Domain of the ??? - the Sea of Sorrows

[Joël of the FoS]

Esteemed members of the Fraternity,

In our Sea of Sorrows project, here’s finally the last stop, the blear Sea of Sorrows itself!

Because Captain Van Riese wishes you to embark his boat for his next mapping expedition.

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Third edition: Ravenloft Campaign setting

Second edition: Domains of Dread, Red Box

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Created in 630

Darklord: Captain Pieter van Riese

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So post here your adventure hooks or stories. Nathan will surely use your inspiring work on the Sea of Sorrows FoS report.

Reminder: This thread is not just for adventure hooks, it can also be to host short verbatim of local sayings or fireside tavern conversations, à la Gaz 1 web enhancement... or your DM thoughts about this domain.

This thread is for posting adventure hooks or comments / suggestion / improvements on another poster's hook. Other comments will be deleted.

Joël

[Ail]

Not so much an idea, but a request.
I like the concept of a ghost ship, but since Domains of Dread, the write-up on Van Riese has seemed insufficient to me.

I'm not really concerned about his story, his powers or whatever. What I'd like to see is the other side, the sailors'.

What is the curse one risks by seeing the Relentless (is this the name?), even if no contact is made; what if they do crash or go abord that ship; how they are lured into it.

In Wagner's opera, from what I gathered, the crew is not exactly undead, and the motivations of the captain (the Dutchman) are romantic at best: he has one opportunity in 7 years (and that means one night and one day, it seems) to find a woman who truly loves him. The crews of a ship and the ghost ship meet, and sing and all....not what I'm looking for.

But the idea that the ghost crew might be occasionally approachable and disguised interests me. So, what if the Relentless could be disguised, to lure people inside it (castaways, for example?) and then they would find they had until the next night, or the next day, to leave the ship?

Perhaps the crew is spectral and skeletal only on full moon nights, and appears human during the day; perhaps one who spends a whole day abord the Relentless is doomed to never leave it, and becomes a spectre along with the rest of the crew.

I'll try to think of more ideas.




P.S.: btw, I don't remember what the books say on this anymore, just that I didn't quite buy it at the time.

[Herman Strauss]

My, it has been awfully quiet in here! Let’s stir the waters a bit.
Strange sights of the Sea #1

• A massive school of shark/mermaid sea hags numbering in the hundreds accompanying a colossal monstrously deformed leviathan, known among sailors as Them Patrol Common.
  They are rumored to be the corporeal spirits of women that were cast overboard. Now they roam the sea, their very presence demanding a human male sacrifice to appease their anger. A captain that fails to uphold the “custom” is not attacked, but can expect to find himself laboring under a dread curse.
  Apart from unexpectedly encountering them, it is said that a captain can invoke them in time of dire need to safely deliver the ship to its destination. However, the life they expect for this service is none other than the captain’s own.
  (Illustration coming soon!)

[Herman Strauss]

Strange sights of the Sea #2

• Sea serpent: The stories surrounding this beast are countless! A particularly vile and unthinkable version has the serpent playing the part of a collector of sorts, the proxy of a primordial race of sea horrors, too alien to contemplate. These creatures plot to drown the world and reclaim their ancestral legacy.
  Another version that is even weirder says that there are many serpents and that their mouths are doorways that lead to an underwater necropolis filled with ever-vigilant half-fish vampires.
  
  Red storm: A horrible storm that has claimed hundreds. This is not a natural phenomenon! Amidst the howling winds that tear the ship apart soar horrible birdlike women eager to snatch an unfortunate with their talons and carry him away. It said that they serve sorcerer and carry men to his barren island as slave labor for the completion of a cyclopean construct.
  
  Sea men: A sea dwelling variety of the Moor-man has been reported. These savages board vessels using primitive log-made canoes. They supposedly dwell on a moving isle, complete with forests, located on the back of a sleeping sea creature. The sub-men are not water breathers and seem to worship their living island, regularly feeding it with ritualistic sacrifices. The most horrible fact is that normal men have been found among their ranks, assimilated prisoners that have completely forsaken their human heritage.

[Herman Strauss]

Strange sights of the Sea #3

• Bleak Pass: people have described it as a canyon in the sea, a passage between two island-sized basaltic protrusions that reach hundreds of feet high into the fog. Their peculiarity lies at the fact that their sheer cliff-like mountainous sides are littered with shipwrecks. Amidst these, one can spot pale figures standing like apparitions. So far no one has been able to communicate with them and dark shapes barely visible shifting amongst the wreckage have prevented the sailors to brave the sheer cliffs and investigate.
  
  The Isle of the Monolith: it stands serene and ominous, an ancient relic of a time long forgotten. There are a host of superstitions to explain the importance of encountering it; though everyone knows that it should be viewed from a distance and each crew has its own story to tell about what happens to those that dare approach to close (or ,heavens forbid, touch the vile thing!)
  One thing is certain though; a crew that encounters it is bound to suffer from horrible and unfathomably exotic nightmares long after the voyage’s end!
  
  3. Phantom Woods: the most bizarre of sights to encounter at deep sea, this haunted and unerving place has an almost mundane explanation. It is little more than a collection of ships unfortunate enough to smash and sink at coral reefs supported by submerged islands. A climbing variety of seaweed has been using the masts as support and has evolved into this aberrant glade. There is however no mundane explanation for the satyr-like entities seen running on the water’s surface!

[Herman Strauss]

Strange sights of the Sea #4

• Captain Kelp: beware of his half-sunken ship, for it is little more than a crypt of wood, salt and seaweed! The descendants of his bloodthirsty men roam about the wreck like seawolves, loyal but feral to the core.
  And as for the man himself, he has long joined the ranks of the ancient dead, forever bound to guard his now useless booty.
  
  The sea devils’ mating: some say that the sea devils we know are the male of the species, remotely human-like and with a incomprehensible mentality. Even then however they are closer to us than the mothers of their species!
  These are massive sea beasts of different and monstrous shapes that have spawned myths of Leviathans and Krakens. They rise for the lightless depths following a cycle only the Sh’ahu’agin understand, each appearing at a different time and each producing a different kind of generation.
  The males meet the female at a sacred breeding ground and as soon as they meet each other a frantic ritualistc “dance” takes place cumulating with the female releasing her eggs in the frothing vortex created. Not long after she quietly departs to the abyss it came from.
  There are few who witnessed these abhorrent events and some of them were even reckless enough to intervene, relishing the opportunity to massacre the entranced sea devils!
  Suffice is to say that death was not included in the fate the Mother held in store for them…
  
  The ruin isles of Theristris: the signs are plain for everyone to see; this once was a land of marvel and magic, and by magic it was torn apart!
  Wondrous constructions that rival the high elf ancestral Legacy lie in ruins. The horrible fate of its people can only be imagined, though the misshapen and inhuman shapes that briefly spy from beneath the waters do offer a disturbing insight.

[Herman Strauss]

Strange sights of the Sea #5

• The Iron Manta: its beaming lights are visible from beneath the surface and the waters boil around it as it moves to strike. Most people claim it is a vehicle of short operated by a fiendish captain and his hellish crew. Those that know better will tell you that it is a mechanical monstrosity that has a will of its own and that it guards the entrance to the underwater lair of a peculiar humanoid race. Located in a treacherous coral reef cluster these people plot, scheme and perform inhuman experiments in their quest to rid themselves of flesh and become immortal machines.
  
  The Botanica: she used to be a magnificent sea going vessel. Now she is a floating tropical nightmare, a tangled mass of vegetation of unimaginable complexity. The elven druids that were once her crew have been transformed to plant terrors, victims of their own plot of vengeance. Their original mission was to locate and bring back to their once forested homeland the seeds of punishment against the humans that ravaged it beyond recognition and changed it into an urban nightmare. Their plan backfired as they where unable to contain the demonic seeds they were carrying into a dormant form. All hell broke loose upon the vessel transforming it into its present nightmarish state.
  
  Forgegate: passage between these volcanic islands supposedly guarantees an escape route far beyond the Land of Mists. The vicious fire-breathing sea dragons that lair here have feasted on the corpses of many outlanders naive enough to believe this ridiculous rumor. The sea witch that lives at the Forgegate Fortress located somewhere on these islands does have knowledge of an escape route, though this is a secret she is unwilling to give away without a price.

[Tykus]

I recommend that Van Riese do something what Davy Jones would do in Pirates of the Caribbean 2 & 3. IIRC, VR continually blames his crew, so maybe he tries continually to replenish his crew. After all, The Relentless is the Flying Dutchman of RL.

[Herman Strauss]

Roll d%

One hundred ideas for the Sea (as per DMG)

1. A ship returns from an expedition with its whole crew turned to crimson bones. After dealing with the murderous undead the noble that financed the expedition is organizing a second one
2. A noble lord’s expedition returns, bringing with them strange native girls reputed to possess magical powers
3. A guild master is creating fake hauntings to purchase ships at low prices
4. A compass with occult powers, haunted by a seafarer’s tormented spirit
5. A magic hourglass must be filled with the sands of time found on the mysterious island of fate
6. An arcane scientist breeding a race of gilled men
7. Several animated humanoid heads have been found in fishing nets. A necromantic chuul is behind this
8. A strange ichthiocentaur is luring young girls into the sea with his moonlight singing. People say he is gathering concubines for the harem of a sea Devil.
9. Several man-shaped animals are found floating dead, each with several gold artifacts on its monstrous body
10. A shipwright entombs young girls inside figureheads bounding their spirits to protect his ships
11. A ship full of lunatics bound for treatment to the island of Dominia
12. A human headed eel, master of arcane arts that grants the gift of aquatic lunar shape changing
13. A high elf flagship mercilessly attacking sea going vessels. No prisoners are taken and the ships are burned. Few mutilated survivors are set adrift with no food or water.
14. A strange coral reef with human shaped formations is actually the garden of an aquatic medusa
15. A Dwarven/gnomish steam ship arrives at port. The dwarves re-supply quietly preparing to move on as soon as possible, but the gnomes are more willing to talk. Signs of combat sustained damage are visible on the hull.
16. A race of long dead island giants are the source of the petrification virus plague
17. A young girl that has miraculously survived drowning begins to speak about spirits that need to find peace
18. A shark faced savage (goblyn) going berserk is found to be a sailor that signed up to a ship named "Relentless" several months ago
19. Innocents sacrificed to a sea monster according to ancient rites are actually taken by…
20. An island populated with exiled criminals, watched by inhuman wardens
21. The stars are right to awaken a mind-shattering sea god
22. A ship of strange design arrives at port. Its ebony skinned captain makes her intentions to trade known.
23. A water elemental demands the life of its summoner to stop harassing the locals
24. A vengeful captain is hiring replacement crew for his continuing quest to kill an albino kraken
25. A strange carcass is washed ashore. No one can tell if it’s a man or a beast
26. A fishing boat captain, his body horribly scarred by shark attack wounds is recruiting harpoon throwers
27. People are making small offerings to a watery imp for good luck
28. An island filled with playful and murderous demon-worshiping nymphs
29. The birth of a two headed wereray heralds the fulfillment of a dark prophecy involving a demon prince of dual nature
30. Reports of a strange island, match the description found in a gnomish ancient book detailing a ring of exotic and whimsical islands filled with wonders and madness
31. A steam-powered, crab-shaped sea vessel, serving as a prison of sorts
32. A fiendishly charming weapons trader arrives at port
33. A mysterious message found in a bottle, written in a strange language
34. Hideously deformed sea giants raid the coastal communities. The locals are hiding something
35. A malevolent undead is killing the crew one by one
36. A small boat with a corpse and half-eaten human remains is found. Amidst the bones is a log with recording in abyssal
37. A set of primitive weapons brought from strange lands beyond the sea. They are imbued with mystical powers
38. A deranged psalm-singing bard that seeks "The song that makes the sea wash the Filth away"
39. A crime-lord has relocated his whoring and gambling operations aboard coast-going ships
40. The "Great Red Albatross" appears foretelling the coming of the warlord
41. A vicious-looking dragon ship is sighted, captained by a dragon-blooded berserker
42. A strange plague whose victims rise as sea zombies
43. A shark cult is becoming increasingly active
44. A boat with shipwrecked survivors arrives, bearing news of a sea monster
45. A magnificent ship, bearing cultural resemblance to Har'Akir, stops for supplies
46. A well armed ship full of Lawgiver's priests, knights and flagellants sails on a religious crusade
47. A mysterious crime lord is using vile fish people as smugglers
48. Dead fishes are washed ashore, killed by an unknown disease. A local secluded sea-witch must be consulted
49. An ice devil is incarcerating seafarers in a frozen prison-island shaped to resemble his hellish home
50. The old drunkard storyteller is found with his throat slit. That night before he told a different story
51. A wealthy merchant is looking for crew to man a journey through the way of venomous tears in order to acquire silkworm eggs
52. Those rescued by dolphins are expected to repay their debt when deemed necessary
53. An immigrant oriental dragon causes the waters to become acidic
54. A mist-shrouded island filled with vast arctic forests and vicious dire animal varieties worshiped like gods by its frightened stone-age human inhabitants
55. A slave market is thriving along the coast
56. On a special night occurring once every 100 years the souls of men lost at sea gather into a macabre fleet best left undisturbed
57. After a mutiny, the non-mutineers are marooned on a forsaken island
58. The father of a beautiful young lady is searching for escorts to accompany his daughter to her soon-to-be husband, the lord of Blaustein
59. A musically educated lord is inviting bards from all over the core to his island for a great musical contest
60. The foul breath isle is known to seep poison. The waters surrounding it are full of dead fish and sea animals
61. A hazlani is paying handsomely for basaltic rock from the island Demise
62. A captain and his crew return loaded with treasure in the form of gold coins of exotic mint. Strange things start to happen after they begin spending the gold
63. A gang comprised of men that look like badly stitched flesh-dolls are stealing foodstuff along the coast
64. Reports of a ship with strange weaponry attacking small vessels
65. Several women give birth to fishlike callibans. Witchery is suspected
66. Debris from a large number of outlander ships are washed ashore, but no corpses
67. Rumor a promising market for spices causes agitation among local merchants eager to secure a share.
68. A strange series of crystal virus infections are spreading terror. This is the work a young girl whose rogue brother was murdered by the local crime lord. He was buried alive in the salt banks
69. A madman's island filled with huge metal constructions and mechanical golems
70. A strange small island formation is protected by water spirits riding sea horses
71. A map describing a new mist-way is found
72. A royally appointed cartographer is organising an island mapping expedition
73. A ship-turned-monastery. Its monks are living as fishermen under vows of silence and constant seafaring
74. Locals perform pagan coastal rituals to appease sea gods. The ritual's dark nature is highly suspicious
75. A secret underwater laboratory with a submerged entrance at the docks
76. A mysterious heavily-guarded warehouse at the dock filled with strange and exotic merchandise
77. Tomes of arcane knowledge begin circulating. They all bear sigils related to a mythical island
78. A covey of crones terrorizes the coast by conjuring terrible storms
79. An old seawolf wants help to die in his homeland so that his soul will rest. Unfortunately, he has been exiled from his people
80. Rumors of a shipment of great red pearls cause arousal in the small coastal village
81. A particularly murderous orca bears the shame telltale scar possessed by a vicious pirate lord executed 20 years ago
82. Locathah attack in an attempt to retrieve their kidnapped young
83. Two known pirates have forged an alliance. The nobles increase the bounty on their heads
84. Several ships crash at the "Jagged Teeth" rocks
85. Several men are found dead suffering shark wounds in their sleep. This is the work of the ghost of their captain whom they've thrown to the sharks
86. A wizard wants to capture the legendary father of sea cats, the "Golden Lion"
87. The marid turtles are coming on a moonless night to lay their mother-of -pearl eggs
88. A mysterious benefactor is sponsoring various quests for lost knowledge. Every meeting with him takes place in steam filled pools, as he claims that this sooths his skin condition
89. The fine stallions brought by ship are actually aggressive carnivorous predators
90. A fervent cleric on the path to become a sea spawn master is infecting unsuspecting townsfolk through the sacrament ceremony
91. A sea serpent has been attacking ships with alarming regularity. Its appearances seem to coincide with …
92. A famous wanted bandit has taken the pirate's trade
93. Strange aquatic specimens are brought to the attention of an academy's scholars
94. A royal vessel that approaches by night frequently requests lady company or entertainers. They reward handsomely although the experience leaves those involved physically taxed and unnaturally pale.
95. A strange storm is predicted. Hideous salt-water toads will fall from the sky
96. A great expedition to a "new world" is funded by various lords around the Core
97. A coast travelling boat-house full of strange gypsies, freaks and fortune-tellers
98. A schooner is possessed by an animator
99. An abber nomad that specializes in aquatic creatures living tattoos
100. The school of wizards of the sunken Lore, located in the belly of a sea monster

[Sareau]

The anthologies My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding and My Big Fat Supernatural Honeymoon included stories on haunted ships, including the idea each ship held a seperate curse-maybe the Flying Dutchman acts as a sort of magistrate doling out curses and if the party happens to be on the ship where the captain has upset the Dutchman...

Perhaps the Sea itself is filled with curse bearing islands that can ensnare ships as well, like Ulysses' travels...

[Hogan Van Monsterband]

The one time we used the Sea, there was an encounter with a small boat, like a gondola, being poled through the water. It was clearly designed for a river, and no-one had any idea how it had gotten this far out. The captain ordered everyone below decks so that the boatman wouldn't see them.

(For those of you who care about explanations, it was a mist ferryman, seting up stuff for later).

[Intrepid]

The one time we used the Sea, there was an encounter with a small boat, like a gondola, being poled through the water. It was clearly designed for a river, and no-one had any idea how it had gotten this far out. The captain ordered everyone below decks so that the boatman wouldn't see them.

(For those of you who care about explanations, it was a mist ferryman, seting up stuff for later).

That actually kind of sent shivers up my spine. I come from a sailor family (like the last umpteen generations where in the navy of one nation or another) and my Grandpa told me a ghost story about a skeleton on a lifeboat, and your bit there reminded me of it..

Good Job

[Sareau]

I like the idea of wreckers-rather reprehensible sorts who would wreck ships on various hazards then loot them, killing the entire crew.

Such a group allied with an aquatic race-sahuagin for shades of Shadow over Innsmouth or perhaps the ixitxachitl just because I like them-the aquatics take care of killing the crew and repay the wrecker by looting the ship and passing the "useless" goods on to their benefactors, who continue to wreck ships just for this purpose.

Of course, for those who enjoy morality plays, there's the wrecker haunted by the ships of his victims, either standard spectrals or lacedons who gets his comeuppance as the party watches in horror.

There's also the short story of the lighthouse-I think by Robert Bloch-whose foghorn sounds just like the mating call of an ancient prehistoric beast...

[Rotipher of the FoS]

Ray Bradbury wrote that one IIRC, not Robert Bloch. Yes, that does have possibilities, although it'd fit better into the setting if the foghorn attracted a ghost ship rather than leftover plesiosaurs.

[cure]

An especially bored FoS scholar might actually attempt to verify that flooding in the Borchava Rivers occurs/ed at the same time as especially heavy rains on the Island of Markovia.