Older Gamers, Older Characters?

[BigJackBrass]

I've noticed that many of us here at the Secret Hero HQ are of a certain vintage... the more mature gamer, one might say. Old, frankly, compared to the target market for, say, Exalted. Does this mean that we tend to be playing older characters?

Is your idea of a hero now a slightly past-it character, approaching middle age and seeing a new wave of criminals emerge? or can you recall the naivety and enthusiasm you had a couple of decades ago and enjoy playing the fresh-faced new super in town?

Generally, I rarely played young characters even when I was one. My most memorable Traveller character was about seventy; and although I've never designed Captain Zimmerframe for Champions there's a terrific Astro City story that often makes me consider it.

Perhaps I should be asking a slightly different question, though: Does the age of your character affect the way you play him at all? or are your characters caught in that comicbook zone of agelessness that saw Peter Parker take about thirty years to get through college?

[Cancer]

I can't make any blanket statements; it depends too much on the campaign. I tend not to play young punks because I prefer characters with lots of skills (and punks haven't had the time to acquire all those skills), but there are clear exceptions to that. I mean, there's the 19-year-old werewolf computer geek with a pathological fear of relationships in the Buffy campaign...

[Supreme Serpent]

The age (as in gameworld age, not how long it's been since I've made the character) of course affects how they're played. The 90-year old wizard will usually act differently than the 15-year old apprentice.

I don't think I trend towards older characters as I've aged, as far as I can tell. I made mature characters as a teen, and have teenaged characters now as a 30-something. Age of the character depends more on the concept and campaign than my own age. If I want to play the inexperienced hero coming into their abilities, they'll be younger. If I want to play the old warhorse, they'll be older. (shrug)

[BigJackBrass]

The age (as in gameworld age, not how long it's been since I've made the character) of course affects how they're played. The 90-year old wizard will usually act differently than the 15-year old apprentice.

Sadly, I've been in a few games where that hasn't been the case (and one superb Chivalry & Sorcery campaign where the wizard was over a hundred and never let anyone forget it, but in very subtle ways. Wonderful stuff) even when it should have been.

[BoloOfEarth]

... or are your characters caught in that comicbook zone of agelessness that saw Peter Parker take about thirty years to get through college?

Well, it took me about 15 years to graduate from college. Does that mean this "life" thing is all one big comic book?

[BoloOfEarth]

As to character age, I typically GM, so character age is typically what fits the character concept (usually villains, so it's all over the board).

My players are all upper-30s / lower-40s age-wise, and their characters are typically in the low- to mid-20s. I never thought much about it, but in retrospect that does seem odd.

[Enforcer84]

Wow. You graduated? I'm still on the "return when able" plan. :D

[teh bunneh]

In my current (Fantasy) game, all the players are playing teens/early-twenties characters (we as players range from our late twenties to our mid fourties). I described one of the villains as "An old woman. Probably thirty-five or thirty-eight," which had all my players rolling in the aisles. :rofl:

I personally have played characters ranging from 16 to 80, and everything inbetween. I think I generally stick with characters in their 20s -- that seems like prime adventuring age: Old enough to know better, but too young to care. ;)

[archermoo]

I have played characters as young as 10, and as old as 2,500, covering a pretty good spread of the inbetween as well. I haven't noticed a tendancy to play older characters as I have gotten older. My current "active" characters are 23, 27, and 35.

[Pariah]

Well, it took me about 15 years to graduate from college. Does that mean this "life" thing is all one big comic book?

Nineteen years for me. And how did I celebrate? By going to graduate school.....

Strangely enough, of the characters I'm currently playing, one of them is in his mid-to-late 30's. He's an archaeology professor in a mystic campaign. All the rest are in their late teens or early 20's. Ish.

[steamteck]

I haven't PLAYED in 25 years but my players who have stuck with me don't seem to have changed the age of their characters. There is a great span of ages in their PCs. My wife still loves playing both supernormally ancient characters and ones just starting out for example. She does especially like playing daughters of her other characters or infamous NPCs

[Lord Mhoram]

Meeb - thousands of years old, with memories going back millions.
Smokeater - early 30's.
Terminval velocity -19
Sift - 20
Black Cat - 38.

I just build what seems right for the characters. I do tend to play older characters more now than I did when I was 20 though.

[Lord Mhoram]

Strangely enough, of the characters I'm currently playing, one of them is in his mid-to-late 30's. He's an archaeology professor in a mystic campaign. All the rest are in their late teens or early 20's. Ish.

I think you are regressing to childhood again. :eek:

[assault]

"Yes and no".

The first RPG I ever played was Traveller, where there were lots of good reasons for playing older characters. In fact, it wasn't technically possible to play characters that were my age at the time! The youngest possible character was 22, and I was 16. I still play Traveller. These days my ideal character would be about my age, but because of Traveller's random chargen that might not happen.

On the other hand, I am in a Teen Champions game at the moment (although it seems to be in hibernation). My character is 16.

So when I started I was playing characters that are about my present age, and now I play characters that are my age when I started roleplaying... Hmm...

But before I get too caught up with that train of thought, I will also play characters of other ages as well. In fact, if there was ever a completely open "play your own Mary Sue" game, I would probably end up with a character who is a bit of a veteran, probably about my present age, although with retarded aging to make him a bit more likely to go jumping around rooftops.

So the answer is actually yes, if I was building a pure self-indulgent self-identification character, I would play an older character. In other games, not necessarily.

[Blue]

I rarely played old characters when i was young. Now that I'm middle aged, I will play the occasional old man. But the majority of my characters are my age or younger.

[TheRavenIs]

Crossfire started age 30, now 55
Titan Mk III now Mk XI started age 30, now N/A
Badger now called Bearcat started age [I have no idea] looked 30 still looks 30, played for 25+
PAX started age 35, now 45

The Chairman started age 32, game ended
The Traveler started age 20 now 10,000+, looks mid-30

Electric Blue real age 2, appears 18 [android made flesh]
Flame starting age 14, now 18
Snow Fall starting age 14, now 18
Ca'Rom Holt started age 20, now 24
Kameron N'Kadie started age 30, now 32
Keslan Zane starting age 19, now 21

Si Mon Re: The Aquarian started age 68 [looked 30], now 70 [looks 30]
Gi Mon Re: Oceanking started age 40 [looks 25], now 40

Dr John Raven starting age 40
Dr Samantha Raven starting age 38
Catherine Raven starting age 16
John Raven Jr starting age 14
Fast Track starting age 13
Raging Bull starting age 13

[Edsel]

When I first started playing RPGs (back around 1980 or so) I usually played characters close to my own age 16-20. Now that I have gotten older my characters generally have too but not too old. I am now 44 and my characters are generally range in age between 23-28. There are rare exceptions but I don't recall ever having a character older than about 30. I think I have played one as young as 15.

[keithcurtis]

These are all going to be ranges. In some cases, there was no set age/calendar, in others, the span of play covered many years.

Galen Stormcaster (Wizard) - 25 (long gap) 80's
Hollister Hamlin (Bard and Herald) - late 20's
Kurtak (Barbarian warchief) - Late 30's
Nocturna (Post-apoc. Goth chick) - 16 (I think. The campaign was a rite of passage)
Antioch Bellisarius (Fantasy Assassin) - Early 20's
Yuuki (robot) - 150ish
Ezili LaCroix (Vapor) - early 20's
Llewelyn Harlech (Hogwarts, first year) - 11
John Kingsbridge (actor) - late 30's

It seems that where age was not dictated by the campaign (ex: Hogwarts), I have preferred 20s-30s. Younger than that and they tend to lack skills, older than that and I wonder why they are out adventuring instead of settling down.

I do seem to remember playing teenagers mostly when I actually was a teenager.

Keith "Older than most of my characters" Curtis

[CrosshairCollie]

It varies by game for me, for the most part ... in general, my characters tend to be in their mid-30s to early 40s, as I play a lot of scientists (frequently with too MANY points in sciences), so being a bit older than usual is simply logical. A moderate number of my characters simply don't have aging as an issue ... immortal, or robots, for example.

Teen Champions, of course, throws this out of whack.

[transmetahuman]

I think I tend towards the youngest adult age that will support whatever amount of backstory I want the character to have. With supers especially, I usually prefer the "new to his powers" guy to the experienced one. It's mainly so I can explore his powers along with him, but it's probably also about my not taking this whole aging thing very well, and wish fulfillment. Of course when GMing I get to play all over the map.

[Kevin Schultz]

I have noticed that as I age, I'm beginning to play older characters; however, that now means I play characters in their mid-20's and early 30's. Occasionally I'll play someone "Old", but only if the system gives advantages to it (such as Ars Magica or Traveller.)

[wrestlinggeek]

My characters have ranged in age from 16 to "I was watching when God grabbed a handful of dust and made Adam." With my age at the time having no bearing on the age of the character. It just depends on what is needed for the character and/or what I feel like playing. I started playing when I was 13, am 35 now, and 90% of my characters throughout have been mid-20s to early-30s.

[BigJackBrass]

Seems like anything and everything goes, then. Cool stuff! Thanks for your replies.

[zaras]

My age: 18

Rough average age of the last 5 pc's ive run: 50 ish. -discounting the thousand year old ancient mythology rip offs.

[Cougar]

I haven't noticed any tendency in my gaming group to play older characters as we've gotten older.

For myself, I tend to pick an age that makes sense in the setting.

An exception to this is my current Champs character, Cougar. Partly it makes sense that he's college-aged. Partly it's just because he was the first Champs character I ever designed and was never happy with the initial incarnation (back when I was in college). When I decided to bring him back, I wanted to play the character I wanted to play back then, but couldn't because of my lack of finesse with the system. Thus, he stayed college-aged.

In the Privateer game I'm playing in, the setting and backstory seemed to call for a guy who was in his mid-20s or so.

Whereas my Over the Edge character is a millennias-old faerie.

I do think most games tend to nudge players towards younger characters in subtle ways -- seems a little strange to be playing a time-worn veteran who, when you come right down to it, is no more effective than the fresh-faced newbie of the group.

Paul

[Vondy]

Approaching middle age is past it?

[Pariah]

I think you are regressing to childhood again. :eek:

REgressing would imply that I actually left it at some point....

[lapsedgamer]

I'm forty now, and I have a concept for a character that is about fifty-five. I'll never get to play him, but I wanted to run a gadgeteer based on Red Foxx's character from Sanford and Son.

He was just a guy runnning a junkyard/fix-it shop when he his natural tinkering ability suddenly expanded to mythical levels. Now he's the Reed Richards of crackpot inventors. Just like Gizmo from the Teen Titans comics and that guy from Astro City.

He's not physically impressive, but he is a cantankerous old curmudgeon with frickin' lasers mounted on his head. ( He made them out of a pair of those eyeglass mounted flashlights, you see). I really just wanted him to be able to call the group brick, "You big dummy" all the time.

[wrestlinggeek]

I'm forty now, and I have a concept for a character that is about fifty-five. I'll never get to play him, but I wanted to run a gadgeteer based on Red Foxx's character from Sanford and Son.

He was just a guy runnning a junkyard/fix-it shop when he his natural tinkering ability suddenly expanded to mythical levels. Now he's the Reed Richards of crackpot inventors. Just like Gizmo from the Teen Titans comics and that guy from Astro City.

He's not physically impressive, but he is a cantankerous old curmudgeon with frickin' lasers mounted on his head. ( He made them out of a pair of those eyeglass mounted flashlights, you see). I really just wanted him to be able to call the group brick, "You big dummy" all the time.

Repped, quoted, and stolen! If I ever get the chance to run a game again, this guy is so becoming an NPC. :hail: :rockon: :rofl:

[lapsedgamer]

Repped, quoted, and stolen! If I ever get the chance to run a game again, this guy is so becoming an NPC. :hail: :rockon: :rofl:

Thanks. Too bad I don't get a chance to play anymore. Don't forget the physical limit for "heart problems"...or would that be a psych limit?

[CrosshairCollie]

Thanks. Too bad I don't get a chance to play anymore. Don't forget the physical limit for "heart problems"...or would that by a psych limit?

Acting 25-, Only To Fake Heart Attacks. :)

[lapsedgamer]

Acting 25-, Only To Fake Heart Attacks. :)

Yep.

[SSgt Baloo]

Approaching middle age is past it?

It is if you're approaching from the other direction!


He's not physically impressive, but he is a cantankerous old curmudgeon with frickin' lasers mounted on his head. (He made them out of a pair of those eyeglass mounted flashlights, you see). I really just wanted him to be able to call the group brick, "You big dummy" all the time.

Look! It's The Mighty Curmudgeon!

Most of my characters have been my own age at the time the character was created, at least when age wasn't a dice roll. One of my fave characters was a humanoid tiger (aged 35, same as me at the time) who had been making a living as an actor for many years (mostly as a corporate mascot).

My secondmost favorite character was an escaped lab animal (a large orange cat) who was a young adult (for a cat -- I don't know how many years that would've been).

[Dr. Hercules]

In the current Champs game I'm in, I play Tomorrow Boy, a 15 year old super genuis from the future. ( I myself am currently 38, which makes me the oldest amongst our players, most being late twenties to early thirties, I believe.)
Anyway he has been a blast to play.

I'm trying to remember if i played any older characters in any RPG, but I don't remember if i did. D&D was always a shame because I always wanted to play the old wizend wizard, which is hard to justify at first level:rolleyes:

I think my oldest characters have been early thirties.


On another note, This discussion reminded me of a campaign idea I once had were the *young* JLA-like team were killed and the PCs, who were all retired or aging heroes, had to step up and fill the gap left by the supreme team.


Could have been fun.