posted
I have a question regarding distances and time for a fantasy novel I'm working on:
My understanding is that a person can walk about twenty miles in one day. True?
If so, is that sun-up to sun-down travel? What about if they traveled well into the night as well? What about if they were on horse back? Would they cover more ground then? How much ground can one cover on horseback if they were in a good trot or run?
Also, would a kingdom that measures about 160 x 220 miles seem large or small or normal?
FInally, say we have a tower measuring over a thousand feet in height. From how far away, assuming it lies in the middle of a very large plane, would it be visible to an observer on the ground.
How about someone looking towards it from a cliff high in the mountains? Would they still see it from sixty or seventy miles away?
And just how far might someone standing on the top of said tower be able to see? fifty miles? Eighty? (I know that from the top of the Empire State building one can see for almost eighty miles on a clear day)....
Okay...that was more than one question. Sorry. But any input is greatly appreciated.
posted
In my fantasy fiction, I tend to express long distances in terms of "X days' journey" or "X days' journey on horseback," in order to avoid having to do these kinds of calulations.
Your kingdom is about more than a third of the size of the current United Kingdom, about one-sixth the size of current France, but more than 2.5 times the size of the Netherlands. That would make it medium-sized, I guess.
posted
In my book I expect to use "x days" as well. However, for my own sake it's nice to be able to visualize how much real distance is being covered...for one thing, that tells me how large/small my kingdom needs to be relative to it's neigbors.
It also helps me determine how far one could expect to see from the tower I referenced which is a fairly important object early in the book. If 20 miles is the limit per day but I want a large kingdom, then it's going to take many, many days to get across it.
posted
Walking at a casual pace, sun up to sundown, one can expect to travel about 20-25 miles with breaks for meals/rest.
Horseback at a dead run, you travel about 25 miles per hour. This pace is not sustainable for more than eight hours or so, and you will have to trade out a horse at a post. If you're not horse-swapping, you should only travel about 15 miles an hour. This would allow you to travel all day, but the horse would need about 15-20 minutes of grooming at the end of the day and a lunch-break in the middle.
Visibility (as far as seeing a giant tower) would generally depend on visibility. On a clear day you could probably see the tower at 20 miles tops. From a mountain top or high in the air at about 40 miles. Also, in a hilly kingdom you wouldn't be able to see it more than 5 or 6 miles.
From the top of the tower, you can expect to see large landmarks (mountains and such) from anywhere between 40 to 80 miles.
[This message has been edited by JBShearer (edited March 24, 2004).]
posted
Also, keep in mind the landscape. Is there a forest in the way? If so, how winding is the path (is there even a path)? Rivers? Do they have fords or bridges? How far out of your way do you have to travel to reach them? If they're riding a horse, does the country have paths for the animal?
But then, all of this is just details. Details are only really important when they have a direct effect upon your story - like the others have mentioned, if this isn't some matter of precise time management, it's probably best to just say that it's "XXX days of travel" and be done with it. You don't ever have to give exact figures about the size of your kingdom if you don't want to (and in fact, they probably wouldn't have exact figures in a typical fantasy world), so people can't really jump on you for realism.
But then, you can do a lot of interesting things with events that occur on trips from point A to point B. For example, OSC's "Red Prophet" (very slight spoilers) wouldn't have happened if Alvin hadn't run into a group of Reds on the way to Hatrack River, and its events have had far-reaching effects on every book in the Alvin Maker series.
[This message has been edited by AeroB1033 (edited March 24, 2004).]
posted
But remember that the Unicorn has a different heating system, and hence will burn out a little sooner than the horse would.
Posts: 697 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
Color and light is also a determinate factor. Red is far more visable to the 'human' eye than blue for example. not to mention it isn't as natural as blue and green. so a thousand foot red tower would stick out like a big sore thumb. And probably leave a person hoping not to find the giant it belongs to. Now race would also make a difference. I'd put an elve's eyes at double a humans. and a Dwarf in the light would be less. As for the Unicorn thing, if there was a little magical influence they could run all day at 30. But a friend of mine once did 32 miles in a day. Also you have to figure the physical prowess of the travellers. Think of Gandalf's Shadowfax he went much faster and longer than a normal horse. I think it was three days straight in a journey that took the rest of them a week or two.
Posts: 1895 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
A person can walk all day, at the pace considered 'walking pace' for that person's culture and/or race. This could come out to less than five miles or more than a hundred miles each day.
A person can follow any pattern of travel whatsoever, traveling at night, traveling all day, using time travel to travel for the same day about a dozen times, using psionic powers to freeze time and or make it run backwards...you can have sun-up to sun-down travel if you like, or during the night, or on horseback.
A kingdom of any geographic size will have a population of some size and a given amount of wilderness area. Whether the cultivated land in the kingdom is sufficient to feed the population, the availability of transportation systems for all that food, and how much untracked wilderness is left over after both these have been subtracted will affect how large the country seems to its inhabitants.
If you have a tower that is in the center of a plane, then it will be visible from any distance, because you will not have a finite horizon.
However, you must take into account the difference between "visible" and "some joker just looking in that direction being able to spot it." Scale down the problem for a minute and place a one inch tall tower-shaped object about 27 feet away. How easy is it to see? Now try this in a smoke filled room to simulate atmospheric haze. You'll quickly find out that how wide the tower is matters quite a bit, as does the color and whether or not the tower is brightly lit.
Sitting at the bottom of a well at night, a human can see stars that may be hundreds of light-years distant. If one of those stars happens to be another galaxy...well then (in a well, no less)! You can't do much better than that from the top of any tower that doesn't poke out through the Earth's atmosphere.
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