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The Gold Bug [Adventure Site]
🕑 Added 2025-09-01 03:07:50 +0000 UTCUPDATE: This post is superseded by this post with the PDF adventure, maps, handouts, and PNG assets.
Ahoy scurvy dogs!
Today I'm posting more of an update that a full release, as I'm not quite ready to share the finished version of this next project, but I want to you all to get a glimpse of this, as it will be part of our Talk Like A Pirate Day Week worldwide event.
The Gold Bug or The Buzzard's Nest
I realized a week or so ago that I've never designed a proper pirate DUNGEON, a fact which I set out to remedy immediately. I'm talking about the kind of location that a rich pirate lord would build to keep his most important asset—treasure—both secret and safe. We're talking ciphers, traps, puzzles, decoys, red herrings, skeletons, and undead (of course). I also wanted an adventure site that could be low combat but high risk, so that GMs and groups have some more diversity in their choices.
This short adventure will be included in the forthcoming Dark Caribbean setting and sourcebook—a project I’ve at last returned to, after a year’s detour into Down Among the Dead.
It has several core inspirations:
The famous short story "The Gold-Bug" by Edgar Allan Poe, which you can read the original story here, or listen to the great Vincent Price read it to you here.
Some facts and many legends surrounding real Olivier Levasseur (a.k.a. La Buse) and the his famous treasure cryptogram, who through an encrypted cipher into the crowd as he was being executed.
One-Eyed Willie's dungeon in Goonies.
The amazing Uncharted 4: A Thief's End (which I've in the middle of playing and is all about pirate treasure hunting).
Classic treasure hunt movies like National Treasure, Indiana Jones, Adams Family, and Skeleton Crew (the new Disney Star Wars show, which is basically space-Goonies).
My plan for the adventure, in addition to this one page map, is to include a written cryptogram cipher handout, art of the Gold Bug, and provide info on multiple ways to extend the adventure like adding a treasure map, hiding addition treasure in the dungeon's main puzzle, and introducing rival parties that are hot on the PCs tail.
I'll update this post when I have the visual assets more complete in the next few days, but I suspect they will change once all the text has been finalized and put into layout, so I don't want to do the same work twice. This will include full resolution maps (4x the one above), keyed versions, player-facing versions, rooms as PNG assets, an old map version, VTT assets, and more.
Then in the next week or so (with at least a week of lead time for TLAP Week), I'll post the adventure text.
![The Gold Bug [Adventure Site]](https://img10.leaqio.com/storage/10/hu/mi/9e04c0-019e82ed-0a9a-740b-8ed7-d14353e891bb.jpg)
Comments
Eamon Mulholland
First of all, yay TLAP Week and three cheers for a proper pirate dungeon! Definitely put a smile on my face. Really curious to see the player facing versions since this looks like a difficult space to describe, and players having enough info to ask good questions is super important when traps are a big feature.
