Can your mental stats decrease when you age?

[danzibr]

So the other day in class my teacher was telling me about a guy he knew when he was younger, as in they went to the same high school. My teacher's friend (let's call him Bob for simplicity) was quite the guy. When Bob walked into the room, everyone looked at him. Everyone listened when he spoke. Looked nice, dressed nice. My teacher described it like... Bob sucked all the energy out of a room and into himself. My teacher said back in the day he would've given any amount of money to be Bob.

Then recently my teacher went to a high school reunion. He knew almost everyone there, talked, had a good time, et cetera, but then one guy came up to him. He sort of shuffled when he walked, had downcast eyes, was quite the husky fellow. This guy came up to my teacher and said, "Hey Billy" (assuming my teacher's name is William). They talked for a bit, I guess didn't really say much, then the guy left. My teacher went and asked who the guy was. Turns out it was Bob.

How could something like this happen? Sounds like the young Bob had a Cha of like 16 and the old Bob has one of like 8.

[Zerter]

It's called life.

[Ashtagon]

In the real, non-D&D world, mental stats decrease with age.

[KillianHawkeye]

D&D is not a good model of real life.

[Slipperychicken]

The age categories in DnD model the fantasy trope of the Old Wise Man. You're supposed to listen to your elders, and wizened Wizards are supposed to be stronger with magic. That's what the age categories seem to model.

[GenghisDon]

as the above all said.

Knowledge (skill ranks) & experience (level) are greater among the aged...attribute scores tend to go down with age.

They also shift up & down a fair bit IRL, unlike in D&D. Power lift for a few years & your str score will have gone up. Or at least you'd get an EX ability of +2 (or more) on str checks to lift or carry heavy objects.

[Psyren]

It sort of makes sense in D&D though. Alzheimer's, senility, etc. are just a Remove Disease away, not to mention all the magical healing and even body swaps adventurers must have absorbed on their way to advanced age (if they lived that long.)

It reminds me of the old WoW joke - people would say that falling damage scales with your level because all the magefood we ate/drank going 1-80 made us fat. The joke doesn't work so well now that mana regens so quickly while leveling but it was good back in the day :smallwink:

[Slipperychicken]

It sort of makes sense in D&D though. Alzheimer's, senility, etc. are just a Remove Disease away, not to mention all the magical healing and even body swaps adventurers must have absorbed on their way to advanced age (if they lived that long.

That's an excellent point, considering that pretty much any mortal ailment can be cured with a 1st-3rd level spell (remove disease, remove addiction, that one in BoED for psychological trauma, etc.). If there are stats for "aging" diseases, they should be removable as well.