D&D 5E Simple Rules for Aging (+)

[Peter BOSCO'S]

Personality Traits "You youngsters need to get off of my lawn." and “Though much is taken, much abides; and though We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” Ideal "I need to take a nap." Bond "I love my nice soft bed in my nice, quiet, restful cottage." Flaw - "I'm getting too old for this [excrement]." And I'm done.

 

[Laurefindel]

In which case you've run aground before you've left the dock.

The baseline assumption is that (most) adventurers are doing so while at the peak of their combined physical and mental prowess - they're as good and healthy and robust as they're ever gonna get, and have enough mental capacity to get by and then some.

Realistically speaking, that might be true. But as far as the game mechanics are concerned, the 45, 60, or 75 y/o characters we play are those that managed to keep a high physical and mental prowess late in their life.

I aim to make a houserule where the 20 y/o, the 30 y/o, the 45 y/o, and the 60 y/o (etc) all have the same combined physical and mental prowess, but distributed differently. Not unlike a halfling and a goliath are mechanically equivalent despite the great size discrepancy, with humans somewhere in between.

 

[Laurefindel]

If you go with the concept of giving out Background Feats like which have begun being introduced...

I'm leaning more and more toward this solution; it's definitely the easiest to balance.

 

[Horwath]

I have a variant exhaust system:

It gives -1 to all d20 rolls(saves, checks, attacks), -1 to AC, -1 to DC's and -5ft speed per exhaustion level(min of 5ft speed)

At every age category above adult: let's say middle age 40, old age 60, venerable 80, you can get:
+1 permanent exhaustion level,

and for bonus;

Option A: +1 to your proficiency bonus. This is plain and simple. You get to stay on equal with young people in everything you trained in, little better even with expertise. Just a little slower and more close to death via exhaustion(pretty realistic)

Or,

Option B: you get a bonus feat(or two). Depending how much you value a permanent exhaustion level to keep somewhat of balance.

 

[Mannahnin]

A relatively simple system for starting ages I saw someone suggest recently was basically to have the player select at character creation whether the PC is Youthful, Mature, or Aging. Note that this was for a simpler version of D&D without a full skill system. I think it might have also been in a context of a rule where every time you fail a death save, your death save value permanently goes up by 1.

Youthful characters get a base death save of 8+ and +10% to earned experience.

Mature characters get a base death save of 10+ and to choose a professional career they had before adventuring. They get one pricy/valuable item or set of gear related to that profession (could be a horse, a small smithy or workshop, or the like) and are assumed competent and knowledgeable in relation to their profession. So they can use those skills and knowledges during play.

Aging characters get a base death save of 12+, the professional career stuff, and a useful NPC relative or servant. The equivalent of a henchman or sidekick character.

As for aging during the game, I'm a bit leery of setting any arbitrary break points. I think what Pendragon does is pretty good. IIRC every year after the character turns 35 you make a check* to see if any of your ability scores degrade. It's a 2d6 table, IIRC. More extreme rolls result in more stats going down. Once you know how many are degrading, randomize which ones and they each decrease by 1. Of course, you can also increase ability scores by training in the winter phase in that system, so you can offset decrepitude, albeit at the cost of not putting those advancement points elsewhere.

 

[Lanefan]

Realistically speaking, that might be true. But as far as the game mechanics are concerned, the 45, 60, or 75 y/o characters we play are those that managed to keep a high physical and mental prowess late in their life.

I aim to make a houserule where the 20 y/o, the 30 y/o, the 45 y/o, and the 60 y/o (etc) all have the same combined physical and mental prowess, but distributed differently. Not unlike a halfling and a goliath are mechanically equivalent despite the great size discrepancy, with humans somewhere in between.

Ah. If you're a fan of what I bolded then we're probably not going to find much common ground here. Hope you find a solution that works for you!

 

[Vaalingrade]

So while people usually use Aging to stack penalties in characters, but here's one that's the opposite:

I often find myself referring to other hobbies and careers I used to do but no longer. Maybe an older character can gain the ability to use a skill as if they were proficient or even has expertise in that they don't have due to things they did back in the day, kind of like the past life stuff the Deva had.

 

[Laurefindel]

Ah. If you're a fan of what I bolded then we're probably not going to find much common ground here. Hope you find a solution that works for you!

I'm not much of a fan of halflings being as physically strong as a goliath. I do appreciate that the halfling race is balanced against the goliath race however, and that's what I aim for with this houserule. Youth, maturity, and old age do not need to be the same, but I do want them balanced against each other.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Youth, maturity, and old age do not need to be the same, but I do want them balanced against each other.

Which is why I suggested a +1 ASI for a -1 ASI at each point age changes. This way they are all balanced against each other and it allows players to shift their focus as the character ages. A PC might become wiser, but lose strength, for example.

 

[James Gasik]

Though in that case, you'll find aging physical characters making poor life decisions in order to keep their Strength!

 

[DND_Reborn]

Though in that case, you'll find aging physical characters making poor life decisions in order to keep their Strength!

Not necessarily, as I mentioned upthread the full idea was you got the +1 for a -1 only if you wanted to. Otherwise, it is assumed you are working to keep your "weakness" from developing into a weakness.

Either way, you might increase STR but lose DEX or CHA or whatever. You might increase INT but sack WIS as you lose touch with the world around you but study more, or how ever you want to work it.

 

[James Gasik]

Yes sorry, was being humorous. Certainly you can find examples of aging warriors who have lived lives where they made very bad choices. Cobra Kai's Johnny is a good recent example.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Yes sorry, was being humorous. Certainly you can find examples of aging warriors who have lived lives where they made very bad choices. Cobra Kai's Johnny is a good recent example.

While I didn't realize you were being totally humorous, I figured you were being a bit anyway. My response to you was more in thinking of the example in my prior post:

A PC might become wiser, but lose strength, for example.

 

[James Gasik]

While I didn't realize you were being totally humorous, I figured you were being a bit anyway. My response to you was more in thinking of the example in my prior post:

Just because it's funny in my head doesn't mean it's funny in real life. You know, like the Bard class!

 

[Laurefindel]

Though in that case, you'll find aging physical characters making poor life decisions in order to keep their Strength!

They’re adventuring D&D characters. Around my table, that usually means making poor life decisions is what they excel at!

 

[MGibster]

It can make an interesting adventure,
a bunch of “has been“ meeting in a fancy inn, and force into an adventure they just don’t want!

It's a campaign idea after seeing the movie RED (retired extremely dangerous), about a bunch of retired spies who become active again. I'd have a bunch of old adventurers come out of retirement for one last adventure. As a red herring, I was going to have the group go after their former nemises to find that he is genuinely happy to see the group and has himself retired as well.

 

[dave2008]

I'm not entirely convinced that stat modifications are really the best way to represent aging. I wonder if it might make more sense for older character to do something mechanically similar to choosing additional backgrounds to represent their additional experience. Or, perhaps, choosing skills to gain expertise in. That's really what has happened. You've had time to burn through a lot of downtime activities.

I'm not sure how best to represent the effects on the body of aging, or from just being out of shape and out of practice. Flat penalties are simple, but they don't seem like the most accurate solution. I would almost go for something like atrophied class abilities. In fantasy stories, we often see things like old fighters who are still very deadly, but they can't do everything they used to. Or old wizards who can cast many spells, but no longer have a grasp on their most potent spells. Maybe you keep your proficiency bonus and your hit dice, but everything else starts to fade after decades of disuse. You're still a 13th level Fighter, but you've only got the class abilities through level 5.

At the venerable stage where you're so old that you need dedicated care, I kind of feel like that would best be represented with steadily progressing permanent exhaustion.

I think this is a great idea actually.

 

[Krachek]

It's a campaign idea after seeing the movie RED (retired extremely dangerous), about a bunch of retired spies who become active again. I'd have a bunch of old adventurers come out of retirement for one last adventure. As a red herring, I was going to have the group go after their former nemises to find that he is genuinely happy to see the group and has himself retired as well.

For once, players can write background as silly and complex as they wanted!

 

[Horwath]

So while people usually use Aging to stack penalties in characters, but here's one that's the opposite:

I often find myself referring to other hobbies and careers I used to do but no longer. Maybe an older character can gain the ability to use a skill as if they were proficient or even has expertise in that they don't have due to things they did back in the day, kind of like the past life stuff the Deva had.

sounds like getting the Skill expert feat.

 

[MGibster]

I understand that not everyone gets wiser when they get older, but for this to work, I think we need to simply recognize that statistics in D&D aren't reflective of real life. So we shouldn't expect againg in D&D to represent with any great degree of accuracy aging in real life.