How "Lusty" is a Goldflight?

[Shalyn]

Different Weyrs play goldflights, and their effects on people, differently. But differences in club-play aside, exactly how much would a goldflight affect:

Your average Weyr worker (Lower Caverns, herdbeast keepers, healers...)

The 'losing' bronzeriders? Can/will they 'perform' under any circumstances?

Non-participating riders? Will they go find someone, or can they go about their daily work?

And...how far does the flight broadcast? After all, 'the best flights are the longest and highest'. Why would an entire Weyr still feel the effects of the queen/bronze after they are miles away?

Come to think of it, if the dragons are miles above the earth, how/why do people hear them? (Remember F'nor's thoughts in DQ - some brown/green flights were as loud as bronze/gold.) Is it the sensitivity?

[Cavatica]

I'm really surprised no one has answered this yet.

Gold flights are big deals, directly affecting nearly everyone in the Weyr, from your bronzeriders all the way down to your lower caverns workers. I'm sure it wouldn't even be all that unusual for particularly sensitive people to pick up on the flight vibes in nearby cotholds and such. I've read (don't remember where now) that it's not uncommon for Weyrs to experience small baby booms after gold flights, particularly high-energy, important ones like leadership flights.

Consider that dragons are, in a lot of ways, a hive mind, a collective. They are, on a subliminal level at the very least, constantly tuned in to one another. Given, too, that the draconic social system is a matriarchy, they're particularly tuned in to gold dragons, planet-wide. For instance, if a green dragon died -- of old age, let's say -- I very much doubt that, in the middle of a Pass with all the Weyrs at full fighting strength, anyone outside that dragon's Weyr would take much notice. When a GOLD dragon dies, it's a big deal: all the dragons and all the riders know it right away.

This means that golds are loud, especially in a heightened state of emotion -- sexual arousal, fear, anger, etc. It's why other queens have to be removed from the Weyr entirely when one of their number begins blooding-- not only will that queen regard them as competition for her males, but her heat may trigger any other golds near their cycles to rise as well (which gives us something like the Prideth-Wirenth catastrophe). The greens don't tend to be a problem, since they're at the bottom of the hierarchy and can resist rising when a gold is mid-flight -- chances are excellent that a mating green wouldn't stand up in a fight against a bloodthirsty, jealous queen, and so they likely stay grounded until the flight is over. However, I wouldn't be surprised if it's common for a few greens, both in the immediate Weyr and other Weyrs across the planet (with progressively fewer of them affected as you get further away), to rise right after the conclusion of a queen flight.

Whether the losing chasers are able to "perform" is probably affected by what kind of man you're talking about, as well as the way each rider's dragon behaves post-flight. For instance, if a bronze dragon is despondent over the loss, his rider may be too bummed out to bother with trying to find sex elsewhere and either take a nap, take a cold bath/shower, or get completely plastered. If the dragon is the type to get annoyed and retain the remnants of his lust for a while, his rider may try to get a hold of a willing lower caverns girl somewhere... or, once again, get completely plastered. Or take matters into his own hands, as it were. Physiologically speaking, I don't see any reason why a losing rider couldn't actually perform. You're not talking about post-ejaculation, you're talking about interrupted arousal. Some men can come back from that with relative ease; some men can't. Again, it just depends on the person.

An entire Weyr would feel the effects of a queenflight a few miles away because, from what I can gather, dragon telepathy stays at about the same strength for a radius of X miles (don't know what it is, exactly) before it begins to drop off -- and, even then, I think you'd really have to be on the opposite side of the planet to notice any change. I think it's sort of relativistic in that regard, and behaves a bit like light-- light travel, for instance, seems pretty much instantaneous for, I don't know, a few light-minutes of distance, maybe even a few light-hours. It's not until you start getting into lots of light-hours, or light-days or weeks or months or years, that you start to see a delay. Telepathy seems to operate on about the same principle-- it has such a wide range that distance just isn't a factor until you get really, really far away.

Also figure that the nature of the draconic collective mind can serve to enhance a "broadcast" -- so if you've got a dozen horny dragons already broadcasting at unusual "volume", a few hundred local dragons (as well as whers and firelizards if any are nearby) all simultaneously tuned in can serve as a pretty effective amplifier. Even non-sensitives are liable to be affected by all the hormones and brainwaves surging between hither and yon.

So, you know. Mindless debauchery for everybody, whoo!

[C_ris]

It was also mentioned somewhere (where, i can't remember) that some green-brown pairings were as loud as gold-bronze though!

[Grey Bear]

Gold dragon is putting out there. Bunch of bronzes who ain't had any action in a while.

Essentially, its like a single dockwalker parading in front of an aircraft carrier full of men who haven't seen shore for 18 months. *beams*

GB

[Anareth]

We know how the BRONZES react (they're males, aren't they?) ;) ) but what Shalyn was aiming for was does a gold flight mean just about anyone in the Weyr who isn't prepubescent, senescent, or otherwise unable/unwilling to perform is boinking like bunnies from the halo effect of the gold lust?

[cwolf]

I thought it was mentioned somewhere in one of Anne's books that younger riders and their dragons were generally sent away during that time... as well as the weyrlings that were adopted by weyr families.

Different Weyrs play goldflights, and their effects on people, differently. But differences in club-play aside, exactly how much would a goldflight affect:

Your average Weyr worker (Lower Caverns, herdbeast keepers, healers...)

The 'losing' bronzeriders? Can/will they 'perform' under any circumstances?

Non-participating riders? Will they go find someone, or can they go about their daily work?

And...how far does the flight broadcast? After all, 'the best flights are the longest and highest'. Why would an entire Weyr still feel the effects of the queen/bronze after they are miles away?

Come to think of it, if the dragons are miles above the earth, how/why do people hear them? (Remember F'nor's thoughts in DQ - some brown/green flights were as loud as bronze/gold.) Is it the sensitivity?

[Cavatica]

We know how the BRONZES react (they're males, aren't they?) ;) ) but what Shalyn was aiming for was does a gold flight mean just about anyone in the Weyr who isn't prepubescent, senescent, or otherwise unable/unwilling to perform is boinking like bunnies from the halo effect of the gold lust? Right.

And I said that most of them probably are. ;>

Also figure that the nature of the draconic collective mind can serve to enhance a "broadcast" -- so if you've got a dozen horny dragons already broadcasting at unusual "volume", a few hundred local dragons (as well as whers and firelizards if any are nearby) all simultaneously tuned in can serve as a pretty effective amplifier. Even non-sensitives are liable to be affected by all the hormones and brainwaves surging between hither and yon.

So, you know. Mindless debauchery for everybody, whoo!

[Grey Bear]

I have this rather bad and totally wrong image of a rather naughty-looking transmitter sending out pulsating pink waves of energy now. Bad GB, bad GB...

GB

[Shalyn]

I thought it was mentioned somewhere in one of Anne's books that younger riders and their dragons were generally sent away during that time... as well as the weyrlings that were adopted by weyr families.

I don't know if that would be possible. I mean, how much time do you have between a dragon waking up all horny, going to blood for energy, then rising?

[Brightwing]

Well, one of the books (or possibly a few) mentioned bronzes blooding their kill prior to a gold flight, even the gold being awake. I think it was Ramoth's first flight, actually. Would that give a little more warning?

[PernWebGoddess]

during the Dragon Sex panel one year at D*C, one of the panelists mentioned how when a goldflight travels near a hold, the birthrate at the hold goes up nine months later. :)

[Ravien Coromana]

during the Dragon Sex panel one year at D*C, one of the panelists mentioned how when a goldflight travels near a hold, the birthrate at the hold goes up nine months later. :)
Thats a scary thought...