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Looking for weather info

Started by James McMurray, October 28, 2007, 04:50:17 PM

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James McMurray

October 28, 2007, 04:50:17 PM
Does anyone happen to know where I can find a fairly simple weather tutorial? I'm not looking to become a meteorologist, just learn enough to randomly generate weather patterns and temperatures based on environment and season.

beeber

#1
October 28, 2007, 05:36:31 PM
here's a couple:
http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/weather/index.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather

just watch the weather channel for a bit and observe the patterns.  know your jet stream, placement of large bodies of water, and areas of great elevation.  you won't get tornadoes (usually) in areas that aren't flat, and hurricanes need warm water to form and strengthen.  

really though, your best bet is simply to use weather as a dramatic effect.  even using a simple table will most likely create unlikely events.  just figure out when you want the dry or wet season (if at all), what latitude is the setting location, and grab a real-world parallel.

dar

#2
October 28, 2007, 06:30:00 PM
Didn't the old AD&D wilderness survival guide have stuff like this? Took into account elevation and lat...

beeber

#3
October 28, 2007, 06:44:44 PM
Quote from: darDidn't the old AD&D wilderness survival guide have stuff like this? Took into account elevation and lat...

the appendix has about 10 pages of DIY weather stuff, with tables.  it does "climatic regions" which could roughly correspond to latitude, and seasons.  i don't see anything about elevation, but i'm just scanning though it at the moment.  

there is a 2d6 table "day-to-day change" which has temp. change/chance of precip./wind conditions therein.  interesting stuff.

dar

#4
October 28, 2007, 07:05:50 PM
*Sigh*, I'm remembering something else. I was pretty sure it was in there.

James McMurray

#5
October 28, 2007, 07:36:28 PM
Thanks!

I'll be making a generator like my others, so it can't be setting specific. Mostly it'll be "is it raining?", "how hard?", etc. But every now and then something major (like a tornado) would pop up.
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