MEPBM: Fourth Age Characters

From: dade-sc@ix.netcom.com(dade-sc )

Date: Sun, 03 Nov 1996 00:00:00 +0000

A SHORT ANALYSIS ON FOURTH AGE CHARACTERS

After reading the Fourth Age rulebook and reviewing the nation
set-up sheet, I was immediately drawn to the Characters section
and ones ability to name new characters and determine their skill
rankings.

Here was my chance to finally create characters that I thought
would be most useful based upon my own personal style of play and
strategy.  I immediately crunched the numbers and discovered the
"real" cost for each skill rank point.  Here's how it comes out:

At 1,500 gold a 60 rank character costs 25 gold per skill rank point.
At 1,000 gold a 50 rank character costs 20 gold per skill rank point.
At 600 gold a 40 rank character costs 15 gold per skill rank point.
At 400 gold a 30 rank character costs 13.33 gold per skill rank point.
At 300 gold a 10 or 20 rank character costs 30 or 15 gold per skill
rank point.

The special allowance for each race allows for the creation of a 60
skill rank character at the 50 rank cost.  Therefore, for example,
to create a Dwarvish 60 rank Commander will cost 1,000 gold or 16.66
gold per skill rank.

Now that we have the numbers, a few thoughts came to mind:

1- Obviously, the most "cost effective" skill rank is 30.  At only
13.33, the 30 skill rank is the cheapest and gets you the most bang
for the buck.

2- The special allowances for the various races provides for an
effective savings of 33% over the normal cost for a 60 skill rank.

3- Its possible to create a super character with 60/50/40/40 skill
rankings.  Again, assuming that we are creating a Dwarven character,
then the 60 Command rank only cost 1,000 gold.  The 50 is another
1,000 at the "regular" price.  And you get two 40 rankings at 600
gold each for a total spent on this one character of 3,200 gold.
This takes into account the fact that your other 7 characters all
have straight 30 skill rankings that use 2,800 gold for your total
of 6,000 gold on all characters.

4- Another optional super character (for an evil non-human) would be
a Agent/Emmy/Mage at 60/60/40.  Hmmm......oh the possibilities are
endless and delicious.

I'm certain others will deduce other more intricate and hidden values
to these numbers which I hope will be shared as the game progresses.

Leo DiBenigno
a current 2950 player but soon to try FA

References

New PBEM
sja@cali.co.uk (sja)
Tue, 29 Oct 1996 00:00:00 +0000
MEPBM: Fourth Age Characters
dade-sc@ix.netcom.com(dade-sc )
Tue, 29 Oct 1996 00:00:00 +0000