AD&D Review - The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh 

I miss the days in the late 90s where I could go to my local comic book store and buy any advanced d&d adventure for 3-5 bucks.

I ran this module back in the early 80s for my group. They IMMEDIATELY took to interrogating and abusing Ned Shakeshaft in a manner that made me (correctly) suspect that someone had read the module before we played it. They unceremoniously killed him, but I took the DMs revenge upon them for their cheating. Fred Shakeshaft, Ned's twin brother, bedeviled the party for years as he sought his revenge... and when I say "years" I mean 8th grade through 11th grade. He stole their horses after they entered the Hidden Shrine of Tamochan. He alerted every non-human in the Caves of Chaos that they were on the way. He swapped out their holy water with well water as they prepared to assault Castle Ravenloft. He followed them around and screwed with them with a tenacity that would have made Gollum blush. He was my first arch-villain. The party was finally able to track him down and kill as we wrapped up that campaign, but Fred Shakeshaft's name is still uttered in hushed whispers as mothers warn their children not to read the damn module before the DM runs it.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh is a book that reprinted this as the first adventure which not only makes sure to add onto Saltmarsh, but gives a reason for the PC’s to go to the mansion. I ran this with an apothecary hiring them to clear out the places since ghost stories are bad for business and Saltmarsh was becoming a good port town for trade. It’s been going rather interesting given how nuts they’ve been. I’ll leave it this way, they scarred Ned intentionally.

GM notes (mostly for my own reference haha) 0:50 the adventure will take 2-3 sessions 2:29 the maps 3:00 the town 3:30 suggestions why the PCs participate 11:34 foreshadow the lizardman tribe nearby 6:00 exploring the house 6:30 the 'prisoner' 7:15 secret doors to the smugglers lair 7:55 the main villain and his henchmonsters 8:27 ...a few days later: the town council's assignment 9:19 the smuggler's ship 9:50 the aquatic elf 10:15 the lizardmen & a pseudodragon 12:00 there are 2 sequels

Just finished running the 1st edition version for my players last night. The module holds up so well over 40 years later. Genuine classic. Would love to see more 1st edition reviews from Mr. Skorkowsky.

Hey Seth, I feel like once you hit a certain pillar of success (like yourself) there is a certain amount of head-nodding granted toward community response. I just wanted to say that I consider your craft to be of a very high quality. I hope that you feel happy about your work, because it is both well explained and entertaining. I am a public school teacher, and after watching your channel for the past two weeks my jaw has been dropped to the floor. The way you explain preparing a session and engaging your group is part and parcel for what the job of an instructor is.Your videos on GM advice fit exactly within in the classroom: expressing expectations, designing an entertaining session, and managing and rewarding behavior, I believe you are a very talented individual, so I would just like to thank you for your insight and work. Please keep it up!

Good mention of the NPC Sea Elf Oceanus. He's iconic and we still talk about him.

The upcoming Ghosts of Saltmarsh hardcover details Saltmarsh, making it a mini-setting and quest hub. So anyone who wants to wait until May 2019--you can save yourself some work by just using WotC's 5E conversion and expansion. While the original was set in Greyhawk, the 5E version is going to be setting-agnostic (a first for any official WotC hardcover). With the fleshed-out Saltmarsh setting, and all the additional adventures, the nautical and underwater mechanics, new monsters etc.--this looks like a really great product.

I keep coming back to this review as I think it's perfectly balanced: it's very informative, funny as heck, and has a perfect tone and length. And Jack turns in a legendary performance to boot! Thank you Seth & Jack!

Hi Seth. I was one of the original playtesters of this module at TSR UK. I'm listed as a playtester in the second module of the series, but it was the first that I actually play tested.

Great summary. Thanks for the great trip down memory lane from way back in the 80's. I remember seeing this module arrive at our gaming store(That was a Train hobby store BTW) a I Dm'd it way back when and exactly what you stated was the problem. no town and no real reason why they would go there. Wish I had you back then to DM this for us. Thanks again.

The hook I use to get parties to investigate; is "Where are my cows?" so; lifestock and perhaps some people keep turn up missing; clues lead to the haunted house; but this hook coincides with the second module. So the missing clues lead to the party hearing about weird lights and sounds and thus the house in question. And I agree; DM's have to flesh out the town, I make it a neutral town of fairly selfish, self concerned people who dont want to get involved. They fish; they drink; they have poor farmland and export peat, and tar, from the swamp and some herbs and some salted fish. This give ships a reason to come here; I usually have the PC's guard a shipment of something to the town council sent by they benefactor.

Super interesting now that WotC has updated this (alongside other) modules for D&D 5e.

love these AD&D module reviews of yours

Great review. I've always liked this scenario (got it back in the 80s) and what made it even better was that it took place in the World of Greyhawk, which I always used as my campaign world. I wish they had included a map of the village, personally.

Saltmarsh was such a popular module with our group(s) in the 80s; must have been played through at least a dozen times, to the point that players could sleep walk through it.

Sinister Secret will return in the 5e book, Ghosts of Saltmarsh this Spring 2019.

Out of all the D&D channels what you describe fits with what happens at the tables I've played at.

I run it at the end of the las millennium. That was a smashing module. Before that one, I had never even looked at printed adventures. That was middle of 90s in Poland, so no chance of getting that stuff before, but I happened to get access to the internet then and somehow found that adventure in txt format. Yes, with a map of the Saltmarsh Inn created from dashes and slashes :) I made my own village, a lot of different backstories in the village and around that Inn and smugglers and village I had a mini campaign. Great times.

We need reviews/tips on the next two modules! This was great, dude! Fantastic job!

Seth + jaunty hat = looks like Stevie Ray Vaughan, RIP.

I ran this and the party took out the pirate crew pretty quick, but that captain dropped a couple of them before a shape-changing psionicist (he liked taking a hybrid eagle form..hands turned into talon and arms into wings). Making the town was kinda tricky and had some NPCs as class trainers...the thief was a halfling that had the smallest patch of farmland and spent most of the time smoking his pipe or just tilling a small plot by hand (but never got anything done). After taking the ship, they named it "The Ill-Gotten Booty" and ended up taking all the stuff in the hold to Waterdeep (but they only got like 10%).

Oh man...how am I just now finding this channel! Great job on the review, one of my favorite modules!

Great review! Funny too! I bought this module in 1983 or 1984 for the reason that you mentioned: levels 1-3. It was hard to find those back then.

I remember players always wanted to play this module so they can get the Pseudo-Dragon as a pet.

You need to get back to this series! I love re-living my own adventures!

This was a great adventure. We got shined on the house by the local sheriff, who wasn’t capable of checking the house and watching the town. It was when we learned the awesome power of color spray and illusions on both sides. The other installments proved equally impressive and fun, but were completely different.

Good review. I actually ran this module a couple of times, back when AD&D was still a thing. I remember enough of it that I could probably improvise something close.

a tad late but i recall some Gms using Restenford from the Secret of Bone hill as a settlement - it gives the added bonus of a fully written out setting, and the Useries gives you a ready made adventure. Granted you will need to work out where to place a march on the restenford map.

A great module and adventure. We played it about five times and quick-scrawled our Saltmarsh with charcoal on plywood. My lure to the house was a rabid wolf reported by a nearby farmer, with tracks and calf entrails to make the trail oh-so-clear to novice gamers. Did we ever figure out who the guy with the lantern on the porch was . . . ?

Just picked up the 5th Ed setting. Definitely put some care into Saltmarsh.

Thanks Seth. Your videos are fantastic! Im looking forward to the 5e port of this adventure coming out soon. I think it’s this one and a few others in and around Saltmarsh. I think my players will really like it.

Definitely one of the best modules I've run as a DM. I think this was also one of the first modules to come out of the UK (thus the U designator). Ned became an ongoing villain in my game as he high-tailed it once the jig was up. My players commandeered the Sea Ghost, and it remained in active service well into their teen levels. One pc eventually made it the flagship of his trading (ei smuggling / privateer) empire. Oceanus became a long-lived trusted follower of a pc ranger, and the pseudo-dragon became a 'familiar' to the party cleric. Don't think I've ever run a module that had this much influence on players.

Wait... where do you find players that don't always end up burning the ship to the waterline?

In my campaign, I am using this module as a jumping off point for a nautical campaign. I'm considering taking a page from the book of Call of Cthulhu and have one of the characters having inherited the haunted house. They go to town talking about their inheritance, find out that it is haunted and there is their call to action. It also might draw some incidental encounters on the way as surely the smugglers will have heard of the heirs coming to town.

Dropping that silly Bard’s beret and picking a good and awesome swashbuckled hat. Jack has some good and proper tastes.

A redux of this would be great including a look at the Ghosts of Saltmarsh as a comparative. A similar treatment to Bone Hill would be much appreciated including your map treatments and fixes you often include.

awesome review.

Well this sounds perfect for my PC's Sea-based fantasy colonial setting! Cheers for sharing this gem

My group just started the 5e version of this adventure. Our party is a bunch of amoral bastards including two Dagon worshippers so when we found Ned we took away his weapon and used him as our "forward scout" by which I mean we shoved him first into every room until he got killed by a swarm of spiders.

Great review- I'm sold! I think I'm going to use this with my new players and have it lead into "Against the Cult of the Reptile God" by switching the lizardmen for Troglodytes. Against the Cult is too tough for a level 1 party so this can springboard the PCs to a higher level first.

Gimme that pseudodragon!

I went through this in about 83. Our DM had a big thing plotted out, had U2 ready to follow up.we approached at night. My fighter threw his torch through a window and the house burned down. He salvaged it somehow but you could tell how sad he was that we didn’t do the haunted house. Lol.

I played this module in the mid-80s and absolutely loved it. Took me awhile to figure out the house wasn't truly haunted and uncover the pirate plot. And I distrusted the spy plant found in the upstairs immediately - something about him had my spidey sense tingling.

What I did was have the former mistress of the great Warrior Rogahn (from B1 In Search of the Unknown) flee over to Saltmarsh with the stronghold's former Advisor Marevak and build that mansion there back in its initial days...

I remember trading these modules with friends at school. We would read them like books because our parents would let us play D&D (because the devil....) Great video. I really enjoyed the nostalgia.

I had one of the PCs inherit the house... and at end of the adventure they needed to sell it for back taxes.

Played this decades ago and ran it recently. I'm going to run it as a one-shot in a few days. I'm thinking of making it more supernatural than the original adventure.

Biggest threat isn't the Illusionist it's the dead Paladin! 😉

Looks like this is officially being updated for 5e.

The Ghosts of Saltmarsh is coming out for 5th, and now I'm intrigued.

Just ordered my POD last night actually! $AUS15.31 (about $9.96) Prices are not too bad here in Australia, it's more postage, but as they are (well my last order) was printed here and not in the UK, postage and delivery time is pretty good (4 days last time!) I like how they used to charts in the DM's guide to describe potions!

Modules like Sinister Secret of Salt Marsh, Village of Homlet, Bone hill, and Under Illifarn are great because they provide a stable starting location that can serve as a hub for adventures in the surrounding areas. While some have lackluster adventures, there is plenty of room for the GM to add his own material or even set other modules within a weeks travel time, since few villagers will have traveled more than a few days from their homes, even in many fantasy worlds.

Being re-released for 5th Edition.

An absolute classic!

I like to run this 3 part adventure; have for many groups; running it now for my kids and their friends; is a good series

Awwww yeah they just released it as part of the ghosts of salt marsh anthology, thanks for the added insight of how this module was so good back in the day

I've always enjoyed this module. Have you run U2 Danger at Dunwater and U3 The Final Enemy? Just curious how you would get the party involved in U2.

If you like good first level modules I'd definitely recommend Retribution by Raging Swan Press. It's statted for Pathfinder but is a dead easy conversation to 5e. It's got a lovely Name of the Rose vibe.

I played through this adventure... Well, a 5E conversion.... well, a 5e conversion of half of it. It was baaaaad. I think most of it had to do with the GM. Should've recognized the signs early on, the dude had the worst time keeping players and stalled us extensively... He seemed more enamored in developping the town NPCs and setting up the surrounding areas than getting us in the adventure. We were only TWO players by the time we actually got to the house (plus a dwarf fighter NPC) and he only managed to wrangle up one more player by the end of it. The "adventure" seemed to conclude after the illusionist's defeat. I called it quits one session after when he magi-ported us off to Orlane (Cult of the Reptile God) and it became clear he was just jumping us from part of a module to another with no rhyme or reason.

Just fyi, U1 & U2 are both now available in print on demand on DriveThruRpg. U3 is still PDF only.

I remember playing all three modules in this set. To my memory, the only aquatic adventure on record. The players were sick with pearls and silver loot by the end. Have you done the "Against the Slave Lords" yet?

This is the first game me and my oldest buddy played at like 11 or 12 years old. We had no idea how to play other than the directions we read on the original AD&D how to red boxset.I think there was a blue boxset that told you how to DM also.My buddy learned from that as well as an 11 or 12 I year old could understand. We never learned from an experienced player or DM. But we actually had a great time even if we did almost everything wrong. We played other module still lost But by the time it started gaining momentum and the rules changed we were in our early to mid teens we had given up dice for beer and babes.As I was growing up I noticed my baby brothers had all the handbooks and newer modules although it was mostly for the artwork they also failed when they tried to make the game work like me.Now although I think the new rules on the new races and classes are ridiculous the game has really picked up steam in the last few years and with you tube and the internet I figured out how bad we were and even though fun, it looks much better with a creative DM who knows how to play and people we know how to play. I would really like to try this again I know my brother did and at a shop just for that. I wonder if you can get in on a game maybe with other newbies to learn with a DM that can teach them how to play correctly. Is there online open games or places like my brother goes to play with others. I want to play correctly and only with serious people who want to learn not goof off. Im close to 50 and my brothers vary from mid 40s

This is my Favorite module of all time , Have you played the other U modules, ? i like the U series overall

I ran this adventure way back when... All I remember from that session is the 1st level magic user with 1 HP putting his finger in a hole in the wall and taking 1 HP damage!

Ah... how I loved this adventure. Definitely one of my favorite published adventures... and it is true that there weren't enough low-level adventures printed back in the day. I did always think it was amusing that they didn't actually supply you with a town of Saltmarsh... so the DM had to prepare a town before you would be able to play. heh I understand why they left it up to the DM, though.

I'm running this in 5E, I introduced my characters as Slaves on a slaver vessel. The cleric was a cleric of Procan, so he prayed for help from his God. So Procan sent out a Kraken to assault the vessel and destroy it. The PC's were rescued at sea by a fishing vessel and taken to Saltmarsh. I introduced the Scarlet Brotherhood as having a couple members on the slaver vessel. So they will be sent to the Haunted House as they are searching a rumor of the slaver's activities.

Recent thought: think we'll ever see the other modules in the series? Or a recap of how to make them... Lovecraftian?

8:10 "Alcholades" may be the best slip of the tongue reward ever.

Ned: I would never poisondiddly your drinkiddly.

Jack is the GOAT of NPCs as per usual

Seth, i see your Chaosium Inc t-shirt! I never really played Cthulu, but for me Chaosium was all about Stormbringer!!! Stormbringer 4th edition was my favorite RPG growing up. Unfortunately it was nearly impossible to find people to play it with though. ;)

My very first module played!!!

Thank you.

Oh yea!!

* slaps forehead * I was watching a ton of Call of Cuthulu reviews of yours before I clicked on this video. I thought this was another one. XD I checked the title once you said “and he only speaks elf.”

Great video planning to run the new 5e version of this adventure this video was really inspirational I'm curious if you have had a chance Seth to look at the new 5e book and what your thought's are? Cheers !

Oh goodie. WotC have updated Saltwater Marsh.

Yep, bought the module new. Was one of my favorite modules ever. Hey Seth ever run Castle Amber?

Chaosium! I found an old copy of "Cities" back in the day, and have been looking for another to replace it. We used the bajeezus out of it.

This Adventure works really really well in the Midderlands Game Setting World.

Also Follow up Yesterday/today the leak from Amazon for 5e Ghosts of Saltmarsh is coming out on May 21rst (Said the Amazon Leak) Did you just happen to do this video the same day? :P

Just saw your review of "The Secret of Bone Hill". I occurred to me that Restenford would make a good location for this adventure. Or is that to many "secrets" in one map hex?

I just ran this adventure, and the party ended up hitting me with a few snags. I told them the story of the Alchemist who lived in the manor years ago and how he disappeared and now haunts the manor. They waited until day despite the towns people betting them to go at night(they used trickery to make it seem they were in there at night) after figuring out it the ‘haunting” was illusions and tricks , they came to the incorrect conclusion that the Alchemist was still alive, just wanted to be left alone so set up all these traps. After coming to that conclusion and finding Ned and believing his story about being bonked on the head , they just left the manor with what treasure they found and left an apology note to the Alchemist.

Expect people to come flocking to this video with WotCs announcement today!

I love this trilogy

You can get all three books on the Internet Archives

Reviewing d&d in a Chaosium shirt is a CoC player powermove.

So what do you think of U2 and U3. I ran this adventure about 17 years ago but never did the sequels. I have a new group of players and think I might try the whole trilogy. I never read the other two but own all of them.

D&D meets Scooby Doo... sigh. I would have rather there been real ghosts. :(

Sounds like a Scooby-Doo episode!

Late 30, just 30,and my 20 year old son is willing to try. That's a whole party family. Can you recommend where to start internet? Live game?Study books first?

😊

How to get the PCs to go to the house? Simply have the villagers tell them to avoid it. "Dont go up there".

Hey, Seth, I really like this format: summarize modules for DMs thinking about running certain quests. My fear is that leaking this material could spark a copyright issue with the publisher, so before I attempt making videos, is there anything I should know?

Salt marsh what ever you do don't use the lizardfolk back door

I loved the haunted mansion in this module, the problem is, it just doesn't fit architecturally into a fantasy/medieval-ish setting with PC's in armor, it has the "feel" of something more 1800's/gothic setting. A small castle would've been better.

The sinister secret surrounding Saltmarsh was that the secret wasn't all that sinister...

I'm not wearing this stupid hat! I'm wearin' THAT stupid hat!

Evil thy name is Ned.