The reader controls a young person making their way to the city of Salamonis to strike it big. Embarking on a career as an adventurer, in their quests they begin to uncover clues toward a greater plot at work. Discovering the secrets of Salamonis, if you will.
Like The Crimson Tide before it, the player's character is a youth with no experience as the book begins, and starts with locked-in low stats. As they successfully complete quests they add points to a score called "Amonour", reflecting experience and notoriety. At certain points these can be cashed in to increase their character's stats. Also notable that the middle of the book is somewhat free-roam, with the player being able to consult a quest board for various minor adventures in the order they please, like in many modern fantasy video games.
Secrets of Salamonis provides examples of:
- Adventure Guild: One of the player's first tasks is to meet the requirements to get into the local one, which will then let them select quests to take on.
- Beware My Stinger Tail: The Screamer Queen has one, but the player has the option of trying to lasso it and chop it off, making the fight with her easier since she'll have lost her most dangerous attack.
- Boring, but Practical: The book's Spelling magic. It asks you a riddle, which if you solve you'll get some kind of advantage. You won't be doing anything cool like blowing up bad guys with lightning bolts from your hands, but it can let you do some very useful things. Like skip an intricate clue-gathering phase of a quest, or avoid a fight with a powerful monster. All in exchange for solving some pretty easy riddles.
- Born Lucky: Not exactly born, but if you train at the Temple of Logaan, you'll get a perk that makes you always win Luck rolls.
- Call-Back:
- The player can, if they're not careful, become one of the victims of Zharradan Marr, indicating this book happens in the prelim of Creature of Havoc.
- While visiting the Forest of Yore, you can pick up information that this book takes place just before the events of The Citadel of Chaos.
- A Dream Sequence later in the book faithfully recreates the first bit of The Warlock of Firetop Mountain. The Dragonfire spell's been replaced with a partial recipe for the potion you need to win this book.
- Dream Intro: The books opens on a daydream the player has of being an experienced adventurer escaping from the cave of an angry two-headed ogre.
- Evil Debt Collector: The unsubtly named Odious Pinchpenny, who has some very powerful magical accoutrements to make sure people (like the player) give him what he wants. Honestly what he demands isn't that bad, it just seems like it because he shows up during the Early Game Hell part of the book.
- Eye of Newt: There are various alchemical ingredients the reader needs to find to win the book, but there are various different clues about what's needed, so it isn't too hard to know to keep an eye out.
- Fame Gate: The adventurer's guild won't let you take certain quests until you've gained a certain level of notoriety.
- Final Boss: The Screamer Queen, broodmother of the monsters that've been terrorizing the outlying settlements of Salamonis.
- Gold–Silver–Copper Standard: The standard form of currency is the Salacoin, a silver coin worth one tenth of a gold piece. Once you join the guild you'll mostly be getting paid in standard gold pieces, though. Copper coins get mentioned early on, but don't enter into gameplay.
- Guide Dang It!: To get into the Halls of Learning, you'll have to answer a question about Titan religious lore you'll have to look up in ancillary material outside the book.
- Happily Married: Averted. Early in the book the reader meets a barbarian named Nanoc who's finished a quest and is looking forward to meeting up with his wife again. It doesn't last, as if you run into him later in the book, it turns out the adventuring life has made it hard for him to be happy at home. Of course, other factors may be at play: he left to do adventuring for five years and, when you first meet his wife and son (whom Nanoc is meeting for the first time), the child says he's four...
- The Hero's Idol: The hero's most prized possession is a book about all the adventures of the dwarf hero Longbeard. Who turns out to be living in Salamonis and joins forces with them to save the kingdom later on.
- Hopeless Boss Fight: You're given the option to attack the royal tax collector, but he is, of course, way more powerful than he seems.
- Jigsaw Puzzle Plot: Some of the things on the quest board are just generic warrior jobs, but a lot of them have a clue to what the larger plot is.
- Job System: Before officially becoming an adventurer, the reader gets the chance to train at various places and gain a perk related to the job they pick.
- Kryptonite Factor: While on one quest that involves fighting a giant maggot, if the hero's gotten a scholarly education, they'll know they can melt the thing with salt and not have to fight it.
- Riddle: How the book's magic system works. They'll be told a riddle, have to add up relevant numbers to the letters in the answer, and then the magic takes effect.
- Shell Game: On their first night in town, the player can meet a grifter who teaches them how to pull a trick like this to get a room at the inn.
- Shout-Out:
- A major character in the book is a barbarian named Nanoc
- Another is named Ruznik Ullsen, a reference to artist Russ Nicholson, who illustrated the first two books in the series and some later on.
