r/WarframeLore • u/TheRogueKnight66 • 9d ago
Warframe time scale
In one of Elenor's KIM messages she mentions the constellations being different between Drifter's time and hers, which got me thinking; how long would it take for he constellations to change? Turns out, its tens of thousands of years! We're working on a times scale similar to that of Dune's! It makes me wonder how much of that time were the Orokin in power for? Anyways I just thought that was interesting!
41
u/Tipsy_Hog 9d ago
From what I understand, the Orokin gained a proper foothold at some point after the Radiation Wars, which was basically a nuclear apocalypse that happened most likely around the early 2000s as a failed attempt to contain the Techrot
We don't know how long the Radiation Wars lasted (or really anything else about the event other than "it happened" lol) and we don't know how long it took for Humanity to get back on its feet.
They wouldn't become the Orokin that we're familiar with until MUCH later though.
10
u/dogplayer22 9d ago
Didn't we got mention of radiation wars on the double digits somewhere? I think I remember hearing or reading the numbers 18 or 23, either way there was at least 3 and if we're considering the interval between one and another being of at least 1 year (otherwise it could be considered the same "war") then things must have gone on for a loooong time, I may be wrong tho this comment in specific is mostly speculation based on my bad memory, dont quote me
19
u/Lucky-Reflection4650 8d ago
18 is mentioned in one of Zariman tablets in Duviri
- What event concluded the Eighteenth Radiation War?
- A. The destruction of the Arctic Hive Cluster
- B. The assassination of Marcellus Ambrosius Lephantis
7
u/Tipsy_Hog 9d ago
Frankly, none of what I say is personally verified. It's just my cursory understanding of what is quite possibly the single most vague and unexplained event in Warframe's lore
17
u/VexedForest 9d ago
This reminds me of the anime Dr Stone.
3700 years in the future and the North Star (Polaris) is no longer true North.
10
u/Carrera26 9d ago
Precession is the slow drift of the planet's axis, and after a few centuries the constellations would be noticeably different. So less time than you probably think.
8
u/LimboMain2020 9d ago
I think that's the real scary thing about the Orokin. They could of reformed history in such a little amount of time
5
u/Emotional_Doggo 8d ago
They most likely did. They went out of their way to destroy and lock up any traces of history before they had absolute control or something to gain from revealing it. Even the slightest slip up meant a fraction of their power being lost and they hated that most of all. Killed anyone that knew and then gaslighted the rest.
7
u/wavrindrake 9d ago
From my research into this. Its roughly 26 to 30k years for every star to change from its original orientation. Which plays into warframe's themes of certain number patterns (the number 30 in this case). With that said, it could still be much later, this is more of a minimum. And nothing happened to alter them further at any point.
4
u/PirateUnlucky3303 8d ago
If you're into astrology, nasa recalculated the zodiac at some point, even adding a 13th sign because the stars have shifted since the signs were determined.. So I guess a couple thousand years at minimum
1
u/WeltallZero 8d ago
So I thought that apparent positions of the stars in the sky would mostly only change due to precession (the Earth's spin axis tilting, which has a 26000 year cycle and would hide or show some stars and constellations from each hemisphere in a fraction of that), at least for any human-relevant timescale. It turns out I was dead wrong, though: from Wikipedia:
Stars in constellations can appear near each other in the sky, but they usually lie at a variety of distances away from the Earth. Since each star has its own independent motion, all constellations will change slowly over time. After tens to hundreds of thousands of years, familiar outlines will become unrecognizable.\13]) Astronomers can predict the past or future constellation outlines by measuring common proper motions of individual stars\14]) by accurate astrometry\15])\16]) and their radial velocities by astronomical spectroscopy.\17])
It still requires tens to hundred of thousands of years, and would mostly affect the stars closest to Earth, but that's still within human timescales and conceivably within Warframe's time frame.
Another possibility (depending on Eleanor's wording, which I can't find in the Kimulacrum) is that she means the Orokin era has a completely different imaginary grouping of the same stars into different constellations. And, I mean, it would be 100% like the Orokin to completely forego the old constellations, mostly based on Greek and Roman gods and myths, and create new ones shape after themselves. :P
4
u/SilverwingStonewall 9d ago
Im pretty sure the timescale from 1999 to now is many Hundreds of Thousands of years, with the gap between the Old War and New War being several thousands of years itself
0
u/LimboMain2020 9d ago
A few hundred years. The first humans in our own world would of seen an entirely different sky.
90
u/Glass_Eye8840 9d ago
A more horrifying thought is something else happened to change the constellations.