Race life expectancy issues

Anthtriel · Nov 5, 2007

Banshee16 said:
Uh....and this view is more supported in modern fantasy? Aside from Tolkien, there are many takes on fantasy where elves are long-lived and/or immortal...

Hmmm...Birthright CS. Dragonlance (Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman)....elves lived upwards of 1200-2000 years. Even Forgotten Realms....in the 2nd Ed. book about Cormanthor, elves lived longer than they do in the PHB. Races of Faerun also extends the lifespan of Gold Elves.

This is all "modern" fantasy.

Then we have a different opinion on what "modern" is. Note the radical change in elf mentality from 2E Faerun to 3E Faerun.

So, yes, there is plenty of precedent in modern fantasy for long-lived elves.

It's far harder to come up with an example for elves that don't live long. As I said, everyone blindly copies from Tolkien. That in itself is not my problem (as I have said multiple times already). My problem are long-lived elves that are treated by the setting or books as if they could easily live along humans as normal citizens without any ramifictions.
It should matter a lot that some citizens live ten times as long as others, yet in Eberron and Faerun, D&D's main settings, it doesn't.

Banshee16 · Nov 5, 2007

Anthtriel said:
Then we have a different opinion on what "modern" is. Note the radical change in elf mentality from 2E Faerun to 3E Faerun.

It's far harder to come up with an example for elves that don't live long. As I said, everyone blindly copies from Tolkien. That in itself is not my problem (as I have said multiple times already). My problem are long-lived elves that are treated by the setting or books as if they could easily live along humans as normal citizens without any ramifictions.
It should matter a lot that some citizens live ten times as long as others, yet in Eberron and Faerun, D&D's main settings, it doesn't.

I disagree. In Birthright, I believe, one of the human regents had an elven or half-elven advisor who had served like 5 generations of the family with distinction. In this case, the advisor's lifespan was a boon that permitted the rulership of the country to benefit from a level of consistency impossible without that advisor's presence.

I'm not sure how living longer doesn't matter in other settings though. It's not like it's going to allow someone to fly, simply because they live longer. But it allows for a certain level of consistency, because your "greatest" citizens aren't dying in 50 years. They've got like 500 years in which to do whatever their mojo is.

In the campaign book Evermeet, from 2nd Ed. there are a group of lvl 20 elves who are ancient, and basically sleep, waiting for times that they are needed. IMO, it's not necessarily a unique idea...but it is cool.

The Complete Book of Elves had a variant rule where older elves got bonus skill points (proficiencies, in 2nd Ed.), based on their age...it was like 1d4 points for every 50 years over 100. It makes complete sense...but it's hard to balance.

Banshee

Kahuna Burger · Nov 5, 2007

Psion said:
Unfortunately, I understand the physiological differences between humans and dogs that require this... and they are quite a bit less pronounced between humans and elves.

So while that sort of handwavey comparison might fly for you, for me, it fails to relax the strain of my SoD.

I think it is awesome that you fully understand the physiological differences between humans and elves. I personally do not, but if asked to explain it, would come up with something to explain the age issues, which might give me some fun insight into the underpinnings of my campaign world.

The only age/mortality change I want to 4e is for the phrase "...and the [druid/monk] still dies when her time is up," to be taken out and burned in effigy.

Psion · Nov 5, 2007

Kahuna Burger said:
I think it is awesome that you fully understand the physiological differences between humans and elves.

Pretty much comes down to this:

INT of average human: 10-11
INT of average elf: 10-11
INT of dog: 1-2

HTH.

Kahuna Burger · Nov 5, 2007

Psion said:
Pretty much comes down to this:

INT of average human: 10-11
INT of average elf: 10-11
INT of dog: 1-2

HTH.

Int of the average green sea turtle, 1-2. Age to sexual maturity, 25 years. There is a lot of variation in lifespan and maturation time in the animal kingdom.

Lonely Tylenol · Nov 5, 2007

Kahuna Burger said:
Int of the average green sea turtle, 1-2. Age to sexual maturity, 25 years. There is a lot of variation in lifespan and maturation time in the animal kingdom.

That's mostly based on the chances that you'll reproduce before you die. If a sea turtle survives its first year, it's likely to survive to sexual maturity...just like humans and elves...so it can afford to wait to reproduce.

The benefit of waiting to reproduce is that you're big, and can have big babies or lay huge numbers of eggs. Unless there's something about elves that makes them far, far less likely to die over the course of 100 years compared to a human, and a really good reason why they need more than 15 years or so to reach sexual maturity, they should more or less match a human in terms of reproductive time. That's the age at which you get large enough that you can pass an infant's skull through your pelvis.

If elves don't grow as fast as humans, there needs to be a reason why, and a reason why they're still around if they have to live in a world that's full of mortal danger from monsters and the like, but have to wait several human lifetimes before they can reproduce. That's what I'd call a poor adaptation.

Ahglock · Nov 5, 2007

Banshee16 said:
Back to birthrate....elves are typically described as having maybe 4 children over a 100 period. How many would a human have in that time period? I'm pretty sure it would be more...

It is unfortunate that they removed the life extension magics from the game. It's a common tenet of fantasy which was present until 3E....but I guess because it doesn't involve blowing something up, it was no longer perceived as necessary.

Banshee

My world was invented during the time when it was "known" that women have a finite number of eggs. I didn't have life extending magic change that. Now that that fact has been brought into question by science, I just ignore it for my world.

So in answer they usually had around 4 kids maybe a few more.

Ahglock · Nov 5, 2007

Anthtriel said:
Works great for high magic worlds of course, but I suppose in most campaign worlds life extending magic wouldn't be that common.

Oh, and doesn't that mean that any important citizen, certainly anyone in power, would live as long as he wants to? The resulting society should be pretty interesting.

The danger is of course that you end up with a Harry Potter world, or Faerun or Eberron. Something that looks great and familiar on the outside, but breaks into pieces once you look at the internal logic that holds it together.

D&D at its core is fairly high magic, though that may change in 4e for all I know.

Yes theoretically citizens can live as long as they want if there important enough to warrant life extending magics. The oldest human who hasn't gone undead in my world is 3,456. The oldest elf is 15,285 years old. They had access to life extending magics much earlier than humans did, especially since they are the first race of my world.

So far the logic hasn't broken any more than any high magic D&D world breaks. A couple thousand really old humans just isn't enough to change that in a world where entire species live really long, especially when lots of them are just really good carpentors.

Anthtriel · Nov 5, 2007

Banshee16 said:
I'm not sure how living longer doesn't matter in other settings though. It's not like it's going to allow someone to fly, simply because they live longer. But it allows for a certain level of consistency, because your "greatest" citizens aren't dying in 50 years. They've got like 500 years in which to do whatever their mojo is.

Well, you said yourself that the 500 year old elves should be the "greatest" citizens then. But in Eberron and Faerun, they aren't. They have less prominent representatives than humans do and about as much as dwarves do, and there is nothing in the material that suggests that the 500 year old elf craftsmen and wizards should be entirely superior to their human counterparts.

trancejeremy · Nov 5, 2007

I think this is how (to a certain extent) Elves (and the other races) have lost their mysteriousness and magic, and are now just oddly shaped humans. (sort of like aliens on Star Trek, just humans with stuff glued to their forehead, and based on a stereotype of some human historical culture)

I mean, originally, Elves were strongly inspired by folklore about Faeries and such. So while they might be long lived, they were completely alien to how humans acted (other than mimicking some things). Heck, even time to them didn't work the same way as it did.

If you look at it really realistically, long lived races (like 1000 years) seems unlikely, because of the effects of cosmic radiation on the body. While humans die before it ever reaches a problem, I think after a while there would be serious problems with cancer and sterilization and mutations. (Though then again, most D&D universes probably don't have cosmic radiation.)

Race life expectancy issues

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