@AndyD273 As you suspected, the diaper changing king question was closed as opinion based. Any suggestions on how to make it not opinion-based?

@Secret ... probably depends on the material... and how it's constructed... (not an engineering expert)

@Secret Not necessarily. Density is what determines collapse, not size.

So, let's say some user posted 4 comments full of text that could be an answer. Indeed, although not quite as good as my answer (IMHO), I wouldn't mind upvoting it if it were an answer. Were I to steal the comments and use them in a proper answer, should I make it Community Wiki or not?

Nevermind: i thoroughly read the person's comments now, and they aren't really all that useful.

@can-ned_food In case it happens again, last I heard, general consensus was to tell them that comments aren't for answering as comments are temporary, while answers are much more permanent, so they should put the comments in the answer. If however, you used those comments to write your own answer, well, to be honest, I wouldn't notice that you'd taken them from someone else. It's a "you probably shouldn't really do that, but it's their fault for writing comments instead of answering the question"

See worldbuilding.meta.stackexchange.com/a/4256/19951

Although if it's not a fleshed out answer, it's fine: worldbuilding.meta.stackexchange.com/q/4953/19951

hey there @Mithrandir24601

@Shalvenay Rytsas! Just eating one of my chocolate muffins :) and wondering my my 'leapfrog' simulation (which is designed to be energy conserving) isn't conserving energy any better than Euler's method of simulation, which isn't as good and isn't designed to be energy conserving

@Mithrandir24601 tasty, but oh noes :/

I'm alright over here. thinking it's a good thing that Daenrys only has to worry about assaulting Casterly Rock and not say, D.C....also, just how big is Drogon anyway?

Yep, tasty :) although lots of people find it to be too dark...

(and making some delicious tea!)

Do you want to know the TV size or the book size?

both

OK - might be a few minutes, but I'm having a look...

So, for the TV show, according to the Wiki, he's the size of a whale at the minute [citation needed!]

hey there @Bellerophon

@Mithrandir24601 Which whale?

@Shalvenay Hi.

@Bellerophon a 'large' one...

@Mithrandir24601 Hmmm, that one isn't in my field guide to British whales. Must be a foreigner.

@Mithrandir24601 so, not that huge, really :P...blue whales top out somewhere shy of 30m/100', so about the same length as an ERJ-170 :P

@Bellerophon Yeah, it's a native to the sea between Esteros and Westeros and just so happens to be the same size as Drogon at the precise moment Drogon is crossing said sea

as to according to the books?

Ah, so: youtube.com/watch?v=lcyN_tH25R4&feature=youtu.be

Numbers start here note: this is for the TV show

Weird, David Tennant uses a different voice for the Doctor on TV and the Doctor on the audiobooks he does.

@Bellerophon David Tennent didn't use his original accent for all but one of his Doctor Who episodes (Tooth and Claw) , so that's probably what you're hearing

Hehe - so dragons aren't measured in terms of 'about the size of a blue whale' but in numbers of blue whales

@Hannah No, he does the Doctor as English but a different English than he does for the Doctor on TV. He can do a lot of accents. Pretty good impression of Billy Piper.

@Bellerophon Oh well, I don't know then... The only Doctor Who audio book i have is a third Doctor audiobook, and i haven;t even listened to that yet

@Shalvenay According to the same Wiki, at the end of the 5th book his wingspan would be 20ft (about 6m), but I don't have the book on me right now to check that

so yeah -- the video has Drogon at ERJ-175 sized, albeit with more wingspan than the RJ

and the Fields of Fire version of Balerion at the length of an An-225 assuming that length and wingspan grow at equal rates in a dragon

(again, more wingspan than the big jet though -- dragons need every inch of wing they can get)

(also -- I don't think Balerion could take off with 250t of cargo strapped to his back :P)

also hey there @Hannah

@Shalvenay -hi-

how're things going?

@Shalvenay probably not :P

@Mithrandir24601 yeah -- it has me wondering if the big Antonov can actually lift its own OEW in payload, which would be quite the feat

(OEW being Operating Empty Weight btw)

@Shalvenay Well, I had to google Antonov, so I clearly don't have a clue :P

also, in terms of things Dany and Drogon don't want to see coming their way... flightservicebureau.org/…

while it wouldn't be quite as bad as what the Emirates A380 did to that bizjet over the Arabian Sea, it'd still be an ugly wake turbulence encounter especially at minimum VFR separation (which could be as close as 500' vertical and 0nm horizontal!)

@Shalvenay Still better than a fully-grown Balerion four times that size!

yeah, a full-grown Balerion would produce enough wake turbulence to give an A380 a good jolt

then again, the best advice that could be given to Dany is "beware of the little fast guys" -- the giants have big "No Tailgating" signs on their backs, but I don't think Dany and Drogon would last long after kicking a nest of Vipers or Hornets...

... My Euler simulation is actually better than my leapfrog :/

@Shalvenay If by vipers and hornets, you mean the animals, then a good blast of dragonfire will soon sort them out :)

@Mithrandir24601 no :P

@Shalvenay That's what I thought...

...I wonder what the look on Dany and Drogon's faces would be when they see an F/A-18E/F doing the Square Loop...

@Shalvenay Drogon: Big thing. Flying. Must be enemy. Fire

@Mithrandir24601 oh dear...probably the worst possible thing he could think haha

@Shalvenay I'm guessing that's some sort of fighter plane?

yah

ah

@HDE226868 I'm just looking at the World tree question... Only one of the answers (many of which have 10s of upvotes) satisfies me that it's hard-science. I've just checked the edit history and am wondering if the OP even originally meant it to be hard-science

So, what should I do? And what should I do if such a problem comes up again?

@Hannah I may as well give you an update - I've taken out my old solar system simulation for 2nd year physics... It's pretty good, but still gives small errors that add up over time to catastrophic results (fractions of a percent per year).

I don't know if it's 1. I'm only using classical physics and relativistic effects matter (unlikely, as this really only affects Mercury to any extent that it would be this noticeable), 2. I'm not considering the effects of the planets on the sun (shouldn't matter by symmetry), 3. I'm using the wrong method (possible, but still doesn't explain why Euler is better than Leapfrog), 4. A result of errors in precision just adding up over time (unavoidable, but can be minimised)

or 5. I'm not considering things like comets, asteroids, moons etc. (which should be a negligible thing) so, I'm going to look at a thing called the Verlet method and perhaps try and find a point where leapfrog and Euler are more accurate

@Mithrandir24601 btw -- I wonder what Dany and Drogon would do if they found themselves in a fight with a fighter jet...

@Shalvenay FIRE!

and y'know, generally clawing and biting it :P

what would happen if you hit a missile with dragonfire?

if you could hit it, you'd probably destroy the missile

don't think that'd work so well against 20mm cannon ammo though

never mind that if Drogon blinks, he'll miss his chance to do anything about the incoming missile

and that catching up to the fighter jet would be pretty much impossible for Drogon

@Shalvenay True that... But then, what effect would the heat of the dragonfire have on things like turbulence?

@Mithrandir24601 not much at the ranges in question -- worst you could dish out on that front is "annoyingly bumpy" anyhow

@Shalvenay Fair enough then :/

So the safest thing to do for Drogon would be to (if possible) sit on the plane :P

@Mithrandir24601 Thanks :) That sounds really helpful.

@Mithrandir24601 LOL. yeah, that's probably not happening. head-on, neither side would want the midair -- and the jet pilot just has to unload (push the stick forward) a bit and kick their AB on to avoid it and set up for the ensuing fight

from there, I don't think Drogon would even be able to find the jet until it announced its presence with a hail of 20mm

@Shalvenay Hmmm... On the other hand dragons would probably have good hearing and eyesight, which the plane wouldn't so much... What if Drogon managed to surprise the plane?

@Hannah Well... I don't know if it will be or not, but it's interesting anyway

@Mithrandir24601 exactly - what are we doing it for if not for the interest/fun

@Mithrandir24601 surprise + a head-on snapshot would probably be his only chance, but poor Drogon probably would be the proverbial side of a barn when it comes to radar cross section

@Hannah I originally did it as part of a tick-boxing exercise so I could pass the year :P

@Shalvenay That's true :/

@Mithrandir24601 doesn't matter, I originally made my spreadsheet due to being annoyed at getting an uninhabited system when doing it manually - I've only continued with it because it became fun (well, its both fun and hurts my brain...)

also, I do wonder what the hail of 20mm would do to poor ol' Drogon...(of course, Dany would be screwed by it -- I'm not sure if either dragon or rider would be recognizable)

@Hannah Fair enough :) I'm beginning to see how things like EVE online came into existence... If it didn't hurt your brain, then you wouldn't be learning completely new stuff :P

@Shalvenay Either absolutely nothing or complete destruction - it depends on how strong dragon scales are against the amount of damage caused by the gunfire

@Mithrandir24601 well, the M53 API round fired by the M61 Vulcan can go through 6.3mm of RHA at 1km range (if Wikipedia is right that is)

@Shalvenay All I know about RHA is that they make really good earphones :P

@Mithrandir24601 no, RHA = Rolled Homogenous Armor

@Shalvenay Aww - yeah, it would probably tear through poor Drogon :(

it does have me wondering though -- if Dany and Drogon got dropped into this world and didn't know anything about the military capabilities they'd find themselves up against, where would they decided to attack?

(I'm not kidding about the earphones though - I have some Sennheiser headphones worth about 3 times as much as the RHA earphones which are, if anything, better)

@Shalvenay Hmm... Don't really know... North Korea? :P

@Mithrandir24601 hrm...that'd be kinda nice :P but I'd think Dany and Drogon would think enough of themselves to go after bigger fish in the pond, no?

@Shalvenay Well, in the books, they started in a small place with lots of slavery, then spent time there building up before going after the big fish...

@Mithrandir24601 that is true -- so yeah, NK would be a good bet. bonus points, they'd get a chance to get intimately familiar with more modern military hardware in the process

Hello everyone!

@Shalvenay just curious about dragons here: would making the wings the same size as the dragon's body allow it to fly for short periods of time while making it move about in the air via gliding?

@SCPilot dragons are slow flyers, so they need all the aspect ratio they can get on their wings :)

hey there btw @SCPilot, how're things going?

I'm doing good. Just looking at ideas for dragon-like animals on my alien worlds. I'm reading the DragonArt how to draw books for ideas.

ah

According to it, the bigger the wings, the more believable that the dragon can fly.

@SCPilot exactly

fortunately, dragon wings fold up fairly nicely in most versions of dragons, so having a gigantic wingspan isn't a ground-handling nightmare for them

So, if my dragon-like animal is as big as a rhino, how large would the wings have to be? Also, is it believable for the wings to part feathered and part batlike?

@SCPilot dunno about a mix of skin and feathers -- and I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but I suspect its possible to work it out

Ah okay. Well, for scales, I'm thinking a combination...of something like armor plating, snake scales, and carp scales. Or is that too much?

@SCPilot something like a thicker snake or fish scale could work, yes

@SCPilot ... i can give a reference for wings for an animal the size of a giraffe... (as Quetzalcoatlus was roughly a similar height and had a wingspan of about 15 meters) so something the size of a rhino probably has smaller wings then that... i'll do a search for something roughly rhino-sized now though

Ah cool! Thank you @Hannah! I appreciate that very much!

So, @Shalvenay, by armor plating I meant something like the third one on the top row from the left: s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/99/6d/8a/…

the problem is that most flying animals are measured by wingspan more then height, so at the moment i'm just looking at the animals with the largest wingspans, and finding roughly how big they were

I see. That makes sense.

Or this is a better example here for the armor plated scales

(also, by Rhino, what species of Rhino are you referring to? (either way, i need to look for animals bigger then birds, as the largest known is not big enough to be useful anyway)

Hm....Maybe a black rhino.

But while i'm talking about birds - for the very low end of the scale you need a wingspan of at least 6.4 meters, as thats the wingspan of Pelagornis Sandersi, which is likely too small to be relevent, but i'll mention it anyway

I'm trying to combine a western dragon, a sea dragon, an eastern dragon together. Doesn't have the long snakelike bodies of the sea dragon and eastern dragon, but more like the body of the western dragon, but the wings are part bat part bird. I want to throw in some gryphon in there somewhere, but I might be overdoing it.

I'm trying to figure out about that tongue on the third one from the left on the second row here in this pic:

What's the point of it being ridged or serrated or whatever you want to call it?

Also, I like the whiskers of the eastern dragon.

@SCPilot being able to rasp bits of flesh off of a carcass basically

Wait...what?

@SCPilot either htat, or grooming

Also, according to the books I'm reading: frills and fins are the same thing. The main difference is the function: if it's decoration, it's a frill; if it serves a purpose such as propulsion underwater or streamlining through the air, it's a fin.

@SCPilot nods

one thing that most dragons seem to lack is a horizontal tail surface of any sort, which I find rather strange

What do you mean?

@SCPilot nothing like the tailfeathers on a bird or the horizontal stabilizer on an airplane

I see. Maybe having both the tailfeathers of a bird and a fur tufted tail.

@SCPilot hrm...perhaps the tuft's more for decor then?

?

It could also be used to swat things like a horse's tail.

@SCPilot that is a point, yes :)

That's true. I'm also thinking that the claws could be used for climbing, digging, and fighting.

@SCPilot yes, very much so

Although the tufts on the tails could hide a barb.

xD

What?

Oh. I'm going overboard. Lol! This is what I get for getting too many inspirations.

I mean this webcomic had some great ideas for unique animals.

cyantian.net/comic/07152008

This is a much harder search then i thought it would be... At a current guess, i'd say there wingspan needs to be roughly 8 meters long, depending on build and aspect ratio - with a high aspect ratio they will be larger, with a low aspect ratio their wings might be slightly smaller. I'm going to try and find some equations to help with this but the only ones i know of require height and back width...

That makes sense. I appreciate your help.

Also, scientists have reported that today, they will no longer use the metric system but use the American system, which includes feet, inches, etc.

;P

Pteranodon has a smaller wingspan much smaller wingspan than what i just mentioned, at roughly 6 meters for males with a height of 3 meters, but there are other pterosaurs with wingspans of 10 meters that have a rough height of 2 meters.

(according to the graphs i looked at)

and psh, i'm british, i'm using metric

(also i'm not a scientist so meh)

I figure no one would fall for that joke. Lol! Wouldn't it be funny if it was true. Everyone in the world would have to measure things with grams and ounces, feet and inches.

@SCPilot Wouldn't make sense tbh, as those who don't use metric are in the minority

Well, I think the minority basically includes the entire United States population.

Or pretty much the entire US population.

@SCPilot Its basically the US, and less then a handful of smaller countries from what i can see.

I figured as much. I think the reason why the US doesn't convert to the metric system dates back to the Revolutionary War. After we defeated the British, we wanted to distant ourselves from the British Empire, so we came up with a new measurement system. Although that's probably an old folktale about why we don't use the metric system. I'll have to look up the real reason later on.

@SCPilot oh well. I'm pretty sure britain used to use a similar system to america until a few decades/centuries ago... or maybe we had a different system altogether... as we do have measurements left over from another system (that we don't really use, apart from miles)

Ah okay. Yeah that's true.

@Mithrandir24601 Oh, yes, that one. I wasn't happy there.

This was . . . about a week before we got the hard-science post notice feature.

So all of the notices were added after the answers were posted - much later. I originally just put a "Citation needed" notice on some, but then changed it when we got the custom notice.

I have no good idea as to how to fix the problem if the OP wants the tag. There probably should have been some sort of discussion about that, but it never happened.

I've been tempted, from time to time, to put a bounty on it and basically say "Hey, anyone want to write a good hard science answer to this?"

I just remembered: would fairy dragons be able to fly, what with them being so small?

At the moment, the community's getting pretty good at avoiding that sort of debacle by just asking the OP in comments if they want the tag.

In this case, the OP did accept the 'hardest' answer there (OK, maybe not a 6 on the Mohs scale :P, but still the hardest), so it does suggest they do/did want it there...

That's true.

@SCPilot From what i know, The smaller something is, the less it cares about gravity... so i'd say a tentative yes...? until someone with better biology skills then me comes along

@HDE226868 I have a question about a certain unregistered user as the same name has been used a while ago for quite some questions that don't really fit the site. Could you check whether this Max is the same as this Max with mod tools

Just out of curiosity to see if he's back or if it's a different one. The symbol indicates that it's a different Max.

@Secespitus Some evidence points to them being the same person.

I hope he doesn't post the nearly-same-always-closed question like last time where he tried to get input on his project :D

Thanks for looking into it

No problem. Not much we can do for unregistered users, unfortunately.

Yeah, we'll see if he starts listening to peoples advice this time.

... have you ever read a fanfiction series so long, that when you get to the end of it you can't quite believe it? - 'cuz thats just happened to me... i spent 3 days reading, and now it's over... (tbh it was a very confusing series, as it occasionally bounced perspectives and time periods without warning)... but still!

1,405,469 words overall... really, it felt longer (but the majority of the series was in one-shots so thats probably why)

@Hannah I don't normally read fanfic, so nope. I have however read some ridiculously long series, which... Yeah... I take your three days and raise you three years :P

It was about 4.5 million words... (Wheel of Time) The first three or so books were reasonably decent, so I read them reasonably quickly, the next 7/8 books or so were not-so-good, so it took at least 2.5 years to read them. Robert Jordan died after that point, Brandon Sanderson took over and I finished the final three books... Very quickly :)

Actually, what fanfic was that?

@Mithrandir24601 Oh wow..

My current epic saga is Malazan book of the Fallen, which has a mere 10 books with about 3.3 million words. It's really good, but really dense (and I don't have a huge amount of time to read :/ ) so I'm not going through it as fast as I'd like - I'm currently just about to start the fourth book

@Mithrandir24601 It was a series, well technically two - Re-Entry and Re-Entry: Journey of the Whills by flamethower (on Archive of our Own). Its a Star Wars time-travel fic... kinda... as in its technically set after the original trilogy, but also in between episode 1 & 2... (the time travel bit) but it kinda goes a bit off the rails and is generally confusing...

Yikes, it has a TV tropes entry...

@Mithrandir24601 Does it?!

Is that good or bad that it has a TV Tropes entry?

tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/… Yep...

@SCPilot It's not a bad thing, just means that it's a relatively well known thing

I see.

Well. I've never read it/heard of it before... three days ago?

(which I suppose is usually a good thing :) )

To put it into perspective, TV tropes only has 16 Star Wars fanfics

ohh

Anyway, i need to get up early(er) tomorrow... er... later today... so i'm signing off now. Goodnight!

@Hannah Night!

OH NO! I now have 5 TV tropes tabs open... WHAT HAVE I DONE‽