Roleplay: Multiclassing and Starting ages

[CardCaptor]

I'll resume a story which happened in my game. There's an Elven Wizard in the party, who's roleplayed that she only recently ever cast spells since her training begun when she was a youngling. On the other side, the human Rogue McRogue, who's 18 years old. Rogue McRogue levels up, and decides for some reason to pick up a level of Wizard. (I know, not optimal or anything, but Rocue McRogue basically wanted the Rogue level for trapfinding, it's not really all that important for the sake of the example since we're quite low op.)

I -may- be crazy, but I think I remember an old Order of the Stick strip which basically tackled the same issue: Does it make sense to let classes which require little to no training (Like a Rogue) pick a class which takes years of devotions to even practice (Like a Wizard), especially if you asked everyone to start at the starting age of your class?

I'm not considering this as broken or anything, not in the least, but I was curious about it. The only 'roleplay' answer I have for that is to ask Rogue McRogue to completely rewrite his character sheet to include a magical training to it, despite the fact he already has a pretty solid, amazing, non-magical backstory. Am I being fair? Or can I consider that adventuring sharpens one's learning abilities exponentially?

[Greenish]

Or can I consider that adventuring sharpens one's learning abilities exponentially?This, basically. It may have taken that elven wizard a century before she got off her arse and into the business, but it won't take her two months to move from magic missile to black tentacles.

Ditto for the rogue, since he's been looking over the elf's shoulder (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0126.html).


[Edit]: Offtopic, but I like rogue/wizard combo. Is he going for Unseen Seer, by any chance?

[Tragak]

Or you could go with the idea that Elves are a race of jack-of-all-trades: that even though one could spend decades focusing on learning mega-spells, elves try to learn to do as many different things as possible. Which could lend itself well to a house rule about extra skill points if you like :smallsmile: