NPC's Ages
DJKajuru
Member Posts: 3,300
As a hook from jaheira's topic , how old do you think each npc is?
My guesses are :
Imoen: 19 or 20 ( she doesn't look like a teenager, even though she acts like one. Besides, it says in the game she's about your age.
Xzar and Montaron : I think they are in their late 20's . Both seem to be quite unexperienced.
Jaheira and Khalid: Being friends with Gorion for a long time, I think they are in their late 30's.
Ajantis , Alora , Skie , Garrick : They all seem to be young adventurers in their early 20's .
Minsc and Dynaheir: Minsc looks late 20's. I believe that he had fought many a monster when you meet him in Nashkel. Dynaheir, despite being very wise, looks like a low rank wichalarn. I'd say she's in her late 20's, too.
Edwin; Late 30's, close to 40.
Eldoth : I think he's around 33. Despite being good looking, he doesn't look very young.
What do you think?
My guesses are :
Imoen: 19 or 20 ( she doesn't look like a teenager, even though she acts like one. Besides, it says in the game she's about your age.
Xzar and Montaron : I think they are in their late 20's . Both seem to be quite unexperienced.
Jaheira and Khalid: Being friends with Gorion for a long time, I think they are in their late 30's.
Ajantis , Alora , Skie , Garrick : They all seem to be young adventurers in their early 20's .
Minsc and Dynaheir: Minsc looks late 20's. I believe that he had fought many a monster when you meet him in Nashkel. Dynaheir, despite being very wise, looks like a low rank wichalarn. I'd say she's in her late 20's, too.
Edwin; Late 30's, close to 40.
Eldoth : I think he's around 33. Despite being good looking, he doesn't look very young.
What do you think?
1
Comments
Jaheira and Khalid are probably close to the end of the century than the beginning, I would say 60/70. Coran is 45, Viconia probably something like 90.
Age is hard to make sense of though, since you can be a member of a race who would obviously need to be a lot older than 18ish to be about to come-of-age, which around the time of Gorion's death is what you're supposed to be, as far as I can tell.
Minsc: Late 30's, early 40's. His mind could be even younger than Imoen's though.
Jaheira & Khalid: Middle aged. For half-elves this means they're hitting the middle 60's.
Montaron: Middle aged as well - according to my calculations he's 53 years old.
Xzar: Charismatic 26 years of awesomeness!
Dorn: A fine specime of an adult half-orc. He should be around 14~19 years old by now.
Viconia: Middle aged as well and has seen at least 172 years.
Aerie: Has not even reached adulthood if you ask me: 35 years old at most. Hands off, that's elven jailbait!
Ajantis: Probably in his twenties, likely early twenties. He's still a young knight, after all.
Branwen: Twenties to thirties?
Garrick: Likely early twenties.
Imoen: You're twenty at the beginning of the game. Imoen is "just a little bit younger than you". Maybe, like, I don't know, eighteen to twenty?
Shar-Teel: Twenties...? Then again, I don't know how old her father is (shh!), so she could be any age, for all I know.
Skie: I'd even say late teens, but probably twenties, likely very early.
Kagain, Korgan, Yeslick: Over forties...they all seem pretty competent, and Yeslick could very well be over a century and a half old, given his behaviors.
Aerie, Coran, Kivan, Viconia, Xan: The elves, I'd put at well over one hundred years, though with Viconia, we at least have something of an idea. She was born in Menzoberranzan...
[SPOILER]House Do'Urden wiped out House DeVir in 1297 DR, so she had to have been born well before then. Baldur's Gate takes place in 1368 DR. The 2nd Edition PHB merely says that an Elf needs to be over 100 years of age to be considered an adult. Soo we're probably looking at somebody well over 170 years old.[/SPOILER]
At least she and Aerie didn't have to wait, what, the 500 years to become a Cleric like in the 1st Edition age tables? :x ...and Aerie strikes me as being really, really young for an elf.
Jan, Quayle, Tiax: Well over sixty.
Alora, Montaron: Twenties to thirties...? Montaron...strikes me as somebody who got his start on the pets in his village.
Jaheira, Khalid, Neera: Jaheira and Khalid adventured with Gorion, so they're...probably a lot older than you, maybe sixties to nineties? Neera sounds very young, and refers to the others as "kids" (though since the High Forest is full of elves and other immortal races, she could be referring to eighty year-olds). Probably early twenties.
Dorn: Welp, he's a half-orc. They age a lot faster than humans, so I'm going to say early twenties.
Jaheria is exactly 21 at the beginning of Baldur's Gate. By her own bio, she was born during the year the Tethyr civil war broke out, which is in 1347. BG1 starts at 1368. So....she and Khalid have only been married a couple years, and are both extremely young by half-elf standards (though it should be noted, Half-elves only age slightly slower then humans until physical maturity, at which point they slow down dramatically. to about 50% human age rate, which means, Jaheria is roughly the same age, maturity-wise as a PC human is). And when you visit Tethyr in ToB, you're arriving right at the end of the reclaimation wars, which is why the rulers sent an army after you at Oasis, the Bhaalspawn were a threat to the stability of the nation...oh...and the destruction of Saradush was blamed entirely on you.
That also explains Elminsiter's presence in ToB...he didn't JUST drop by to congratulate you, he was there helping guard Lhaeo, as he claimed the throne of Tethyr as King Haedrek the III, rightful ruler of Tethyr.
Of course...bioware has really F'd up the time line, since you're mentioned to have been saved from the ritual site and brought to candlekeep as an infant...but unless they were just holding the children there, rather then preparing to enact the ritual as ToB implies, it would be too soon, as Bhaal wouldn't have even died for another 10 years (The time of troubles was in 1358), and if the timing didn't matter, why let the children grow at all?
@Silchas It specifically says that Sarevok escaped from the ritual site in the confusion...a 1 year old doesn't escape on their own, and 3-4 is highly unlikely, not to mention, they actually conjure a representative of his spirit at the time, which is roughly consistent with a 8-12 year old. And with his own Biography confirms he wandered on his own, slumming for awhile before being taken in by Rieltar.
You are not the same age at all. The question posed is, but what if Sarevok had been taken instead of you? When the Harpers attacked, he ran away during the confusion and escaped the compound, while the game specifically says Gorion has cared for you since you were an infant. If Sarevok was an infant, he couldn't have escaped on his own. It only says Sarevok was one of the CHILDREN at the compound, and could've just as easily as you ended up with Gorion.
Further evidence is mentioned in BG1 when discussing Koveras, with Tethtoril. When he's recounting Koveras's previous visits, he always refers to him as a young man, even when it's clear he'd be a child if he was the same age to the protagonist.
That's incorrect
It has been said that Sarevok was one of the other babies Gorion didn't get to bust out and that the roles could've easily been reversed (the trials in hell maybe, not sure)
That puts both at the same age
As for the ToB explanation of how the protagonist came to be Gorion's foster child - it's a complete mishap, because writers forgot/dismissed BG1 explanation. It's also not clear as to how old those children were during the ritual, because Sarevok's apparition states that he fleed from there on his own. And there is a raven dream in BG1, during which protagonist recollects how he came to Candlekeep with Gorion being few seasons old and vaguely remembering his/her previous stops at other locations. So that probably means that the children in that temple where at least few seasons old - who knows when Bhaal started seeding the world with his spawn, probably years before the Time of Troubles. At least that would explain how half-dragon Abazigal even managed to father a son in ToB.
If you assuming a young child, say 3-4, then the ritual site was raided 6 years before Bhaal's death, and would put Sarevok at 10-12, which does make a bit more sense that he could effectively escape on his own, and would place his final age about ~28, which does seem reasonable as a candidate for a Grand Duke.
Jaheria though I have a hard time justifying..I mean she could've been 3-4 when servant brought her to the druids, and then spending several more years as part of the druid enclave during the civil war could've altered her perceptions of her childhood which might account for discrepancies...but there's not a whole lot of wiggle room, eventually joining the Harpers as a young teen and meeting Khalid and begin courting, and later working with Gorion, possibly as liaisons as he keeps the Harpers up to date on the status of his ward over the years, marrying as they reach maturity, and then sent to investigate a possible Zhent plot along the sword-coast, and while there get a letter from Gorion requesting their aid as he has to move his ward since Candlekeep has been compromised. Ultimately leading up to where you meet them in game.
As for strength, well, he's a berserker after all and there's no rule barring young humans to be inherently strong by the roll of a dice.
I wouldn't put Viconia at older than 120 at most, and I would say it's more likely she's just around 100.
Aerie seems to fall around the same, to me.
As for Jaheira, she does not say when she was born, only that she was born to nobility that remained loyal to the late king during the civil war, at which point she was orphaned. The exact details are left vague enough that you can assume she is anything from 20 to 30. Given that she knows Gorion at least somewhat, she must have had some correspondence with him, which would be... extremely... difficult if she was only 20.
"She says that she was born in the Tethyr region to a loyalist of the King Alemander regime, unfortunately during the Thethyrian civil war."
It says during, which means 1347 DR - civil war started at at that time, beginning with coup on the king. And nobles' castles were sacked by mobs even later. But whatever, for the sake of roleplaying I too tend to give her a few extra years, because she has too much common sense for such a young woman, even being a druid
- Skie I would definitely put as the youngest, possibly 17 or 18, she's classic MySpace age - glittery pony gifs, etc
- And I'd put Eldoth in his late 20's, he's definitely a little rough around the edges but appears to have that young man's charm still going for him
- Edwin seems young to me, he doesn't have the astute nature of someone in their 30's and he's far too narrow minded and power hungry for maturity, I'd say he's mid to late 20's, after all his thirst for power does backfire...
- Nalia is possibly only slightly older than the PC methinks, for someone with such a lack of maturity and understanding there is something a little worldly and cultured about her
- I wouldn't say Garrick is terribly young, he has decent wisdom and has led a colourful life, possibly early 20's, he has that eternal youthfulness about him, same as Imoen
- I'd put Faldorn in her mid 30's, to the point where a human's physical statistics start to diminish but their mental statistics start to increase, she's very composed, somewhat lady-like, as lady-like as a Druid can be I guess
- Safana I can't help but imagine the exact same age, or as close too, as Eldoth. They just sound like they come from similar backgrounds, I can imagine her being somewhat Skie-esque when she was much younger
Sure, I don't expect the average person to know these things, or even casual D&D players, but you would think that fellow nerds who are nerdy enough to argue about racial aging on a forum would have an idea what they are talking about first.
I think this is why a lot of people think elves are arrogant when they try to tell humans what to do and act superior, but really they are just to proud to make themselves look bad by saying, "Hey human, I have had a thousand years to make mistakes and have made just about every mistake that is possible to make, so listen to me when I tell you this is a bad idea." They aren't really arrogant, no more arrogant then a parent giving advice to a child at any age, I am almost 40 and my parents still give me advice, its simply a matter of perspective.
Anyway regarding the long lifes of the demihumans I remember reading that that was one of the reasons humans actually got powerful in the world, with their shorter lifes they have a tendency of taking risks and gaining power faster than the longer lived races.
I never bought that explanation though. The only reason the world wasn't ruled by the elf races is the artifical level limits added by second edition. Really with centuries to study any mage would get a lot of XP by researching alone, even if he never went in an adventure in his entire life.
So let's all hail our level 200 Elf Overlords