fine aged character

[urbanpirate]

i seem to remember an item from second edition. I think it was called staff of withering, which depending on charges used either rotted off body parts or caused the target to age. Is there and official wotc version of this item or similar for 3 or 3.5?

[Anxe]

I don't know about official, but here's a homebrew version for ya.

+1 Quarterstaff with 50 charges
You can expend 0, 2, or 3 charges when you hit.

0 - does nothing
2 - target ages ten years. A Fort save DC 16 negates this aging.
3 - random limb on the target shrivels and falls off. Roll a d4 for which limb. The target can make a Fort save DC 17 to resist.

Cost: 30,000 GP

[Divide by Zero]

Aging is a big deal. I don't think I've seen any aging effects pre-epic. Remember, when someone dies of old age, they die For Real. 30,000 gp would be horribly underpriced for that.

[Tinydwarfman]

Aging is a big deal. I don't think I've seen any aging effects pre-epic. Remember, when someone dies of old age, they die For Real. 30,000 gp would be horribly underpriced for that.

well, it's not likely you'll make your target die, but you could certainly put them over their next age category, giving them horrendous physical stat loss.

[Divide by Zero]

well, it's not likely you'll make your target die, but you could certainly put them over their next age category, giving them horrendous physical stat loss.

Stat loss which can never be reversed by any means, except for that one really evil spell that drains life from other people.

[Thurbane]

Stat loss which can never be reversed by any means, except for that one really evil spell that drains life from other people.

Or Reincarnate:

The magic of the spell creates an entirely new young adult body for the soul to inhabit from the natural elements at hand.

[Lord Vukodlak]

I recall a 3.0 spell hasting of age which advanced the target an age category.
However it stated it could not kill the subject and the effects were reversible.

[Divide by Zero]

Or Reincarnate:

Forgot about that. So your choices are stealing life from someone else or being killed and then turned into a random creature.

[Gralamin]

Keep in mind, there are some problems with Reincarnate. Most Noticeably, Break Enchantment becomes a 1 minute casting time*, No save, Instant kill spell on you.

* There are likely tricks to make this faster.

[hewhosaysfish]

Keep in mind, there are some problems with Reincarnate. Most Noticeably, Break Enchantment becomes a 1 minute casting time*, No save, Instant kill spell on you.

* There are likely tricks to make this faster.

*boogles at the concept*

Just looking over the SRD entry for Break Enchantment... Transmutation... level 5 or lower... even if it's instantaneous...

My god, that's hilarious!

[Thurbane]

I remember back when seeing a Ghost caused you to age, as well as casting certain spells (definitely haste, also Wish from memory). Fun times...it was an incentive to play an Elf, but many groups houseruled that it was a relative percentage of aging, rather than just X years (i.e. 3 years aging for a Human would mean 30 years or so aging for an Elf).

[TheMadLinguist]

Keep in mind, there are some problems with Reincarnate. Most Noticeably, Break Enchantment becomes a 1 minute casting time*, No save, Instant kill spell on you.

* There are likely tricks to make this faster.

Of course, it refers to "victims", so YMMV as to whether or not it works on people who willingly used it.

[Ormur]

Forgot about that. So your choices are stealing life from someone else or being killed and then turned into a random creature.

You can also use the instant version of reincarnate, last breath. It only works the round after the target dies but you don't loose a level. So if you know a druid you can just ask him to fill all his 4th level slots with the spell. If you don't like your new race you just slit your throat and have him cast it again until you roll something acceptable.

If you want to stay human you'll need on average 7-8 castings which cost 3500-4000 gp. If you're including the cost of spellcasting and you hire the cheapest druid that can cast 4th level spells (he'll probably be able to cast 2 because of bonus spells) it would cost you 1960-2240 gp extra.

So on average it would cost a human about 12000 gp every century to never die of old age if he was picky about race. Other races would have to pay more to end up the same because they're less likely to roll it but most of them wouldn't need to have the spell cast on them twice a century like humans either (too bad if you're a gnoll, bugbear, troglodyte or lizardfolk).