Revisiting Storm Calc Issues

[Flashlight237]

So I'm revisiting this topic (can't bump the old thread due to necrobumping rules): https://vsbattles.com/threads/storm-calculation-issues.160914/

I'll put up the key points of the last thread's OP as follows.:

1. Cumulonimbus clouds (which we base storms on) are actually 15 miles in diameter, far below the 20-km radius currently used: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumulonimbus_cloud
2. Flaws with hurricane and storm calculations pointed out in detail. (See OP in last thread)
3. Wattages of hurricane and thunderstorms determined.
4. Baseline thunderstorm wattage calculated.

The intention is to make storm calculations significantly more accurate by providing both a bigger picture of how storms work and helping calculate storms in a more accurate way. However, these proposals were all but rejected because... Reasons... Thing is, there are three other things that I think further necessitates these accuracy improvements.

1. The 20-km value used had been depreciated by our horizon calculations revision.
2. The 20-km value would not be useable in any practical sense since it requires the utmost in perfection in sky conditions, plus there are too many variables involved such as lighting (bright objects such as lightning can be seen much further away), sky clarity, and object size (I mean, the moon can be seen in daylight). Typical clear skies only let you see up to three miles away from yourself into the horizon, and storms are even worse for visibility (with a flight instructor claiming a mile and a government agency even going as far as to say "near-zero". Fog can reduce visibility to less than a kilometer.).
3. The furthest out anyone can hear lightning is 10 miles (16 km): https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-science-thunder

Really, going for 12 kilometers in radius instead of 20 is being generous with storm calculations. Death Battle typically measures storms directly when doing their calculations regardless of whether it lines up with irl storms or not, often causing storms to appear smaller than IRL storms.

As I have intended with the last thread, the goals of the changes are as follows.

1. Set in place the use of 12 km as the standard radius for storms instead of 20 km.
2. Determine whether to use total energy output (as current storm calculations do) or wattages (as current hurricane calculations do)
3. Better contextualize storm calculations for everyone.
4. (Optional) Set a baseline for when there are too many unknowns (Wikipedia lists 1 petajoule for thunderstorms, which is 277.777 to 555.555 gigawatts based on the time period a storm lasts (30 to 60 minutes).)
5. (Optional) Add a recommendation to measure storms directly instead where possible.

Will it be tricky? Mmmmeh.... "Storm" is a pretty common keyword found in Tier 7 profiles, and keywords such as "weather manipulation" and "environmental destruction" add more elephants to the room. It's pretty easy to find where to start. Either way, I estimate that accuracy will increase for storm calculations significantly should this go through... Because, you know, second time's the charm..!

 

[Damage3245]

1. Set in place the use of 12 km as the standard radius for storms instead of 20 km.
2. Determine whether to use total energy output (as current storm calculations do) or wattages (as current hurricane calculations do)
3. Better contextualize storm calculations for everyone.
4. (Optional) Set a baseline for when there are too many unknowns (Wikipedia lists 1 petajoule for thunderstorms, which is 277.777 to 555.555 gigawatts based on the time period a storm lasts (30 to 60 minutes).)
5. (Optional) Add a recommendation to measure storms directly instead where possible.

These proposals seem fairly reasonable to me.

 

[Flashlight237]

Bumping this one to try and get more people to look into it.

 

[Flashlight237]

Bump

 

[Flashlight237]

Another bump-de-dump.

 

[Damage3245]

@DontTalkDT Your input on the OP would be helpful here.

 

[DontTalkDT]

The thing with 15 miles is that there is no real reason to assume that a fictional character creating a cloud would create a standard sized cloud. Could be much smaller or much larger. The 20km are not from how big the average cloud is, they are based on how far one can see, such that one would notice if some other part of the sky is still blue.
The three miles thing you mention doesn't apply because clouds are high up. You can see something beyond the horizon if it's above ground. Something a kilometer above ground can be seen even 100km away if you only take the horizon into account. See.

The clear sky regarding to clear skies is about things in the air which would block vision. Clouds high up aren't the issue, since they aren't in the line of sight. Fog, rain, dust etc. would be. That's also what your articles address: Limited visibility due to rain and fog.
Usually in storm creation feats we don't have those before or shortly after the clouds are created. If we have limited visibility, existing rules say to not use that method.

No idea what you mean regarding hurricane and storm calculations. They are calculated practically the same? Like, pretty sure all our methods apply to both.
We don't really use total energy for a storm (at least not directly), we use the total energy to create the clouds, but that's because in feats the clouds are created immediately.

(Btw. the cloud manip page already says to use pixel scaling if viable)

 

[Flashlight237]

The thing with 15 miles is that there is no real reason to assume that a fictional character creating a cloud would create a standard sized cloud. Could be much smaller or much larger. The 20km are not from how big the average cloud is, they are based on how far one can see, such that one would notice if some other part of the sky is still blue.
The three miles thing you mention doesn't apply because clouds are high up. You can see something beyond the horizon if it's above ground. Something a kilometer above ground can be seen even 100km away if you only take the horizon into account. See.

The clear sky regarding to clear skies is about things in the air which would block vision. Clouds high up aren't the issue, since they aren't in the line of sight. Fog, rain, dust etc. would be. That's also what your articles address: Limited visibility due to rain and fog.
Usually in storm creation feats we don't have those before or shortly after the clouds are created. If we have limited visibility, existing rules say to not use that method.

No idea what you mean regarding hurricane and storm calculations. They are calculated practically the same? Like, pretty sure all our methods apply to both.
We don't really use total energy for a storm (at least not directly), we use the total energy to create the clouds, but that's because in feats the clouds are created immediately.

(Btw. the cloud manip page already says to use pixel scaling if viable)

I'll address each of these one by one.

1. For one, we use irl standards for calculations all the time because, simply put, we're told to do that. For mountains, it's 2000 feet. For buildings, we count the stories and multiply by whatever the average storey is (around 12-15 feet depending on the type of building). For people, we use 5'9" for the average man and 5'4" for the average woman and 62 kg for both. While yes, there are things smaller (ex. Camp Wawanakwa's signature mountain, hobbits, and Ivysaur) or larger (ex. Princess Peach, Godzilla, and Mt. Fuji), generally what we're supposed to do is assume based on standards set in real life for certain unknowns even though mountains, buildings, etc vary all the time. A cloud shouldn't be an exception even when it has as many variables as mountains.
2. The Storm Calculations page literally says "but for the average cumulonimbus cloud" in Heading 1, Paragraph 4, Sentence 2. 15 miles is the radius of the average cumulonimbus cloud. You can't contradict an article's writing just like that.
3. That's exactly the thing. Things like altitude, lighting, object size, sky clarity, etc make things more variable than one might expect. As pointed out earlier, 20 km is for very, very ideal conditions (which, again, storms aren't). At ground level, we're limited to 3 miles as I've said before, even though things higher like clouds can be seen much further out. Lightning can even be seen a little further out, up to 265 km if your field of view isn't obscured (granted the link here is to some news article and not the NOAA, but still): https://wgntv.com/weather/weather-blog/how-far-can-you-see-lightning/

As a real-life example, on my way to work in one particularly foggy morning, in a fog that only lets me see objects up to 0.2 miles away, I can see lights from traffic signals up to a mile away, yet nothing further. All of this is assuming buildings and trees don't get in the way of our vision. If anything, it's much easier to use the standard size for a cumulonimbus cloud than it is to use a visibility guideline that, in practice, works against everything we've both pointed out in our respective viewpoints.
4. And that's the thing. In fiction, storms always darken the area when they appear, immediately affecting the lighting of the area they appear in. Usually (depending on how well the illustrator or animator understands how storms work), the sky also grays out much like it does in an irl storm. The former appears on first appearance of the storm rather than, like you said, shortly after. And yes, I know you brought up blue skies earlier, but it was more relevant here than it would be in the last two points. Granted there are exceptions to this like Mufasa appearing before Simba for example, but in that case, the storm doesn't appear above the characters as they usually do.
5. My man, the hurricane section literally brings up wattages before the calculated values are made.:

Method 1) - Total energy released through cloud/rain formation: An average hurricane produces 1.5 cm/day (0.6 inches/day) of rain inside a circle of radius 665 km (360 n.mi). (More rain falls in the inner portion of hurricane around the eyewall, less in the outer rainbands.) Converting this to a volume of rain gives 2.1 x 1016 cm3/day. A cubic cm of rain weighs 1 gm. Using the latent heat of condensation, this amount of rain produced gives 5.2 x 10^19 Joules/day or 6.0 x 10^14 Watts.

Method 2) - Total kinetic energy (wind energy) generated: For a mature hurricane, the amount of kinetic energy generated is equal to that being dissipated due to friction. The dissipation rate per unit area is air density times the drag coefficient times the windspeed cubed. One could either integrate a typical wind profile over a range of radii from the hurricane's center to the outer radius encompassing the storm, or assume an average windspeed for the inner core of the hurricane. Doing the latter and using 40 m/s (90 mph) winds on a scale of radius 60 km (40 n.mi.), one gets a wind dissipation rate (wind generation rate) of 1.3 x 10^17 Joules/day or 1.5 x 10^12 Watts.

What I'm trying to point out is wouldn't it be easier to maintain consistency by using straight-up total energy like we already do for storm clouds, or use wattages like we already do with hurricanes? Or both depending on the situation?
6. Yeah... I kinda dropped the ball and forgot to read the article before making this thread.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I'll address each of these one by one.

1. For one, we use irl standards for calculations all the time because, simply put, we're told to do that. For mountains, it's 2000 feet. For buildings, we count the stories and multiply by whatever the average storey is (around 12-15 feet depending on the type of building). For people, we use 5'9" for the average man and 5'4" for the average woman and 62 kg for both. While yes, there are things smaller (ex. Camp Wawanakwa's signature mountain, hobbits, and Ivysaur) or larger (ex. Princess Peach, Godzilla, and Mt. Fuji), generally what we're supposed to do is assume based on standards set in real life for certain unknowns even though mountains, buildings, etc vary all the time. A cloud shouldn't be an exception even when it has as many variables as mountains.

No, we use low-ends or things of limit variability.
For mountains we use the smallest things that can still be called a mountain, not an average. Similarily, bottom size for nations is tiny if we accept one at all.
For stories, there is limited possibility to vary their height downwards. You can't make them much lower, as people have to stand in them and you need to build a ceiling.
Clouds are similar to nations. They vary vastly and there is pretty much no lower limit.

To that comes that you have to remember that we talk about artificially created clouds. A storey is built by normal means, so it can be expected to follow normal standards.
Supernatural storms are not. An assumption of average supernatural storm size is basically not an assumption about the natural phenomenon of storms, but an assumption on the power of storm users. Any storm user will at most create a storm as large as they are powerful enough to do.

2. The Storm Calculations page literally says "but for the average cumulonimbus cloud" in Heading 1, Paragraph 4, Sentence 2. 15 miles is the radius of the average cumulonimbus cloud. You can't contradict an article's writing just like that.

One mention is regarding viewing distance, which is exclusively used if the sky is covered, as that's evidence supporting that particular value. Without that data point we don't use it.
Then there is the area statement, which is an example. You can't use that without confirming independently that the assumption is true. It's not something to default to.
And then there is the cloud thickness. Not the best method, but we at least have visual confirmation that it looks like the cloud type as supporting evidence.

3. That's exactly the thing. Things like altitude, lighting, object size, sky clarity, etc make things more variable than one might expect. As pointed out earlier, 20 km is for very, very ideal conditions (which, again, storms aren't). At ground level, we're limited to 3 miles as I've said before, even though things higher like clouds can be seen much further out. Lightning can even be seen a little further out, up to 265 km if your field of view isn't obscured (granted the link here is to some news article and not the NOAA, but still): https://wgntv.com/weather/weather-blog/how-far-can-you-see-lightning/https://wgntv.com/weather/weather-blog/how-far-can-you-see-lightning/

It's not really for ideal conditions. It's for good weather conditions, yes, but not for very good ones or extremely good ones. As said, if it's for example raining it doesn't apply, but if you look at cloud calculation feats you will find that we usually aren't in the situation where we have to judge whether the whole sky is covered in clouds while it's raining. We can usually see that before the rain sets in. I.e. we can use the clear air conditions that were there before the character created rain (or clouds in general) to judge things.
And for our cloud calculations, clouds are all that matter. If a patch of sky is not covered by clouds because the character only created clouds in a small radius, then that patch is high up and a big area. Neither object size nor low-to-ground height is ever relevant.

As a real-life example, on my way to work in one particularly foggy morning, in a fog that only lets me see objects up to 0.2 miles away, I can see lights from traffic signals up to a mile away, yet nothing further. All of this is assuming buildings and trees don't get in the way of our vision.

All of these scenarios are already not allowed.

If anything, it's much easier to use the standard size for a cumulonimbus cloud than it is to use a visibility guideline that, in practice, works against everything we've both pointed out in our respective viewpoints.

It doesn't, really. And contrary to the arbitrary size assumption it has a data point we can confirm and from which the result follows.

4. And that's the thing. In fiction, storms always darken the area when they appear, immediately affecting the lighting of the area they appear in.

Nah, Nami creates tiny storms.

Usually (depending on how well the illustrator or animator understands how storms work), the sky also grays out much like it does in an irl storm. The former appears on first appearance of the storm rather than, like you said, shortly after. And yes, I know you brought up blue skies earlier, but it was more relevant here than it would be in the last two points. Granted there are exceptions to this like Mufasa appearing before Simba for example, but in that case, the storm doesn't appear above the characters as they usually do.

A feat being a trope doesn't discredit the feat. If lots of authors like to make their characters have specifically sky covering storm feats, then lots of authors place them in that tier.
Just like how lots of authors doing mountain busting doesn't mean we should ignore the implication of size that comes from that.

5. My man, the hurricane section literally brings up wattages before the calculated values are made.:
What I'm trying to point out is wouldn't it be easier to maintain consistency by using straight-up total energy like we already do for storm clouds, or use wattages like we already do with hurricanes? Or both depending on the situation?

Yes, but that's for continuous feats. The power to sustain rain or to sustain wind. Not the power to instantaneously create clouds.
Those are different because they don't describe the same thing. It seems to me like you're comparing apples to oranges.