Don’t know if this has been discussed before but I’m just going to throw my hat in that it hasn’t, and I may be being abit realism-centric for y’all but what do you guy’s think about your charter getting old? I myself noticed there’s little feel of evolution or growth in your character as your level (especially with oblivion leveling, but lets not get into that) and it just seemed superficial. It could also make you consider a seachange, those halcyon days of butchering innocents in the dark brotherhood could just become too much for your character and you could retire to a cave, or a farm. Instead of you just thinking your characters as disposable and past there sell by dates by the time you finish the guild's aging could extend your interest in them. And then, as Mr. Larkin might put it, ‘The only thing that can come after aging’ you could die of natural causes! That take’s into account your characters lifestyle! Okay this is sounder lamer and lamer as I keep thinking about it, so….. thoughts?

Considering that few players ever get past one year (In-Game Years) playing with their characters, that couldn't have any repercussions.

If the world was huge and that fast travelling between two cities would take days, that'd be interesting. But otherwise, it can't work.

An aging world would require too much change. We're talking about lore and politics specifically.

If it follows the pattern of Morrowind & Oblivion, barely enough in-game time will pass for changing seasons to even be an issue.

Aging doesn't seem like something the game needs.


Beyond that, I have a couple general thoughts....


1) I make my characters to be a certain appearance. I spend time on it, I download mods to improve it, etc. I'm against anything that changes the look of the character against my will - no growing hair, no gaining scars, no getting fat/muscular/etc.... no sir, I don't like it.

2) Played Fable 1. Aging in that game was handled terribly. There was a one-year time break in the story, and suddenly my character was this amazingly wrinkled and grey old man. And every single NPC around him still looked exactly the same as before. Yeah. Right. (And I've heard worse things about the "your stat gains mutate your body" system in Fable 2, but haven't played that one, luckily.)

I think this is an interesting idea. Although I can imagine people being very divided about actively aging through the game. I don't know how they'd implement it without pissing off a lot of TES fans who don't want to get old.

Personally, I wouldn't mind if your character started at 16-20 and topped out in your 40's. As for your character dying...That would be sad. It would make for an interesting game though, you'd probably become more attached to that character if you couldn't go back to play as them.

Doesn't affect those of us who play as Mer, so a bit unfair forcing aging on the other races, perhaps.

Quite, or just speeded up time? and hopefully there will more to do in game making it last longer than previous es's

It's worth pointing out that the entirety of the events of both Morrowind and Oblivion took place over the course of one year each. Not a whole lot of time for your character to really show any signs of age.

I don't like the idea. If I make a young-ish character, then I want to be a young-ish character. If I make an old character, I want to be an old character. Don't force me age.

It would also be hard to accurately implement aging, given how the races have a wide range of life expectancies.

I like the idea of consequences, especially for the experienced Dark Brotherhood type character. I would like it if the world responded and even changed around you as you do the questline.

HOWEVER, I can't condone the idea that my character is actually aging. In the event that I do want to take my time, I would hate for a character to die when I'm halfway through the main quest after having done the mages guild or something.

Maybe age by itself could have some effects, such as bonuses or penalties to your skills, and maybe a consequence on your hair color, but that would be all. No age death though, no way.

Meh, anything fable does skyrim could do ten times better, and as i don't 'do' mods i thought aging would actually spice up the limited appearance features from the last games.

No, thanks. Morrowind's level up texts were unpleasant enough. Most of my characters are to one degree or another immortal, anyway...

It might make an interesting mod for those so inclined, though.

(me personally I have gotten to 3 or 4 yrs, but I do use beds alot to progress time for role playing reasons) I think I would rather have the ability to alter your appearance to make your self look older at the rate you want. but I think maybe that kinda control should be possible by hair cuts and changing hair color, (I had a character in FO3 that got older and I did it that way) but there are too few people who play that far to justify the need for t his to the devs. and I am in agreement that I don't necessarily want my character to change in a way that I can't controll.

Er...the longest I managed to keep one character going was 650 in-game days. Call it 2 years...I don't see how much effect aging all of 2 years would have. And he was a Redguard...would any Mer even notice 2 years? :shrug:

Really not seeing how this would add anything particularly worthwhile.

While the game time maybe doesn't pass fast enough on paper to justify an old character I think one can assume that it's meant to be 'fast-forward'. How else would your character be able to advance from a level 1 rookie to a superhero (and save the world etc) in maybe 200 days?

Just like a whole province of Tamriel is so small that I walk the distance from Leyawiin to Bruma when I go out with my dog in real life. Yet it is meant to be large in your imagination.

Retiring as a game concept sounds extremely boring to me though when you really have to actually play it. Maybe you could do it like in Pirates!, where you could always retire and then could see the status you achieved (depends on the gold you earned and the fame you gained - lots of different outcomes are possible, from beggar to king's advisor or something similar). In Skyrim it could be affected by the quests you solved, how you solved them (if there is more than one possibility), the overall fame you gained, the money you gained, the houses you own etc.

This thread title made me think of Heart of Gold.

Sorry just had to say it, Neil Young fans here?

This subject comes up once in awhile and the typical consensus is that it just wouldn't be worthwhile trying to implement it into the game.

Well, thanks for that update. :goodjob:

So i guess i'm the only one that thinks this is a better idea than dragons?

Can't see it adding anything to a game like Skyrim that takes place over a short timespan
Maybe if a CRPG ever gets made thats episodic rather than a continuous narrative it would work

I'd think I'll have to say most definitely. Though there was one person awhile back that started a thread stating that dragons were bad for the game, so who knows. You might just have a kindred spirit or two out there.

And you have a big fiery beast to ride everynight :flamethrower:

my player character is an ageless vampire, but i would like a retirement faction in tes soon

it wouldnt be right I can tell you right now people will not spend over 3 in game years, so if you go from 20 to 80 in that time it would just be weird

The topic description shudda been,'I'm getting to old for this ****,'
But yeah I was thinking about this even in Oblivion, I had a character locked in prison for 10 years and he came out like it was only yesterday that he was looting the countryside

I honestly thought that dragons were the worst idea, until this showed up.

As Kiralyn2000, I'm spending too much time trying to find mods that make me beautiful in all situations.

Games like Fable included aging because they took several decades of in-game time to complete. However, I believe Morrowind only took place over the span of four years (officially) so players would be unlikely to see much change with their characters in that time. The same applies for Oblivion. Fable III also wouldn't have the player age at all because it was also supposed to take place in a short amount of time (a few years).

My personal stance is that it be left out. I like my characters to look as I made them. It might be necessary for consistency in games that span large periods of time, but I don't honestly see me playing Skyrim for 21,900 ingame days. Elder Scrolls never has any time gaps in its stories, it'd be really hard to pull off such an advancement of time. If they want to keep the game short (as defined in the time of Tamriel) I say let them, it would prevent the need to implement too many more features like this