Human max for secondary attributes? (Per, will, FP)

[Figleaf23]

Originally Posted by trans

I don't have any opinion on the maximums, but would note that there are plenty of men, anyway, who are as strong or stronger at 40 than they were at 22.

My personal observations suggest that human males continue to add muscle and bone mass until their mid-late 20s.

[Purple Haze]

Originally Posted by Johnny1A.2

Note too that special cases exist where age brings improvement to sensory performance. Mildly nearsighted people, for ex, sometimes experience 20/20 vision in middle age as the tendency toward farsightedness cancels out the initial problem.

No they do not. Middle age brings presbyopia not hypermetropia. Presbyopia is caused by a hardening of corneas causing them to remain focused around their resting point. In people with normal vision this distance is about 20' (hence 20/20 vision), their increasing inability to read may convince them that they are becoming farsighted but this is not the case, they still have 20/20 vision.

A person with myopia will need a lesser prescription for reading than they did before (perhaps even none at all), but they will still require there original prescription for outdoor activities like driving.

[Vynticator]

If you consider female ironman triathletes, you have a good case for FP with Very Fit far exceeding basic HT- certainly insofar as HT reflects resilience to non-race related pain.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by trans

I don't have any opinion on the maximums, but would note that there are plenty of men, anyway, who are as strong or stronger at 40 than they were at 22. Dex and FP can degrade by 40, but not for everyone.

I fully do agree! I'm far much stronger at 44 than I was at 20. I suppose it all depends on activity. I'm now a black belt karateka and did almost no sport when I was 20. So, my strength is improving more and more every year, exactly as my training is becoming harder and harder...

Loosing abilities with aging really depends on activity: older people tend to do less and less physical activities... But this is not true for everyone!

Of course, I will sooner or later reach a point where I won't be able to go on training harder and harder... It didn't happen... Yet!

Originally Posted by trans

Some changes in sensory abilities are apparently inevitable (not able to adjust visual focus as quickly, reduced range of frequencies that can be heard), but whether that means a drop in Per is another question. Per is in the brain, too.

Yes. And as it has been said above, Per is not acute senses. It is mainly vigilance. Older people have reduce senses. But not necessarily reduced vigilance. Young people sometimes dream and don't really pay attention to their surrounding. Which makes them not good at noticing detail.

Which can explain the fact that an "old" detective like Hercule Poirot or Jessica Fletcher, who find clues far much quicker than younger policemen, are perfectly believable. Per is a matter of attention (and almost training) rather than acute sense.

So, in my humble opinion, the human limit would be about the same than IQ, plus or minus one or two points, at maximum. I find that GURPS authors did a very good choice to base Per on IQ rather than making it a stand alone attribute.

[Captain Joy]

Originally Posted by BraselC5048

Ok, Ok, sorry I brought attribute loss with age up. How about we try to get this thread back on track. Anybody got any ideas on the max for Will, Per, and FP?

This is what I was going with; it comes from my Human Template:

EDIT: I've since updated my maximum human values in the above link.

Secondary Characteristic Modifiers
HP cannot vary by more than 30% of ST [B16]
Will cannot be above 20 nor lowered by more than 4 [B16]
Per cannot be above 14 [house-rule] nor lowered by more than 4 [B16]
FP cannot vary by more than 30% of HT [B16]
Basic Speed cannot vary by more than 2.00 either way [B16]
Basic Move cannot vary by more than 3 either way [B16] and can not be above 7 in any case [house rule]

Advantages
Acute Hearing 14 Max [Tactical Shooting ???]
Acute Taste and Smell 14 Max
Acute Touch 14 Max
Acute Vision 12 Max [Tactical Shooting ???] (even if Perception is above 14)
Appearance cannot be Horrific, Monstrous, or Transcendent

Spoiler:  

Originally Posted by BraselC5048

(I've never actually required a sense roll in a game I've played).

I use them all the time. I pretty much require a roll every time they open a door, whether there is anything to notice or not.

I put this in a spoiler in an effort to keep from derailing this thread.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Captain Joy

Advantages
Acute Hearing 14 Max [Tactical Shooting ???]
Acute Vision 12 Max [Tactical Shooting ???] (even if Perception is above 14)

Tactical Shooting doesn't cap vision or hearing, it caps Acute Vision at +2 and Acute Hearing at +4.

A vision score of 12 means the furthest you can see a man sized object that is not in plain sight is 70 yards or 210 feet. That seems a bit limited to me.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

Tactical Shooting doesn't cap vision or hearing, it caps Acute Vision at +2 and Acute Hearing at +4.

A vision score of 12 means the furthest you can see a man sized object that is not in plain sight is 70 yards or 210 feet. That seems a bit limited to me.

I don't know to what Per score it exactly corresponds in GURPS terms, but some (very rare) people can see Saturn's rings directly*. They don't necessarily recognize them as rings, but they can see a little line when they look at Saturn in the night sky.

Furthermore, I've always found that GURPS hints for what is perceptible or not perceptible were very low... According to the Hearing Distance Tables (Basic Set, Campaigns, page 358), a normal conversation requires a hearing roll with no modifier to be noticed at 1 yard! And a light traffic (a car passing on the street, for instance) requires the same roll at 2 yards!

I know that I have a very acute hearing sense (I can hear some light bulb or TV on standby mode whistling). But I really wonder how high could be my acute hearing advantage in GURPS terms...

_____

*In France, vision is rated on a 0 to 10 scale. A score of 10 means normal vision. Some people can go higher and those who can see Saturn's rings have a vision score of 15.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Gollum

According to the Hearing Distance Tables (Basic Set, Campaigns, page 358), a normal conversation requires a hearing roll with no modifier to be noticed at 1 yard! And a light traffic (a car passing on the street, for instance) requires the same roll at 2 yards!

I'm guessing the're some sort of Hearing-equivalent of the 'In Plain Sight' modifier missing. At least +6, possibly as high as +10.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I'm guessing the're some sort of Hearing-equivalent of the 'In Plain Sight' modifier missing. At least +6, possibly as high as +10.

Sure. And this is how I handle it... But following the Rules As Written, there is no such modifier. They just say : an unmodified roll. So, it could also mean than when the sound is not "in plain sight" (ie when there are other sounds around, distraction, or other kind of obstacle) there would be a further penalty (rather than a bonus when the sound is "easily audible").

[Gollum]

I suddenly thought about something... The rules given page 358 may be for adventuring and combat situation – as it is often the case with GURPS modifiers. Thus, in an ordinary non-adventuring situation, characters would receive a +4 bonus – exactly as for driving or piloting...

But we are still quite far from what people like me or people with a very acute vision can notice... Without giving such characters a so high acute sense that it makes them better than cats or eagles. My hearing sense may be very acute (army wrote my ability as the maximum possible hearing score), but I'm still very, very far from a cat hearing sense.

So, the answer of maximum human sense abilities in GURPS should first look at animal descriptions. I've not my books at hand, but it sounds obvious that the maximum acute hearing level of a realistic man can't go over half the average cat acute hearing level. Which is certainly already overestimated...