| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Wenin |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 00:18:39
I'm creating a spell that involves time and I was wondering if there is any known time ratios established between the various crystal worlds besides a 1:1 relationship?
Example:
1 Hour of time passage in Faerun equates to 2 Hours in Greyhawk. (I totally made this up, it is only an example of what I'm looking for.)
I've always assumed they are all on a 1:1 relationship, but I wanted to confirm this belief. |
| 21 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 15 Dec 2010 : 11:05:49
Toril-Krynn-Oerth are very definitely established as 1:1:1 in all the Spelljammer and Planescape lore I've read. One of the Spelljammer books mentions that these three worlds are relatively "close" to each other (in phlogiston terms), whilst other D&D worlds are unusually distant, isolated, placed at the DM's discretion, or have thus far never been "mapped" by Spelljammers. Planar travellers are mostly 1:1, though differing temporal conditions (or quirks) are described for various planes, particularly the Astral; time in the entire D&D cosmos seems, for the most part, to be about 1:1 with Sigil. Of course some places (Ravenloft, Athas) are so disconnected that it may be impossible to ascertain their timeflows, though 1:1 doesn't seem like a bad assumption.
1894 ... so Elminster might enjoy Coca-Cola, eh? |
| see |
Posted - 15 Dec 2010 : 08:40:10
The Earth-Toril time rate is tricky, and not just because of 4e. The Realmspace supplement indicated Elminster's Safehold had, simultaneously, a portal to Ed Greenwood's home that synchronized with the passage of time on Earth, and a portal to Yellowstone National Park in the year 1894 that may or may not be synchronized. Perhaps the latter was to an Earth on a plane with a Temporal Factor (1st edition Manual of the Planes) of -5?
Toril-Krynn would be 1:1 under the 1st edition and 2nd edition cosmologies. As of SAGA and then 3rd and then 4th, well, who knows? |
| The Sage |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 05:45:42
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
Back in 2E, when we had Spelljammer and Planescape connecting most of the settings, there was an article in Dragon that explicitly matched up the years in the settings. It's harder to figure now, though, as both Dragonlance and the Realms had timejumps. Krynn's wasn't as much of a timejump, but they did move it forward at least one human generation, and it was several years later in real time that we got the FR timejump. So while we used to be able to match up all the dates between the settings, I'm no longer sure that's possible.
DRAGONLANCE's so-called time-jump isn't as clear as all that, though. And additional 3e material now makes that particular aspect somewhat "murky." As such, I wouldn't put all that much stock in that element, now.
I'm just saying that we had a fixed reference point, a place where the two timelines intersected -- and then we got new Dragonlance tales, focusing on the children of the Heroes of the Lance. The fixed reference point we had was around the time of the War of the Lance and the Battle of Palanthas. But then we saw the next generation, so time had advanced 20+ years on Krynn, but only 10 or so on Toril. With the timelines advancing unevenly, it was no longer as easy to line up events.
True. And 3e largely attempted to fill in the 20+ year gap anyway -- detailing events and characters that helped to flesh out the missing years, which in my eyes, renders the skip-ahead... somewhat irrelevant now. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 05:43:50
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
lol, no fixed reference points? All those articles involving Elminster, Mordenkainen, etc meeting Ed or each other in our world ... presumably dated easily (within a month or two) from the magazine cover ... there are no concrete references to D&D calendars (or specific events which occur at known calendar dates on D&D worlds) in any of those articles?
5:2 Earth:Toril timeflow ratio, lol ... I remember for a while it seemed more like 1:1 or less (much, much less).
What Wooly said. 
Additionally, as I noted with the FRCS reference above, production times between the various TSR products also likely made it increasingly difficult to find commonality between the separate timelines of each setting. Obviously, the Realms had entirely more products published for it in a single year during 2e, than DRAGONLANCE for example. And that kind of schedule likely impacted on when and how each setting may have related with each other... at least temporally. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 04:50:52
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
Back in 2E, when we had Spelljammer and Planescape connecting most of the settings, there was an article in Dragon that explicitly matched up the years in the settings. It's harder to figure now, though, as both Dragonlance and the Realms had timejumps. Krynn's wasn't as much of a timejump, but they did move it forward at least one human generation, and it was several years later in real time that we got the FR timejump. So while we used to be able to match up all the dates between the settings, I'm no longer sure that's possible.
DRAGONLANCE's so-called time-jump isn't as clear as all that, though. And additional 3e material now makes that particular aspect somewhat "murky." As such, I wouldn't put all that much stock in that element, now.
I'm just saying that we had a fixed reference point, a place where the two timelines intersected -- and then we got new Dragonlance tales, focusing on the children of the Heroes of the Lance. The fixed reference point we had was around the time of the War of the Lance and the Battle of Palanthas. But then we saw the next generation, so time had advanced 20+ years on Krynn, but only 10 or so on Toril. With the timelines advancing unevenly, it was no longer as easy to line up events. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 04:47:12
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
lol, no fixed reference points? All those articles involving Elminster, Mordenkainen, etc meeting Ed or each other in our world ... presumably dated easily (within a month or two) from the magazine cover ... there are no concrete references to D&D calendars (or specific events which occur at known calendar dates on D&D worlds) in any of those articles?
5:2 Earth:Toril timeflow ratio, lol ... I remember for a while it seemed more like 1:1 or less (much, much less).
Well, we did have some fixed reference points... But then one setting moved forward 20-some years, and several years of real time later, the other moved forward 100 years -- and that was after it had already moved forward at a different rate than the first. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 01:35:42
lol, no fixed reference points? All those articles involving Elminster, Mordenkainen, etc meeting Ed or each other in our world ... presumably dated easily (within a month or two) from the magazine cover ... there are no concrete references to D&D calendars (or specific events which occur at known calendar dates on D&D worlds) in any of those articles?
5:2 Earth:Toril timeflow ratio, lol ... I remember for a while it seemed more like 1:1 or less (much, much less). |
| The Sage |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 00:50:18
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I did speculate in my Time travel in the Realms scroll that events involving disruption of Mystra/Weave(Time?) could "knock the Realms out of sync" with the rest of the cosmos ... introducing gaps of indefinite duration or sporadic bursts of accelerated/decelerated timeflow ...
Though the timejump was really more of an arbitrary setting displacement, not involving any special "explanations" beyond simple fiat. Worlds are always in motion, maybe time ratios between them constantly change as they drift around.
Well, when all the worlds had connections to each other, there was never an indication that time ratios were anything other than 1:1. With settings like Spelljammer -- which was specifically designed with cross-world travel in mind, I'd expect that if time ratios were different, it would have been mentioned.
Indeed. And PLANESCAPE often danced around the subject when it came to the temporal relationship between the Primes. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 00:49:39
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I notice none of these systems attempts to include Earth. What year in our calendar (CE) did the Realms ToT take place?
I don't think they've made an explicit connection between Realms-time and real-world time. Which is good, again considering the 100 year timejump.
The only specific reference we have to something like this, is from the 3e FRCS -- pg. 260.
Basically, the timeline of the setting [during 3e] was supposed to advance about two years per five years worth of FR products. Specifically, for every five months that passed in the real world, time in Faerūn advanced by two months. But Rich Baker later confirmed that designers found it more and more difficult to adhere to that standard, as the years progressed. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 14 Dec 2010 : 00:43:45
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
Back in 2E, when we had Spelljammer and Planescape connecting most of the settings, there was an article in Dragon that explicitly matched up the years in the settings. It's harder to figure now, though, as both Dragonlance and the Realms had timejumps. Krynn's wasn't as much of a timejump, but they did move it forward at least one human generation, and it was several years later in real time that we got the FR timejump. So while we used to be able to match up all the dates between the settings, I'm no longer sure that's possible.
DRAGONLANCE's so-called time-jump isn't as clear as all that, though. And additional 3e material now makes that particular aspect somewhat "murky." As such, I wouldn't put all that much stock in that element, now.
|
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 22:45:02
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I did speculate in my Time travel in the Realms scroll that events involving disruption of Mystra/Weave(Time?) could "knock the Realms out of sync" with the rest of the cosmos ... introducing gaps of indefinite duration or sporadic bursts of accelerated/decelerated timeflow ...
Though the timejump was really more of an arbitrary setting displacement, not involving any special "explanations" beyond simple fiat. Worlds are always in motion, maybe time ratios between them constantly change as they drift around.
Well, when all the worlds had connections to each other, there was never an indication that time ratios were anything other than 1:1. With settings like Spelljammer -- which was specifically designed with cross-world travel in mind, I'd expect that if time ratios were different, it would have been mentioned. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 21:55:01
I did speculate in my Time travel in the Realms scroll that events involving disruption of Mystra/Weave(Time?) could "knock the Realms out of sync" with the rest of the cosmos ... introducing gaps of indefinite duration or sporadic bursts of accelerated/decelerated timeflow ...
Though the timejump was really more of an arbitrary setting displacement, not involving any special "explanations" beyond simple fiat. Worlds are always in motion, maybe time ratios between them constantly change as they drift around. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 21:30:18
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I notice none of these systems attempts to include Earth. What year in our calendar (CE) did the Realms ToT take place?
I don't think they've made an explicit connection between Realms-time and real-world time. Which is good, again considering the 100 year timejump. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 20:55:16
Daviot - your reference does not equate to the other two systems above (at least insofar as DR/AC/CY calendars ... I'm not familiar with TU/OC).
I notice none of these systems attempts to include Earth. What year in our calendar (CE) did the Realms ToT take place? |
| Daviot |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 20:36:21
According to my easily-accessible-notes (which may be from said Dragon mag):
"1361 DR on Toril = 358 AC Krynn = 581 CY Oerth = 856 TU (Time of Unity) = 5043 OC (Olven Calendar, Greyhawk)" |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 18:23:20
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I'll append another question onto this ...
Has anybody ever correlated the calendars between worlds? (Especially Toril, Krynn, Oerth, Earth, Ravenloft.)
For example, when in the Krynn calendar did the Realms Time of Troubles occur?
If the timeflow is not 1:1 between worlds then the calendars would move at different rates.
It was explicitly done in Dragon. I want to say it was issue 159, but I'm away from my pdfs at the moment. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 18:22:22
Back in 2E, when we had Spelljammer and Planescape connecting most of the settings, there was an article in Dragon that explicitly matched up the years in the settings. It's harder to figure now, though, as both Dragonlance and the Realms had timejumps. Krynn's wasn't as much of a timejump, but they did move it forward at least one human generation, and it was several years later in real time that we got the FR timejump. So while we used to be able to match up all the dates between the settings, I'm no longer sure that's possible. |
| Matt James |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 15:18:10
Sage beat me to it :) My brother has done extensive work in that area (as evident on his ancient website). |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 01:23:08
That's an awesome link, Sage! I also found an independent compilation called A Spelljammer Timeline.
Both seem to assume a fixed 1:1 time ratio between worlds, quite natural from the Spelljammer viewpoint (although some mention is made that "other primes" and worlds like Mystara may not be temporally synchronized). Varying rates and properties of time are well known among different planes, so perhaps also between different primes; Toril, Krynn, and Oerth seem to be firmly established as being proximate within the cosmos and sharing "common" time. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 01:02:49
I don't distinctly recall anything this far in scope being published officially.
However, you may both find this chronology to be somewhat useful. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Dec 2010 : 00:56:53
I'll append another question onto this ...
Has anybody ever correlated the calendars between worlds? (Especially Toril, Krynn, Oerth, Earth, Ravenloft.)
For example, when in the Krynn calendar did the Realms Time of Troubles occur?
If the timeflow is not 1:1 between worlds then the calendars would move at different rates. |
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