Galaxiel asked me if the map of A1-0 should have something that we could put on the map to provide directions to the centre of the galaxy and similar, like a “compass” . It got me thinking how random the name A1-0 is and how a naming convention would work in practise. I came up with something that would both work and make people think it doesn’t make sense (just like RL systems!). Hear me out, it’s crazy enough to work.
A would stand for authalic (meaning equal-area - every sector has equal area)
1 would signify the ring (further explained below)
0 would signify the segment of that ring (further explained below)
Angles, radii etc are not to scale.
The horizontal cyan line is collinear with the “eastern border” of the A1-0 sector map and the vertical cyan line is perpendicular to it. Inside the blue circle are 99.9% of all stars (or something like that).
Between the blue circle and the galactic centre (a supermassive black hole) there’s a number of circles. One of them is the red circle; it represents an estimated border that divides the galaxy in two parts that have an equal amount of stars (the core is much denser). The area between two circles is called a ring. The ring between the red line and the first circle on the “core-side” of the red circle is the zeroth (0th) ring. All rings are further divided into sectors that all are 5° wide. The first sector counter-clockwise from the horizontal cyan line is the 0th sector. Thus A1-0 is the 0th sector in the first ring core-side, though not the 0th! Since 360/5=72°, Sector A1-0’s clockwise neighbour is A1-72!
Since the angle is fixed and all sector areas must be equal, the closer to the core, the more radially stretched out they will be. And vice-versa, the further away the more stretched out they will be tangentially. The borders of the map of our sector will have to be slightly modified to reflect this new proposed shape, but this wouldn’t affect anything.
The sectors in this proposed system go all the way through the galactic disk (or at least cover 99% of all stars or another relevant number).
What about segments that are on the other side of the red circle? To make the naming system just the right amount of confusing, they count outwards from the red circle and use the letter B instead!
Also, I think we should probably introduce two additional directions as well, “Above” and “Below”, since the Galactic Disk is still really big, and three dimensional.
Oh, I forgot to mention in the OP that this system would assume that the sectors go all the way through the disk, or that they cover 99% of all stars or something like that. I’ll edit the OP.
If with this new system the Sector isn’t just 100 ly tall anymore, how would we reconcile it with our nations only occupying a 100 ly tall part of it?
The thin disk alone is around 1000 ly “high”, so that would already change the total number of stars a lot
Also, there’s the additional problem (that I just noticed) that stellar density in Sector A1-0, given it’s relative vicinity to the Galactic Core, would be much higher compared to the density around the sun. If we were to take numbers similar to the Milky Way, Sector A1-0 would have a stellar density between 16 to 20 stars per parsec, multiple times higher compared to the 1 star per parsec in the region around the sun.
So yeah, we both have to reconcile the star amount and expansion of nations if we use this new mapping system, as well as generally having to move the Sector rimwards if we want to maintain a stellar density close to the sun, regardless of what new system we settle on.
Thanks. I almost forgot about the “implications” part of this naming convention. Yes, I was thinking the star nations would be up to 1 kly high. It would make more sense to have expanded in this direction too. We’d have to recalculate the stats. I don’t believe having a greater number of stars should change anything lorewise.
I’m open to it. Besides, it would allow nations to be more realistic in terms of expansion, as well as being able to have more interesting and unique three-dimensional shapes.
I’ll calculate the total amount of stars that would be in the Sector as soon as I have the time, and if we’re all positive on changing the figure and adopting this new system, we can figure out how many there can be in each plot.
I’ll post the map with all sectors here too so that it doesn’t get buried on Discord.
The red circle is the 50% border that divides the galaxy into two parts that have an equal amount of stars. The yellow circle is the galactic bulge border. The blue circle is the 99% border. Inside it lie 99% of all stars.
Between the yellow and red circle lie the A-series sectors. Between the red and blue circle lie the B-series sectors. The sectors in these series all have the same volume. Inside the yellow circle lie the C-series sectors. They have a different volume and also have layers.
Speaking of that, I can probably make it so that the Sector is in between two galactic arms, that way we wouldn’t have to move it but the density would be acceptable
With a Sector that is 3400x3400x1000 lightyears, and with a local stellar density of 0.004 stars per cubic lightyear, in total Sector A1-0 would have approximately 46.240.000 stars (46.24 million).
Additionally, if we want a relatively similar stellar density to our Earth’s region of space, the Sector would necessarily have to be in-between two galactic arms, and that too is kind of stretching it, but I think it works (unless we move the Sector rimwards, this is the only possible solution)
It seems like Earth is located a bit inside an arm. Perhaps it would make sense to lower the stellar density a bit if A1-0 is to be located between two arms? With the updated size of the sector (roughly 3,400x4,400x1,000 = 15.88 billion cubic light years) we would have approximately 63.53 million stars. How about 0.003 stars per cubic light year for a total of about 47.65 million stars? The current version of the map has a stellar density of about 0.009 for comparison.
@Qwert , I had to place it in between two arms because the Sector is so close to the Galactic Core, so it was the only way to lower the stellar density to Orion Arm-like levels (otherwise we could get stuff like 15 stars per parsec or more). Regardless of that, I think 0.009 is a better stellar density all things considered.
So, taking all that in consideration, with an updated size of 3400x4400x1000 ly and a stellar density of 0.009 stars per cubic ly, we would have a total of 134.464 million stars.
You still have to take into account that the Sector is quite closer to the Lampshade’s Galactic Core compared to the Sun’s distance from the Milky Way Core.
Even after putting the Sector in the least dense point in-between two galactic arms, at that distance from a galactic core even a density of 0.009 would be a relative stretch.
The really dense region is inside that yellow circle. If there’s a bar too, we can say that A1-0 isn’t located inside it. Perhaps we can settle for 0.004 and place A1-0 between two arms?
We have two exciting options now that the sector has grown to 4,400x3,400 ly (from 3,400x3,400).
Resize the plots according to the image to the left. That means that the plots would be roughly 30% larger and that portions of some plots would be inside Sector A1-1!
No resizing (image to the right). There would be lots of more free space rimward!
