"Old Age" system in Dom3 - need some info

[Wick]

I just checked it out and each point of nature magic adds half of your baseOld to your Old. A elegant way to test this is to pick a pretender with nature and look at it on the next screen (that lists magic, dominion, awaking...).

Each point of Fire subtracts 5 from Old if Old => 200 and subtracts 2 if Old = 50. The only test case I found 50>x>200 was the Golden Naga (334) whose f2 gave her 69. I didn't check the <50 case.

[dirtywick]

I played a game with Growth 2 and a game with Growth 0, and the growth scales make a really noticeable difference Old Age afflictions. I don't know what the math behind it all is, but it's a pretty big help.

[RoyalOak]

Not so sure about growth. Recently played MA Abysia, and at first late winter turn 6 of my 8 eligible units for old age get diseased, altough I've taken growth 2.

I for one like to see the age system toned down a bit : I've quit playing abysia for the moment, as they have really big aging problems.

[Belcarl]

If the chance for getting the dreaded "disease" affliction was tuned down, I wouldn't mind the new Age system. As it is now, I'm struggling to keep my precious old human mages alive with a lot of nations.

Maybe an option to turn the Aging system to easy, standard or severe before starting a game would be a nice feature.

[Agrajag]

Abysia has easy access to Boots of Youth, and can forge blood boosters so that all of its old warlock can cast rejuvinate on themselves (by forging a few boosters and passing them around), so the only ones that are in some trouble are the Anathemat(sp?) Dragons.
This would make you invest quite a bit in blood, but I think its worth it.

[WraithLord]

I think old age should be toned down a bit. I like the flavor it adds but as it currently is I avoid recruiting old aged mages unless I absolutely have to. I think that reducing the chance for getting the disease affliction and a adding a couple more counters to old age/afflictions from old age might do the trick.

Sadly, old age has affected Pythium (my favorite nation) quite badly. I'm not saying that I want to play it exactly as in dom-II, it ok that A.T.s suffer from old age, so long as it doesn't *drastically* reduce their life spans. The feature isn't bad, just needs adjustment imho.

[Twan]

I think that the affliction chance once old is not too high, it's having all the best mages or priests starting old that is annoying for some nations. Just imagine instead most of them starting 1-3 years before the old age limit... you would have a guarantee they won't become diseased 2 turns after recruitment, and old age would still be an important long term factor (and continue to have the same power for decay and BoT effects) but not one more random factor for short term.

Old age is a good idea I think, but once you have recruited your best priest as EA Ermor, appointed him as your prophet and seen him become deseased the next turn, you start to find the mechanic less fun. As well spending 250+gp on a mage to see him mute or feebleminded in the year is not the pinnacle of a game experience IMO.

[Unwise]

The only real question is whether or not the age is counted into price (in gold or gems) of the unit. Does a dottering Arco mage cost significantly less than an equivalent mage who is still young and spry?

[Cainehill]

Agrajag said:
Abysia has easy access to Boots of Youth, and can forge blood boosters so that all of its old warlock can cast rejuvinate on themselves (by forging a few boosters and passing them around), so the only ones that are in some trouble are the Anathemat(sp?) Dragons.
This would make you invest quite a bit in blood, but I think its worth it.

Except that for one thing, Boots of Youth aren't available until Const-6 : an awful lot of mages can have gotten diseased, feebleminded, mute, and dead before then, and having to refrain from recruiting 4/5 of the national mages until then is crazy. For another thing, yes Abysia is a blood nation - but having to outfit 4/5 of their mages with an item that costs 10 blood slaves also sucks, considering that those slaves could've gone into summonings.

I mean, when even your _weakest_ mages start with old age, there's something wrong imo. Pretty damn hard to research to blood-6 or construction-6 when the mages you'd want to use as researchers are dying or getting feebleminded on you, _consistently_. Demonbreds are a little pricey for research use, _and_ they're capitol only.

So, the aging system has ensured that I will never _EVER_ play Abysia, and possibly other nations. Wonderful bloody mechanic.

[Nerfix]

Abysia suffers way, way too heavily from aging, but as for blindness/muteness/feeblemindness I've seen those com from old age about, uh, five times. Total.