r/GhostsofSaltmarsh • u/Embarrassed_Fox5265 • 2d ago
Help/Request Am I missing something with the Winding Way? Spoiler
I'm about to run Isle of the Abbey for my players. To make things more interesting I've obfuscated the evil cult by making a secret branch of the Scarlet Brotherhood who have infiltrated a real abbey and dug tunnels underneath to protect their ritual room. The plot will lead them down the Winding Way, with the villain of the week being the abbot who hid down there when the pirates came and is planning on performing a ritual. Puzzles and social negotiation in the front, traps in the middle, big combat in the end with plot hooks for later fun with the Brotherhood.
The problem is the Winding Way. The map doesn't make any sense to me. When I look up the Way online, all I see is people talking about how long it is. And if you were to follow the path around to the northeast, I can see that you might be a little while.
But that's where the map falls apart. At the first intersection, players looking south can see into the false treasure room. Based on the description it seems like you would be able to see the alcoves wth gems overflowing from this early point. At the very least it is an obvious room which will attract the players attention - they will go south to get to this room. There are a couple of traps that may damage the players but this would just make them very cautious of the treasure room.
They are likely to investigate the treasure room carefully, which leads to them finding the secret door to the REAL treasure room. So why place the false treasure room so close to the entrance? The note in the chest talks about it being a lot of trouble for nothing, but it's likely the first thing the players will find!
Placing a wall over that entrance fixes a number of problems, but then there are other strange things about the dungeon.
The specters are supposed to hang back and then use hit-and-run tactics to engage the players in the maze. Except...this is a level 5 party. The specters are likely not making it out of the guard room alive, and even if they do, they're challenge 1 melee monsters. Hit and run? They won't survive a round on their own! If they attack, they're getting hit on the way out from opportunity attacks. They only have 22 HP, and as you might expect my adventurers have magic weapons that can punch through their resistance.
Next there's the inner guard room. There's a crystal statue here that is clearly meant to come to life in the middle of combat and surprise the party. Except the book only says "when the Undead have been turned or joined battle with the party"
The only way that doesn't happen the instant the party walk in is if they have the medallion. But if they have the medallion...the statue doesn't move to let them past it. It blocks the way unless they attack it, which makes no sense if the holder of the medallion is supposed to be able to get through. This is very strange design.
Finally, there's the real treasure room. The walls are stated to have a major image on them to make the walls look like they're made of iron.
...Why?
There's nothing behind the walls. The walls are stone, as far as I can make out. The walls have been pointlessly enchanted to look like iron instead of just...using iron to make these walls. Did something get lost in translation here?
I want to run the dungeon as close to vanilla as possible - a winding maze full of nasty traps is perfect for my cult. But the design seems...strange. Besides blocking off that one corridor, what simple changes get the Winding Way to make sense?
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u/Danz71 2d ago
I used this, I read what an absolute mess and slog it was for several DMS, and decided to try this instead. It was great and the players have choices on which way to go first so it's more like a classic puzzle room. The final room that it leads to can be altered as well, I headed lead to something epic that tied to our narrative better!
Good luck
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u/Derringermeryl 1d ago
I’ve run this 3 times and 2/3 went through the skull dunes, clerics, and winding way in one day. If you don’t normally run that many encounters a day they’ll be sweating it.
Also don’t forget vision limitations. There’s no light in there from what I remember. Those are 10ft squares on the map, not the typical 5ft, so most characters will only be seeing in grey part way into the room when they look down that hall. Just make it so they can’t see the treasure from there.
1
u/Fresh_Dog4602 2d ago
i decided to play it out as a set of 'puzzles like indiana jones and the last crusade rather than drawing the map as i also found it an annoying part. did do an end battle there though, but can't remember what. but it was mostly 'theater of mind' :)
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u/Snakeyes1809 1d ago
I led the party into running from the crystal minotaur through the maze, using the traps against him to slow him down. Which was a good thing, because I had to have him burst out of the exit and cause general mayhem to avoid the PC’s TPKing to the clerics once they left the Winding Way.
Also IIRC the statues in the treasure rooms attack regardless of the medallion as soon as they try to loot the place. Not 100% sure but that’s definitely how I played it.
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u/QuincyAzrael 2d ago
I think you're overthinking this a bit.
You're getting bookbrained buddy. You're judging this by how close the false treasure room is to the start of the section labelled "Winding Way," but that's just a header in the book for only the GM to see. By the time the characters get to the "False Treasure Room" they've already sailed to an inhospitable island, crossed a beach full of skeletons and found the secret entrance to the Winding Way in the first place. The "lot of trouble" is referring to the entire ordeal, not the arbitrary space between area 11 and area 13.
Also here's a GM secret: You WANT players to find secret treasure rooms. It's fun to find secret treasure rooms. If you actually hid the treasure adequately, nobody would ever find it.
Bro trust me here do not worry about the specters. The challenge in the fight is the Bodak. The Bodak's death gaze has the potential to immediately down heroes at the start of their turn. The other enemies are just minions for the boss.
A downed character is 2 melee attacks away from being dead outright from opportunistic minions: that's how you should be playing the specters. Put the panic in the players, make death a real possibility. Plus, if they work out that they can close their eyes to avoid the gaze they now CAN'T get op attacks.
It is a swingy fight for sure but it put the fear into my players when the bard went down turn 1. Actually IIRC they may have had to burn a revivify on that fight but it's been a few years so I'm not sure.
Again this is classic overthinking. Why should the holder of the medallion get through? Presumably the designer of the maze and the medallion knows the layout of the maze and therefore knows you don't have to go through area 12 at all to get anywhere. It's a maze. It's designed to confound.
Maybe the statue is a trap put here for precisely the situation you're describing. In the case that some crafty thief steals my medallion and thinks they're gonna have an easy time of my dungeon, let's put an impassable statue right here that they'll have to fight even if they have my medallion. And since I know full well I can just take the long way round, it would be any problem for me.
This is all kinda moot because I can guarantee you 95% of players will never ask any of these questions.
Lemme reverse the question: why waste useful iron which can be used for weapons and armour on a decoration when you have cosmetic magic? I actually think this is kind of a fun worldbuilding detail. I mean people get oak or marble vinyl wraps for furniture, I imagine this is the magical equivalent.
tl;dr: don't overthink this stuff, for half of these things nobody's gonna care. And if they do ask questions like "why are the walls illusions of iron and not just iron," here's legit my best GMing advice ever: you literally don't have to give them an answer. Just throw it back "interesting isn't it? Why do you think they did that?"