To unapologetically steal from Mike Rugnetta: Here's an idea — No matter if it's divided into three chunks, something that only comprises one story cannot be considered a trilogy, and it will always be weaker for having been unceremoniously hacked to pieces. Usually in the middle. But how do we know if something is a set of stories or just a single one? Well, the answer here is to ask, "What's the tension? Where does it resolve?" A story always needs a tension; this is what gives it us sense of beginning, middle and end: A tension is introduced, played out, and resolved.

By this logic, The Umbral Aristocracy Trilogy isn't a trilogy at all. At best, it's a duology, but even that's stretching it. From start to finish, the tension comes in the form of the question, "Hey, what's up with this map?" and that tension is only resolved at the end of the third module. The 'trilogy' only has one tension and true to form, it's the middle chunk that suffers.

When you think of it in these terms, it's clear to see why Beneath the City of the Dead feels lacklustre in spite of some pretty great individual moments, particularly in its bonus objectives. Helping out a dwarven gravedigger with what seems like a scavenging dog ripping up corpses, but turns out to secretly be a pack of ghouls? Nice twist! Helping a wererat's ghostly sister find closure? Cool scenario! But neither feel connected in any real way to the main adventure. They feel tacked on.

And really, could they be any other way? Beneath the City of the Dead has a lot going for it; the combat encounters are actually really neat in the way they make use of tight spaces and numbers to feel claustrophobic and powerful. (Only one fight involving swords, armour and portraiture misses its mark.) But it can't tell any other story beyond: You come into this crypt. Oh hey, you made it through the crypt.

Beneath the City of the Dead is a flavourful but otherwise by the numbers dungeon crawl. It lacks compelling story, has a hum-drum quality to the entire proceeding and cannot help but feel like it's padding time within a trilogy that is only one story rather than a trio of stories that tie together. While it is undoubtedly a victim of the structure of the entire trilogy it also cannot escape the sense that it could have been much more.

This was a fun advnture to run for players. It was pretty straightforward in regards to the main and bonus objectives and was easy enough to describe in detail. My party ended up RPing almost this entire adventure, including interacting the the boss in a hilarious way.

I really enjoyed this module. It can be dangerous if the party is below the APL, but that's pretty common. I've run it as a DM 3 times now, 2 with the 2-hour and once with the 4-hour. I've seen a lot of creative solutions by players with traps and encounters which has made it a real treat.

One of the better DDAL08 modules. I did not notice as many errors as other modules and it ran smoothly.

I've read many other AL modules and this just doesn't seem to have had any effort put into it. I do a large amount of prep before ever running anything, so I will be able to repair it, but I shouldn't have to repair an adventure to this extent. The descriptions are hard to follow, there seemed to be no effort put into laying out the encounters logically, and I could BARELY follow the idea they were going for. The tipping point for me not giving this at least 3 stars (because hey, at least it gives me an idea on adventure to run) is that the map does not match its written description. This is just lazy and I paid money for this product.

Fun little dungeon crawl, the first mod where my players got arrested

This is by no means a standalone adventure. Combat encounters are uninspired, and the portrait room can quickly lead to a TPK with a strong party of rash players. "I stride through the room and do the thing" can be problematic, but I reward sticking to the the character the player has created.

I do absolutely love Artor Morlin for some reason. I ran the modules in 1 4 5 6 2 3 progression, so the characters recognized him and he they, and had an exciting conversation afterwards. I have hated to run the 08-01 and 08-02 on a single night and left the players with a bland finish.

The use of werewolves in 08-01 and 08-02 is great.

This adventure was not especially good. Room descriptions contradict themselves, the magic item isn't actually found anywhere, and the map seems to have winding corridors just to disguise the fact that it's a linear progression (or to fit it on the page.) The encounters mostly seem to rely on overwhelming the players with numbers, and end up just being drawn-out combat (I admit that this is in keeping with Artor's recent intrusions, but from a gameplay perspective it's annoying to have to deal with so many NPCs.)

This is very definitely a middle adventure. It really cannot stand on its own. The hook for groups who didn't play 8-1 is fine, but the ending literally has no satisfactory stopping point. You have to either ad lib something or just head directly into 8-3. The fact that this adventure is meant as a segue, and does alright in that role, is the reason I didn't rate it too poorly.

The ghost bonus objective might add some roleplaying opportunities, if you have the time. It looked interesting, but I had to skip it.

"empty, boring, plotless" are some of quotes I got from my players upon giving this module my best effort and it was the best recieved module in the set.

Pretty Good adventure and the setting is different than other Waterdeep settings, Ran it on Halloween!

An old school dungeon crawl at it's best. Bonus Objective A is a not really well written. The combat is innovative but has some very odd choices for monsters. The undead encounter in area B is not really thought out well.

The underlying idea for this adventure is good (the only thing saving it from one star), but the final product is a bit of a failure. Much like I've heard of the other Season 8 AL content so far, this is less of a pre-made module, and more of a vague adventure outline. While that's not a terrible thing in and of itself, the development/editing on this "adventure" is incredibly lackluster. It definitely seems like an unfinished work, and should not have been released as is.

The map is unlabeled, and while it's not too difficult to figure out which rooms are which, that extra annoyance is amplified by other issues. And there are relatively major issues with the majority of the encounter in the module, including text contradicting itself and/or not matching the map, an unlikely (or even mechanically impossible, with map and minis rules) number of combatants in confined areas, errors in the printed stat blocks of creatures, and a completely underwhelming climax that, from what I can tell, requires the next adventure in the series to resolve.

As a DM, you're going to have to do a lot of tweaking and/or straight up re-writing of the module in order to make something sensible and compelling out of the mess of the final product, which seems to be a hallmark of the current season's offerings. It's incredibly unlikely that I'll willingly run any more content from Season 8 if this is indicative of the quality of what's to come.

Like the other DDAL08 adventures, this will require more preparation skills than previous season adventures. Newer DMs may want to ensure they have plenty of time to prepare, or skip these adventures altogether until they feel comfortable improvising most of an adventures content and interactions. Provide in each adventure scene is a list of the NPCs, what they know, and what their motivations are. The rest is up to the DM to set the scene. If this is your bag, go for it!

This is a typical "break into/explore a crypt" scenario, albeit with some fun bonuses like not being seen by the City Watch while doing it. Like DDAL08-01 before it the end comes rather suddenly with a cliffhanger ending, setting up the finale in DDAL08-03. A couple of things to note:

• Some of the combat encounters (particularly in the bonus objectives) can be pretty rough on a small group of players (such as 3 level 2 characters). Keep that in mind when running the encounters.
• The magic item unlocked at the end of the adventure is not present anywhere in the adventure, so be creative in placing it somewhere (for example, the NPC the players meet at the end of the adventure could offer it to them as a means of securing their aid for DDAL08-03).

I played this as the 2h version at a con, then I DMed the 4h version and ironically it's shorter in the 4h version. The 2nd sidequest could have been written a little clearer as to which sister was afraid of rats (first reading seemed like the Star necklace was afraid of rats, when in fact it should have been specified the Moon necklace/quest-giver was the one afraid of ratts-which makes way more sense). The map/text could have been worded better at the 2 statues and door which is shut and the only way to open it is the item found in the room past the door? (why have a door there? it should be the secret door is found by the item, and there should be no door by the statues).

The most glaring issue, however, is the fact that the actual conclusion is not included in DDAL8-02, but is part I of DDAL8-03.

Was a little tough for my players was fun and love that they get to work with a Vampire.