As part of my work on a program that'll simulate the history of the order with different starting assumptions, I was reading back over the aging rules in AM5. Something that I noticed that I had not before is the difference between Aging Points and Decrepitude Points. Decrepitude is a constantly increasing pile, but Aging Points disappear as soon as you've gained a sufficient number to drop a stat.
An implication of this that hit me is that there is nothing in those rules that states (or even implies, really) that one's stat maximums change as one ages. Thus, magi with access to suitable CrCo and/or CrMe rituals really can fend off all aspects of aging short of death.
Realizing this has led me to a House Rule for my Saga: the stat loss from aging affects both the current stat and its maximum value. Has anyone else pondered this particular aspect of the RAW before? Is it clarified or overruled or made more explicit in any of the later books? (I can't remember any examples of Decrepitude or Aging points really being discussed anywhere else.)
I've spend some time thinking about rituals that raise stats (CrCo + CrMe + maybe CrAn).
The problems are: They ususally cause warping. To prevent this the ritual must be both tailored to the recipient and mastered by the caster (unless one like rolling botch dice). They also cost plenty of vis.
I don't think that age is the real killer in this game. Twilight points are more impotant when it comes to the age maximum. There's no way of getting rid of them.
The right magic can pretty much stave off all the unpleasent symptoms of aging short of death... and there are Mysteries that can do an end run around even that. The trick, however, if you you need to have access to the right magic... and that goes back to your saga's assumptions about the Order and the way magi interact with each other.
Can you just hire a powerful Corpus or Mentem magus to cast restortive spells when aging takes it's toll? Are the lab texts for spells readily available for anyone to copy and learn? Or do archmagi have better things to do with their time then cure the afflications of their juniors and are powerful lab texts jealously guarded by those who labored to create them? It really depends on your saga.
As "each aging point also counts as an experience point towards decrepitude", your Decrepitude total will go on mounting and it cannot be countered. Boosting a stat makes no difference to the acquisition of the XP in Decrepitude. Once a character gets to Decrepitude 4 they are pretty close to death. That's 50 XP of course but they can add up quickly,
I would point out that a single minor virtue, unaging, takes care of all characteristic losses -- in addition to allowing one to function normally even at Decrepitude 4 (and also keeping one young looking!). I do not think it's unbalancing to allow multiple, expensive hermetic rituals to produce an effect that's less than that provided by a minor virtue.