The Layman's Physics Discussion

[sciencebot]

So the first few moments of ARR's opening movie, plus the 'stinger' scene on the Moon and the model of Hydaelyn on the Astrolabe are a fib, a lie and a bald faced whopper then?

Hey, people have made much stranger claims against much stronger evidence about the planet they're living on! The original draft of that post had Hydaelyn as a donut-shape held aloft in the arms of a great celestial Goobue.

Let me expand on that: I can accept that the writers of the game will handwave all this away with the explanation of "magic". I just think that's a really boring explanation and want to come up with headcanon theories about how this all works. So can people stop pointing out that this is fantasy? Of course I know it is. I'm trying to ignore that, let my disbelief swing, and fill in the blanks.

All goofs aside: That's fair! I think the problem some folks are having is that we don't really know all that much about the specifics of how magic functions other than "y'know... aether stuff". So it's hard to say "this is a plausible explanation for the mechanics here" without also saying "but like, there are also 300 other plausible explanations". But I'll do my best to toss you an actual theory about the Sea of Clouds.

The Sea of Clouds seems to be held up by air-aspected crystal deposits. Like, a lot of them, that place is littered with the things. We know water-aspected crystals create springs by just sort of naturally generating water from quests and landmarks in the area. Maybe the reason the air is dense enough to breathe normally, and we aren't hurled from the place immediately by powerful winds, is that they're constantly putting out enough to be stable and survivable? It's an idea, anyway!