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CHAPTER 3: Things start to happen

With the bulk of the ship explored and no "villain" found, the players might want to re-group and decide what to do next. This is when "things" start to happen to the crew. Have each of the following happen in any order you choose, whenever they feel most situationally appropriate (generally they are listed in an escalating order, so the more you keep them in the listed order, the better):


Dark passenger

At one point in time when the characters are all standing around together, make them all roll a perception check. Whoever scores the highest (or choose at random if two or more characters roll equal highest) sees - out of the corner of their eye - what appears to be another figure standing amongst them, but as soon as they turn to look at who it is, they are gone and they aren't sure whether it was a real person, or just a hallucination. The characters may try to find whoever this figure was (and it was Lord Pembleton), but he will have already left and they will be unable to locate him.


Milly's escape

At some point when the party is not paying a great deal of attention to her, Milly takes a lit lantern from the deck and climbs overboard into the party's longboat, rowing it away. The party may notice once she is perhaps 30 to 60 feet off the edge of the ship. If they ask her to come back, Milly will apologize, but say that there is nothing that could convince her to return to the ship. Shortly afterwards she will stop speaking, her face will go blank and she will stand up, then she will smash her bottle of rum and the lantern of the longboat, causing it to immediately become fully engulfed in flames. She will stand there calmly amongst the flames for a good moment, but after a few seconds she will let out one scream, then inhale to scream again, but inhale flames and die.


Split the party

At some point, a player will describe wanting to go somewhere and the other players will likely want to join them. Regardless of where they "want" to go, have them come to a small room filled with dismembered body parts in a pile. What's more, upon entering they find that while they thought they were accompanied by the entire party, only two of the party actually went (you choose which ones). For the rest of the party, explain to them that they were still in the same location they had been previously, discussing their options, and they had THOUGHT that the departing party members were there with them up until that point, but now you think about it, they're gone and you're not really sure when they left.


For the two party members who entered a room full of body parts (try to choose two martials), they see the body parts move across the floor and "congeal" together, forming into a kind of golem creature. Have all the party members roll initiative (even the ones not in the room).


The flesh golem will always go immediately AFTER the last of the two players who are in the room. Run the encounter as follows:


  • When player 1 attacks, note the damage types and amount of damage
  • When player 2 attacks, again, note the damage types and amount of damage (separately to the first)
  • Describe the creature attacking each of the players and roll dice to simulate attacks and damage, however the damage inflicted will be the exact same amount and type that each opposite player inflicted on the creature (think of a way to describe the creature's attack that would make sense for the damage type - for example punching for bludgeoning damage, claws for slashing damage, stabbing with a protruding bone for piercing damage, a hand glowing with radiant energy for radiant damage). So, if player 1 inflicted 12 points of slashing damage, and player 2 inflicted 7 points of piercing damage, then the creature will inflict 12 points of slashing damage to player 2, and 7 points of piercing damage to player 1.
  • The "creature" will pass any saves for magical effects (things like entangling, grease, blindness etc).
  • Allow this encounter to continue for long enough to hurt the characters, but not enough to down either of them before their accompanying party member(s) arrive in the room.


When the other party members arrive in the room, they don't see the body-parts golem at all, instead they see the two party members battling each other. Once they've seen this they should take action to tell the two party members to stop fighting and in doing so the illusion will immediately be broken and the party members will see the truth.


Chumming from Chum

This must be the last event before proceeding to the next chapter.

For some time before this event, don't mention Chum (the NPC) at all. When you're ready for this encounter, mention to the party that they haven't noticed until this moment, but it's been a while since they've seen Chum. Their search for him should bring them to the main deck, where they will see him sitting near the edge of the ship, facing away from them and muttering to himself. As they approach, they will see that he has carved open his stomach, and attached his innards to the anchor. As they move closer he will hit a release causing the anchor to drop over the side, and unspooling his internal organs with it. As this starts to happen, whatever force has control of him will drop its control, and he'll offer a brief shriek of agony before his internal organs are pulled out and he is killed.


Written in blood on the deck where he was sitting is a word. This word denotes a location on the ship (which will be where the Captain's body is). For the location, choose whichever of the following is highest on the list, and hasn't yet been explored by the players:


  • Figurehead - the figurehead they saw on the ship when they rowed in was obscured by the mist enough that they couldn't make it out, and it was actually the captain's body, tied to the front mast (if the players did inspect the figurehead closer, then it was simply a carved mermaid, and the captain's body is not here).
  • Crow's Nest - the captain's body is hanging (by the neck) from the crow's nest on the mainmast. If the players went here before this event, then the crow's nest is empty.
  • Rear anchor - the captain's body is weighed down by a heavy rock and hanging off the back of the boat by a rope. It can be pulled up onto the main deck.


If the party have explored all of the above locations to the point where it would not make sense for a body to be there, then use 'Figurehead' and simply state that while they previously inspected the figurehead and found it to be a carved mermaid, now up on inspecting it they see it's the captain's body (and their original perception of it as a mermaid was a result of Lord Pembleton's manipulations).