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Brother-Redemptor wrote:
As far as i know Space Marines being “functionally immortal” was always just a theory held among the Space Marines during the Great Crusade but they had never been able to test it as none of them had ever lived long enough. The Great Crusade only lasted for around 200 years which would still mean that every Space Marine alive at that time was still young by the standards of 40k Marines. The Theory seems to have been proven false however given that we have seen that they do start to fail over time. The average Space Marine should expect to serve for around 200 to 400 years before they are killed or are no longer fit for service but then you have very old Marines like Logan Grimnar and Ulrik that prove that they can live up to at least 800 years with the Blood Angels being stated to be amongst the longest lived at around the 1000 year mark.

Standard Humans are pretty much all over the place with the average citizen either having a very short and brutal life or the lucky ones that can expect to reach an age which would be similar to the age expectancy of today’s world. There are wealthy humans that can extend their lives for several centuries but they are very few in number. The Sister of Battle are likely to live for a good few centuries given how well funded they are.

Eldar live for around 1000+ years with some like Eldrad living well past the 10,000 year mark but this is put down to his vast Psychic might. So it looks like the more the Eldar develop their Psychic powers the longer they can expect to live, but their bodies will eventually start to crystallize. Pre-Fall Eldar were essentially a race of perpetual’s, they lived there lives and upon their deaths their souls would enter the Warp and after a time return to live again. Many among the Pre-Fall Eldar had ambitions to extend their lives to the point that they could outlive stars.

Tau are a short lived race, the oldest can probably expect to reach their 60th year unless there is some other factor involved like commander Farsight.

Dark Eldar have the potential to live as long as their Craftworld kin, as long as they are able to survive that long. Most of the Dark Eldar Haemonculus have been around since before the Fall and many had high ranking positions among the pleasure cults that spread throughout the old Eldar Empire.

Orks I would say are actually “functionally immortal” as they just keep on getting bigger and stronger the longer they live; as long as they are not killed that is. I don’t think there has ever been an example of an old Ork that can no longer fight. Does anyone know what happens when an Ork gets too old?

This is perfect. Very nicely summarised based on current information available and intelligent thought.

The only thing I'd mention is that Dark Eldar are able to live far longer than their Craftworld cousins (or at least those that aren't Eldrad-level psykers), provided they can survive that long. Through their technomancy, they can reanimate deceased individuals entirely. The only hard-cap I could see to their life is the fact that as they get older and older, it takes more and more to feel their emotional vampirism which staves off the predations of Slaanesh and regenerates their bodies. Theoretically, if the trend continues, there would come a point where it would simply not be possible to provide enough sustenance to extend their life further. That would be the maximum life expectancy for a Dark Eldar.

That we haven't heard of any Dark Eldar that have reached that state suggests that it is very late indeed. If Vect has been around since the early days of Commorragh (M18), and Lelith is older, their life-expectancies would be fantastically long given that they're not even on constant life-support yet.

Oh, and the Necrontyr's lifetimes were described as being painfully short. I've always imagined an old Necrontyr to be around 35, although that's not based on any sort of evidence. It's just what I would imagine to be 'painfully short'.

Fictional wrote:

Mudrat wrote:
It has to be mentioned that there are all the CSM in the warp who have been around for a long time. I am aware the warp has no sense of time (The night lords trilogy only remembers Terra about 100ish years ago), but then there's no reason a CSM can't have spent more than 10,000 years fighting in the warp, making them older than any non-eldar/necron.

This is the sort of bit that always gets me.

When ages are mentioned, are they relative or absolute?

You could be 100 Terran years in absolute terms, ie physical age measured against a fixed time base.

But you could also be 1000 years in relative terms because 1000 years have passed on Terra whilst you were in warp jumps etc, even though you are only 100.

I'd lean on the side of 'if you've only experienced the equivalent of 100 years of aging, you're only 100 years old'. Certainly for the purposes of determining the aging process of Astartes.

In relative terms, a lot of Traitor Marines would be the oldest humans alive.

 Galef wrote:
The did change Vect's background in the recent Dex. He is no longer as old as the Fall, but was a slave in the early days of Commoragh. He rose up to overthrow his captors and built a regime that united many webway pockets that ultimately create Commoragh as it is in the present.
So currently Eldrad is the oldest, but even Farseers begin to turn to crystal when they start getting too old.

And Eldar must be significantly older than 10k considering he was already a chef Farseer during the Heresy and it can take centuries just to master being a Seer, much less one of the most powerful ones

They didn't so much change it as not give an exact time frame for when he was a slave. Given that Commoragh pre-dates The Fall by a long way Vect could still be very easily be over 10 000 years old, and the same could apply to Lelith Hesperax.

I imagine when it comes to the Eldar, it is the same with most fictional elves, that they are essentionally immortal unless killed in battle, through misadventure or disease/sickness.

As for Space Marines, I would imagine that the Emperor designed them to be long lived, but not immortal. The experience gained from centuries of combat would be invaluable, but it would also be dangerous given the amount of exposure to the warp over time too.(Not to mention Gene seed degradation)

 Ynneadwraith wrote:
I'd lean on the side of 'if you've only experienced the equivalent of 100 years of aging, you're only 100 years old'. Certainly for the purposes of determining the aging process of Astartes.

In relative terms, a lot of Traitor Marines would be the oldest humans alive.

It is the difference between physical age and how long a person has been around for, but I'd agree, the ages specified for those living outside the warp would be their physical ages.

So traitor legionaries have been around a long long time, but physical age? all depends on the vaguries of the warp.

Akuprime wrote:
I imagine when it comes to the Eldar, it is the same with most fictional elves, that they are essentionally immortal unless killed in battle, through misadventure or disease/sickness.

As for Space Marines, I would imagine that the Emperor designed them to be long lived, but not immortal. The experience gained from centuries of combat would be invaluable, but it would also be dangerous given the amount of exposure to the warp over time too.(Not to mention Gene seed degradation)

In the absence of any evidence I'd agree with you on the Eldar front, but there's definitely a quote somewhere saying that their lifespan is somewhere between 1000 and couple of thousand years.

Very interesting insight about Marines though. Fits the grimdark theme that the emperor could have made Marines immortal, but chose not to as it would be more efficient against chaos (or he'd be concerned about losing control of them another way).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Akuprime wrote:
I imagine when it comes to the Eldar, it is the same with most fictional elves, that they are essentionally immortal unless killed in battle, through misadventure or disease/sickness.

As for Space Marines, I would imagine that the Emperor designed them to be long lived, but not immortal. The experience gained from centuries of combat would be invaluable, but it would also be dangerous given the amount of exposure to the warp over time too.(Not to mention Gene seed degradation)

In the absence of any evidence I'd agree with you on the Eldar front, but there's definitely a quote somewhere saying that their lifespan is somewhere between 1000 and couple of thousand years.

Very interesting insight about Marines though. Fits the grimdark theme that the emperor could have made Marines immortal, but chose not to as it would be more efficient against chaos (or he'd be concerned about losing control of them another way).

Fictional wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:
I'd lean on the side of 'if you've only experienced the equivalent of 100 years of aging, you're only 100 years old'. Certainly for the purposes of determining the aging process of Astartes.

In relative terms, a lot of Traitor Marines would be the oldest humans alive.

It is the difference between physical age and how long a person has been around for, but I'd agree, the ages specified for those living outside the warp would be their physical ages.

So traitor legionaries have been around a long long time, but physical age? all depends on the vaguries of the warp.

Agreed

It gets even weirder when you realise that there's no reason that the variable time-dilation in the warp would happen on a scale large enough to mean that all of you would age at the same rate.

Most of you could be barely 10 years old, but if your arm was in the wrong place at the wrong time it could be 800 years old.

Warp-space must be a very strange place to live indeed...

Fictional wrote:

But you could also be 1000 years in relative terms because 1000 years have passed on Terra whilst you were in warp jumps etc, even though you are only 100.

Or you go back in time due to warp trickery and arrive 100 years before you were born ... how old are you then

I've read through this thread and I'd like to mention a fact concerning the eldar aging as well as a theory I read regarding Eldrad. The Eldar don't age in the same way other races do and they certainly don't die in the same way other races do. Craftworlds Eldars all follow diffrent paths, which they spend "a lifetime" to master, something I assume to be a human lifespan, but could also refer to an non immortal Eldar lifespan, perhaps dating back to before their immortality. We learn about this in "path of the warrior", where the main character goes from the path of the dreamer, to the path of the sculptor to, where we are in the book, the path of the warrior (in his case striking scorpion). He spends an unspecific but finit amount of time on each path. I'll leave the book for now because anything else would be spoiler warnings. Once an Eldar has reached a certain ammount of time in a path and is unable to turn away that Eldar is said to be "lost to that path". This is equalevent to death to humans. When this happens the Eldar cute his or her ties to the family and dons an armour/gear/clothes of a leader of said path. Most well known of theese are the Exharchs of the paths of the warrior and the farseers of the paths of the seer. When an Eldar dons the aging gear his or hers councious is absorbed into a massive councious of other previous wearers. Hence all the experience and memories of said Eldar get shared with every other Eldar that has previously worn said gear. When this happens the Eldar become completly unrecognisable and their personality become a mixture of all the previous Eldar in said position, untill an actual death claims the Eldar. The most famous example of this effect is phoenix lords. They've died and been resurected by new Eldar hosta innumerable times, each time adding more experience then the Eldar themselves could never hope to gather, turning them even deadlier then their original training intended.

We know this is how it works and people have theorised that Eldrad Ulthran is actually a collection of lost farseers bound in that armour. The name Eldrad Ulthran did mean something like "leader of Utwhe" or similar, don't quote me on it though because I don't remmember the exact translation. Hence it's a ceremonical name worn by a body that's been exchanges many times used by a collective conseusness.

In short: Eldars are immortal, their psyche is not.

Concerning Space marines as many has stated Dante is the oldest at some 1400years or so, Cassius is considered old and is the oldest members of the Ultramarines at some 400 years.
Most Space marines probably has much shorter lifespan.

Last note is that the Emperor is rocking some 60.000years right now. Suck it Vect and Asurmen.