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Why don't real life trees get really, REALLY big? Like a mile high. Giant trees (often with towns built in them) are a staple of fantasy literature and movies. What prevents real trees from getting that big?
Me? I love the idea of trees so big that they have their own ecologies, with other little trees and things growing off them and streams flowing down the creases, etc. Mostly I think of big, leafy deciduous trees with massive canopies, but mile high pine trees work too. Or mega banyans and mangroves? Cool. I can also imagine Asian elves living in massive bamboo trees, with each chamber of the stalk serving as a separate room.
Any other tree ponderings out there?
Why don't real life trees get really, REALLY big?
Not quite an expert, but trees eventually hit an upper limit to their height based on several factors. I think the big one is capillary action, which is necessary to draw up water (and nutrients) through the xylem (I think). At certain heights, the weight of all that water in the capillaries effectively prevents it from rising any further. Similarly, giant trees have to support their weight; although cellulose provides structural strength, I don't think it could reasonably support a the weight of a mile-high tree.
All that said, I love the concept of trees having their own eco-system, and find this a staple of fantasy and sci-fi. I once developed a planet for a WEG Star Wars game called Bramble, which was essentially just one planet-sized mass of organic material.
Now fungi on the other hand... they can get really big...
Because Conservatives and Republicans cut them down for money.
-W. E. Ray
ILMAO! Too true.
But seriously, you don't even need to go into botany to explain why trees top off at certain heights; just look to physics. Objects of similar shape become structurally weaker and weaker the larger they get, so while a meter tall tree only needs to be a centimeter thick to survive the elements a hundred meter tall tree needs to be five meters thick to survive. That means not just linear growth, but exponential growth which means it's just not feasible for a tree to grow beyond a certain height depending on its particular climate and environment.
Btw, this same problem would apply to certain large flying lizards in real life. A great wyrm's legs would have to be as thick as its body to hold itself up and its wings would have to each be five times the length of its body to keep it aloft.
TS
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The issues have been pointed out here, but:
1. the water from the roots to the leaves are pulled up as continuous chains by capillary action. While these chains are surprisingly strong, I doubt they can sustain their own weight for miles.
2. they would need tremendous resources of water and nutrients.
3. they would have to be seriously massive to hold themselves up, and would be vulnerable to wind damage.
None of this frankly precludes anything in a fantasy setting, or course. Or, more scientifically, a low-G setting.
Then there's just the good ol' common sense issue that gasses get thinner as altitude increases, as well as harmful radiation. Beyond a certain point it just gets more productive to get wider rather than taller. You get more yummy CO2 and you can crowd out even more of your light-hogging rivals. Tall is only necessary to outcompete your fellow trees.
Now that said there are some crazy crazy big trees in the real world. In California there's an old redwood so huge they had to cut a TUNNEL through it to let cars go through. Kid you not.
capillary action limit + square-cube law
I believe there's an old Dragon magazine article on why giants can't exist based on square-cube limits.
For those 4E gamers who may read this at some future date, Dragon magazine was a paper publication about D&D (and in the olden days, other types of gamin as well, even books!). It was canceled by WotC in 2007, a move they regretted unto the end of days.
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As a sidenote I saw some old trees being dug up on the History Channel that are 50,000 years old but because of being buried in peat and not subjected to oxygen and degradation, they are being used in high end furniture. I wish I remembered the name of it, but as an ex-carpenter I remember that the wood from them was going for from $21 american per linear foot to over $100 american per linear foot depending on wood grain pattern and prominence. One of the logs that they dug up and loaded on a truck looked to be around 12' in diameter.
Not really helpful and all that but still sort of interesting.
I hope someone remembers what the wood was called...
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Redwood National Forest ISamazing.
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As far as Fantasy, or rather, "realistic" fantasy, a world-designer could say that said species of Giant tree has an "organ" (or whatever part of anatomy that passes for organs in plants) that creates a low-gravity "well" inside the trunk itself, helping the capillaries "push" water and other nutrients up to the branches.
Moreover, huge, upper branches of said Giant tree could have means to, by osmosis, use minerals, water and other nutrients as needed from the various organisms growing there, 3000 ft up, in their own little ecosystem.
Evolution-wise, many species of these proto-Giant trees existed, each "racing" against the others to see which species would grow tallest and get the valuable sun rays. Said Giant tree wins because its low-grav sap -- or tissues (whatever) are the most successful.
Hope these trees aren't disiduous!!!!!!
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In my homebrew cosmology, Twin Paradises is the "Border Plane" to Celestia and is a two-sided Herbaceous Forest where all the plants are enormous. But I never really got into the science behind it -- it's not a Material Plane, afterall. Earth physics need not apply.
-W. E. Ray
Or it's got a dryad in it. That get the ole sap flowing...
A side note that does have some bearing is that most trees are immortal. They never die of old age, rather they die simply from disease, accidents of nature, or actions of animals (including man).
So, in an enviorment that could support limitless growth, a tree given enough time could conceivably grow to whatever size you want. Lifespan isn't the issue; as has been noted earlier, physics is.
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Beyond a certain point it just gets more productive to get wider rather than taller.
Cool. I'm getting more 'productive' all the time!
capillary action limit + square-cube law
I believe there's an old Dragon magazine article on why giants can't exist based on square-cube limits.
'How Heavy is my Giant' was reprinted in the 1st Dragon Annual, along with such classics as the newfangled Illusionist and Ranger classes. I use it all the time for superhero games, since it gives weights for all sorts of things my superheroes end up turning into (or getting turned into) like granite, ice, wood, stainless steel, etc.
In a fantasy world, where Dragons, gargantuan Monstrous vermin, Giants and Titans regularly scoff at the stresses that the square-cube law puts upon them, it makes total sense that there would be trees that also partake of whatever special nature allows these critters to get so big. In the decades-old article, innate Levitation-like ability was cited (along with the precedent that some of the affected creatures, such as Cloud Giants, Storm Giants, Titans and Gold Dragons, already had Levitation as a usable ability) as the reason why some of these creatures could grow so large and remain functional.
Additionally, in a fantasy world, there are structural materials that are significantly stronger than real-world examples. A tree made of Darkwood, said to be nearly as strong as steel, would be able to grow quite tall without collapsing under it's own weight. And while trees rarely get big enough to warrant evolving any more sophisticated fluid transport in the real world, a darkwood tree that is aiming for the stratosphere might evolve to develop fluid reservoir chambers inside of itself at various heights, allowing the capillaries to move the water up in short hops, like mountaineers going up Everest. They don't have to do it in a single push, but can pump it up to the first reservoir, and then a second channel can pump it up to the second reservoir, etc.
This would make for an interesting premise. Combining supernatural effects (elven darkwood forests have traces of fey magic and the trees can grow taller and taller, with the branches at the highest levels being almost weightless when attached, as the weight-negating pseudo-levitation magic gets strongest the farthest away from the earth) and superior evolution (the reservoirs of water, that elves might tap into for water supplies in the higher reaches, or even swim in!), and an elven forest-city would be quite doable. The elves would also have some special trade materials. Darkwood by itself is freakishly strong (particularly to the base of the tree), and the upper branches of taller trees might be able to be harvested by a special procedure that locks in whatever properties make them all-but weightless, for the creation of featherlight 'flying ships.' This might even be a trade secret of the elves, who market the light upper wood as 'Soarwood' and don't let anyone know that it's the same tree that produces both types of wood!
As with many fantasy world critters, the trees found in elven woods might not be native to the material plane, being the plant descendents of transplants or seeds that ended up being carried over from Arborea or the Feywild, much as elves are what the fey have slowly become in the presence of the material plane. In whatever realm they came from, the progenitors of these trees still stand, the smallest of them miles tall, and as animate as any Treant (albeit one of beyond-Colossal scale!), while the tallest is stationary, but said to have stars tangled amidst it's branches and roots that lead to the underworld...
As has been stated, fungi can grow to ridiculous sizes. These are not, of course, the mega-mushrooms of Morrowind fame, but mycelia reaching across vast areas. There are also various plants that can grow truly massive, the horseradish is one example. It grows from a root system that can expand pretty much without limit. I am admittedly not an expert, but the point is, if you want bizarre structures, look to nature. =)
Pretty much everything noted above is correct. Heaven forbid, my grad student work is in Plant Sciences, so I feel I can speak with a tad bit of authority on this one thing.
Nah, probably not.
In addition to the laws of physics and structural concerns, there is the problem of getting nutrients (especially water) to the top of the tree. Trees move water through capillary action, augmented by osmotic adjustment, changes in water potential, and by some internal physiological devices that maintain a continuous water column in the xylem. After a point, gaps might form in the water columns within a tree without a little help, killing the top of the tree.
Wind is a serious bee-otch for taller trees. Many redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens) don't just grow straight and true. Instead you'll find the top starts to look like a fairy-tale castle. Parts of the crown break off and the tree grows new auxiliary meristems to the sides of the break, causing major buttresses to form as the tree branches out (no pun intended) and then upward again. It'll look like an upside-down flow chart over time.
As for tree age, trees don't die of old age per se. Older trees seem to die when they grow too large to maintain themselves through photosynthesis. At some point, they get too inefficient at it (leaf area index is too low compared to volume of the tree). As a result, not enough photosynthesis occurs to do maintenance on existing structures and parts of the tree may die off. A tree under this kind of stress is also more vulnerable to pests and/or disease, which may ultimately kill the tree.
As an idea of some regular tree lifespan:
the current champion for oldest living individual tree-bristlecone pine, well over 4000 years old and close to 5000
oldest tree, period: an aspen (Populus tremulus) colony in Colorado, easily 10,000 years old (aspens propagate clonally, so each one is a clone of the original)
aforementioned redwoods: up to 2000 years, I believe
black tupelo/blackgum/sourgum/whatever you call it (Nyssa sylvatica): up to 650 years of age, overall oldest tree on the East Coast
other common Eastern trees (Quercus sp., Acer sp., Carya sp., etc.): up to 500 years or so
Now, what does this all have to do with gaming?
Now, what does this all have to do with gaming?
If you cast Mordenkainen's disjunction in one of those elven cities you get a bunch of mightily p***ed-off elves?
Btw, this same problem would apply to certain large flying lizards in real life. A great wyrm's legs would have to be as thick as its body to hold itself up and its wings would have to each be five times the length of its body to keep it aloft.
TS
Not to threadjack, but it is interesting to note that in real world legends of dragons, most were comparable to real world animals in size (large to huge).
Now back to the topic at hand. Depending on the species, a sequoia can reach close to 400 feet in height and between 20 and 30 feet in diameter.
Because Conservatives and Republicans cut them down for money.
-W. E. Ray
Actually, we do that so you liberals will have a roof over your heads while you're whining and wasting everybody's time.
If you cast Mordenkainen's disjunction in one of those elven cities you get a bunch of mightily p***ed-off elves?Now, what does this all have to do with gaming?
That depends on how many plant growth spells are involved, as well as other assorted arcane goodness, I guess.
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If you cast Mordenkainen's disjunction in one of those elven cities you get a bunch of mightily p***ed-off elves?Now, what does this all have to do with gaming?
Nah, if Disjunction doesn't make giants fall over with broken legs, elves die rapidly of old age and dragons fall out of the sky, it won't affect the trees either. It may have started out magical, but it's become innate.
In addition to the laws of physics and structural concerns, there is the problem of getting nutrients (especially water) to the top of the tree. Trees move water through capillary action, augmented by osmotic adjustment, changes in water potential, and by some internal physiological devices that maintain a continuous water column in the xylem. After a point, gaps might form in the water columns within a tree without a little help, killing the top of the tree.
Any idea if the tree could develop internal reservoirs to store small pools of water at various levels, so that it would only run the water up to a reservoir, and then a second set of capillaries run from reservoir 1 to reservoir 2, etc? It seems like a simple enough evolutionary solution.
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Any idea if the tree could develop internal reservoirs to store small pools of water at various levels, so that it would only run the water up to a reservoir, and then a second set of capillaries run from reservoir 1 to reservoir 2, etc? It seems like a simple enough evolutionary solution.
Aren't there tropical plants like orchids that leech water out of the air? At higher levels the trees might develop some sort of web of fine tendrils that draw moisture from the clouds and actually pump it down to lower areas.
Similarly, if a tree is big enough to develop an ecology within its branches, maybe it also has a way of absorbing minerals from the left over detritus and dead bodies of old birds and squirrels. Or maybe elves actually bury their dead within the tree ["We came from the great trees and we return to the great trees."].
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Because Conservatives and Republicans cut them down for money.
-W. E. Ray
Because leftists and Democorats force them into the commons so that it's in nobody's interest to keep them around long enough to grow that big.
Forest product companies plant nearly a billion trees a year in the US alone. I wonder why Georgia Pacific hasn't gotten a Nobel Peace Prize?
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Any idea if the tree could develop internal reservoirs to store small pools of water at various levels, so that it would only run the water up to a reservoir, and then a second set of capillaries run from reservoir 1 to reservoir 2, etc? It seems like a simple enough evolutionary solution.
I don't see why not. Also, if there's enough rain in the area, you might have trees that capture the rainfall in such reservoirs.
For strength, you can certainly postulate plants that create fibers stronger than cellulose (as somebody mentioned).
If you care about evolutionary sense, you might want to consider what evolutionary advantage you get from height. For real trees, this is largely a competition for light, since light is required for photosynthesis. You need sufficient nutrient density in the ground below the plant to support multiple huge organisms in close proximity, otherwise other considerations are more important than expending resources in competing for the light.
None of this is necessary if you don't care for that level or type of detail, of course. Sufficiently pervasive magic is interchangeable with complex biology. 8-)
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You need sufficient nutrient density in the ground below the plant to support multiple huge organisms in close proximity, otherwise other considerations are more important than expending resources in competing for the light.
If I'm not mistaken, this is why most carnivorous plants grow in bog and swamps and other places with cruddy soil.
This is officially a Kewl Thread! (The ending of my Arcana Evolved game a couple years ago featured an entire village at the foot of a mile high tree tapping into the Source of the Green.)
Megatrees make for mega-adventure! You can have multi-level vertical dungeons within, airships without and all manner of creatures evolved around the tree.
I'm currently designing a city for a campaign that has six mile-high trees around it that serve as airship ports, along with special druids that tend the tree and races that live and work there.
Aren't there tropical plants like orchids that leech water out of the air? At higher levels the trees might develop some sort of web of fine tendrils that draw moisture from the clouds and actually pump it down to lower areas.
Similarly, if a tree is big enough to develop an ecology within its branches, maybe it also has a way of absorbing minerals from the left over detritus and dead bodies of old birds and squirrels. Or maybe elves actually bury their dead within the tree ["We came from the great trees and we return to the great trees."].
Some orchids to have aerial roots, as to mangrove trees, and many forms of ivy.
1) There are epiphytic plants (mostly in the tropics) that leave their roots to dangle from the trees they grow in. They can absorb water just fine that way. Others wrap their roots around the trees and absorb water running down the trunk. Both of these ignore true parasitism.
2) I am unaware of any tree storing water. Being a tree uses quite a bit of water-hence you stop seeing them as you move west from Appalachia toward the Great Plains. Succulents (cacti) obviously do so. Water weighs quite a bit and holding up a tree is already difficult enough, so why add more structural stress to store water? To be fair, certain plants have deep taproots that hit the water table, pull the water up, and then moisten the soil at the base of the plant in order to facilitate nutrient uptake in the soil around the plant, since the soil there is where all the good stuff is at (O or A horizons), while the water is in poorer soil nutrient wise (B, C, or R horizons even).
2a) If there's lots of water, why store it if you're a tree? If there isn't a lot, then you really don't belong there. Also, storing water may create the problem of being unable to pull in more water later due to lack of water potential. Stored water could also cause you to freeze up and explode in the winter (which happens to trees as it is). Overall, if you need water that badly, it's better to grow a root system with a taproot or evolve to endure the water lack for years as a seed and then grow fast (desert annuals), or develop pneumatophores like a cypress or aerenchyma and live in a wet environment.
3) I'm not up on my cloud forest ecology, but I suppose it may be possible for a tree to gain nutrients from the ecosystem growing in its upper branches. If so, the nutrients will have to penetrate the tree's bark, which is specifically designed to keep stuff out, then penetrate the phloem (designed to move things but not necessarily in the right direction). Maybe when scientists get done looking at the cloud forest and the arboreal soils of the redwoods we'll know. I'd be inclined to doubt it, however.
4) Mangroves have aerial roots to keep from suffocating. Plants actually gain oxygen through their roots, not their leaves. Oxygen coming in through their leaves is not coming in very fast and may not bind to rubisco (an enzyme that begins photosynthetic processes but also plays a role in photorespiration). Mangroves, cypresses, and other plants with roots like this are just trying to breathe and/or brace themselves so that the tides don't take them out (mangroves) or their mass doesn't cause them to fall over (cypress, to a small extent).
5) Carnivorous plants live in bogs and swamps or underwater (bladderworts). Wetland soils can be quite fertile, but nutrient turnover is low due to the low rate of decomposition of the inundated/frequently inundated soil organic matter (SOC). Wet soils have low oxygen content (due to usage of pore space by water and microbial respiration) and thus low decomposition rates, resulting in slow nutrient turnover. Sundews, pitcher plants, venus flytraps, and other such mixotrophs are eating live critters for protein, which they need just like us (enzymes are proteins that catalyze reactions). Wetland soils can be very nitrogen limited, and nitrogen is required for protein synthesis.
Wow, thanks guys, this is great review! I'm doing teaching assistant work this semester plus soil chem and advanced plant ecophysiology, so review is great right now.
Any other questions about plant life? I mean, real-world plant life, not shamblers and such?
Because Conservatives and Republicans cut them down for money.
-W. E. Ray
Because leftists and Democorats force them into the commons so that it's in nobody's interest to keep them around long enough to grow that big.
Forest product companies plant nearly a billion trees a year in the US alone. I wonder why Georgia Pacific hasn't gotten a Nobel Peace Prize?
Because they plant crappy, fast-growing "trees" like white pine, rather trees which will develop into old-growth forest and contribute to the biosphere. While I am sure that some learns to make use of the stuff paper and lumber companies plant, the rain forest (or even the old growth woods of the west coast) they will never be.
Any trees can grow into old-growth type forest; you just need to leave them alone for a few centuries. Really, those planted trees are just second-growth (or later) forests. Young forests are good at carbon sequestration, but you lose soil organic carbon if the trees are cut down and the ground left exposed for too long. Add in changes to the earth's albedo and the carbon footprint of the operation and I'd be pleasantly surprised to find that these operations actually generate carbon credits instead of needing them.
Where are the druids when you really need them?
The druids are off saving the whales.
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1) There are epiphytic plants that leave their roots to dangle from the trees they grow in. Others wrap their roots around the trees and absorb water running down the trunk.
Certain plants have deep taproots that hit the water table, pull the water up, and then moisten the soil at the base of the plant in order to facilitate nutrient uptake in the soil around... since the soil... is where all the good stuff is.
Evolve to endure the water lack for years as a seed and then grow fast or develop pneumatophores like a cypress or aerenchyma and live in a wet environment.
It may be possible for a tree to gain nutrients from the ecosystem growing in its upper branches. If so, the nutrients will have to penetrate the tree's bark, which is specifically designed to keep stuff out, then penetrate the phloem
Damn, talk dirty to me, Giiiirl.
-W. E. ray
1) There are epiphytic plants that leave their roots to dangle from the trees they grow in. Others wrap their roots around the trees and absorb water running down the trunk.
Certain plants have deep taproots that hit the water table, pull the water up, and then moisten the soil at the base of the plant in order to facilitate nutrient uptake in the soil around... since the soil... is where all the good stuff is.
Evolve to endure the water lack for years as a seed and then grow fast or develop pneumatophores like a cypress or aerenchyma and live in a wet environment.
It may be possible for a tree to gain nutrients from the ecosystem growing in its upper branches. If so, the nutrients will have to penetrate the tree's bark, which is specifically designed to keep stuff out, then penetrate the phloem
Damn, talk dirty to me, Giiiirl.
-W. E. ray
Umm, Molech, you might want to check the "post your pic" thread from a while back, and perhaps save your commentary for Tegan, Eileen, or Dungeon Grrrl . . . I'm not offended, nor am I trying to hide anything. I believe I posted on the "why this avatar" thread as well.
That said, I was talking dirt plenty in there. O, A, B, C, R: I only missed the E horizon. College education has its uses.
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Because they plant crappy, fast-growing "trees" like white pine, rather trees which will develop into old-growth forest and contribute to the biosphere. While I am sure that some learns to make use of the stuff paper and lumber companies plant, the rain forest (or even the old growth woods of the west coast) they will never be.
Right. Pine=evil, oak=neutral, walnut=good, mahogany=exalted. What domains does your religion offer, again?
Okay, I have a question: do any plants or fungi have an equivalent of muscles? I know that slime molds can move, and at least the venus fly trap plants have moving parts. How does that work?
How this relates to D&D... well, much fun has been made of the "muscular action closes the hole" line in the description of the Swallow whole ability on plants.
If you want a farout "gigantic tree" deal, read the Integral Trees by Larry Niven. He has a way of making the fantastic plausible with his sci fi.
That is a good book. The sequel, The Smoke Ring is also good, but not nearly as good at The Integral Trees.
Rainbow Mars, also by Niven, also features a really honking big tree. Makes the Integral Trees look like matchsticks.
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Okay, I have a question: do any plants or fungi have an equivalent of muscles? I know that slime molds can move, and at least the venus fly trap plants have moving parts. How does that work?
How this relates to D&D... well, much fun has been made of the "muscular action closes the hole" line in the description of the Swallow whole ability on plants.
They don't have muscles - most of it is hydraulics. Slime mould grow in specific directions, I assume.
Okay, I have a question: do any plants or fungi have an equivalent of muscles? I know that slime molds can move, and at least the venus fly trap plants have moving parts. How does that work?
How this relates to D&D... well, much fun has been made of the "muscular action closes the hole" line in the description of the Swallow whole ability on plants.
In the case of venus flytraps, the quick closure is due to cells at the base of the trap rapidly filling with water, creating pressure that rapidly snaps the trap shut IIRC. As for slime molds, I have no idea. There's no equivalent to muscular tissue in plants that I'm aware of (though with all the beech trees I saw this summer I was beginning to wonder if I had Ents).
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Okay, I have a question: do any plants or fungi have an equivalent of muscles? I know that slime molds can move, and at least the venus fly trap plants have moving parts. How does that work?
The flytrap trick of shuffling water around to increase / decrease the size or alter the shape of individual cells would also make a pretty good base for how shapechangers could function, seeming to grow larger or smaller by inflating or compressing individual cells and shunting water around. (In a realistic world, they'd have to do something with that water, like sweat it out in a splash as they 'shapechange' into something smaller, and then require gallons of water to return to full-size, or expand into something larger than normal, but in a fantasy world, the water can 'go away' or be 'conjured up internally' as needed.)
Physics?! Who dares.... Oh. We're talking real world. Okay.
This thread really is interesting. But in terms of creating megatrees in a fantasy setting, if one does not want to bring physics and biology in, it's easy to explain. Fey spirits like dryads can strengthen the trees, repair damage, and even move water around in them. The trees themselves have root wells that entangle planar rifts to the Elemental Plane of Water, providing them with a literally limitless supply of Aich-Too-Oh (although you may want to say this supplements what they get from the air/ground so that you don't have these things growing in what was formerly a desert; if they could literally grow everywhere, they might take cover the world).
You could expand this as far as world trees. You could have continents separated not by water, but by vast gulfs between the canopies of the trees that hold each aloft. Even further, you could say that each "plane" is really a tree, with the various layers being the continents/landmasses/whatever held in the branches, descending further and further down as you went. And, of course, there's always the possibility of taking that idea all the way, that the entire Multiverse is contained in a single massive tree, with the Lower Planes in the roots, the Upper Planes on its canopy, and the Material Plane somewhere around the middle; in otherwords, Yggdrasil (or the 3.x FR cosmology, depending on what reference you prefer).
I think I just found a cosmology for my homebrew, actually!
For anyone who may be interested, check out 'Forest of Doom' from Dragon #73 - an excellent old school adventure based around a mega-tree.
Another good reference (for atmosphere) that I just recalled! Alan Dean Foster's Midworld. Big trees, multiple levels of a jungle and rainforest, adaption to an alien environment, etc. There's also a Flinx sequel. Ummm. Mid-Flinx. Not as good, but more flavor of a giant rainforest.
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So would a giant tree have giant leaves, or just a whole bunch of big leaves?
(There's this really cool tree in the park where I take my son that has a huge canopy and a mass of tangled roots at ground level. Every time I see it I imagine a whole city built in it's branches and on it's roots. Isn't there a city built in a giant tree in one of the recent GameMastery adventures?)
So would a giant tree have giant leaves, or just a whole bunch of big leaves?
(There's this really cool tree in the park where I take my son that has a huge canopy and a mass of tangled roots at ground level. Every time I see it I imagine a whole city built in it's branches and on it's roots. Isn't there a city built in a giant tree in one of the recent GameMastery adventures?)
Hmm...If it's fantasy I would say yes to giant leaves. Trees have a variety of leaf sizes, so I would say it's doable.
The GameMastery module you speak of is W2: River into Darkness I do believe and Bloodroot (I think) is the name of the town.
So would a giant tree have giant leaves, or just a whole bunch of big leaves?
(There's this really cool tree in the park where I take my son that has a huge canopy and a mass of tangled roots at ground level. Every time I see it I imagine a whole city built in it's branches and on it's roots. Isn't there a city built in a giant tree in one of the recent GameMastery adventures?)
Where's this park of yours at? I'm always happy to stare at bizarre and unusual trees!
Where's this park of yours at? I'm always happy to stare at bizarre and unusual trees!A little triangular park at the corner of Venice and Culver in West LA.
It's a bit late for Spring Cleaning, you know.
Why don't real life trees get really, REALLY big? Like a mile high. Giant trees (often with towns built in them) are a staple of fantasy literature and movies. What prevents real trees from getting that big?
Wood isn't strong enough to support that much weight. Other reasons are good, also, but this one is simple (and equally correct).
Thankfully, our roleplaying characters don't live in real life :)
I would add that NEED would be a reason for big trees.
A tree has to get as high as the other trees surrounding it in order to get sunligh. This also may be why huge trees are mainly found in deep valleys or at the base of mountains (they have to get high enough to see the sun longer). So a lone tree in the middle of a plain should be smaller than the same kind of tree in a lush forest.
Why can't they grow to gargantuan sizes? For the same reason why we can't make buildings that reach space... At some point, the entire building would be elevator shafts to get folks to the highest reaches of the building. Trees have to get nutrients from the ground all the way up to those top branches. If trees were to grow as high as mountains, the tree itself would be hollow (from all the conduits) and break under its own weight.
Mind you, this is just speculation as I am no where near a specialist on trees. lol
Ultradan
I would add that NEED would be a reason for big trees.
A tree has to get as high as the other trees surrounding it in order to get sunligh. This also may be why huge trees are mainly found in deep valleys or at the base of mountains (they have to get high enough to see the sun longer). So a lone tree in the middle of a plain should be smaller than the same kind of tree in a lush forest.
Why can't they grow to gargantuan sizes? For the same reason why we can't make buildings that reach space... At some point, the entire building would be elevator shafts to get folks to the highest reaches of the building. Trees have to get nutrients from the ground all the way up to those top branches. If trees were to grow as high as mountains, the tree itself would be hollow (from all the conduits) and break under its own weight.
Mind you, this is just speculation as I am no where near a specialist on trees. lol
Ultradan
Trees survive beneath other trees just fine, Ultradan, if they're shade-loving or shade-tolerant species. For example, flowering dogwoods do just fine in the understory, as do red maples, American holly, and black tupelo. Huge trees require lots of water, lots of nutrients, and to be LEFT ALONE to grow. A lone tree in the middle of a plain might just be smaller because of water stress or competition. As for the elevator shafts, trees have them: it's called xylem. The problem is cavitation, which is when the continuous stream of water moving up the xylem is interrupted. Not a good thing. A hollow tree is bad because it lacks the support to stay up and is rotting from the inside. My uncle finally cut down an old maple that had gone hollow for about two stories this summer-trees will hold up to some degree but not forever. The estimates I've heard (from experts in the field, which I might be some day) say that water will only go up to about 450 feet before the tree can't get it up further, due to osmotic adjustment, physics, water potential, and whatnot.
Lathiira, the Plant Science grad student