Universe Factory - 2017-09-14

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5:07 AM

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Its not done yet. I still have to add the super mountain and there will probably be some desert and stuff in places...maybe, I dunno I'm tired. Also, I just watched Mortal Combat on Netflix. Its just as terrible as I remember.

3 hours later…

Mithrandir24601

7:57 AM

@NexTerren it depends on whether it's a European or African woodchuck, surely?

5 hours later…

1:07 PM

@James That's pretty cool. Is this the whole globe, or just a portion?

@James how'd you go about for making this? The mountainring on the right seems a tad weird from my understanding of geology, but my understanding is limited ^^

1:52 PM

@AndyD273 Just a portion, so the big island is roughly Australia sized.

@dot_Sp0T Free hand. Drew it in pencil then scanned it and added the color.

the big one is australia? Oo

and yes the mountains are weird and may change, but the idea of a plateau/massive valley in the middle of the mountains intrigued me.

@NexTerren @Green Check it out ^^

The idea is interesting indeed, and with the reference size being australia your formation might just work

What about maybe doing the folowing:

I can do nothing, no problem.

:D

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Following your mountains and trying to find some plate clashing (not too good at it sadly) the yellow is the situation as it currently seems, while the red is a possibility orienting itself on the form of the landmasses allowing for a, in my opinion, more naturally, and also bigger, valley/plateau forming in the middle

Naturally there's also processes such as glaciers and ice-ages forming landmasses

2:03 PM

I had considered adding more mountains to the south on the big island

I probably also need to add some smaller islands in-between the main ones where it curves SW

the form of the big island sort of suggests, to me, that there would at least be some hills along the North-South line (spine). You could extend that line into some dotted islands or just drop it and say there's a deep drop in the sea (e.g. a trench or just a depression) - plate tectonics can move into both directions (they can have plates clash with each other > producing mountains where one plate is lifted AND they can have plates move away from each other > producing trenches, volcano belts.)

etc

but again, your archipelago is looking amazing as it is already

Looking forward to things such as lakes and rivers

How does it look/feel style wise?

I would probably use the words pristine and clean so far

Yeah, the gods got started and then took a break. Its easy to be clean when its simple :D

colour choices are sweet, alas I don't know how to interpret the coastline colours yet

2:15 PM

@dot_Sp0T it's worth pointing out that the world is coming out of an ice age, so there are a lot of places in there that would have been above water until the ice melted, maybe much of the light blue. I don't know if that helps with your calculations

@AndyD273 well it's mostly rule-of-thumb stuff I did :/

@dot_Sp0T Those honestly weren't intentional, just a result of the process I used to create it, the lines weren't clean so I blended.

interesting, I thought these smerches were either lower coastal areas ('beaches' or just flats) or cliffs

^^

although cliffs are made by erosion if I remember right - so probably little to none

Now I feel bad for not working on my worldmap...

@dot_Sp0T We can pretend they are.

@James Initial thought: Unless there's a super steep gorge out of that mountain ring, we're gonna have a nice, high altitude lake a la Lake Tahoe.

2:25 PM

@dot_Sp0T do you think any of the islands would be volcanic?

looking at the tectonics and ranges I pretended to know how to properly draw I'd say these could have some activity.. but at this point you'd probably be better off asking someone more versed in this :(

@James Oh, so if the deity causes the big mountain to rise up in the middle of the Australia sized continent, and it's not just volcanic, say by punching a hole through the plate where there might not be one naturally, then that could account for shifting and rising of mountains that are out of the normal pattern.

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Assuming the mountain ranges being due to tectonics this could be a possibility (black plates, red ranges, pink-ish mountains raised due to other means)

alas the top left line of islands could be a flatter mountainrange (which would, according to my understanding, split plate a into two plates)

Mountainranges usually come from plates clashing

single mountains are often due to volcanic activity, alas don't need be active volcanoes

plate-boundaries do not necessary mean mountains, plates can also move apart

here's some nasa map: globalchange.umich.edu/globalchange1/current/lectures/…

2:43 PM

Here's another:

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so take everything I say with a grain of salt

@AndyD273 There's also going to be the loading involved with putting that much weight on a plate. If Olympus Dens (I just made up the name for the super high volcano) is on the biggest island that doesn't have mountains yet, then I'd expect to see some kind of concentric cracking on the surrounding plate.

That's a good point. Looking at where the plates on on Earth, and how many mountain ranges aren't anywhere near a plate border, I think we could get a lot of this without having to worry too much about making the plates fit the map

@AndyD273 Agreed.

For example, the Yellowstone supervolcano is a long way from the interface of the North American and Pacific plates.

This is also one of the things I love about geology. Unless you really really really know what you're doing, you can make a map up however you want then invent a back story to explain it.

And...we've got billions of years of planet history to work with.

Also, a deity that may or may not have to follow all of the normal rules.

A little mid continent buckling? Yeah, that looks good...

2:55 PM

The wikipedia article on mountain formation is a good & quick read to get a feelign

But in general you can also make use of the GoT-Rule - aka. making stuff up and then having your fanbase find scientific explanations

@dot_Sp0T You mean a summer that lasts several decades before winter finally comes?

@AndyD273 the most prominent example :)

We're WorldBuilding.SE we find a way 9 out of 10 times - every time

This has some pretty pictures: dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3629262/…

@AndyD273 pressing right arrow HOW DID YOU DECIDE TO SHOW ME NEWS ON SELENA GOMEZ??!!

3:11 PM

@dot_Sp0T It's not my fault you strayed from the path...

I mean it's the daily mail... blind click with caution

I trusted you Andy!

@dot_Sp0T The page I sent you to was celebrity gossip free

I trusted you...

@James I have a request. When you draw in Olympus Dens (the huge mountain) can you draw in a snow line in white then air line in black?

@Green I mean, this is clearly the most important feature. Come on, .0! You should have started with it!

4:20 PM

@AndyD273 The big mountain will actually be on the island directly southwest of the biggest island.

@Green Yes.

@Green ...weird question...would snow be able to blow up into the atmosphere-less parts of the mountain...?

@James why not? snow is merely powdered frozen water

Wouldn't it boil though?

with low enough atmospheric pressure?

its been a long time since chem/physics, I forget.

At low enough pressure it would indeed boil, although not be hot to touch. If I have my physics right(?)

But that'd be at an absolute vacuum, not..?

we need the physicist version of a bat signal in this joint.

here you go

4:30 PM

@James Probably not? I mean, the wind can't blow where there is no air... and the clouds actually stop a little ways below the top of the atmosphere, so there probably wouldn't be much snow above that point either

...so basically only if they were moving fast enough to get thrown that high...

but if they did they would boil away to nothing...I guess?

@James check the video; seems that nothing much happens to dry snow at all in a vacuum

Roger

@James my guess would be no since wind is usually how snow is deposited. However, there may be periods of 'snow' on the peak following an eruption but I don't know how long those would survive before the water sublimated away.

...maybe we should just write this up as a question for main :D

@Green Thoughts on the map style/flavor wise though?

4:57 PM

@James it looks good to me. For the information we want to convey, I think the map shows it just fine.

I know I'm going to want more information as time goes by but it seems good right now.

5:21 PM

@James have you worked out whether Olympus Dens is going to be a shield volcano or a strato volcano?

5:42 PM

I'd like to vote for strato volcano. I picture it being pointy, and not just a giant lump.

Like, Olympus Mons really doesn't look that majestic, or even that tall. It's squat and dumpy.

@AndyD273 Seconded. Strato volcanos also blow up more spectacularly. Shield volcanoes just leak lava.

Compare that to Mount Fuji...

@Green Well, it could be a well vented strato volcano?

Or the deity causes it to go extinct after it breaks through the atmosphere.

@AndyD273 For a structure 50 miles high, well vented is going to be an understatement.

Hey, the Death Star was well vented, and look where that got it.

@NexTerren :smirk:

5:46 PM

@NexTerren Ok, so no shooting plasma topedos at the giant volcano. We'll have to put up signs.

2

@AndyD273 WHat about throwing really big at rocks at it from space?

The Death Star was an inside job! Don't believe the cover-ups sheeple!

@Green Depending on the size of the rock, the volcano will probably be the least of your worries

#DeathStarTruther

@NexTerren So you believe the propaganda films do you? Next you're going to tell me that you believe that someone can do the Kessel run in 12 parsecs. That doesn't even make sense! The rebels didn't have the kind of firepower to take down the Death Star. It was an inside job to collect the insurance money, since the Emporer figured out that it was going to cost too much in maintenance.

@AndyD273 Hey man, if that was true the Empire wouldn't have turned right around and built a second one, but twice as big. You may not be willing to accept that domestic terrorists are a real thing, but troops died to bring you the order you enjoy today.

6:13 PM

@NexTerren Dude, I'm sorry, but did anyone actually see the "second" Death Star? Government records show a lot of money going out to pay for it, but I think it's pretty convenient that no one was allowed to get close enough to the star system to verify that that it was actually being built.

And don't you think that it's pretty convenient that Darth Vader, who was in charge of sector security and making sure that no one got close to the site, disappeared shortly after this supposed second battle station was destroyed? I think that he was embezzling the money, and when the Emperor dropped in for a surprise inspection Vader killed him and all his guards, and then disappeared. It's not like anyone could recognize him out of that suit he always wears.

Can't top that.

Now I see why conspiracy theorists do it... It's kinda fun

I mean you are a world builder.

6:38 PM

@Green So...strato volcanoes are cooler...but I feel like shield is more likely considering the size...strato volcanoes have a tendency to blow themselves up.

That being said we are talking about a volcano that came into existence magically so we can basically do whatever we want.

@James Bingo!

Agreed! #TeamStrato

I would probably argue against something as uniform as Mt Fuji (awesome as it is) so let me play around with it and Ill see what I can do. Can someone hook me up with the measurements for Olympus Mons (base size in M^2 and height) i have a busy afternoon and Ill forget to look.

And a little bit of math later, with a height of 50 miles Olympus Dens can be seen from 631.5 miles away.

whats the height of the atmosphere on earth?

6:45 PM

@James Outer space is considered to be 50 miles. LEO is about 100 miles.

@James en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympus_Mons

How did we function before wikipedia...like...as a species? I forget.

You realize weather will have to travel AROUND this mountain.

...I don't even know where to begin thinking about that.

@James Yep :)

There are going to be some hellacious winds on the sides parallel with the prevailing winds.

@James Depends... Technically it is 300 miles thick, but I think at some point it's just a matter of counting how many zeros are between the decimal point and the 1...

@AndyD273 Do you mean 300 miles wide?

6:48 PM

@Green He's talking about the atmosphere.

@James Ah. My apologies.

Reading comprehension FTW.

Agreed then. You'll run into stray gas particles a long way out. Orbital decay is a problem, even for geostationary orbits.

@James Following the arrows FTW!

...would the atmosphere be "taller" near the mountain?

@James How do you want the semantics to play out? Argue one way and it's "yes". Argue another way and it's "no".

6:51 PM

@Green ...freaking science.

Yeah, according to this: space.com/17683-earth-atmosphere.html The total thickness is 300 miles, but most of the air is below the 10 mile mark.

This is why people don't believe in climate change.

From the perspective of any air breather, the mountain is taller than the atmosphere.

From a nerd's persective of how far out gravitationally bound gas particles go, the atmosphere is taller than the mountain.

The thermosphere extends from about 56 miles (90 km) to between 310 and 620 miles (500 and 1,000 km). Temperatures can get up to 2,700 degrees F (1,500 C) at this altitude. The thermosphere is considered part of Earth's atmosphere, but air density is so low that most of this layer is what is normally thought of as outer space. In fact, this is where the space shuttles flew and where the International Space Station orbits Earth.

What about from the perspective of god monkeys?

6:52 PM

@James Do they have to breath?

@James The mountain is taller. It makes for a more interesting story.

Also, having the mountain be taller aligns well with a normal person's understanding of "atmosphere".

...I'm starting to wonder if you would even be able to see the top of this mountain.

@James Absolutely you could.

well thats good.

On clear days on a mountain you can see for tens or hundreds of miles. The part of the atmosphere that's going to obstruct the view is only about 10 miles thick at the most.

Since most of our super tall mountain is above the atmosphere (and visibility in space is effectively unlimited), you should be able to make out lots of details on the top of the mountain.

6:56 PM

True...it would actually be easier to see up than out.

@James Precisely :)

Now you just have to be far enough away to get the whole thing in your line of sight.

but close enough not to obscure the view.

True. While you could technically be close to the max visible range of 600 miles, beyond maybe 400 (I'm guessing) the top of the mountain will be obscured by atmospheric haze (and the bottom part of the mountain obscured by the planet).

I think you would have to be flying several miles in the air to actually see the whole thing...

@James Agreed, possibly only from space. Some of the math I did said a stratovolcano 50 miles high would be either 200 or 400 miles in diameter at the base.

7:04 PM

...how the hell am I going to draw a picture of a volcano that you can't actually see all at once.

@James um, draw a picture of the parts you can see?

:-\

What if instead of being a single volcano it is a ring of volcanoes and in the middle is a secret hidden biome...like land of the lost without dinosaurs.

nope nevermind...the base would have to be ridiculously huge then.

@James Don't chicken out!

We have an entire island to form the base of the volcano.

@Green Yeah I am basically going to add the volcano and use it to define the scale of the map.

@James BAHAHHAHAH!!! Do it!

7:09 PM

@James What if the caldera is just very deep? Like deep enough to hold an atmosphere in

I suppose that is possible...

@AndyD273 That could be pretty cool. They wouldn't get any sunlight though....wouldn't that make them super duper cold too?

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@Green well nothing direct at least...but it could get plenty of heat from being in the center of a giant damn volcano.

I'm feeling lots of bio-luminescent creatures.

@Green I don't know about the sunlight... depends on different factors, like the steepness of the caldera sides, but as for heat, it's a volcano

@James Maybe. Depends on if it's still active at all....but really we can make it as active as we want.

7:12 PM

@James This could work

Like Pandora at night

@James And lots of fun monsters!

Also like Pandora at night

oooh maybe these guys.

20

Q: A Human Hunter with Sonic Powers?

As part of Fortnightly topic challenge #3: Creature Design I am looking for a realistic way to create a particularly nasty creature. What I would like: A creature that is capable of emitting a sonic 'noise'...maybe wave is a better term This ability should allow the creature to render higher ...

science-based reality-check biology creature-design fauna

This is what I was thinking size wise for the volcano base but I will have to do some math when I am working on it to see if that makes sense.

weird...I can't upload

eh, youll see it later.

8:01 PM

@James File size maybe? I've had trouble uploading images from my phone because it makes them ridiculously huge for some reason... Maybe just scale it down a bit?

I saved it as a BMP and that wouldn't even work.

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that was a test...

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huh...weird now it works...

Mons covers 120,000 square freaking miles.

so thats what...350 miles per side (if you square it off) give or take?

Where's Mons?

...this whole thing was your idea.

No, I mean where on the map. Is it the black hexigon?

that's my tentative plan, yes

And Olympus mons is only like 16 miles tall but we have been talkign about 50 or something. Which is it?

8:18 PM

@James I think we hit an incorrect source originally, thus the confusion.

@James Also "only" 16 miles tall.

Also Earth has a lot thicker atmosphere than Mars, so the mountain has to be taller.

And we aren't going to let Mars win the biggest freak'n volcano contest, are we???

I Say No!

how about we go with ...25 miles tall.

is my math right on the sides of the mountain being 350 miles?

@James We're assuming a cone 35 miles tall?

tall enough that humans can't breathe for like the top 10 miles.

How wide is the base? I don't see a scale on your map.

8:26 PM

there is no scale yet.

I am using the mountain to figure that out

but mons is 16 miles tall and covers 122,000 sq/miles

How wide is the base? I don't see a scale on your map.

1 min ago, by James

there is no scale yet.

Hm.

@AndyD273 MY DLP AGENT LOCKED UP MY BROWSER WINDOW, OKAY

Ragglefraggle...

@James so is the black hex the air-line Green requested? Wouldn't it be more sensible to put the top of the mountain at the very center of the island (or at least more believable regarding the slopes not going straight down)

"...Olympus Mons is a shield volcano 624 km (374 mi) in diameter (approximately the same size as the state of Arizona), 25 km (16 mi) high..."

Okay. So. If we increase the height by 56.25%, then the width increases likewise if we want it just as flat. Do we want it just as flat?

8:30 PM

Humans can only really function long term below 8000M/26,246 feet which is only 5 miles up

@dot_Sp0T Never you mind the placement of my magical volcano!

@James never heard it being called that

@dot_Sp0T I actually thought the same but didn't want to be picky

@dot_Sp0T oh...yeah it was sort of created by gods...

@NexTerren it's James, he needs to be put into his place

but I can think about moving it.

8:32 PM

^^,

I'm just messing with you (at least regarding the putting into your place)

@NexTerren Lets go with 25 miles high.

that is 20 MILES TALLER THAT HUMANS CAN ASCEND

should be sufficient

And I would argue the base could be narrower since this is not a shield volcano...does that pass a logic test?

Okay so Everest has a W/H ratio of 2.26. Mons has a W/H ratio of 23.4

@NexTerren But the difference is Mons is a shield volcano, which are dumpy, flat, and ugly, and a strato volcano, which are tall and majestic. So a strato volcano with the base Mons has would be much taller.

What do we want the W/H ratio to be?

Or do we need another mountain for comparison?

use Vesuvius

8:34 PM

do you have like a valley full of dinosaurs in the caldera?

@dot_Sp0T I made a land of the lost reference about that earlier.

@James dang

@NexTerren I would like you to get an average of all these and then get back to me. Chop chop.

List of stratovolcanoes

A list of stratovolcanoes active in geologically recent (Holocene) times follows below. The Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program database lists more than 700 such stratovolcanoes. == Africa == === Cameroon === Mount Cameroon === Democratic Republic of Congo === Mount Nyiragongo, Goma. Listed as a Decade Volcano. It contains an active lava lake inside its crater which overflowed due to a crack in 2002. === Eritrea === Alid Volcano === Ethiopia === Borawli, Afar Region, Ethiopia === Kenya === Mount Kenya, which contains several volcanic plugs on its peak. === Tanza...

What if the Mount Everest was a Volcano

"This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it."

Who wants to set off some volcanoes?!

8:38 PM

Mt Fuji is 24 miles around at the base, and 2.3 miles tall.

@AndyD273 well thats easy math at least

As draw, ours is 2100 miles around, so 210 miles tall?

so at 25 miles tall the base would be somewhere around 250,000 sq miles and roughly 500 miles on a side.

Based on these facts about Mt Fuji: factsanddetails.com/japan/cat25/sub165/item982.html

at 250,000 sq/miles that would make this mountain larger than all us states except texas and alaska

Its dang close to being as big as Texas though.

8:44 PM

@James Huh, Alaska could hold two of them! Texas sized burn

@AndyD273 ...I'm not sure if this is funny or not.

I'm not either. I think I need a nap

ah naps, in the quiet peaceful days pre-children.

I guess it depends how how you feel about Texas in general, and how small it is compared to Alaska in particular,

Height (mi) Width (mi) W/H
Everest 5.49 12.4274 2.263642987
Mons 16 375 23.4375
Fuji 2.3 24 10.43478261

Fuji seems like it's between the two extremes.

8:47 PM

I like this one

Augustine Volcano

Augustine Volcano is a central lava dome and lava flow complex, surrounded by pyroclastic debris. It forms Augustine Island in southwestern Cook Inlet in the Kenai Peninsula Borough of southcentral coastal Alaska, 280 kilometers (174 mi) southwest of Anchorage. Augustine Island has a land area of 83.872 square kilometers (32.4 sq mi), while West Island, just off Augustine's western shores, has 5.142 km2 (2.0 sq mi). The island is made up mainly of past eruption deposits. Scientists have been able to discern that past dome collapse has resulted in large avalanches. == Description and geologic... ==

@NexTerren so is this roughly accurate with the Fuji numbers?

8 mins ago, by James

so at 25 miles tall the base would be somewhere around 250,000 sq miles and roughly 500 miles on a side.

@James how many sides does it have?

For Fuji numbers with a width of 500 miles, it would be 50 high.

Could drop it down to a width of 250 miles

I was talking about the square, not the diameter...sorry that was unclear.

I guess it could be whatever you want it to be. The Augustine volcano is nice, it has a much wider base than height, so you could use the measurements you came up with no problem... Plus the initial ramp up would be more gradual...

Hmm, I wonder if you could design a volcano based on the golden ratio

that could be kinda cool

Hey all... if I may interrupt the monkeylords for a moment: we currently have no submissions for the blog. If any of you have been meaning to write something, this would be a good time. :-) Don't be intimidated by Heather's recent series of excellent posts; there's room for everyone.

3

9:07 PM

@MonicaCellio I am in the middle of writing up some stuff to go with the first two podcast episodes, they may make sense to go on the blog as well.

@James that makes sense. Nobody's gonna know about the podcast if you don't announce it somewhere and the blog has readers who will be interested. Thanks.

@MonicaCellio I am self-concious but I could try to whip something up on designing a city map. Alas
it's my first piece of work and it would only be an introductory piece

9:22 PM

@dot_Sp0T ooh, city maps haven't been covered yet at all on the blog. We've had some terrain-design posts, but this would be new. I'd like to see that. Thanks!

@dot_Sp0T We have some good posts on city development that could be used as fodder to fill write ups out too...

@James ? I was going to do a small map and present some techniques on quickly filling out a space with something useful :/

Ending up with something like Vincent posted in here some time ago, just less fancy

Yeah do your thing, just suggesting you may find some of the posts useful. Examples:

21

A: How can I ensure my cities don't all look the same?

City design can be broken down pretty effectively. These are some options (certainly not an exhaustive list. Source: What is the city's history? Why did it form? EDIT: And when! This is crucial to deciding the history and evolution of a city (obviously) There are a few options here. Fort. Oft...

12

A: Designing a map for a fictional city

Designing a city map is a layered process so here are your layers (or steps). Step 1: Define the site Define the physical location. The basis of which is a topographical map. This should include elevation, rivers/streams/lakes (I could have just said bodies of water I suppose...), and what t...

Shamelessly self-promoting again, are we?

But I will work through them and link them where applicable

I'll probably give it a slight DnD affinity so I can use the produced map in my campaign though

partially...its just gotten to the point where there are so many q/a's that I can't keep track of things I wasn't involved in.

9:34 PM

(not that it matters)

:D

The DM's guide is an amazing resource for filling in maps...

the 5e one at least

indeed

@MonicaCellio here we go for the medium account: medium.com/@dot_Sp0T

@dot_Sp0T added!

9:50 PM

@MonicaCellio great, thanks. I hope to have something ready in some 18hours

@dot_Sp0T cool, thanks again! I'm looking forward to seeing it.

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