Some Old Age Tests

[FrankTrollman]

And if the Philosphers had been young, they would have picked up 12000 research turns instead. A Sloth 3 Philosopher picks up 8 Research a turn for 50 gold plus or minus the Magic rate.

At Magic 0, the Philosopher is a better buy over 121 turns than a similarly priced character who generates 5 Research. That's great, because you can't get characters for 50 buck who generate 5 Research who are young.

At Drain 2, the Philosopher is still beating a character with a base 5. At Magic 1 - same deal. At Drain 3, the Philosopher pulls ahead of a young character with a research of 6 - which is awesome. At Magic 3 they are still advantageous over characters with a 5 base, but it's a lot closer.

Of course, that's the 120 turn picture at Growth 3. At Death 3, the 120 turn picture is a lot bleaker. At neutral Magic scales, our Philosopher only pulls ahead of researchers with a base research of 4 - which is only a very good deal. At Drain 3 they pull ahead of base research 5 characters, and with any Magic rate at all they are only better than Research 3 characters - which is the industry standard. At that point, in the long run they are only a noticably good deal for the money (costing as they do considerably less than a normal Research 3 magician and out thinking them by a lot).

And of course, the Philosopher is researching in a front-loaded fashion and once they die of old age you aren't paying them upkeep any more.

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So the bottom line is: Even at Death 3, a Sloth-inspired Philosopher is a better deal in the long run than any available young researcher for the moolah. And in the short run, he's just crazy crazy awesome.

People whine about age a lot, but at least for philosophers, it isn't even a deal. Those guys are still worth every penny and more.

-Frank