An Alternative to Tech Level: Milleu

TGLS · 09-08-2020, 08:04 AM

So I've been thinking a bit about the strengths and weaknesses of Tech Levels.

Strengths
- Useful for defining settings in broad strokes
- Helps sort "catalog" books
- Helps define characters who move between very different levels of technology (by making high technology very expensive, and defining the inter-technological defaults)
- Useful for gadgeteers

Weaknesses
- Borderlands of technology result in lots of arguments and confusion (i.e. Is the Apple II TL7? Is the early IBM PC TL8? Do the years matter? Should there really be a cliff between the two?)
- Do technologies that don't change in user facing ways actually change in terms of difficulty? (i.e. is a dugout canoe and a fancy fibreglass canoe all that different in terms of paddling to destination?)
- Divergent and Superscience TLs are confusing and result in arguments. (i.e. is this setting with anti-gravity just TL7^? Is this steampunk setting TL5+1 because it has things comparable to primitive cars, or TL5+5 because it has fairly advanced AI?)

Then I started to wonder why skills like Fishing or Accounting have no TL attached to them, while others like Geography and Intelligence Analysis do. Surely fishermen who operate modern fishing trawlers and accounts who let QuickBooks do the heavy lifting will have a lot more trouble without their toys than a geographer or an analyst.

Milleu
So here's the "solution" I came up with. TL is done away with entirely; the only person who has anything to do with it is the GM while building the setting. All TL'd skills don't take any TL next to them. Instead, the GM defines a number of Milleus that exist in a setting.

Every character gets one milleu for free (like a Cultural Familiarity) and the cost of a particular milleu depends on how similar it is to milleus the character has (also like Cultural Familiarity). The costs of milleus are up to the GM, but the main guide is as follows:
- Nobody pays anything for irrelevant Milleus. Anyone with no relevant milleu qualifies for a disadvantage.
- A character with Milleu A (Native) and Milleu B pays the same as a character with Milleu A and Milleu B (Native), even if Milleu B is more primitive compared than Milleu A.
- Partial milleus are perks. For example, a 1950s test pilot who flies alien spaceships may have "Alien Milleu (Spaceships Only) [1]"
- 5 pt. milleus should have penalties of about -5. 10 pt. milleus should have penalties greater than -5. 15 pt. milleus should have no rolls allowed. Any milleu with smaller penalties than -5 is free.

Here are some possible sets of Milleus (everything is priced relative to the default):
- Contemporary [0]
- 1930s Earth [0], 2030s Earth [10], Ancient Ones [15]
- 2020s Earth [0], Extraterrestrial [Irrelevant! If none other, -10]
- Cybertech [0], Biotech [10]
- Yrth Contemporary [0], Northlander [0], Underground Engineer [5], Recent Migrant [Irrelevant! If none other, -10]
- Wizardly [0], Muggle [15]
- Warp [0], Pre-Warp [5], Q [15]
- Computerized [0], Non-Computerized (i.e. they use lots and lots of paperwork) [5]

What do you think?

09-08-2020, 08:04 AM	#1
TGLS Join Date: Jan 2014	An Alternative to Tech Level: Milleu So I've been thinking a bit about the strengths and weaknesses of Tech Levels. Strengths - Useful for defining settings in broad strokes - Helps sort "catalog" books - Helps define characters who move between very different levels of technology (by making high technology very expensive, and defining the inter-technological defaults) - Useful for gadgeteers Weaknesses - Borderlands of technology result in lots of arguments and confusion (i.e. Is the Apple II TL7? Is the early IBM PC TL8? Do the years matter? Should there really be a cliff between the two?) - Do technologies that don't change in user facing ways actually change in terms of difficulty? (i.e. is a dugout canoe and a fancy fibreglass canoe all that different in terms of paddling to destination?) - Divergent and Superscience TLs are confusing and result in arguments. (i.e. is this setting with anti-gravity just TL7^? Is this steampunk setting TL5+1 because it has things comparable to primitive cars, or TL5+5 because it has fairly advanced AI?) Then I started to wonder why skills like Fishing or Accounting have no TL attached to them, while others like Geography and Intelligence Analysis do. Surely fishermen who operate modern fishing trawlers and accounts who let QuickBooks do the heavy lifting will have a lot more trouble without their toys than a geographer or an analyst. Milleu So here's the "solution" I came up with. TL is done away with entirely; the only person who has anything to do with it is the GM while building the setting. All TL'd skills don't take any TL next to them. Instead, the GM defines a number of Milleus that exist in a setting. Every character gets one milleu for free (like a Cultural Familiarity) and the cost of a particular milleu depends on how similar it is to milleus the character has (also like Cultural Familiarity). The costs of milleus are up to the GM, but the main guide is as follows: - Nobody pays anything for irrelevant Milleus. Anyone with no relevant milleu qualifies for a disadvantage. - A character with Milleu A (Native) and Milleu B pays the same as a character with Milleu A and Milleu B (Native), even if Milleu B is more primitive compared than Milleu A. - Partial milleus are perks. For example, a 1950s test pilot who flies alien spaceships may have "Alien Milleu (Spaceships Only) [1]" - 5 pt. milleus should have penalties of about -5. 10 pt. milleus should have penalties greater than -5. 15 pt. milleus should have no rolls allowed. Any milleu with smaller penalties than -5 is free. Here are some possible sets of Milleus (everything is priced relative to the default): - Contemporary [0] - 1930s Earth [0], 2030s Earth [10], Ancient Ones [15] - 2020s Earth [0], Extraterrestrial [Irrelevant! If none other, -10] - Cybertech [0], Biotech [10] - Yrth Contemporary [0], Northlander [0], Underground Engineer [5], Recent Migrant [Irrelevant! If none other, -10] - Wizardly [0], Muggle [15] - Warp [0], Pre-Warp [5], Q [15] - Computerized [0], Non-Computerized (i.e. they use lots and lots of paperwork) [5] What do you think?