D&D 5E Ideas for shipwreck area?

[Shadowdweller00]

Ideas for traps/curses:
- Forests of entangling and/or carnivorous kelp
- Mysterious whirlpools
- Poisonous or irritating coral
- Areas that cause victims to mistake which direction they travel in (maybe Int:save or move in a random direction)
- Collapsing wrecks
- Wards that warp piercing weapons
- Strong underwater currents
- Explosive (and unstable) cannonballs...or other explosive shells.
- Effects which cause noise...such as the screaming mastheads mentioned previously.
- Dispelling wards...potentially leaving unfortunates without water breathing effects.
- Trinkets that instill some obsession or delusion upon the possessor

If you want to beef up or develop sahuagin a bit:
- Shark allies and/or mounts (giant sharks should be reasonably threatening)
- Give them areas of cover, such as ship hulks, kelp beds, or coral reefs so they can abuse their swimming speed
- Equip them with things like nets or containers of squid ink (effectively causing a fog cloud effect when broken under water)
- Maybe giant or drift nets
- Consider applying sahuagin racial stats to a more threatening NPC type

 

[was]

I like the sahuagin idea. Maybe throw in some underwater temples made of some of the sunken ships with fanatical sahuagin clerics and worshippers. Possibly add 4-armed sahuagin beserker/anti-paladin type defenders.

 

[steeldragons]

Three words: aquatic mind flayers.

Bet they won't see that one coming!

Bitd, we used to call them Kopru!

Hey cool! Looks like someone already did a 5e conversion!

 

[Wik]

Oo! A fun subplot:

Artificial islands SUCK for navigation. Pieces break off and often float just beneath the waves, which can damage boats. They're called deadheads, and they suck. Naturally, mariners would want some sort of warning set up. So, in this area of enchanted ships and evil spooky stuff... the PCs also have to erect a lighthouse of some sort! Or possibly even a set of ranges (a range is two or more posts with a light or a line on them. Once you line them all up in a row so that the lines overlap with one another or you only see one light, you know you're in a direct line with the range.... while "on the range" you know you're in clear water).