|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
01-27-2018, 12:28 PM | #1 |
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: South Dakota, USA
|
[Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Previous Thread: Enhanced Tracking
Next Thread: Extra Arms If you're new to this series or just want to leave feedback about it, check out the Introduction Thread. If you need help finding something we've already discussed, johndallman is maintaining an index of which traits we've discussed. This is especially handy if the trait you are searching for happens to have been part of a multi-subject review. Basic Today we will be looking at three traits - Extended Lifespan, Longevity, and Unaging - as they all reduce or completely eliminate the detrimental effects of aging. By default, once a character is 50 years old, once per year the player or GM must make a HT-based "aging roll" for each of the four main Attributes (ST, DX, IQ, and HT itself). At age 70, the frequency you must roll goes from once-per-year to every six months, then it halves again to once every three months at age 90. Success means there is no decline, but failure means that Attribute drops by one and a critical failure lowers the Attribute in question by two. TL provides a modifier to these rolls (see p. B444 for details), and you may not use Luck to re-roll. With the GM's permission, you may be able to lose CP from your character equal to the value of the lost Attribute(s) instead: losing or reducing an Advantage, gaining or worsening a Disadvantage. Longevity (p. B66) is a Mundane, Physical Advantage that costs 2 CP and affects what fails for aging rolls. If you have this trait, only a 17 or 18 fails and only the latter counts as a critical failure. If your modified HT roll is against 17 or more, then only an 18 fails, and it doesn't count as a critical failure. Extended Life Span (p. B53) is an Exotic, Physical Advantage that costs 2 CP per level. Each level doubles your age of maturity (18 is the default), the age at which you first start making aging rolls once per year, the age at which you must roll once every six months, and the age at which you must roll once every three months. This can be combined with Longevity. Unaging (p. B95), an Exotic, Physical Advantage that costs 15 CP, and prevents you from needing to make aging rolls at all. It also prevents you from being aged unnaturally, unless you take another trait that says otherwise (like Dependency with the "Ages Unnaturally" Enhancement). There is an Enhancement available to Unaging - Age Control - which adds +20% to the cost but allows you to superficially age (no aging rolls, but your appearance changes accordingly). You may do so at up to 10 times the normal pace of aging, and in either direction (growing older or younger). Even the book points out that it is more cost efficient to take Unaging than 8 (or more) levels of Extended Lifespan. Other Supplements
Past Editions Under the Third Edition (Revised) rules, aging operated in a similar manner as it does now. As such, so do all three of these traits. One relevant difference is that you could take "Age" as a Disadvantage. Longevity can be found on page 21 of GURPS Basic Set (Third Edition, Revised), where it costs 5 CP, lacks the bonus effect when your HT roll is made against a 17 or higher and states that you cannot receive points back from the Age Disadvantage if you have Longevity. I don't know in which supplement they first appear, but we'll be referencing Compendium I for the next two traits. Extended Lifespan appears on page 54 and is specifically cited as a Racial Advantage (thus unavailable to Supers or the like). It costs 5 CP per level and works very similar to its Fourth Edition counterpart. The differences I noticed were that each level does not double the time between major age thresholds, but increases the span by the base value e.g. one level would effectively double things, but two levels merely triples the original value (instead of quadrupling it). The text also mentions that time between required aging rolls also doubles. Finally, Unaging shows up on page 69. Again, the character may not take the "Age" Disadvantage, or at least cannot get any points back for taking it. Though unnamed, the same Enhancement that allows one to age in either direction at up to 10 times the normal speed is present. As Third Edition rules capped how many points you could invest in Skills based on age, a suggestion on how to handle that is also given. Useful Links Feel free to suggestion any existing threads or other, appropriate links on this matter. Discussion Starters This is (usually) a generic list of questions for those who want to participate in the discussion but need a little help. If you already know what you want to say, feel free to skip these. ;)
__________________
My GURPS Fourth Edition library consists of Basic Set: Characters, Basic Set: Campaigns, Martial Arts, Powers, Powers: Enhanced Senses, Power-Ups 1: Imbuements, Power-Ups 2: Perks, Power-Ups 3: Talents, Power-Ups 4: Enhancements, Power-Ups 6: Quirks, Power-Ups 8: Limitations, Powers, Social Engineering, Supers, Template Toolkit 1: Characters, Template Toolkit 2: Races, one issue of Pyramid (3/83) a.k.a. Alternate GURPS IV, GURPS Classic Rogues, and GURPS Classic Warriors. Most of which was provided through the generosity of others. Thanks! :) Last edited by Otaku; 08-02-2018 at 08:00 PM. Reason: Finally noticed it still said "Next thread: Pending" |
01-27-2018, 12:33 PM | #2 |
Hero of Democracy
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: far from the ocean
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Monster hunters has several templates that ought to have unaging on them, but explicitly don't because it's not an advantage in play.
Similarly, many gms replace these traits with immunity or resistance to aging effects.
__________________
Be helpful, not pedantic Worlds Beyond Earth -- my blog Check out the PbP forum! If you don't see a game you'd like, ask me about making one! |
01-27-2018, 12:53 PM | #3 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
I've only dealt with Longevity, which I allow characters to buy freely in play provided they do so before they're old enough to make their first aging roll. I both run and play campaigns in which multiple years of game time have passed, and where characters can reasonably make long-term plans. I've also used it when writing character sheets for historical people; it's usually fairly obvious who should have it.
Fit and Very Fit apply to aging rolls, of course. I'd be interested in the limitation value for "HT, only for aging rolls."
__________________
The Path of Cunning. Indexes: DFRPG Characters, Advantage of the Week, Disadvantage of the Week, Skill of the Week, Techniques. |
01-27-2018, 12:58 PM | #4 | |
GURPS FAQ Keeper
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Kyïv, Ukraine
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Quote:
As a GM, I mostly treat all aging-related traits as Features because the longest aging that PCs in my campaigns underwent is a decade (of years that are shorter than ours). |
|
01-27-2018, 01:14 PM | #5 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Quote:
I thing to note about the old version of Extended Lifespan is that most Racial templates (such as in Bio-tech) took a separate Advantage to not have their date of maturity doubled. In 4e this became a 0 pt Feature. As to characters, in 3e I had a 500 year-old character who had none of these traits. He just used Magic to prevent aging, specifically the Halt Aging spell. When I was GM'ing World of D'y'r't Famed mage Aldehar the Incendiary got a Great Wish once and used it to become Unaging. That saved him from learning and casting the Halt Aging spell. If you wonder about the rest of the group from that campaign I think Gage, King of Rogues had some sort of plan about not dying but she kept it secret. I'm sure she wasn't going anywhere without her money. Nix the Barbarian said she was going to Heaven with Brother Hugh. Sometimes when he did that Brother Hugh was just running errands for Ra but he wasn't going to tell Nyx she couldn't come. My first 4e character, Belisiarius MacArthur, genetically engineered warrior-accountant had 2 levels of Extended Lifespan from his nano. He could have gotten more time from bio-tech rejuvenation if he needed it too but before that came up he acquired a sort of life support symbiont.
__________________
Fred Brackin |
|
01-27-2018, 01:37 PM | #6 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Quote:
The most important reason that the changes that Project Jade Serenity caused in the 'supersoldier' candidates include something like Longevity, Extended Lifespan or even Unaging was to justify comic book aging and the trope that most every important character has the physique of someone in their young adult prime, unless it's an important plot point for them not to. Chase Taylor (my PC) doesn't look even remotely his age at 37 and Cherry Bell, our NPC resident psychopath, looks nineteen at most, despite being 36. Some of the US Army Special Forces NPCs who were in their mid-forties already when they went through Project Jade Serenity look rugged enough seventeen years later, even appropriately middle-aged, but they are all ripped as [bleep], with the bodies of much younger men. In any campaign where point costs matter, I agree with this. I've never had Longevity, Extended Lifespan or Unaging actually provide an in-game benefit woth a single point. They are merely a part of background.
__________________
Za uspiekh nashevo beznadiozhnovo diela! Last edited by Icelander; 01-27-2018 at 01:44 PM. |
|
01-27-2018, 02:02 PM | #7 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
They aren't in 1e. Longevity is in Horseclans, from 1987, where it is 40 points. I don't know where Unaging originated.
__________________
The Path of Cunning. Indexes: DFRPG Characters, Advantage of the Week, Disadvantage of the Week, Skill of the Week, Techniques. |
01-27-2018, 02:04 PM | #8 |
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
The only time I've ever seen it come up as 'useful' is in games where enemies have powers based on Ageing... but it's still very rare, and even in those games the ageing effects were pretty much as easily fixable as HP damage was.
|
01-27-2018, 03:39 PM | #9 |
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: USA, Arizona, Mesa
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
Lately I've been treating Unaging as a Rare category for Resistant, Longevity as a perk-level Unusual Background, and letting all other age-related traits fall by the wayside while treating lifespan as a Feature. Aging-based attacks work in proportion to the target's natural lifespan (or one-half/one-quarter that amount for Resistant levels lower than Immunity, if that's appropriate). Age Control becomes limited shapeshifting.
|
01-27-2018, 05:46 PM | #10 |
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: New Zealand.
|
Re: [Basic] Advantage of the Week (#50): Extended Lifespan, Longevity, Unaging
My current campaign is centered around a party of elves all of whom are unaging. The campaign is planned to cover about seven or eight thousand years of game time in erratic detail. I have had to throw in a couple of house rules to do with skill levels as a result. There are some other issues to do with linguistic drift as well.
__________________
Waiting for inspiration to strike...... And spending too much time thinking about farming for RPGs Contributor to Citadel at Nordvörn |
Tags |
advantage of the week, extended lifespan, longevity, unaging, week, [basic] |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|