I have a couple of questions about rejevenate treatments, I've seen some contradictory comments and I was wondering about peoples take on this. In the Inquisitors Handbook for example, there is a reference to someone who is almost a hundred reaching the limit of how long his life can be extended through the available technology, yet, in Ravenor there are several characters who are a couple of hundred years old and still fit and able.

Does anyone know how effective these treatments are? Also, how do they work? do they halt the aging process completely for a certain length of time? slow down aging dramatically? does it actually reverse the aging process?

This seems like something important to have in the setting seeing as how dangerous it is for inquisitors and how rarely a new inquisitor gets accepted it wouldn't do to have the experienced ones dying off of old age.

Depending on the fluff you read it is possible to extend life into the hundreds of years. For instance in the Cain novels a term of service for a commisar is 100 years. All fluff agrees that there are life extending means. No fluff tells you exactly how this works and for how long.

Soo... go with what you like.

Our organs get worn out after several decades and we start getting old. Even if you are in perfect health, you have programmed maximum lifespan for your organs. If you manage to replace them with artificial i guess you can live until your brain shuts down. I presume some form of surgery similar to creating servitors will be in the core of life extension. It's all matter of organ replacement

I agree there are conflicting fluff sources on this. If you look at the Calixis sector timeline, it seems to imply the hundred of years view. (Which shouldn't be surprising since Abnett had a hand in shaping the sector.)

Our organs get worn out after several decades and we start getting old. Even if you are in perfect health, you have programmed maximum lifespan for your organs. If you manage to replace them with artificial i guess you can live until your brain shuts down. I presume some form of surgery similar to creating servitors will be in the core of life extension. It's all matter of organ replacement

I consider organ replacement to be unlikely - after all, the brain is an organ. I'd rather assume chemical treatments and gene therapy, with lots of words with the prefix nano (everything's better with nano-stuff!). Age reversion or complete halting is doubtful, but slowing it down for a big enough factor is functionally the same.

As for its efficiency, it's all a matter of who you know and what you can pay. Minor house nobles and mid-ranking officers might stretch their years to somewhere around 120 while Inquisitors, High Lords, Rogue Traders and their ilk might live upwards of half a millenium.

Scourge the Heretic had a teenaged (both real and biological age) assassin assume the identity of a noblewoman somewhere above 200.

For instance in the Cain novels a term of service for a commisar is 100 years.

Where is that said? Cain is a special case because his status as a HERO OF THE IMPERIUM grants him access to sponsored rejuve treatments.

Cifer said:

Actually in Cains Last Stand he specifies that it was Amberly that got him and Jurgen the rejuv treatments (which did not seem to include organ replacement). Well actually it implies that he got more from the inquisitor than he would have otherwise (and thus only had a few grey hairs as a sign of his age).

As to it being 100 years. It is mentioned many times throughout the books.

I always assumed it was Augmetic lungs and Chemical injections that told your organs:

"Nope, you're not 80 and failing you are in fact 18, fit and healthy!" Or something, something that caused the organs to pump out the needed bits and bobs to keep you functioning.

Well todays scientists are pretty sure they have found out what makes you grow old. They think it has something to do with the "caps" on the ends of your DNA strands. They just don't know how to effect the process yet, but it is only a matter of time.

So it is very easy to assume that they have figured this out. Most sci-fi games ingore the fact that most scientists think we are only a few decades with a 100 years at the out side of being able to stop aging. Of course the real question is if the powers that be would squash the technology or not, as its ramifications are huge.

Edit: Before everyone brings it up, Yes yes I know telomere shortening is not the only cause of aging. It is however the primary cause and would be the logical first step and increase the life expectency greatly (you would also look young). For those cells that are not effected by this and aging is caused by "damage" to the cells it is thought that other treatments (such as gene therapy with stem cells) may be effective.

Well I think three things factor into it.

One has already been stated with the quality of the drugs used. "Name brand" rejuv treatments are better then generic brand rejuv treatments

Second is how often you get them. Obviously the more money you have the more often you can get very expensive rejuv treatments, the less money you have to spread them out, making them less effective.

Third is when you start taking rejuv treatments. The earlier you start the younger your organs are when their aging process is slowed down, and the longer they'll last. I doubt that rejuv treatments undo the effects of aging as much as slow down the process, so if you're organs are already worn down, well its not going to do as much for you as a teenager starting on them.

llsoth said:

Actually in Cains Last Stand he specifies that it was Amberly that got him and Jurgen the rejuv treatments (which did not seem to include organ replacement). Well actually it implies that he got more from the inquisitor than he would have otherwise (and thus only had a few grey hairs as a sign of his age).

I know she provided the treatments for Jurgen - Cain's were sponsored by the Munitorum because of his status.

As to it being 100 years. It is mentioned many times throughout the books.

It's mentioned many times that Cain is somewhere in his second century - but where does it say anything about length of service?

I'd imagine the majority of rejuve treatments are anagathics of varying effectiveness (temporarily slowing or halting the aging process),with cheaper versions being some combination of organ transplants, cosmetic surgery, cybernetic prosthesis and hormone injections. The maximum extension possible would presumably depend upon the exact subject (some people may have a limited tolerance for anagathic drugs) or be subject to certain conditions (internal or external, such as background radiation, ambient levels of toxic substances, progeria, diet and exercise etc) which limit the effectiveness of the treatment. Obviously, the more expensive treatments will provide a greater life span (probably). I'd imagine that the more high-end anagathics may even provide a limited anti-gerone treatment (sort of like a month at a health spa,with an added dose of Nivea Visage), so that the subject not only doesn't age as much but also looks somewhat younger than when he/she started it.

I'll also add that there is mention of a 'complete rejuvenation' treatment in the Inquisition War trilogy ( Harlequin , iirc). From the description, that basically entails a complete psychic mapping and copy of the subject, which is then pasted into a (far younger) clone body, while the original is destroyed (can't have a soulless body lying around). Said clone will not have instant access to all the memories of the originial subject, and will have to be trained, groomed and guided into unlocking those memories and forming the same personality. The process apparently can take a decade or so, but when you consider that you've essentially doubled the already extended lie-span of an important Imperial citizen, what's a mere 20 years?

Personally, I dislike the complete rejuve (or rather, find it distasteful; I think it's a good plot device) as it runs afoul of the continuity problem: namely, the original subject is still dead...

Of course, the rejuvenation options mentioned above are just the ones approved for use within the Imperium. I suggest aligning oneself to the Warp, allowing the subject to age backwards (or sideways).

Yeah people tend to forget factoring in warp travel, which might mean you're bumbling around on a ship for a year and in real time a few decades have gone past.

Cifer said:

In fact I ment that with organ replacement you can live as long as your brain shuts down. The original brain.

I wrote up an article on rejuvenat treatment together with rules for DH last year...here's a link to the Darkreign page (ironically enough sponsored on the page I opened by BUPA, the UK healthcare insurance company...)

http://www.darkreign40k.com/general-background/rejuvenat-treatment.html

llsoth said:

Interestingly, some of the fluff in 40K has hinted that the rejuvination treatments require "elements" from (formerly) living children, and that (perhaps) each treatment kills a child. This might actually make sense (in a weird, "this is how things work in the 40K universe" kind of way) in terms of telomere replenishment - rejuvinating life cupons by stealing them from somebody else's cellular tissues.

And as you say, there are other causes to aging (cholesterol accumulation, accumulation of REM, free radicals, etc.), but aside from the radiological hazards modern science has ways of handling all of these. I don't think it would be too off-base to say that rejuvenation treatments could hypothetically extend life indefinitely.

The major problem, of course, is that accumulated errors within rejuvenate treatment systems (due to aging and poorly-understood technologies) might lead to inaccuraces that cause different systems to have different abilities to forestall aging. This could vary from system to system.

I think a rejuvenate treatment must take quite some time while the person is basicly helpless hence, why Tobias Belasco (Dotdg p.195) have not undertaken such a treatment.

hmm maybe age will soon force him to do so, thats another potential plot to throw at my players one day

Sarius said:

Also I got the impression that his life style was pretty bad or his health.

*insincere comedy derailment*

If you want to know the scary truth of rejuvinate treatments look no further than the South Park episode 702 " Krazy Kripples ."

*continue reading your regularly scheduled thread*

Pneumonica said: