RP Character and their age?

Lore Role-playing
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So as someone fairly new to RP I have noticed some information that conflicts with what we know how races mature. I have often met Draenei/belf/nelf characters who claim to be in their early 20-ties, but accomplished mages/hunters and so on…

Am I wrong in what I have researched about the races and their ages?Cause I’m pretty sure I got their ages right? I’m asking cause , as someone new to RP, I want to respect the story people wish to tell with their characters. As a result I will usually check someone’s TRP before walk up. Since both of my characters(that i have been trying RP on are stupid old by human standards(belf DH and Lightforged draenei) I have made comments at the youth of certain characters and got almost insulted reactions.

So my question I guess is… A 30 year old Belf/Nelf/Draenei is essentially, by the standards of their culture… a child?

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It is a bit of touchy subject as we lack lore that would be clear cut and cannon. I think in similar thread it was noted that Sylvanas was soldier at the age of 20.

But with long living races one has to remember that there are three steps that may be quiet spaced out.

When your body reaches adulthood. For simplicity sake let’s pin that moment for when growth stops and you can have children. Which in of itself may be spaced out as we know nothing of biology of the other races.

The moment you are developed in terms of mental capabilities and character traits. In our human case it happens few years after 1st point. Do other races follow same notion?

When society views you as adult. Which can have several degrees. Maybe elves are allowed military service at age of 20-30 when they are physically mature but need to be centuries old to hold public offices or establish families? No set lore on that.

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I read somewhere that elves and draenei aren’t considered adults until they are about 200 years old… But I doubt it was an official source.

To be safe, I assume at least bicentennial age on adults of those two species. The others are considered adults roughly around the same age as RL humans, I think.

A quick google search yielded this:
(forum won’t let me post links)
https: //wow. gamepedia. com/Life_spans

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It is basis and commonly agreed on, at least to my knowledge. One can only hope that at some point we will have Chronicles finish up telling history and will tell us what each race is like.

Warhammer 40K and Xenobiology, how I miss you.

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I believe for draenei and night elves, you’re a “teenager” or a “young adult” from 20 to 300.

But we do definitely know that blood elves have the same societal maturity (is that a term…?) as other races, actually.
If you do levelling in the Eastern Plaguelands and follow along the story of Fiona’s caravan, two characters called, I believe Gidwin and Tarenar (a dwarf and a blood elf) talk about sharing a childhood.

So unless dwarves are considered adults from the age of 300 as well (which would be weird), then Tarenar is indeed a blood elf around his 20s or 30s who is considered a full grown adult.

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Certainly not a Blood Elf. We know, from a Canon Lore Source that a Blood Elf, aged 20 is both physically and culturally adult. Sylvanas was already a Farstrider at age 20. Farstriders are elite soldiers, so unless Quel’thalas has a policy of using Child Soldiers (and this was pre-Scourge so its not like they were short of numbers), then we can state with certainty, that High/Blood Elves are physically, mentally and culturally adult at pretty much the same time as a human is. -All- Elves (now that Night Elves and Nightborne are not immortal anymore) have the same lifespan. Between 3,000 and 9,000 years old. The exact word used is “Several Thousand years” The word ‘Several’ is only used to mean three or more, but less than ten. Their aging is just weird however…

But yeah, an Elf is adult at 20, if not earlier. Can’t really help with Draenei, but we do know that Velen is not unique in being over 25,000 years old, It just seems to be a Draenei thing. I mean there is a Mushroom seller on Bloodmyst Isle who was born in Mac’aree. Dude is 25,000 years old, and sells mushrooms, so it clearly isn’t some sort of “I am important therefore I live longer” thing.

I don’t actually know at what age Draenai reach adulthood though, to be honest.

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I believe the general consensus for an educated guess (aka “AD canon”) is that, with the exception of blood elves, longer lived races reach social maturity at the age of 300.

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Long living races are maturing same as human.
They could be mages, hunters and etc in their 20’s, however i cant really digest when someone has 20 yo character that just became the saver of the world and etc calling it big names.

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I believe there were a couple of lines in Rise of The Horde about Durotan seeing a particular Draenei child when he was fairly young, and then as an adult, decades(?) later, seeing what he thought was the same draenei child virtually unchanged. If it was indeed the same child, then draenei age/mature quite slowly.

That would be pretty weird, though, if they spend decades - or even centuries - as children, while learning at the same rate as humans.

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Very, very weird.
I mean, just think of the biological implications that has. A race that needs several decades or even centuries for its body to fully develop and its mind to become mature enough so that the individual is self sufficient?

Draenei should be dumb oafs, barely knowing a few words in common and incapable of comprehending even the most basic change from argussian to azerothian culture.
Not the highly intelligent space faring aliebs that they actually are.

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I was talking, more along the lines of their social standing within their cultures.

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They obviously aren’t what your quote of me described them to be. I was only talking about what a race that requires several decades of infancy to fully develop should be. Their brains’ capabilities of learning should be very, very minimal.

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Yeah I get what you mean. Would be kind of funny if that were the case mind you :smiley:

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[insert mandatory Lightforged brainwashing joke here]

WoW is a bit lack of the official chart of aging
The RPG had a nice chart but its not canon anymore (plus since then we got the Shetrak, those snake leaders were there when Mythrax went berserk and the snake loa sacrificed herself to stop it, and they are still slithering among us… old old snakes)
Usually we use the “if they live longer than Humans, they mature like humans till ~16-20, then slows down or stop aging at all” formula
Or simply dodge the age-question

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I just tend to assume that characters are assumed to be adults somewhere between 16 and 20 (albeit young ones) unless stated explicitly otherwise. It feels silly to think that a Draenei who has lived long enough to outlive several generations of humans to still be treated as a child.

I mean, surely there will be milennia old Draenei looking down at the younger generation that haven’t even reached 500 yet just like we see with 50 year old humans treating 20somethings as children but that doesn’t mean that they’re right.

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The only race we have some info about that is not considered adults at human age is Gnomes, Jaina’s apprentice was still considered a teenager at age 22.

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I mean, Kind of true but also historically Incorrect. Nowadays we would recoil at the notion of a 14 year old getting married (In the western world) and would not consider a 40 year old OLD.

As our society has advanced and our longevity has increased, norms have shifted.

Look no more than 50-100 years ago, to our grandparents, most of whom were probably married with several children by the age of 20. Nowadays we consider 20’s to be a fun time of exploration, pushing societal boundries etc…

30’s where the marrying years for my parents… Myself and most of my friends are around that age, most are not married. And are still enjoying life with well paid jobs(much better than most of our parents had) and fulfilled social lives.

My elder brother and a lot of his generation is only now marrying around the year 40. With advancements in medicine and “welness” they are bearing healthy children, with a lot of income and stability to raise that child.

If your life expectancy is exponentially greater than a modern Human, I think it’s safe to assume your society would reflect that. Our own society certainly has.

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You’re right on the part that we wouldn’t exactly be down with the idea of a 14-year-old getting married but the idea that 40 was considered OLD in, for example, medieval times is just flat-out wrong. People living to 60 and older back then wasn’t unheard of. It’s just that sickness and getting wounded was way more often lethal.

Still, someone’s generally legally considered an adult when they reach 18 (or 21). While less common it’s not unheard of for people to get married at 18 years of age even in 2019 even though most at this point choose not to. Society will treat you like (mostly) an adult when you’re old enough to vote, get married and have children. That doesn’t mean that you’re taken entirely seriously by older generations but I think that’s always been a thing. No-one in their right mind would call those 30 year-olds that aren’t married and plopping out children of their own children.

I do agree with this one, but I don’t think it’s as simple as just stretching out the “phases” a person’s life goes through. If a Draenei is physically mature at, say, sixteen, it would be silly for them to be treated like a literal child for hundreds of years by society.

Could be older Draenei wouldn’t trust someone who’s only seen a couple decades with a position of power because they have lived through so much history but it would be silly to treat a physically grown and capable person as a child (with all the protection and caretaking that comes with it) for hundreds of years.

I could see Draenei in that stage of life having a lifestyle that mirrors today’s 20/30 year olds though, where they’re considered a grown-up by law and society but also are sort of free to enjoy life without having to worry (yet) about legacy, career and starting a family as much as their elders do.

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Was not referring to medieval times, but you are partially correct. Life extension has reached ridiculous levels nowadays, with no signs of stopping. There are 50 year old people alive now, that are as physically fit and capable as 20 year olds 100 years ago.

The amount of food and nutrition available to you nowadays is incredible. What you ate today is probably more nutritious and pleantifull than what most kings and nobles ate in the middle ages(Those big feasts were 1) not that big 2) a rare occasion and a show of status);

But I agree with most points you made. The entire point of current life extension research isn’t to simply add years on, the idea is to keep you in your prime 30-40 for men 25-35 for women(most would agree on these brackets) for as long as possible. I mean draenei are like the best mages in the universe so anything goes… But I get your point in general.

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Sorry about that assumption. Medieval times are often the thing that this setting is compared with (even if it doesn’t completely fit for a number of reasons) so I just went with it. Honesly you could make a case for many (any?) point before modern medicine.

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