One of the things that has always bugged me about FRPGs is the speed with which characters advance - after a few weeks or months of adventuring, your typical FRPG character will have several levels\ranks under his belt. I'm not convinced that a group of high-ranked teenagers works in a low-fantasy setting like Dragon Warriors - reaching high ranks should be a real achievement, as much for having accomplished so many legendary deeds as for doing it before their body gave up. One of the things I like about Pendragon is how you only do 1 adventure per year, and creates a point in your character's progression where ageing causes more deterioration in your character than you can offset by increasing in ability through adventuring.
The use of age as a motivator I think is quite powerful, and fae curses that prematurely age a character could have significant consequences for their development. Ambitious characters may even search Legend for the fabled fountain of youth, or bargain with fae and demonic patrons to restore their youth to enable them to continue to pursue lifelong goals that are stretching out of reach. Myth and folklore are filled with these concepts and dilemmas, which I think fit DW very well. You may even notice the priorities of the players change as they wrestle with predicament in which they find their ageing character - do they risk one more adventure, knowing that their character's abilities are fading, in the hope of one last glorious victory, or should they retire their character, finally accepting that they are no longer capable of the feats of their youth. What must the frustration be like for a knight used to challenging the most dangerous foes and accepting the most harrowing of quests, to be confined to an ageing body capable of performing only the simplest of missions.
Also, ageing could be a positive thing - the knight that performs his duties diligently, the sorcerer that performs his experiments in the seclusion of his tower or lair, and the mystic that devotes himself to a life of meditation and aide, without an adventure in sight for anyone. I would argue that just by
being an adventuring professional and acting in accordance with your profession, you should earn some XP (maybe 1 per month) - an average 40-year-old that bumbles through his professional life (assuming he starts at 16) would be 6th rank, and still only 7th rank at 50 years old - still shy of those Skills of the Mighty!
My original take on growing old (
http://cobwebbedforest.co.uk/library/pe ... ?qs=ageing) was that everyone will achieve a certain minimum age, and then start deteriorating. However, I have since been thinking about ageing based on Strength + Health Points. The attributes that govern one's physical constitution should have a bearing and arbitrarily deciding that all humans need to start making ageing rolls at the same age didn't seem very Dragon Warriory.
STR+HP (based on starting scores) ranges from 8 (Strength 3 sorcerer with 5HP) to 33 (Strength 18 barbarian with 15HP). Ageing intervals would now be based on this score - so the Sorcerer reaches middle age at 24 (16+8), old age at 32 (16+8+8) and be considered venerable by 40 (16+8+8+8), whereas the barbarian doesn't need to start rolling for middle age until 49 (16+33), reaches old age at 82 (16+33+33) and becomes venerable at 115! An average human, with a combined STR+HP of 17, would reach middle age at 31, old age at 48 and be venerable at 65 - life expectancies were much shorter in the pseudo-Dark Age setting of DW, but lucky rolls could still see even a character with low STR+HP reach a ripe old age.
So...
What do folks think, and has anyone used age in their games\campaigns in any meaningful way?