MyTraveller World Generator - Social and Tech

29 Jan, 2026

When I started to write this I didn't know how much attention gathered previous post. If you're not in the know jump to https://vdonnutvalley.bearblog.dev/mytraveller-world-generator-starport-and-physical/ to get better understanding of this whole affair.

Population, Government, Law Level

I don't think MyPopulation would be different from regular Traveller books. Just a table, 0 means no people on the world (which does not mean the starport is empty - people servicing starports are not counted for world's population). First thing I can say is that if population is 0 then the next elements - Government and Law Level - will be 0. It's a "Barren" world.

I won't bring the table here up. The rule is roll 2d6-2, 0 means no people, 1 means tens of people, 2 means hundreds, up to 9 with billions and A with tens of billions. Simple, easy. Cepheus plays a little with modifiers based on Size, Atmo and Hydro but I don't. I like to come up with reasons why there are millions of people on a world with Dangerous atmosphere or otherwise unlivable. One of the first worlds ever that I rolled was this asteroid/space station with hundreds of millions of people next to an empty Garden World. Story writes itself.

Next point is complicated. And I'm still not so sure about it all. It is Government. The roll is 2d6-7+Population. As far as I understand there is either some consensus regarding the results of the table among various Traveller edition creators or it is just copied and pasted.

0: None - anarchy, in some cases family bonds dominate. Yeah, that is a zero form of government.
1: Company/Corporation - government are managers, citizenry are employees. STOP As much as I understand the whole premise - it is a worker world, a company colony, I get it. Makes sense that it appears more often in worlds with small populations. But it also affects the next step - Law Level - and I highly doubt Corporate Colony would have loose regulations for the workers, I've been working under corporate boot and if they could take something from you they'd do that. I need to sleep on this thing.
2: Participating Democracy - "government by advise and consent of citizen" - so like Athenian Democracy I think, community voting on things and participating directly, makes sense here, more likely in small communities and probably not so strict with laws of citizens. OK
3: Self-Perpetuating Oligarchy - it is some type of aristocracy or feudalism system, the high caste is ruling over low caste. It is kinda OK, but not sure about Law Level modifier.
4: Representative Democracy - standard representative democracy, elected representatives making decisions. OK
5: Feudal Technocracy - I understand technocracy, officials leading the government are elected or chosen based on their expertise, somewhat Soviet or Chinese, maybe a bit European Union but why does it have to be feudal? Is there something from a book or other media that inspired Classic Traveller that was explicitly Feudal Technocracy? I don't know what to think of it. Also feudalism feels better for setup of oligarchy.
6: Captive Government - something simple, government on the world is from another place, it is specifically active colony or conquered place. Kind of high on the scale, could be lower due to population or higher due to law, mhm.
7: Disunion - originally called "Balkanization" let's just not call it that, ok? - today's Earth, various governments fighting each other. Seems ok.
8: Civil Service Bureaucracy - "government by agencies employing individuals selected for their expertise", so Technocracy again? Something here doesn't check out.
9: Impersonal Bureaucracy - thank Mongoose Traveller for explaining, so these are ruling castes that are separated from citizens, "decaying empire". I'm not sure how to represent it or how it actually works. The bureaucracy from point above can be like that too, I guess? At least Law Level checks out.
A: Charismatic Dictator - okay, this is fun, world during or after revolution, new leader is backed by people and is ruling as a dictator. Cool. High Law Level checks out but would it be that popular on populous worlds? How common on billion-people level worlds would that be?
B: Non-charismatic Leader - okay, fun again, charismatic leader passed and new one is chosen by more or less legalised ways. Situation is getting more stable. Points as above.
C: Charismatic Oligarchy - so, like Dictator but a few of them at once? Is it big enough difference?
D: Religious Dictatorship - so like Charismatic Dictator but religious? Again is the difference that significant?

So yeah, I have some issues with Governments roster and their influence on law level. Some things are weirdly specific, some seem like duplicates, most highest populous worlds will be during or after revolutions, ruled by dictatorships or something, I don't know how I feel about this. It did fueled my feeling of unstableness when I rolled a subsector but also it feels kinda strange. I need to think about it a lot. How do I see my cosmos?

Next thing is Law Level. The roll is 2d6-7+Government. Aside of government influence (and by extention Population) over it I think Law Level is weird. Very USA centric when it comes to weapons. Like any stable modern country not currently having war on its territory has Law Level around 7 according to original tables. Only USA would be on "light" law level. Crazy that not allowing guns everywhere is considered strict or even totalitarian. Also in the books it mostly covers weapons. I think Law Level should also affect at least the Offworlders. I thought of something like this:

Law Level	Prohibited Weapons	Offworlders
0	No Law	No Law
1	Explosives, undetectable and heavy weapons	Radio contact required
2	Military guns and rifles	Passenger manifest required
3	Any assault rifles	Landing only at authorised sites
4	Personal concealable firearms	Landing only at starport
5	Shotguns	All cargo has to be registered
6	Airguns	All business has to be registered
7	Knuckles, stunners, fireworks	Visits discouraged, contact with onworlders supervised
8	Long blades	Leaving starport is forbidden
9	All blades	Landing permitted only for overhead agents
A+	All weapons	No offworlders permitted

Of course specific laws may vary. I also thought of worlds restricting intel or tech but I'm not sure how it would work. It might block a lot of trade which is a basic game loop of Traveller so I guess these two will stay.

Okay, with Law Level we're almost out of Universal World Profile. There is only one thing left. Another contentious point that I struggle with A LOT! TECHNOLOGY LEVEL (TL). Let's review the standard Traveller tables and then I will point out my grudges.

TL 0 - no technology, Stone Age
TL 1 - Bronze or Iron Age technologies
TL 2 - Renaissance technology, growing science
TL 3 - manufactures, mass production, firearms
TL 4 - industrial revolution, plastic, radio, late 19th century
TL 5 - electrification, telecommuniation, internal combustion
TL 6 - atomic power, computing, better materials
TL 7 - satellites, reliable transport to orbit
TL 8 - reaching other planets in the system, permanent space habitats
TL 9 - gravity manipulation, early Jump Drives
TL 10 - stable Jump Drive, colonies and factories on other worlds
TL 11 - first truly artificial intelligences, better Jump Drives
TL 12 - weather control, terraformation, micronised fusion power
TL 13 - battle dress, better artificial intelligences, cloning of body parts
TL 14 - personal fusion weapons
TL 15 - anagathics, Jump 6 possible, first black globe technology

This is a trimmed up version of tables from Cepheus and Mongoose, I didn't want to just paste them here. All systems gather them into categories like 0-3 is Primitive, 4-6 Industrial, 7-9 Pre-Stellar and then various types of "Stellar" technology, Emmy from https://spooky.blot.im did a twist on that:

All right so for me I like Tech Level as it stands is somewhat redundant. If I was to make a sci-fi world and provide some taxonomy to various worlds it makes sense. But as a gameplay material I don't think it is that good. From the perspective of equipment there are improvements between the tech levels are significant and it makes sense for low TL but then we get to modern world somewhere between 7 and 8 TL and what next? Well, it cannot change too much because then the game wouldn't be relatable so we still have the same guns (slightly better), same cultures, spaceships out of sci-fi novels. So yeah, separation makes sense but also doesn't need to be that granular, especially high tech.

And then we step into worlds being marked with Tech Level. What does it mean that my asteroid world with millions of people has TL 6? Do they live on a space station but have only basic computers and can barely launch small spacecraft? How can they do that when there are people on TL 12 spaceships regularly visiting? Mongoose addresses it somewhat giving guidelines on which atmospheres can support life with which type of TL. They mention that if population has lower tech they cannot repair life support and are likely doomed. And I have found by rolling subsector that almost one third of all my worlds was in this situation. Also it points only to Atmosphere as a limited but I believe both Size and Hydrographics have a huge impact too - imagine 5% water planet and primitive technology. These people don't have water and are dead. Or Mercury-sized planet with very low gravity and people with Renaissance tech? How do they melt their swords in xenon atmosphere?

I've seen a lot of explanations of it. That TL is productive capacity of the world. Or that is the most common tech and there are people and governments with higher level. And I can understand those ideas. And in my head there are no barbarian worlds or they are very rare. You'd need to have a Garden World environment and a lot of passengers from many spaceships (considering even large ships cannot load too many people at once in Traveller universums) to avoid immediate collapse due to various factors. Or potentially some crazy people might get to Garden World and create this cosplay world where they slowly devolve into their chosen tech level and forget about it. But then there is this big question - how would civilizations from other worlds pass up on a GARDEN WORLD! IT IS A RARE WORLD THAT YOU CAN LIVE ON WITHOUT LIFE SUPPORT! VERY PRECIOUS PLACE IN CRUEL COSMOS! HOW COULD YOU WASTE IT!?

So what does Primitive TL on unlivable world means? I don't know yet. I lean on explanation that it is simply most common technology. Either it is restricted by government (on High Law totalitarian worlds) or whatever happened and they cannot produce enough and offworld trade cannot keep with a demand. Another creative exercise shit. It would also mean that the civilisation MIGHT have a problem with life support. Or maybe they are prepared and have spare parts and technicians 'on-site' but people in commonality have insufficient tech. OR religious reasons or something. Shit, I need to write a post about cultures and religions as I see them in grand cosmos.

I wanted to finish this post with my thoughts on Trade Codes and trade in general but I would be writing this for the next two months or something so it is as it is and I will mix Trade with Cultures and Religions and "bigger world". Cheers!

#Traveller #worldbuilding