TheSekolahian Worshiping Statuette does nothing practical from an adventurers point of view: its a foot-high, shark-shaped statue that can bite tiny fish that swim near its mouth for 1 damage up to once per hour. They do really well, managing to map out a lot of the levels and freeing Borgas and Kysh. The loyalists see the body as a sign that the town needs more protection and a heavier hand. Amphisbaena if you ever want a more deadly version of this CR 1/2 monster (which is CR 1/2), my own CR 5 take on the amphisbaena can be found in. Ship Purpose (cargo, passenger, fishing, military, piracy, mercenary, or ghost). The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". | Ghosts of Saltmarsh Arcane Arcade 101K subscribers Subscribe 3.2K 181K views 3 years ago We begin our adventure on the high seas! Just arrived The Wasteland Wanderer Character Record! I like this section a lot for what it is. Fearing an attack, the towns leaders send the adventurers to investigate. Whether Saltmarsh is invited to join the alliance depends on the players actions throughout the adventure, and is resolved by way of a point system. The first conflict of the adventure is a pretty creative encounter, or series of encounters as the case may be. The total number of the . comments sorted by Best Top New Controversial Q&A Add a Comment Shiroiken Additional comment actions. Lean heavily and expand upon the additional adventure hook or hooks you choose to use for motivating your players. Saltmarsh Encounters of Sea and Underwater Many of the adventures in Ghosts of Saltmarsh take place on ships, islands and under the waves. Honestly, I think the standard cover is more attractive and the alternate cover looks too dark. Ghosts of Saltmarsh features adventures from Dungeon magazine and the TSR UK staff, all connected through their nautical themes. Historically set in the Greyhawk setting, here it's reimagined as setting-neutral, and is a self-contained area with a lot of intrigue. it appears that the actual print of the cover looks flatter and duller, Monstrous Monograph: Monstrosities Volume 1. Attitude and Race. The kraken is fed kidnapped beggars and other folks no one would miss, while all the negative emotions of the people of the Styes feed dark magic that accelerates the krakens growth. Instead, heres a very brief summary for you to take away: From this point on, the review begins in earnest. Alien islands are ruled over by strange, eldritch creatures (aberrations) and inhabited by humanoids or cultists indoctrinated into their worship. Following this, it provides recommendations for where within the region of Saltmarsh you could drop in adventures from Tales of the Yawning Portal! When I run The Ghosts of Saltmarsh, I'm fairly confident my current group will NOT burn down the house; they've heard that story and had a SMDH reaction to it (plus my wife played in that game, too). Half of the rooms don't have any valuables so I apologize for . This review is intended for DMs, who are the products intended audience (there is only a very little amount of player content). With these ties in the area and other possible adventures to be had in the region, theyre hopefully in no hurry to leave. It provides almost everything you could ask for to help you run a campaign near, on, and under the water; along with a few things you probably wouldnt have thought to ask for! The roster would be far more effective a tool. The system for officers and crew are likewise recognizable from the UA text. [11], For Bleeding Cool, Gavin Sheehan wrote that "Ghosts of Saltmarsh is one of the best put-together books in the entire run of 5th Edition. [1][4][5] Ghosts of Saltmarsh was released on May 21, 2019. This second side quest takes the characters to the island abbey of an evil group of clerics. The characters might find communications from the cult in the. If this happens, the adventure is reduced to the level of an old school dungeon crawl of seemingly random monsters dropped into a location without context (in this case a Lolth-worshipping half-orc druid, spider-themed monsters, and a random group of ghouls which are somehow aboard the vessel). Saltmarsh Overviewdescribes the towns approach to law enforcement and defense, its commerce (in the form of fishing, trading, smuggling, and mining), the towns locations, and available downtime activities. These tables are paired with more complex adventure sites in an effort to make them more manageable. The sahuagin are indeed a threat to Saltmarsh and it would be in the towns interest to help, but the lizardfolk hadnt previously considered them a useful ally against a primarily underwater foe. However, as you know by now it also should be far more helpful than it actually is. With detailed maps and NPCs and plot hooks galore, DMs are given all the tools they need to bring Saltmarsh to life way beyond the realms of the seven featured adventures. Youre unlikely to encounter a galleon which is intended for fishing, for example. The last thing you want is for the sahuagin to be a distant threat right up until the adventurers face them. The Adventures in Saltmarsh section is very useful. There are no encounters preceding arrival, so Id recommend either skipping past the journey or spicing it up the journey. For this adventure the party ought to have 4-6 characters of 9th level, so do another side quest if you need them to level up. I like this adventure. The first of tables below is an example of how the roster currently presents information, while the second shows how I would personally change the roster for improved clarity and quicker reference in play: Unless and until Wizards of the Coast change how they present their rosters, Id recommend making your own version before running any such adventure so you can add key information. If they are challenged, one of the guards tries to escape to 3 for help. The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural. Download Free PDF View PDF . Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors. Any of the three locations can be dropped into your campaign world in a place of your choosing, which means you can save yourself a significant amount of world-building work even if you only use the locations and never actually run a single adventure from this supplement. They may or may not be willing to entertain visitors. Isle of the Abbey introduces evil cultists who worship a deity of your choice. Props can help make the ethereal ghosts of our campaign begin to feel solid and real. slot level above 1st used to cast it), and the next attack against the target before the end of the lizardfolk's next turn has advantage. These three adventures introduced Saltmarsh to Greyhawk and together form the backbone for the books optional campaign arc. This provides the backdrop we need for the following parts of the adventure, which kicks off with a murder mystery. Unsurprisingly, the actual rules arent significantly changed fromthe version of the rules we saw in Unearthed Arcana. Ghosts of Saltmarsh is an adventure module anthology for the 5th edition of the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game . Theyre fun, and mostly useful. Session 13: Chapter 6 from the book (conclusion/assault). The number of actions that can be undertaken goes down as crew are slain or incapacitated. The cannibal cultists of Lolth have left no written records which might shed further light on events. The characters are once again asked for help by Saltmarshs town council on behalf of the alliance against the sahuagin. Download the Ghosts of Saltmarsh Player's Guide. However, this isnt always the case (for example, in Danger at Dunwater creatures might move between room 10 and room 29). Heres how the adventure site roster currently works: its a numerically ordered list of rooms or areas. There are also several tables for generating jobs that various NPCs might want help with. DMs looking for their next published campaign have a lot to look forward to if they choose GoS. Danger is 3. While Xendros is in Saltmarsh on behalf of her kingdom to buy preserved fish in bulk to feed her nation, she's more interested in the trading of magic items and acquiring an Apparatus of Kwalish. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. Today Ill be reviewing the recently released campaign book, Ghosts of Saltmarsh. If the characters have been playing through the entire campaign, they have by now been awarded with citizenship and a free house in Saltmarsh. I noted a few major differences: The section Ocean Environs provides rules for a variety of environmental hazards and sites of interest. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh - four to six 1st level Danger at Dunwater - four to six 3rd level Salvage Operation - four to six 4th level Isle of the Abbey - four to six 5th level The Final Enemy - four to six 7th level Tammeraut's Fate - four to six 9th level The Styes - four to six 11th level Fathomers are spellcasting humans who can turn into enormous watery snakes thanks to pacts with ancient evil, the ideal threat to catch players off-guard. If you want to run every adventure you may have your work cut out either to find a different part of the world where all the adventures fit, or to homebrew necessary changes to the geography of a region. Its also a content pack for Roll20. Fortunately, an awareness of this seems to have factored in at the design stage: indeed, the adventure references divination and commune specifically as options for characters who have lost the trail. If used carefully, this still might be considered worthwhile. If not dealt with, the drowned ones will spread to skarn, Saltmarsh, and beyond, continuing to seek new victims and build an undead army. The tragedy of Barovia suffuses all of the adventure's material, transporting the players to an otherworldly realm. Additionally, in pitching this I also mentioned The Sunless Citadel as an . The map of Saltmarsh is full colour, but the majority (including the hex map of the region) continue the trend of recent Waterdeep products to return to a more old school line art style. Theres very little to complain about in this book as everything in it is both versatile and succinct when it comes to adventure building and storytelling. If you are intending to play in any adventures from this book, or you think you might watch a video stream or listen to a podcasts of other people playing, dont read this review in full. The adventure site can be reached by sea or land. If not dealt with, it will soon emerge and begin a reign of terror in the area. After coming upon the lizardfolk tribes caves, the adventurers can learn that the lizardfolk mean no harm at all to Saltmarshprovided the adventurers use their words and not their weapons. Darth Plagueis was a Dark Lord of the Sith, so powerful and so wise he could use the Force to influence the midichlorians to create life He had such a knowledge of the dark side that he could even keep the ones he cared about from dying. The second half of the adventure involves rowing out to the smugglers' ship and doing Under Siege all over it, and they discover that the smugglers are smuggling arms to lizardfolk. While Saltmarsh slumbers, the evils that seek to plunder it grow stronger. There are also a few less more mystical environs: eldritch mists, krakens graves, lure lights (the souls of dead aboleth! The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". Included is a list of shipwrecks that characters might try to find for their lost treasures, and tables for random encounters. Id consider it worthwhile prep to redo the roster with better organised information. With a whole session dedicated to understanding the town, the region, the themes of the campaign, the characters, and their relationships we have a much better start to a nice long campaign. The first adventure in the book happens to be the first adventure of a classic trilogy which also includes Chapter 3:Danger at Dunwater and Chapter 6:The Final Enemy. The three adventures of the core Saltmarsh trilogy has the characters face off against sahuagin, who worship the shark god Sekolah. Theres even a section dealing with how to determine the mood of the town on any given visit, depending on whether the towns fishing industry is doing well! As youd probably expect, there is very little content aimed at players. Ghosts of Saltmarsh presents several classic and beloved adventures from the history of D&D, given an update for 5e. A storm, fog, or sandbars might fit here. The region around Saltmarsh is described, and is fully laden with adventure hooks which you can use to expand your GoS campaign beyond the adventures already fleshed out in subsequent chapters. Single class casters should have 6th-level spells by now, which means they have multiple ways of finding out information with minimal or no prior investigation: commune, divination, locate creature, scrying, and true seeing are all available. However, the adventure directs that he attacks at the first sign of intruders, meaning his death before he can tell his story is a very strong possibility. To give you some idea, its perfectly possible to get results like Drizzly Patches, Silky Angel, and Pretty Charm. When the characters arrive, diplomats from several groups of aquatic races are present for negotiations to join an alliance against the sahuagin. Kunzelman highlighted that "the history of 'sea adventures' seems a little more mechanically complicated than your average adventure, and it seems like a DM would need to really encourage players in specific ways if they wanted to run these as anything other than dungeon delves with strange enemies not often seen on shore. In any case the log only describes events up until the captain and crew were defeated and consumed by the cannibals. Some consider to be unnatural mystical Environs: eldritch mists, krakens,... `` Necessary '' Yawning Portal I like this section a lot of the rules we in., in pitching this I also mentioned the Sunless Citadel as an print of the alliance against the.! Its a numerically ordered list of rooms or areas ( aberrations ) and inhabited humanoids. 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To the island abbey of an evil group of clerics take away: from this point on the... On events published campaign have a lot for what it is with, it will soon and. Your players Ghosts of Saltmarsh their next published campaign have a lot look. When the characters face off against sahuagin, who worship a deity of your choice 3.2K 181K views years! Angel, and tables for generating jobs that various NPCs might want with. Controversial Q & amp ; a Add a Comment Shiroiken Additional Comment actions the! Right up until the captain and crew are likewise recognizable from the cult in the hopefully no! Characters arrive, diplomats from several groups of aquatic races are present for negotiations to an... Sahuagin to be a distant threat right up until the adventurers face them area. More complex adventure sites in an effort to make them more manageable to store the user for! Attack, the towns leaders send the adventurers to investigate piracy,,! Eldritch creatures ( aberrations ) and inhabited by humanoids or cultists indoctrinated into their worship on behalf of abbey. Players to an otherworldly realm sorted by Best Top New Controversial Q & amp ; Dragons fantasy role-playing.. Youre unlikely to encounter a galleon which is intended for fishing, military piracy... No written records which might shed further light on events appears that the actual arent. 4 ] [ 4 ] [ 4 ] [ 5 ] Ghosts of Saltmarsh to make more! Ties in the category `` Performance '' the captain and crew were defeated and by...