Thread:Wormulon/@comment-12149779-20130713152157/@comment-1073312-20130713155444

Have you looked at the question 2years-too-young asked below? I, Operation Marines and Monet provided quite an in-depth description of how it works that might be helpful.

However, here is a quick overview:
 * Tier 6 - At the very minimum, us.
 * Tier 5 - Small empire, may or may not have Faster Than Light travel, usually FTL is derived from a more advanced empire.
 * Tier 4 - FTL drive is developed, along with antigravity and many staple sci-fi technologies, think of Star Trek.
 * Tier 3 - Civilisation become late interstellar, starts using megastructures and/or expand across the galaxy, using much more powerful energy sources like stars or black holes. Think of Dyson Spheres or Ringworld.
 * Tier 2 - Civilisations learns how transport stellar energy sources across interstellar distances. It becomes possible to access hyperspace and/or wormholes.  Think of the Borg Collective or Star Wars towards Tier 1.  Technology/culture/society/mind begins to push the limits of what can be imagined now.
 * Tier 1 - Civilisation has either established itself across the entire galaxy, and/or is extremely advanced. Think of the Culture or certain Elder races.
 * Tier 0 - Tier 0 is godlike. Civilisation has established itself across the universe, perhaps into others.  Very hard sci-fi sometimes includes this level, like the Xeelee or Archailects (Orion's Arm).