Aelle of Sussex: Born 445, so he is 73 at the time of Badon Hill.

Aesc of Kent: No character sheet, but we know he is mentioned coming to Britain with Hengest in 446, so at the very best, he would have been born then, and more likely, before 430. This would make him 88 at Badon Hill, or at best, 72.

Byrthnoth of Sorestan: Ruler from 495 onwards, so at the very least, around fifty and possibly older.

Cerdic of Wessex: Born 451, he is 67 at Badon Hill.

Cwichelm of Anglia: No character sheet, but he bursts to the scene in 500 with a large scale invasion, so he is probably at least 30 at the time to have such a following. Thus, he is around 50 at Badon Hill.

Ossa of Nohaut: Ruler from 496 onwards. Chances are that he is at least in mid-twenties by then, which would make him in his late-fourties by Badon Hill.

Port of Portsmouth: Arrives 501, so if we apply the 30-year old criteria, he would be in late fourties at Badon. However, his two sons are mentioned (Bieda and Maegla), so I would be tempted to make Port closer to mid-fourties in 501, and hence around Cerdic's age at Badon.

Sledd of Essex: As we are correcting the name of the Saxon King who establishes Essex (Aescwine, which sounds suspiciously like a nickname: "Aesc-Friend", and the alliance between Kent and Essex... hmmm... :) ), Sledd takes over as the Prince of Essex in GPC, and becomes the King after Aescwine dies in 505. He shows up demanding Tribute in Sarum in 496, and assuming he is a brash youngster then (20 or so), this would make him in early fourties by the time of his death at Badon Hill. Not bad.

Yffi of Deira: Ruler from 496 onwards. Chances are that he is at least in mid-twenties by then, which would make him in his late-fourties by Badon Hill.


So, as we can see, there is a definite 'bulge' around 40-50 years of age. and a couple of outliers around 70, and Aesc around 90, which takes all the fun from killing him away.

We pretty much have to keep Aelle, since he is the Big Bad Bretwalda. However, note that Aelle's son is NOT Celyn, which is the name of the Cymric nobleman who is placed in charge of the conquered Sussex after Badon Hill. His three sons who arrive with him in 477 are Cymen, Wlencing and Cissa. Given that only Cissa is mentioned in 491, this hints that the other two predecease their father. The only problem this is that to have Cissa even borderline adult at 14 on arrival, Aelle would have sired him when he was closer to 17. But, if we assume that Cissa is born in 463, this would make him 33 in 496. A nice contrast to the younger princes of Wessex (Cynric, below) and Essex (Sledd), with a reputation as the Butcher of Anderida. I kinda like that nickname. :P He'd be 55 at Badon, though, getting a bit in the years.

Cerdic doesn't do much and indeed, ends up captured rather than killed, so we can have him doddering around no problem, protected by his bodyguards. His son, Cynric, is probably around the same age as Sledd, so early fourties.

The other kings around fourties and fifties is OK. You'd expect the king to usually be a bit on the older side, and no doubt they have plenty of princes fighting and dying, too.

Aesc is the one I really wanted to talk about. Frankly, he is way too old for there to be any glory killing him at Badon. So what I would be tempted to do is have him croak in 488 (when Hengest did in GPC), and invent a son, Oisc (an alternative spelling of Aesc), who takes over 488 - 512, which matches the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles (however, you should be aware that these early genealogies are fables, pure and simple; that being said, we can still lift stuff from them). Then you can march in Octa, Son of Oisc, Son of Aesc, Son of Hengest. Born in 484, he would be 34 years old at Badon, at the height of his physical prowess. Much better opponent than 88-year old Aesc, IMHO.

Port is another old king that I think we could do without. Having him die at Netley Marsh 508 would allow one of his sons to inherit (lets say Maegla), and if they were around 20 in 501, that would make them in their late thirties at Badon, again, pulling the average age down a bit.

So, if we do these changes, we have at Badon Hill:
Anglia: Cwichelm (around fifty)
Deira: Yffi (late fourties)
Essex: Sledd (early fourties)
Kent: Octa (mid-thirties)
Nohaut: Ossa (late fourties)
Portsmouth: Maegla (late thirties)
Sorestan: Brythnoth (early fifties)
Sussex: Aelle (73), Cissa (mid-fifties)
Wessex: Cerdic (67), Cynric (early fourties)

Yeah, I can live with that.

As always Morien, very interesting stuff here.

For our campaign I created a spreadsheet to track NPC ages and slowly rising Glory totals (because Jaradan isn't going to stay at the same glory forever, his rises yearly a bit as well!). I find your age points very interesting because I would have run into this very issue when the time came. I would have sort some kind of historical basis to try to fix it and ran smack into the "legendary" ages these Kings were allotted to live. Then I would have made something up instead. So your work-around works for me.

King Pellinore is one of my favorite characters, admittedly because of T.H. White. I actually will be portraying him as a nerd who actually has skills when he's focused and in later years becomes a badass with a face picture of Ser Barristan from Game of Thrones. Again, his advanced age vexes me and I'm going to make him younger and show up later than the 485 introduction he would have had, as you posted in another thread. In line with that, I'll have to recast some of my Saxon Kings so that Aelle is very old and distinguished for Badon because he's going to be old, but he's also the Bretwalda. I'm sure I'll run into other aging scenarios as the GPC goes on, but thanks again for information about this one.

Cerdic of Wessex: Born 451, he is 67 at Badon Hill.


Please note that GPC Gamemaster Characters gives Cerdic's birthdate as 461, which would otherwise be possible, but in the main text, Cynric is described as a handsome young knight in his early 20s when he is met for the first time in 496. Which would mean that Cerdic needs to have sired Cynric when he was 12 or so. This is a bit too young, so I prefer the KAP 5.1 (p. 47) date of 451. (Which also leads me to suspect that 461 is a typo.)

I'm sure I'll run into other aging scenarios as the GPC goes on, but thanks again for information about this one.

You are quite welcome.

Yes, Pellinore is another 'problem case' for me. Pushing his appearance (and Glatisant's) back to 492 or 493 helps, making him a decade or so younger. I am still not sure how Pellinore has all these legitimate sons after he is spending his whole time pursuing Glatisant and having lost his kingdom. It is a puzzler.

Many of the named RTKs will be very old by the time of Camlann. Even Mordred, one of the youngest, is in his mid-50s. However, thanks to the Grail Quest and the previous fighting against Lancelot (not to mention the massacre at the rescue of Guinever), many of the other named knights are dead, and have been replaced by new, younger knights. So it is not that bad in the end.