Re: Tweaking the Age Distribution Tables

From: moonbroth <nick_at_L2Z1Aw4Zr0TLkA8btp2DnORiy7d2Y13Gbcm9x10bStpN5a1_xBwaskf-ceOerZ17NCNYgVf>
Date: Tue, 09 Apr 2002 11:08:46 -0000


John wrote:

> Nick's Age Distribution Table is a powerful and very effective
> tool that's made our job much easier

Thanks, John! But I completely agree with you that:

> The present version, in adapting the age pyramid to TR's statement
> that a clan is 50% children, produces some odd effects.

For the record, I first developed the table for populations that were 33% children (cf. the Balazarings in "Griffin Mountain"), which is in line with real-world populations, then had to flex it *heavily* when the population stats in "Thunder Rebels" came out.

I'm extremely grateful to John for identifying flaws in the current figures (which I had not previously noticed), and hope we can hammer out something more reasonable over the next few days.

> While constant pregnancy not be a particularly far-fetched
> assumption for the Heortlings, I found it a sobering thought

I would *strongly* resist it. It makes Glorantha too darn weird. In general, I aim to make Glorantha match our reasonable expectations, so we can focus on the stuff that's *meant* to be weird. I'm sure we'd have heard before now if all Heortling women of child-bearing age were constantly pregnant.

> Nick notes that the figure for Rome in Empire was only 31.7%.

My source for this is a fairly approachable site, as demography goes: http://www.utexas.edu/depts/classics/documents/Life.html

Have a look if you enjoy this kind of thing.

> Another promising option is to differentiate the male and female
> birth mortality rates so there are a few more women of child-
> bearing age at the expense of those live-hard, die-young,
> adventuring males.

I think you'd be hard pushed to make enough of a difference through this, without skewing the culture (as John notes). It might be worth doing, but then you'd have to use distinct gender separations for different cultures (depending on how "adventurous," "live-hard" and/or "die-young" the male and female populations appear to be). For these reasons, I'm against major tweaks based on gender.

> A third option, less appealing for me, would be to reduce the age
> of senescence to artificially inflate the children percentage, but
> this means less elders.

Doesn't work for me -- same reason as "all pregnant, all the time," it'd be too darn weird for gamers' reasonable expectations.

> Thoughts?

Can we pin down where the "50% children" figure came from? (Same source as all those detached family homes in the other Read Me First pages?). Is there any good reason to stick with it, and not (say) go with 33% children / 33% women / 33% men, which is more natural and intuitive.

Cheers, Nick            

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