Any chance on seeing a series about the different settings in D&D in the future? Would love to see episodes about forgotten realms, spelljammer, planescape, etc.
@@stephengibson7838 speaking of spelljammer, with the stuff in this new book and the spelljammer in the dungeon of the mad mage, is it possible to bring spelljammer into 5e? I've been wanting spelljammer content for 5e for awhile and I feel like this is as close as we'll get for quite a long time.
Hello Jim, Hello Pruitt. I am enjoying your videos and wanted to ask if you ever did any or would consider doing any throwback videos for those of us running D&D 3.5 games?
Ok Saltmarsh was written by two English men and was the first D&D module to be published by English creater's in D&D history. The coast it takes place on is supposed to be an almost exact copy of the Cornish coast and the flavour that of Cornish smugglers of the 18th century. I ran it when it came out when I was 11 or 12 and 40 odd years later I live on the Cornish coast it is my joint favourite AD&D module along with The lost caverns of Toloshnacanth.... Toloshnercanth Tolosh... you get the picture!
And Saltmarsh was fleshed out in more detail in the Dungeon Master's Guide II for D&D 3.x It was a sandbox town, with a lot of quest ideas here and there and enough stuff to keep you going for a long time. It also felt vibrant and alive. It was the first d&d campaign I ran, back in my late teens, and even though I've moved on to other systems since, it holds a very special place in my heart. It was an excellent sandbox.
Sinister secret of Saltmarsh was the first module I ran as a DM back in adnd times, 30-35 years ago. I just got back in d5 after a 20 year hiatus and was pleased to find this book, and am running it with a new group. We just completed salvage operation and it was a blast, my player literally had nothing left in the tank at the end. I started a sea encounter on their way back to saltmarsh. I play in the forgotten realms but in 2nd ed times and put Saltmarsh on the southside of the mouth of the Vilhon Reach. My characters have smuggler and pirate ties.
God, the more I read in Ghosts of Saltmarsh, the more I want to run an underwater campaign. Not just a sea-going campaign, but a totally aquatic adventure. All amphibious party - Tritons, Sea Elves, Water Genasi, Grung, some homebrew races - and just explore the oceanic depths. Shipwrecks. Hostile land-dwellers. Sunken cities. Forgotten fortresses of bygone underwater empires. A forest of petrified trees. Deep trenches. The lightless depths. The remnants of undead armies that marched across the seafloor. Boarding gnome submarines. The possibilities are endless, as are the potential for aquatic monsters. From sharks and octopi, to giant bobbit worms and dense clouds of dire jellyfish.
All these ideas are awesome! D&D needs more aquatic adventures, and the possibilities of wonderful and dangerous encounters are plentiful beneath the waves 🌊
Started running Saltmarsh recently, and the players have pretty early on been given a boat and crew (by me) and been asked by the town council to start up a Surveyors guild, which is letting me use all of the randomized tables as much as possible as the players, between adventures, can get involved in town politics or go out and explore some random islands. A really fantastic book that clearly comes from a place of love by the creators.
This is one of the best ever 5e relleases because: It is set in Greyhawk It has classic modules that can be used separately or as an ongoing campaign While smaller than the 3.0 version, Saltmarsh is a great home town for adventurers New rules that provide great options New locations with ideas for adventures Seafaring and ship combat and did I mention that it is set in the legendary Greyhawk rather than the Forgettable Realms! (Sea Princes, Scarlet Brotherhood, classic deities rather than rip offs or imitations!) Currently playing these modules with the Yawning Portal ones and it's the best!
There is one reason that Ghosts of Saltmarsh is greater than any other Content expansions... NEW BULLYWUG MOBS BABAAAAAY!! Now we're up to a whopping 4 WHOLE MONSTERS! (if one included Farblex Splattergoo from Tyranny of Dragons) seems like the perfect segue into a Monster Episode Talking about Bullywugs...eh? Ehhhhh? please give frog bois more love, WoTC :'(
Ah you mean the Grungs big brother. I enjoy having them eat my smol players. Its an amazing thing to hear someone scream as their gnome is swallowed whole. But i do prefer Grungs, i have no idea why. Bullywugs are fun too.
@@cyan4845 ..how dare you. Grungs are a pale intimation of the Bullywug. Bullywugs have a proud history, going as far back 1st Edition Fiend Folio. And yet...among all the typical 'weak session 1' monster races, Bullywugs were the ONLY ONE to not be given a playable status in Volo's Guide to Monsters. Such an injustice!
Running this book , starting this week. Added a wereshark cult and forced my players to take a ship that's a fixer- upper to explore the area for some gold before more high sailing.
The first Saltmarsh module always has been a favorite for me...in no small part because the story is basically the same as every Scooby-Doo episode ever.
@@nairocamilo my players have two ships in their "fleet" so far. :) *Constant Stormy* has the StormGiant figure head and 1 hull upgrade. *Repulse Lilac* has the Ever-Full Sails and the Eldrich Fog enchantment. Challenging them with unique ships and crews is a blast. And now that they're average level 12 they've just started the Sahuagin Fortress Assult quest.
Loving this so far. Adding my own world ending threat, which ties in all my players plots and goals. They've got their stories woven into various chapters. Been a lot of fun!
I'm on-deck to run this at my local game store. It's probably 6 months away, but I'm very much looking forward to it. Our table runs anywhere from 3 to 11 players at any session. I think the random encounter tables and side quest suggestions of this book will be a godsend for me, with such erratic attendance.
I feel ya, I've got a party of 11 and only 4 are regular. I recommend getting good at one session quests and other things so people don't need to attend session to session.
@@fisherjam5182 that's exactly how I manage it. I show up to a session, prepared to advance the main plot, but also prepared with 2 or 3 potential side quests and always a handful of stat blocks for spontaneous stuff. These game store campaigns have really stepped up my ability to adjust on the fly.
@@hipsterbrigadier9428 I'd set the hook in a seaside city you're familiar with and focus on the fun of traveling the seas before the crap hits the fan on the boat. There's an optional encounter leading up to the main plot that I'd skip unless you want to extend the session by 1-2 hours. Fighting off a sahuagin raid can be fun but running a massive battle as your first encounter may not be the best idea!
I just started running Salvage Operations as a side quest for my group in their Tales from the Yawning Portal campaign. Was going to have the 'merchant' who offers them 10,000 gold to find his 'deeds' be a Lich who is secretly trying to have his phylactory shipped across the sea to him so he can re-hide it (obviously he doesn't want the phylactory at the bottom of the sea, otherwise death means a hell of being constantly reborn to die). My only problem with the actual module is that my players found the Swarms of Insects (Spiders) incredibly frustrating to fight. I played it rules as written and I have to agree, each combat went on for upwards of 6 turns. If I run it again, I think it'd be best that after the Giant Spiders or Ettercaps die, the swarms either retreat or only take 1 damage to kill. Either that, or give them a fear or vulnerability to fire.
Maybe this has already been answered elsewhere, but are y'all thinking about doing a review of the Acq. Inc. book? I'd be curious to hear your take on it.
This book is the adventure module most to my liking. I have Tales from the Yawning Portal, Dungeon of the Mad Mage, and this, all to scavenge ideas or whole scenarios from. And while all of them have useful material, Ghost of Saltmarsh is the only one I'd happily just take a module from - hell, take the whole city! - and plonk it down in my world. Everything else needs work to make it fit, but this is pretty much plug-and-play. And then, of course, we come to the non-adventure chapters. Oh man, that's some good stuff!
Clearly I need to convince my DM that Water Walk should be modified with a Spell DC so you can cast on unwilling creatures (willing creatures can choose to fail the save, as you do).
I'm using this book to help frame my campaign for 5e. All the pros you pointed out are why I picked this. I've transported the locations to an island south west of candle keep. So far it's been great fun for the table
Can you guys do a video talking about your favorite content and adventures from older editions of D&D? You can talk about how to use that in 5e or what DM's can gain from reading those older stories
Its about time they had a Greyhawk adventure book. The old school AD&D modules are mostly set there anyway. I always liked my characters to be from the Dim Forest back then.
@@KoljaWolfi though they have given no common year date in the book, technically it is set before, but there are some things there that occurred after, but it is easily adjusted to fit in either time setting. Before the scarlet Brotherhood attack, the SB are unknown and the Sea Princes are the biggest known threat, after the attack the SB are known and treated with suspicion, but the Sea Princes are still the biggest known threat.
I really want to see a video on how you guys cover tools and the rules you like to use for tool usage. Tools are one of those things that can really let people roleplay their characters and get something useful in the process.
My dad gave me this book as a present and I’m psyched to use it with my players! Our wizard’s dad is a pirate and I can’t wait to use him as a hook to get the team over there.
A drunken priest with a hidden cache of cursed gold, watch some John Carpenter's "The Fog," and get some inspiration for creepy undead sailors and a sleepy coastal town. Couldn't hurt, right?
I've been using the XKCD webcomic, "Map of Online Communities" from way back in 2007 as an inspiration for a campaign setting. Crossing out the names of different social media sites and forums and replacing them with different planes or societies from magic the gathering, sub continents from different D&D settings, and other insane things like "Warring feudal Japan and China but with Dragonborn." About an hour into brainstorming this it became apparent that Ghosts of Saltmarsh would be necessary to run any campaign in that world due to the simple fact that the map is 75% bodies of water. xkcd.com/256/
I've been running the Saltmarsh adventures since the book came out, and I'm so happy that y'all are finally covering it. I'm looking forward to hearing your opinions on some things.
U1-U3 were awesome when they came out, and were so different from other modules (U = UK). Ghost of Saltmarsh is great if you have players that like to have agency in a game. It has politics, intrigue, lots of water based adventuring, along with dungeon delving. It is a regional campaign, and feels more real than once again saving the multiverse. This is my kind of world to play in.
I picked this up as a potential future campaign for my main gaming group. The combination of pirates and Lovecraftian vibes seemed like an easy sell and a fun break from Pathfinder.
I think I'll combine some ship battle aspects from Skies of Arcadia for my own campaign setting. My world has a lot of magic stuff in it, so imagine cannons being able to fire enchanted ammo after the wizard casts a spell on it. Maybe a cleric can use a device to convert healing spells to ship repairing spells? I know my party will get a mimic ship, so healing spells will work for that already.
My players are bumming around the moonshae Isles right now, they're suffering from the very problem you talked about at 16:20, they hired a crew but forgot a bosun / shipwright. Now their ship is at 150 / 300 hp and they NEED to dock. Each time I roll for an encounter they Court death.
@@samuelevans738 One of them does have mending, which they've used to fix the sails and minor damage to the hull. Mending can't fix the missing rails, holes in Upper Deck, and damaged steering wheel. Their ship was at 70/300 hp by the time they made it back to port.
@@vanforwar ah... fair enough. Although, maybe next time they should pack extra wood and nails and other ship bits. The spell's description does say it's allowed.
@@samuelevans738 Yeah, they should! Although i would still say, because of their lack of shipbuilding knowledge they couldn't fix everything... especial when they took so much damage. I actually "revised' the Mending and Light spells in our game. They start weaker, but grow more powerful as they level, like damage cantrips. Mending heals 1d6 to constructs and objects but it cant be used on them again until they loose more hit points.
The boat tables in the back are just the greatest thing ever. It'll be so much easier when my players ditch the main stuff, do some pirating and then help the wizard ascend to lichdom!
Ghosts of Saltmarsh felt a lot more like playing through Kingmaker on Pathfinder. There are a lot of written campaigns, both professional and unprofessional, that did what Ghosts of Saltmarsh did but obviously not as effectively the way WotC did. There were some things about Kingmaker that I really liked but Ghosts of Saltmarsh takes the best about this interconnected style of sandbox, modular adventures that culminate into a campaign.
Real quick before I finish watching this. I'm at any 20:30 and I think that's describing the part of the adventure that I'm at right now. I haven't heard any real spoilers yet, but is there any in the last 13 minutes of the video?
Hyped for the next campaign I'll play in it! With a female Triton Storm Sorceress / Tempest Cleric; trident, whip and shield wielding; loosely based on the mixed theme of Aquaman / Wonder Woman.
I've loved Saltmarsh (etc.) from my AD&D days. I love what they've done to update it to D&D 5e, especially the detail of the town itself. Question: what other WotC/TSR Greyhawk material is still in print, for 5e or earlier, or is it time to scour Ebay for old AD&D stuff?
i am really thinking about upgrading my current collection of 2nd edition advanced stuff to the 5e version. I have and have played / dm'd the saltmarsh adventure many times and love it! am i gonna wish i waited until the 6e version of the books is out before i spend all that money?
I have an illusionist wizard of tenth level, and want to make a stronghold for him. A wizard's tower or something. Any ideas? Note: I want him to run some kind of public service from it, like a library or something... so I could use some help figuring out what would have to be in place in order to accommodate for close proximity to cities and/or towns...
I loved the original Saltmarsh series and it was my one wish to be revamped for 5E. I have the new book and it's an amazing resource for all things aquatic for my homebrew world. I'm sorry that I won't get to play through it again. A half-aquatic-elf Berserker barbarian, fearing being possibly influenced by Sekolah, leaves his homeland...only to face the Sahaughin and his destiny. A storm sorcerer found in a shipwreck as a child discovers her destiny and origin at sea. A warlock answers the call and his dreams, taking to the waves to answer the beckon of a Dragon Turtle older than the stones, and to face his mortal enemy. An orphan with a silver tongue and skill with blades seeks to reclaim his perceived birthright as a roguish Pirate King... There are so many tales that could take shape in this book.
