The Orbit of the Moon

[Konig Des Todes]

*uses his epic necromantic lich powers to bring back this thread*

I only skimmed the thread, mainly paying attention to the posts with pictures and rather short posts, for now.

A thought that came to me a while back when I first found this thread, but forgot to post it, and which came back to me recently, is a simple thought and one that I do not see as being thought up in this thread:

What if Tyria has more than one moon? Currently, we have no statement (to my knowledge) on the moon itself, and it is true that we only see one moon at a time - but that doesn't mean there cannot be two or more moons that rotate around the planet, just that we haven't seen two or more moons in the same area at the same time.

And would provide an answer to the various orbit paths that we see.

[Akirai Annuvil]

The solution is a rotating elliptical orbit of the moon! The moon is on an ellipses around Tyria, this ellipses has not a fixed focal point, instead it is rotating. Much like this graphic:

Though skimming the thread, the topic is actually quite interesting.

[shadowhand]

There might also be other explanations... Such as the dates being different. Odds are that we are not (lorewise at least) in Riverside Province at the same date (or even year) that we do Master Togo's bonus mission.

So, different dates, different seasons, different geographical positions, different hours of the day/night.

All of which makes it plausible for the moon to have (almost) any shape, size and position in the sky.

[Alaris]

One thought came to mind.

Can someone explain this?

[Gmr Leon]

In lore terms, I would propose something to the effect of illusion magic at work on that.

[Konig Des Todes]

I would say physical change done by Thorn (everything else seems to be, for the most part...), but with the moon having two appearances in decorated towns, it may very much be illusional.

[shadowhand]

I'm guessing that Lyssa is easily amused and that she'll provide illusion services for free every halloween :)

[chumbucket]

Hey everyone - I hate for my first post in the forum to be a thread necro, but I was reading this thread and I absolutely cannot resist adding something to the puzzle.

So the moon in Tyria changes sizes in the same zone.

In the Sage Lands, if you walk east from The Wilds and look at the moon, you will notice it gradually get smaller and larger as you walk, as if though the moon is reacting to your character walking into the jungle.

I tried to get a video of the effect. I apologize for the shaky cam and poor quality - I tried to get it as high res as I could. I also tried to look around quick to give you guys an idea of where I was when this phenomena occurred.

http://www.xfire.com/video/2a1c93/

So... yeah. Even with elliptical orbits I'd say that throws a monkey wrench into the works pretty badly. Anyone have thoughts on this?

Also, I'm really enjoying reading through the lore archives and learning about theories about random things. GW is a lot more fun to play now that I'm actually somewhat paying attention to the scenery and the lore... :3

[Gmr Leon]

I suspect that's merely similar to the sky change from Yatendi Canyons to Vehtendi Valley in Elona. Or from any of the areas surrounding the Astralarium into the Astralarium. It's not that time suddenly leaps forward to night, merely that either in one case it's a magically produced effect, storywise it's night there, or, for whatever resaon, they decided to make it so. (I think Vehtendi Valley was purposely made night to fit with the story of Nightfall and sneaking into Vabbi, but it's been awhile since I played through it.)