Constellations and the Night Sky

[murf]

Yea. Having done game assets before, I totally understand how sky-boxes work and why they don't inherently support proper celestial mechanics. And it's a lot of work to patch it do something only a smattering of people are going to notice or appreciate.

It's sort of like the story of how Neil deGrasse Tyson told James Cameron he got the night sky wrong in Titanic, and then Cameron chastised him with "Imagine how much extra money Titanic would have made if I got the sky right." Of course, then Cameron went to fix it in an updated DVD version... but still, I can wish really hard.

But yea! Eclipses! Yea, we could complain about having proper lunar and solar motions, but I'd say it'd be enough setting some form of schedule like "a lunar or solar eclipse occurs only once every three or so real life months" as long as they recognize the fact that lunars only occur on full moons and solars only on new moons. Or randomly have a comet or meteor every few months. That sort of diversity/random occurrence would be neat and make the night sky interesting to look at.

Of course, also as best I can tell, it looks like a generic starfield with no cloudy streak indicating that Hydælyn is in a galaxy. Is it in a cluster with no galaxy? Is that even possible?

NOTE: I apologize for derailing my own Lore discussion into one about using proper science on a minor environmental graphics detail.

[Myranda]

NOTE: I apologize for derailing my own Lore discussion into one about using proper science on a minor environmental graphics detail.

There's nothing to apologize for!!! :P We're at least still on topic as far as a desire to see a diverse night sky in many aspects with implications for the lore. And the Titanic story is always a classic, what really sells it is the passion in Tyson's voice when he tells it himself.

Of course, also as best I can tell, it looks like a generic starfield with no cloudy streak indicating that Hydælyn is in a galaxy. Is it in a cluster with no galaxy? Is that even possible?

An isolated cluster may not be probable (I wouldn't place Hydælyn in a cluster at all, we don't see enough bright nearby stars in the night sky and such a dense stellar environment doesn't bode well for planetary stability), but certainly there are gas-depleted dwarf galaxies out there that aren't much bigger than clusters in terms of total stars but are more spread out, and don't have spiral shapes or any kind of form of extended matter that would lead to a galactic streak of sorts. So if we're hell bent on an explanation without changing the current appearance of the sky, let's go with that.

[murf]

So if we're hell bent on an explanation without changing the current appearance of the sky, let's go with that.

Sounds good to me! I'm only an amateur at astronomy so I'll readily defer to someone with more knowledge at it than I.

Of course, there could just be some odd level of ambient light pollution that doesn't allow for naked eye viewing of a galactic streak, or perhaps it emits in some band of light outside the visible light spectrum. I don't think Eorzea has developed radio/infrared/x-ray/etc. astronomy as of yet.

[Kenmei]

Of course, also as best I can tell, it looks like a generic starfield with no cloudy streak indicating that Hydælyn is in a galaxy. Is it in a cluster with no galaxy? Is that even possible?

I have to disagree here, there was definitely a cloudy galactic streak in Eorzea's sky in 1.0, I even have a couple screenshots to show it.

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/7...1312672180.jpg
http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/6...1307724287.jpg

On the subject of Eorzea's position in the northern hemisphere, we have some more evidence of this in the way the sun and moon moved in Eorzea's sky. I spent some time stargazing in 1.0 and noticed that the sun and moon move in a southerly arc (suggesting that we are in the northern hemisphere) rather than passing through the zenith (which would suggest we are near the equator) or moving in a northerly arc (which would suggest we are in the southern hemishpere).

Back on topic though, I love all the suggestions for ARR's sky made here. I'm glad I wasn't the only one to notice all the inconsistencies with 1.0's moon phases and how it waxed/waned.

[Myranda]

I have to disagree here, there was definitely a cloudy galactic streak in Eorzea's sky in 1.0, I even have a couple screenshots to show it.

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/7...1312672180.jpg
http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/6...1307724287.jpg

On the subject of Eorzea's position in the northern hemisphere, we have some more evidence of this in the way the sun and moon moved in Eorzea's sky. I spent some time stargazing in 1.0 and noticed that the sun and moon move in a southerly arc (suggesting that we are in the northern hemisphere) rather than passing through the zenith (which would suggest we are near the equator) or moving in a northerly arc (which would suggest we are in the southern hemishpere).

Back on topic though, I love all the suggestions for ARR's sky made here. I'm glad I wasn't the only one to notice all the inconsistencies with 1.0's moon phases and how it waxed/waned.

Excellent points there, sir!

So we can firmly establish that Hydælyn is located in a flattened galaxy and that Eorzea is in the northern hemisphere. That leaves us with the uncomfortable choice then that Menphina orbits retrograde compared to Hydælyn's rotation which is physically unlikely, or that the phases are mismatched and go in the reverse order that they should be.

So yeah, how about them constellations???

Wonder if Ferne is regretting the creation of the lore forum yet, lol... soon as it opened we've been flooding the thing with little minutiae that we've been holding back from posting off-topic in the Loc forums. Either that or he and the Loremasters are relishing the fact we care so much about their world.

[Anonymoose]

That leaves us with the uncomfortable choice then that Menphina orbits retrograde compared to Hydælyn's rotation which is physically unlikely, or that the phases are mismatched and go in the reverse order that they should be.

Being in a linkshell (soon-to-be company) that has a steady subcommunity of Mumble users, I've had the pleasure of hearing murf rant about this one at length, which can get hysterical. Companies that like to world-build simply don't often have realistic celestial bodies. I wonder how hard it would be to fix the moon program...

Wonder if Ferne is regretting the creation of the lore forum yet <...> Either that or he and the Loremasters are relishing the fact we care so much about their world.

Probably a little bit of each, lol.

The two major points of the lore forum are met, however. We have a place to talk about this stuff and the Localization forum is now free of grammatically correct ambiguities. What vagueries they intend to clarify for us is up to them - but I'm sure anything the community at large is interested enough in to keep a thread going will at least get a nod someday.

That said, it's been a quiet week. The LOC squad is probably drowning in beta phase two Grand Company content and phase three city preparation.

[Myranda]

Would it not be possible to gleam a rough latitude by locating the celestial pole (either north or south, and assuming it properly exists), and finding how many degrees it sits off the horizon? [Again, I'm an amateur, so I'm not 100% sure how it works.]

Yes, this would be one method (altitude of pole = latitude), and as it turns out is equivalent to Kenmei's statement about the arc of the Sun's daily path. Both are direct consequences of latitude causing the rotational axis to tilt with respect to the local horizon, regardless of how the axis is tilted to the orbital plane. So we really can unequivocally say Eorzea is in the northern hemisphere, no doubt at all.

Being in a linkshell (soon-to-be company) that has a steady subcommunity of Mumble users, I've had the pleasure of hearing murf rant about this one at length, which can get hysterical. Companies that like to world-build simply don't often have realistic celestial bodies. I wonder how hard it would be to fix the moon program...

Man, I wish I got to know you guys more during 1.0, our lore-hungry Excalibur server... My own LS/FC is yet to decide on what we'll do for 2.0 server since that information hasn't been released to us, but if we end up on the same server still I might have to hit you guys up for the /flist, or maybe get a pearl if your FC will be operating an LS arm as well (I will of course, be loyal to my current LS for joining a FC, considering I'm now an officer for it).

Back on topic and responding to both of you, I definitely also don't expect every last detail to be accurate in any game's night sky. It's just not feasible from a programming standpoint for very little return on investment, as we all recognize. The moon phases thing should be fairly easy to deal with though, it's basically just sliding one texture over another, how hard can that be?

[murf]

Strictly and scientifically speaking (as determined by the International Astronomical Union which is in charge of regulating the naming of celestial bodies), its English name is "the Moon" (note the capitalization and inclusion of "the" in the quotes), and the same goes for "the Sun". Luna (and Sol) are the Latin names for them, but the official modern names are just the Moon and the Sun. The Latin versions are almost exclusively used in fiction to invoke a sense of "scienciness" or advanced civilization, or in poetry just to be... poetic... but nobody uses them in the scientific community and literature, just like no scientist seriously references Earth as Gaia or Terra. Other languages may use something closer to the Latin (like Spanish la luna), but in those languages it doesn't sound foreign or special, it's just the way they happen to say "the Moon" in the same way our Spaniard might call a dog a perro. When it comes to Menphina I do however concur that very few citizens would refer to it by name, and just simply say "the moon" as suggested.
(Fun fact: professional astronomers don't call our galaxy the Milky Way in journals either, it's just "the Galaxy")

As far as our attempts to determining the latitude of Eorzea on Hydælyn, drawing conclusions based on that screencap do of course depend on our European cultural notion of north as being "up": our Australian friends may want to have a word with us... Of course, with the developers being Japanese, it's again not a far stretch to assume this is the convention being used, especially given the orientation of the in-game compass, no matter how much calling south "up" would be just as valid a viewpoint.

(For the record, I don't think we can actually glean with any confidence anything about the axial tilt of Hydælyn's rotation relative to its orbit based on current evidence, including the light bloom. The planet isn't shown to rotate in the trailer so it could just be camera perspective. Hell, we could attribute the apparent lack of in-game seasonal weather effects as evidence of a 0° tilt, though we run into problems with frozen-time paradoxes as once explained by Ferne in relation to main story events needing to be pegged down to a given year, regardless of when a particular player completes the content.)

This ended up way longer and more nuanced than I originally intended... but that's what I studied in grad school, so... @.@

Would it not be possible to gleam a rough latitude by locating the celestial pole (either north or south, and assuming it properly exists), and finding how many degrees it sits off the horizon? [Again, I'm an amateur, so I'm not 100% sure how it works.]

I have to disagree here, there was definitely a cloudy galactic streak in Eorzea's sky in 1.0, I even have a couple screenshots to show it.

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/7...1312672180.jpg
http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/6...1307724287.jpg

On the subject of Eorzea's position in the northern hemisphere, we have some more evidence of this in the way the sun and moon moved in Eorzea's sky. I spent some time stargazing in 1.0 and noticed that the sun and moon move in a southerly arc (suggesting that we are in the northern hemisphere) rather than passing through the zenith (which would suggest we are near the equator) or moving in a northerly arc (which would suggest we are in the southern hemishpere).

Back on topic though, I love all the suggestions for ARR's sky made here. I'm glad I wasn't the only one to notice all the inconsistencies with 1.0's moon phases and how it waxed/waned.

That was more me not remembering than anything. I'm glad to see something was there at least, and I hope it makes it into ARR.

Of course, there are all manner of things we could note are missing due to improper orbital motions: Seasons, time zones, adjustments to the celestial sphere based where your current location is, effects of light pollution when in cities, etc. I don't want to complain too much, and seeing it is a fantasy world, there is some amount that I can forgive, but others (like moon phases in the wrong part of the sky) that a little more research could do well to improve the immersion. But it is a lot of work for little payoff, so I can understand why it may not be on the critical list.