Cosmology Idea discussion.

[RainingFish]

This was actually how I initially imagined it, but I couldn't figure out how to work night and day cycles into the world if the sun was in the center.

Edit: Technically I did have a way for night and day to come, I imagine the sun actually diving back into space through the ocean and it would orbit in and out of the dome. But I feel like night and day would basically become catastrophes that even breaks my suspension of disbelief lol

That moon idea orbiting it though could be interesting if it worked kinda like my continental eclipse idea. Where the Moon blocks enough sun light that instead of being a beacon at night it is the actual reason night comes.

You could also have a world without night. That might be interesting.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

You could also have a world without night. That might be interesting.

Many years ago I toyed with a concept called "Caveworld" - the entire planet was, essentially, dried magma, riddled with holes, some of which run all the way through... But, deep inside it are the Nodes - each Node represents, in some way, the four classic Greek elements - Fire, Air, Water and Earth. The Earth nodes contain many precious minerals and are the reason why people settled on this world. The Fire Nodes could be tapped to provide all sorts of energy to power the colony. Air and Water nodes were essential for making the colon survivable.
And then there were the fourth Node types discovered, alternately called (depending on which group "claimed" them) Chaos, Mana or Core Nodes - those who could access them could work feats that could only be described as "magic" ... but sometimes they had flares that caused random things to happen - monsters to appear, gravity to reverse, etc.
Areas near Fire Nodes were in perpetual daylight (unless a Flare changed things), and the rest of the planet was underground with only artificial light available, as the surface was airless (except a few points near Air nodes, including the first one ever discovered) and frequently bathed in radiation from the planet's sun, radiation that going more than a meter inside the planet was completely blocked (except during some Flare events...)

 

[Garolymar]

Many years ago I toyed with a concept called "Caveworld" - the entire planet was, essentially, dried magma, riddled with holes, some of which run all the way through... But, deep inside it are the Nodes - each Node represents, in some way, the four classic Greek elements - Fire, Air, Water and Earth. The Earth nodes contain many precious minerals and are the reason why people settled on this world. The Fire Nodes could be tapped to provide all sorts of energy to power the colony. Air and Water nodes were essential for making the colon survivable.
And then there were the fourth Node types discovered, alternately called (depending on which group "claimed" them) Chaos, Mana or Core Nodes - those who could access them could work feats that could only be described as "magic" ... but sometimes they had flares that caused random things to happen - monsters to appear, gravity to reverse, etc.
Areas near Fire Nodes were in perpetual daylight (unless a Flare changed things), and the rest of the planet was underground with only artificial light available, as the surface was airless (except a few points near Air nodes, including the first one ever discovered) and frequently bathed in radiation from the planet's sun, radiation that going more than a meter inside the planet was completely blocked (except during some Flare events...)

That's a cool concept, I really like these sorts of posts, and seeing other people's world ideas. they always paint the clearest pictures in my head. I love underground worlds too, having all that stone and dirt above you is comforting and terrifying at the same time. Plus whenever I played Rimworld I'm always basically a mole man carving his way into the mountains.

You could also have a world without night. That might be interesting.

I kinda imagining even the day light, if the sun was in real space, that day time already would have a sort of cool, darker tone. not as bright as we have it. I was also thinking that maybe the ocean depths aren't uniform, so like giant waves (Like churning at the bottom away from the islands instead of near the surface where the islands float) could change the way the light looks as well, like besides the continental eclipses and such.

Honestly I'll probably have to make a bullet form list of what is and isn't a mechanic one day, but this is just fun talking about it with you guys.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

That's a cool concept, I really like these sorts of posts, and seeing other people's world ideas. they always paint the clearest pictures in my head. I love underground worlds too, having all that stone and dirt above you is comforting and terrifying at the same time. Plus whenever I played Rimworld I'm always basically a mole man carving his way into the mountains.

Never heard of Rimworld - sounds interesting.
I think I wrote two chapters for the story WAY back when - had a starship approaching the planet with a military team (including the MC, who would discover he was one of the rare few who could tap the Chaos Nodes) approaching the planet, and the team getting a history lesson on how the planet was discovered and settled, and why the military was being brought in now to help run the place and never got past that point - partly because I kept seeing ways to use it as a game setting instead of a novel setting, and partly because I really wasn't sure where I was going with it, just liked the idea.

Some strange worlds I've actually used:

• Darcala, a tidal-locked planet in the Star Wars universe - an entire world that is "Dark Side Infused" to some level, but also a very valuable mining asset. All life lies within the planet's "twilight zone" between the blazing hot light side and the ice cold dark side.
• ... another one for Star Wars that I can't remember the name of; it was something tied to one of the old French authors, Dumas or Victor Hugo or something - but on this planet, the use of technology above basic firearms was forbidden by law - visiting the planet was done by modified hang gliders that had full life support and very low power engines until they were inside the planetary atmosphere, when all tech would just shut off and you'd have to glide in. Leaving the planet required something akin to being fired from a cannon while attached to a zipline, with life support gear that (usually) kicked in as soon as you left the atmosphere... The reason for this law were wolf-like creatures wandering the planet that EAT all forms of energy except kinetic - but these creatures were so rare due to hunting and having a low birth rate that most people forgot they ever existed and just believed "it has always been this way. It is not our place to question." The only people who knew otherwise usually found out when a fire blazed out of control or someone did something really stupid like firing up a blaster pistol, turning on a lightsaber or trying to use anything with a power source ... and they rarely survived long enough to share the tale. As an aside, players LOVED the hang-gliding in part but were a bit less keen on the cannon to leave bit... :
• Star Wars again: A jungle world that I don't remember if I named it, actually - it came to galactic attention when, shortly after it was discovered, an Imperial Star Destroyer moved in to claim control - and was promptly destroyed by a planetary weapon of some sort, a weapon the natives call "Stormgod". This incident prompted the natives, a mantis-like race, to decide it was time to say "hi" to the galaxy as a whole, and invited groups from the Empire and the Rebellion to "pitch their case" - leading to one of the strangest adventures I ever designed with two paths (a Diplomacy Path and an Action Path) - the Diplomacy side, the PCs were trying to talk to the natives, sell them on the Rebellion, and keep the Imperial troops from breaking the local laws (also had a "fun" little aside where the PCs are invited to go drinking with some of the delegates, and a local female decides one of the PCs looks "interesting" and tries to get that PC - regardless of gender, species, etc. - to go back to her room with her... only to find that not only do the natives LOOK like mantises, they mate like them too...). On the "Action" side the PCs go into the jungle to find and capture Stormgod before the Imperials can either capture or destroy it, as it really is the ONLY thing maintaining the peace...

 

[Garolymar]

Never heard of Rimworld - sounds interesting.
I think I wrote two chapters for the story WAY back when - had a starship approaching the planet with a military team (including the MC, who would discover he was one of the rare few who could tap the Chaos Nodes) approaching the planet, and the team getting a history lesson on how the planet was discovered and settled, and why the military was being brought in now to help run the place and never got past that point - partly because I kept seeing ways to use it as a game setting instead of a novel setting, and partly because I really wasn't sure where I was going with it, just liked the idea.

• Some strange worlds I've actually used:
  Darcala, a tidal-locked planet in the Star Wars universe - an entire world that is "Dark Side Infused" to some level, but also a very valuable mining asset. All life lies within the planet's "twilight zone" between the blazing hot light side and the ice cold dark side.
• ... another one for Star Wars that I can't remember the name of; it was something tied to one of the old French authors, Dumas or Victor Hugo or something - but on this planet, the use of technology above basic firearms was forbidden by law - visiting the planet was done by modified hang gliders that had full life support and very low power engines until they were inside the planetary atmosphere, when all tech would just shut off and you'd have to glide in. Leaving the planet required something akin to being fired from a cannon while attached to a zipline, with life support gear that (usually) kicked in as soon as you left the atmosphere... The reason for this law were wolf-like creatures wandering the planet that EAT all forms of energy except kinetic - but these creatures were so rare due to hunting and having a low birth rate that most people forgot they ever existed and just believed "it has always been this way. It is not our place to question." The only people who knew otherwise usually found out when a fire blazed out of control or someone did something really stupid like firing up a blaster pistol, turning on a lightsaber or trying to use anything with a power source ... and they rarely survived long enough to share the tale. As an aside, players LOVED the hang-gliding in part but were a bit less keen on the cannon to leave bit... :
• A jungle world that I don't remember if I named it, actually - it came to galactic attention when, shortly after it was discovered, an Imperial Star Destroyer moved in to claim control - and was promptly destroyed by a planetary weapon of some sort, a weapon the natives call "Stormgod". This incident prompted the natives, a mantis-like race, to decide it was time to say "hi" to the galaxy as a whole, and invited groups from the Empire and the Rebellion to "pitch their case" - leading to one of the strangest adventures I ever designed with two paths (a Diplomacy Path and an Action Path) - the Diplomacy side, the PCs were trying to talk to the natives, sell them on the Rebellion, and keep the Imperial troops from breaking the local laws (also had a "fun" little aside where the PCs are invited to go drinking with some of the delegates, and a local female decides one of the PCs looks "interesting" and tries to get that PC - regardless of gender, species, etc. - to go back to her room with her... only to find that not only do the natives LOOK like mantises, they mate like them too...). On the "Action" side the PCs go into the jungle to find and capture Stormgod before the Imperials can either capture or destroy it, as it really is the ONLY thing maintaining the peace...

It's a colony sim game, think the sims mixed with tower defence and heavily space themed, I don't know if you're into video games, but based on your descriptions I think you might like Rimworld. You can start as a cave tribe people that gets attacked by mechanoids or lovecraftian inspired monsters (DLC exclusive thing...) Plus the bizarre things the characters get up to are just funny. it's a very basic looking game but it really sparks the imagination. Quite a few of the side characters I have in my story are based on my colonists and how I imagined they might actually would've acted if they could lol. (Edit: there are loads of different basic scenarios/ ones you can create, not just the ones I talked about, it's a cool game one of my favorites)

The tidally locked world is definitely my favorite up there. I remember just brain storming with my brother, (he mostly just lets me rant lol) and I was thinking about how people in those twilight areas of the habitable zone might treat the extreme nether regions of their world. Like maybe they see the hot side as some divine barrier barring their access to heaven and the cold side where all the poor souls go who were sinful in life. Or maybe if they are more advanced they can actually make it into these extremely different biomes to find old lost civilizations that were there before the planet was like that, or maybe there are some extremophile type creatures that live there, again like lovecraftian frozen monsters.

It's fun seeing how our lenses are very different too, The way you describe your worlds/how they were made is very heavy scifi, which is good cause I feel like especially the world I'm talking about is probably more in line with a scifi story, lol my lense though always gets stuck in fantasy.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

No matter what I start out writing, it almost always, at some point, winds up being either:
1) Horror
2) High Fantasy
3) Super-heroes
4) Two or three of the above (usually two).
That was probably why I did a lot with Star Wars back in the day, since it pretty much defines the "start out as science fiction, become something else for a bit, finish as science fiction" aesthetic...

I'm hoping I can kind of avoid this happening if I ever post my literally 2/3 finished romance novel, and can kind of avoid it (sort of superheroish but not really) in Digital Cowboy - but everything else has already gone to one or more of these...