Average life span

Blaster

Blaster

Rear Admiral
Awhile ago I noticed this in the Life at Port Broughton section of StarSoldier

“Mr. Paz is a human, roughly seventy. Not old by any means for a core civilian, but an amount of years which can take its toll on the frontier.”

I was wondering if anyone knows what the average life span for humans in Wing commander is. Would a person born in 2600 have a good chance of still being around in 2700, assuming they weren’t killed in any of the wars during that period? The StarSoldier quote made me think people in the core worlds live quite a bit longer than most people today but life might not be as long on the frontier.
 
Yes, I think you picked up on that exactly correctly. It's to explain why people like Doomsday (who would be 81 in 2701) are still active (Arena's unused single player storyline involved Vance Richards, who would have been 93).

(The extreme known age for a human in Wing Commander is supposedly Admiral Wilson, who the Confederation Handbook claims was born in 2498. In all likelyhood the book actually meant 2598, though... but, who knows, with Pilgrims.)

(Okay, that isn't true. Privateer 2's lore involved the founder of Crius Net, Vrootle Pigfididrin, having been 420 years old at the time of the game, thanks to multiple brain relocation transplant operations.)
 
That was a mistake on the author's part, seeing as he appears again in the WC4 novelization, set after the events of False Colors (though published earlier). The follow-up book to FC was to have included mention of his making it to an escape pod so he'd be around for WC4, but Mr. Keith passed away before the sequel to FC went anywhere, AFAIK.
 
Hmm, do we know what the average life span of the kilrathi is? (preferably in 'earth' years...)
 
Nomad Terror said:
I was impressed with how Star*Soldier mentions Stingray is still alive and kicking
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There are quite a few old timers mentioned in there as being alive and kicking. Star*Soldier is one of the best pieces of canon to be added ever to WC lore. It manages to touch and comment on almost everything in WC history.

We really should put together some kind of fan thank you for the people who put it together. It was obviously a labor of love that required an amazing amount of research to create.
 
I particuarly liked how Grayson Burrows has apparently become a pirate, with a heck of a bounty on his head. Looks like we know what route HE went after Righteous Fire...
 
So I guess this means maniac wasn’t near the end of his career as an active duty fighter pilot in prophecy. Also Paladin didn’t stop flying fighters because he was getting old like I thought.
 
Hmm, do we know what the average life span of the kilrathi is? (preferably in 'earth' years...)
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Good question - we don't know. It's long been suspected that Kilathi have shorter lifespans because they mature much more quickly (Hobbes was serving in the military by age four). We know that the Emperor was more than 75 years old when he died. He fought his first war in 2594 (against the Varni) and died in 2669 -- of course, he didn't die of natural causes... but he does claim in Fleet Action (2668) that he doesn't expect to live much longer.

Action Stations notes that Kilrathi warriors retired after forty years of service before the war.

So I guess this means maniac wasn’t near the end of his career as an active duty fighter pilot in prophecy. Also Paladin didn’t stop flying fighters because he was getting old like I thought.
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It's possible that the Confederation has a mandatory retirement age... but Paladin left to take over Special Operations.

As for Maniac, it's hard to say... the Prophecy guide says he's considering retiring to write his autobiography (in 2681) and Secret Ops says he's working as a lobbyist rather than a fighter pilot during that story.
 
Blaster said:
So I guess this means maniac wasn’t near the end of his career as an active duty fighter pilot in prophecy. Also Paladin didn’t stop flying fighters because he was getting old like I thought.
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Actually, he WAS getting up in years - remembering that he had at least twenty years in fighters on the Claw alone, and before that had been in Intelligence (see the WC Movie). Hell, he also indicated he'd been with the Iason, if I remember my lines right, which means he's been involved in the Kilrathi war since the beginning; which would be about 30 years at that point, before going off the front lines.

Remember that Halcyon himself was supposed to rotate back to Tactical at the end of SM2, and he's been out there a long freaking time as well - retirement doesn't mean leaving the forces, or so it appears from Paladin's example: just retirement from duty as an active pilot. Maniac's only been flying about 20 or so years by the time Prophecy rolls around, so it's not impossible he'd still be able to go on for a few more years before retiring from active flight duty.
 
Apparently then, Confed does not impose mandatory retirement after twenty years for non-flag officers outside of "in for the duration" emergencies the way that the USA does.
 
I was assuming that because Doomsday Was still active at 81 that the other pilots could still be flying around that age but I guess its not necessarily normal for someone that old to be heathy enough to keep flying combat missions or that confed would let them even if they were physically able.

The Emperor probably had the best medical care of any Kilathi so he may have lived longer than normal. Of course some people die younger than average even when they have better than average medical care.
 
The Emperor also was severely wounded in his early years (one leg and one eye missing) and had probably not the most relaxing job. At least I think that's to take into account as well.
 
A serious injury early in life could definitely shorten it, although I’m sure there are people who have lived to a very old age despite a bad war wound. I think the only thing the Emperor’s age can really tell us is that it is possible for kilrathi to live more than 75 years, not what a normal length of life is.
 
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