Age. Sucks.

[Gabanus family]

Your critique is duly noted.

Wouldn't it be an idea to allow rulers to tax their Dukes more or less individually. This way the ruler has some power against the Dukes and it would make the game more dynamic with more Duke powerplay and internal struggles sometimes as well.

[Anaris]

We have some ideas about how to put pressure on Dukes, but we don't yet have anything clear enough to move on.

I think that would be worthwhile for a complete separate thread, so feel free to make one with suggestions as detailed as you like! ;D

[Anaris]

What about (not so) new players being practically shut away from all higher kingdom positions because hundred year old kings and dukes just sit on their asses in their capitals forever?
Aging penalties at least could make gameplay unsatisfying enough for such players to shelf their ancient characters. Otherwise there will be just characters who win the game because they were created ten years ago and accumulated stupid amounts of gold, honour, influence, stats, etc. without any drawbacks.

The problem with that is twofold.

First, there's not a particularly high correlation between "characters with high physical age" and "characters we want to remove from their positions so someone else can take over." It's not, after all, like there's anything specific about a character who's been around a long time that makes them inherently less good for the game, or less worthy to hold a high position. It's characters who hold high positions purely for the sake of it that are really detrimental.

Second, age doesn't actually have a strong enough turnover effect. Sure, I've seen a half-dozen people grump that their character is getting old, and they have to delete them...but I've seen a lot more just keep the character out of battles, sitting around in their towers doing nothing. Indeed, I would posit that it is exactly the type of person we want to affect most that is most likely to start from the assumption, "My character gets to stay around," and work from there on how to make it happen.

That's why we've come up with the Health mechanic. It is essentially the inverse of Age, for while avoiding Age and its consequences means staying at home and doing nothing (thus making you much less likely to lose your position), avoiding Ill Health and its similar consequences means getting out in the field and doing stuff. This not only means that your characters are more likely to be interesting, it means that they're more likely to run into situations that cost them their high positions.

[Constantine]

Kings were less the problem than Dukes.

Fair point.

It's not, after all, like there's anything specific about a character who's been around a long time that makes them inherently less good for the game, or less worthy to hold a high position. It's characters who hold high positions purely for the sake of it that are really detrimental.

I don't completely agree here.
It's not that super old characters are inherently bad, it's just that younger character need more chances to become movers and shakers. Otherwise an active geezer can keep his position indefinitely which is not very great even if he's a wonderful player.

On a slightly different note, I was under an impression that age penalties were there to balance out the character's inevitably accumulating power. Like usually characters who can recruit 250 archers are old enough to be really slow and do not participate in too many battles. But with no penalties realms with a handful of really old dudes will simply be able to mow down armies with several times more knights.
I mean, I agree it sucks to see realms fade away because many characters are too old to be active enough. But wouldn't it also suck to let them acumulate stats until they can single-handedly storm and take over regions? Maybe old characters should just.. well.. die of old age? I mean, 5+ RL years per character is a damn good run for any game.

[Noone you know]

Yes, but what IS "Ill Health"?

Is it like being wounded? Or just less hours?

If a character does nothing but log in once per week to maintain their titles, how does this make them change how they play?

[Gabanus family]

Fair point.I don't completely agree here.
It's not that super old characters are inherently bad, it's just that younger character need more chances to become movers and shakers. Otherwise an active geezer can keep his position indefinitely which is not very great even if he's a wonderful player.

I'm not sure I agree with this. There are enough realms out there where you should be happy if you find one or 2 active geezers to begin with and properly fill your government.

On a slightly different note, I was under an impression that age penalties were there to balance out the character's inevitably accumulating power. Like usually characters who can recruit 250 archers are old enough to be really slow and do not participate in too many battles. But with no penalties realms with a handful of really old dudes will simply be able to mow down armies with several times more knights.
I mean, I agree it sucks to see realms fade away because many characters are too old to be active enough. But wouldn't it also suck to let them acumulate stats until they can single-handedly storm and take over regions? Maybe old characters should just.. well.. die of old age? I mean, 5+ RL years per character is a damn good run for any game.

This could be dealt with by adding the penalties on traveling with large units etc. Or even remove 1 or 2 hours per turn when your army is 80+ men and 150+ men respectively, which will be dedicated to more management tasks in respect to your men.

[JDodger]

just make it so less-hour age tiers are at older ages, like 7 hours at 48 instead of 35 or 38, etc, and make the recovery time a little less onerous. still realistic while not as annoying.

remove the penalties for heroes, encouraging older chars to go that path. heroes are more than the aversge man after all.

make heroes easier to kill in battle.

voila, mortality incentivized rather than inactivity punished.

[Sacha]

Just add mortality already. Make all characters 'heroes' in battle so they may be killed as any hero might, and allow a chance for any critical wound to result in death. Scale the risk so that younger characters have improved odds of surviving.

And for the dogged centenarians who just won't die either by chance or by design, allow simply dying of old age above a certain treshold. For instance, at age 100, start a counter. Week 1, 1% chance of death every morning turn. Week 2, 2%. Week 3, 3% and so forth. After a RL year, you'll have 50% chance of dying every morning, or even every 7 days if you want to be generous. That should all but guarantee that nobody lives past 120.

Let's get Game of Thrones-y.

Adding even more complex code that nobody will understand isn't going to help, IMHO. More code = more bugs = more frustrations for both devs and players, and as was pointed out, there is already plenty of stuff on the devs' plate. That's not meant as a diss, either.

[Anaris]

As I've already told Vita:

I'm not going to force mortality on anyone who doesn't choose it without a damn good reason, and enthusiastic support for the plan from Tom.

I'm all for adding mortality as an option, but not mandatory for anyone.

[Noone you know]

Sacha's plan + Scrolls of Eternal Youth that remove 5-10 years from their age.

They WILL die, but only if they don't work to actively prevent it. They can make some effort to play & spend all that horded gold to stay alive indefinitely.

Might be a nice magical property to add to other Uniques, as well.

[Sacha]

Then at least do it for the dinosaurs who just sit in their ivory towers, and who really should have spared us the trouble of having to kill them off in the first place. There is absolutely no acceptable reason for anyone to be upset that their 114-year old might keel over at any moment.

[Noone you know]

are there actually very many of those left, now that Atamara is shut down?

[Zakilevo]

I agree with getting rid of hours.

But I think it would be better to just make older/inactive characters to have a chance of getting killed from any wounds. That way we can clear out older inactive characters while awarding those who stay active.

[Noone you know]

How do you define "active", and how do you do it without breaking the Inalienable Rights.

"Inalienable rights are the rights which every troop leaders has, simply because they are a noble. These rights can not be taken away or made conditional. They are absolute and final. "

"The inalienable rights are:

    Playing at your own speed, timing and activity level, i.e. logging in as often or seldom as you like, at whatever times you like."


http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Inalienable_rights

http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Inactivity

[Noone you know]

Again, people are making things too indirect and complicated.

The thing you are complaining about isn't age, it is inactive players who can't be removed.

So make it that they can be removed.

We can remove rulers, council members, marshals, diplomats. So make it that lords and dukes can be stripped of their titles if they aren't "doing their job".

Seems like problem solved to me.