Actually, if I could piggyback on this discussion (and hope none of my players pop in here to read this)

I'm fully cognisant of juvenat treatments, the age ranges of various Space Marine chapters and well-to-do Inquisitors and AdMech and the like, but I've got some details for an NPC I'm trying to hash out and this discussion ties in with that.

I have a planet that my RT and his crew are going to visit - the planet is inhabited by a tribal offshoot of humanity, who are the descendants of a crew from a pilgrim ship that crash-landed on the planet nearly 2000 years before. I was planning on the remains of the crashed ship having been gradually subsumbed by the planet until it's now just another geographical feature (A forest-covered mountain), with a strong taboo against anyone approaching or entering the "cave system" of said mountain.

Why? Because when the ship first crashed, a surviving Tech Priest went a bit cuckoo-bananas, was trying to repair the ship or salvage what he could, decided the other survivors were trying to sabotage his work and destroy his Machine, and he set battle-servitors of various stripes up to patrol and guard the ship, and make tasty gibbets out of anyone who approached. Warnings about "Don't go near the ship, the Tech Priest has gone mental and is murderating everyone" have gradually become legends over time about ghosts and demons in the heart of the mountain, destroying any who go near.

I would like, if my players decide to try and loot the tasty pilgrim ship (relics and sacred artefacts, yay!), to still have some of the servitors roaming the corridors, and possibly even Señor Tech Bananaphone lurking around somewhere in there. But after 2k years, is that possible? I was thinking the ship would still have minimal background power, so servitors could conceivably be recharging that way - but what about their gooshy human bits? And the TP himself - if he was sufficiently machine-like before the crash (or upgraded himself enough after), could he have survived that long? I was planning on having a stasis-vault on the ship where relics and artefacts may be - can human(oid)s safely use stasis fields or is it for inanimate objects (Hi Rowboat Girlyman) only?

Servitors that stay in cryo-suspension until needed seems more likely, unless the Tech-Priest replaces his servitors with fresh ones, by perioodically raiding nearby villages. Re: stasis fields, sure, why not? He's a mad tech-priest, he probably experimented on himself anyway

I didn't think about having him raiding the villages for specimens to put into his servitors, that's a brilliant idea I could use that as another hook to keep my players on-planet or to gently choo choo them towards the ship. Heee.

Ahem. I mean, I should be working right now. Not GM planning

Xanthia said:

If your techpriest has access to a stasis vault its entirely possible for him to periodically take a stasis-nap while his minions do something.

i.e. I've detected a deposit of extremely useful materials 2km directly down into this planets crust under the ship. I calculate it'll take my servitors 100 years to dig that deep, extract the minerals and process them. I'll program my servitors to do this, including setting other servitors to periodically raid for new bits to build more servitors and take a 100 year nap. When i come out, i'll have loads of the whizzy mineral i need for my <insert evil scheme>.

Using this he could quite easily shave many centuries off his actual biological age.

In terms of canon, there's no reason your techpriest couldn't hide in stasis to keep himself alive: there are at least two instances in canon of using this technique to bypass security and infiltrate even the Imperial Palace, although persons in a stasis field do dream, sort of: their last thought repeats itself constantly until the stasis field disengages. The Inquisition has been known to take advantage of this when interrogating key targets when the information is not time-sensitive, and it has contributed to at least one case of massive insanity leading to possession (the subject in question being a Navigator whose last though before the stasis-field activated was a particular daemon of Slaanesh- a century of that constantly in your head would turn anyone insane and begging for daemonette possession).

That said, I'm fairly certain I've seen accounts of tech-priests pushing the 1000 year mark relatively easily, although by that point they're most definitely more machine than man (ie: there's only part of their brain left that is original). There are even a couple of tech-priests that have beaten that by successfully uploading their personality via MIU into a data-matrix and body-surfing by taking over any techpriest with a compatible port that plugs them in. I can't think of any reason that the same trick wouldn't work with servitor bodies, or bodies stolen from the local villages...

Thanks again for the help and ideas guys I had most of my core ideas worked out, but these are all some great ideas to help refine it all.

And you're right Alasseo - now I think about it, I do recall reading fluff that involved using a stasis container to travel somewhere and bypass security. I just completely blanked on that thought when I was setting all this up. I've read so much fluff I can't even keep it all straight any more.

I want this tech-priest to be a boogeyman of sorts for the local tribes - almost like their Devil, in a way (God-Empra being, well, God of course). So the sneaking out periodically to raid villages for bodies for more servitors fits that nicely as well. A few stasis naps here and there, so his visits are more of an "Every x generations the devil appears" story than a regular occurrence... It's all plotting along nicely in my head and notebooks.

I would like to mention one foolhardy, hard to kill Imperial commissar of Steel Legion Sebastian Yarrick. Before the Armageddon's Wars he was already of this rank and retirment age that was 940M41 and retirment age for person of his post will be around 200. So now we have 999M41 3 War for Armageddon is still going on so yarrick is before 250 with ork tech bionics and still on active duty. So living over 300 is piece of cake even in war conditions.

Raising the dead thread... Sorry.

In the case of Astartes immortality... Theory. The first batches of Astartes are still effectively immortal, ie the ones created during the Great Crusade and Heresy eras. At that time the methods of implantation were much superior and actually rooted in real science and not superstition which lead to functionally immortal space marines. Sadly all loyalist space marines from that era have either taken massive damage and died or got their mutilated bits installed in Dreadnaughts. Traitors on the other hand are still around, few of them have probably lived through the entire 10 thousand years that has gone by since though due to time dilation effects of warp-real space overlays like the Eye.

Could be the reason why many Heresy era Astartes refer to newer generations as "weak bloods".

As a sidenote, they do not generally count warp travel into someones actual age... Someones who is gone in the warp for five days when 2 centuries go by in the real world is not gonna be counted as 200 years older when he or she gets back... at least not after actually telling people that for the traveller only five days passed.

If someone is willing to replace their fleshy bits with inorganics or vat grown replacements they can also be functionally immortal, although at some point the physical degradation of the bits that can not be fully replaced, ie the brain, will win out and make them seriously bonkers or just plain dead.

Then there is the Regeneration trait... How long would be lifespan be of someone whose cells continuously renew themselves ad infinitum?

The understanding we have in my group is that all our characters are in the economic class where they can get good life prolonging drugs and treatments if not great ones and that subsequently unless killed they can all expect to live a minimum of two hundred years before aging becomes a more aggressive problem. I've got an NPC who is the holder of the warrant because nobody wanted to play the RT when we started who I've stated to the players is almost three hundred and fifty which is actually very old for a human as un-meched up as he is. Which is why he's a somewhat shriveled old bastard with surprising strength and agility but a thin leathery body and a fairly serious case of dementia.

It's also my understanding that time dilation is not counted into one's lifespan but rather you do the math if you can be bothered and you keep a running tally of your two different ages but when referring to how old you are you use the number that represents your actual personal experience.

So with those two assumptions being the foundation of my interpretation something interesting comes to light, that the career of a particularly successful RT who makes tons of very long trips could span well over a thousand calender years in the materium.

The recent Black Library novel Atlas Infernal stars an Inquisitor who is well over 300 years old, kept alive (albeit doddering and decrepit) by juvenant treatments.

Lifespans are another thing in the fluff where the detail will depend heavily upon where you look. What all sources agree upon, is that they can be prolonged via technology - commonly known as juvenat treatments. How much depends on the book in question, or more specifically the author who wrote it. The Dark Heresy core rulebook (whose sector fluff was written in part by Dan Abnett) mentions Lord Sector Hax being over 200 years old, though juvenation treatments make him look just about 50.

In Games Workshop's own vision, Space Marines seem to have an average biological lifespan of about 300 years, though some Chapters may greatly exceed this - Dante for example is said to be the oldest living Astartes at about 1.100 years of age. Chaplain Cassius is the oldest active Ultramarine at "close to four centuries of age", and is said to look the part - though life-sustaining bionics keep him strong and battle-ready.

This information can be found in the 6th edition TT rulebook and the 5E Space Marine Codex, though as mentioned before, this is just one of the many possible options. The way the IP is being handled when it comes to such details essentially makes the question of "how official" something is redundant ... unless you care exactly where a piece of fluff comes from because like me, you may have made it a policy for yourself to generally prefer some sources before others.

My own interpretation here is that juvenation treatments and Astartes longevity are just two products of the exact same technology (Occam's Razor), and thus confer a similar extension of one's lifespan. Considering that, as per the Index Astartes, Space Marines require regular drug treatments to keep their overcharged bodies from going into shock, it may even be possible that juvenation is not internal but just part of the chemicals they take - making it the exact same thing some nobles and other Imperial officials use to prolong their lifes. After all, it's not part of the implant list ... unless we assume that the increased lifespan is just a side-effect of a generally more efficient metabolism.

[edit] added Cassius

And then of course we have the fabled Halo devices, which purportedly make you immortal.

At least I think that's what they're called. It's possible I'm completely off base here. But with the massive amount of advanced (and grisly) medical technology, and all sorts of Space Magic, the upper limit of lifespans have been raised considerably. But it seems likely that most people that the players will deal with (generally the ultra-privileged) can reach their second century in relative comfort before they have to resort to more drastic measures.

A few other ways to extend one's life span indefinetely (slightly OT, as this references sources outside the RT books)

1. Make friends with a Biomancer. Given their description in DH core rulebook, rejuvinating aging cells should be child's play for a master of the art.

2. Good old-fashoned demonic Pact of Immortality (again from the DH rulebook). Comes with any number of strings attached, but you become ageless and nigh-impossible to kill (assuming average fate points of 3 and ability to spend rather than burn fate to avoid inescapable death, you'd need a phenominal run of bad luck or a lot of VERY determined people to take you out).

3. Be a vaunted servant of chaos in general. The BC materials don't exactly spell this out, but language used in several places throughout the book seems to assume age isn't even a concern at that point.

I'm happy enough to assume that anything with the regeneration trait becomes effectively immune to biological aging. After all we have creatures on earth now that don't noticibly suffer from senescence. We even have a jellyfish that can revert to a polyp state and begin aging all over again. That said I wouldn't think human sanity can be maintained forever, especially if all your friends keep up and dying.

Or you could become part lobster. Those things don't age either, they just get bigger.

*EDIT*

Kind of like orks, when I think about it...

Mechanic enhancements could keep you around for a long time. I know that in Lure of the Expanse, Captain Roth has had much of his body replaced with cybernetics, as part of his being inserted into the Light's bridge, and most of that is still around; he's not looking so hot, but he's "alive".

As for Space Marines, I know that they can live a long time, they have redundant systems, they can enter hibernation sleep (most can), and heal from lots of stuff that way. Access to the best stuff of the Imperium helps. I don't know how long one CAN live, but I expect that any of them might live for centuries, but die in combat. As for those silly Blood Angels, **** vampires...

Hiyas!

I think that the resurrection of this thread is proof enought that immortality does really exist in RT.

L

As for Space Marines, I know that they can live a long time, they have redundant systems, they can enter hibernation sleep (most can), and heal from lots of stuff that way. Access to the best stuff of the Imperium helps. I don't know how long one CAN live, but I expect that any of them might live for centuries, but die in combat. As for those silly Blood Angels, **** vampires...

Varies from chapter to chapter but most will live about three to five hundred years, Blood Angels are pretty much unique in that they live for up to a thousand and change. I'm sure some of the chapters are much shorter lived, the Black Templars all have rocks between their ears and are really self abusive so I'm guessing they're probably one of the shorter lived chapters.

As much as Space Marines move around it's probably more likely than not that they end up being some of the people whose lives stretch across a thousand calender years even when they subjectively only live a few hundred.

Lord-Captain Roth of the Light of Terra ... By my calculations (Angevin Crusade vs Opening of Spinward Front)

Over 1500 years old.

He is pretty much an AI now though, as only a piece of his heavily "mechanized" brain is still active (his body now is just a mummy).

Oldest in the galaxy: if considering only those of human origin, then Ahriman and Kharn are top of the list - both were born on Terra and joined the Legiones Astartes before the discovery of the Primarchs. Bjorn, who was still fairly young when the Heresy began, is likely a century or two younger.

Add in other species, and Eldrad Ulthran is possibly older - he was a Farseer during the Heresy, so he's unlikely to have been less than a few centuries old at that point. The only others older are things like Necrons, and they aren't alive...

Age of Space Marines: Fundamentally, the idea of 'dying of old age' is a flawed concept. Nobody actually dies of old age, but rather from conditions that result from protracted wear and tear upon the body. Astartes bodies are notably less susceptible to this wear than humans, but decades of battle will result in an accumulation of inefficient scar tissue, even with the efficient healing provided by their bodies. As time passes beyond the peak condition of the warrior, his physical condition will deteriorate very gradually - the warrior will become slightly slower, slightly weaker, slightly less robust. Sooner or later, that deterioration may cost him his life - not being puissant enough to avoid or survive a telling blow or fatal shot. Some warriors may choose to 'retire' from front line roles at this point - training scouts, command in reserve companies - while others may press on and endure in spite of their increasing frailty (frailty is relative here - even an elderly Space Marine is far stronger, faster, and tougher than an unaugmented human... but when you're facing mortal peril, the slightest difference can be all the difference between life and death). Blood Angels demonstrably age more slowly than even other Space Marines, but a sufficiently skilled, mighty and most importantly lucky Space Marine can keep going for a very long time...

[...]

Fundamentally, the idea of 'dying of old age' is a flawed concept. Nobody actually dies of old age, but rather from conditions that result from protracted wear and tear upon the body. [...]

That's only true to an extent. Yes, nobody ups and dies due to old age, but said wear and tear would not happen if the body wouldn't increasingly cease the regeneration of lost tissue. That is, to say, "growing older".

The process of ageing isn't just wear and tear. It's an actual process that results in said wear and tear eventually being impossible to maintain.

So people most definitely die due to old age, in that if they weren't old, they wouldn't die due to whatever eventually kills them, such as failing organs.

Tick tock. Tick tock. Tick tock .

[...]

Fundamentally, the idea of 'dying of old age' is a flawed concept. Nobody actually dies of old age, but rather from conditions that result from protracted wear and tear upon the body. [...]

That's only true to an extent. Yes, nobody ups and dies due to old age, but said wear and tear would not happen if the body wouldn't increasingly cease the regeneration of lost tissue. That is, to say, "growing older".

The process of ageing isn't just wear and tear. It's an actual process that results in said wear and tear eventually being impossible to maintain.

So people most definitely die due to old age, in that if they weren't old, they wouldn't die due to whatever eventually kills them, such as failing organs.

Tick tock. Tick tock. Tick tock .

My point being that there is no arbitrary clock that kills you when you reach a specific age - age itself isn't the killer, it's conditions brought about as a result of advanced age. And your pedantry doesn't actually impact the point I was making, merely a single element of the route I took when explaining it, where I happened to choose brevity over strict accuracy.

Too often with sci-fi and fantasy settings, people look at average lifespans and life expectancies and forget that they're averages, influenced by a variety of factors. Similarly, too often people look at off-hand comments without the context - there's a long-running debate about Astartes being immortal that stems from a single line in Horus Rising , where Garviel Loken mentions that he doesn't know whether or not Astartes die of old age.

With a typical average life expectancy of three centuries, and a war that had only lasted two centuries at that point, even the oldest of Space Marines at that time are still relatively new, and with no prior generation to set precedence, nobody knew whether or not it was possible for a Space Marine to die in other ways than battle (indeed, I'd argue that even late-M41 Astartes die far more often to combat trauma than age-related conditions, even if the consequences of aging may be a contributing factor in the battlefield demise of older Astartes).

Double post. The forum was borking up and taking a helluva long time to load and bam, double-post that wasn't even identical to the first. This one only had a quote. So just ignore.

My point being that there is no arbitrary clock that kills you when you reach a specific age - age itself isn't the killer, it's conditions brought about as a result of advanced age. And your pedantry doesn't actually impact the point I was making, merely a single element of the route I took when explaining it, where I happened to choose brevity over strict accuracy.

Too often with sci-fi and fantasy settings, people look at average lifespans and life expectancies and forget that they're averages, influenced by a variety of factors. Similarly, too often people look at off-hand comments without the context - there's a long-running debate about Astartes being immortal that stems from a single line in Horus Rising , where Garviel Loken mentions that he doesn't know whether or not Astartes die of old age.

With a typical average life expectancy of three centuries, and a war that had only lasted two centuries at that point, even the oldest of Space Marines at that time are still relatively new, and with no prior generation to set precedence, nobody knew whether or not it was possible for a Space Marine to die in other ways than battle (indeed, I'd argue that even late-M41 Astartes die far more often to combat trauma than age-related conditions, even if the consequences of aging may be a contributing factor in the battlefield demise of older Astartes).

All the rest you are entirely correct in, of course, I was merely making a point at the sidebar, not attempting to start an extended argument with you.

And yes, people tend to mess up averages, such as thinking that people in the middle ages only lived until they were 30 and then suddenly dropped dead, so on and so forth. But based on what you just wrote, I think something is annoying you today, beside my post, because half of what you say in no way relate to what I said.

Cheer up, man. It's not the end of the world.

Yet.