I was thinking about how cool the harsh land of skyrim will be when i thought about the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_sun and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_night effects that lands above the Arctic Circle experience. I understand that Nirm is a different world than our earth but most planets tend to have some kind of tilt in there axis as they rotate around their star, so Nirn having these effects would not be completely out of the question.

Also from a rp point of view it would be kinda awesome.... especially for a vampire character during the polar night period!!!! 30 Days of Night any one? :chaos:

There are no 30 days of night (atleast here) but there are days that lasts for over 2 months, good idea

I think it is not going to be experienced enough for Bethesda to bother. The effects usually last about a month (at least anywhere that you would want to go to see it), and although many characters can be played for several game months, you probably wouldn't see more than one of each of these. If they shortened it, it would just cheapen the effect.

Plus I really don't want to have to see a hundred "[censored] SON AND MOONS ARE BROKED" posts a day because many people are too stupid to know what this natural occurring thing is. And yes the misspellings were intentional.

I'd rather keep a standard day/night cycle, it'd get kinda boring if it was day/night for weeks or months.

This.

There is an entire continent North of Skyrim. It's not that far North!

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Atmora

No.

Nirn is however not like that. Skyrim is not the northern most area of Nirn, Atmora is far to the north. However, Aurora Borealis is fine, the midnight sun and Polar night of our world just doesn't fit well imo.

I said no only because they would have to add so many calculations for such a small feature. It'd be kinda cool, but not worth the effort.

Right, the Aurora is seen in the contiguous U.S., so it does extend pretty far south. And I doubt they'd wanna program a progressively changing day/night cycle anyway.

Edit: Nevermind

lets put in season changes first, before going this far.
What is the tilt of Nirn anyway?

At most, I'd like nights to go up to 16 hours and have days8 hours and vice versa, but even that only for a while. It's not something I'd really like to see. Also, Skyrim ain't that close to the polar circle.

Now that is the million dollar question, isn't it. lol

I'm not even sure "axial tilt" is even a meaningful term when it comes to Nirn. When the sun is actually an opening in the sky that leads to the plane of magic, one has to imagine that physics concepts like that have to be thrown out the window.

I should also like to note that Morrowind, unless I missed something, didn't have changes in the length of days depending on the time of year, and portions of Vvardenfell are actually further north than the northernmost point of Skyrim (and that's not even including Solstheim). Who knows?

If there are 30 days of night for a vampire to roam whenever he wants, then that means there will also be 30 days of sun that will kill the vampire. If they have 30 days of sun, then EVERYBODY that wants to be a vampire will complain and freak out.
For the sake of our sanity, I think they shouldn't have 30 game-days of night/day, but maybe extend the time a little bit, so the amount of sun and moon will vary from 8-16 hours of each. That will make it so it is noticable, but won't cause people to freak out about there not being night or day.

TL;DR
I think they should vary the time a little, but not as extreme as having 30 days or night/day. Maybe just make it so the length of day and night change as the seasons progress.

How about the Aurora Polaris?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurora_(astronomy)

I don't think Skyrim is actually that far north, especially since Atmora is supposed to be even more northwards. Skyrim is as far north as Solstheim and the norther areas of Vvardenfell and Morrowind, as well as Highrock.

Skyrim's climate is probably colder than its neighbors due to topographic elevation rather than geographic longitude.

Midnight sun, maybe in Atmora, but not in Skyrim.
Polar night is pretty complicated and Skryim is not that far in the north.

I said 'no', but not for stupid geographical reasons like "Skyrim isn't far enough north you guys!". I just think it would detract from gameplay too much to have permanent darkness.