Wrecked Into the Salt Halls
The storm put you through the cliff. That is the only way to describe it: a following sea lifted the ship, the helmsman screamed something about a white line in the rock, and the hull went into a sea cave at the speed of a thrown spear and came apart around you.
You are on a shelf of wet limestone in the dark, coughing brine, and the sea is still coming in behind you in long booming pushes. Ahead — inland, uphill, away from the water — the cave stops being a cave. There are steps. Someone cut steps.
Premise. The party arrived by shipwreck through a sea cave, which means the water is both how they came in and how they can leave. That is why this Beginning points at the two seaward Resolutions: the party already knows the sea is reachable, and the whole session becomes a search for the place where the maze touches it again.
Starting State
- Full kit, and all of it soaked. Nothing is lost, but: every spell scroll, written page, and paper item requires a DC 12 check (Sleight of Hand, or Arcana for a scroll) or it is ruined. Rations: half of them are spoiled. Torches: wet, and useless for one hour. One lantern survived because someone had the sense to shutter it.
- Full HP, but each PC starts with one level of exhaustion from the swim, removed by a short rest. Say so plainly: this is the swim, not a curse, and it goes away.
- Full spell slots. Nobody chose this.
- The wreck. Timber, cordage, two intact casks, and a spar the party can take if someone thinks to. The spar is worth remembering; X11 has a use for it.
Opening Scene
A tidal shelf 40 ft × 30 ft, sloping up and inland, with the sea cave behind and cut steps ahead. The water reaches the bottom third of the shelf on each surge, and the surge comes every ten rounds — which is your clock and should be narrated out loud from round one.
No creatures. The scene is a salvage decision under a tide. Ten rounds of "what do you save," then the water tells them to move.
Salvage, one item per PC per round, before the surge.
| Item | What it costs | What it gives |
|---|---|---|
| The shuttered lantern | Free | The party's only reliable light for the first hour |
| Two casks (water, and salt beef) | One round each | Rations for the run; the empty cask is buoyant, which matters in X11 |
| The spar | Two rounds, Athletics DC 13 | Twelve feet of shaped ship-timber. A raft's spine, a lever, a bridge |
| The helmsman's chart-case | One round, Investigation DC 12 | Waxed leather, contents dry. A coastal chart with the cliff marked — and a cave mouth marked do not |
| A drowned crewman's kit | One round | A knife, a purse, and a small carved Poseidon that is worth having in a maze this wet |
The tide. On round 10 the surge takes the shelf's lower third and everything left on it. Do not kill a PC with this; sweep gear, not people. A character caught by it makes Athletics DC 13 to hold on, and on a failure is dragged 20 ft back toward the sea and takes 3 (1d6) bludgeoning damage.
The steps. Cut, worn, and old, going up and inward, with a shallow channel alongside them that the sea has cut over centuries. The channel runs inland, which is impossible for seawater and is the first hint of X11's river.
First Clue (Whisper tier)
The party is standing in it. The sea is inside the maze, and it comes and goes. Deliver the Whisper as the sound behind them changing pitch — a second boom, deeper, from somewhere ahead and to the left, out of time with the surge behind.
That is X16's Whisper (there is another way the sea gets in) or X11's (there is fresh water under this, running to the sea). Both are true and neither is confirmed. Use whichever you rolled, and let the other stand.
Exits
Scaling — APL 6 / 12 / 15
| APL | Adjustment |
|---|---|
| 6 | No exhaustion. Surge every twelfth round. DCs −2 |
| 9 | As written |
| 12 | Surge every eighth round. DCs +1. Two casks are stove in |
| 15 | Surge every sixth round, and something in the sea cave takes an interest — a scyllan tentacle (Deep Water Kin, W14) sweeps the shelf once on round 6: +8 to hit, 14 (2d10 + 3) bludgeoning, and a grapple that drags 15 ft toward the water. It does not pursue past the steps. DCs +3 |
Drowning, shipwreck, and dead crewmates in the water. This is one of the deck's harsher openings and drowning is a common, specific fear — name it before you run it. The softer framing: the ship grounded rather than broke up, the crew got off, and the party swam a short distance in no real danger. Keep the soaked gear and the tide clock; lose the bodies.
- The tide clock does the work. Ten rounds of salvage with a countdown is one of the best openings in the deck, because every choice is legible and the pressure is not violence. Narrate the surge every third round.
- Let them keep the spar. Players who drag twelve feet of ship's timber through nine rooms of a maze have earned whatever X11 gives them for it, and the running joke of carrying it is worth more than the mechanical benefit.
- The soaked-scroll checks are one minute, not five. Roll them all at once, in the open, and move.
- Both seaward Resolutions are live here, and you do not have to choose early. X16 is the sea door; X11 is the river. Let the clue tiers pick, and if the party finds both, let them choose which — that is a genuinely good ending.
- If you are running short, hand them the lantern, one cask, and the chart-case, skip the siphon, and put them on the steps in five minutes.