Forty years ago, the Poisoned Poseidon was a pirate ship that tormented the Sword Coast. Its captain was the warlock Kelton Hunter, who used his ill-gotten gains to fund his infernal spellcraft. In 1457 DR, the pirate warlock sailed the Poseidon at the head of a pirate fleet into the harbor of Baldur’s Gate itself. In a duel with local adventurers, powerful spells caused the massive ship to be washed ashore, leaving it high and dry nearly a hundred feet from shore in the Brampton neighborhood. Kelton himself is said to have vanished, although locals still tell the story of how devils dragged him through a portal to Hell itself.
No one wanted to pay to have the hulk removed, and so for several years it lay abandoned, slowly sinking into the muck while serving as a breeding ground for rats and a lair for various ne’er-do-wells. When the old retaining walls of the dock (damaged during the Spellplague) were finally repaired in the 1470s, however, the ground around the Poseidon stabilized and new construction sprang up around it. The ship itself was converted into a tannery.
In 1492 DR, Dead Three cultists quietly took over the tannery. Other employees were cycled out and cultists were brought in. The Poseidon still operates as a profitable tannery, but serves as a front for cult activities.
LOCATION OF THE POSEIDON
The Poisoned Poseidon is located here:
I’d originally looked at placing it on the far western edge of Brampton, but realized this would basically put it directly across the street from the Low Lantern (see Part 3H: Trafficking Amrik). Nonetheless, we can see how the investigation is going to send the PCs tramping about in the Brampton neighborhood, so it’ll probably be a good idea to review the details on the neighborhood and see what else is in the area before running this session.
Of course, since I’m creating the Poisoned Poseidon out of whole cloth, it doesn’t actually appear on the map. But I did pick a section of the map that fit my general image for the tangled warren of buildings I imagined lying around the ship. (Take a peek at Random GM Tip: Visualizing City Block Maps.)
With a little bit of photoshopping, though, I was able to add the ship to Baldur’s Gate (and threw in Insight Park, too):
You can buy the high-resolution isometric map and top-down map from Mike Schley’s web store. The image above is a relatively tiny section of the isometric view, but I’ve maintained the same resolution so if you buy the map you should be able to add it seamlessly using any image manipulation program.
REFUGEES ON THE DOCKS: One of the reasons for using the Poisoned Poseidon and placing it on the Docks, is to provide an opportunity to view the Elturian refugee crisis from a different angle. The docks just to the east are crowded with refugees trying to find passage on already overbooked ships. Where to? For most of them, it almost doesn’t matter. They’re hoping that the situation will be better in Amn or Waterdeep or Daggerford or Neverwinter or almost anywhere. (Many of them might believe that whatever happened to Elturel is coming for Baldur’s Gate next and they just want to get as far away as possible. See Rumors of Elturel.)
MAPS OF THE POISONED POSEIDON
In creating the Poisoned Poseidon, I hacked together several different maps. First, to position the ship into the urban environment, I took Dyson Logos’ map of Mistshore from Dragon Heist (a slice of which you can see here) and hacked it together with the Third-Story Run map from his website.
For the lower decks of the ship, I grabbed one of Mike Schley’s maps from Ghosts of Saltmarsh, did some quick photoshopping to make it match the neighborhood map of the ship, and then added a Lower Hold from Dyson’s Buried at Sea:
Dyson’s map had actually been of an ersatz ship — a crypt that had been made to resemble a ship — but that didn’t matter: For our purposes, the Lower Hold is the part of the ship that had sunk into the muck. As some point, this unintentional “basement” was expanded by knocking a hole in the back of the ship.
(It was this image that actually decided me on the Poisoned Poseidon: When considering locations that could serve as a murder sites for the Dead Three cultists, Dyson’s Wolf Tower and Vanshiro Reliquary were also on the short list.)
And, of course, because we’re hacking maps together here, the “set dressing” is that of an active ship rather than one which has been converted into a tannery. The scale also changes from 10’ squares to 5’ squares.
KEYING THE POISONED POSEIDON
I’m going to describe the Poisoned Poseidon in broad strokes. If you want to write up a detailed key of each room, it should be a fairly straightforward extrapolation.
As the PCs explore the Poisoned Poseidon, they’ll also be exploring a medieval-style tannery. My primary reference for this was Kim Rendfeld’s short article “Odd Jobs — Tanning: A Medieval Dirty Job,”which I recommend checking out.
OUTBUILDINGS: A wooden staircase on the north side of the ship leads up to the deck. A number of buildings have been erected directly next to the old hull. These mostly contain supplies for the tannery (chemicals, blades, stretching racks, etc.).
MAIN DECK: The main deck is generally kept clear, but there might be a stack of tanned hides ready for sale. A crane has been installed on the poop deck that is used to raise and lower heavy material from street level.
MAIN DECK – CABINS: The Master of Souls’ quarters are found in the fore cabin. One of the aft cabins is a meeting room. The Poseidon Correspondence handout can be found here.
LOWER DECK: Most of the lower deck is used to store the untreated skins of slaughtered cattle that are delivered to the tannery, along with the blood, dirt, manure, hooves, and horns that come with them.
LOWER DECK – CABINS: The aft cabins are used as sleeping quarters for the murder squad. The smaller fore cabin has been converted into an armory. The larger fore cabin contains three small shrines, one dedicated to each of the Dead Three.
HOLD: The fore chamber is a work floor where skins are trimmed. The aft chamber has huge vats. Here skins are sprinkled with urine or soaked in an alkaline solution of wood ash and lime before being folded, hair-side in, and taken down to the Lower Hold.
In the main hold, skins which have been treated in the Lower Hold are brought back up and placed in stone treatment vats containing a solution made from the bark of spruce firs. They remain here for as long as a year before being ready for sale.
LOWER HOLD – CATACOMBS: The various niches lining the catacomb halls are stacked with urine-soaked skins (they are kept here until the rotting hair has loosened). The four iron doors lead to small cells where prisoners are held to various purpose.
LOWER HOLD: The lower hold is studded with wooden racks on which treated hides are spread. Special knives, which hang on the walls, are used to scrape the hair off one side and whatever flesh remains on the other. Several huge vats are then used for washing: A solution of pigeon droppings or dog shit removes the lime.
In the center of the Lower Hold is a table. Shohreh Netitia’s corpse lays there. A side table contains a disturbing variety of surgical instruments and three brands (each with the holy symbol of one of the Dead Three). The Poseidon Papers handout can be found amidst these instruments and Shohreh Netitia’s refugee papers can be found among her personal effects.
- Refugee Papers: A DC 15 Wisdom (Perception) test reveals the papers to be forgeries. The forgery can also be detected if the PCs look to verify the origin of the papers (for example, by cross-referencing the refugee lists in the High Hall; or tracking down the official tabularius whose authorizing seal supposedly appears on the papers).
ADVERSARY ROSTER
| Iron Consul + 3 Fists of Bane | Main Deck | |
| 2 Commoners | Lower Deck | (tannery workers) |
| 2 Fists of Bane + 2 Necromites | Lower Deck - Cabins | (resting) |
| Reaper | Hold | |
| 4 Commoners | Hold | (tannery workers) |
| Master of Souls (Remigio) | Lower Hold | (preparing body) |
| 2 Fists of Bane | Lower Hold - Tunnels | (guarding cells) |
* Remigio has already cast animate dead today, leaving him with only one 3rd level spell.
Stat blocks for Dead Three cultists can be found in Descent Into Avernus, p. 231-235.
See Art of the Key: Adversary Rosters for details on using an adversary roster.
OBSERVING THE POSEIDON: PCs who place the Poisoned Poseidon under observation will be able to observe the regular routine of both the tannery and the murder operation.
- Fists of Bane and Necromites from the Lower Deck cabins relieving the watch on the main deck.
- Tannery workers collecting supplies from the outbuildings.
- A shipment of raw cattle hides being delivered from the Hamhocks Slaughterhouse.
- Tanned hides being loaded onto a cart and taken to the Wide for sale.
- The reaper leaving to go to the Frolicking Nymph Bathhouse (see Part 3F: Dungeon of the Dead Three) and then returning with written instructions. (He’s likely to then meet with the Master of Souls in the Main Deck cabins.)
- A necromite and two Fists of Bane leaving with Shohneh Letitia’s corpse (to be dumped in Insight Park).
- A messenger from the Frolicking Nymph Bathhouse carrying a letter indicating that they’ve located Iolanthe Oshrat. (The messenger then returns to the Dungeon of the Dead Three.)
- A necromite and two Fists of Bane leaving to kidnap Iolanthe Oshrat (their next victim).
QUESTIONING CULTISTS: Cult members can be interrogated, although they won’t cooperate easily. All of them know that their instructions come from the cult leaders at the Frolicking Nymph bathhouse. Only the Master of Souls knows that they are specifically targeting Elturian knights.
(The tannery workers are also Dead Three worshippers. They know the murders are happening, but they aren’t “read in,” so to speak. They do know that instructions come from some other cell of the cult, specifying who the targets are.)
Some names you can use for cultists, if needed:
- Fahul (a Fist of Bane)
- Thando Ora
- Joslyn Ifa
- Zangaroa
POSEIDON CORRESPONDENCE
Remigio—
I’m not really surprised to hear that Fahul is complaining about living in a tannery, the fastidious little weasel. I’m pretty sure Vaaz just wanted him out of his hair when he assigned him to you. If he keeps giving you a headache, remind him what the alternative is. I doubt he’ll find the noxious fumes of this sewer we’ve been gifted under the bathhouse any better.
Flennis
Remigio—
Expect more Fists from the Frolicking Nymph within the tenday. And probably a couple of Night Blades. Now that the Agent has his operation fully established, he should be able to start feeding us targets at a faster clip.
Flennis
Master of Souls,
I hope all things are well. I have heard complaints from one of my Fists, but I assure you that neither I nor the Emissary lend it any credence. The Emissary does suggest, however, that your minions begin dumping the bodies farther afield. He wants us to “spread the terror,” and is also concerned that the park may become a security concern.
Vaaz
POSEIDON PAPERS
SHOHREH NETITIA
Hazel skin. Green eyes. Dark brown hair braided in two tresses.
Residence: Cuiric’s Boarding House
Relation: Great-Grandmother
She lives near the Frolicking Nymph. An abduction squad or observers could be sent from the bathhouse if it would be easier.
FOLLOWING UP: Cuiric’s been dead for a hundred years, but his boarding house is run by his great-granddaughter Laila. She found the door to Shohreh’s room broken down and reported it to the Flaming Fist, but there’s been no follow-up. Shohreh’s great-grandmother was a Hellrider, but there’s no clear way of discovering that (unless, of course, the PCs get clever). The relevant clue here is that whoever is feeding names to the Dead Three cultists is interested in who they’re related to (which might prompt the PCs to ask questions when backtracking the other victims, see Part 3D: Investigating the Murders).
Curious as to why a FR pirate named his ship after a Greek god. Are there not enough perfectly serviceable FR sea gods? Or is this just one more example of the strange linkages between the FR and Earth?
Poseidon is worshiped in Impiltur.
“I’d originally looked at placing it on the far eastern edge of Brampton, but realized this would basically put it directly across the street from the Low Lantern” I assume you meant ‘western’ here, since the Low Lantern is on the western edge of Brampton?
Correct! The far western edge would put it directly in Insight Park, which feels equally problematic. 😉
I’m mildly confused on a few things. How are the guards guarding the tannery? Are they out in the open? And if so, why haven’t they been reported by locals? Well-armored guards wielding maces and spears guarding a simple tannery seems a little bit odd.
Also, how is your average level 2 adventuring party supposed to survive fighting two CR 2 creatures in quick succession, and then face off against a CR 4 spellcaster with access to Fireball without suffering heavy losses? Was this intentional?
Nevertheless, I’m enjoying the Remix. Keep up the good work!
Given how notorious tanneries are for their stench, I question whether the tannery workers would actually live there.
@Wyvern: The thing about smells is you get used to them. I assume Baldur’s Gate is a pretty hard place to be a poor person, and if that’s the case, the workers probably don’t have much choice. At least the tannery is dry.
@Nolan: Presumably the guards wear cloaks and keep out of sight as much as possible. But more importantly, reported to who? Anyone who has to live next to a tannery is guaranteed to be at the bottom of the pecking order. Imagine you’re a ghetto dweller living next to a grow-op of some kind. Obvious gang-bangers wander in and out at times carrying illegal firearms. Pretty scary dudes. But the cops don’t come around much, and when they do, they might drag your brother to jail for car theft. And the gang leaves you alone as long as you keep out of their way. Would you be in a hurry to report them?
I just started running this last weekend – if you have a smaller party, I recommend having less enemies on the main deck, because those followers of Bane are incredibly hardy – the combination of very high AC, advantage on all saving throws during combat, and that Voice of Command ability makes for a very though fight; they can dish out a lot and no attack option is particularly good at hitting them. My 6 players managed to pull through, but it was a hard fairly resource intensive fight. (2 of them went down temporarily, 2 others almost, and they used the terrain cleverly)
Incidentally, if anyone running this wants fancier maps, I made these in Dungeondraft, feel free to use them. The DPI is fit for use in roll20.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1FKaDR9SH-pH8gRI_4UDZC_n5xmujCt_J?usp=sharing
I have a question, what is the Reaper doing in the in the Hold Floor? Just watching? Will she disguise herself if she listen the party coming?
The Poisoned Poseidon was great, we didn’t finish it last session, but my players ignored Insight Park and went straight for the rumours of cultists. As frosted fists, they just went in under the guise of official business, demanding an immediate inspection. Well, this is my kind of adventure to DM – lots of ad-lib required, I freely admit I only did a quick pass preparation for Insight Park, Amrik, and the Poseidon. So I didn’t give a lot of thought to how the players might approach any of these options.
Anyway, rather than stone-wall them with “where’s your warrant”, I decided it makes sense that the Frosted Fist take regular bribes from various unsavoury types. So the cultists have a quick discussion, and the leader on deck pulls out a pouch of gold, and hands it over, complaining that the Fists are a day early, “see you in a week, yeah?”
That caught my players off guard somewhat, but they got the idea, they know the city from earlier campaigns so bribing corrupt guards is a known trope and now they are the corrupt guards themselves (or are they? interesting mix of PC’s, all kinds of alignments from NG to LE).
Anyway, one thing lead to another, and a fight broke out. As a couple of people noted above, this is a tough fight, and it should be, unless the players go out of their way to investigate and prepare. My PC’s are level 3, and I dropped one at least once. Be sure you follow Justin’s intentions on using an adversary roster – the PC’s should not be allowed to just pick off small groups one room at a time, unless they have explicitly done their homework and made it possible. For example in our fight, straight away two cultists ran below deck, and came back with the next level’s roster as reinforcements. The fight got hard, but the players learned vs dead-eye that ignoring half a dozen mooks is a mistake, so they fought well. So cultists are dropping, as does a PC. Another cultist goes below deck, to get more reinforcements. By the time the third wave arrives, I survey the battlefield, and decide that there are a lot of dead cultists and the new ones would be next, so the reinforcements all go straight back down, to gather the Final Boss and make a plan. One cultist (of Bane) survives and surrenders, which is a common theme in my games where I try and avoid slaughter to the last man (especially important to show the players that fight to the death isn’t the only option, especially when some of my fights kick their butts).
So we ended it with the PC’s still on the top deck, with a prisoner to interrogate, and an unknown number of people still below decks, that know a group of Fists have just slaughtered most of their mooks (and the ranking Bane-ite). Now I’ve made a basic plan of what the remaining cultists will do, and of course it won’t be “wait in your designated area, for the PC’s to kick down your door”…
Got a nice TPK on this with my four players and even by removing one bane fist. I guess they have learned to don’t go head first in the ennemy lair x3
My party of 6 2nd level characters just got their butts handed to them in the Poisoned Poseidon, even after I added a couple of Flaming Fists (one Guard and one Veteran) to their party.
I would suggest replacing the Master of Souls with a Skull Lasher. It was the one remaining 3rd level spell slot of the MoS that really did them in, as it was used to cast fireball. Along with Grave Magic, this caused 36 points of necrotic damage to everyone in the party. If they had not all managed to make their dexterity saves, they would have been killed outright.
At first glance, this situation seems unwinnable for the PCS. Any one of the groups in the roster (except obviously the commoners) are a deadly encounter on their own for a group of level 2s, and it seems like they’ll probably need to fight most of these guys- so resources will be drained. What am I missing here?
Disclaimer: I didn’t run *this* Poisoned Posideon. I felt the “ship turned building” gimmick of both this Poisoned Posideon and the Low Lantern was a little repetitive, so I went with Dyson’s wolf tower. I wrote up a new history for the tower, shuffled around the rooms and enemies a bit, and ran it more or less the same.
Disclaimer 2: My group also just got done with Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, so they were used to using stealth tactics and fleeing if things got too bad. They didn’t want to bring all the enemies on top of them all at once if they could avoid it.
That all said… yeeeah, it’s pretty deadly. My group could have gone to the Low Lantern and faced Amrik first, but they sprung for wolf tower first and jumped in at level 2. There, they stealthed in and got 2/3 of the way through. They charmed a cultist for interrogationfor some good info, before he called for help. The whole encounter flipped on its head at that point, with the PCs now running away and chased by a Master of Souls. Just before they got away they turned a corner and half the party was snagged by a neromantic fireball. 2 of them saved and lived, but the 3rd failed the save and was killed outright. The party had to leave his corpse behind.
What’s interesting is that they managed to acquire a handful of notes and they got some good interrogation info out of the cultists, but the players still felt like it was a failure. Then, several sessions later and after DotD3, they started running their heads into a wall, so they decided to try to “fix their mistake” and head back to wolf tower, but now at 4th level. And so I ran wolf tower not once, but twice.
Thanks to a lightly retouched adversary roster, the tower was restocked and the cultists had upped their numbers. What they hadn’t expected was the PCs to show up in disguises from the DotD3, so the PCs snuck in AGAIN, and with some extra help managed to clear out the entire complex of all hostiles (no interrogating survivors this time), including the Master of Souls who killed their friend before. They saved a refugee from being murdered, acquired another note, and turned the tannery over to someone else to keep it cultist-free.
Just looking at this from the perspective of a DM prepping to eventually run this, but… another Master of Souls? That, combined with the facts that the only Skull Lasher of Myrkul we see is in a murder squad, *and* how Remigo seems to receive several letters from Flennis, whereas Flennis has no correspondence from Remigo makes this feel like the obvious position to change some things around and insert the Skull Lasher of Myrkul into this position, maybe adding a correspondence in the Dungeon of the Dead Three that doesn’t serve as a clue to the Poisoned Poseidon, but at least a sort of… reference?
Just a couple thoughts.
I made a version of this map in DungeonDrafts for my Roll20 game. This is my first attempt to use this program. It’s set up to be 70×70 pixels per square. I figured I would put it here for anyone who likes more colorful maps. https://imgur.com/a/odHwwYY
The forethought you have put into all of this is immensely helpful. I really like the Poison Poseidon and I will be using it. Only concern I had is that it seems that tanneries are usually located in the outer city due to the smell etc… Also, it would seem easier be rid of the bodies in the bay rather than taking a trip to Insight Park.
Ran this last night. I used Yorick’s beautiful maps, so I want to thank them profusely for that. They were great.
It went pretty well, but they had a rough go of the first encounter on the main deck. Then while fighting Remigio, they actually got the drop on him and got him to about 5 HP before he got to take a combat turn. Since I knew he was about to bite it I decided he was not the type to surrender, and I used his last turn to cast fireball at all my level 2 players. He knocked out three of them but the barbarian lived and lopped off his head. I’d already decided to nix the two guards in the jails to make it a bit easier and because it was already getting late.
This was all well and good. They took the remaining papers, so they’ll be onto the bathhouse next week. However, they decided to “cut their losses” and leave without exploring “that last room”. So they didn’t talk to Reya and didn’t get anymore of the lore.
If I’d been thinking on my feet, I would have included the key to the cells in Remigio’s pocket, maybe that would’ve given them an impetus to check out the door.
Anyway I feel like I have to find a place to put Reya so they can get all this info.
It’s always fascinating the conclusions your players come to. They had been trying (and failing) to get anyone in the place to cough up information the whole night. They were finally about to get a big info dump from a willing NPC and they decide to bail. What amazes me is that they already knew (because I told them) that this was the bottom floor. And it appeared to them that there was just this one little room left. And they decide not to open it. Incredible.
They said they’re going to report their findings to Zodge. I’m thinking I’ll have him send a couple men to follow up in the tannery, at which point they’ll find Reya and by the time they get out of the Dungeon of the Dead 3, Zodge will have debriefed her and they can get the info then. I look forward to them finding out what was behind the door.
Sorry if this post is longer than customary. I hope someone enjoyed reading it.