PROBLEM:
When seeing the new character creation system it strikes me as odd. The system values age and gives points so that characters reach the peak of their abilities by the age of 50. What causes me dissonance is to see real data, just for a comparison see the mean age of Olympic gold medalists in the following sports:
archery: 26.2
fencing: 24
wrestling: 25.6
gymnastics: 24.6
triathlon: 27.2
Do you see a pattern? Athletes reach the peak of their performance around the age of 25 but their physical performance decreases as they age and is not compensated by experience.
To think that an archer, a fencer or a wrestler would reach its peak by the age of 50 is plain ridiculous.
For mental tasks the story is different: chess players often reach the grandmaster level in their twenties but they remain competitive in world championships until their fifties (see this and this). One can also see historical figures and the age when they commanded large armies and ran successful military campaigns:
Alexander the great: 24
Napoleon: 36
Saladin: 37
Genghis khan: 42
Julius Caesar: 48
The variance in ages suggest that the peak mental capacity + training can be reached at a young age and remains at peak performance at until their fifties if not longer. My point is that a character should be able to become a fine strategist in its late twenties, whether or not the character can obtain a high ranking position in the army is an entirely different thing that is probably best decided with in-game earnt reputation.
SUGGESTION:
I would suggest modifying or removing the association between points and age. The system is rigid and does a bad job at representing reality, it creates dissonance and limits the ability of characters to do things that they could realistically do.
If the concern is that all characters would become olympians and legendary strategists at a young age I would suggest a limiting the number of exceptional characters. That is, giving characters a certain number of points at creation and allowing the number of points to increase with time or with in-game reputation.
Data on olympians was taken from here.
The mean is produced by averaging the age of the athletes at the time they won the gold medal. Data from the five most recent Olympics were used. All athletes are male.
The dataset that I assembled can be found here
Data on historical figures
- Napoleon
- Saladin
- Julius Caesar
- Alexander the great
- Genghis Khan
Data on chess players
List of world champions (with age!)
List of chess grandmasters
When seeing the new character creation system it strikes me as odd. The system values age and gives points so that characters reach the peak of their abilities by the age of 50. What causes me dissonance is to see real data, just for a comparison see the mean age of Olympic gold medalists in the following sports:
archery: 26.2
fencing: 24
wrestling: 25.6
gymnastics: 24.6
triathlon: 27.2
Do you see a pattern? Athletes reach the peak of their performance around the age of 25 but their physical performance decreases as they age and is not compensated by experience.
To think that an archer, a fencer or a wrestler would reach its peak by the age of 50 is plain ridiculous.
For mental tasks the story is different: chess players often reach the grandmaster level in their twenties but they remain competitive in world championships until their fifties (see this and this). One can also see historical figures and the age when they commanded large armies and ran successful military campaigns:
Alexander the great: 24
Napoleon: 36
Saladin: 37
Genghis khan: 42
Julius Caesar: 48
The variance in ages suggest that the peak mental capacity + training can be reached at a young age and remains at peak performance at until their fifties if not longer. My point is that a character should be able to become a fine strategist in its late twenties, whether or not the character can obtain a high ranking position in the army is an entirely different thing that is probably best decided with in-game earnt reputation.
SUGGESTION:
I would suggest modifying or removing the association between points and age. The system is rigid and does a bad job at representing reality, it creates dissonance and limits the ability of characters to do things that they could realistically do.
If the concern is that all characters would become olympians and legendary strategists at a young age I would suggest a limiting the number of exceptional characters. That is, giving characters a certain number of points at creation and allowing the number of points to increase with time or with in-game reputation.
Data on olympians was taken from here.
The mean is produced by averaging the age of the athletes at the time they won the gold medal. Data from the five most recent Olympics were used. All athletes are male.
The dataset that I assembled can be found here
Data on historical figures
- Napoleon
- Saladin
- Julius Caesar
- Alexander the great
- Genghis Khan
Data on chess players
List of world champions (with age!)
List of chess grandmasters
