I'm new to this board, but I've been playing in Mystara for over 13 years (I started with the red box set). I've always loved Mystara but, life being what it is, my group and I always had a hard time playing on a regular basis. To give you an idea, we started the current campaign in 1998, the game began in AC 1002 and is now currently set in summer of AC 1006, right after the meteor hit the Darokin/Glantri border.
However, lately we have been able to play on a more or less regular basis, and some of my players are starting to get really interested in the history of the world. So I started re-reading some of my old Gazetteer and I notice one large discrepancy. The subject has probably been discussed here before but I couldn’t find any reference and since there is no search option on the board (or I am to blind to find it), I figured I’d ask what you guys think about this.
Both Gaz3 and Gaz5 (and DA1 I believe) say that Blackmoor was once where the Brokenlands are now. However, I seem to remember that the Hollow World box set placed Blackmoor on Skotar. I also remember seeing it on the pre-cataclysm map.
How do you guys consolidate those two facts?
Francis
Both Gaz3 and Gaz5 (and DA1 I believe) say that Blackmoor was once where the Brokenlands are now. However, I seem to remember that the Hollow World box set placed Blackmoor on Skotar. I also remember seeing it on the pre-cataclysm map.
I'm sure Havard will weigh in here pretty soon, but looks like I may have beat him to it. ;)
In any case, DA1 strongly implies that the Broken Lands are the location where Blackmoor used to be (the In Between Worlds- formerly known as the Blackmoor Comeback Inn- is located there, after all).
The Gazetteers actually placed Blackmoor up near the junction of the Borea River, far to the northwest of the Known World (and the Broken Lands); this is actually borne out somewhat by the Dragonmage of Mystara novels.
For some reason, the location on the Hollow World maps was moved to the continent of Skothar, and it has remained there ever since, under the old TSR "most recently published materials are considered more correct canon" policy. Despite being in the wrong location (southeast of Thonia, rather than northwest), that is the currently accepted location of Blackmoor. All post-Hollow World published products and most fan-based materials assume this to be the case.
There were many discussions about it on the Mystara Mailing List back in the day. Some links to those discussions are here and here. Of course, those were just two of many such discussions, and there may be more in the MML archives somewhere.
Of course, you are free to place Blackmoor wherever you want, and there is certainly justification for either of the two choices.
Hope this helps!
But in these discussions one alternative is often forgotten. It is the one that is most supported by canon material, if you simply count the references:
Blackmoor, before the Great Rain of Fire and the Planetshift, was located on the "present" north pole.
I've always preferred this alternative, as it fits best with a lot of the other Mystaran history. Most of all, it takes into account the original idea of the Planetshift (which none on the other locations of Blackmoor really do), and the resulting history of migrations and the melting pot of Known World that they created.
But I of course have no trouble with other interpretations. We all know that Mystara is a world written in layers.
And there are some notable troubles with the "Polar version". The biggest: what about the polar openings to the Hollow World? According to the HW DM's book they were originally - before 3000 BC and GRoF - created in arctic regions. So what happened after the Planetshift? Were they recreated in the new poles??
Anyway, I checked the products by a quick glance. Here's a cataloque of Blackmoor versions in canon products:
Gaz 1: Karameikos
- in 3000 BC "Blackmoor becomes North Pole"
- Of course there is a great discrepancy with later products in that in Gaz 1 this takes place in 2000, not 3000 BC.
Gaz 2: Ylaruam
- GRoF takes place in 3000.
- Planetshift freezer the Blackmore continent over. Although it is not explicitly stated, this seems to lean on the "Polar version"
Gaz 3: Glantri
- Here we have a new version. The timeline refers to "Temporary Ice Age" in former Blackmoor lands. This seems to hint to the "Glantri/Broken Lands version", as Tristan rightly noted.
Gaz 4: Ierendi
- Planetshift freezes the Blackmoor continent over, and the Known World
ir freed from Ice. This is the first reference to the idea that KW was a polar or arctic region before.
--> So: This hints to a very strong Planetshift, one that shifted the planet axis 90 degrees or so.
Gaz 5: Alfheim
- After BM is destroyed, elves in colonies near BM lands flee to Known World, like the lands of modern Broken Lands.
--> This actually doesn't say anything about BM. Everything depends on the duration of their exodus. I'd still say that this leans close to the "Borean version". (But: It hasn't yet been referred to anywhere!)
Gaz 6: Rockhome
- Again: "BM becomes the north pole"
Gaz 10: Broken lands
- This product introduces the "Borean version".
- In the timeline it is said that in 2400 BC Beastmen moved to the former lands of Blackmoor. The tribal migrations map places this in the Borean valley.
- So Cthulhudrew is right in saying that this alternative is introduced in the Gazs. But also wrong, because Gaz 10 is the only one!
- Note that this product simply seems to ignore the strong planetshift and the idea that Blackmoor froze over.
Gaz 12: Ethengar
- This product again states explicitly that Known World was a former polar region. So again, a strong axis shift.
Gaz 13: Shadow elves
- Here we have "slight discrepancies"
a) it seems to indicate that BM continent froze over, just like the elven homeland became the south pole.
b) it refers to elven colonists in or near BM who fled to the newly formed Broken lands.
c) Elsewhere those elves whose colonies were "in BM" are said to have lived "in Glantri".
--> So the ancestors of the Shadowelves either migrated a very very long way, OR they just moven in from Glantri. OR one is supposed to believe that modern-day Glantri (under arctic ice!) was "close" to the now-polar BM.
Gaz 15: Dawn of Emperors
- Again: Blackmoor becomes north pole
HW SET:
HW Outer World Precataclysmic Map
- A totally new place for Blackmoor, Skothar. There is simply now other reference to this, or at least I haven't found it. I've tried to scourge the MML about the history of the "Skothar version", but I'm still baffled.
- If one takes this version serioulsy, it eliminates a lot of the other stuff.
--> KW couldn't have been under ice, and there hasn't been much of a Planetshift. Why? Check the HW Precataclysmic Map! The arctic circles are precisely where they are now in relation to the continents. The Northern pole is pretty much where it is after the GRoF in 3000 BC.
Going on to the HW DM's Book itself:
in the History section timeline:
- The Blackmooreans make contact with elves "at the other end of the world"
--> Okay, this might still work with Skothar, one doesn't have to take it literally
- Four elven clans colonize areas near BM (the ancestors of the Shadowelves)
- But then: in 3000 BC: "Blackmoor becomes the north pole"!!
--> So the HW map and the HW book are in total disagreement with each other!
It also raises questions about the policy of "later products always being right" mentioned by Cthulhudrew.
A few things to consider:
What is Blackmoor?
Blackmoor was at one point only a small Thonian barony, eventually becoming an independent barony. However, Blackmoor was also a world spanning Empire, an heir to the original barony, but yet covering a much larger area. When discussing the location of Blackmoor, we should consider whether we are talking about the area covered by the High Tech Empire or the tiny medieval kingdom.
Dave Arneson's Maps
The problem with setting Blackmoor, that is the Medieval Kingdom pf Blackmoor anywhere near the Known World is that it would make the maps created by Arneson, also used in the DA-series useless. At the very least these require a coastline with water to the east and a landmass to the west. The Brokenlands, Ethengar and Glantri are all inland on all continental maps, making it difficult to make them the locations of Uther's Blackmoor. Disregarding these maps is possible, but a mistake IMHO since it would make it much more difficult to make use of old and new Blackmoor products.
The Comeback Inn
In DA1, the Comeback Inn appears in the Brokenlands and brings those who enter back in time to the Age of Blackmoor. However, the Comeback Inn is usually located within the City of Blackmoor, and placing that city within the Brokenlands would have very strange consequences for the location of Blackmoor. Making that Blackmoor's location would also not help explain of Blackmoor would be moved below the polar ice. The best way to deal with the Comeback Inn OMHO is to assume that it moves both in space and time and may appear pretty much anywhere.
The Radience
The Radience represents many of the same problems as the Comeback Inn. If we assume that it still rests in the same location where the Beagle Crashed, that would mean Glantri would be somewhere south of Blackmoor city, making Blackmoor city lay, nowhere near the coast, not in the Brokenlands and not below the polar ice. Again, it is easy to assume that the Old Ones moved the Radience when they modified the reactor of the Beagle.
Is having Blackmoor below the Polar Ice all that important?
This is another question. Although Marco presented some interesting maps from the Italian boards (link anyone?) that allowed for Blackmoor being moved below the polar ice, would that affect the modern Mystara setting in any interesting way? It would mean that the heart of Blackmoor could never be discovered by Mystaran archeologists, blocking for a potentially interesting scenario idea, but not having many other effects. Assuming my modified version of the PreCatacysmic Mystara map is correct, this would place parts of the Blackmoor empire below the Polar Ice, but the Old Barony would still be somewhere near the Bay of Thorin...perhaps opening for an interesting dungeon adventure....
Alternate Explainations for the Location of Blackmoor here and there could simply be various colonies and settlements at the time of the Peak of the Blackmoor civilization.
Although I often argue for the location of Blackmoor City on Skothar, I'd like to stress that I'm not 100% decided that that is the best location for it. I'm interested in arguments for other locations, and I actually sort of like having Blackmoor's real location be a mystery, perhaps the greatest mystery of all of Mystara....
Hmmm...perhaps the real location wasn't on Mystara at all?
Håvard
Francis
Thanks everyone, this is really helpful. I’ve been toying with the idea of starting a new campaign (after we finish WotI) in Blackmoor and have the players meet there doom after they become heroes in there own right only to be resurrected thousands of years later (circa AC1000) to once again save the day (and probably meet whatever cause there doom in the first place). I haven’t figure out all the details yet but it’s coming along. However, I’ll have to figure out exactly were Blackmoor was in my world so I know were the heroes’ tomb can be found. This thread is a lot of food for thoughts.
Interesting. I've had some similar ideas myself. I was considering starting a campaign with scenarios through various periods of Mystaras history. I wasnt going to use the same characters though, but the players would take the roles of the descendants of their former characters, playing their bloodlines through time as it were....
If I were you I'd just chose one of the locations. Perhaps in this case it would make more sense to have the toombs closer to the Known World if that was where the next campaign would be set. Ofcourse, the toombs could have been moved magically aswell.
Perhaps the characters were buried in the basement of the Comeback Inn. That would help if you wanted to bring them back into the Brokenlands.
Do you have the new Blackmoor material from ZGG?
If you havent already check out my Blackmoor Website. Might be some useful stuff there for you...
Håvard
Is having Blackmoor below the Polar Ice all that important?
This is another question. Although Marco presented some interesting maps from the Italian boards (link anyone?) that allowed for Blackmoor being moved below the polar ice, would that affect the modern Mystara setting in any interesting way?
Håvard
For me it's not primarily the fact that BM is under polar ice that is important, but the fact that Known World became what it is precisely because it was freed from ice sheets. It's one of the most ingenous "explanations" of the menagerie that the Expert set map created. Countless migrations were seeking new homes away from the new arctic ice, and KW became a meeting ground.
This development requires the drastic planetshift.
Do you have the new Blackmoor material from ZGG?
If you havent already check out my Blackmoor Website. Might be some useful stuff there for you...
Håvard
No, I don't have any of ZZG material. For some reason, I was under the impression that it had nothing to do with Mystara's blackmoor. All I have are the four DA modules.
I looked at your Blackmoor website, great stuff there. I Particularly like your map of the world in the time of blackmoor.
Thanks for the tip.
Francis
No, I don't have any of ZZG material. For some reason, I was under the impression that it had nothing to do with Mystara's blackmoor. All I have are the four DA modules.
Due to copyright and other reasons, ZGG's Blackmoor products do not mention Mystara. However, nothing in those books negate whats done on Mystara. Maps, NPCs etc are all similar to what was in the DA modules.
Great resources IMHO.
I looked at your Blackmoor website, great stuff there. I Particularly like your map of the world in the time of blackmoor.
I'm glad you like those things. I have some more stuff that will eventually make its way there, but as you can see it has taken a while since I had time to make an update.
I am open for suggestions though.
Cheers!
Håvard
Gaz 1: Karameikos
- in 3000 BC "Blackmoor becomes North Pole"
- Of course there is a great discrepancy with later products in that in Gaz 1 this takes place in 2000, not 3000 BC.
The 2000 BC bit actually fits with the original Blackmoor info, in module DA1, IIRC. Don't have it to check atm, but I'm pretty sure that DA1 had Blackmoor only 3000 years in the Known World's past, not 4000.
Gaz 3: Glantri
- Here we have a new version. The timeline refers to "Temporary Ice Age" in former Blackmoor lands. This seems to hint to the "Glantri/Broken Lands version", as Tristan rightly noted.
Not to mention the location of the Beagle, underneath the Great School of Magic. Of course, it's location was later retconned to having been moved by an Old One (in WotI).
For me it's not primarily the fact that BM is under polar ice that is important, but the fact that Known World became what it is precisely because it was freed from ice sheets. It's one of the most ingenous "explanations" of the menagerie that the Expert set map created. Countless migrations were seeking new homes away from the new arctic ice, and KW became a meeting ground.
This development requires the drastic planetshift.
I see this point. It doesn't fit too well with the map from the HW boxed set, but although not under Polar Ice, this area could have been covered by a gigantic glacier.
That would contradict Blackmoor era settlements in the region though, which is suggested by many other sources...
Håvard
-Sheridan
For the number of times I've heard references about Blackmoor being shifted to the North Pole, I always thought that was the worst possible location that could be assigned to it...considering Mystara doesn't even have a North geographic pole! The top of the planet opens up to an entranceway to the Hollow World, so there isn't even anyplace up there for it to sit!
-Sheridan
A valid point. I actually raised it in the MML a couple of months ago (or longer, time flies). This is a huge discrepancy in the Mystara material, and derives I think again from the fact that different people wrote stuff at different times.
Hollow world is (if I'm reading the chronology right) a later invention.
But funny enough, if you read the HW Set DM's book timeline, it mentions
1) the axis shift
2) BM becoming north pole
Actually the bigger issue here is that the whole idea of ANY kind of axis shift becomes untenable.
Why?
Well, in the beginning Ka created the polar openings to the Hollow World. That's right polar openings before 3000 BC.
If the axis shifted during the Rain of Fire, the openings should be somewhere else in relation to the "present" pole.
If I remember correctly, in some timeline (fan-made, I think) there was an attempt to correct this problem. Ka would have had to close the old openings an open new ones in 3000 BC, regardless of where Blackmoor was.
That is, if one wishes to keep the idea of axis shift, and the resulting migrations which are the cornerstone of Mystaran history.
Funny old gameworld, innit?
Actually the bigger issue here is that the whole idea of ANY kind of axis shift becomes untenable.
HW DM's guide,
page 6:
"Ka opened great shafts a few miles across from the outer world to the Hollow World."
page 11:
"Blackmoor becomes the north pole and its civilization disappears. The elven civilization becomes the south pole; the elves are able to migrate to the area called Grunland"
"BC 3000-2500: Ka and his ally-Immortals must spend hundreds of years and incalculable magical energy to prevent the sudden change in the planet's axis from destroying whole regions of the Hollow World. The Immortals create new, gigantic, fog-clad openings to the outside world at the location of the new poles, and seal up the former (smaller) polar openings."
So, it's part of Canon. The real question is why are the mountain ranges that Ka designed to be running East-West on the equator still equatorial, part of the incalculable expenditure of magical energy?
Oh, and as an added bonus, the Immortals effectively disintgrated Blackmoor-proper (or at least its new capital; kind of like the difference between Philidelphia, and the planned City of Washington D.C.; Blackmoor the original Barony might be south of Thonia, but their new city, built like the City of the Gods might have been in or north of Thonia.) and the technilogical elven society (they created gigantic holes where these civilizations ended up). That was probably the Immortals' intention, to prevent another disaster.
Blackmoor tech all over the planet? Time travelers and the GRoF itself (when a whole country goes "boom" and shifts the planet's axis, there are bound to be a few things that get thrown across the world.
HW DM's guide,
"BC 3000-2500: Ka and his ally-Immortals must spend hundreds of years and incalculable magical energy to prevent the sudden change in the planet's axis from destroying whole regions of the Hollow World. The Immortals create new, gigantic, fog-clad openings to the outside world at the location of the new poles, and seal up the former (smaller) polar openings."
Well I'll be. I knew it was somewhere, but I didn't bother to shift my eyes on to the right column of the timeline.
Thanks for the correction. And your ideas on Immortal intentions sound quite good.
Starting with Mystaran landmasses PRE Cataclysm and the placement of the current nations by that time:
Then you've got Mystara Pre Cataclysm with nearly all the races that dwelt there:
This is a VERY GOOD closeup of the Blackmoor region:
And here's the best of them, the world during Blackmoor's Imperial era and BLackmoor's boundaries, which shows that Blackmoor spread also into Brun.
A wonderful theory of ZOmpatore also explains why there was still a working Blackmoor artifact in the Broken Lands.
Suppose that the Blackmoorians pushed their crusade against the beastmen up to the point of building a line of fortresses to contain the hideous beastmen in the arctic zone and that one of these settlements was heated and powered by one of the so called Blackmoorian artifacts, as there were many others in the world where Blackmoor had colonies or cities (or maybe it was a flying ship).
What caused the GRoF? Prolly the interaction of Mystara's magic with Blackmoor's tech reached a critical point where magic corrupted the Blackmoorian tech and caused a shortcircuit or some kind of malfunctioning in one of the artifacts. This artifact exploded and the explosion traveled through Mystara's magic field like a colossal tide, that swept upon the technological devices like a storm, making all of them explode at the same time. This caused the GRoF. BUT the artifact near the Broken Lands was in an anti-magic zone at that time (since it was near the north pole), so it was preserved from the magical storm that spread across Mystara, and survived, although the Blackmoorians who lived nearby, perished in the ensuing shift of the planet's axis and due to the earthquakes or similar natural catastrophes.
This left the device off and untouched for centuries, until the elves came. When they discovered it, prolly some of those who remembered ancient Blackmoorian devices wanted to use it to heaten their lands, but since it was already unstable, their triggering cause it to explode and it gave way to the Glantrian catastrophe. That shows why tinkering with tech on Mystara is highly discouraged by Immortals (and therefore even the gnomes have learnt that's better to use magic or technomancy than technology).
This map finally shows how far could have gone the explosion of the nuclear devices in Blackmoor (and by comparison we can judge the extention of the Broken Lands explosion):
I am so glad you (re?)posted these! I was sure I'd seen (at least some of) them on these boards before, but I couldn't remember where.
As much as I hate having to modify my own Pre-Cataclysmic maps of Mystara, I am leaning towards accepting mr Zampatore's excellent work in this respect!
I also like his theory on why the Blackmoor device is found within the Broken Lands.
There, still are a few unresolved questions, but I feel we've come quite a way further.
Any theories on the possibly Blackmoorian city found near Fenhold, just south of Alfheim according to the Legacy of Blood module?
Håvard
Fine work, indeed. If these are not already in the Vaults, someone might collate a package of all this discussion, and send it to Shawn?
I also took the liberty of uploading them to my Blackmoor Website (http://www.geocities.com/havardfaa/), along with a link to this thread. DM, do you think Lo Zampatore would mind if I keep the maps there?
I agree that they should make their way to the Vaults as well...
Håvard
I'm still keeping one of the maps out of the fold since it's not yet finished: the map detailing all of the migrations during various eras of Mystara
As for the Blackmoorian relics in Fenhold, I don't remember reading anything about it! Are you sure the ruins are from Blackmoor's time?? IMHO they should be Nithian, if I had to pick a choice!
As for the Blackmoorian relics in Fenhold, I don't remember reading anything about it! Are you sure the ruins are from Blackmoor's time?? IMHO they should be Nithian, if I had to pick a choice!
I agree. This is what CM9, p.26, says about the sunken city's origin:
"Where did this city came from? Is it as old as Blackmoor, or a relative newcomer, only about a thousand years old? This depends on what the DM wants. If it dates from the Blackmoor period, it might contain some vestiges of the strange technology that eventually doomed Blackmoor and its allies."
AFAIK this is the only reference about the site's origin in the whole module.
It leaves the DM a choice, but I'd rather make it Nithian becouse it seems more logical and the opposite hypothesis could cause some trouble... ;)
The only problem I have with the maps is where it requires the Oltec/Azcan to be located. With the latitude and longitude of their locations, they are almost located within the arctice circle- certainly they are far outside of the tropics, and their culture is most definitely tropical in origin (as evidenced by their basis on real world cultures, but also on their transplantation into the Hollow World jungles of similar climates).
They'd have developed an entirely different culture at those latitudes- certainly they'd have to be more fully clothed than they are.
I like the maps, as far as nailing the whole Blackmoor thing is concerned, but as far as the locations of the Azcans/Oltecs, I think we're going to have to move them further south. (Same for the Karimari, as it happens).
I agree. This is what CM9, p.26, says about the sunken city's origin:
"Where did this city came from? Is it as old as Blackmoor, or a relative newcomer, only about a thousand years old? This depends on what the DM wants. If it dates from the Blackmoor period, it might contain some vestiges of the strange technology that eventually doomed Blackmoor and its allies."
AFAIK this is the only reference about the site's origin in the whole module.
It leaves the DM a choice, but I'd rather make it Nithian becouse it seems more logical and the opposite hypothesis could cause some trouble... ;)
Hmmm...I guess you guys have a point. It makes alot more sense making the City below Fenhold to be of Nithian origin. It messes up a minor detail in my Thunder Rift Timeline, but I'll just change that part. Unless there is some way to link Frog Folk and Newts to Nithia...
DM: I'm very much looking forward to seeing more of those maps, so make sure you post them when they are ready!
Cthulhudrew: Yeah you're right, these maps also support the theory of having Blackmoor on Skothar. It would be interesting to see a similar approach (retro-fitting) so we could see what Blackmoor on Brun would look like. I am still leaning towards it being on Skothar myself, but I would like to see all options explored....
Håvard
Hmmm...I guess you guys have a point. It makes alot more sense making the City below Fenhold to be of Nithian origin. It messes up a minor detail in my Thunder Rift Timeline, but I'll just change that part. Unless there is some way to link Frog Folk and Newts to Nithia...
It could still possibly be a Blackmoorian city- recall that (in the Dragonlord trilogy) there is a Blackmoorian city in the vicinity of Soderfjord (where one of the rogue dragons makes his home- at least I think it was Blackmoorian), and there is at least one other Blackmoor outpost on Brun (though far to the northwest- where Thelvyn initially gets the armor and weaponry of the dragonhunter).
"You are all autorhized to post, publish and even modify my maps.
If you make changes to any map, please add a note on it saying something like: "Modified by:..." etc. etc..
I reserve the right to update my maps posting the revised versions on the Italian Mystara Boards. The updated maps will show somewhere on them a progressive version number. If you don't see any version number - and the map does not seem modified by anyone else - it is inteded that this is the version 1.0 of the map.
LoZompatore.
PS: Thanks for your appreciation!"
There ya go!
As for the Azcans and Oltecs location, Andrew, this is canonic. We didn't choose where to place them: they have always been there in canon.
We also know how great has been the planet's axis shift (see HW Map), so Zompatore just put everything in place as it was described, and this is the result.
It is true that Oltecs and Azcans didn't live in a tropical zone (the Oltecs who moved to the Savage Coast did, however), but we could explain the relative warmth of their location near the coast if we suppose there was a warm sea current and a warm weather pattern in that region before the cataclysm. That also explains why they settled there: it was relatively warm, humid and fertile. ;)
Could it be likely that Newfoundland (roughly in the same position in real world) enjoyed such a weather under these conditions, to make a RW comparison?
As for the Azcans and Oltecs location, Andrew, this is canonic. We didn't choose where to place them: they have always been there in canon.
Oh, I know- I didn't mean to imply that it was your fault or anything, just that these maps shed a new light on what was previously established from the Hollow World maps, and didn't really fit with the locations as previously established, and thus it raises some questions about the "canonical" locations of the Azcans and Oltecs.
Could it be likely that Newfoundland (roughly in the same position in real world) enjoyed such a weather under these conditions, to make a RW comparison?
Hmm, from the (admittedly little) research I just did on Newfoundland, I don't think they would be similar at all. Newfoundland seems to experience temperature and weather extremes of degrees not encountered in the Central American region, and it certainly doesn't have the degree of flora that would be found in Central America.
I think we'd either have to suppose there is some other sort of Mystaran micro-climate going on in those regions (ties to the Elemental Planes or something, like in Ylaruam) or else move the "established" locations of the Azcans and Oltecs more to the south.
Could this be possible (he was taking Uranus as example of a planet whose axis is not inclined as much as earth's)?
An idea that Zompatore expressed to explain this situation is that maybe, when Mystara's axis was not angled as much as it is now, the temperatures around the globe were different. This means that the arctic region was effectively reduced and that maybe the rest of the planet got the same temperatures, more or less.
Got me- I really don't know enough about axial tilts and temperatures to say (didn't go to enough of my astronomy classes
The only thing that immediately strikes me about that theory is that we see in the maps the latitude and longitude markings, and the bands designating tropical and arctic zones, and I think those things are based (at least in part) on the degree of axial tilt of the planet, so I don't know if it works.
Like I said, though, I ain't no rocket scientist. Seems to me someone else might have a better idea here on the list- surely we boast some astronomers or geologists herein?
Got me- I really don't know enough about axial tilts and temperatures to say (didn't go to enough of my astronomy classes
The only thing that immediately strikes me about that theory is that we see in the maps the latitude and longitude markings, and the bands designating tropical and arctic zones, and I think those things are based (at least in part) on the degree of axial tilt of the planet, so I don't know if it works.
Like I said, though, I ain't no rocket scientist. Seems to me someone else might have a better idea here on the list- surely we boast some astronomers or geologists herein?
Earth's global temperature has varied widely through its history. I would think it would be possible to have quite warm temperatures, even in northern regions, though I'd assume that would mean that the equatorial regions would be even hotter!
Håvard
Hmm, from the (admittedly little) research I just did on Newfoundland, I don't think they would be similar at all. Newfoundland seems to experience temperature and weather extremes of degrees not encountered in the Central American region, and it certainly doesn't have the degree of flora that would be found in Central America.
I have to sneak in here (having lived in Newfoundand for almost 10 years) and let Cthulhudrew know that he's fairly accurate. However, even the island itself experiences different weather:
The southern coast is the most mild, being tempered by the warm gulf stream.
The Avalon Peninsula (eastern part of NFLD) experiences the most precipitation, or at least the most cloud cover and foggy weather it seems. The trees are also 'stunted' or restricted in growth here.
Central NFLD experiences the greatest temperature ranges and also the most snowfall in winter. It is least affected by the moderation effect of the ocean and it is also much higher in elevation for the most part.
I've never been able to travel to the northern peninsula (yet ;) ) but it experences the cold 'Labrador Current' that comes down from the artic to mix with the Gulf Stream off the east coast of the island. The Labrador Current is also responsible for bringing the iceburgs down into the Atlantic.
The western coast is mountainous but generally has moderate weather. However, it also experiences nasty storms especially once you get inland a little further. The area is also known for its strong winds.
All that just to say this, It is possible for a northern climate to be moderated by the sea and prevailing winds, but it will still be a hard place to live especially in winter. Now that I look at a map, Canada's west coast is probably a better example for what we want. It is very mild (and wet) due to the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains at their back. Just to give you guys an idea of how mild, Vancouver hardly gets any snow at all. Of course, it's a different story altogether once you get inland and up into the mountains.
As for the tropics and artic circles, they are entirely a function of the 'tilt' of the planet. From what I've seen in canon, the 'tilt' of Mystara has remained the same (thus the tropics and artic circles are at the same latitudes) but the 'axis' of rotation changed. I guess that as a result of the GRoF the planet began to wobble and then slowly tighten to spin back onto a new axis but still retained the same tilt.
Ah crap! Time to go...
As for the tropics and artic circles, they are entirely a function of the 'tilt' of the planet. From what I've seen in canon, the 'tilt' of Mystara has remained the same (thus the tropics and artic circles are at the same latitudes) but the 'axis' of rotation changed. I guess that as a result of the GRoF the planet began to wobble and then slowly tighten to spin back onto a new axis but still retained the same tilt.
From the HW maps, there is still a change of tilt, though it doesnt reflect the statement that Blackmoor ended up on the North Pole or that the Known World was on covered by the Arctic during the Blackmoor era. That is what Zampatore's maps fix. Ofcourse, as Cthulhudrew points out, this creates other problems.
Thanks for the info on Newfoundland! I know that region was supposedly warmer when Vikings discovered the area than it is today (same with Greenland), though tropical would be a dramatic overstatement, I agree. In earlier ages though (like the Jurassic?), the temperature all over the world was much warmer, perhaps due to some natural Green-house like effect. This could have been a case during the Blackmoor era too, unless we want to draw in magical climatic alterations. Or we could just move the populations around on the map. Either that, or go back to the HW maps and ignore references to the North Pole for both the Known World (Pre GRoF) and Blackmoor (Post GRoF)....
Håvard ;)
:DHere is a scheme of what I did:
- The Mystara maps onf HW boxed set (or in the Rules Cyclopedia) are based on a kind of projection called Eckert IV; you may easily find in literature or on the web the equations to draw a map following an Ekert IV projection given the latitude and longitude of the geographical points you want to represent on the map. On this projection the polar regions are strongly deformed in E-W directions, while equatorial regions are slightly deformed on N-S direction. That's why my pre cataclysmic maps look so odd in some regions (such as the Arm of the Immortal).
- So, I made a sample of about 400 points of the Mystara map of HW boxed set, determining their latitude and longitude (approximatively). This was a VERY boring part.
- I converted these latitudes and longitudes in spherical cohordinates (ro, theta, phi, centerd in the center of Mystara), and then in Cartesian cohordinates (x,y,z, centered in the center of Mystara). Once again, all the needed formulas are available on the Web.
- The xyz cohordinates of each geographical point represent a vector that can be easily rotated (simulating the rotation of Mystara axis) using two suitable rotation matrixes. It seems complicated but it isn't: all the formulas are already available on every math book/website.
- Then you have a rotated vector: you go back step by step through the whole procedure (convert it in spherical cohordinates, then in latitude and longitude and represent it on an Eckert IV projection) and you have your pre-cataclysmic map. You just have to connect the 400 rotated points with some lines (that's why my maps seems so hooked).
I did not afforded this task by hand: I wrote a routine in VBA on an Excel worksheet that accepted post-cataclysmic latitudes and longitudes and converted them in pre-cataclysmic ones, drawing them on a graph (which was the basis for the maps).
For the axis rotation, I considered the fact that the Ethengar steppes (33N, 32W of Sundsvall Meridian) were the ancient North Pole (see the PWAs series in the description of the Ethengar Khanate). By the way: the ancient south pole is a point at 33S, 148E of Sundsvall, which is a portion of sea just west of Cape Fire on Vulcania.
About Blackmoor position, I considered the whole published material. The only suitable point for the position of this land is where i placed it (between the modern Nentsun Peninsula and Nentsun Plateau).
If you like I can send my reasons about Blackmoor position in another post.
I'm very glad you've joined the Wizards MMB!!! ;)
Could the broken lands be the site of the original large meteor strike on Mystara that allowed KA to discover the World Shield and Hollow World? Due to the large amount of fracturing of the crust allowing Ka to explore for new flora and fauna out of curiosity.
The region may have been where Blackmoor's contaminated remains was deposited for burial blocking mortal races from esily finding a path to the hollow world and hiding artifacts they could not destroy. Since they had to work as quickly as possible with limited resources to use.
Leading to the Radience and the Inn at the end of the world being placed there.
Got me- I really don't know enough about axial tilts and temperatures to say (didn't go to enough of my astronomy classes
The only thing that immediately strikes me about that theory is that we see in the maps the latitude and longitude markings, and the bands designating tropical and arctic zones, and I think those things are based (at least in part) on the degree of axial tilt of the planet, so I don't know if it works.
Like I said, though, I ain't no rocket scientist. Seems to me someone else might have a better idea here on the list- surely we boast some astronomers or geologists herein?
There is a number of things that contribute to climate.
1) Latitude this governs how much sunlight you get, on the Equator there is more sunlight striking the surface heating it up and warming the air. Ignore longtitude. Height has the same effect.
2) Distance from coast, further from the coast the greater the range in temperatures daily and seasonally (if the planet has a tilt). Land warms and cools rapidly creating greater fluctuations. Large bodies of water are slower to change so opposite applies
3)Air cells these control where rainsfall. Warm air raises at the equator cools and releases water, cools and descends away from equator absorbs more moisture at surface returns to equator where it rises again losing moisture. A lot more to it then that but that is the first stage. Check web for Hadley cell in atmosphere.
4) Rotational tilt, given that some sources state that Mystara does not have a tilt. No tilt there would be no seasonal changes to weather patterns. Harder to explain without diagrams.
With no tilt a planet would revolve round the sun, spinning perfectly on its axis 90degrees or vertically to the sun. Both poles would be equal to the sun. So No seasons as each area of the surface would recieve the same amount of sunlight everyday of the year.
With a tilt to the angle of rotation, it always points in the same direction like a gyroscope.
If the sun was in the centre of a picture when the planet is to the left of the sun and the tilt of the planet pointed the north pole away from the sun. The amount of sunlight decreases. Southpole more light. The planet always
recieves the same amount of sunlight, its the positioning of the land masses, oceans that changes. They also change the positioning of Aircells see above.
Sounds corny but check out a basic childs environmental book i used one for my degree :D
But I have to be a bit geeky about the tilt-sunlight-latitude relation.
- Sunlight warms up the region better when the lightrays arrive at an angle closer to 90 degrees. It's simple to understand the principle: if you tilt the plane on which you let imaginary rays "rain", the distance between ray "hits" increases. Same with water droplets or anything.
- Height (meaning that the tropics is closer to sun??) doesn't have much effect here. (Or did I misunderstand you on that point?)
- Thus on a planet without tilt the equator gets always the most sunlight.
- But if you have a tilt (and for simplicity let's discount oddballs like Uranus with a 97 degree axial tilt), you get not only seasons but tropical zones. So the zone which the sun warms most during the year varies N-S on this area (between tropics of cancer and capricorn, of course).
- So the relation of both tilt and latitude to sunlight&warmth are based on the same principle.
One added factor in depermining the actual climate of a region is sea currents.
----(change of subject)
And thanks for the hard work, LoZompatore. The basics are pretty simple as you mention, but you shouldn't be too modest. Number-crunching is mostly a boring business, and I certainly would never have had the energy to take on that project.
Now, anybody volunteer to make 3D-projections of the different Pre-cataclysmic map versions?
-Height, the higher Altitude above Sea Level you go the cooler it gets. That was all
The best simple thing is to say that at any given latitude there is a dominate Climatic effect
-Polar
-Tundra
-Temperate
-Desert & Drylands
-Tropical
-Mountains
Now how many tides does Mystara get since it has 2 moons! :D
The first is a map showing the modifications of coastline and continents after the Great Rain of Fire. I draw this map comparing the coastlines showed in the HW pre-cataclysmic map with the modern coastlines; then I added these modifications to the map of 'rotated' Mystara (which is based on the modern shape of continents) I calculated.
The second is a detail of supposed Blackmoor region (ie the modern southern coast of Nentsun Peninsula), adding some other details caught from HW pre- cataclysmic map and DA modules series, in order give this area a more similar look to DA maps.
By the way, why I think blackmoor should be near Nentsun Peninsula? Here is some facts about Blackmoor position coming from official manuals:
- Blackmoor is on the southern shore of an inner continental sea. East of this there is a larger sea, extending south (from DA1 maps, and from the fact - in DA1 - that Thonia galleys patrol eastern sea - and Thonia is south of Blackmoor);
- Blackmoor should have a subtropical climate, but, due to the influx of cold water from Firefrost channel, the climate of the whole region is temperate (DA1, page44);
- North of Blackmoor there are lands with colder and colder climate, inhabited by Skandaharians (DA modules) and Beastmen (HW, DM manual, page 9: the Borean Valley is a frozen land north of Blackmoor); moreover, north of Blackmoor there is at least another sea (Skhandaharian sea, with fjords, from DA1);
- South_Southwest of Blackmoor there are broad lands occupied by Thonian Empire. The Thonian Empire area should be about ten times the Blackmoor area (from DA1 we know that Thonia has 10 military provinces, and that if the Iron Duke manages to conquer Blackmoor region he will be the leader of 'a strong province' - DA1, decriprion of the Iron Duke in the NPC section);
- Elves of Evergrun live at the opposite side of the world with respect to Blackmoor kingdom (see, for example, HW, DM manual, page 10). We know, also, that Evergrun became a frozen land after the Great Rain of Fire, and that Evergrun is a 'continent' (a big island, to be honest) offshore Davania southern tip (see, for example, the elven migration map in GAZ6)
So, given the fact that if you rotate AC1000 Mystara map the previous polar regions will shrink to a little area (remember that on a Eckert IV projection the polar regions are extremely stretched in E-W direction), the possible position of Evergrun is limited to the little circle I draw on my pre-cataclysmic maps.
This circle is also centered, approximatively, on 10W, 37S cohordinates.
Let's see what we find 'on the opposite side of the world' with respecto to this point (which means 170E, 37N):
We find a tropical coastal region with two-three internal seas, a broad extension of land south and soutwest of it, a lot of land north of it (moreover, the Borean Valley is near the North Pole). Adding a couple of details (showed also in the HW pre cataclysmic map), such as the Firefrost channel and the Shallows, you will have your land of Blackmoor.
It fits all the required features described in the official manuals.
Blackmoor was surely NOT in the actual position of Glantri City because the Nucleus of the Spheres was moved from its original place by an Old One and placed in the actual position benath Glantri (see WotI, Immortal's Fury book, page 7).
Moreover, the position of the Comeback Inn is not important for determining Blackmoor position. In DA1 it is written that the Comeback Inn is able to move people (and itself) in time and SPACE. So, the Broken Lands are simply the place where this artifact 'decided' to stay in AC1000. In other times we should expect that the Comebak Inn had a different location.
In conclusion, the famous sentence about "Blackmoor being the Broken Lands we know today" of DA1 should be intended without capital letters on 'Broken Lands'. Blackmoor has been shattered and scorched by the cataclysm, simply becoming a patch of 'common broken lands'.
A question to Havard:
For your website, are you interested in a short article summing these (and other) conclusions I made about Blackmoor? ;)
A question to Havard:
For your website, are you interested in a short article summing these (and other) conclusions I made about Blackmoor? ;)
I would love that Lo!
I will send you my contact info as a private msg if you don't have it already.Thanks for posting these maps BTW. They confirm my long standing theories on Blackmoor's location, down to the details on the Firefrost Channel and the Land of the Egg of Coot.
Also, you make some interesting observation of Blackmoor's neighbours, especially on the size of Thonia, which I hadn't noticed. Now wait untill I get around to incorporating the Wilderlands into these maps (I have a decent theory underway...)
Håvard
A question to Havard:
For your website, are you interested in a short article summing these (and other) conclusions I made about Blackmoor? ;)
and of course if you want such a thing on the Vaults LoZompatore
I played the old Dungeons and dragons when I was little but only had a few modules, and always wondered about the larger world they hinted at. I just recently started buying Mystara related stuff on eBay to read about it.
I found this thread through Havard's website. I guess it's been dead a while, but I'd like to point out a passage about the cataclysm on page #2 of DA1 "Adventures in Blackmoor" for anyone else that refers to this page:
"...Fearful was that time-a waking horror when the earth shook and skies burned. And when it was done, Thonia was no more. The land existed, yes. But its cities were tumbled, its pride humbled, its culture a poor tattered thing lacking the will even to continue. A few survivors sailed to new land, which they called Thonia in memory of all that they had lost. But it does not bear and never bore the least resemblance to the waking dream of elder Thonia-the Golden Empire.
"In the far north of what was Elder Thonia where for half a millennium a vigorous border province called Blackmoor had dominated the affairs of the empire, the grey seas lapped unbroken save for a few islands that were once uninhabited peaks. Of the towns and castles of the Northlands, there was-nothing. All were swallowed by the sea. And when the land again rose up from vasty deep, it had been scraped clean. What was not destroyed by waters-the mountains and riverbeds, the cliffs and lakes-were soon buried under a half mile of ice, as climatic changes wrought by the catastrophe made the Northland into a howling glacial wilderness. When the climate again shifted back to more or less its original pattern, the very face of the land had changed. It was as if, said men, a curse from an angry and vengeful god had utterly and purposefully obliterated Blackmoor and all her works...
"...All that is known is that some accident occurred, and Blackmoor sank beneath the seas, its shattered shores becoming the Broken Lands we know today."
I don't think there is any explicit mention of a polar shift in this early publication, but if that's how you interpret it, it's clear that it was temporary. It also suggests that glacier movement obliterates the contours of the northern part of the continent.
I've only skimmed most of what I've bought so far, but it seems to me, at least at the moment DA1 was published, Arneson intended Blackmoor to be on the site of the Broken Lands described in X1 "The Isle of Dread". So far, it looks to me like DA1 gives the first reference to the Broken Lands since they are shown on the map in X1.
If anyone that is more versed on the subject than me comes back to this thread, I hope they will comment on the above passage.
Thanks.
Earth's global temperature has varied widely through its history. I would think it would be possible to have quite warm temperatures, even in northern regions, though I'd assume that would mean that the equatorial regions would be even hotter!
As a latecomer to the discussion, I won't weigh in too much, but I do think that climate variation can go a long way towards explaining the presence of "tropical" peoples in regions with what we would consider to be drastically cooler climates.
Even an increase of 1-2 Celsius in average temperature (not much of a stretch) can have wide-ranging implications year-round. IIRC, a global temperature drop of about 0.5 Celsius produced the "Little Ice Age" (c. 1400 - 1850), whereas the Medieval Warm Period that preceded it was what made Greenland marginally habitable. It was also during that time that the Vikings visited Newfoundland, which some believe may have been the "Vinland" they wrote about in their sagas. During that earlier, warmer period, it's entirely possible that grapes might have grown there. All this, theoretically, with an average temperature increase of less than 1 Celsius.
All this to say that a region on Mystara occupying a latitude similar to Newfoundland or northern Europe *could* support a culture we normally associate with more southern climes, if the climate were a bit warmer.
BTW - the maps are fantastic!
Geoff