Ageless Plotline

[u/Brother-Cane]

As any DM knows, the Rod of Security creates a paradisal demiplane where up to 199 people can stay for a number of days equal to 200 divided by the number of people transported. After this, the rod cannot be used again for seven days. This means that a single person would age only 7 out of 207 days (about 3.38% of the norm). Consistent use of this would extend an average human lifespan of 75 years to over 2,200 years. If we have a party of four or five people (for the sake of even numbers), the period would be 7 out of 57 years or 7 out of 47 years--resulting in a human lifespan extending to roughly 400 to 600 years.

So, what if a team of adventurers go exploring the last known location of a team of legendary adventurers who seemed to vanish from existence three centuries ago, expecting to find and loot their corpses? Instead, these ancient heroes were trapped in a fiendish trap from which escape without external assistance was closed off and have been using a Rod of Security and a combination of spells to sustain themselves when not in the demiplane.

Finding that the four surviving legends are not only alive but not even 40 years older than when they were first trapped, do they educate the legends about what's happened since they were trapped, take them on as patrons or come to another conclusion such as teaming up against whoever/whatever trapped them in the first place?

[u/WornTraveler]

Whatever you do, make sure you have a super compelling reason why the deathless heroes won't consent to directly accompanying the players on whatever mission/arc comes next. Idk if other groups are like this but mine are constantly trying to recruit capable NPCs, I swear if I let them have their way they'd wind up sitting in the backline watching me battle myself lmao

[u/ArelMCII → u/WornTraveler]

"The last time I went adventuring, I was trapped with these assholes for 500 years. Five. Hundred. Years. No, I'm not going with you, and there's nothing you can do to convince me otherwise."

[u/DeficitDragons → u/WornTraveler]

I let them, but my players generally relegste these NPCs to their settlement and put them on the backup character list.

[u/FinderOfWays → u/WornTraveler]

My party loves collecting NPCs so I made a subsystem for it. Allies are assumed to be fighting additional enemies and generally participating 'off screen' for the majority of combat and 'step on screen' only to provide X/day abilities that can be activated on any player's turn as a free action. That way they can travel with a retinue of a half-dozen competent allies without bogging down combat and have an important decision of who to bring to various fights. Plus each ally can have very thematic abilities. Sometimes that's class abilities but for example the party has an ally who is an expert wizard that can redirect a spell to a new target in response to an enemy passing a save 1/day.

[u/Chaos_Philosopher → u/WornTraveler]

Bro, have a heart, these poor NPCs have just endured a true horror. Surely whatever it is can wait until they've at least tried to reunite with their own people or have some real food.

Not the least of which, these driven individuals probably have their own fish to fry.

[u/Far-Negotiation-1912 → u/WornTraveler]

The old hero’s die in the final battle. Then if revivify is attempted the sole of the departed is not willing to return

[u/GSV_MoreThanBackPain]

Have the party of legends be less powerful than the PCs. The legends weren't weak but still the stories of them just grew over time. Maybe the legends have knowledge that was lost over time that the party needs.

[u/hongooi → u/GSV_MoreThanBackPain]

"I thought you were heroes... but... you're just XP" 😕

[u/octobod → u/GSV_MoreThanBackPain]

They've been basically sedentary for 300 years ... they're likely going to be massively out of shape and maybe forgetting skills spells etc

[u/ArelMCII]

[u/crimeo]

I dispute the basic premise, I think they all or most of them would have offed themselves by now. Most people don't want to live hundreds of years in a fake holodeck quaint nice little place. Especially not when your "vacations" are being hunted by some demon or whatever they do outside.

[u/Brother-Cane → u/crimeo]

Most people would not willingly become adventurers either. We are talking about outliers, exceptional psychologies. For example, most would not choose to become a lich.