Are you prepared to journey to Icewind Dale, the frozen north of Faerûn? Times are strange, and countless rumors swirl around this cold and isolated land, like so many snowflakes in an endless blizzard. The next D&D adventure, announced at D&D Live 2020, is dark fantasy horror story titled Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden. This encounter is the fourth part of an ongoing encounter series called “Icewind Mail: Special Delivery,” a non-canon dark comedy that leads into the official adventure. Well, sort of. It’s more like it tosses players in the general direction of the official adventure with some silly props and tells them to go have fun.

The previous encounters in this series are:

1. Loadin’ Up the Icebreaker
2. Frost and Fear in Fireshear
3. Ambush at Aurilssbarg

Battle on the Icebreaker

The characters are traveling back to Fireshear to dock and prepare for an overland journey to Ten-Towns. On the journey there, however, their ship is attacked by an undead sea monster! They need to defend the Icebreaker, along with their crew and captain, from being destroyed before they reach the port.

The giant shark skeleton that attacks the Icebreaker in this encounter is the byproduct of a frost giant necromancer conducting evil magic in Icewind Dale, near the mountain known as Kelvin’s Cairn. An adventurer named Artus Cimber, whom the characters have been tasked with delivering a parcel to, is trying to deal with the threat—and the unwitting characters have to manage the fallout of his battle against the forces of evil. In a future encounter, however, they can take on the source of this evil once and for all in the course of their deliveries.

Combat Encounter: Evil on the Icy Sea

This combat encounter is beyond deadly for a party of 2nd-level characters; however, they have the aid of the crew of the Icebreaker. The Dungeon Master will need to carefully manage the monster and NPCs in this fight in order to avoid annihilating the heroes.

Read or paraphrase the following to begin the encounter:

You stand on the deck of the Icebreaker, gazing eastward over the fog-shrouded frigid sea until it reaches the distant mountains on the horizon. The peace of the misty morning is broken by a shout from the crow’s nest. “Captain!” the sailor cries. “Something’s headed right toward us from the stern, moving fast. It’s an intercept course!”

The creature heading directly towards the Icebreaker is a giant shark skeleton. Its bones are bleached white and it has two giant pieces of glowing black onyx lodged in its eye sockets. If you don’t have access to the Sleeping Dragon's Wake adventure, use giant shark statistics, but give it immunity to poison damage, and a 20-foot walking speed to represent the humanoid skeletons inside it that can use their legs to walk it around.

The shark rams into the back of the Icebreaker, causing the ship to rock, and starts gnawing through her hull as sailors rush to the deck. Captain Turth Silvermane, a half-orc veteran, stands by the helm and bellows orders. If the characters ask him for orders, he asks them to try and dislodge the beast gnawing on the stern of the ship. Roll initiative!

If the characters can’t dislodge the shark after 2 turns, it tears a hole in the stern of the ship, then dips under the waves as the Icebreaker starts taking on water. This has consequences in the “Shark Attack!” section, below. The characters can dislodge the shark by forcing it to move (such as with an eldritch blast empowered by the Repelling Blast invocation), or by dealing damage to it. Once the characters deal 25 damage or more to the skeletal giant shark, it detaches and slips beneath the waves to prepare for its next attack.

Shark Attack!

Read or paraphrase the following:

Captain Silvermane growls as the shark disappears beneath the waves. “I don’t like this… that was too easy. Stay on guard, mateys!”

One round passes in safety after the giant skeletal shark is dislodged and lurks beneath the cloudy sea, giving the characters a chance to heal or cast protective spells. Then, on its initiative, the giant skeletal shark leaps from the ocean and soars into the air, then slams onto the deck of the Icebreaker and bellows a fearsome challenge. Terrifyingly, the skeletal shark stands up on six pairs of skeletal, humanoid legs. A creature that makes a successful DC 13 Wisdom (Perception) check can see the skeletons of six sahuagin trapped inside the shark, using their bodies to maneuver it around while on the ship’s deck. This leap is all the shark can do, and it ends its turn. Silvermane bellows for aid from the sailors belowdecks.

Roll initiative for the sailors; they have a +1 bonus to initiative rolls. A group of 10 sailors of various races appear one turn later on their turn in the initiative order. If the shark breached the Icebreaker’s hull in the previous section, only 5 sailors appear, as the others are bailing water and patching the hull breach. Captain Silvermane joins the fight as well.

See the “Managing Mass Combat” sidebar below for more information on how to handle a group of sailors.

Shark Tactics

The giant skeletal shark is a tremendously powerful creature that can drop most 2nd-level characters to 0 hit points in a single attack. Only have it attack a player character if they are the only creature that it can reach on its turn (using its 20-foot walking speed). Once the shark is reduced to half its hit point maximum, it roars and uses its reaction to spew forth four of the skeletons propping it up. This reduces its walking speed to 10 feet, but now these skeletons focus on killing the characters.

This shark and its skeleton allies fight until destroyed.

Managing Mass Combat

Mass combat is one of the most challenging tasks for a Dungeon Master. Playing monsters and a group of ten sailors is a huge mental burden. Instead of forcing yourself to flip back and forth between monster and NPC statistics, consider the sailors as a single unit of creatures. Each member of this unit has their own space on the map, but they essentially have no statistics. If a creature attacks them, the attack hits on any roll other than a natural 1, and the attack always kills them outright (or knocks them out, if you want to be merciful to your nameless NPCs).

The group of sailors focus all their attacks on the giant shark, and they deal 3 damage for every sailor present. Their damage dwindles as the shark kills more and more of their unit.

Since Captain Silvermane is a named character, the players may expect him to contribute more than his nameless sailors. Simply have him deal 10 damage to the shark each turn. If the shark attacks him, he is instantly dropped to 0 hit points and begins dying. If you want to make this simulation feel more “fair” or “realistic,” consider rolling dice in secret before making these decisions. You can roll the dice for a dozen NPCs if you like, but this method is quicker, simpler, and less of a headache for you as the Dungeon Master.

Conclusion

The shark is destroyed when it is reduced to 0 hit points. It roars and thrashes, then explodes in a xylophonic clatter of ribs and teeth. Each creature within 20 feet of it must make a DC 13 Dexterity saving throw, taking 7 (2d6) slashing damage on a failed save or half as much on a successful one. Sailors and other NPCs may fall unconscious, but aren’t killed outright by the shark’s death throes. The two magnificent black onyx gemstones in its eye sockets tumble onto the deck of the ship. Each one is worth 100 gp.

After this attack, Captain Silvermane orders the Icebreaker to make its way to Fireshear as quickly as possible so they can make full repairs, give a proper burial to any lost crewmembers, and find new crew. If Silvermane was killed in this fight, he is survived by his first mate, a brown-eyed, silver-haired chaotic neutral female human veteran named Saderthe Vel.

Are you excited for Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden? Looking forward to more chilly adventures over the sweltering summer? Let us know what you're looking forward to in the comments! 

Get ready for more icy adventures in Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden by preordering the digital version on D&D Beyond, and get free preorder bonuses like the Glacial Digital Dice Set. 

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Did you like this encounter? Check out the encounters in the Encounter of the Week series. You can also pick up the adventures I've written on the DMs Guild, such as The Temple of Shattered Minds, a suspenseful eldritch mystery with a mind flayer villain. My most recent adventures are included in the bestselling Encounters in Theros, a collection of over 70 unique encounters created by the Guild Adepts, which can be used to enhance your campaign in Theros or in your Greek mythology-inspired campaign setting. Also check out the Platinum Bestseller Tactical Maps: Adventure Atlas, a collection of 88 unique encounters created by the Guild Adepts, which can be paired with the beautiful poster battlemaps in Tactical Maps Reincarnated.

James Haeck is the lead writer for D&D Beyond, the co-author of Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus, and the Critical Role Explorer's Guide to Wildemount, a member of the Guild Adepts, and a freelance writer for Wizards of the Coast, the D&D Adventurers League, and other RPG companies. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his fiancée Hannah and their animal companions Mei and Marzipan. You can find him wasting time on Twitter at @jamesjhaeck.