Poll: Size the Mata Nui robot

[bonesiii]

It's because there are three items logically linked together, almost mathematically linked together: 1) the size of the giant, 2) the size of the planets in question, 3) and the force of gravity emitted by each of these planets.

Well, I suspected so (are you summarizing what NS said earlier that I missed, though, or reading this into it?) -- but that assumes Greg actually understands the issue with the gravity, and his response about the absorption theory seems to me to show that he doesn't.

 

(And I wouldn't expect him to. His focus was on events, what characters do, etc.)

 

There's a mention in JE that Makuta's head was clocked by Bota Magna, instead of a moon shard. It's a tiny mistake.

Okay, I suppose that could actually have come about by mistake -- but if NS (I think he said that too, pardon if I'm getting people mixed up ) meant that it's non-canon, that was covered by the "dual canon" thing on that subject. A previous topic outlined all the quotes and timing on this one, if anybody's curious enough to dig. (I believe it was one of my posts.)

 

I got the impression that official story sources took precedent over Greg answers

Generally Greg's answers are the most canon, mainly because he wrote many of the sources. Depends on the source and the detail, though. It's really best to look at each case with specifics than to generalize. (And I wouldn't wanna try to make an exhaustive list of "excepts" either. )

[fishers64]

 

It's because there are three items logically linked together, almost mathematically linked together: 1) the size of the giant, 2) the size of the planets in question, 3) and the force of gravity emitted by each of these planets.

Well, I suspected so (are you summarizing what NS said earlier that I missed, though, or reading this into it?) -- but that assumes Greg actually understands the issue with the gravity, and his response about the absorption theory seems to me to show that he doesn't.

 

(And I wouldn't expect him to. His focus was on events, what characters do, etc.)

 

Nah, I was stating my own opinion on the subject, which I thought NS agreed with based on something else he said.

 

Last night just wasn't my brightest posting hour. Sorry.

 

 

I got the impression that official story sources took precedent over Greg answers

Generally Greg's answers are the most canon, mainly because he wrote many of the sources. Depends on the source and the detail, though. It's really best to look at each case with specifics than to generalize. (And I wouldn't wanna try to make an exhaustive list of "excepts" either. )

 

Welp, the 40 million foot number is a Greg Answer, so I'm not sure how you can get out of it.

[bonesiii]

What do you mean? Get out of what? *is confused again*

[fishers64]

What do you mean? Get out of what? *is confused again*

Get out of using the 40 million foot number for the robot size. You all were trying to shrink it. 

[bonesiii]

Shrinking it just takes a retcon -- that would go for anything already canon. (And like I said, we can still figure out what "should" be canon, even if Greg doesn't go for it. )

 

But thanks for clarifying. I thought you meant something more complicated and not remotely like that... glad I didn't base an answer on that lol.

[fishers64]

Erm, yeah. I was saying that Greg answers being more canon wouldn't make the 40 million feet less canon. 
 

Shrinking it just takes a retcon -- that would go for anything already canon. (And like I said, we can still figure out what "should" be canon, even if Greg doesn't go for it. )

Truth. And given the poll results, maybe that's actually worth a shot.

I'm not feeling motivated to make that topic though. It should be one of the now many people who have stepped forward with the goal of shrinking it to take the time to hammer it out. And not in this one, which is made of flames.
 

But thanks for clarifying. I thought you meant something more complicated and not remotely like that... glad I didn't base an answer on that lol.

I'm not surprised lol.

I will inform the universe that it is unlikely for my mind to sum up or refer to a complex concept in one line. When it tries, it keeps pulling and pulling and pulling more information until I have launched into paragraph upon paragraph. Most stuff on this forum (to my mind at least) actually is simple. I just got done explaining an extremely complex website system so my business prof can understand it, and I've used four pages, and I'm still not done. I think that it will need to be simplified...

I doubt that saying so will help though. In my math class this semester, there was a guy who sat next to me asked to see my test after it was graded (he wasn't cheating since the test was over). He was surprised to see that my test was filled with work, and practically covered with long calculations and diagrams and number lines. He said that he didn't think that he needed to put that much work on the page, because he was "analytical" (whatever that means) and could work everything out in his head. He found all the complications fascinating. My math prof has complained about those people more than once for not showing enough work.

My math prof is like me.

But not everyone is. It's my understanding that some people immediately go straight for the complex answer. Or they get to the complex answer in a way that is practically effortless. How? Beats me, man. I take notepad documents, instruction books, spreadsheets. Years. Filled with headaches. And I'd say there's a few of those people in yonder topic here. Of course, that is a generalization. But still. 

 

(Of course, once I do finally manage to get it, I never forget. I keep telling myself that's an advantage. )

 

So yarr. If it's one line, it's probably as complicated as one line. Ironically, this is more complicated than one line, apparently, because I've now written like five paragraphs lol. 

[Makaru]

This has been bugging me all week.

 

So here's my issue with the 40 Million Feet thing. It isn't even the size, which conceptually works if you try really hard. It's the impractical measurement. Nobody in this topic can claim to have any appreciation of what "40 million" of anything is. No one can. Your brain isn't set up to deal with quantifying what is conceptually infinity. We don't measure the distance between cities as centimeters for that reason.

 

So why choose feet? Using a reference measurement closer to that scale would make way more sense to talk about (IE 12,000 km or 7600 miles). Using non-standardized nomenclature is absolutely baffling. You may as well have measured the robot in inches for all it was worth.

 

[this begins the part of my post that is entirely opinion and conjecture]

 

And I think that's the reason. I suggest that there was only as much thought put into the scale as to what would sound "impressive". An arbitrarily large number tacked on because planning and world-building is extremely difficult in terms of geography. The writer(s) can't appreciate what scale they are working with and now we have a robot that is the same diameter as earth.

 

And when you put an arbitrary scale into play like this it muddies up writing something believable. I get that Bionicle does not operate within "real world physics", but we've had enough examples of how mass and gravity work in the Bionicle universe we can somewhat ascertain how physics do work.

 

I think we can all agree that in a science fiction story, the BARE MINIMUM is that the story and everything that happens in it should at least operate within its own rules and circumstances. And while there is no way I can compile the extremely boring statistics and math to back it up [partially because I don't feel the data exists but mostly because even if it did I would not want to], the entire final battle as well as the mere existence of the Giant Robot feel wrong, and I think there has to be some merit to that.

 

What I think happened is, while the Matoran Universe existing within the Robot is a fascinating idea, the whole idea conceived as magical space fantasy was written into a more serious science fiction corner, and trying to merge those concepts together in the end as one was extremely overambitious without having planned it from the beginning.

 

TL;DR

The whole GSR was a great idea implemented poorly and confusingly in the end but I don't see how they could have done it any better.

[Thormen]

With regards the the gravity not working as depicted in the media, I think we don't have to worry too much about that since we, again, don't know the material properties of Protodermis or the celestial objects we're talking about. Of course we have this observation by Galileo Galilei and the biologist J.B.S. Haldane that you can't just supersize things and expect them to work the same: if you have a giant human who is basically the same as a normal human, except that he is ten times as tall (so, say 17m / 56 ft), then his mass is a thousand times as large (say 100 tonnes), which would break his own bones. This same math has also been applied to show that there will never be any giant spiders: their body is not designed to carry the large weight they would have if they were too big. These kind of problems not only arise when you supersize the creature in question, but also when you supersize the planet: a planet with larger gravity will also have regular-sized creatures break their bones/shells with just their own weight.

 

However, did anyone know there is a giant spider? It's called La Princesse, is 15 meters / 50 feet tall, weighs 37 tonnes and was walking around Liverpool in 2008.

 

Of course La Princesse is a machine and the reason it doesn't get crushed by its own weight is because it is built with a steel frame. Living spiders on earth cannot possibly develop such a frame, so the logic above still stands. It does however give us a lot of possibilities in the BIONICLE universe.

 

In my opinion, anyone who is worried about 2-meter-/seven-foot-tall bipedal creatures walking around on a planet with gravity 'far larger' than the gravity on earth should be more worried about a bipedal with a height of 12 000 km / 40 million feet (or 3 300 km / 3 150 km / 10 million feet if you are in favor of retconning the number) walking around on the same planet, but people seem to be very willing to explain that away: the Great Spirit Robot could mess with gravity, could have been specially designed to carry its weight and lessen its own impact etc. Why don't we apply this to other creatures in BIONICLE as well?

 

Biomechanical MU inhabitants are 85% mechanical and 15% organic/carbon-based. This ratio might very well be close to the composition of La Princesse, the giant spider I mentioned earlier, since it was constructed out of a steel frame with poplar wood on top of it. In other words, I don't see a problem here: the biomechanical MU inhabitants could easily be though of as able to withstand much greater gravity than creatures on earth. There is a small number of organic Rahi of course, but they were living inside the MU with its artificial gravity for the most part of history and I don't think we have any confirmation from Greg that they survived after the death of the Makuta. Besides, they were organic but still made out of Protodermis, and we don't know the material properties of Protodermis so no problem there either.

 

What's more difficult is explaining the Spherus-Magnans, who definitely experienced 'far greater' gravity and are only 15% mechanical and 85% organic/carbon-based. Still, 15% is something and I can definitely imagine the Spherus-Magnans having a reinforced bone structure. This biomechanical state is of course not their 'original', biological state, so we must assume some kind of 'proto-Agori' etc. that were 100% organic/carbon-based, but who's to say they were able to carry their own weight the same way as the current Spherus-Magnans do? Maybe they were crawling on their bellies, which would certainly give them an incentive to reinforce their bodies.

 

Also, what exactly do 'organic' and 'carbon-based' mean? 'Organic' material is simply material that is used in life processes (which it is by definition if it's part of Matoran/Toa/Agori etc.) and is carbon-based, and 'carbon-based' essentially just means there's a significant amount of carbon atoms in it. Carbon-fiber reinforced polymer is carbon-based and it is extremely strong and extremely lightweight. Why can't the organic tissue of BIONICLE creatures have similar properties?

 

What's more difficult to account for is how the gravity acceleration was depicted in movies and games etc. Falling objects are depicted as accelerating at more or less the same rate as they would on earth, even though this rate is based on the size and mass of earth and such a rate in BIONICLE would have to be based on the size and mass of whatever celestial object they are on. However, I don't think a megaplanet necessarily has a larger gravitational acceleration than earth: the acceleration should equal G * m / r ^ 2 , where G is the gravitational constants Fishers mentioned earlier, m is the mass of the planet and r is the distance from the center of the planet. As I mentioned above, increasing the planet's diameter by a factor of 10 would increase the mass by a factor of 1000 and the distance from the center by 10, which would increase the acceleration by 1 * 1000 / 10 ^ 2 = 10. However, as I also showed above, this math only flies if you assume the material composition stays the same: why can't Spherus Magna have a lower density than earth? As long as we don't know the exact size and mass I see no reason to worry about this either.

 

And all of that is only necessary if you assume those media to be 100% visually accurate, which they aren't. The gravitational acceleration depicted could easily be once of the visual details that aren't canon. And how many of those depictions are we really talking about? Most of the story took place either inside the GSR (which had artificial gravity) or on Aqua Magna (which, as Munty demonstrated, doesn't have to be significantly larger than earth and might also have been affected by the gravity-devices of the GSR). The only problematic body is Bara Magna (and by extension Spherus Magna), which means we're only talking about 2009 and 2010 here. The Legend Reborn has bigger problems with the canonicity of its visuals than this, so if you want to 'fix' that the gravitational acceleration is the least of your worries. Beyond that I don't think any of the videos or games (Glatorian Arena?) are considered canon, the BIONICLE Battle videos of 2010 are 'semi-canon' so we don't have to worry about them either.

 

And then all of that is assuming the gravitational constant G is the same in the BIONICLE universe as it is here, even though Fishers pointed out it might be different.

 

To sum all that up: there are many, many ways we can make a 'far greater' gravity on Spherus Magna work with the canon information we have.

 

Also a huge thanks to toa kopaka4372 for finding out Makuta's Guide to the Universe mentions the size of the Island of Mata Nui! This was exactly what I was looking for: a second source to compare the original source. When we convert the measurements in kio from the original BIONICLE.com website we get a length of 489.09 km and a width of 243.86 km. Makuta's Guide to the Universe says the length of the IMN is 486 km, which is clearly very close to the initial measurement (it's off by 3.9 km, which is less than a percent and can easily be attributed to rounding error in the calculations). The width is a different story: Makuta's 285 km is in fact significantly different from the calculated 243.86 . Here I suggest we look at the length/width ratio of canon pictures of the IMN: I measure 604/324 in pixels, which means 489,09/262,36 or 486/261 . Apparently either figure is about 20 km off... That's not much either, but definitely too large to attribute to rounding error.

 

But regarding the length of the IMN: I think that's pretty solid now. It was featured on the BIONICLE.com website back in 2001 when BIONICLE.com was our most central source for canon information and remained there for three years. It disappeared in 2004 and only in 2008 was it mentioned again in an official guide: and whaddayaknow, the length is still essentially the same. That shows to me that this number was in the story bible from the start: otherwise it would not have survived such a long period of not being published.

[Rahkshi Lalonde]

i still stand in saying that there's a certain limit to how much you can stretch concepts to fit your story before it reaches the point where it would be so much easier to do the opposite. :0

[Thormen]

i still stand in saying that there's a certain limit to how much you can stretch concepts to fit your story before it reaches the point where it would be so much easier to do the opposite. :0

Is this in response to something specific? I do agree with you that a 40 million foot / 12 000 km tall robot "stretches concepts" to a point where it's easier to get rid of the canon size, and I think you can extend that argument to many aspects of the BIONICLE canon. However, I don't know if you meant that easier is automatically better, which is not something I agree with. We had to stretch concepts from the start: biomechanical beings on a tropical island, elemental powers, Kanohi masks... and I'd argue those 'stretched' concepts actually did BIONICLE more good than harm (I personally like them ). I still prefer the size of Christian Faber's concept art over the canon number, but I don't think we should disregard possible solutions simple because they 'stretch' things.

[Munty]

NOTE : The image in this post is NOT representative of it's written content and I do not try to suggest it is an accurate representation of ANYTHING so please do not neglect to read this post should you dislike or disagree with it

 

I've been following this topic closely and think it's doing pretty well right now. I see the main discussion seems to be one regarding the effect of Bionicle gravity on various life-forms and structures (one of the things I mentioned previously too) I think the gravity within the MU is fine as it's internally generated (somehow!) so that's not a problem. As for the effect of BM/SM gravity on the Agori and Glatorian and such that is another question entirely. Consider the fact however (the canon fact I might add!) that Tahu and many other MU inhabitants fled the GSR immediately prior to the final battle (and everyone else left following it) None of them experienced any change in gravity which I would suggest is fairly conclusive evidence of the gravity both INSIDE the MU and on the SURFACE of SM being the same. It makes sense that the great beings would replicate the gravity of their home planet anyway, especially as they created some of the MU's inhabitants ON Spherus Magna!

 

That would suggest the whole bionicle universe was under the same gravitational forces which I think makes for a less confusing world personally. Of course Greg stated that the gravity on Spherus Magna is significantly greater than that on earth but this can still be true to a point without it being PROPORTIONALLY greater. Also, Greg never went into any details on the matter and instead was simply responding to a fan question, which he did so vaguely and with little consideration (exactly the same way we came to have a 40 million foot robot as it happens. It's just that people didn't continue to push him for exact details regarding gravity which is a GOOD thing!)

 

There's no reason I can think of that the Bionicle Universe could not still have a 'significantly stronger' gravitational field than earth without causing us more problems. The Matoran and agori are all fairly short and squat which would make sense in a world of higher gravity. Then we have beings like Toa who are larger and stronger heroes anyway, perhaps this is why they get so much taller when they transform from Matoran into Toa?! Then they shrink again when they turn into Turaga, losing their squatness in the process now I come to think of it. Perhaps they retain some of their previous Toa Energy even after the transformation which allows them to exsist in the stronger gravity even without the physical bulk of most Matoran we see?

 

Most of the Rahi don't pose any issues as they all have various ways of dealing with stronger gravity. Some are tracked like the manas and Muaka which would give them a larger footprint which would help. Other creatures like Nui Jaga have many legs to support relatively small bodies. And of course none of them are what we would consider to be strictly organic so it isn't as if they have 'bones' to break as we would normally consider for a real life equivalent. I've always considered most Bionicle pieces to have exo-skeletons with living muscle inside them, that would provide significantly more strength (and power) than any earth creatures I can think of. Consider crustaceans living in deep water for a vague comparison... The Glatorian evolved naturally on Spherus Magna so it's understandable that they would be inherently strong enough to handle the gravity of their home planet. If gravity was stronger on earth, all species indigenous to the planet would also be stronger to compensate for it (consider DBZ's Gravity Machine) 

 

So moving on from gravity... I can't remember what else was currently being actively discussed actually...

 

I know Bonesii commented on the irregular shape of the Aqua Magna shard I drew as it's usually depicted as round (he's going to hate what's coming next ) First up, a scientific explanation for why I drew it the way I did, though one should bear in mind that the entire purpose of said doodle was to illustrate 'how' a certain scenario could exist so let's treat it as comic book science

 

In a normal situation, a planetoid that consisted of as much water as Aqua Magna would almost certainly take on a spherical form as Bones suggests. Of course that would essentially destroy the shard theory as either the ocean would be too deep for the Mata Nui island to exist, or the curvature would need to be made too extreme to allow for it. But anyway there is a reason for my ignoring the usual effects of a central gravitation al force acting on all the water equally. I'm treating the shard(s) as having only travelled a relatively short distance from Bara Magna itself as if they went too far they would escape it's orbit and fly away. I also treat them as being locked in a geostationary orbit as otherwise it would be impossible for Mata Nui to relocate them as easily as he does (as it would require them to orbit the planet for thousands of miles and possibly be re-aligned before repairing the planet!)

 

If these conditions are assumed to be true then the gravity of Bara Magna would still be acting strongly on the shards in order to keep them in obrbit. This would mean the waters of the Aqua Magna shard are actually being affected by TWO separate gravitational fields which would prevent it from ever obtaining a spherical shape. Consider how the moon (being as it is very small in comparison to the earth) is able to affect earth's oceans so drastically that we have tides. In fact the water on our own planet is also not spherical as tides are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon essentially lifting up the oceans below it as it travels in orbit. So now imagine that our moon is locked in a geo-synchronous orbit, directly above the gulf of mexico (for example). This area would experience constantly high tides while the other side of the world would receive forever low tides.

 

Now imagine that Earth is the size of the Aqua Magna shard. And also imagine that the moon is the size of Bara Magna... The gravitational pull of the larger planet would be extremely significant and therefore would undeniably cause a high point in the oceans on the underside of the shard. My illustration is still far from accurate as I haven't calculated precisely how the two fields would effect this body of water but rather manipulated the water in a way to suit my hypothesis. I do believe however that real life science + Bionicle science + comic book science is probably enough to allow my Aqua Magna Shard to be 'believable' in the incredibly unbelievable Bionicle Universe

 

I should probably also mention that I've included a THIRD gravitational field in this depiction based on above observations. Consider that I said 'all of the BU probably experiences the same gravitational forces'? Well that can't be true on Aqua (or Bota) Magna as they are both of such miniscule proportions compared to Spherus Magna. It is, in my opinion, outside the realms of suspension of disbelief that AM can therefore be experiencing the level of gravity that we see on the Island of Mata Nui. Instead, the island's gravity is equal to the MU gravity which in turn is equal to the SM gravity. I would suggest then that the artificial gravity produced by the GSR also extends upwards from the robot to affect the camouflage islands it creates.

 

This would also explain why he landed on his back (essentially keeping the MU 'flat' to the planet he arrived on) even though he crashed. It must be hard wired into the programming as landing on his side or front would mean he couldn't produce suitable camouflage (speculation) and noone could leave the MU because gravity would be wonky. I know noone usually needs to leave but if the Toa were needed (as they were) and the GSR hadn't switched on external gravity just think what could have happened! So for these reasons (and probably more!) I'd suggest that the GSR also produces an external gravity field in a direction that is towards it's back, therefore in synchronisation with the internal MU gravity when camouflaged on a planet. This goes some way to explaining why the water on 'top' of the shard is being pulled 'flat' more than one would expect in the dual gravitational field theory. A third source of gravity works wonders for the Aqua Magna shard though!

 

 

 

 

Moving on! I've been meaning to expand the shard image to see if I could determine planet size based on what I already have (which I'm pretty happy with but of course is TOTAL speculation!) So in case anyone else is curious as I am here's what I figured out. Bonesii, sorry man but Bota Magna is currently just another ugly shard, not sure how to make that look like a planetoid as it has no water! Frankly, ALL the official images of the three planets are impossible. It wasn't a shattering so much as an expulsion of two other planets from a bigger daddy planet. Both AM and BM seem to be fully formed spherical planetoids with the latter having dense jungle growth on all sides. That just isn't possible, certainly not in 100,000 years. Maybe 100 million but I'm straying from the point... 

 

It's possible to argue that the BM shard was heavily reformed after being expelled from the planet but the issue then becomes how did it return to place so smoothly and magically fill the exact same hole it came from? Also consider that in official media, the planetoids are GIGANTIC! The BM one seems to be about 1/4 of the mass of the entire planet in some images which is just obsurd, especially when it's depicted as a spherical object leaving a spherical hole. The edges of the hole it makes are far from pretty too so just NONE of the official images work at all in analysing the shattering/reforming and I think that will remain a fact no matter what your opinions are on anything. 

 

Anywya, enough of analysing pictures, I'll find time for that in a more appropriate thread as this is probably not the best place for it. I will use it however to put forward a few speculatory sizes if it pleases the court...

 

So here in it's rawest form is just ONE interpretation of the Spherus Magna trinity of planets. Bear in mind there is NOTHING here that can be confirmed and plenty of ways to argue against it (primarily size and shape of the planetoids but also EVERY aspect of scaling which is based on a hypothetical scaling of the GSR!) But I did it anyway so now I'm going to put some numbers on it First up, here is the pic, please don't hate it too much

 

 

So we have sizes for AM, BM and SM based on hypothetical scaling of the GSR (and everything else!) Here are the approximate sizes of each planet based on each possible robot size...

 

First up, Greg's 40million foot robot. Measurements in km (because you don't measure planets in feet unless you want to write a LOT of zeroes!)

GSR                            12,192km

Aqua Magna               36,576km

Bota Magna                97,536km

Spherus Magna        719,328km

 

Now with the Faber figure.

GSR                             3,300km

Aqua Magna                9,900km

Bota Magna               26,400km

Spherus Magna       194,700km

 

Quite a difference there but of course it's all subjective so can be completely discounted... I still like it as a theory though and the scaling doesn't seem too ridiculous. It technically works with both figures along with the official images that show Bota Magna as larger than Aqua Magna by about double. It doesn't come anywhere close to the kind of scaling shown in official artwork as far as planetoids:planet ratios go but I don't think that's a bad thing as any shattering that caused that much damage would literally destroy the entire planet (it's not even a question of comic book science ) Of course the shards could be scaled separately to the GSR so it would be easy to produce a version where that ratio IS maintained without the overall size of Spherus Magna changing and instead just re-scaling the planetoids. 

 

Another thing to point out in the above image is something I mentioned before. The oceans... The white line in the water marks a possible water level for the planet after the Shattering. Imagine all of the liquid directly on top the AM shard being rocketed into space with it and soon after forming the encapsulating ocean (thrice effected by gravity ) A lot more water would be either lost to space or distributed across the planet where it would be quickly absorbed into an increasingly dry and barren landscape. The remainder of the huge oceans would recede into the new hole created by the departure of the AM shard creating a far shallower ocean than previously existed. Essentially the planet's water table would be dramatically affected and even the deepest wells would run dry very soon. The fact remains that a significant ocean still exists but it would be easy to miss it in most of the official media.

 

Another alternative, which would leave an entirely dry planet, is that the planet has a honeycombed come (as I believe Bonesii suggested at some point?) which would not only cause the remainder of the oceans to drain away (imagine the AM shard being the cork to a planetsized flask!) but also go some way to explain why the gravity isn't unimaginably strong without relying so heavily on comic book physics! Anyway, we know there is a whole bunch of EP down there so there MUST be some hollow parts towards the core anyway and they can't be too deep or noone would ever have found them... So that's a good way to end up with a completely dry planet, and also it would allow for much more expansive oceans than my current doodle which is essentially a large primary basin and then a bunch of increasingly shallow seas surrounding it.

 

Anyways, that's enough for me. Got work to do and now my whole morning has gone Good job keeping the debate clean and family friendly folks. If we're not careful this may turn into a serious discussion

 

EDIT : I think the shards need to be markedly bigger now I see them again with fresh eyes. I don't dislike the size of the GSR compared to Spherus Magna but the shards seem too small. I can't imagine why the Shattering would create two such tiny parts of the crust to be ejectd yet no other damage. I'll probably mock up another version with larger planetoids at a later date, perhaps it'll make Bota Magna look more round?! The only issue I can see with enlarging Aqua Magna is that it will begin to need an impossibly deep ocean (on SM) to be able to carry enough water with it to form an ocean of it's own in space...

Edited May 6, 2015 by Munty

[Thormen]

That's another nice doodle, but I'm glad you said you're going to size Spherus Magna down. Not so much because of gravity issues or whatnot, but mainly because when I look at the doodle I ask myself: "Really, what were the Great Beings worried about?" When I first heard of the Shattering, I imagined a planet splitting into a number of similarly sized shards, which would be a pretty big catastrophe if you happened to live on said planet. That in turn makes the rationale for the Great Beings to try and reverse the Shattering a reasonable one. But based on the measurements of this doodle Spherus Magna apparently only loses a small part of its surface area: the surface area of Spherus Magna should be 4 x pi x (59 x GSR) ^ 2 = 13 924 x pi x GSR ^ 2 , and that of the discs it loses to Aqua Magna and Bota Magna respectively should be pi x (3 x GSR) ^ 2 = 9 x pi x GSR ^ 2 and pi x (8 x GSR) ^ 2 = 64 x pi x GSR ^ 2 , which add to 9 x pi x GSR ^ 2 + 64 x pi x GSR ^ 2 = 73 x pi x GSR ^ 2 . That makes the surface area Spherus Magna loses 73 / 13 924 = 1 / 190.74 = 0.53% , meaning the surface of Bara Magna constitutes almost 99.5% of the surface of Spherus Magna. Of course you mention how the surface would quickly dry up, which would be a significant environmental catastrophe, but if that was the main issue the Great Beings were worried about they could've just created a giant pumping mechanism and water reservoir to drain the Great Ocean, which would solve the problem immediately and be a lot less difficult than building a giant robot.

 

As for the depth of the Great Ocean on Spherus Magna: I personally would be OK with having an ocean depth of up to a quarter of the planet's diameter, which would allow for a significantly smaller size of the planet. It's on one of the poles, so I don't think we need to worry that much about the planet trying to achieve a spherical shape there, and even though it's a lot deeper than the Mariana Trench I think that shouldn't be a problem for BIONICLE.

[The 1st Shadow]

To go with what Thormen said, it would have helped if MN/Teridax were able to see what they were doing when restoring it (also, BM was the in the northern part of the planet, and AM is right where it should be ). So, making the planet significantly smaller (2/3 the size? 1/2?) would be just fine, and leaving the fragments as they are would be far more accurate. Otherwise, I like your direction here. 

[Munty]

Will have another go later with a rescaling. Are there any actual maps or pictures of the surface of BM/SM at any point that might help? Or are they all as contradictory sa the rest of the stuff we have here? Would be a great help to see where the oceans are and where the shards came from as both of you have given locations of something or other. How do we know BM was from the north? And how do we know the sea was at the pole? Any images or further info would be greatly appreciated. I can try and work it in if it seems like good canon! Also what's the opinion on the scale of the robot compared to the planet? If I change the size of the shard then everything else becomes changeable too. Could make the GSR larger or smaller at will but I think it doens't seem too unbelievable as it is. Still ridiculously huge but not planet breakingly so... IMO anyway

[Rahkshi Lalonde]

 We had to stretch concepts from the start: biomechanical beings on a tropical island, elemental powers, Kanohi masks... and I'd argue those 'stretched' concepts actually did BIONICLE more good than harm

 

I wouldn't call those stretching concepts, since they don't fundamentally rearrange base physics or break suspension of disbelief at a core level. and, they all relate, mostly, to the in-world magics that are super easy to understand without really really really long equations and diagrams. :t

[The 1st Shadow]

How do we know BM was from the north? And how do we know the sea was at the pole?

Because it included the Northern Frost, which was confirmed to be near the north pole of Spherus Magna.

 

Aqua Magna was on the side, more or less. Who said anything about it being near the pole?

 

Anyway, we have no depictions, but check any of the narratives that dealt with those locations--that should give you a rough idea.

Edited May 6, 2015 by The~1st~Shadow

[Munty]

You said that Bota Magna was in the northern part of the planet and that Aqua Magna is fin where it is. I guess I should really read the books in order to get this right but I think I'll just do what I can and have people advise me on the necessary corrections later on Is the Northern Frost just frozen water then (like our North Pole) or does it have a landmass under it (like our south pole) Think I'll do some Bs01 surfing and see if there are any useful Spherus Magna locations listed there

[The 1st Shadow]

You said that Bota Magna was in the northern part of the planet and that Aqua Magna is fin where it is. I guess I should really read the books in order to get this right but I think I'll just do what I can and have people advise me on the necessary corrections later on Is the Northern Frost just frozen water then (like our North Pole) or does it have a landmass under it (like our south pole) Think I'll do some Bs01 surfing and see if there are any useful Spherus Magna locations listed there

Landmass. There's just the one ocean on the planet. There could very well be water up there, but it's not that big. Think of Alaska or something like that.

[Munty]

Alaska? Something the size of Alaska on a planet as huge as Spherus Magna might as well not exist at all Will figure it out anyway, just been fiddling with some other stuff for now...

 

Was going to work on another image of the shattered planet but ended up with something a bit different so thought I'd put that up here instead for now and see what is thunk of it before doing anything else. 

 

This is essentially a cross section of the interior of Spherus Magna pre shattering. I actually put the image together largely ad-hoc to try and illustrate how a honeycombed core might work but ended up with what I think could be a plausible cutaway of the entire planet. 

 

First here's how things work in real life on earth...

We have a solid iron core, around that we have a layer of molten iron, around that we have the mantle, and finally we have the thin crust.

 

I think this seems to fit rather well into the image below by some coincidence. We can imagine Spherus Magna to have a solid protodermis core, surrounded by molten (energised) protodermis. Surrounding this is the rocky mantle of the planet which contains huge honeycombed structures which themselves contain more EP. The outer mantle is simply solid rock but probably contains a whole bunch of honeycombing itself as well. We can probably think of this outer mantle as the 'volcanic' region where EP from the core is trying to force it's way to the surface, especially when exacerbated by mining! Finally, here is said image to help make sense of all those words...

 

 

With this cross section we can easily imagine how huge chunks of the crust would be blown away due to protodermis in certain areas building up to critical levels within the cavernous inner mantle. This interpretation would also provide a much thinner solid outer crust than we would otherwise experience. So in essence it would be more like trying to find a weakness in the outside of a shell than remove an entire slice from a solid ball. 

 

An added bonus of this composition is that we can remove far larger chunks of the planet in the shattering. The inner and outer mantle can both be removed in the shattering meaning the planetoids can be anywhere up to 1/4 of the diameter of Spherus Magna which is much closer to what we see in the official images. Not looked into ocean depths as that will still be an issue for sizing the Aqua Magna shard but that is the smaller of the two planetoids so it could work out fine. Perhaps Bota Magna should be 1/4 of SM's diameter and Aqua Magna could then be just 1/8th? They're pretty much numbers I just pulled out of thin air but so was 40million feet and that seems to have stuck

 

Any thoughts, please let me know. I'm also aware this is very close to off-topic and I almost made a new one for this post and image but decided it's still relevant as a visual aid for the scaling of the GSR in comparison to not only Spherus Magna and the planetoids but also to Earth (something far easier for us to relate to because it's real and we live there ) I included two rough representations of our blue planet based on both Greg's size for the GSR (where it is the same size as earth) and Christian's size (where Earth is roughly 4 times larger than the GSR) Personally, I think CF's Earth looks far more reasonable as we still end up with an undeniably gigantic robot but Spherus Magna becomes far more believable too. I think really it's the difference between Earth looking like a moon next to SM or simply like a meteor! 

 

Feedback welcome, criticism too but again remember this is all conceptual. I like the 1:59 scaling of the robot to the planet personally but it could easily be changed. The point is, we have no figures at all to use in determining the size of SM or it's planetoids/shards so this one is in essence up to us. I think it would be pretty cool to fanonise a number for this at some point but first we need to determine what size we want to use for the robot...

[The 1st Shadow]

Alaska? Something the size of Alaska on a planet as huge as Spherus Magna might as well not exist at all Will figure it out anyway, just been fiddling with some other stuff for now...

 

Uh, what? I wasn't talking about the size. You asked if it was over water, and I said "think of Alaska." Alaska is frozen tundra (or, land, if you prefer). Yes, the Northern Frost would be far larger than Alaska, the rest of Bota Magna even more so. I was talking conceptually, answering the question you asked. Nowhere did I say it was the SIZE you should work with.

[Munty]

 

You said that Bota Magna was in the northern part of the planet and that Aqua Magna is fin where it is. I guess I should really read the books in order to get this right but I think I'll just do what I can and have people advise me on the necessary corrections later on Is the Northern Frost just frozen water then (like our North Pole) or does it have a landmass under it (like our south pole) Think I'll do some Bs01 surfing and see if there are any useful Spherus Magna locations listed there

Landmass. There's just the one ocean on the planet. There could very well be water up there, but it's not that big. Think of Alaska or something like that.

 

 

Apologies, I seem to have misinterpreted that bit of your post

[Rahkshi Lalonde]

hm, mildly off topic, but still on topic of general problems with bionicle, but,

 

isn't SM kinda... big? to have only one ocean? (unless the one ocean covered most of it's mass anyway.)

[The Hip Historian Iaredios]

As many problems as "All Our Sins Remembered" had, I feel one of the big things it got right was the depiction of The Shattering. It was much more believable, felt more catastrophic, and didn't annoy me as much as the depiction of The Shattering as was portrayed in "The Mata Nui Saga". Holy Crapoleon & Suffer in Succotash, that annoyed me to no McFrakfillian end!!  This is admittedly evident in my Rude Awakening project, where I have the former pieces of Spherus Magna being quite large, continent-level in size; rather then being the size-equivalent two colorful France-size dung flings being shot/pooped out of the sides of the big ball of dune-ridden poop.

Edited May 8, 2015 by Iaredios Paerkenon

[Munty]

Is that THIS representation by any chance?

 

I'd never even thought to consider the shattering in such an extreme way but it certainly does seem like a more significant catastrophe! How about if something more or less between the two was what actually happened? Bara Magna doesn't seem to move from it's orbit (assuming it has one?) so there's a limit to how extreme the event can be. The two smaller chunks were also held in place above Bara Magna by the largest chunks gravity so they must be markedly smaller. I agree however that all the images that show the shattering as just popping two tiny balls out of a huge one are completely superfluous and easily disregarded. 

 

That said, the above image can also be ignored as it's essentially showing total destruction of the planet from the very core. All three chunks would drift off through space in such a cataclysm, not to mention resulting in the inevitable death of anyone unfortunate enough to be on the surface at the time. It also suggests that the entire core of Spherus Magna was destroyed and all three shards are of roughly equal size. None of these suggestions will fly with what we already know. It's also been pointed out however that the other more commonly accepted canon portrayal doesn't make sense either. If SM only lost such a tiny percentage of it's total surface, why the big drama? There's no way all of the planet's water was located in that one spot, it would make 90% of the planet uninhabitable (assuming water is necessary for life in the Bionicle universe??)

 

So none of the official artwork we have of the shattering really makes sense. It just doesn't work with the rest of the story. I'd suggest something more in the middle. Instead of having lumps blown 'off' the planet I think it's more reasonable to go with chunks blown 'out' of it as in above picture. This gives us significantly larger shards/planetoids and will have huge repercussions for the planet. It becomes feasible for the planet to have lost the majority of it's water if the AM shard constitutes a significantly larger portion of it's surface area and Bota Magna would be twice as large so it's now conceivable that it removed the majority of the planets vegetation. Bara Magna woulkd have to be left around 50% intact in my opinion, it must at least still have the solid core intact as that would be what affects the decision of which part to repair and we know from well established facts that BM is the largest body of the three.

 

I really like the above image, it provides a much more volatile shattering and I think that's what we need as so far it all looks pretty tame. And let's not forget, the larger these shards get, the easier it will be to allow for the shots of Aqua Magna we see in the robot rising clip. Regardless of the robot size, that particular clip is all about perspective after all! I have work to do now but I think I'm going to start a new topic later to try and separate conversations about the planets from those about the robot. I'm not comfortable walking such a thin line between on-topic and off so I think it's best that way. While each discussion will contain relevant information to the other we can always cross-quote or link to such posts. 

 

In the meantime, this topic was meant to be about sizing the GSR. Everyone seems to be leaning more and more towards scaling it down to Christian Faber's 3,300km as we turn up more and more information in favour of this. We're currently at 34:56 in the voting but I think we need at least a 2:1 ratio to make any fanon decision on something so huge. Perhaps we should start a new topic asking a more specific question with just the options 'Faber's size', 'Farshtey's size', 'don't know/care' as options. We can try to include all the most important points to consider (for both sides of the debate) in the first post so people can read up on what we've been discussing before casting a vote. Seems like it may be worth a shot... I think it would be best if someone neutral or anti-resizing creates the post and poll though so the minority get's every possible chance to argue their corner. I know we had a rocky start and I believe his opinion may be shifting slightly now but maybe Bonesii might be a good candidate for this? What say you Bones?! Anyone still reading this topic, let us know what you reckon. I think we've progressed as far as we can now without taking a moment to get reorganised and starting fresh personally.

[Kopekemaster]

**stumbles into something much deeper than he had initially envisioned**

 

Anyway, I said smaller. I typically imagine it as something absurdly massive, still, but not quite so ludicrously massive.

[Thormen]

I wouldn't call those stretching concepts, since they don't fundamentally rearrange base physics or break suspension of disbelief at a core level. and, they all relate, mostly, to the in-world magics that are super easy to understand without really really really long equations and diagrams. :t

Elemental powers don't fundamentally rearrange base physics??? o_O Have you ever met a person or seen a machine that could create, absorb and control earth? How about a mask capable of creating a shield that cannot be penetrated by anything unless it's an ambush?

 

What breaks our suspension of disbelief is subjective, in fact I think many people would have their suspension of disbelief broken as soon as they saw biomechanical beings on a tropical island living like pre-modern humans.

 

I would like to respond further to your post, but it's not clear to me what you were originally responding to so I can't place what you said in context. If you're simply arguing why you don't like 40 million feet / 12 000 km, no argument there: I also would have preferred a different number, but what's done is done. If you mean you disagree with the stuff I said about gravity: I was just naming a couple of possible explanations for how it might work, not saying it absolutely has to be that way, just saying that people shouldn't worry about that stuff being impossible. Alternatively you can invoke "in-world magics" there as well, of course.

 

Aqua Magna was on the side, more or less. Who said anything about it being near the pole?

 

That would be me I was basing that on a discussion I had with Bones a while back where he said the Great Ocean was on the south pole of Spherus Magna and I thought he provided a source for that, but after rereading the topic it seems he didn't. In any case, BS01 gives us the 'compromise' of AM being in the southwest.

 

AM being on the south pole however would be very helpful because of what Munty just said about the shards being knocked out of orbit. Spherus Magna orbits the star Solis Magna and so did Bara Magna after the Shattering. Both the Shattering and the Reformation however have to have been extremely powerful events that would have knocked the planet out of orbit, unless the forces on the planet were equal and opposite to each other, i.e. if AM and Bota Magna were launched from exactly opposite points of the planet with the same force. Admittedly this still gives us problems with envisioning how both shards were pulled into orbit around the planet, but that's a (so far undiscussed, as far as I know) problem we have anyway.

 

We can imagine Spherus Magna to have a solid protodermis core, surrounded by molten (energised) protodermis. Surrounding this is the rocky mantle of the planet which contains huge honeycombed structures which themselves contain more EP. The outer mantle is simply solid rock but probably contains a whole bunch of honeycombing itself as well. We can probably think of this outer mantle as the 'volcanic' region where EP from the core is trying to force it's way to the surface, especially when exacerbated by mining!

Actually the planet can't be made of Protodermis, since Protodermis is a synthetic material made by the Great Beings to emulate some properties of Energized Protodermis. I would say the inner part of the planet is made of metals (or possibly non-metals) that are less dense than iron.

 

A lot of honeycombing neatly accounts for the EP being down there, but I don't see how these honeycombs could have survived the Shattering and the Reformation. The Shattering must have been powerful enough to break the material the honeycombs are made of, so it would seem to me the honeycombs would be crushed as if you were to smash your fist on a piece of toast. Then we would be left with just pieces of the outer shell and the core, which would make the Reformation impossible. I also think it doesn't solve the original problem (the fact that we don't want Spherus Magna to be that heavy) if the honeycombs are mostly filled with EP: EP also has its own density.

[fishers64]

I could make said poll (anti-shrink hand raise) but not sure what it would accomplish beyond what this poll has done.

 

Aside from nailing down how many of the "smaller size" people prefer Faber's size, that is.

Edited May 7, 2015 by fishers64

[The 1st Shadow]

 

Aqua Magna was on the side, more or less. Who said anything about it being near the pole?

 

That would be me I was basing that on a discussion I had with Bones a while back where he said the Great Ocean was on the south pole of Spherus Magna and I thought he provided a source for that, but after rereading the topic it seems he didn't. In any case, BS01 gives us the 'compromise' of AM being in the southwest.

 

AM being on the south pole however would be very helpful because of what Munty just said about the shards being knocked out of orbit. Spherus Magna orbits the star Solis Magna and so did Bara Magna after the Shattering. Both the Shattering and the Reformation however have to have been extremely powerful events that would have knocked the planet out of orbit, unless the forces on the planet were equal and opposite to each other, i.e. if AM and Bota Magna were launched from exactly opposite points of the planet with the same force. Admittedly this still gives us problems with envisioning how both shards were pulled into orbit around the planet, but that's a (so far undiscussed, as far as I know) problem we have anyway.

You're assuming the smaller shards actually were SHOT out of Bara Magna. We're never told exactly what happened. It could very well have been done in a less explosive manner. Stress fractures form due to the tapping of the EP-->sections of the planet begin to weaken and separate-->after a time and more tapping of the EP, the largest chunks get slowly pulled out of orbit by the planet's movement through space, having nothing to anchor them down--> No explosion.

[fishers64]

What I remember is that the Fire Tribe was trying to tap the power of the Energized Protodermis - hooking power lines to it, which would result in a explosion. I remembered this post.
 
I can't find the Greg Answer that convinced me afterward just yet. This was a BS01 quote: 
 

http://biosector01.com/wiki/index.php/File:AOSR_Energized_Protodermis_Testing.png <there's the testing image, bones...
 

 

i always thought the fire guys lit it on fire to see what happend then BOOM!

 
That is, in all likelihood, exactly what didn't happen... but it's a hilarious mental image.
 
Anyway, yes, BS01 has a page, but the graphic novel never detailed the scientific processes the GBs used. As we all know, while Greg appreciated science, he never purported to have any idea of how it works.

 

Actually, at the risk of answering my own question (do I do that? never ) I have evidence that they did: 
 

Energized Protodermis is also explosive, something Vakama took advantage of to render Sentrakh unconscious during the Battle for the Kanohi Vahi.

 
 Shattering = Explosion.  
 

The Fire Tribe, in an effort to claim the power of the Energized Protodermis, managed to break into the Ice Tribe's well, and began siphoning off the substance from its spring. A chain reaction began in the core of the planet and eventually it caused the planet to shatter into three pieces.

Clear as mud.
 
But based on these two facts, I thought they tried to burn it, and use that to run a steam turbine or something. But if that's the case, why would the Great Beings put both EP and Toa of Fire in the same universe, given that a careless Toa of Fire could blow the entire universe apart? 
 
Also, not clear why that one experiment would tell them that the stuff would blow, or why SM people would think burning it would be a good idea. 
 
EP can also be used to stabilize power sources for huge things like giant robots, but that doesn't cause explosions, as far as we know.

 

[bonesiii]

T1, it was confirmed to be an explosion. The poles thing is as far as I know still only theoretical but it makes sense with basic physics -- equal and opposite reactions. If they go out both poles at once, Bara Magna isn't knocked out of orbit. Every other arrangement has that problem (well, aside from the equivalent of poles, like maybe magnetic poles instead of orbital poles). It also seems to make more sense why those two spots were chosen; rotational stress fractures might make the poles the two spots most likely to give way when explosive internal pressure starts.

 

(And the best art showed it as a polar thing. Not proof, but enough to put it on the table.)

[The 1st Shadow]

T1, it was confirmed to be an explosion. The poles thing is as far as I know still only theoretical but it makes sense with basic physics -- equal and opposite reactions. If they go out both poles at once, Bara Magna isn't knocked out of orbit. Every other arrangement has that problem (well, aside from the equivalent of poles, like maybe magnetic poles instead of orbital poles). It also seems to make more sense why those two spots were chosen; rotational stress fractures might make the poles the two spots most likely to give way when explosive internal pressure starts.

 

(And the best art showed it as a polar thing. Not proof, but enough to put it on the table.)

Exploded, yes. But was it enough to repel the smaller planetoids? The explosion could have knocked them loose, and then they floated out during orbit. "Exploded" doesn't have to mean "Alderaan getting blown to bits by the Death Star"--It could just as easily mean "Michael Bay blowing up a building." Both of those are explosions, but of different magnitudes.

[bonesiii]

I don't know what you mean. What exactly are you asking? Because we know they didn't fall back onto the planet, and also got locked into orbit. Whatever the sizes of the bodies involved and their gravity, we know they got that balance right. But we don't know the sizes so anything more specific than that is speculative.

[The 1st Shadow]

I don't know what you mean. What exactly are you asking? Because we know they didn't fall back onto the planet, and also got locked into orbit. Whatever the sizes of the bodies involved and their gravity, we know they got that balance right. But we don't know the sizes so anything more specific than that is speculative.

You're saying an explosion shot the planets out of Spherus/Bara Magna, and that the force of both explosions would counteract each other and keep the main body from going out of its normal orbit.

 

I'm saying that the explosions caused by the EP didn't have to be as big as you're suggesting. The explosions could have been small enough that it wouldn't disrupt the normal orbit of Bara Magna, while the two smaller pieces were knocked loose just enough that they fell aside and followed their larger counterpart around Solis Magna.

[bonesiii]

But that again is a subjective answer we can only define with exact math. ANY imbalance disrupts Bara Magna's orbit a little according to Newtonian physics. The question is just how much. (So if you say "doesn't disrupt" you actually mean disrupts a small enough amount to not be noticeable.)

[The 1st Shadow]

 (So if you say "doesn't disrupt" you actually mean disrupts a small enough amount to not be noticeable.)

Correct. Glad you're up to speed.

[Thormen]

You guys are correct in concluding that there could have been a force on Bara Magna that was too small to be noticeable (and in concluding that 'noticeable' is also subjective), but one thing you shouldn't forget is that this directly depends on the mass ratio between Bara Magna and the two moons, and therefore also the size ratio. If the Shattering would have split Spherus Magna in two equal halves (let's call them Bara Magna and Bota Magna) then the force that acts upon Bara Magna should be equal and opposite to the force that acts upon Bota Magna, and the force that acts upon Bota Magna should be so great that it can move Bota Magna such a distance that it can be locked into orbit. And since the mass of Bara Magna is equal to the mass of Bota Magna, the same goes for Bara Magna (which means the two halves will most likely start orbiting each other, assuming there's a force that pulls them into orbit). If the mass of Bara Magna is twice the mass of Bota Magna, then Bara Magna gets knocked away with half the velocity Bota Magna gets knocked away with, if Bara Magna is three times the mass of Bota Magna, it gets knocked away with a third of the velocity. If you want to diminish the velocity Bara Magna gets knocked out of orbit with to such a degree that it's not noticeable anymore even though Bota Magna's velocity is still significant, then you're going to have to make Bota Magna's mass 'not noticeable' in comparison to Bara Magna's mass. The same goes for Aqua Magna, although admittedly the problem becomes smaller when you have two forces (one for Bota Magna and one for Aqua Magna) with a wide angle between them due to vector math. However, we're still left with such a large mass ratio that it makes me wonder again "Really, what were the Great Beings worried about?": if Bota Magna and Aqua Magna are not a sizeable part of Spherus Magna, the Shattering wouldn't be a big deal.

 

What I just realized though is that we haven't considered the possibility that Spherus/Bara Magna was actually knocked out of orbit during the Shattering: maybe the Shattering knocked the planet into a different direction so that it escaped from orbit, but then ended up being caught in a different orbit around Solis Magna? That in itself would also be catastrophic (desertification?) and doesn't require the two moons to come from poles of Spherus Magna. What do you think?

[bonesiii]

I think the canon seems intended to imply the desertification had to do with the ocean going away, so messing up the water cycle there (and leaving two giant craters that water could fall down more easily, making what water did rain for a while quickly inaccessible).

 

Also, about the sizes, if AM is to be big enough to accomodate the giant, yet SM small enough to not have completely crushing gravity, it seems like the sizes have to be more similar than different. So yeah, imbalance is an issue. While it could still work out, the polar theory avoids the issue, makes sense of why those two lands broke, and matches the best art -- what's not to like?

Edited May 8, 2015 by bonesiii

[Munty]

I think there's only one thing I can suggest which doesn't seem to have already been mentioned here...

 

Following on from Thormen's theory that the 'explosion' may be less violent than is initially suggested, what reason do we have to believe the force that caused the shattering originated in the core of the planet? I stand by my earlier suggestion that the core of Spherus Magna could well be solid EP (not solid protodermis as was pointed out is actually a synthetic GB reproduction of natural EP) as we have no reason to believe this material cannot exist in non-liquid states. That would mean an eplosion in the core of the planet would not be simply destructive but catastrophic. Any explosion that can punch through the core of a planet will most likely destroy it completely...

 

Now here's an idea I think is interesting and has some merit. We know there was already Energised Protodermis inside SM but it never caused any issues until the inhabitants started to mess with it. I would suggest then that EP has some latent expansionary qualities which were tapped when the Agori began mining/tapping it. Consider the planet to be a bowl full of soda and the Agori to be dropping in mentos by the bucket load... It would be like dropping nuclear bombs in a dormant volcano. Sooner or later, things are going to go wonky!

 

Now imagine that the destruction of the planet was caused by excessive mining by the Agori which caused such a huge increase in the volume of EP within SM that it essentially began to 'hatch' from the planet, peeling back two parts of the crust like an eggshell. First we see huge earthquakes and ravines opening up all over the place until eventually something gives way and the Aqua and Bota Magna shards are ripped completely free from the rest of the planet and ejected into space.

 

We know Aqua Magna has to move pretty fast in order to take the ocean with it (there will be a certain altitude at which the gravity of AM is able to retain the water as the pull of Bara Magna weakens with distance) For this reason, it must be expelled reasonably quickly but not necessarily as lightlning fast as we always assume... It would also lose a lot of it's speed relatively quickly as it loses momentum due to BM's gravity trying to pull it back down. Eventually it reaches perfect equilibrium and loses all momentum soon after escaping the pull of Bara Magna but before escaping it's orbit. In this way it keeps it's water, stays in geostationary orbit and doesn't fall back towards BM.

 

The same can be said of Bota Magna but of course BM is bigger. If we assume they were both dislodged as part of the same cataclysm (ie. single 'explosion') then this can be argued by placing the origin closer to Bota Magna and further from Aqua Magna. The difference in size and mass of the two shards would mean that in this way they could conceivably experience the same proportional forces when being shot from the planet as there would be a larger force acting on BM's larger mass and a smaller one on AM.

 

If we assume a central 'explosion' however, Aqua Magna would be expelled at roughly twice the speed of Bota Magna and subsequently (being also half the mass) be lost to space forever

 

So we're definitely looking at one of two scenarios.

 

First possibility, the planet experienced a single explosion that was located closer to Bota Magna than Aqua Magna. I find this hard to explain as it makes no sense that Aqua agna would be shot away from the planet when the explosion was so far away (possibly on the other side of the planetary core no less!) This is especially strange when we consider the damage to the Bota Magna region. If there was so much extra energy in the explosion, why didn't it break off a larger chunk in this region? Or maybe dislodge other smaller pieces of crust on the same side of the planet (closest to the origin) Also consider that things tend to explode UP and OUT rather than DOWN and IN. Something of particular note if we consider EP to have expansionary properties which led to the catastrophe in the first place. It would be expanding UP towards the surface of the planet, into spaces in the rock. It couldn't expand down into an area already full of rock or EP, so it wouldn't explode into this area either. Shockwaves are deflected when they hit impermeable obstacles after all, even liquids do a good job of blocking their progress. I for one think it's easier to imagine the majority of the blast being deflected upwards towards Bota Magna than almost 1/3 of it travelling back down through the entire planet, through the core, out the other side and out to Aqua Magna...

 

Which leads to a second more easily acceptable possibility. The shattering wasn't one single grand explosion but many all over Spherus Magna. We see  images of the Core War that show us cracks and canyons in the planet's surface even before the shattering. I would suggest these are stress fractures from the localised build up of pressure in regions where the EP has been tapped. It's trying to find a way out and these cracks are where it's almost succeeding. Consider them to be volcanoes waiting to explode, but a huge network of them all fighting for freedom. The GB's knew this was a bad sign and so built the robot. Presumably they even foresaw that parts of the planet may be dislodged (otherwise why were the robots built with the ability to repair such damage?!) This would all suggest the shattering was a long time coming, long enough to build a giant robot or two at least! So a slow build up of pressure makes way more sense than a single catastrophic explosion.

 

So now what does the shattering look like? I'd suggest there was more build-up in more heavily populated parts of the planet because that's where there would be more mining. And if you lived on a planet like Spherus Magna, where would you build your major settlements? Perhaps near the ocean? Or near the jungle? Food, water. Good place for major populations I would suggest and therefore also a likely location for the mining... So here around the Aqua and Bota regions of Spherus Magna we start to see the 'gold rush' of the Bionicle Universe. The EP in the regions becomes increasingly agitated by the mining and pressure continues to build, causing stress fractures all over the planet, but most notably in these areas. Eventually the pressure becomes too much and the enitre Bota and Aqua regions are launched into space by the buildup. It's just like popping the cork on a bottle of champagne really, just a bit bigger...

 

Consider these eruptions to be separate events but culminating at similar times. I say similar because this would leave us with a little wiggle room regarding orbit issues. If Bota Magna pops and the planet is knocked slightly off course then fine, it happens. The planet then rotates to any point we want before Aqua Magna pops and in this way we can even place the regions in close proximity to each other while still allowing the second eruption to 'correct' any orbital hiccups that occured during the first one.

 

I also think we should probably stop treating these two shards as the only parts of the planet that were expelled as it seems unlikely and somewhat anticlimactic in the grand scheme of things. We always think of this one huge explosion that caused the planet to break into three chunks. I think we need to take a moment to consider the real life implications of such an occurrence. It seems to me, far more likely that the panet would be experiencing thousands of much smaller catastrophies than just one big one. Besides all the other issues cause by one gigantic explosion, everyone would quite simply be dead, and that doesn't happen... Far more believable is a series of worsening disasters all over the planet, culminating in the shattering and the formation of the Aqua and Bota Magna shards. Prior to this, there could still be many other similar eruptions in which smaller parts of the crust were displaced by similar, but smaller, instances of EP venting. Some of these could be island sized, others country sized and even others could be continent sized (given how large SM is by Earth standards some could even be considered planet sized and still be significantly smaller than the shards!) The point is, this damage could easily occur but not be all that noticable in the grand scheme of things. The smaller the shards, the smaller the eruption and therefore the smaller the force with which they are expelled. They would inevitably return to the planet without reaching anywhere near orbit, quite possibly the would barely even move but they would still be considered shards after this point as they have been physically disconnected from the remainder of the planet...

 

Spherus Magna could have experienced thousands, hundreds of thousands of these smaller eruptions, many of which would be in the massive stretches of uninhabited land but many more of which would have killed millions of the planet's inhabitants. That would fit well with the complete lack of population we see later on and why there are no significant structures of any kind remaining on the planet. ALL the most densely populated areas would have been the first to fall fou of EP venting due to them being the places where the mines are after all! This would also explain why the GB's built the prototype robot. It was intended to repair these relatively small shards and keep the planet from shattering entirely. Subsequently the eruptions grew more violent and the robot couldn't repair them. Perhaps the reason it exploded is because they were trying to use it for jobs it just couldn't handle? So then they built a much larger robot with the ability to move planet sized shards and also to act as an 'arc' in case the planet was lost. The matoran were not only intended to preserve the robot they were living inside but also to preserve the work of the GB (we don't know what exactly is in the archives after all!) 

 

In the end, the final shattering vented all of the remaining pressure that was built up inside the planet and with all mining ceased (because everyone was dead!) no more pressure build up occurred. So the planet wasn't destroyed, the GB's survived and they summoned the GSR to return once they were sure it was safe. 

 

This little post turned into something much bigger than I intended, I think I'm going to call it a theory though if noone minds feedback (particularly issues and discrepancies) welcome and encouraged.

 

TL:DR How to summarise such a huge post?

 

The shattering was NOT a single gigantic explosion. Energised Protodermis began building up pressure when the Magnan's started to mine/siphon it. This increasing pressure caused stress fractures and opened ravines all over the planet to try and vent. Venting began to shatter the crust and the GBs built the prototype robot to repair it. Venting worsens, prototype 'splodes. GBs build GSR to carry out repairs and act as an Arc if the planet can't be saved. Final shattering launches Bota Magna and Aqua Magna into orbit (not necessarily at the same time) and vents all remaining pressure. GB's summon GSR to return and fix planet but he crashes. Then Gen 1 sort of happens

[The 1st Shadow]

 

The shattering was NOT a single gigantic explosion. Energised Protodermis began building up pressure when the Magnan's started to mine/siphon it. This increasing pressure caused stress fractures and opened ravines all over the planet to try and vent. Venting began to shatter the crust and the GBs built the prototype robot to repair it. Venting worsens, prototype 'splodes. GBs build GSR to carry out repairs and act as an Arc if the planet can't be saved. Final shattering launches Bota Magna and Aqua Magna into orbit (not necessarily at the same time) and vents all remaining pressure. GB's summon GSR to return and fix planet but he crashes. Then Gen 1 sort of happens

This... This is basically what I was saying.

 

What I just realized though is that we haven't considered the possibility that Spherus/Bara Magna was actually knocked out of orbit during the Shattering: maybe the Shattering knocked the planet into a different direction so that it escaped from orbit, but then ended up being caught in a different orbit around Solis Magna? That in itself would also be catastrophic (desertification?) and doesn't require the two moons to come from poles of Spherus Magna. What do you think?

That is an intriguing idea, actually. Yes, losing the majority of its surface water to Aqua Magna would have caused Spherus/Bara Magna to have a screwy water cycle, but what if it actually got knocked just a little closer to Solis Magna? Increase the heat, make living conditions a bit worse, etc... That what you were thinking?

[Thormen]

Following on from Thormen's theory that the 'explosion' may be less violent than is initially suggested,

 

This... This is basically what I was saying.

Yeah credit for that actually doesn't go to me but to T1 I'm actually opposed to this idea since we either need a violent event with a large force to knock the heavy shards away into orbit, or we need light and tiny shards that can be knocked from the planet with less force (which defeats the point of the 'Shattering' to me).

 

I do very much like the idea that the 'explosion' (putting quotes because they could've simply been instances of Energized Protodermis expanding as Munty said) could've occurred outside the planet core and that there could have been multiple 'explosions'. It's a lot easy to trigger an 'explosion' closer to the crust if that's where you live, but what's more important IMO is that if the 'explosion'/s didn't occur in the core, then the resulting forces do not originate in the planet's center of gravity, which means the shards won't necessarily travel straight from the center of gravity. If they were to travel straight from the center of gravity, they actually wouldn't achieve orbit since they need a speed perpendicular to the direction of gravity to do so. So I was originally assuming that some event (smaller followup explosion?) had to have happened on both Aqua Magna and Bota Magna to force them into orbit around Bara Magna, but this works better IMO.

 

Whether it's an actual 'fiery' explosion or not, or whether it's multiple explosions is hard to argue IMO... We don't know enough of the properties of EP to determine that.

 

That is an intriguing idea, actually. Yes, losing the majority of its surface water to Aqua Magna would have caused Spherus/Bara Magna to have a screwy water cycle, but what if it actually got knocked just a little closer to Solis Magna? Increase the heat, make living conditions a bit worse, etc... That what you were thinking?

Yes, that's more or less what I meant. But as you and Bones pointed out we already have an explanation for the desertification, so it's mainly speculation...