D&D 5E Aging and the 5E PC

[Mark CMG]

Added OP question - How do you think it would play in 5E if the cost of using certain high levels of magic aged a character or if major amount of healing all at once caused aging (like half or more of HP in a single 24 hours)?

 

[Stalker0]

Aging is probably a great idea for one of the 5e modules, but definitely not a core concept.

 

[Tortoise]

I would like this to be available in game, but in 30 years of play I have only seen it used maybe twice. It is definitely a campaign specific option.

 

[Sunseeker]

I generally don't favor aging unless there is something particular about the story that demands it(such as if a character gets pregnant). My adventures usually take the form of something akin to LOTR(sans the Hobbit), an epic adventure in roughly a year. I like to keep the wheels of my world turning while my players play, and in that regard it's easier to keep them in turn with the political machinations of a short time, instead of what may happen in a a decade or more.

I also like to make issues pressing. Having a doomsday plot that won't go off for 100 years isn't very pressing. It also allows for players to make their characters the elderly type. Seasoned soldiers, aged wizards ect... If I throw in even so much as a decade at these characters they might die of old age! I'd rather kill my player with a purple wurm than the sands of time!

 

[yoshikawa666]

I see no problem with aging, as long it's optional.

 

[Yora]

Added OP question - How do you think it would play in 5E if the cost of using certain high levels of magic aged a character or if major amount of healing all at once caused aging (like half or more of HP in a single 24 hours)?

I assume most groups would just ignore it entirely.

 

[SensoryThought]

I don't see aging as in pcs getting too old as a problem in most games.

In fact, I often see the converse, which is the 18yr old level 1 who gains 9 levels in 6 months of game time. I have found a couple of ways to stretch this out (traveling, inter adventure downtime) but it is something I find myself having to be mindful. Especially in D&D where healing is an overnight event.

 

[Li Shenron]

I've never seen the aging rules being used in games where I've played...

Normally, I would have no problems in players choosing to play an older character and getting the benefits/penalties for that, but no one has ever seemed to be interested.

I think I would definitely like a lot to play campaigns that last so long (for the PC), that characters are taken through different ages of life. I do not mean that necessarily there should be a mechanic for that... it could just be flavor and description.

Certainly one thing to look for is that different traditional fantasy races age at very different rates.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Added OP question - How do you think it would play in 5E if the cost of using certain high levels of magic aged a character or if major amount of healing all at once caused aging (like half or more of HP in a single 24 hours)?

I like things like that in principle, but in practice it does create some strange balance issues between the races. Your half-orc barbarian probably gets healed a lot, so he'll die young (so to speak), while your elven wizard has an even bigger advantage in expected lifespan than he already did.

 

[Lord Zack]

Personally, I'd like to see guidelines for training time and other forms of down time, so that the campaign will actually take some time, and thus things like age might actually come into play. Obviously this should be optional, since some people have play styles that don't jive with this notion, like adventure paths that require you to level up multiple times in a single adventure to keep up with the challenges.