Notes on AGE

[Morrus]

As I've mentioned a couple of times before, I'm very unhappy with the current age system. So I've jettisoned it. However, I still want age to be part of a character - it's still a defining characteristic. My grandmother is not the same as my niece in many ways.

However, I also strenuously want to avoid penalizing any age. It must be equally attractive to play a young person or an elderly one. Both are interesting characters in their own way.

So here's where I'm at so far.



Now, each of those just provides the one ability for now. That's to keep it simple. Others will be added over time, so an elderly character, for example, will have a choice of 2-3 abilities.

I haven't *tried* this yet. I feel it's better than the horrible attribute mods that were in place before, and I think the abilities are small enough to not be overriding but noticeable enough that you'll... well, notice them occasionally. We have things representing the brashness of youth, and things representing wisdom or experience as the character gets older.

One thing I've avoided is things like "naive" and "frail" - I don't want penalties there.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I wonder if we can back engineer how old Morrus is by his thoughts on the names of ages, it is funny how our psychology of what age is what changes.
to my 87 year old grandmother I'm just a 'kid' at 33, to my niece and nephew I'm 'old' and in most of my friends eyes I'm just an adult...

21 is an adolescent witch means 18 is only half way through...
Young is all the way to 28
and middle age doesn't start till 47... I thought 40's was mid life crisis zone? I know in my group we all fear the big 40...
old starts at 65 (not even retirement age anymore here in the states)

my real response jokeing aside is that with NEW being about times yet to come shouldn't humans age better, maybe even live hundreds of years? I mean the new James woods show makes it sound like kids born today could have an average life span over one hundred...

How does tech level effect these ages?

 

[Morrus]

my real response jokeing aside is that with NEW being about times yet to come shouldn't humans age better, maybe even live hundreds of years? I mean the new James woods show makes it sound like kids born today could have an average life span over one hundred...

How does tech level effect these ages?

Depends on the setting. Star Trek, for example, doesn't have people living hundreds of years. Other settings do. There's no default setting, so no automatic assumption everyone uses anti-aging drugs or what-have-you. But there are rules for them, and they do reduce 'effective' age, if available in the setting.

Any GM is free to tweak those numbers anyhow. If you just want to say "adolescent is up to 145 yrs in my setting", go right ahead!

 

[Morrus]

This is actually coming along quite well, I think. It's basically a mini traits system, though a little more focused on age.

 

[MarkB]

It's an interesting change, but it looks like a lot of situational modifiers that are likely, individually, to be used seldom enough that players will forget they're there half the time.

I almost feel like the "+1d6" modifiers should basically just be keywords that can be invoked when deemed appropriate, rather than tied to specific actions. The brashness of youth feels somewhat stilted if it only comes into play when making charge attacks or leaping gaps.

Also, do all species age in the same manner? Maybe some alien races should have their own ageing chart.

 

[Morrus]

I almost feel like the "+1d6" modifiers should basically just be keywords that can be invoked when deemed appropriate, rather than tied to specific actions. The brashness of youth feels somewhat stilted if it only comes into play when making charge attacks or leaping gaps.

Heh. Like the skills are, you mean? That reminds me of what someone said to me about skills - "what's to stop someone selecting 'doing things' or 'being lucky' as skill and getting +1d6 to EVERYTHING?"; that's kinda what "brash" as a keyword would do.

 

[MarkB]

Heh. Like the skills are, you mean? That reminds me of what someone said to me about skills - "what's to stop someone selecting 'doing things' or 'being lucky' as skill and getting +1d6 to EVERYTHING?"; that's kinda what "brash" as a keyword would do.

That is a good point, and one reason why I prefer FATE Core over FATE Accelerated. But, of the options you listed in the Age chart, I'd probably tend towards taking the ones that can just sit there on a character sheet, doing their job, like the SET IN YOUR WAYS Will bonus, rather than something like EXPERIENCED which will only come up occasionally when there's an ambush round, by which point I stand a good chance of having forgotten it's there.

That's just play-style, though. I know a lot of players will prefer those bonuses, and probably keep track of them better than I would.

 

[Morrus]

That is a good point, and one reason why I prefer FATE Core over FATE Accelerated. But, of the options you listed in the Age chart, I'd probably tend towards taking the ones that can just sit there on a character sheet, doing their job, like the SET IN YOUR WAYS Will bonus, rather than something like EXPERIENCED which will only come up occasionally when there's an ambush round, by which point I stand a good chance of having forgotten it's there.

I promise you that after playing the game just once, you will reverse that tendency. The ambush round isn't occasional; the roll for it comes up at the start of EVERY combat, and getting/not getting it is big.

 

[LucasC]

This is actually coming along quite well, I think. It's basically a mini traits system, though a little more focused on age.

I like this better than what is out there right now. One observation - all of those abilities except one are replaced as you age, whereas one has a lasting impact on your character beyond the age group.



Any skills I purchase with Adaptive are going to stick around when I'm an old fellow. Don't know if that's good, bad or neither, but it's different than all the others on that table.

 

[Morrus]

Any skills I purchase with Adaptive are going to stick around when I'm an old fellow. Don't know if that's good, bad or neither, but it's different than all the others on that table.

That's true. We'll see how it goes!

Incidentally, given that Androids have no age, I added two specifically for them.

[TABLE="width: 100%"] [TR] [TD="width: 100%, bgcolor: #e6e6e6"]

• CHILDLIKE You are designed to emulate human behavior and are “growing up” in a childlike manner which some find endearing; you gain a +1d6 die bonus to social checks with engineers and scientists
  
• ROBOTIC Your intimidating expressionless face and robotic voice give you a +1d6 die bonus to intimidate others.

[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]