I'll be honest. The only reason I bought this was because of a party wipe on the Slitherswamp level to the spirit nagas and I needed an easy idea for an AL-legal adventure to help with them figuring out the more interesting situation of Alterdeep without possibly going completely off-book. I figured the agency and loose writing of a season 8 module would fit the bill. So, in that it was a success. Being able to pile on more weirdness helped.

The module, however, has many glaring issues. There are the QC issues (missing stat block, typographical errors, grammatical errors, lack of a printer-friendly version, and so on) that have been commented on at length by other reviewers. It's not a good sign when one of the first bits of information in the setting--the crystalline chimes, engraving, and door--seem to have no correlation with each other. The players need to use the gems in the doors to get around and all they have to do is to touch one. The chimes have no part in that, and the engraving would indicate that the notes are D, F, T(?), L(??), and S(???). Presumably it makes sense if you've read and ran the previous adventure and that is not what was actually intended, but there is literally nothing to build on so to do anything with it would be the hand-waviest of hand-waves and is better left out entirely.

It's unclear how players are supposed to get back from any one room to another; I assume the easiest way (and possible intent) is to run the door as a central hub leading to/from other areas with a portal on the other side. Empty rooms with obvious traps aren't very interesting even if you have players who are likely to trigger them because they can. The thralls are either going to wind up being a frustrating puzzle or a murder hobo killing spree unless the party came packing with enough dispel magics. Of course, that assumes you somehow get across to the players that the characters are enthralled without just coming out and telling them. Then, of course, there is the question of whether or not killing them all would count for "freeing them from enchantment." The explanations of who everyone is is buried in an appendix instead of being put in the main text and the puzzle "solution" is in yet another appendix.

The fight with the bone nagas would be improved by giving some idea what sort of nagas they were in life. I decided to go with one spirit and one guardian for variety, but again it seems like another case of purely lazy writing and lack of craft.

The maps are kind of fun and can scale up fairly easy with some screenshots and scaling. The side effect on the wand of lightning seems like it's a great opportunity for future role-playing that will probably be totally ignored in the majority of AL play.

Frankly, everyone involved in this module except for maybe cartography--designers, authors, and editorial for sure--should be embarrased that this module was released in the state it was. The only saving grace was that I didn't pay full-price for a rough draft.

Your classic dungeon crawl into a kobold warren. It is intended as an extended intro module for Yawning Portal, but it plays quite well on its own. It gives many different characters a chance to shine, what with traps, fights, and some lateral thinking possible. It can be somewhat difficult to run as written, as the attacks from the kobolds behind the walls is somewhat unclear and can be difficult to remember. It's a good one to run on quick notice if you've spent some time getting the map prepared and with some real work a copy of the map blown up into playable size and cut up to allow placement of small parts one at a time can really add some flair. Difficulties include the map being written as 1 inch equaling 10 feet, meaning the map feels small unless it's made quite big by going to 2 inch squares. Unfortunately, it's not as good of a module with the new season 8 rules, as even the magic item is available to all players already.

Much like the tier 1 modules, it brings an end to the trilogy but not with a great amount of satisfaction. A full party of 7 will probably find the final fight too easy, and players might need some guidance on how to actually destroy the Cyst. It's probably also got the hardest secret missions for characters to complete, as it makes all the fights throughout the module more difficult if members of the Order of the Gauntlet or the Zhentarim are present.

Probably the best of the trilogy. The opening is fun, even though I've had trouble getting players willing to try trebucheting themselves. The number of options in the middle allows the DM to set up the best encounters for the party or give the players some agency into what they actually run into, giving players some replayability if they try it again with another character. The final encounter is fun and should be a very hard fight for the characters. It's definitely difficult to run in just two hours; if you've got a larger block of time I'd suggest running three middle encounters before continuing on.

The setup is quite good and the whole thing rather creepy. The enemies might be too much for characters of lower levels in the tier even with the APL adjustments. A nice touch is a number of options for the DM to set up encounters to be a better matchup for the players. Considering the death curse, the possibility of permanent reduction to max HP may also be too much for lower-level characters. Unlike the others in the trilogy, this is where the target APL is really probably a minimum for a good session. The other option, since the trilogy isn't really tied into the death curse, is to run it after your players have dealt with the death curse in the hardcover if they're still in the appropriate tier and interested in running other adventures in Chult.

As a series of intro modules, it's about what you'd expect. Running it all will get your players from level 1 to 2 with various types of encounters that they're like to run into later in Chult. The MacGuffin had my players wanting more followup on what it actually meant, which is nothing really. It's probably better to run it after running Cellar of Death if possible, which should get your players up to level 3 and ready for either dealing with Port Nyanzaru or the tier 1 season 7 modules.

The second best module in the trilogy, and the climax of the series of modules. It can be somewhat difficult to run, as a whole heck of a lot is going on simultaneously in Bulobo, and players may have some trouble figuring out the puzzle. Mine haven't had trouble and got it right away, but as others have noticed at least one or two riddles are somewhat vague. I strongly suggest giving the party a chance to have a short rest once they're inside, as the entire module is basically two combats back to back and if they've had trouble in Bulobo going straight into the final battle is likely to not be fun to play.

This is easily the weakest of the modules in the trilogy. The urban chase doesn't make much sense, especially with the geography involved as written, and frankly is probably best skipped as it was optional to begin with. For that matter, the whole children pickpocketing the characters does not work well. The word satchel is used way too often (though my players did enjoy the chance to buy one), the NPC guide appears out of nowhere, and it was hard to get my players to continue into the jungle when they were originally told to just investigate a shop. The combat is rather unexciting and there's really not much chance for role play. The author promoting a Twitch stream in the text is unprofessional. If you are interested in running the trilogy, I'd actually suggest using theater of the mind and getting through it as fast as possible.

This is probably the best module of the trilogy. The racing brings a different mechanic to the game that my players enjoyed and allowed for a night that wasn't just combat. One note for those who are used to reading odds in the American style: The odds listed have been reversed, so that what would be listed as bet 1, receive 7 is listed as 1:7 instead of 7:1. It took me a couple minutes to figure that out. The whole yuan-ti setup isn't that compelling, but the fun of running the race overcomes the mediocre hook.

I ran this for a fill-in for a vacationing DM running Out of the Abyss. It works well with an easy hook if the characters are already in the Underdark. It's got some good RP possibilities and the combats can be fun. However, all the warnings about errors and needing to find errata are spot on. With some work, you can fix the errors and get the module into a shape that's not too hard to run, but it's probably going to take an hour of looking on the internet and annotating the writing.

This is exactly the log sheet for Season 8 I was looking for. It clearly lays out everything I'm going to get for the entire career of my character and has easy tracking to remember what I saw three months ago. The use of Comic Sans really puts it over the top! The FAQ is right, too. It really needs some stickers and gold stars for tracking.

I've only run this once and I don't do a lot of DMing, so it's quite possible that I don't have the skills to make this module shine. The concept is a nice change of pace from your standard hack-and-slash, but it takes a lot of work on the DM's part to fill in the blanks. It has everything you could want--creepy carnival, creepy clowns, creepy maze, etc., but it somehow seems less than the sum of its parts. It might actually be better to run everything but the combats theater of the mind and not try to design and draw an entire carnival on the grid. I ran it with several people I know and play with regularly who were willing to play a RP-heavy module, but it still felt like I had to railroad pretty hard to keep them moving forward. This is not something I'd want to run with a table, especially a full table, put together at the last minute with complete strangers.

I've run this multiple times and it has become my go-to for DMing on short notice, especially on busy AL nights at the store with a group of random players thrown together. The module is well-written and generally well-balanced, although I think it loses some of the fun at weak or very weak levels for the encounters. The map design for both encounters is reasonably open, which gives players a chance to plan an attack and doesn't disadvantage spellcasters and other characters that are heavily-dependent on ranged attacks. Basically any party class combination can figure out a way to defeat the enemies and seal the well if they stop and think about what they're doing and what they know from skill checks or combat results. It's pretty easy to run as a DM as it doesn't have any traps, timed events, or a need to railroad the players. The players have generally seemed to like it as well.