How does one determine which direction is upspin and which is downspin when on a Halo?
I believe that it is made arbitrarily. It’s brought up a couple times in “The Flood” that cardinal directions are useless on a Halo, so the soldiers had to pick an arbitrary point on the ring and go up-spin or down-spin from there
As an example, a marine could point at the Pillar of Autumn crash site and say “Alpha Base is three klicks downspin from the crash site”, meaning Alpha Base is three kilometers away from the POA crash site in their direction.
I guess you can effectively only do that at night, by watching the movements of the stars and/or nearby planetary bodies.
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> I believe that it is made arbitrarily. It’s brought up a couple times in “The Flood” that cardinal directions are useless on a Halo, so the soldiers had to pick an arbitrary point on the ring and go up-spin or down-spin from there
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> As an example, a marine could point at the Pillar of Autumn crash site and say “Alpha Base is three klicks downspin from the crash site”, meaning Alpha Base is three kilometers away from the POA crash site in their direction.
Oh I see. So it’s a relative direction that requires a point of reference such as the PoA in your example and your current location. Is that correct?
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> I guess you can effectively only do that at night, by watching the movements of the stars and/or nearby planetary bodies.
That’s an interesting idea. Can you please elaborate a bit?
Up spin refers to the direction the ring is spinning in while down spin is the opposite. Because almost everyone who survived the autumn came down from orbit they most likely tracked the direction of spin. The movement of the light and the near by gas giant also helped to highlight up spin and down spin.
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> Up spin refers to the direction the ring is spinning in while down spin is the opposite. Because almost everyone who survived the autumn came down from orbit they most likely tracked the direction of spin. The movement of the light and the near by gas giant also helped to highlight up spin and down spin.
Okay, now I get it. I totally forgot the rings spun while in orbit. Thanks 
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> > 2533274902628105;5:
> > Up spin refers to the direction the ring is spinning in while down spin is the opposite. Because almost everyone who survived the autumn came down from orbit they most likely tracked the direction of spin. The movement of the light and the near by gas giant also helped to highlight up spin and down spin.
>
> Okay, now I get it. I totally forgot the rings spun while in orbit. Thanks
Ah yes so it isn’t arbitrary. Thanks for the clarification smasher555!