Proposed SD.Net Civillisation Chart

[NecronLord]

I propose a chart with some basic units by which to measure a civilisation:

Industrial capacity (size of largest facilities maybe?)
Common weapons strength
Most power weapons strength
FTL speed
Empire size
Time travel
Average of all above

For omnipotents everything would be the highest rating. We might think of using a scale of 1-10 or 1-100 can assigning values according to category. For instance, FTL would require a logarithmic scale because some universe have very slow FTL and some have instant travel to anywhere. You get the idea.

We would use only canon and official (non-conflicting with canon) data that has been demonstrated in the works, and is not unreasonably beyond the previously known capabilities (like if there was a ST character that says the Federation built a 100 mile wide planet nuking space station but we never actually see it) so noone can use bullshit evidence.

How about this a meathod of deriving some of those.

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Industrial Capacity= Est Millitary Output Per Year (total units warships, munitions, soldiers{I know, but they still count})* Tech Level * Est War production increase * Capitalisation Standard/Quality of control (A planned economy can work, depending on the efficiency of the running, a culture mind would be a * 10 modifier, The USSR 1/1.2 modifier)*Durability of state manufactured units (Necrons, time lords, culture etc, anyone who builds to last).

Durability Table, Time to failure of large systems

10,000,000 years or greater    10
10,000 - 9,999,999 years        7
5,000 - 9,999 years             5
1,000 - 4,999 years             3
100  - 999 years                1
99 years or less                0

Common Handweapon millitary grade strength * Air to air munitons strength * Space weapon strength (where applicable) Measured in Joules

FTL, foldspace drives = 100 Someone else can do the table.

Est Empire Size, Where applicable, In light years^3, or possibly in Km^2 with counting 1KM airspace for single planet civs?

Time Travel

1=Slight Manipulation ability
2=Up to one minute
3=Up to one year
4=up to one century
5=Up to one Millenium
6=Unlimited Backwards travel
10=Absoloute time travel (e.g. Time Lords)

[Cpt_Frank]

Would be a good idea.

[NecronLord]

Anyone, feel free to knock around any Ideas you have

[Cpt_Frank]

Ok the different criteria are fine but how do we sort them 100% objective?

Some criteria will have to be valued higher than others, for example:

Star Trek has full-scale time travel, however pitiful weaponry while other societies like SW are much more powerful and can't.

[NecronLord]

Ok the different criteria are fine but how do we sort them 100% objective?

Some criteria will have to be valued higher than others, for example:

Star Trek has full-scale time travel, however pitiful weaponry while other societies like SW are much more powerful and can't.

They don't have full scale time travel. they have a few centuries at most. IIRC. However on that they do actually beat the culture. I think what we need are some well known examples such as the Culture SW ST(federation) and the USA to use for calibration. might want to put something in about teleportation as well.

[Cpt_Frank]

Ok the different criteria are fine but how do we sort them 100% objective?

Some criteria will have to be valued higher than others, for example:

Star Trek has full-scale time travel, however pitiful weaponry while other societies like SW are much more powerful and can't.

They don't have full scale time travel. they have a few centuries at most. IIRC. However on that they do actually beat the culture. I think what we need are some well known examples such as the Culture SW ST(federation) and the USA to use for calibration. might want to put something in about teleportation as well.

culture... urgh

A few centuries? How so?

[Enlightenment]

A much simpler and arugably superior method of ranking civilizations is simply to state how much energy they are capable of directing. In the absense of economic data (GDP etc), energy usage is a fairly good indicator of industrial capacity. Industrial capacity is much more important in determining who's win a war than other things like reliability or the finer points of FTL drives.

For SETI purposes the standard energy usage scale is the Kardashev-Sagan type scale, described at http://www.angelfire.com/on2/daviddarli ... hevciv.htm .



By this scale:

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Galactic Empire						II-8 / III	
Total Anihilation						III	
Systems Commonwealth			II-3	
Culture			V	
Excession			VI	
United Federation of Planets			I-4	
Dominion			I-5	Rough guess based on UFP figures
Borg			I-5	"
Klingons			I-3	"
Romulan Empire			I-3	"
Minbari Federation			I-4	
Interstellar Alliance			I-5	Based on Minbari estimate
Centauri Empire			I-4	"
Earth Alliance			I-3	"
Narn Republic			I-4	"
Moving Mars			VII	
Species 8472			II-4+?	
Krenim			V	
Xeelee			V	
29th century UFP			V	
Thirdspace aliens			IV	
			
			
Type legend:				
				
I-III	Standard Kardashev-Sagan type scale			
IV	Control over entire universe			
V	Civilization able to alter spacetime in a non-linear fashion			
VI	Civilization able to alter spacetime across multiple universes  in a non-linear fashion			
VII	Civilization able to arbitrarily alter physical law			

[Cpt_Frank]

A much simpler and arugably superior method of ranking civilizations is simply to state how much energy they are capable of directing. In the absense of economic data (GDP etc), energy usage is a fairly good indicator of industrial capacity. Industrial capacity is much more important in determining who's win a war than other things like reliability or the finer points of FTL drives.

For SETI purposes the standard energy usage scale is the Kardashev-Sagan type scale, described at http://www.angelfire.com/on2/daviddarli ... hevciv.htm .



By this scale:

Code: Select all

Galactic Empire						II-8 / III	
Total Anihilation						III	
Systems Commonwealth			II-3	
Culture			V	
Excession			VI	
United Federation of Planets			I-4	
Dominion			I-5	Rough guess based on UFP figures
Borg			I-5	"
Klingons			I-3	"
Romulan Empire			I-3	"
Minbari Federation			I-4	
Interstellar Alliance			I-5	Based on Minbari estimate
Centauri Empire			I-4	"
Earth Alliance			I-3	"
Narn Republic			I-4	"
Moving Mars			VII	
Species 8472			II-4+?	
Krenim			V	
Xeelee			V	
29th century UFP			V	
Thirdspace aliens			IV	
			
			
Type legend:				
				
I-III	Standard Kardashev-Sagan type scale			
IV	Control over entire universe			
V	Civilization able to alter spacetime in a non-linear fashion			
VI	Civilization able to alter spacetime across multiple universes  in a non-linear fashion			
VII	Civilization able to arbitrarily alter physical law			

That works fine for the lowest 95% but not for the techno-über-wank universes.

[HemlockGrey]

I think it should be a strictly military chart. Numbers, weapon yield, and production.

[Cpt_Frank]

I think it should be a strictly military chart. Numbers, weapon yield, and production.

There are other factors such as culture ships being able to fight from hyperspace unavailable for other ships.

[NecronLord]

VII Civilization able to arbitrarily alter physical law

Bearing in mind the TNG episode, Deja Q (IIRC) that weighs in the UFP @ VII.

[Cpt_Frank]

VII Civilization able to arbitrarily alter physical law

Bearing in mind the TNG episode, Deja Q (IIRC) that weighs in the UFP @ VII.

Or what about finding cracks in an event horizon

[Cpt_Frank]

Ok, to keep it as simple as possible I propose:

-Firepower
-Numbers
-Territory(planetary, interstellar, galactic, intergalactic, universe-spanning)

And

Special abilities (fighting from hyperspace, time travel).

[NecronLord]

VII Civilization able to arbitrarily alter physical law

Bearing in mind the TNG episode, Deja Q (IIRC) that weighs in the UFP @ VII.

Or what about finding cracks in an event horizon

I feel confident that such nonsense can be ignored. Even assuming this (by some insane lovecraftian strangeness) happened, they aren't ever going to find it agian.

[Cpt_Frank]

Bearing in mind the TNG episode, Deja Q (IIRC) that weighs in the UFP @ VII.

Or what about finding cracks in an event horizon

I feel confident that such nonsense can be ignored. Even assuming this (by some insane lovecraftian strangeness) happened, they aren't ever going to find it agian.

Yeah it was a work of the mighty Stuffed Cthulhu(TM)

[NecronLord]

Or what about finding cracks in an event horizon

I feel confident that such nonsense can be ignored. Even assuming this (by some insane lovecraftian strangeness) happened, they aren't ever going to find it agian.

Yeah it was a work of the mighty Stuffed Cthulhu(TM)

True...

[Typhonis 1]

Shouldnt the Xeelee be a VII group?

[Cpt_Frank]

Shouldnt the Xeelee be a VII group?

More a VI.

[Enlightenment]

Bearing in mind the TNG episode, Deja Q (IIRC) that weighs in the UFP @ VII.

I intended VII for civilizations and entities that can alter physical law throughout the entire universe. Damn near everyone is capable of doing local alterations as this kind of thing is required for the staple SF stupid pet tricks like 'mass lightening,' reactionless drives, shields, and FTL.

[Exonerate]

I recall a scale that was developed for a RPG based on technology levels... It was from 1 (Stone age) to 17 (Nearly omnipotent)

[Faram]

The fools have awkened me

Phear Cthulhu

[SirNitram]

The problem is, unless it's painfully complex, you miss parts. For instance, the Time Lords can't put out that much energy, as I've seen. The Netherese don't put out alot of units, but they'd assrape a number of groups, even before we get into their time travel...

It's a troublesome thing, these civilization charts..

[Dahak]

Shouldnt the Xeelee be a VII group?

More a VI.

They can, and do, fool around with natural constants and physical laws. So, in this chart, they'd be VII

[HemlockGrey]

Hence, I'm thinking, pure sci-fi chart, based on military only.

[Currald]

Even with military, you need to take many variables into account (see Wong's "We Want You for the Galactic Empire!" page. Simply averaging the values for each of these capabilities is not enough, as a civilization at war is only as strong as its weakest link. We Americans can easily see the lesson in that from out recent losses in the war against fundamentalist Wahabism. They hit us in just the right place with minimal effort, and now we're expending massive resourses hitting back in the best way we know how, air power.

Another examples, even assuming that Federation ships were a match for Imperial ones, the Imps would easily clean up in a ground operation, as the Feds have no army, really. It would be simple to occupy San Francisco and Paris and cripple the Federation. I think that trying to reduce everything to a simply chart is reductionist to the point of being pointless. Only a detailed analysis such as Wong's page will give an acceptably accurate picture.