Author Topic: Rejected: Bring back old age penalties  (Read 1587 times)

Stabbity

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Rejected: Bring back old age penalties
« Topic Start: December 17, 2018, 06:15:48 AM »
Title: Bring back penalties for old age.
Summary: Bring back penalties for old age

Details: Previously, older characters got less hours every turn, and took longer to heal. I propose this be brought back, but perhaps set back the age when they start to accrue. Used to 35, I believe, that characters dropped to 7 hours per turn. Perhaps push that back to 40, or further.
Benefits: Encourages turnover. Older characters used to retire or step aside for younger blood when they got too old. Now we have characters over 100 running around like their younger counterparts, and there is no incentive for old characters to make room for new blood, leading to stagnation. Opens the door for people to see older characters clinging to power removed by having them wounded, and provides incentive for people to retire gracefully, die in a blaze of glory, or be forced out by new blood, keeping things from stagnating.
Possible Downsides or Exploits: Could lead to old characters sitting around doing nothing while clinging to power, but honestly, this just gives people more incentive to remove them.
« Last Edit: December 20, 2018, 08:41:12 AM by Wimpie »
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Anaris

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Re: Bring back old age penalties
« Reply #1: December 17, 2018, 02:07:57 PM »
Nope. We removed this for a reason.

The hypothesized effect of increasing turnover never materialized to the extent that would warrant the feature's existence.

The downside you cite is, in fact, exactly what happened instead.
Timothy Collett

"The only thing you can't trade for your heart's desire...is your heart." "You are what you do.  Choose again, and change." "One of these days, someone's gonna plug you, and you're going to die saying, 'What did I say? What did I say?'"  ~ Miles Naismith Vorkosigan

Chenier

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Re: Bring back old age penalties
« Reply #2: December 17, 2018, 02:37:38 PM »
Yup, the downside is pretty much why it was removed.

10 years ago, a realm of 5 regions had 20 nobles, most of them young, almost all of the participating in the mobile army. Say, 75%.

If we extrapolate with how things were when the penalties were removed, and the current density... Today, that same realm would have like 10 nobles total, 7 of which would get like 5 hours per turn, at least 5 of those would forever squat safe regions, and your mobile army would be about 3 active nobles and 2 who always lag behind. Good luck waging any kind of war with that.
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Medron Pryde

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Re: Bring back old age penalties
« Reply #3: December 20, 2018, 07:08:15 AM »
I did end up deleting a character because of this age code.

I had lost my unit in battle one region outside my nation.  One region from the capital.  The trip to get back to the capital took me something like a week to move from one region to the next one and cost me most of my gold.

Random bandits would rob me, scratch me, the scratch got infected, and I would spend the next two or three days in a coma.  I woke up, traveled a few hours, and got attacked by another bunch of bandits who stole more of my money, scratched me, sent me into a coma, and wake up two or three days later.

The age code made it impossible to play, so I deleted the character and created a new one with the same name, in the same nation, and kept playing the same character.  Just with the storyline of the gods giving him new life.  Because I could.

Now here's the thing.  He was a HERO.  He didn't live long enough to be crippled by the age code because he sat back and never did anything.  he charged into battle and the bad guys just failed to kill him.  I TRIED to get him killed against overwhelming odds.  But they KEPT MISSING HIM.

So...I'm real glad the age code is gone.  It makes it much more fun to play.  :)