Relative aging amongst the races

[Halaster Blackcloak]

This little nugget from 1E has always been interesting. In the 1E DMG, pg. 163, under Major Malevolent Effects (Artifacts), there is a table showing the relative aging effects on the various races, when caused by the artifact. It ages a character 3-30 years. Here's the breakdown, by race and how much any given race is aged:

Half-orcs = 2 years
Humans = 4 years
Halflings = 7 years
Half-elves = 12 years
Gnomes = 20 years
Dwarves = 25 years
Elves = 30 years

It may not be scaled perfectly, but it's workable.

I once used to use this to adjust for aging caused by ghosts, which made the elven PCs a little more leery of combating ghosts. Same for dwarves, etc. In other words, on seeing a ghost (and failing a save), instead of aging 10 years like a human, a dwarf would age 50 years and an elf 75 years.

My players learned to hate ghosts. LOL!

Anyone else ever adjust aging?

[Tarrax Ironwolf]

Never even thought of that. I just used the generic 10 year aging when encountering ghosts (or ghost like creatures).

[Mira]

Absolutely! I did my own calcs, figuring out the relative ages based on the distance between the different age categories. I didn't know there was a table already setup for that!

It really shocked the player of an elf that said, "I'm an elf, who cares if it's a ghost?" He was old-age by the time the combat finished!

Mira (A day without sunshine is like, well, night)

[Beowulf]

Personally I'm not a huge fan of magical aging; I reserve it for very special situations. I like magical level drains even less as to me they make absolutely no logical sense at all. You physically remain the same but lose just surgically specific skills related to game levels- really? That's the story the authors want to go with?

[Mira]

As a general rule, I'm not a fan of level drain or a ghost's aging. But I did like the 1 year aging on haste and the aging from some other spells. When I used level drain, the group always had the means to restore them and I didn't make a high level spell only restore one, I had it restore them all.

That said, for a one-shot game, or one that's only going to run for 3-4 sessions, all bets are off! And that's the sort of game I did the relative aging on that elf with.

In our long term campaigns, we were always asking people if they wanted to be hasted, so that those who were concerned about the aging could opt out (we didn't use relative aging with most spells, other than Wish and the like)

I'm glad I started playing before crafting was in the game, I've seen how out of control that can get in subsequent versions. In my world, items were mostly left over from bygone eras, there were very few people capable of crafting a magic item, and even then, it would take a long time, be costly and not all that powerful. I still ran a fairly high magic game, mostly to even the playing field a bit more. In my game, the PCs were all different, even if more than one played a fighter. Didn't need insane amounts of rules to make it that way, they grew into it while playing and having preferences for different items. None of this 'planning a character' stuff that I have seen from 3E on.

Anyways, I've always thought that for long term play, there were plenty of things that could destroy a character, make them unplayable or just not fun to play. Aging too much or too much permanent level drain wasn't worth it. I made sure that dragons were feared far more than a vampire, while if you stick with the rules, any player is going to fear level drain compared to loss of hit points. and death is easier to 'cure' by the rules.

Mira (What happens if you get scared half to death twice?)

[Halaster Blackcloak]

Beowulf wrote:

I like magical level drains even less as to me they make absolutely no logical sense at all. You physically remain the same but lose just surgically specific skills related to game levels- really? That's the story the authors want to go with?

I've always seen level drains in a sense of "personal power" ala Carlos Casteneda. When you're drained of a level, you lose personal power, which is in a sense a measure of the power of your soul, your personal ability to do things. Being level drained lowers it, hence you lose abilities unless and until you can re-gain that power. Kinda hard to explain unless you read his books (Journey to Ixtlan is the best to understand it).

To me, level drains therefore always made sense, but they were just just very irritating to deal with because you have to erase spells, hit points, etc. So it's a lot of record keeping.

Artificial aging to me was always the most problematic threat. Let's say you see a ghost and fail your save, then age 10 years. You eventually overcome the fear, return to the party to help fight it, and it hits you - aging you 40 years. You're now 50 years older. Even if you started that adventure at the age of 16, you're now 66 years old and lose a 3 pts. of Strength, 2 pts. of Constitution, and 1 pt. of Dexterity. This will likely mean less fewer total hit points, worse thaco, lesser damage inflicted on enemies, less weight that can be carried, lesser chance to bend bars/lift gates, worse AC, worse ability to react to surprise, worse system shock, lesser chance of being raised, etc.

Besides the physical setbacks (lowered ability scores), there is the issue of people not being able to recognize you. Imagine being a 16 year old who is the heir to his father's farm. Your father dies, you try to collect your inheritance. Your father was 58, you're 66. How can you be his son? Would anyone even recognize you? Family? Friends? Acquaintances? I bet his 16 year old sweetheart is in for a shock when he comes home to her!



So yes, artificial aging is very involved and fraught with challenges for the players. And unlike losing a limb or being blinded (which can be healed using regeneration) or losing a level (which can be reversed using restoration), or even dying (which can be reversed using raise dead or resurrection), there is no (relatively) easy fix for artificial aging. I've had this argument numerous (numberless even!) times with the 3E crowd. Youth potions do not work! An elixir of longevity is the most powerful de-aging item in the DMG. It restores 1d12 years of aging for an average roll of 6-7 years. That 16 year old would need 7 such potions on average to restore the youthfulness lost to that ghost. And that's just for one character! An elixir of youth restores just 1d4+1 years, for an average of 3-4 years restored. So it'll take 12-16 such potions to resolve the problem.

I for one do not hand out youth potions like candy on Halloween. Also, with the more powerful potion of longevity, each time you drink one it has a cumulative 1% chance of reversing all aging removed by that potion, past and current. So there's a danger of inevitable backfire.

You could certainly use a wish spell, but those are given out very rarely in a well run campaign, so good luck getting one.

I also like artificial aging because it sets up quests to find a fountain of youth, research into spells or potions or other magic that can reverse the aging, quests taken for specific gods in return for restored youth, etc. It makes the DM get creative and the players to work hard.