Curvature of Glorantha

[David Scott]

48 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

But now, you have to do things about populations as well, as otherwise population density becomes weird. And that means you have to do something about city sizes unless you want the urbanization level to change dramatically. And so on and so on - it never ends!

How so? Population density decreases as the population remains the same. Setttlements will be the same size. You don't need to increase their scale.

[Akhôrahil]

32 minutes ago, David Scott said:

How so? Population density decreases as the population remains the same. Setttlements will be the same size. You don't need to increase their scale.

The assumption was that first, you will want to maintain the population density. Once you do that, you will need to increase city sizes to maintain the level of urbanization.

If you don't care about population density, then fine. But reducing population density by 60% should reasonably have massive social effects (for one thing, you need to explain why it isn't higher, when agricultural technology remains the same - one acre still produces as much). Demography is destiny!

Edited August 15, 2019 by Akhôrahil

[Sir_Godspeed]

4 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

The assumption was that first, you will want to maintain the population density. Once you do that, you will need to increase city sizes to maintain the level of urbanization.

If you don't care about population density, then fine. But reducing population density by 60% should reasonably have massive social effects (for one thing, you need to explain why it isn't higher, when agricultural technology remains the same - one acre still produces as much). Demography is destiny!

Having cities stay the same size while the area around them turns from densely populated farmland to scattered farms is also really weird.

There is this quite long, but very indepth and interesting article on how Westeros population density and urbanization makes no sense which might be applicable here. It does cover quite a lot of other topics that aren't applicable to Glorantha (cultural diversity for example), but the rest is interesting, albeit perhaps a tad bombastic.

https://medium.com/migration-issues/westeros-is-poorly-designed-3b01cf5cdcaf

[Brootse]

On 6/12/2019 at 9:39 AM, MOB said:

Glorantha is flat but does have a horizon—in-world "scientific" explanation here, with diagrams:

[TL/DR - light, being a manifestation of Aether and thus properly belonging in the Sky World does not travel in straight lines. The elements always seek their own proper level in the bubble that is Glorantha, thus light tends to curve upward slightly as it flits along at a great pace. This is why you see the top of a mast as a ship approaches, then the sails, then the body.]

 

Would this "curvature" make distant objects look exactly similar on Glorantha like they do on planet Earth?

[MOB]

13 hours ago, Brootse said:

Would this "curvature" make distant objects look exactly similar on Glorantha like they do on planet Earth?

Yes. For example, the masts of a ship would be visible before the hull, etc.

14 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Having cities stay the same size while the area around them turns from densely populated farmland to scattered farms is also really weird.

My contention is that conceptually, in Greg and other American creators' heads as they were mapping this out, 1 KM (key mile) was actually 1 Mile all along. So in effect, nothing changes on the ground in Glorantha. There is no change to population densities, city sizes or whatever.

[Lordabdul]

By the way, @MOB, is that explanation about light rays going back up to the sky a "house rule" of yours or is there any mention of it in published material? (I like it, it's very Gloranthan)

About distances, I've actually always found it weird that American designers would make maps in metric (but in a good way since I'm European!), but I'm not sure about that "key mile" theory since they also used the metric system in other places of the early RQ1-2 texts like weapon lengths and stuff. But they could have somewhat unconsciously messed up their mental images, I guess.

Edited August 16, 2019 by lordabdul

[jajagappa]

7 hours ago, lordabdul said:

a "house rule" of yours or is there any mention of it in published material?

I thought it was noted in one of the Notes from Nochet bits in TotRM, the work of one Columbus Mercator, sage of LM.

[Sir_Godspeed]

9 hours ago, MOB said:

Yes. For example, the masts of a ship would be visible before the hull, etc.

My contention is that conceptually, in Greg and other American creators' heads as they were mapping this out, 1 KM (key mile) was actually 1 Mile all along. So in effect, nothing changes on the ground in Glorantha. There is no change to population densities, city sizes or whatever.

Fair dues.

[FlamingCatOfDeath]

On 6/26/2019 at 1:10 AM, Akhôrahil said:

I'm with you on the size. When you look at Genertela, with its wide array of different cultures, its steppes, its Fantasy China, its sprawling Lunar Empire, its West, and so on, you imagine that it's the size of Eurasia. Then you realize that it's the size of the U.S., that the Lunar Empire is the size of France rather than of the Persian Empire, that Kralorela is the size of California rather than of China, that the steppes of Pent aren't actually very large, that Sartar is tiny, and so on, and suddenly it looks like a miniature of an Earth setting. This also means that the already really disparate cultures are absolutely packed into a smaller geographic area.

I mean if you look at the late Bronze Age near east the crazy levels of diversity looks fairly reasonable, especially given how in Glorantha you have to deal with monsters drastically increasing transportation and infrastructure costs where they live. (Which makes interconnectedness more expensive which makes empires spanning to many such areas much less feasible then they would be an our world)

(IRL pre Bronze Age and post Bronze Age empires operated on very different geographic scales)

[MOB]

Just remember that when it comes to distances in Glorantha, everything is probably 1.6 x bigger than the map scale in km would suggest because...

On 8/16/2019 at 2:16 PM, MOB said:

My contention is that conceptually, in Greg and other American creators' heads as they were mapping this out, 1 KM (key mile) was actually 1 Mile all along.

 

[Squaredeal Sten]

Personally, I am more attracted by investigating flat Glorantha mechanics than by finding some way to justify making Gorantha look round but still really not be round.  

Haze will limit visibility enough for me.  Note that in or near the Wastes there will be a lot of dust in the air.  This will limit visibility more.  So I doubt anyone in Prax will have a good view of Kero Fin.

 I am attached to the idea that from Genertela's south shores you may see the looming mass of Pamaltela even though you won't see detail.  No Gloranthan Columbus is needed to find the other continent.  

Edited June 7, 2022 by Squaredeal Sten
Spelling. Note vs notr

[David Scott]

On 6/3/2022 at 3:51 PM, Squaredeal Sten said:

Haze will limit visibility enough for me.  Notr that in or near the Wastes there will be a lot of dust in the air.  This will limit visibility more.  So I doubt anyone in Prax will have a good view of Kero Fin.

You might find these interesting along with the original G+ thread on TapaTalk:

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/catalogue/websites/old-glorantha-com-news/for-you-praxians-out-there-heres-a-view-of-sacred-prax-from-the-paps-looking-towards-stormwalk-done/

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/catalogue/websites/old-glorantha-com-news/for-those-of-you-who-wanted-the-references-for-corys-prax-landscape-picture-here-it-is/

 

[Jeff]

The map scale has always been one Dragone Pass hex is 5 miles or about 8 km. That's the absolute scale. 

That is the scale for the map in the Starter Set, the maps the Guide to Glorantha, etc. There hasn't been use of things like "keymiles" in nearly thirty years. So that is just a weird anachronism.

[Jeff]

And Glorantha is flat. Distant objects are smaller and far enough away you can't see them without magic unless it is something truly huge like the Red Moon (40 km or so in diameter) or the Spike (about 6000 km tall). 

Here are some notes from last year:
 

Glorantha is a flat world surmounted by a Sky Dome. The Sky Dome itself tilts back and forth, north and south, each year. The Sun's height in the sky also changes throughout the year. It is highest in the sky (and brightest) in Fire Season, lowest in the sky (and dullest) in Dark Season. These effects can and have been measured. Nick Brooke's charts in his Gloranthan Manifesto (volume one) are really useful for understanding this.

One of the weirdest effects of this is in Pamaltela, where the God Learners observed that in the north the seasons were roughly the same as in Genertela, but heading further south into Jolar, it actually got warmer in Dark Season the further south you got. They theorized that due to the tilt of the Sky Dome in Dark Season, the celestial heat spilled out onto the Sea of Fire beyond the Nargan Desert, warming the south.

The movement of the stars and planets are carefully observed by many Gloranthan cultures. Interestingly, the Sunpath planets do not have retrograde movement, apparent or real, as they move along the Sunpath. However, the Southpath planets do move erratically. Shargash is perhaps the worst, speeding up and slowing down depending on the length of its path, although regardless of path taken, it always takes two weeks to go across the Sky Dome. (See the Guide to Glorantha for more details).

This stuff is all observable and measureable. Although there is a distance beyond which things cannot be seen (varying on the size of the object) with powerful enough magic this can be overcome. For example, atop the Footstool of Yelm in Raibanth it is said that the Emperor can see anything in the Middle World. And there are tales that during the Broken Council, watchers sat atop the Tower in Dorastor and watched for the movements of their enemies in Dragon Pass and even Seshnela.

[Oracle]

19 hours ago, Jeff said:

... or the Spike (about 6000 km tall). 

...

Really? I know, that the Spike was huge, but 6000 km? or is that 6000 m?

[Joerg]

1 hour ago, Oracle said:

Really? I know, that the Spike was huge, but 6000 km? or is that 6000 m?

The sky dome is a perfect hemisphere, and the peak of the Spike touched it. With about 12 000 km from edge to edge, the Spike would have to have been about 6 000 km high.

The experience of ascending the Spike may have yielded different heights or elevations. Already at 10 km height, mundane measurements cease to matter.

[Jeff]

4 hours ago, Oracle said:

Really? I know, that the Spike was huge, but 6000 km? or is that 6000 m?

The Spike ascended to the zenith of the Sky Dome so yes, it would have been some 6000 km high and was visible anywhere, at least if you were trained to see it.

 

[French Desperate WindChild]

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

The sky dome is a perfect hemisphere, and the peak of the Spike touched it. With about 12 000 km from edge to edge, the Spike would have to have been about 6 000 km high.

The experience of ascending the Spike may have yielded different heights or elevations. Already at 10 km height, mundane measurements cease to matter.

by the way, is the spike just from ground (0 to +6000km), or can we find it in the underworld (from -6000km to +6000 km) ?

[Joerg]

2 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

by the way, is the spike just from ground (0 to +6000km), or can we find it in the underworld (from -6000km to +6000 km) ?

The Spike continued through the center of the. Earth Cube and the heart of the Seas into the lowest basement of Darkness, getting wider as one descended.

The Sea Portion was still water, described in the Missing Lands origin myth of the waters from Darkness. The myth was also part of the Work in Progress Book of Drastic Resolution: Volume Water. Lots of weird, never heard before names of water entities, probably not to surface again.

The Darkness foundations of the Spike might have survived with less damage than the part that pierced the Earth Cube. Magasta's Pool connects the Surface waters with those of Hell - presumably parts of the River Styx, possibly flooding after the implosion of the Spike.

The missing bits in the center of the four fragments of the Earth Cube probably extend significantly farther than the volume formerly occupied by the Spike. As that edifice imploded, material from the Earth Cube that may have remained higher up when Umath pushed Gata down at his birth might have tumbled into the void that expanded in the center of the Cosmos. Other portions were pulled over to the Curustus Range by the effects of the Magnetic Mountain.

 

Although in the center of the Surface World, the watery slopes of the Whirlpool are part of the Outer World, where the rules of the normal Inner World fade out of importance.

If you visit Godtime, you can still visit the Spike, the settlements in the high valleys of its foothills, or the pristine elf forest prior to Umath's Birth, on a sheer pillar. The Celestial Court would have been where the lower ranges of the Sky Dome intersected with the tip of the Spike, even above the White Elf Forest that covered the tio of the Spike.

For those of you who might wonder why a Spike would be a tool for the World Machine, other than the axis on which the Sky Dome rotation pivoted: A spike reaching up out of a flat surface used to be a desktop filing aid where any loose piece of paper could be deposited on the spike, creating a flawless sedimentation record of those sheets. Used among others by newspaper editors.

[JRE]

12 hours ago, Joerg said:

For those of you who might wonder why a Spike would be a tool for the World Machine, other than the axis on which the Sky Dome rotation pivoted: A spike reaching up out of a flat surface used to be a desktop filing aid where any loose piece of paper could be deposited on the spike, creating a flawless sedimentation record of those sheets. Used among others by newspaper editors.

That could be a way to create sequential order in the absence of time. Those deeper indicate events that happened before the ones higher, even if all events are accessible...