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[T5SS] TL 0 Imperial Worlds

Garnfellow

Garnfellow

SOC-13
Peer of the Realm
I did a query on TravellerMap for all TL 0 Imperial worlds. I was surprised by the very small number of examples and the extremely skewed distribution:

  • Anomaly Five (Deneb 0615) X100000-0
  • Ugrik (Deneb 2016) E300000-0
  • Kulabisha (Fornast 2404) E687000-0
  • Hyacinthe (Fornast 3228) E436000-0
  • Barren (Gushemege 0228) X652000-0
  • Unuv (Gushemege 1127) X423000-0
  • Larspri (Old Expanses 0408) X581000-0
  • 134-635 (Old Expanses 2005) X6A5000-0
  • Arthur (Reaver's Deep 3112) E566000-0
  • Kishakhpap (Solomani Rim 0125) X410000-0
  • Weipu (Solomani Rim 0719) X543000-0
  • Rimmon (Solomani Rim 1306) X422000-0
  • Altair (Solomani Rim 1522) X000000-0
  • Khugi (Solomani Rim 2713) X000000-0
  • 728-907 (Spinward Marches 1214) E955000-0
  • Tavonni (Spinward Marches 1520) E567000-0
  • Djinni (Spinward Marches 2111) X559000-0
  • Gerome (Spinward Marches 2818) X573000-0
  • Pavanne (Spinward Marches 2905) E310000-0
  • Huderu (Spinward Marches 3114) X575000-0
  • 971-852 (Trojan Reach 2814) E78A000-0
  • Deyis II (Zarushagar 0917) E874000-0

I can't guarantee I got all of them, but this seems like a very odd result. I would not expect barren, TL0 worlds to be common or even uncommon in the Third Imperium, even in a "frontier" area like the Spinward Marches. But why so many in the Rim? And why so few everywhere else? I would expect almost every sector to have at least one or two barren systems.

Does anyone know what is going on here? It looks like all barren worlds not specifically mentioned in canon got mass scrubbed from the T5SS data. (This would explain why the Rim and the Marches stand out.)

If this were intentional, I'm not sure it's completely desirable. If an accident, can it be undone?
 
maybe they're haunted.

Arthur (Reaver's Deep 3112) E566000-0 and 728-907 (Spinward Marches 1214) E955000-0 seem really strange. atmo 6/5 but hydro 0?
 
Unless I am misunderstanding something, these worlds all have no people.
(although some still manage an E starport)
 
All of the worlds listed are barren. I would expect barren worlds to be TL 0. These worlds have never been inhabited. Given the long history of the Imperium I find the list being this small expected.
 
Unless I am misunderstanding something, these worlds all have no people.
(although some still manage an E starport)
Click to expand...

more specifically, they have nothing that counts as an imperial citizen. but there will be someone/something there to justify the E.
 
tjoneslo said:
All of the worlds listed are barren. I would expect barren worlds to be TL 0. These worlds have never been inhabited. Given the long history of the Imperium I find the list being this small expected.
Click to expand...

Barren worlds need not never have been inhabited; our own world is full of formerly populated places that were abandoned due to economic or political or climate change. The Imperium is old enough that many worlds could have been settled, thrived, and depopulated dozens of times.

I don't think it's the total number of barren worlds that seems hinky, it's the distribution: the Rim and the Marches have 50% of all barren worlds in the Imperium.
 
atpollard said:
Unless I am misunderstanding something, these worlds all have no people.
(although some still manage an E starport)
Click to expand...
In T5 I believe E can be an automated nav beacon, but no other facilties. X is either absolutely nothing or simply unknown.
 
A couple of those jump out as being possibly teaming with sub-sentient life.

Perhaps the IISS is keeping watch to see if the native life achieves sentient status.

And population 0 means 0-9 Imperial citizens - enough to justify a couple of type S survey teams perhaps.
 
To put it another way, you have two sectors that appear to follow very different rules for barren worlds than all other sectors in the Imperium.

I have no problem with barren worlds being very rare within the Imperium, but I don't think they should be systematically scrubbed either.

For example, the Mongoose Solomani book had a half dozen or more barren worlds in Alpha Crucis that were overwritten with populations in the T5SS. I'm not sure that was the right call.
 
There is no prime directive - some ethically challenged merchants would make a fortune trading with TL0 cultures and they would be quickly elevated.
 
I, too, find it a weird result. And not because the distribution across geography (I'm not really family with 3I geography.)

It's the part where there is no pop or government or laws that throws me off.

When rolling for the Tech Index, one rolls a single D6 and adds appropriate mods based on the other UWP factors.

There are only two negative modifiers:
-4 for X starport
-2 for Religious Dictatorship

That's the only way to end up with 0 TL

But once you've got that -4 from an X Starport you'll need +4 in DMs on that die roll to guarantee avoiding a Tech Index of 0.

And gathering up +3 worth of DMs on the Technological Index Matrix actually isn't that easy. With no +DMs you've got a 66% chance of having a Tech Index of 0.

Rolling up a X Starport really weights the odds in favor of a Tech Index of 0, but with a population, government and laws all as given possibilities.

I know that that GDW forced the hand on the UWPs. I wonder if they altered the UWP generation quite a bit to get these results.
 
creativehum said:
I, too, find it a weird result. And not because the distribution across geography (I'm not really family with 3I geography.)

It's the part where there is no pop or government or laws that throws me off.

When rolling for the Tech Index, one rolls a single D6 and adds appropriate mods based on the other UWP factors.

There are only two negative modifiers:
-4 for X starport
-2 for Religious Dictatorship

That's the only way to end up with 0 TL

But once you've got that -4 from an X Starport you'll need +4 in DMs on that die roll to guarantee avoiding a Tech Index of 0.

And gathering up +3 worth of DMs on the Technological Index Matrix actually isn't that easy. With no +DMs you've got a 66% chance of having a Tech Index of 0.

Rolling up a X Starport really weights the odds in favor of a Tech Index of 0, but with a population, government and laws all as given possibilities.

I know that that GDW forced the hand on the UWPs. I wonder if they altered the UWP generation quite a bit to get these results.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure when it came in, but population 0 forces law 0, tech 0.

Frank
 
ffilz said:
I'm not sure when it came in, but population 0 forces law 0, tech 0.

Frank
Click to expand...

That's completely understandable.

But that's not what I was discussing. I was pointing that every TL 0 world found on that list in the OP had 000 for pop, gov, and law... And by the rules, that's weird.

It's certainly possible at that all the worlds on that list were rolled as Pop 0 worlds, which forced the other UPP codes to 0.

But where are the Starport X worlds that ended up with Pop, Gov, and LL above 0 and still have a TL 0. Any Starport X worlds is likely to be such a world. Where are those worlds?
 
Last edited:
By the way, I just shot over to the Traveller Map. I think Garnfellow got the result he did because he specified Imperial worlds (???)

I say this because I searched for both TL0 world and Starport X worlds and got worlds that had:
TL 0
And
Worlds with Pop, Gov, and Law.

Maybe worlds within the Imperium were reset so that's if there was no tech, by definition no one would live there?
 
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