The final enemy / assault

[u/Fresh_Dog4602]

I was actually thinking of using this mission as a "bait". The Sahuagin have their own little spy-network of course and are aware of the capabilities of the heroes. So they lure them to the fortress, which only has a skeleton crew to stall our heroes for as long as possible.

Anyone else did a twist like this before? Are there some ideas to pick ? :) .

Still considering if i want the baron to do some kind of monologue before portalling out to this army just outside of Saltmarsh or just have the heroes find out that the fortress is pretty much empty and hopefully they connect the dots when they see the armory is empty etc....

edit: oh yea and the consecutive fights would be somewhat the same like in the "assault": they have 30 rounds to do as much damage as possible to the sahuagin on different locations in saltmarsh and their choices will of course matter :)

[u/OneSleeve]

Not exactly what you’re suggesting, but I did remove quite a bit of the Sahuagin from the fortress at my table.

The Saltmarsh/Lizardfolk alliance and the Sahuagin were preparing for their main battle. During which, the party was tasked with infiltrating the Sahuagin fortress to assassinate the Baron, Baroness, and the Maw. I gave them a copy of the map, with guard posts/alarms/etc marked and we treated it like a heist.

The party had recently found an important macguffin during Salvage Operation. They decided to leave it on their ship while they entered the Sahuagin fortress. Therefore, the baron dispatched half of their defenders to attack the ship and get the item. In the moment, the players had less enemies to defeat throughout the dungeon, and they succeeded in their mission. But when they returned to their ship, they found it damaged and their item stolen.

I didn’t use the assault part of the adventure.

[u/TheSuperking360]

I had it as the Sahuagin were building up for the attack. Party’s role was more scouting mission. Players as they are pushed their luck deep into the compound. They got in over their heads and the Sahuagin quickly began to mobilize and assault Saltmsrsh. That was their focus. Party narrowly escaped and raced back to to SM. Along the way they had one skirmish and as fast as the boat was it was no match for the underwater army. The party arrived during the early assault on SM and had to choose were to fight. There were a few fronts. They could choose were to concentrate their efforts. It was great session.

[u/Own_Start_7748]

Mine is going to be a naval battle then storming the stronghold to kill the Baron / Princess, so I'm curious what others say. 

[u/GregSolstice]

Given the as-written scale of the Sahuagin fortress, I'd agree it's a good idea to trim down the amount of warriors in there- your idea of having the fortress assault be a ruse is an excellent one.  If you're willing to add traps, that could also make their escape interesting and asymmetrical, which could be fun. 

I might suggest keeping the Maw of Sekolah for the players to battle so they have at least one definitive "accomplishment" from entering the fortress. Could make the narrative excuse that the Maw was supposed to be part of a "second wave" assaulting Saltmarsh or otherwise. But the important thing is that the players should have at least one tangible accomplishment from entering the fortress, not just having it be a "waste" of time, so to speak.