) I am working on and was just wanting to get your guys input on these subjects.
Age - I plan on making age a relatize thing for the players. When you character is created he starts out being 20 years old. When you are younger what you do affects your stats more then later because you are still shaping your character. If you were to do some sort of strength training (be it fighting or training at the local guild or helping the local buisnesses by doing wood cutting or rock removal) it would help your strength stat more then if you were say 60. But also over time things like wisdom will increase and may increase faster as you get older so you would fight smarter and not need the strength as much BUT you would still have a lot of strength so you could still smack around the new stronger kids on the block through brains not brawn. Age also helps to let players know who has been around for a while and who hasn''t. Your player would age even when you are not using him. I was thinking about roughly 5-8 years a month so that in a year a player would be in his 80''s. Age would also play a role in the political system where rules could be set up in some cities that a Player can not be Mayor if he is under or over a certain age and that players could have lengths of terms. Maybe even set up social security J/K. Also it would be possible that a city can have set up Mandated military service where if your city is under attack and you are frmo the ages of say 20-30 you would be required by law to help defend if you are available. This would mean that even when you are not actually playing the computer could AI control you to defend the city, it would never be required for you to attack another city though only defend your own.
Death - Death''s always the trickiest part of any ORPG I think. It always sucks to die and lose everything but it means no real risk to you if jsut start back with little lose then mayeb some EXP and maybe a weapon or 2 that you can go back ni 5 minutes and get anyways. So here is the way I was thinking of handling it. Linked to the age system set up above a player could die with little or nothing lost from the ages of 20-35 but then after that all player deaths are permanent and you have to start over again after that. There would be resurrection spells but they would not be a scroll that costs 100 bucks it woudl be somethnig that would take a very strong mage and would not be something that the fellow couldn''t do over and over. It would basically only be there as an option for a mage to try and resurrect someone of great power who could give them somethign in return (that''s more detailed with the storyline I am planning.) This I would believe make it so players could get use to playing and not really have to worry about dying to much but later has to once they know how the agme flows. Also this would make for lpayers who make it to the age of 80 are more respected because they were able to live their life that long without falling victim to death (or can be looked at as a giant pussy for never tryign to go outside his town.) Also after you die when ou cmoe back your character will start out a bit better stat wise then when you first start with a new character. This is to make it not so bad that you died and will give you the option to maybe create an even greater character quicker because you will have a bit of a head start. Also if you die defending your town no matter what age (saying you were forced into it while you were not there) you will not lose anythign and it will seem liek nothing happened to you (though your house might be burned down from invaders) Though also after a certain point I was thinking abotu making it possible for you to die in your sleep. A player may get to be of extreme power and the storyline may have evolved to make him a big part (say he is the evil ruler of a city killing off people for no reason and people may try to revolt against him or a band of merry adventures may try to free this city.) It would suck to fight your way through a heavily guarded fort jsut to get to the end real person and find him offline. This would only be allowed to players of great power and someone liek that would haev many guards and monsters to defend themself most likely. Also the player would have AI to defend himself so yuor character woudl still have a chance at warding those people off. This i where the reserrection mentioned earlier would come in. After this very evil players death the people would bury his corpse probably in someplace somewhere well guarded so that noone coudl ever reserruct him. This is where others could band together to reserucct him so they can use him for his powers and work with him to say recreate his empire. Now when that player is resurrected you get 2 options, the player who originally controlled him is given the option to start controlling him again or if he declines (or is no longer playign the game) AI will take over his position. Now i know AI can not make up for what a plyer brings to the character but it woul be bad for teh players to adventure that far and not get anything in return for rescueing the character, or possibly the player would come back tolife to imbue them with some new gift that he once had and then coudl disappear not to be seen from again.
Children - Alright here was another interestnig idea i had. Okay first example if you die permenantly you have the option to come back as a child of your character. What this would mean is that your player would be similar looking (same haircolor skin color and such, though you can change sex if you wish) to what you did look like and your stats will be similar to yours in balancing (but just a lot less powerful). Next after you get to a certain age you will be allowed to let new players be yor children. This can help to give a new player someone to help them out a bit and maybe get them started off better. Players could then be offered children say every 5 years of their life after the age of 45. Now when this player dies who has children his belongings will go to his childeren be it land or money or items (after a tax by the goverment of course , this is would be so a player didn''t jstu die comeback as his own child and get everything the way it was before.) The player before he dies has the ability to make a will and decide where it all goes. If a player doesn''t make a will it''s divided evenly between them all. Also for players that are brand new to the game that is a child to someone else they do not get the bonuses to stats and have them pre assigned to where they are or have to look like their parent at all.
Well give me your input on these ideas.
RipSUp
P.S. sorry for all the typos and bad spelling I have been working late and need sleep
Or wait maybe more peopel woudl want to play it then after hearing of the gae on the tele 
