Timeline and Age Changes

[ChampionMouse]

Ah-hah! Thanks for the replies, Xigo and Grak. I have not read any of the WoW books or anything, so I did not know the details of the Orcish aging timeline. I am rather surprised that they age more slowly than humans, but I can work with it. It would probably be easier to stick with that established timeline like you said. Don't want to make things overly complicated or throw something off. Then there would be shenanigans galore. Hee. Shenanigans.

[ImagenAshyun]

I love this. I absolutely love this timeline. It makes my writing and understanding of events in my profiles MUCH, MUCH easier and makes plenty sense. Now I can edit my profile accordingly for the server restart, plus consider some retcons I've been hoping to make.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.

[Uthaniel]

Durotan took his rite of passage at age 20, which is the time it is established that all orcs take their rite of passage. Similarly, even the current age progression shows that orcs age more slowly than humans (edit: post-adulthood,) though their lifespans are roughly the same. Many orcs do die early deaths due to violence, but I don't feel that this impacts their actual lifespan or age of maturity.

It's a matter of opinion as to which makes more logical sense, but I would rather go by a canon source than a non-canon one.

Though I agree...

The frostwolf rite of passage -is- rather unique, right? Given that the frostwolves have their own test, maybe each clan has their own age and tests.


That said, I think that if you compare a human and an orc, they're somewhat similar and despite this being a rather selfish reason, the races' age to adulthood being a minimum on 17~18 just sits better with me.

Wow is medieval afterall, and if you take wow wiki to the letter, humans also are considered adults at age 15, the same age children where considered adults back a few centuries.

Here, see? Scroll down to human/worgen.

Now, this is a gross assumption, but assuming Humans, Worgen, Orcs and Tauren are given as adults at age 15, despite being entirely different races, isn't it also viable that they consider puberty adulthood and not an in-between state as we do in modern times?

That said, it lifts the question. Ethics, or realism?

Frankly, I'd rather stick with ethics. Even if they're -considered- adults, it doesn't mean they -are-, and it opens opportunities for rather displeasing scenarios.


Of course, that's just my opinion. Most of the times I don't even know what I'm talking about.



EDIT: Interestingly enough, orc adulthood age was edited in the wiki to 18, and apparently have early lore to support it.


EDIT2: Of course, that lore is also from the non-canon RPG books.

[FlyingSquirrel]

Actually, the CotH wiki page says Humans are adults at 15, too.

[Psychyn]

Interesting! Never saw that page on the wiki, yet we've never allowed (human) characters of under 18 in the past.

That's another subject though I suppose, just found it an interesting link. *Tips hat*

[LostStranger]

Never saw that page on the wiki,

Though it'd be something awful to try and verify such a suspicion with but this smartphone as
system access, I do note that the [history] wiki tab is very much your friend.

[Grakor456]

Though I agree...

The frostwolf rite of passage -is- rather unique, right? Given that the frostwolves have their own test, maybe each clan has their own age and tests.

It is not. The novel was rather unambiguous about this. The Om'riggor was a rite of passage that all clans practiced and recognized.

In addition, the years were changed on the wiki recently, though it was taken from a wiki source that, again, references the d20. In fact, all of the ages are referenced from the d20. This poses a problem, because I learned something interesting the other day about the ages of high elves: they were lifted from the 3.5 D&D ages for elves in that setting, which obviously doesn't necessarily work here. As the WoW-Europe site mentions Belves and Nelves having similar age ranges, I'm starting to be more inclined to agree that the ages are wrong.

Another reason why the d20 can't be entirely trusted.

I'll make sure to edit the human adulthood age number back to 18 once we have some things finalized.

Now, knowing that each expansion really does happen in consecutive years, then the timeline is thus:

-10,000 - War of the Ancients.
-9,000 - The World Tree is made.
-7,300 - The Highborne are exiled.
-6,800 - Quel'Thalas is founded.
-2,800 - The Troll Wars.
-2,700 - First Guardian is appointed.
-2,500 - Ironforge is founded.
-1,200 - Seven Kingdoms of humanity are founded.
-823 - Aegwynn clashes with Sargeras' avatar.
-230 - War of Three Hammers.
-5 - Rise of the Horde. Blackhand is made warchief, Draenei slaughter begins.
-1 - Orc chieftains drink demon blood. Sacking of Shattrath.
0 - Dark Portal is made. First War.
6 - Second War. Internment camps are made.
8 - Invasion of Draenor.
10 - Alexstrasza is freed from the Dragonmaw clan.
18 - Thrall frees the orcs from the internment camps.
19 - Thrall and Tirion rescue Eitrigg from execution.
20 - Reign of Chaos.
21 - Frozen Throne.
23 - Sunwell Trilogy.
24 - Cycle of Hatred. Tensions between Alliance and Horde rise again.
25 - World of Warcraft begins.
26 - Burning Crusade.
27 - Wrath of the Lich King.
30 - The Shattering. Cataclysm begins.

[Wuvvums]

Interesting! Never saw that page on the wiki, yet we've never allowed (human) characters of under 18 in the past.

That's another subject though I suppose, just found it an interesting link. *Tips hat*

Mostly because unlike the other races, we can interpret humans as humans. I believe we made the minimum age of adulthood 18 mostly to avoid the implications of pretending to be someone as young as 15, especially when some characters on the server can get somewhat promiscuous.

I'd feel a little uncomfortable if we had some people rping 15-year-old girls, as an example..

[CappnRob]

Boo, I liked the other timeline better.

[Mathias]

I also like the other timeline better. However, if we do go with this timeline, we have to fix the Cata year, as I'm still under the impression that it should be on year 30. This is going by dialogue in Cata stating Edwin VanCleef died five years ago and a druid in Hyjal mentioning the Third War was ten years ago.

[Grakor456]

I also like the other timeline better. However, if we do go with this timeline, we have to fix the Cata year, as I'm still under the impression that it should be on year 30. This is going by dialogue in Cata stating Edwin VanCleef died five years ago and a druid in Hyjal mentioning the Third War was ten years ago.

Yeah, that was my bad, I forgot about the greater time gap between Wrath and Cata. Fixed.

[Krilari]

So, post restart we'll be in year 30..?

[Mathias]

Year 30, and do Shattering events. That'll be fun.

[Psychyn]

Shattering events.. I don't think any of my characters would make it out in a 'sane' state.

... I want. Out of curiosity though, does it mean we have to edit all our profiles to fit year 30 should this timeline be fully up, running and sorted out?

[Grakor456]

We'll probably be in year 29. We can't do the Shattering itself justice, but there are still events that happen prior to the Shattering that leads up to Cata.

I'm still thinking of tweaking the Rise of the Horde numbers a bit. Hrm.