/tes/ - The Elder Scrolls Discussion

Right so I was particularly bored today and I decided to do a little star gazing. I noticed that Masser is actually quite large especially compared to moons in our own solar system

yeah I know you can't compare inb4 muh magic this is just for fun

So assuming that Masser is the same distance from nirn as the moon is from the earth it would have an apparent visual diameter of 3 earth moons without calculating Apparent magnitude which I simply do not have the time to do.

The diameter of our earths moon is 2159.2 miles across which would put Masser at a whopping 6477.6 miles in diameter. For comparison it diameter is far larger than mars and a little less than Venuses.

Due to the size of Masser it would be a fair assumption that it has a molten core and assuming its composition is roughly that of Mars (visually they are strikingly similar) we're looking at a gravitational pull roughly equivalent to the Earth.

Another detail is that it has a thin atmosphere which means it must have a magnetosphere to avoid having it stripped by solar winds.

look I know that Mundus doesn't follow our universes astronomical rules just play along

Now this brings up a problem. Nirn must be a very large planet to not be torn apart by tidal forces from Masser but gravity on Nirn appears to be the same as earth. This is one of the few times where we can just pass it off as magic since there's absolutely no way it would work.

Secunda is an absolute enigma to me. It appears to be about twice the size of earths moon but its far brighter than Masser so its apparent magnitude is likely larger than the object itself, sort of like how the moon can appear to be very large in the sky because of all the light it reflects off its surface.

Now the basic equation for Apparent magnitude is

mx-mx,0= -2.5 log n10 (fx/fx,0)

Since Magnus appears to be the same distance as the sun we can say its apparent magnitude is -26.74 and using that as a reference we can see that Secundas surface is very reflective and its apparent magnitude is -14.24 which is brighter than the earths moon. With this in mind we can estimate that Secunda is around 880 miles across, far smaller than earths moon. I have no choice but to assume that Secunda is that size since it would have to be orbiting a fair distance away from Masser to avoid a collision.

The problem with Secundas size is that it should be ripped apart by Nirns tidal forces essentially turning it into a ring system but it would appear to not be orbiting Nirn.

I think that Secunda in fact orbits masser rather than nirn which would help to answer a couple of the issues presented.

So I'm starting to think that Masser is in fact not quite a moon but that Masser and Nirn are a binary system of two planets just like pluto/charon.

This would answer all of the nagging issues presented by their size and mass.

Well i'm done sperging out have fun with this information.