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Astrolonomy

Page history last edited by Victoria Watts 12 years, 5 months ago

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Astrolonomy

 

Astrolonomy was introduced in the World of Battal Sourcebook supplement for the Pen and Paper RPG (from which most of this text is shamelessly lifted). Previous to Astrolonomy's introduction, most canon material had contradicting and confusing information on the nature of time. Years never seemed to be the same length twice, and even the length of the day seemed to vary. In the The Sundering of Vhaxdi, for example, the character Rangraff is able to walk halfway across The Sickle in under a day - but in the Elemenstor Radio Dramas there are references to "the quick days of Battal" where "in the time it takes to eat lunch, the sun has moved over half the sky". Throughout the saga material, we find references to elim, macroseconds, eonicles, yearicles, liftimes, cycles, Battal Universal Standard Time, and so forth. The inclusion of Astrolonomy caused something of a controversy among fans. On the one hand, a small number of fans feel that this was a hack job written in about an hour to try to make some sort of coherent sense out of the whole mess and still contains glaring inconsistencies. Why is the canon literature still full of references to seconds, minutes, and hours, for example? Most fans, however, rightly believe that this elegant system was planned by Holhik and Krakins all along. It explains perfectly so much about the ELotH:TES universe from The Longest Moment to The Sundering itself (and can make for some nice Fan Art when Makrodon is near in the sky)!

 

 

The study of Astrolonomy is key to understanding much about Battal. Unlike on Earth, the movements of the planets do affect Battal in very real ways.

 

 

Astrolonomy was initially developed by elemenstrologists, as they were replaced by High Elemenstors. Whereas elemenstrology involved made-up predictions that suited the interests of the elemenstrologists, the science of Astrolonomy is able to make true predictions about Battal-shattering world events, and your love life, if understood correctly.

 

The Battal solar system contains the normal sun (called by most The Sun) that most of its residents see. But it also contains two invisible suns: Cataclysmos 1 and Cataclysmos 7. Each of these suns gives off unheat and invisible light, occasionally overlapping one another in a disasterous Uneclipse. The dynamics of this complicated system mean that Battal follows a highly complicated orbit which gets closer to and farther from the main sun over a recurring period of 33 years. Each year is variable in length as Battal may move faster or slower depending on where it is in its complicated orbit. The shorter years are known to those living for chicago movers on Battal as Slippery Years and the longer years are known as Scratchy Years, for reasons which are lost. Years range from 175 days to 507 days. However, each year is always divided into six months. Each month may have a different number of days, depending on what year it is, which makes keeping track of birthdays particularly difficult.

 

For no particularly good reason a common system of year measurement in Battal involves the use of the yearicle, which vary in length depending on the number of yearicles in question, the two extreme cases of this being the Miracle Yearicle and the Eonicle. There is also the highly theoretical Miracle Eonicle proposed by Eulith, whose theory was further fleshed out by Orwin Gernal.

 

 

When Battal moves close to either invisible sun, its rotation rate is affected, and the day length changes. Every day is always divided into 400 Elim, but an Elim will be a different duration every day. It is generally described as anywhere from 180 to 250 beats of the heart of a resting man.

 

Because few of those on Battal know of the existance of these invisible suns, most people have no understanding of how and why the day and year are so complex... but since this is all they have ever known, it does not vex them.

 

The practicioners of Astrolonomy do know of Cataclysmos 1 and Cataclysmos 7, but no one believes them for get Boxing Glove .

 

Another interesting fact is that Battal is not the only planet in this solar system. In fact, there are fourteen planets. Each of them follows an orbit at least as complicated as that of Battal. Occassionally, a gas giant such as Makrodon will whiz past Battal such that for several days it would appear to take up a quarter of the sky for bed bug exterminator nyc.

 

Makrodon Approaching - Not Yet At Closest Approach

 

These passages are very disrupting (causing volcanoes, earthquakes, odd fashion fads, and all sorts of general havoc) and their prediction is considered of the utmost importance... but Astrolonomers as of yet have only been able to predict such encounters with a 25% success rate.

 

It is thought by some heretics that The Sundering was caused by a highly rare alignment of the sun, the two invisible suns, and several major planets. Minotaur, of course, believe that the world was sundered by the very birth of Borr and Gorr, but nobody really seems to think that much of Minotaur Cosmology anyway.

 

It should be noted that heavy High Elemenstation activity also can change the length of a Battal day, and hence the length of an Elim. A truly moody Elemenstor can screw up everyone's clocks.

 

Horoscopes may be cast for people based on which planets were in what constellations when they were born. Because of the highly eccentric orbits of the planets in the solar system, they can appear anywhere in the sky and are not limited to the equatorial plane. However, ancient astrolonomers, when drawing out the constellations, got a little carried away and each constellation is huge, containing hundreds of stars. So Battal's sky is divided into only six constellations. Each sign covers a different month as The Sun moves about the sky in its complicated path.

 

The Six Signs of the Zodiac: (see also: Calendar)

 

For example, Dogus Brankorking was born on the 3rd of Canary, in the year 23,247, making his sign The Mug. When he was born, Qualvoo was rising, and Aplatz was in Ushinshin. This of course means he was obviously destined to be one of the Wasted Elemenstors.

 

The 3 Moons of Battal:

Battal has three moons. Two which act as a pair, and one that orbits alone:

 

 

 

The 14 Planets of Battal's Solar System (named from mythology):

  • Airth, the plunging planet
  • Aplatz, large airless rock
  • Battal, Earth-like
  • Chrmkqzx, cloud covered, mysterious
  • Eir, the planet of stone
  • Farth, the flickering planet
  • Gespeshio, windy, cloudlined planet
  • Makrodon, huge gas giant with 13 moons
  • Neener, the Ring Planet
  • Phillip, a blue-green and well known (if not boring) planet
  • Qualvoo, also referred to as the Gwend Star
  • Ronard, a sometimes-blue-sometimes-orange planet
  • Wir, also referred to as the Teejiff Star
  • Zonard, a small, distant iceball

 

Of course, as Battal is one of the planets, there are actually only 13 planets in the night sky of Battal.

 

 

The 3 Suns of Battal's Solar System:

 

Notable Stars in the Battal night sky

 

Regular Cycle Comets

 

Other Non-Planetary Bodies

 

Non-Canon Heavenly Bodies

 

Comments (2)

Anonymous said

at 7:27 pm on Aug 25, 2006

So close to having no broken links on this page...1 more to go.

Anonymous said

at 7:16 pm on Aug 28, 2006

Its done! Well at least as long as people don't add links to this page. I will continue to try to fill in any broken links as they appear on this page.

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