when it's hot, you get it when the sun's angle is small. Gran Canaria has 23 degrees Celsius this time of year, very pleasant. You would not get a sun burn in Germany if it had 23 degrees. But down there you will not last ten minutes. An army of English tourists is there for your convenience taking measurements.

[draxynnic]

[quote name='4thVariety'] [Please no argument for Dwayna's secret ACME magnet in the center of Tyria][/quote]Why not? In a fantasy setting, there COULD be a magic magnet. Or the Sun could be different enough in nature to our Sun that you don't need the magnetic field for protection, and "north" and "south" are actually based on something apart from magnetism.

[quote name='4thVariety']Tilt or no tilt, people on the equator would still be black and people near the poles more white. Hotspots depend on land mass distribution and the weather, but generally the sun intensity gets lower the further away you get from the equator. Today that is the difference between -50 and +50 degrees, but rewind a few hundred million years and you would see +60 and the equator and +30 on the poles. Skin color is just a matter of the angle the sun hits your face long enough, temperature is a matter of how the sun's energy is shifted around by the atmosphere and the oceans. Which is why human effects on the atmosphere are no laughing matter.[/quote]You're speaking in absolutes again. More accurate would be "people on the equator will be darker and people near the poles will be lighter, all other conditions being equal". People who live in a dense forest will probably be lighter than people who live in a desert regardless of latitude.

[quote]Sun revolving around non-tilted planet = Tyria is still heavier than its sun. But not to repeat myself, balls of hydrogen that size would not ignite into suns! Not into a yellow sun for sure. And not while orbiting another stellar object for sure.[/quote]Tyria's sun may not be a star as we know them, however!

(Actually, technically speaking, such systems generally orbit around a central point which is closer to the heavier object - this is how extrasolar "hot Jupiters" were first detected.)

[quote]If ArenaNet seeks to synchronize Tyrian events to our planet, then it needs to match astronomy details as well. That is one thing better not to look too deeply into.[/quote]Or wiggle their fingers and say "Maaa-giiiic" (or, better yet, explain that magic). It's a fantasy world. There is magic.

[quote]After reading it once more, I reckon we only have two solutions. Adapt the Earth model of things, or blame everything on crackpot magic theories that add up to bottled insanity. It also goes to show you want all went into Earth for it to turn out the way it did.[/QUOTE]"Crackpot magic theories" that have been used before, both in internally consistent fantasy worlds (Middle-Earth, for instance - I can't remember exactly what the Sun and Moon were in Tolkein's world off the top of my head, but they certainly weren't a ball of hydrogen plasma undergoing fusion and a semi-reflective rock reflectively. Didn't seem that crackpot to me. Not the same as our world, obviously, but internally consistent in a magical universe) and in mythological explanations in our own world before we had the tools to discover the truth.

[quote]Africa is where humans were made. That is why we have our default skin color there: black. People then ventured north and got paler. AFTER being pale they went into North and then South America (Mitochondrial DNA proof ftw). After arriving there, the process of getting darker again started. It never finished, technology slowed it to a halt, global travel in the 1500 ruined it completely.[/quote]It's not just South America. Look at Africa - there's a pocket of light(er) skin right in the middle of the continent - about where, if I remember rightly, where the heart of the African jungles were (or used to be, anyway).

[quote name='Konig Des Todes']Though you are correct in that we shouldn't state the planet is a sphere. It may be flat with a magical force keeping things such as magma from going along the sides (or straight down). [/quote]I'm suddenly reminded of all those physical problems involving an infinite plane...

[quote]Which is interesting to not as all lines point to the Shiverpeaks always being cold and frosted. "Celebrating the end of winter where winter never ends" etc. etc.[/quote]Although that is the Far Shiverpeaks - it might be that the Southern Shiverpeaks can thaw in winter.

Still, it is interesting that even the Far Shiverpeaks have trees. Botany isn't my field, but I'm pretty sure trees do need a non-frosty growing season (this is why mountains have treelines, for instance). Possibly the trees of the Shiverpeaks have evolved a way to get around this. (magic? :p)

[quote]Tyria orbits its moon, which orbits the sun (i.e., Tyria is the moon). Or, Tyria orbits an object, which is not the sun, and is in place like the sun (three bodies, one orbit).[/quote]Ah, the three-body problem. Fortunately, we all have desktop superCrays nowadays...)

[quote name='Arson']1. What is the name of the planet?[/quote]ANet is lazy, and hasn't come up with seperate names to distinguish between the continent and the world. (This is still better than Warcraft, which didn't distinguish the world from a nation until they renamed the country Stormwind... after its capital city. And how many nations bigger than a city-state do that?)

[quote name='Muan']I would also like to point out that if you look at the geography of Tyria, the climates of certain areas (Ascalon in particular) either do not make any sense or indicate that the sun rises in the west. It is possible that some if not most of the geographic features of Tyria really do mean nothing.[/quote]Do you mean the Ascalon-Kryta relationship? This is explainable. First, Ascalon is at a higher altitude (it's described as being highlands in the Prophecies timeline - and notice how you always go through a tunnel when travelling west from the Shiverpeaks?). Second, being closer to the sea, Kryta may be being warmed by a current from Elona (similar to the Gulf Stream warming Western Europe relative to Siberia). Third, if the prevailing winds are blowing east across the Shiverpeaks, this will cool Ascalon down significantly.

[quote]Volcanoes only appear in one known place on Tyria (maybe two)[/quote]Two known, almost certainly a third... and this is over what may be a quite small area.

[quote]We do see stars but we do not know that they are suns. In fact, it is much easier for me to believe they are tiny holes in the membrane which separates us from the mists or luminous bodies fixed to a crystal sphere. Indeed the Canthans at least speak of the stars with religious overtones suggesting they might be magical bodies as they create projections on Tyria's surface. However, while we do not know if there are other suns, we can assume there are probably other planets in our system as there are objects in Napuhi Quarter (outpost) which seem to depict several smaller spheres above a larger one which we can only assume is Tyria (this might be seen as proof Tyria is considered by the Canthans to be round though we cannot be sure of their reasoning).[/quote]A good point. The Canthans seem to believe that great deeds could cause people to be lifted up to the stars (or at least have their deeds reflected in the constellations). Now, as astrology sceptics often say, "How can uncaring balls of plasma billions of kilometres away affect my life or vice versa?" Since we do see some validation of the Canthan beliefs, this does seem to imply that at last some stars may be a little closer.

[quote name='4thVariety']Now back to some facts about Suns:
The sun in Tyria is yellow, which goes to tells us a lot about its size. For it to be yellow like that (little atmospheric discoloration happening in Tyria), a "dwarf" class star requires a diameter (!) of a million kilometers. So no, it is not possible for the sun to be a "smaller luminous body". The color does not fit! The sun also contains roughly 99.7% of all the matter in this solar system, so anything else is just a speck of dirt (hence our problems finding other specks of dirt in neighbouring star systems).

But hey, lets look for other smaller stars to fling around Tyria. We got brown dwarfs, who would be very bad suns since they do not support fusion. Those things can be 80 times the size of Jupiter and not ignite. Let's go bigger. Red dwarf stars are at least ignited, but they also sort of suck since they are not very bright. Already, they can go up in size to almost 70% of our sun. In terms of mass and which object circles around which the case is pretty much closed already. Earth would be a Jupiter moon, not the other way around.

Let's even go one step further, let's take some hydrogen the size of the moon, let's spin it around Tyria in all the ways you want and now let's set it on fire magically, so it classifies as a proper sun. Happy? Because that would work, provided we make the sun work that size by magic. Only problem is, that such a sun would be short lived. REALLY short lived. Let me do the math. How does 384 years lifetime sound? Because after that time a sun the size of our moon would have depleted its fuel. Btw, our sun will burn 10 billion years, don't let that scare you.[/quote]All true... when the laws of physics are the same as in our universe. Check your assumptions - they may not apply.

[quote name='4thVariety']No, they cannot be created by varying your distance from the sun, mainly because that would require an orbit that would slingshot the planet out into space.[/quote]And? So it would be a more elliptical orbit. Doesn't need to be comet-level ellipticity. ("Ellipticity" may or may not be a real world. I don't care.)

[quote]The Shiverpeaks are green in Summer because of two things: It's snowing and we can still see trees, bridges and dungeon entrances. If the snow did not melt, more snow would be falling until it would bury the entire landscape beneath the snow. 1-2m of snow a year is relatively normal for such areas, so even if there was one summer without melting the trees would vanish beneath 4m of snow. Then 6, then 8 and soon all we would see is snow and rocks. No trees, no frozen lakes (although that one is magically frozen I am told), no Droknar's Forge. All gone within years beneath snow falling and not melting.[/quote]The paradox you're suggesting doesn't require a snow-free season, just that there is some equilibrium between snowmelt and snowfall. This equilibrium doesn't necessarily have to reach the point of bare earth (consider the Himalayas, for example).

[Briar]

Briar here to close up the holes in Draxynnic's post

draxynnic said:

"Crackpot magic theories" that have been used before, both in internally consistent fantasy worlds (Middle-Earth, for instance - I can't remember exactly what the Sun and Moon were in Tolkein's world off the top of my head, but they certainly weren't a ball of hydrogen plasma undergoing fusion and a semi-reflective rock reflectively. Didn't seem that crackpot to me. Not the same as our world, obviously, but internally consistent in a magical universe) and in mythological explanations in our own world before we had the tools to discover the truth.

Tolkein's Sun and Moon were magical glowing gemstones (Silmarils), Originally there was no sun or moon - instead the world was lit by magic glowing trees.

No fiery balls of plasma here.

Quote

It's not just South America. Look at Africa - there's a pocket of light(er) skin right in the middle of the continent - about where, if I remember rightly, where the heart of the African jungles were (or used to be, anyway).

Quote

You're speaking in absolutes again. More accurate would be "people on the equator will be darker and people near the poles will be lighter, all other conditions being equal". People who live in a dense forest will probably be lighter than people who live in a desert regardless of latitude.

Yep, skin colour has nothing to do with how close you are to the equator and everything to do with how much sun you are getting.

Any peoples who live in a forest are going to get less sun because of the trees. People who spend allot of time out on the open water will be darker (because the waves reflect sun) as does snow... The list goes on.

Quote

Still, it is interesting that even the Far Shiverpeaks have trees. Botany isn't my field, but I'm pretty sure trees do need a non-frosty growing season (this is why mountains have treelines, for instance). Possibly the trees of the Shiverpeaks have evolved a way to get around this. (magic? :p)

I happen to actually have knowledge of Botany, trees can grow anywhere in the shiverpeaks as long as there is no permafrost. Once you hit the permafrost the trees die. So yes there would have to be a certain degree of thawing going on.

Then again the tree selection in the shivers makes no sense. All trees up that high should be conifers... Yet as someone else pointed out, we have birch trees - makes no sense, birch trees would not be able to grow leaves for a suitable period of time and would die.

Edit: The shiverpeaks - likely not as "shiver" as we think

Edited by Briar, 20 November 2009 - 03:35 PM.

[Sirius]

The problem with using science and logic to explain stuff in a fantasy world is that the real answer might quite often be "oops, didn't think of that".