Rou Quan is much older.
I agree that Shaolin martial arts are older than TCC. "All Chinese martial arts are sons of the same mother." (By implication, all Chinese martial artists are brothers. But, that'd be another thread, and be about as likely as convincing humans they were connected). It's all very Confusion
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but in my opinion anybody /with the solid MA base of course /could assemble his own form, best for his personal use/preference.
We have contemporary example - 24 TJ form.
Yes, and no no no
. Sure, if someone has a solid base, he could make up his/her personal form. Some would argue that he should. However, imo, his base wouldn't change. And it all depends on what the person intends the form to do or what he intends to do with it.
Why a form is created must be similar to why forms were created in the first place. We can basically agree that they started as the linking together of single movements. Linking them together also had a positive effect on the body. People remembered and wanted to pass them on to the next generation.
It is probably true that the sequence of forms derived from Shaolin is because it was found to work, or was said to work. Otoh, people have extracted partial sequences and found that they work too. That might seem heretical, except that people use the form to help their lives, not tcc. Starting out with a short form can be an introduction to a longer form. Doing the form was never the end all of tcc practice. But, it is more than enough to have positive effects on the elderly.
The other issue is "how" people do the form. Fortunately, that is the one area where the consensus is disagreement. I.e., everybody knows that everybody else is doing it wrong.
"A man is rich when he has time and freewill. How he chooses to invest both will determine the return on his investment."