This is a fantastic adventure location, with a great connected thread of logic and interwoven connections. Every NPC has a rich and realistic connection with every other NPC, with so much potential for interfering PC shenanigans. It even has a great TPK recovery potential, allowing the PCs to reawaken after losing initially as new potential sacrifices, and start over.

Like all the best adventure locations, it's a powder keg in a room full of fuses. It asks a little more of the GM to keep the connections in their head, so they know PCs doing X will probably affect Y, but not too much. It's so self-contained, and there's only a few people to keep track of.

I know some people complain about it not "telling the players what they're supposed to be doing," but I think this is just a misunderstanding of playstyles. This is not a traditional 5e linear adventure (or "adventure path"). It's more in the player-driven sandbox / OSR tradition, where it is a benefit to give the players the flexibility to determine their own goals. It gives a whole page of hooks to connect players and let's them loose, and it does it so well.

The only complaint I do share with others is that the richly interwoven meta-narrative could be better laid out more fully initially, so the reader doesn't have to hunt around in the book for the various pieces that fit together.

Pros:

• Interesting NPCs, quest hooks and the story behind the dungeon
• Awesome layout, I love having the relevant sections of the map and the description of the rooms in that section all on the same page or spread
• Interesting encounters and traps that can be overcome by clever thinking and good roleplaying - combat or simple checks are not always the answer!
• I personally really liked the art, though I know not everyone else might
• Awesome random encounters, sights & sounds, and other random tables. I love random tables!
• This adventure can be easily dropped into most existing settings and games
• Although just shy of a megadungeon, it can provide for many sessions of gameplay and players can go through it at their own pace
• Can be easily looted for parts (i.e. you can just take some of the encounters and NPCs and traps and sections of the tomb and adopt it in your own game, rather than running Tomb as a whole)

Cons:

• Although there are handy flowcharts and explanations of the ritual and the sacrifice, I still found parts of it rather confusing because some of the crucial information to the main plot is buried in throughout the book. Take notes or highlight as you are reading through it!
• I was not a fan of the writing style in the module and it could've used a lot more editing and proofreading (incomplete sentences, other frequent grammatical mistakes, some spelling errors). The rest of the module is so polished that the lack of proofreading stands out like a sore thumb
• Players have to be warned ahead of time that this is not a "fair" dungeon. They are not expected (in fact they are strongly discouraged) from trying to defeat every threat in the dungeon. This may feel quite unsatisfactory to many players, especially those who have not played the oldest editions of D&D. While I am used to and fully expected this approach from this module, I was still taken aback a bit by some of the deadliness. It's not quite as deadly and sadistic as Tomb of Horrors, but it may not be to every DM and player's liking.

Depending on what you're looking for in an adventure module this could easily range from 5 stars to 3 stars. Let's break it down:

• Incredibly interesting setting
• Great backstory
• Gorgeous presentation, art, maps, etc
• Easily a piece that could be "plugged in" to another campaign or setting

• Very difficult to figure out how to run this as a module
• Not much clear direction for what the players should do or how they should interact with the world
• If running the suggested play "all the characters start out stuck in the dungeon" there really aren't very good clues for them to figure out what's going on or how to deal with it. In other words there is a ton of backstory but virtually no clear idea for how to get that backstory to the players.

Overall this is very well-created, exceptionally crafted, quality work. If you want something that works as a good and interesting setting and not a stand-alone adventure module this is great. If you're looking for clever ideas, interetsing new monsters, or just an interesting read then definitely pick this up. If you're looking for a stand-alone adventure module to run the players through be prepared for a lot of work. I for one am very glad I picked this up.