“Statistics from the Second Imperial Grand Survey” from the Travellers’ Digest 10 (1987) provides some interesting sector-level data on the Imperium. I thought it would be illuminating to revisit this old article in light of T5 extended world gen, and try to apply the results to a little thought experiment: finding the “missing” worlds of Magyar sector.
The TD article explains why survey results show the Imperium containing 11,197 member worlds in 8,796 individual systems: “The terms ‘world’ and ‘system are not synonymous to the Scouts. The Scout Service considers all the bodies within one cubic parsec of space to constitute one ‘system.’ On the other hand, a ‘world’ is a major body anywhere within one single system.” The article uses the term “double system” to refer to any system with more than one member world.
T5 uses similar terminology. A “star system is composed of a primary star and one or more stellar companions. Orbiting these stars are a variety of planets, planetoid belts, and gas giants. Orbiting planets and gas giants are a variety of satellites” (267).
Unfortunately, T5 is somewhat inconsistent in its use of the term “world.” Page 402 and the surrounding text uses a fairly expansive definition: “Each system may have many different worlds: planets, gas giants, asteroid or planetoid belts, satellites, and various small worldlets” (402). However, the terminology on 491 is much more restrictive: “worlds” are only planets or satellites, and do not include belts. I’ll be using the term “world” in the more expansive sense; basically, all the things that are enumerated in the “Worlds” data field in T5SS sector files.
So a system consists of the primary, potentially other stars, and then various worlds. And one world stands out from all the others: the mainworld.
Every system in the IISS schema has one world designated the mainworld, even if that world is completely uninhabited and/or interdicted.
So the mainworld is straightforward enough, but what do we call the other worlds in the system? T5 uses the terms “other worlds” and “non-MainWorlds.” Previous versions of Traveller have used “secondary worlds.” MegaTraveller had rules for something called “subordinate worlds” which are a somewhat different concept: basically, subordinate worlds are non-mainworlds that are controlled by the mainworld. I’ll be using the term non-mainworld to be consistent.
T5 puts some hard restrictions on non-mainworlds: “The maximum Population for any non-Mainworld is Mainworld Population minus 1. All worlds other than the Mainworld have Spaceports rather than Starports” (405).
So going back to the Travellers’ Digest article, let’s use the term “major worlds” to denote those worlds that are sufficiently important to be individually counted by the IISS as Imperial member worlds. And let’s use “minor worlds” for any worlds in an Imperial system that do not make the cut. All mainworlds are automatically major worlds, and most non-mainworlds are minor worlds.
In order to be considered a major world, a non-mainworld has to meet one of two criteria: (1) orbit a companion star in far orbit from the star orbited by the mainworld; or (2) have a population UPP within 3 levels of the mainworld.
The TD article emphasizes that if a system has a star in far orbit and that companion star has its own planetary system, “the Scouts consider these systems to automatically [emphasis added] be double systems.” Given this, I will allow these situations to override the T5 restriction on non-mainworld population to mainworld population -1.
Although not specified in the TD article, I would further require the non-mainworld, whether located in a remote system or not, to have a minimum population code of 4 or more in order to be considered a major world.
So with these definitions in place, let’s turn our attention to Magyar sector. The survey data shows that Magyar has 131 Imperial systems with 216 individual major worlds and a total population of 509.7 billion. So almost 65% of all Magyar systems have 2 or more major worlds, including the mainworld. This is the second highest percentage after the Solomani Rim, with 69%.
The T5SS data for Magyar shows 130 Imperial systems. (The discrepancy is probably due to a miscount of Atlas of the Imperium allegiances.) The total mainworld populations of these systems comes to 422.588 billion.
Which means Magyar is missing 85 major worlds with a total population of 87.112 billion. As a thought experiment, can we infer what these worlds might look like, and where they might be located?
(Note that we’re only talking about Imperial systems here; the Solomani Confederation controls another 386 systems in Magyar. Most of the sector’s high population mainworlds are located in Imperial territory, so the Imperium has 77% of the sector’s population with only 25% of the systems.)
The TD article explains why survey results show the Imperium containing 11,197 member worlds in 8,796 individual systems: “The terms ‘world’ and ‘system are not synonymous to the Scouts. The Scout Service considers all the bodies within one cubic parsec of space to constitute one ‘system.’ On the other hand, a ‘world’ is a major body anywhere within one single system.” The article uses the term “double system” to refer to any system with more than one member world.
T5 uses similar terminology. A “star system is composed of a primary star and one or more stellar companions. Orbiting these stars are a variety of planets, planetoid belts, and gas giants. Orbiting planets and gas giants are a variety of satellites” (267).
Unfortunately, T5 is somewhat inconsistent in its use of the term “world.” Page 402 and the surrounding text uses a fairly expansive definition: “Each system may have many different worlds: planets, gas giants, asteroid or planetoid belts, satellites, and various small worldlets” (402). However, the terminology on 491 is much more restrictive: “worlds” are only planets or satellites, and do not include belts. I’ll be using the term “world” in the more expansive sense; basically, all the things that are enumerated in the “Worlds” data field in T5SS sector files.
So a system consists of the primary, potentially other stars, and then various worlds. And one world stands out from all the others: the mainworld.
Every system in the IISS schema has one world designated the mainworld, even if that world is completely uninhabited and/or interdicted.
So the mainworld is straightforward enough, but what do we call the other worlds in the system? T5 uses the terms “other worlds” and “non-MainWorlds.” Previous versions of Traveller have used “secondary worlds.” MegaTraveller had rules for something called “subordinate worlds” which are a somewhat different concept: basically, subordinate worlds are non-mainworlds that are controlled by the mainworld. I’ll be using the term non-mainworld to be consistent.
T5 puts some hard restrictions on non-mainworlds: “The maximum Population for any non-Mainworld is Mainworld Population minus 1. All worlds other than the Mainworld have Spaceports rather than Starports” (405).
So going back to the Travellers’ Digest article, let’s use the term “major worlds” to denote those worlds that are sufficiently important to be individually counted by the IISS as Imperial member worlds. And let’s use “minor worlds” for any worlds in an Imperial system that do not make the cut. All mainworlds are automatically major worlds, and most non-mainworlds are minor worlds.
In order to be considered a major world, a non-mainworld has to meet one of two criteria: (1) orbit a companion star in far orbit from the star orbited by the mainworld; or (2) have a population UPP within 3 levels of the mainworld.
The TD article emphasizes that if a system has a star in far orbit and that companion star has its own planetary system, “the Scouts consider these systems to automatically [emphasis added] be double systems.” Given this, I will allow these situations to override the T5 restriction on non-mainworld population to mainworld population -1.
Although not specified in the TD article, I would further require the non-mainworld, whether located in a remote system or not, to have a minimum population code of 4 or more in order to be considered a major world.
So with these definitions in place, let’s turn our attention to Magyar sector. The survey data shows that Magyar has 131 Imperial systems with 216 individual major worlds and a total population of 509.7 billion. So almost 65% of all Magyar systems have 2 or more major worlds, including the mainworld. This is the second highest percentage after the Solomani Rim, with 69%.
The T5SS data for Magyar shows 130 Imperial systems. (The discrepancy is probably due to a miscount of Atlas of the Imperium allegiances.) The total mainworld populations of these systems comes to 422.588 billion.
Which means Magyar is missing 85 major worlds with a total population of 87.112 billion. As a thought experiment, can we infer what these worlds might look like, and where they might be located?
(Note that we’re only talking about Imperial systems here; the Solomani Confederation controls another 386 systems in Magyar. Most of the sector’s high population mainworlds are located in Imperial territory, so the Imperium has 77% of the sector’s population with only 25% of the systems.)
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