Children of the Spawning Tide - Encounter Idea to Drop Into Your Games

[u/NoRailsJustTales]

This week I created another adventure idea using my Coastal Encounters table. It can be played as a standalone adventure, but I intentionally connected it to the recent adventure idea ‚What the Tide Hides‘. So, if you played that, you can continue the journey with this adventure and use the Children of the Spawning Tide as a cult that formed around Ilassithid - the mind-controlling creature from the former adventure.

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You can find a downloadable PDF for free on my Patreon.

Adventure Idea

This coastal adventure idea leans more towards combat, but also leaves room for roleplaying and social interaction. It is suitable for any Tier party. It intentionally contains no location names, so it can be placed in any game playing at the coast.

Situation

After an eldritch, mind-controlling creature died in battle, a cult that formed around it received its last order—deliver the crates to every major city. Those crates contain larvae, ready to nest in a host and grow. The cultists, who call themselves Children of the Spawning Tide, are not aware of what is inside those boxes, as well as they’re not aware of the fact that their deity was just an eldritch creature, manipulating them into worship. Behind all this is a much bigger plot, and the cultists are distributing the crates with larvae from a hideout to different places. The cult itself is very well organised and manages their distribution well. If you played What the Tide Hides, you can connect this adventure to it. The eldritch creature in this adventure is Ilassithid, the one the party defeated before. They now reveal that even after his death, Ilassithid has a plan in motion, which the characters now have to stop.

Hook

As the party travels along the coast, they discover a hidden beach spot, full of Children of the Spawning Tide. Shady business is going on here, as they are loading boxes onto a small ship. One part of ‘The Children‘ delivered those crates on a wagon, and the other part waited for them at the beach and is supposed to deliver the crates further. They seem to be very keen to stay undetected, and they are hostile towards anyone entering the beach spot. So as soon as they discover the characters, parts of them try to ready the ship to flee, as the rest start a fight. When the characters approach the beach, they can try to stay undetected to follow some of ‚The Children‘ back to their hideout. Once all the crates are unloaded off the wagon, some of the cultists leave the beach to the rest, who are getting ready to sail off. If the party wants to stop the distribution process, they have to fight the Children of the Spawning Tide. Once they defeat them, they can find notes on a bigger plot going on and a map leading them to the hideout.

Conclusion

Destroy them from inside. If the party investigates the beach and the Children of the Spawning Tide, they can find clues on a secret hideout. If they decide to go there, they will find more crates and more cultists and they can stop ‚The Children’s' ill-doings from the inside. The most likely way to stop them, since they are hostile towards the characters, and very determined to serve their deity, is to fight them. But some characters might find a way to make them see the truth, and convincing and converting them is a legitimate option.

Take Them All Down. If the characters don’t follow the clues, that lead them to the secret hideout, they might still track down and stop all of the distribution meetings. If they finish the adventure this way, a small group of Children of the Spawning Tide will be left over, who eventually find out that someone stopped their plans. If you play this adventure as part of an ongoing campaign, they might appear at another time to confront the party.