Punishments

[fodder]

i don't think it's a bad idea to nudge players to move old chars on

[Stue (DC)]

i don't think it's a bad idea to nudge players to move old chars on

my "old" chars with 35-40 years just reached their peak in experience, skills, h/p shown, reputation and recognition among others, and now they should be abandoned?

that is as if you are convincing someone to abandon game completely.

[fodder]

obviously it would refer to proper old chars, as opposed to being unlucky with a middle aged char.

[Stue (DC)]

i see it with every middle-aged char exposed to frequent warring, does not seems to be matter of luck.

[^ban^]

i see it with every middle-aged char exposed to frequent warring, does not seems to be matter of luck.

Sounds like a serious case of observer bias. Age exists for a reason. If you don't like the downsides of getting old, then stop playing an old character, otherwise accept it for what it is: getting old.

[Tom]

I don't want to go into the specifics, but one general point I consider important:

BattleMaster is a game unafraid of change. Over the years, many core parts of the game have been completely thrown out and replaced. Some more than once. If stuff doesn't work, we will make it better or replace it with something else that might work.
Which is why I've always felt it important to listen to people complaining. Every part of the game should have a function in a process that ultimately leads to players having fun. Part of that process is challenge - part of the fun of gaming is overcoming obstacles, which means as a game designer, I have to put up obstacles.

There's a trend in game design if you observe it over 25 years like I have. Initially, computer games were fairly tough and unforgiving. The challenge was high, as was the feeling of accomplishment in having mastered it. With computer gaming going more mainstream, that has changed dramatically. Rewards are being given out more often, in higher total quantity, for basically anything that's more difficult than clicking a button.

BattleMaster is not a reward-heavy game, because it doesn't have a specific goal. You set your own, and it's difficult to reward that. But BattleMaster is a game full of obstacles, put there intentionally so you can overcome them. And some of them can not be overcome permanently. Age is one such things - you can adapt to the change in hours and wounding to minimize its effect, but you can not remove it. Prison is another such source of frustration with no easy way out, but there are various solutions to make it more manageable, like agreements to exchange prisoners.

Nevertheless, the frustration in not being able to overcome an obstacle should never be higher than the feeling of accomplishment in doing so. And if you think that is the case with anything, do bring it to the attention of the dev team.

[Heq]

I actually like how it helps to "funnel" concepts.  Do to the speed of wounds healing and some other stuff, being "young and stupid" really isn't penalized as heavily as "old and reckless."

Getting wounded requires you to do something which, well, got you wounded.  To make the video game reference, games don't start off punishing you for making simple mistakes, but as you level up, they tend to become less forgiving.  If you're past 35, you've been playing for some time, you know what's what and all that jazz.

Unless you're playing a hero that's past 35, in which case I'm sorry, I have no sympathy.  If you pick a subtype with nifty bonuses, with the downside of "Hey, you can't change from this, and you're gonna get wounded more," it seems odd to then complain when the penalty is actually enforced.  It'd be like someone at the 3e D&D table saying "I want a to play an elf for a Dex bonus, but I don't want any penalties.  I like bonuses but I don't like penalties, so can I just have all the bonuses so I can beat everyone else and be the ultimate character because that would be awesome."

[Stue (DC)]

I will try to expresss my thoughts about age part of this discussion as simple as possible:

char of 18 is very healthy and very quick, but with so low skills and h/p that many options are unavailable to him.

char of 65-70 is very sick and slow, but it is expected that he acquired something during his career.

in that respect, if we want some balance, would it be logical that mid-years are golden years, where there is best balance of skills and health? that can last from 30 to 45 or from 35 to 50 or something similar, but there should be some years when character is at its peak, first he patiently work to reach his peak, than he enjoys his peak for a while, after that he sees his things are slowly degrading.


i felt some of my characters never got chance to enjoy in their peaks - annoyance by low skills is just replaced with annoyance by low health, and that is what i feel discouraging.

[De-Legro]

I will try to expresss my thoughts about age part of this discussion as simple as possible:

char of 18 is very healthy and very quick, but with so low skills and h/p that many options are unavailable to him.

char of 65-70 is very sick and slow, but it is expected that he acquired something during his career.

in that respect, if we want some balance, would it be logical that mid-years are golden years, where there is best balance of skills and health? that can last from 30 to 45 or from 35 to 50 or something similar, but there should be some years when character is at its peak, first he patiently work to reach his peak, than he enjoys his peak for a while, after that he sees his things are slowly degrading.


i felt some of my characters never got chance to enjoy in their peaks - annoyance by low skills is just replaced with annoyance by low health, and that is what i feel discouraging.

Quick quiz, how many elite athletes do you know that are between 35-40? Take if from someone that has served in the military, even by 30 your body starts to tell you that your best days for combat are past.

[vonGenf]

I would add this:

Getting wounded is not fun. The longer you are wounded, the less fun it is.

Wounding people, on the other hand, is fun. The longer they are wounded, the more fun it is.

Overall, I think the current game balance is good. I have been seriously wounded quite a few times; each time I hated it enough that I did not want it to happen again, and that I wished to exact revenge on the people who wounded me (that's good). It never occurred to me that this broke the game in any way, or induce me to stop playing; that would be bad. There is a level at which the second effect would start to occur, but it's not the case yet.

[Fleugs]

in that respect, if we want some balance, would it be logical that mid-years are golden years, where there is best balance of skills and health? that can last from 30 to 45 or from 35 to 50 or something similar, but there should be some years when character is at its peak, first he patiently work to reach his peak, than he enjoys his peak for a while, after that he sees his things are slowly degrading.

Think about real life. Try it. You don't peak at that age. By far. You peak in your late teens and early twenties. The system as it is, is good now. But I imagine you will never accept that.

[Gustav Kuriga]

Physically, you don't start losing your fitness until your forties. Why do you think the U.S. Army accepts recruits up to age 35? Plus, seeing that our characters are mostly warriors, meaning they stay fit in order to fight on the battlefield with their troops, they won't be losing that fitness anytime soon, since they are constantly training, or at least exercising. Being that our nobles are constantly fighting at least from their early twenties, their experience and physical fitness curves will meet somewhere in their thirties. After which their experience will continue to go up, while their physical fitness goes down.

[vonGenf]

I computed the average life expectancy of the Kings of England, from Offa up to 1500.

It's 43 years old.

Yes, that includes many assassinations, but that's the whole point.

(And, yes, I do have a life.)

[De-Legro]

I computed the average life expectancy of the Kings of England, from Offa up to 1500.

It's 43 years old.

Yes, that includes many assassinations, but that's the whole point.

(And, yes, I do have a life.)

Would have been easier to look up the stats. The life expectany for nobility in England was 30 years. However that was from birth, and factored in the high infant mortality rate. IF as a noble you survived to 21, your life expectancy was up around 63

Physically, you don't start losing your fitness until your forties. Why do you think the U.S. Army accepts recruits up to age 35? Plus, seeing that our characters are mostly warriors, meaning they stay fit in order to fight on the battlefield with their troops, they won't be losing that fitness anytime soon, since they are constantly training, or at least exercising. Being that our nobles are constantly fighting at least from their early twenties, their experience and physical fitness curves will meet somewhere in their thirties. After which their experience will continue to go up, while their physical fitness goes down.

Sort of, you will notice that most armies grade their fitness requirements by age. For example when I joined the military I was required to be able to run 2.4km in 10 minutes 20 seconds. By the time I left my age meant that they would accept 11 minutes 30 seconds . You are still fit enough to do the job, but you are kidding yourself if you think you are as fit and recover as fast as you did at 21.

[Stue (DC)]

Quick quiz, how many elite athletes do you know that are between 35-40? Take if from someone that has served in the military, even by 30 your body starts to tell you that your best days for combat are past.

our chars are not athletes. they command troops rather than being ordinary "expendable" soldiers in the army.

if we would insist on background in that respect, that is ok.

if we say character peak years are 23-25, that is also ok. but than, game mechanics should allow that we are able to reach max skills at that age, which is far from being the case. moreover, hours reduction should begin, for instance, dropping to 7 hours per turn after age of 20, dropping to 6 hours after age of 35. than reference to realistic background should be established.

even more, most of heroes should die at 25-30.

if all that would be done, we would be consequent and say - whoever runs his char with over 40 has to accept that such char is extremely unhealthy man.

curently, one of my chars reached bright peaks of leadership skills at his 40. due to some ic circumstance, he lead archer troop most of his life, was commanding army much, and his skil is exceptional. however, he is seriously wounded in say 4 of 5 battles, always staying out of thing for 2 or 3 days, most of time being only wounded in the army, always him. apparently the same experience which allowed him to reach very high skill, "gifted" him very bad health, so tha way he is actually discouraged to be ambitious at all - being unskilled is still much less boring than laying wounded all the time.

do we want players to be discouraged to have any ambition as they will learn - the more ambitious they are, the more they will suffer, so it is better that they are passive and silent.

even more, if we want to announce that 25 is character's peak, should the whole game be designed so that people have opportunity to reach their actual peak in reputation, recognition among other nobles, titles and positions by that age? i feel that would need incredibly comprehensive rebalancing.

i believe that i was able to express some points - that health should simply be balanced with other opportunities characters have during their career. having health peak unrelated with other character peaks creates some awkward situation rather than balance - people in power and position are constantly laying wounded around.

it is likely the most visible on ec, warring continent - i frequently see that, after big battle, rulers, generals and marshals of both sided are the ones who most frequently stay wounded.

at the end, what is purpose of skill than? if someone has high sword skill, commanding infantry troop, should that skill help him to avoid wounds? Wounding on battlefield should logically be more related to skill than to age.

poisioning, getting sickness would be another story, but we do not have such concepts. if we would put plague out of middle age statistics, average age would be dramatically changed, and that is not related to warring.