A question about Tech Levels

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

Did you mean Clarke? ("Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"?) Or did Asimov have his own variation on the theme?

Turn it around ("sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology") and it shows up a lot. Sometimes attributed to Larry Niven, but it's probably been said by many people following Clarke.

Yeah. I meant Clarke. Asimov was robotics.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Treasure Planet, honestly, is more TL 4+5^) than a flat 4^. Their ships do use some kind of rocket-looking thrusters and lots of pirate story fixtures are rendered in tech-looking ways.

I don't know how Cyrano works, but straight-up TL 4^ space travel could look like The Road Not Taken, or ships made of antigravity wood that can sail to and through space...or Spelljammers, perhaps.

GURPS is a little vague on how "^" is to be used in conjunction with TL(x+y).

I've gone though what GURPS material I have and the only clear example of TL(x+y)^ I can fine is Mandrake-1. Everything else is either TL(x+y) with magic/alternative physics or TL(x+y) sub technology x^

Logic would suggest Cyrano would apply some of that TL(x+y) to their TLx^ It is one of the least explained parts of the GURPS TL system...which may be the point.

On a side note the rarely seen sequel "Herbig-Haro" has this to say about all the races humanity has encountered in the 1200 years since 2039: "No idea—in hindsight they're obvious enough. What's that race that flew bronze ships because they couldn't smelt iron? And every every species we know that reached what the old Terrans would have called a seventeenth-century technological level did what was needed—except us."

This means the highest anyone other then humanity got in that universe was TL 5^ at which point their progression simply stopped. Then humanity finds the Zanat.

Ironically humanity became so technologically fragmented in its expansion that "These Zanat of yours will have to be reckoned with. From your tapes, I'd rate their technology at the level of mid-twentieth century Terra: say, 130 pre-Confederacy. There can't be more than a couple of hundred planets in human space that can match them, and no three of those trust a fourth, Loki sadly included. Now a whole united species knows where we are."

On a side note the Zanat also have FTL capability showing that either they discovered it or it fell into their lap.

[Stormcrow]

I never assume that writers of supplements are in perfect harmony with the writers of base rules. I take examples of TLs of the infinite worlds with a grain of salt.

TL^ is used to designate a single piece of technology as operating on principles that don't exist in the real world. An example is a TL^ warp drive. Since it's superscience, it doesn't matter whether a TL10 or a TL2 society developed it. Build it with TL10 materials and it's a TL10^ warp drive; build it with TL2 materials and it's a TL2^ warp drive.

TL(x+y) is used to designate a technology or overall technology that has diverged from the real world's technological path (historical or projected). It uses different principles than we would to achieve a similar effect. What that principle is is not specified by the designation. So the Earth League of Tales of the Solar Patrol, which diverged from our world by not developing transistors in the 1940s, is TL(6+3). Its technology operates in an analog fashion to achieve TL9 results.

If your divergence is due to magic being used in a technology, then you've got a combination of the two. Posit a setting in which a disaster in the 1970s (TL7) infused the Earth with usable magic. People start to find ways to incorporate magic into devices. Today that world would be TL(7+1). An example might be in data processing. Instead of a heavy expansion of the Internet, personal computers might have a "magic card" installed, which lets them download data at high speeds from public servers over the "Mananet." Such a PC would be designated TL(7+1)^.

Fortunately, it's not terribly important to get the TL of every society and device in your campaign world exactly right. The main use for it will be for authors to give readers a way to work out what equipment will be available in a setting. The other main use of TLs will be to calculate penalties when you're using technologies you're not familiar with. In the latter case, the GM just has to know enough to produce the best modifier; the details aren't important.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

I never assume that writers of supplements are in perfect harmony with the writers of base rules. I take examples of TLs of the infinite worlds with a grain of salt.

Problem is Andrew Hackard and Steven Jackson himself edited the Basic Set while Steven Jackson wrote Infinite Worlds and Andrew Hackard was editor. So you have an editor of one book writing the other (Steven Jackson) and the same person (Andrew Hackard) editing both.

So two of the same people had a hand in both the Basic Set and Infinite Worlds

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

TL^ is used to designate a single piece of technology as operating on principles that don't exist in the real world. An example is a TL^ warp drive. Since it's superscience, it doesn't matter whether a TL10 or a TL2 society developed it. Build it with TL10 materials and it's a TL10^ warp drive; build it with TL2 materials and it's a TL2^ warp drive.

TL(x+y) is used to designate a technology or overall technology that has diverged from the real world's technological path (historical or projected). It uses different principles than we would to achieve a similar effect. What that principle is is not specified by the designation. So the Earth League of Tales of the Solar Patrol, which diverged from our world by not developing transistors in the 1940s, is TL(6+3). Its technology operates in an analog fashion to achieve TL9 results.

The problem is when you run into worlds that have a split TL. I should mention that Krenneth Hite, who wrote Infinite Worlds also wrote Infinite Worlds-Lost Worlds and Infinite Worlds-Worlds of Horror.

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

If your divergence is due to magic being used in a technology, then you've got a combination of the two. Posit a setting in which a disaster in the 1970s (TL7) infused the Earth with usable magic. People start to find ways to incorporate magic into devices. Today that world would be TL(7+1). An example might be in data processing. Instead of a heavy expansion of the Internet, personal computers might have a "magic card" installed, which lets them download data at high speeds from public servers over the "Mananet." Such a PC would be designated TL(7+1)^.

This is where things get a little squirrelly. The pro-internet goes all the way back to 1969 with ARPANET (read Cliff Stoll's Cuckoo's Egg for what it was back in the 1970s when mainframes were the thing). PC in of themselves are considered TL8 so a PC with a "magic card" that connected it to the "Mananet" would be TL8^ not TL(7+1)^

Magic plays total havoc with the GURPS TL scale. Shape metal+create fire+create Water can = steam engine. So would such a Steam engine developed in Roman times be TL2^ or TL(2+3)^?

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

Fortunately, it's not terribly important to get the TL of every society and device in your campaign world exactly right. The main use for it will be for authors to give readers a way to work out what equipment will be available in a setting.

Which given the huge range of magic in GURPS it fails to do. Shape metal makes it possible to make weapons sharper and armor better then they ever could be in the "Normal" TL1-4 range. With enough mages/blessed folk smithing may not even exist. In some colleges one can get pretty deep before encountering spells that require magery.

Heck, iron rations (one of the supplies available in old AD&D1) could be nothing more then normal food with Preserve Food cast on it.

[Stormcrow]

This is where things get a little squirrelly. The pro-internet goes all the way back to 1969 with ARPANET (read Cliff Stoll's Cuckoo's Egg for what it was back in the 1970s when mainframes were the thing). PC in of themselves are considered TL8 so a PC with a "magic card" that connected it to the "Mananet" would be TL8^ not TL(7+1)^

I'm perfectly aware of the origins of the Internet. That's why I said "heavy expansion," not "invention." The computer in my example is not a normal real-world computer with a TL^ magic card inserted; it's a computer from the TL(7+1) world that operates on magical principles. If you took that computer to a no-mana zone, it would cease to function, because the technology on which it operates isn't working. Your TL8 computer with a TL^ magic card would continue working, sans network.

Which given the huge range of magic in GURPS it fails to do. Shape metal makes it possible to make weapons sharper and armor better then they ever could be in the "Normal" TL1-4 range. With enough mages/blessed folk smithing may not even exist. In some colleges one can get pretty deep before encountering spells that require magery.

The point of TLs is not to predict the existence of technology, but to guide the GM in its application. You're not looking at a TL and trying to decide what technology must therefore exist; the TL tells you the level of technological progression of any given technology that the GM says DOES exist.

So declaring a magical society TL(7+1) does not mean I can now predict what the technology will look like. I'm DECLARING what the technology looks like, and then reading equipment lists and applying modifiers according to that declaration. Declaring TL(7+1) does not, for example, mean there must logically be computers with mana cards connecting me to the Mananet; but if I SAY that there are, then I know that MOST of the computer's operation is based in real-world 60's and 70's technologies, with the latest advancements being in magical features. It tells me that a character from this setting would have a -2 penalty using the TL8 computer I'm sitting in front of now, and I would have a -2 penalty using his. I know that our computers can do roughly the same work. I know we would both be able to use a TL7 mainframe with a -1 penalty.

And that's kind of the whole point of having TL rules in the first place. Not to force the game's technology into a certain shape, but to give the GM a tool to use in adjudicating the uses of various technologies that do appear in his game.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

I'm perfectly aware of the origins of the Internet. That's why I said "heavy expansion," not "invention." The computer in my example is not a normal real-world computer with a TL^ magic card inserted; it's a computer from the TL(7+1) world that operates on magical principles. If you took that computer to a no-mana zone, it would cease to function, because the technology on which it operates isn't working. Your TL8 computer with a TL^ magic card would continue working, sans network.

Supersicence serves the same function as magic (Clarke's and Niven's laws do a tango :-) )

Take Star Trek for example. On the surface the Original Series (TOS) is TL11^ but based on the details TL6^-7^ would be more accurate.

Computers are composed of flashing lights and manual switches just as they were at TL6 for much of Kirk's original tour.

The microchip was unknown in their 1990s ("Space Seed"), a imitative TL6 culture could in a few years duplicate much of their technology thanks to studying one part...and they took 100 years to go from early TL5 to 1920's TL6 even though they had books on how to make the TL6 stuff ("A Piece of the Action". Crude versions of their computers can be made with TL6 equipment ("City on the Edge of Forever") and so on.

Yes they have some TL8 equipment such as the high tech clipboard which is clearly a iPad like device, but they are effectively at TL6^.

[TwodSix]

Originally Posted by Kerdied

I would ask to you how it will be a TL 2+7/2+10 or 3+6/3+9, please?
My players are not too fond of TL 10 (or 2+8/3+7).

Shame, TL10 is probably one of the most interesting areas of technology. Unmanned interstellar missions (and possibly very slow generation ships), but fast relatively cheap interplanetary travel, medicine might even have reached biological immortality and artificial creatures can be developed. There's a lot to explore in TL10 that people tend not to (Transhuman Space is a great example of how TL10 verging on 11 might go).

For a TL9 equivalent, capabilities are likely at the level of 2001: A Space Odyssey (without the problems feeding six billion people that world has). Manned interplanetary travel is slow and probably involves firing boosters to achieve the transfer that'll take you to your target and/or gravitational slingshots, not a flip and burn. Interplanetary travel takes months at best, years for most routes.

Note at the divergence you're going for you'd either end up with something so wildly different that GURPS Tech Levels can't really cover it, or a massive case of 'like X but'. This seems to stop being the case around TL5 (where divergence causes mechanical computers to be used instead of electronic ones) or TL6 (where the transistor is never developed but electronics/electrics still develops), but that's a bit more of a case of anything more than a few levels above them being speculative anyway.

The closest thing to TL(3+6) is most like Spelljammer, where there's still things like spaceships, but the way they're made is different because the world is inherently different (or, for a less divergent TL(3+6) you'd get something like The Aether Sea with magical holographic controls and ships being armed with giant wands of scorching ray instead of laser cannons). on the TL(3+8) side you'd likely have significantly glowier Star Wars, where blasters are replaced by automatic wands or other theoretically different but functionally the same item.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by maximara

Supersicence serves the same function as magic (Clarke's and Niven's laws do a tango :-) )

Take Star Trek for example. On the surface the Original Series (TOS) is TL11^ but based on the details TL6^-7^ would be more accurate.

Computers are composed of flashing lights and manual switches just as they were at TL6 for much of Kirk's original tour.

The microchip was unknown in their 1990s ("Space Seed"), a imitative TL6 culture could in a few years duplicate much of their technology thanks to studying one part...and they took 100 years to go from early TL5 to 1920's TL6 even though they had books on how to make the TL6 stuff ("A Piece of the Action". Crude versions of their computers can be made with TL6 equipment ("City on the Edge of Forever") and so on.

Yes they have some TL8 equipment such as the high tech clipboard which is clearly a iPad like device, but they are effectively at TL6^.

No. Kirk may have joked about the Iotians reverse engineering the transtator, but it was a joke at the end of a very jokey episode. If it was that easy, the Romans would have done it. They had plenty of samples of communicators to study and better technology than the Iotians. Mind you Star Trek is a setting that has some people with Science! and Engineer! so a lot more bending of technology limits is allowed.

[Ulzgoroth]

I submit that TL is more meaningful applied to a society than an individual artifact, and that this lets us draw a useful difference between TL X^ and TL X+Y^.

What defines a TL X+Y society is that in it's general capabilities (notably productivity) it resembles a TL x+y society. A TL X^ society has general capabilities matching a TL X society, plus some 'impossible' capabilities. As the Basic Set points out, the super-science impossibilities don't actually belong to any TL except by arbitrary GM assignment and "superscience doesn’t have to change a society’s overall TL, create a new technology path, or cause a divergent TL."

So when does it do so? When it gives the society broad capabilities higher than their point of divergence in doing the things that non-superscience societies can.

Magic wands that perform like gamma-ray lasers don't make you TL3+9, ^ or no ^, but magic wands that perform like semi-automatic rifles, plus agricultural magic that matches the performance of early tractors and chemical fertilizers, plus Tensor's Floating Disks that do a decent stand-in for trucks, plus something that can stand in for powered, factory production, and so forth...could be TL 3+3, with a ^ in the quite likely case that some of the things the magic does are also impossible to replicate with technology.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

No. Kirk may have joked about the Iotians reverse engineering the transtator, but it was a joke at the end of a very jokey episode. If it was that easy, the Romans would have done it. They had plenty of samples of communicators to study and better technology than the Iotians. Mind you Star Trek is a setting that has some people with Science! and Engineer! so a lot more bending of technology limits is allowed.

Actually the communicator was not left behind in "Bread And Circuses" (the 20th century Roman like world aka 892-IV) as Merik threw the communicator into the cell after saying "Starship, lock in on this. Three to beam." Claudius does imply that the landing party had more then one communicator but we the audience only see Kirk's.

Besides Scotty could have simply beamed it up during the blackout he caused.

It should be mentioned that TOS has logic/continuity problems even with its serious episodes. See Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planetary Development for some of the more blatant ones.

To rephraze Kirk's comment in "Patterns of Force": 'The chances of another planet developing a culture like Ancient Rome, using the names of the Roman gods, and having colloquial twentieth-century English are so fantastically slim...'

In fact colloquial twentieth-century English is a West Germanic language with borrowed words from various Romance languages (ie languages derived from Latin the official language of Rome) and Greek. So the odds of another world having the exact same linguistic pathway that lead to colloquial twentieth-century English are beyond "fantastically slim", they are near impossible.

I'm a Treker but I will admit when my favorite show drops the ball. They really messed things up with Enterprise btw as there is no way to reconcile that mess with TOS (unless you invoke the whole Temporal Cold War BS)