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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JohnSnow" data-source="post: 4037462" data-attributes="member: 32164">Okay, I actually think this is pretty frickin' cool as a concept. And I think it might (and I stress "might") even satisfy KM's requirement for proper treatment of heroic characters.The theory is basically that when Sir Hacksalot "retires" from adventuring, he isn't necessarily keeping in shape, and therefore preserving his heroic status. To steal an example from the series where I got my alias, it's like the difference between Eddard Stark (or even Barristan "the Bold") and King Robert Baratheon.Nearly twenty years have passed since they won the throne of a kingdom. Eddard has been warden of the North, riding hard and constantly training. He might not quite be the man he was 20 years ago, but he's still a dangerous, dangerous man. King Robert is different. He's been living the good life, whoring and drinking and feasting. He's fat, and jowly, and his armor no longer fits. He's still strong as an ox (his ability scores haven't dropped much), but he's no longer the warrior he was in his youth. Robert Baratheon is just NOT an adventurer any more. Barristan is more halfway between the two. Due to a combination of age and lack of practice, he's probably not quite the warrior he was in his youth, but he's hardly a pushover either.D&D doesn't allow for this kind of "level loss." Similarly, it doesn't allow for the notion of a character who's past his youth and decides to take up adventuring without him being a multiclass nonheroic/heroic.But aren't both of these situations something we might want rules for? The first is unlikely to ever affect PCs, ambitious and constantly active as they are, but they could be a great world-building tool for DMs.I actually think something like an inactive year is probably better than so many months. So if the king, who was once a mighty warrior (Ftr 15), hasn't bothered to pick up a sword in 12 years, he might be barely more than a low-level fighter by now. And the example that Professor Phobos and I suggested could be covered by our once 20th-level knight having been inactive for decades. Now he might be vulnerable to a relatively mundane injury, because with all his inactivity, he's effectively become a low-level commoner.I actually think this covers nicely characters like the Musketeers, or Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, who were clearly more powerful heroes in their prime than when they "came out of retirement" for their later adventures. And not just by a couple points from their physical stats due to middle-age. They're pretty clearly "out of practice" and therefore "lower-level" than they used to be.Cool concept. I may work this idea into my next game.</blockquote>

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