Creepy crawlies, spooky sea-side mansions, and too many clues to count. Jinkies! It's The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh from Ghosts of Saltmarsh! Level 2 is where I get my hands on the material and run some of the beginning content of the game. With my first impressions and experiences, I give insights about the material and how my expectations met reality.
This post contains spoilers for Ghosts of Saltmarsh.
I've been reading over Ghosts of Saltmarsh material for about 6 months now. I first really cracked open the book while on vacation on the beach. Something about being a nerd reading about a sea town overrun with pirates and smuggling while on a calm seashore with a light ocean breeze under an umbrella dodging frisbees was oddly charming as it was discordant. Immediately, I was extremely enthused about all of the material within the book. Saltmarsh is a welcome mix of a classic adventure catalogue with a setting guide. The first 35 pages give a lot of life to this small town, including some extras like backgrounds, possible side encounters, and areas surrounding Saltmarsh that are eerie and enticing. They're given enough detail to tell you what can be encountered, but open enough to allow you to fill in details that can make it specific to your world, or up to your interpretation.
However, today was the first day that I really got to play into the content. The first adventure, The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh, was an adventure originally published in the U.K. for AD&D. (I found this fitting since I'm a recent resident in the UK, particularly living near some coastlines that would fir some of the descriptions provided in the adventure.) The adventure was basically a hit, with reviewers like Jim Bambra noting how it relied on players putting pieces together for themselves to solve the case, rather than just relying on combat or rolls. (1, yes I know its Wikipedia).
I did not know this going in to run the material however. I had read over the material about 3 times before running the book, so I understood very little about the historic intention of the adventure, and just had to go off of what was implied in the book. I got to practice some of what I had read over with my wife in a 1-on-1 campaign. We're still in the middle of the adventure but wanted to note some impressions so far.
Intent: Going on a Ghost Hunt(?)
Have you ever had players want to go on a Ghost Hunt in D&D, where they actually didn't find a ghost? I can say this setting really takes the cake on making the flavor of hunting an apparition while mixing in a good amount of intrigue and mystery. The design is clearly to make a Scooby-Doo style ghost hunt, slowly revealing that the spooky villain is actually a less-than-spooky villain.
I task my wife, playing Cherina Stormwater and her housecarl Vicfaelor with the job from the council. Locals have been reporting that this house is certainly haunted. Once owned by an alchemist with less-than-wholesome desires, the place is now cursed and a ghost frequents the premises. Locals have been getting more antsy about the place, but the only recent reliable source is a drunk too hungover to talk unless you induce him with money or more alcohol. Maybe both.
There are plenty of clues in plain sight showing this house is being used for other purposes. It's just up to the players to take the initiative to see that information.
Cherina believes there's either a Ghost in this house or some bad ju-ju with a squatter. I've given her no background information on Saltmarsh at this point. Frankly, the town is filled with scum, smugglers, and corrupt politicians, and this house is home base to one small arm of the operation. Smugglers are moving goods out of a hidden cave under the house out to a ship that hides offshore in the nightly fog. The book has given me a plethora of tools to spook the house up, playing out as screaming traps, gross bodies, none too few empty rooms, a fake hostage, and a bunch of diseased critters. However, there are plenty of clues in plain sight showing this house is being used for other purposes. It's just up to the players to take the initiative to see that information.
Playthrough: Hit and Near Misses
Despite being told its a ghost, Cherina has picked up that this doesn't sound like a typical SyFy dramatic wall crackling ghost. She starts taking steps to find out information. She speaks to the drunk to find entryways into the mansion. The local kids tell her about the spooky light that flashes on dark nights in one corner of the house.
When we get close, I describe the house sitting near a cliff, a bit further back from the sea. She doesn't see the cave from this angle, so I don't describe it to her. They begin scouting out the place from afar, watching for movement. She even uses speak with animals and asks a crow about any people moving in and out of the house, and any "shinies" they may have. The crow notes that "Sometimes people go in up top, sometimes they come out of the bottom to go to a boat out at sea." Our session ends with her staking out of the house at night, watching for the light in the corner of the house. She marks it down in her notes.
Just as she is having fun uncovering the clues with creative measures, I'm having fun watching the narrow misses and connections made between clues.
At this point, we end the session going over the details she's found. I ask her in character as Vicfaelor what she's thinking is up. She says she doesn't know, but an element confusing her is the crow saying "Some people come out on top, some people out the bottom". Do they have flying mounts to get in the ceiling? How does that work? Oddly enough, my wife has pretty much pulled every string she can to find clues about the house, outside of going into the house. Yet, this simple detail gets missed in the theatre of the mind. The cave below in the cliffs, implied by the crow, is mistaken for the ground floor of the house. It's an intricate detail that's understandable, but it is entertaining. Just as she is having fun uncovering the clues with creative measures, I'm having fun watching the narrow misses and connections made between clues.
This is an element of fun I had not anticipated while setting up the session. Normally, I consider information gathering to be somewhat of a charge bar. Players unlock clues, which become more detailed over time until the DM says "You figure out that X is the answer". Instead, the Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh has plenty of clues that are relatively specific in their own right, but the clues don't have any particular meaning by themselves. Instead of sightings of shadows and moving figures, you have vague stories of ghosts and fiends. The crow mentioned some more specific movement, but no clear direction on whereabouts the figures move. The light appears in the window, and the code is written down, but without looking to the ocean, the blinking light has no discernible meaning.
The clues that have been written into the story are inherently vague to the larger narrative, but detailed enough to merit finding.
It's wonderful. It gives the players the full responsibility of connecting the dots of the information given to them. The DM becomes less of an information bank, and rather a vending machine of small facts. Yes, there are footprints in the house, what about them? Sure, there's a blinking light in the window. Why not? The clues that have been written into the story are inherently vague to the larger narrative, but detailed enough to merit finding. Putting these pieces together is what makes it the most fun, as writing down the blinking light can be used later, or following the footprints leads to a secret entrance.
I am concerned about the mere amount of random encounters that could happen. There are tons of small animals and bugs that are riddled inside and outside of this abandoned mansion. If I were to throw every one of these creatures at Cherina and Vicfaelor, it would likely exhaust them. They could try to rest inside of the building... but I think the "Ghosts" would get to them. At the same time, I'm not here to hold their hand, but I do think that the sheer amount of animal encounters could play into delaying the actual good content in this source.
Future Thoughts
Cherina and Vic are going to be exploring the insides of the house next, and running into some of the traps, critters, and Ned, most likely. Eventually, the adventure description has them attempting to board the Sea Ghost, the offshore ship that the smugglers are moving supplies and goods to from the house. It will be interesting to see if my wife wants to pursue getting onto the boat on her own initiative, or if she'll want to head back into town and report her findings. Depending on how the next session plays out could drastically affect the outcome.
I would be curious to see the same session played out with players who are less inquisitive. Most of my groups would simply say "Alright, let's go to the house" and march of to the doorstep. They would still find clues, but they would definitely be way less keyed into everything going on around them regarding the meta-story of the smugglers. Then again, the setup of the story does encourage the players to at least do some pre-exploration questioning in the town of Saltmarsh. Regardless of what will happen with my future group, it's been a ton of fun running this module so far.
Thanks for reading!
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