My group is heading for the shipwreck at the end of SWW, and I'm not very happy with the transition into HTBM
Firstly, I've completely cut out the Masher Reef, and have replaced it with the second storm being created by Emraag the Glutton. Effectively Emraag will create a storm using Control Weather, force the ship towards the shore, and once the PC's attempt to engage him, he'll submerge and proceed to hole the ship. Effectively the PC's options will be crash on the IOD, or sink.
So, at the point they crash, I don't want to have the line 'The ship rolls, the sea plunges over, everything goes dark' as my players will cry foul. ALL of them knocked unconscious by a wave? Sounds silly, and obvious railroading (even though the end of SWW is all railroading)
So I want them to potentially stay conscious through the wave (Fort save maybe?) and whoever does has the opportunity to nurse the ship to shore. I don't want them to save many colonists, but when the storm picks up the colonists will get pushed below decks which means when the ship gets holed, Emraag can use his breath weapon through the hole, killing everyone there (and many of the supplies)
Planning to have this all occur just before dawn, so by the time the ship crashes the sun is just coming up, allowing the storm to pass. Anyone still awake can start the salvage operation, anyone washed overboard awakes on the beach a short distance away.
Does this all sound plausible? Did any of you run this any different to the book?
I seem to remember there is a long thread on the forum somewhere about the shipwreck. Most DMs felt the same way about the shipwreck as you do.
What I basically did, was give them 3 or four (reasonably high) profession (sailor) checks to "park" the ship on the reef. Since practically the whole group had invested in profession (sailor), they managed to succeed by aiding each other. Then I let some NPCs panic and run off across the beach, so some of them got killed by the T-rex. All in all this turned out to be a very exciting scene and one of the most memorable moments in the campaign.
I also foreshadowed the event by letting Skald shoot an albatross. It was an albatross with savage fever, so he had no choice but to shoot it, but still the crew considered this bad luck. The PCs had to stop them from attacking Skald.
Then I let some of the NPCs hint that the storm was not natural. To this day, the players are convinced that Demogorgon sent the storm.
Here is one of several threads discussing the SW's wreck.
Thanks for this, would have been good to go do a decent search of the forums before posting! I've worked out how I'm going to play it...
Currently (as of last night), the Sea Wyvern has lost track of the Blue Nixie (during the first storm), and has now become entrenched in Journeys End. My PC's have searched the Rage and are about to head off to find 'Mother' and ask her politely to let their ship go, thank you very much.
They know that they are very close to the IOD (the druid has been using wild shape to act as spotter), so should reach the 'wreck' in next weeks game.
So... I'm going to use the suggestion that the Blue Nixie got to the wreck site first, thanks to the fact that the storm blew them further south and they didn't get delayed by Journeys End. There, the ship would have encountered Emraag, who pushed the ship towards the shore, and ultimately wrecked it. The few survivors (Lavinia, Kora, Jade Ravens, one or two others) have no way to communicate with the Sea Wyvern, so they head south and plan to make the trip to Farshore on foot. Rowyn is also there (in disguise) but her and her colleague head off inland (probably going to reappear in COBI).
So when the Sea Wyvern turns up, Emraag gives the PC's the same treatment. Once they are forced towards shore, they'll spot the wrecked Nixie and (hopefully) realise that Emraag is probably not worth a fight right now. If they don't, Emraag wrecks the ship anyway, and HTBM plays out roughly as written.
If the Sea Wyvern doesn't wreck, then my PC's can either wait out Emraag and hightail it to Farshore, or more likely send the ship off and follow Lavinia by land. HTBM will still roughly work.
I'll let you know how my players react
I followed some of the suggestions of previous threads as well.
in short:
- the players plan to turn the Sea Wyvern into some sort of night club/temple of Sharess (Forgotten Realms) (the cohort & followers of my bard PC belong to the temple), so I decided to have the Blue Nixie be wrecked by the storm
- there were plenty of survivors of the Blue Nixie(ca. 1/3 died (during wreck or due to IoD fauna), 1/3 had set up camp, 1/3 including Lavinia mounted an expedition to get some help)
- Enter the sea wyvern & players --> Players (+ Urol, Avner) decide to follow Lavinia's expedition on land & the sea wyvern takes up the survivors & continues to Farshore.
- HTBM worked more or less as written (tip: search the forum again for Olangru's creepiness...)
have fun!
Hagor
Yes, there are many excellent suggestions for increasing Olangru's creepiness. Just be sure first as to how strong your players' stomachs are, as some suggestions are not for delicate minds. :)