I won't address the editing issues past saying there are a number of them.

What I will address is narrative and combat tuning issues.

The narrative is actually a pretty good narrative, for the most part. A degree of fun, a degree of wit, and some interesting characters to play with. It deliberately eschews the usual 'End of the World' T4 tropes of Utter Disaster and DOOOOOOOM!!!!! if the Great Heroes of The Realms don't the Grand Evil Poobah. If it weren't a T4 adventure, set in Faerune, I'd account that a strength.

Unfortunately, this is a T4 adventure set in Faerune. Faerune is a world that lurches from disaster to disaster, saved on a daily basis by the acts of heroes. Trying to pretend otherwise is silly -- it's just part of the narrative of the setting. Every land, every city, every village owes something to heroes of one stripe or another. From the lesser heroes who deal with lesser issues, to the greater heroes that deal with world-shattering issues. They have a perfect world-shattering plot here, and they just don't use it to it's full potential.

Now, by itself that flaw wouldn't even be worth knocking a singel star off for. But the result of that flaw is what costs this adventure more than anything else. It's undertuned. In trying to avoid 'End of the World!!!!' monsters, the writers have left themselves in a horrible place as far as monster selection. Much of the combat is appropriate to a T3 party. A low end T3 party at that. Some of the fights, to be completely honest, work better for a T2 party. Anyone who goes to DM this, have Kobold Fight Club handy to build encounters with, and be prepared to rewrite every single fight. (And don't forget that with Staff of the Magi, Cloaks of Invisibiliity, and other legendary's becoming standard equipment, you're gonna need to push into 'deadly' fights to make any progress at all.) Take the time to look up thematic replacements, and make sure to utilize every last trick you can get -- a T4 party has plenty of tricks of their own. The monsters chosen, all to often, simply aren't a significant threat to a T4 party, not even in numbers.

The optional end boss, as an example, can easily die before it gets a single turn -- it simply doesn't have a fraction of the AC or HP it needs to face a high-powered group of T4 adventurers. It's a fun encounter, but so undertuned as to be a negligible combat with no meaningful resource expenditure.

I won't address the editing issues past saying there are a number of them.

What I will address is narrative and combat tuning issues.

The narrative is actually a pretty good narrative, for the most part. A degree of fun, a degree of wit, and some interesting characters to play with. It deliberately eschews the usual 'End of the World' T4 tropes of Utter Disaster and DOOOOOOOM!!!!! if the Great Heroes of The Realms don't the Grand Evil Poobah. If it weren't a T4 adventure, set in Faerune, I'd account that a strength.

Unfortunately, this is a T4 adventure set in Faerune. Faerune is a world that lurches from disaster to disaster, saved on a daily basis by the acts of heroes. Trying to pretend otherwise is silly -- it's just part of the narrative of the setting. Every land, every city, every village owes something to heroes of one stripe or another. From the lesser heroes who deal with lesser issues, to the greater heroes that deal with world-shattering issues. They have a perfect world-shattering plot here, and they just don't use it to it's full potential.

Now, by itself that flaw wouldn't even be worth knocking a singel star off for. But the result of that flaw is what costs this adventure more than anything else. It's undertuned. In trying to avoid 'End of the World!!!!' monsters, the writers have left themselves in a horrible place as far as monster selection. Much of the combat is appropriate to a T3 party. A low end T3 party at that. Some of the fights, to be completely honest, work better for a T2 party. Anyone who goes to DM this, have Kobold Fight Club handy to build encounters with, and be prepared to rewrite every single fight. (And don't forget that with Staff of the Magi, Cloaks of Invisibiliity, and other legendary's becoming standard equipment, you're gonna need to push into 'deadly' fights to make any progress at all.) Take the time to look up thematic replacements, and make sure to utilize every last trick you can get -- a T4 party has plenty of tricks of their own. The monsters chosen, all to often, simply aren't a significant threat to a T4 party, not even in numbers.

I'm going to give a special call out to two fights: one uses wil'o'wisps with a mere +4 to hit, another is a mass of CR 3 undead. +4 to hit isn't worth showing up with in T4 -- it's a joke. And CR3 undead are just an initiative roll away from being Turned and destroyed by a high-level cleric before they do a thing.

I won't address the editing issues past saying there are a number of them.

What I will address is narrative and combat tuning issues.

The narrative is actually a pretty good narrative, for the most part. A degree of fun, a degree of wit, and some interesting characters to play with. It deliberately eschews the usual 'End of the World' T4 tropes of Utter Disaster and DOOOOOOOM!!!!! if the Great Heroes of The Realms don't the Grand Evil Poobah. If it weren't a T4 adventure, set in Faerune, I'd account that a strength.

Unfortunately, this is a T4 adventure set in Faerune. Faerune is a world that lurches from disaster to disaster, saved on a daily basis by the acts of heroes. Trying to pretend otherwise is silly -- it's just part of the narrative of the setting. Every land, every city, every village owes something to heroes of one stripe or another. From the lesser heroes who deal with lesser issues, to the greater heroes that deal with world-shattering issues. They have a perfect world-shattering plot here, and they just don't use it to it's full potential.

Now, by itself that flaw wouldn't even be worth knocking a singel star off for. But the result of that flaw is what costs this adventure more than anything else. It's undertuned. In trying to avoid 'End of the World!!!!' monsters, the writers have left themselves in a horrible place as far as monster selection. Much of the combat is appropriate to a T3 party. A low end T3 party at that. Some of the fights, to be completely honest, work better for a T2 party. Anyone who goes to DM this, have Kobold Fight Club handy to build encounters with, and be prepared to rewrite every single fight. (And don't forget that with Staff of the Magi, Cloaks of Invisibiliity, and other legendary's becoming standard equipment, you're gonna need to push into 'deadly' fights to make any progress at all.) Take the time to look up thematic replacements, and make sure to utilize every last trick you can get -- a T4 party has plenty of tricks of their own. The monsters chosen, all to often, simply aren't a significant threat to a T4 party, not even in numbers.

An entertaining mod, but beware -- a T4 mod is not for the DM of faint heart.

The good:

The plot is entertaining, and while I'm not done with the T4 content yet it appears that the AL team has learned from the lessons of S4 and is giving DMs all the information up front rather than trying to surprise us with it in later modules.

The fights are interesting, with unique mechanics and ideas that suit a T4 party, and for once the foes can actually hold up against a T4 party.

The bad:

The last room reads like it should be a massive setpiece battle that swings back and forth; in practice, I've never seen it play out that way.

The ugly:

The scale here is huge. Just... huge. This is not a 4 hour mod, it would have been better served as an 8 hour mod, just because the combats can drag on... and on... and on.

I don't know if it's a player base issue, or a signposting issue, but people dont' seem to quite 'get' that this is a multi-planar adventure and that they should be popping into the border ethereal. You just don't see people popping over in any of the rooms except maybe the orrery, where there's a rather huge hint that there's something there. Advice to fellow DMs: really play up the border etheral clues. Sometimes, you just have to use a clue-hammer and WHACK that info into your player's heads. (And if that fails, upgrade to a clue-missile)

Squee warning is in effect. Squee warning is in effect.

SQUEEEEEEEE!

I cannot overstate how much fun this mod is in the hands of a prepared DM.

The good:

A fun, entertaining, and original dungeon crawl, littered with interesting traps instead of just 'dex save this' traps. The author clearly paid attention to the master's lesson in good trap design provided by the best of Tomb of Annihilation, and IMO also paid close attention to the concurrent master lesson in bad trap design in Crypt of the Nine Gods. When you get smacked by a trap, you feel guilty for not seeing it, not set upon by a surprise. It has a clearly communited time limit, and an interesting antagonist.

I cannot overstate how much fun the reverse gravity trap was. That entire room was just pure awesome. "And again, upside down." HILARIOUS. Of course, when you have a druid and a monk -- both immune to poison -- doing the bulk of the work, it looses some punch.

The bad:

Like many T3 mods, this one has issues with unusual party compositions. You really shouldn't punish players for not bringing spellcasters, a lot of people don't have a huge choice in their T3 / T4 character selection. The doors can be very difficult to handle with a party consisting of a barbarian, a fighter, and a cleric -- none of whom can cast 'comprehend languages' even if you do give them a scroll. Or in the gravity room, when we had a group without anyone arcane or dex based in the party. When no one is proficient in arcana or thieves tools, this room becomes positively vicious. Class checks really shouldn't be a thing in AL.

Also, the Beholder fight just feels... out of place. While it's vaguely fun, there's something 'off' about it. And it definitely compounded the scaling issue above. (Even more fun, a monk can almost negate the entire fight by running into the pit, using their action to get the snake,t hen bonus action dashing back to the door in a single round.)

The ugly:

The boss fight is a massive set-piece fight. It's fun, but it's also going to take a LOT of time to run.

A good, solid T3 entry. It's fun, witty, and entertaining -- but could use a massive editorial pass.

The Good:

The back-and-forth bickering of the party's two sage allies provides a comedic backdrop as needed (I kept turning the 'like an old married couple' into 'these guys are in a relationship' and the parties loved it), while their absent-minded professorism keeps the party on edge. The characterization of the lich had people laughing and enjoying themselves at his expense.

The mod's author actually pays attention to the general structure of a 5E adventuring day, with a series of encounters, rather than trying to throw one or two mega encounters at players. He also includes built-in short rests to help nudge the short-rest characters into line.

The Bad:

1 on 1 combats can be fun. The entire party getting stuck in a set of 1 on 1 combats, not so much. I saw combat oriented characters blast their opponent with ease, while social, support, and similar characters struggled to stay alive. That section could also use an editorial pass to clear up it's instructions, I'm still not sure if I quite ran it 'right'.

As for the Bibliomancer, I had to use the sages to shortcut this 'puzzle' -- because the answer wasn't included. If you're gonna include a puzzle, give the DM the answer. This entire section could do with a rewrite, to help clarify things. (What 'flaw' did the bibliomancer have? The sages agree there is one mentioned in the previous section, but there's no flaw mentioned there!)

The Ugly:

Psycic Scream with a DC 20 save is a GREAT opener. Unfortunately for us, it's stun effect doesn't go away until a character passes the save. That means that not only is it possible to lock players out of the entire final fight (which isn't that much fun for them), if a character has a negative int score (say, barbarian?), they can never save. Never, ever, ever. Evena nat 20 doesn't save them, since you can't 'crit' a saving throw. We had people walk away with permanently stunned characters that we had to handwave away and let the locals heal in the healing room.

A good, solid dungeon crawl. It's a bit light on combat, though that gives it more time for the fun roleplay and exploration elements. The traps are just plain fun to play with and run.

The boss fight could definitely use touching up.

Overall, this mod reminds me of the fact that it's easier to critique something that's bad -- because you can find the things to help improve -- than something that's good, because there's nothing left to complain about. This mod only lacks that little something extra, the 'je ne sais quoi', to tick it over into a 5 star. It's a good mod, it just doesn't cross the line into exceptional.

Normally I don't like 1 hour adventures. This set of T2 encounters has mechanical issues -- I had to 'hack' extra short rests in several times, most notably on the Hermit's tower -- but somehow manages to overcome my usual complaints. They're fun, bite-sized adventures you can fit in where needed.

A solid try at a 2 hour adventure. It suffers from the usual issues of 2 hour adventures, but manages to pick up a bit with it's conclusion.

It makes solid use of magician's force to give the players the appearance of agency, while maintaining it's internal integrety quite well. The final fight has potential to be quite entertaining.

One of my favorite modules, ever. I don't typically like 2 hour mods. This one is the exception.

It's a giant sand box that players get to play in, and DMs are given awesome tools to handle anything they do. So long as they stay on-mission, the mod doesn't concern itself with how they might prevail, it just gives us tools to adjudicate whatever they might want to try. And if the players get stuck, it gives us some truly awesome ideas.

Bobsledding down a mountain, in a giant's sarcophogus, would be awesome. But no, that's not what we get. We get to SURF an AVALANCHE down the mountain. And rather than being given nitty-gritty mechanics to adjudicate it with no sense of fun, we're given general guidelines and told to adjust to what our table needs.

I cannot over-emphasize how good this module is. This mod, by itself, not only clears the threshold of awesome, it leaps over it to the point where it breaks my rating curve. I make it a policy to rate a mod that avoids errors a mere 4 stars. It's not enough to be 'good', if you want 5 stars for me -- you need to be great. To have that special spark of something special. Not only would this mod get my 5 star rating, it's so far past just great, past 'merely' exceptional, that I'd give it 6 stars if I could.

A good mix of role play, investigation, and combat, with some genuinely entertaining moments. A solid, strong effort that easily avoids railroading players into the 'one right way' to solve it.

The only thing that keeps this from being a 5 star review is the lack of that something extra, that 'oomph', that you get on truly great mods. This is a good mod, it just doesn't make the leap into great.

T1 mods should really be careful of being combat-oriented. Way to easy to kill characters off without even meaning to, and an absolute dearth of actual roleplaying opportunities.

2 hour mods have to be frugal with their time. This mod was too frugal in all the wrong places.

A fun mod, well worth running

It's fun, engaging, and entertaining. No two runs are likely to be identical, right down to the possibility of a high-capability rogue (or other clever player shenanigans) short-circuiting half the adventure. It does have a few editorial issues that DMs need to be aware of and address. It's not explained in the mod, but the DMG guidance on traps is added because DMs are expected to ad-lib additional traps as needed and appropriate.

Probably it's biggest flaw -- and the fact that this is actually it's biggest flaw is a pretty good sign of quality! -- is that a pair of assassins are given a set of scrolls. Scrolls that, firstly, they cannot possibly use as they are not spellcasters, and secondly that -- in the case of the Silence spell -- does not actually do them any good, since it's locked to the place it's cast on, and not mobile.

This mod continues the fun of the season in high style, with interested fights, interesting NPCs, and quick action.

My only complaint is that, as written, many DMs will assume there's no room for a short rest between the two fights. If the party consists entirely of long-rest characters, it's not that big a deal -- but a group of warlocks, fighters, and monks are going to be bitterly and unfairly pressed because they are never given the chance to recover the resources that other classes have in enough quantity to not need recovery.

Remember: the DMG explicitly calls out 2 short rests to the long. This mod, like many AL mods, forgets that this isn't just an HP recovery opportunity -- it's when certain classes get the opportunity to recover abilities, bringing their power level in line with the expected power level.

This mod continues this season's efforts to incorporate 'unusual' ability checks, to continue to attempt to bring in unusual character abilities.

It does an excellent job, and gives an interesting investigation storyline, with some interesting diversions that actually give players the ability to interact meaningfully with the world.

Wadamu is a fun character, and works well to smooth over the roughness of incorporating wilderness survival in the normally combat-oriented AL structure.