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Inspiration questions for winds of light

TJPoldervaart

Minstrel
For a WIP of mine I'm currently in the worldbuilding phase, and I wondering if some of you would care to give some input/ inspiration. So:

In a world where winds of light cause extremely rapid plant growth, what are the first three (worldbuilding) questions that pop into your mind as a reader?

(I'm still working on the physical representation of these winds of light. For now, imaginge them as a wave of bright sparks in the air that moves over the land like a wind and lays down onto the flora. The further the wind goes and the more flora it has caused rapid growth in, the less energy it has left, until it eventually dies out)
 
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Eduardo Ficaria

Troubadour
Here are my three points regarding your settings:
  • Those winds are just made out of light or some sort of highly energetic (magical?) particles charged by photons/sunlight? Because if those winds were just light I would worry about the levels of radiation (as heat at least) in such a world...
  • Rapid growth implies rapid depletion of nutrients from the soil. Are you planning to compensate that somehow? Maybe this wind of light is not just ultraenergetic but really rich in nutrients? A real example of this would be the wind that carries the dust from the Sahara desert towards the Amazon region, feeding the soil of the rainforests there.
  • Winds depend on many things, like temperature, geography and other particularities. How and where that wind is created? Depending on this answer you might end having regions really overflowing with vegetation while others have much less in comparison the farther you go from the more privileged, so to speak, areas. You might need to study the wind dynamics on Earth, just for reference.
  • Yeah, a fourth one that I couldn't resist to add here. Regions blessed by such winds will become a reason of dispute and struggle among any neighbouring countries, tribes or whatever you have in your worldbuilding. Those areas should be perfect for growing crops, (unless that hypergrowth depletes the soil too much). This will give you a good reason for political strife and war!
 

Chasejxyz

Inkling
1: What the heck is a wind of light? Like is it EM waves in a tangible form? Some rock that gives off EM waves in the same range that the sun does?

2: How have the plants adapted to this? Are there "rain shadows" (areas where things like geography keep the winds of light from reaching most of the time), what do the plants there look like? Since our sun gives energy from the top down, plants have their solar collectors high up and pointing upwards, while the lower parts of the plants (stems/trunks) don't have those. What direction do the winds come from? Is it the same every time or does it change? How do the plants know this and adapt to it? Sunflowers move around to collect as much sun as possible as it goes across the sky. Do plants have little cups or channels to collect these little light grains?

3: How have other forms of life adapted to this? Reptiles sun themselves to increase their metabolism, countless species have lighter underbellies and darker tops so they're harder to see when prey animals look up, there's cyanobacteria, the heat of the day cause many mammals to rest during the hottest parts of the day in places like the savannah and desert. Does long-term exposure to the little light grains cause radiation (sun) burns? Then things that crawl around on the ground will need to adapt resistance to that. How big are they? Could colonial animals like ants or mole rats collect them and make little underground farms? What if they fall into the ocean, do they sink, do fish try to eat them? Or do they avoid them because it makes them easier to be seen by predators? Would there be a parasite that has bioluminescence to trick fish into thinking its a light grain so it can get inside a host? Are there times of year that have more or less winds? Do they correspond with breeding or feeding periods?
 

Devor

Fiery Keeper of the Hat
Moderator
I haven't read the other answers. But I would wonder:

1) Are the plants that come from this normal plants? Is this the only way plants come from? What happens ten years later, do they die out or continue to thrive, and why?

2) If I'm an animal and I look up in the sky and I see one of these light winds forming, I'm going to chase it, right? With predators and other animals presumably doing the same thing, how does that play out?

3) Can you form these things artificially? Control them? Capture them? Use them in any way?
 

pmmg

Myth Weaver
First three questions:

1) what causes the light to blow

2) can the light be felt like wind can?

3) what does it do to non-plants.
 

K.S. Crooks

Maester
Are plants the only things affected by the winds of light? Can the winds of light be used to sail, glide or surf? Can other things alter the direction of the winds of light? Are there plants that have adapted to better use or better deflect the winds of light?
 

SinghSong

Minstrel
Question mark- is this literal 'solid light', as most others seem to have assumed, or is this simply something with that visual effect, and those effects on the ecology of this world (i.e, "a wave of bright sparks in the air that moves over the land like a wind and lays down onto the flora. The further the wind goes and the more flora it has caused rapid growth in, the less energy it has left, until it eventually dies out")? Because it'd be relatively easy to get around the technicalities by simply having the "winds of light" be some sort of bioluminescent symbiotic airborne biofertilizing agent. Say, something akin to a cross between photobacterium (which cause 'waves of light' in oceanic environments IRL, and have symbiotic relationships with marine fish and squid, whereby they're provided with nutrients and oxygen for reproduction, in return for providing bioluminescence to their hosts, which can aid in sex-specific signaling, predator avoidance, locating or attracting prey, and schooling), and plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR's, which directly enhance plant growth by a variety of mechanisms, including fixation of atmospheric nitrogen transferred to the plant, production of siderophores that chelate iron and make it available to the plant root, solubilization of minerals such as phosphorus, and synthesis of phytohormones, as well as direct enhancement of mineral uptake due to increases in specific ion fluxes at the root surface). So, the main three questions I'd be asking would be:
1) What causes the 'winds of light'?
2) How exactly do the "winds of light cause extremely rapid plant growth"?
3) Do the 'winds of light' have any detrimental effects, on plants or any other lifeforms?
 
Not three questions, but just one (since I'm lazy... ;) )

Are these things seasonal or can they be predicted? If they come at a fixed time then it will very much determine the calendar of the society, similar to the floods of the nile in ancient egypt. If they can be predicted then a lot of resources will be devoted to doing so accurately, since it will be the difference between starving and living a happy, well-fed life.
 

TJPoldervaart

Minstrel
There seems to be some confusion as to what I mean with winds of light, which is quite understandable now that I read my post again. So, what do I mean by it? Well, it comes pretty close to this, actually:

"a wave of bright sparks in the air that moves over the land like a wind and lays down onto the flora. The further the wind goes and the more flora it has caused rapid growth in, the less energy it has left, until it eventually dies out"

To specify it a bit further, this 'wind of light' will be the single magical feature of the world I'm building from which I'm extrapolating everything else that makes this world unique when compared to Earth. I won't go too far into the details of how they work on a biological level, mostly because that would require a long and tedious explanation I doubt you or even most readers go into, but what it boils down to is that plants have evolved to use these winds instead of sunlight, because these winds lead to faster growth and reproduction.

So, putting it in the wonderful way of bringing a concept down to a practical level in a non-exiting way: It's a wind of magical particles that sparkle and cause plants to grow very fast.

Also, thanks so much for all the replies! It helps me a lot to know what other fantasy authors/readers would wonder about, so I can make sure that those points are adressed within the book without succumbing to worldbuilders-disease or boring (hopefully) future readers.
 

Chasejxyz

Inkling
I won't go too far into the details of how they work on a biological level, mostly because that would require a long and tedious explanation I doubt you or even most readers go into

You don't have to explain it to us, but you should still know it. I know the sources of energy in my magic system on a scientific level: "life energy" is ATP, for example. I never discuss what the ATP cycle is, the pros and cons of aerobic vs anaerobic respiration, that your body is just reusing the same molecules over and over...because the characters wouldn't know this, and it has nothing to do with anything. But since I know these things, I know that you need to breathe to use magic, so if you arrest someone's respiration (either by preventing the muscles from moving or removing the air from the system) then they can't use magic. Or to be more specific, they cannot "generate" more magic, so once their body uses it up by existing after 10+ seconds then they're helpless. But all the reader will see is "He couldn't breathe, his body wouldn't obey him, and he quickly felt his magic slipping away."

When you're building a totally new type of life like you are, you are going to want to know how things work. Plants on other planets might not be green because the spectrum of light that reaches the ground could be different, but saying "oh the leaves here are purple" builds a really strong visual for the reader. A planet that has a day that lasts a month would have wildly different animals: not eating for ~12 hours because you're not suited to doing things during the day/night is feasible, but is not eating for 15 days? So animals are "hibernating" a lot or aren't strictly nocturnal/diurnal. Plants might have secondary sources of nutrition instead of just sunlight. Maybe predators are much more dangerous at night since they're more desperate, or maybe they rely on echolocation instead of sight, so how your characters would keep themselves safe while traveling will be different. These little hints at a bigger, well-thought-out world will drive your reader's imagination wild.
 

TJPoldervaart

Minstrel
You don't have to explain it to us, but you should still know it.

I actually meant that I wouldn't go too far into the details on here. But yes, during the worldbuilding, I'm absolutely designing how this system would work on a biological level. Absolutely a good point, though. One I fully agree with, especially because it helps with extrapolation and creation of specific things I think are awesome.
 
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