The transition between the Neogi (introduced as villians in DDAL10-06) and then the focus being on this seemingly unrelated city of horros is a little unsatisfying. Especially for players who have gotten attached to the Goliaths of Wyrmdoom Crag this module feels like a distraction from the main storyline of getting them back. The structure of the module in exploring this Ancient city is neat and definitely nice and creepy. The fights didn't feel very challenging for the party, even with the adjustments for strong/very strong party compositions. The party didn't enjoy the chase sequence at the end, chases in general don't seem to be very engaging in D&D right now.

To me it feels similar to DDAL10-02, in that both modules feel like filler, with some interesting narrative threads being established for later on in this storyline, but not a lot of forward momentum keeping players engaged as they play this particular module.

It was a fun adventure! The encounters with the Ice Trolls then Mammoth and the Winter Wolves was a standout, nail biting experience especially with the auras.

The gathering of herbs felt like skippable filler, The module hit 5 hours with a group that was average per APL guidance due to the travel and gathering mechanics. I think in this case, while the Apothecary and Chwinga were fun, they weren't adding to the adventure, I'd rather just have this module be all about navigating the combat encounters, and tighten it up so the Exploration Pillar helps with navigating the threats in part 4, and the social pillar provides more alternate ways to avoid combat if needed.

The Vampire Kobolds felt like HP sponges rather than threats, especiallyl after the threat of the Ice Trolls and the Mammoth/Winter Wolves. And the fact that you end up long resting several times while Prook recovers means that the part wasn't particularly resource stressed by the module. They just took a while to clear out enemies.

An adjustment I would make would be to just let Prook have a couple levels of exhaustion that can be cured normally (skipping the tea part) and only allow short rests (maybe due to the Blizzard in Icewind Dale) to push the party further.

Helpful pack, again, appreciate the pdf with guidance to the adventure as well!

This was an incredible experience. I ran this as a single table of 5 players, but I really want to do it as part of an event in the future as well to get the table interactions.

Starting out things in Easthaven is a brilliant way to tie into the larger story of the hardcover, it's almost a 50/50 chance that party members who play the HC have been to Easthaven from Bryn Shander and know something about the troubles besetting the rest of the eastern ten towns. Reading through the towns we didn't visit (my table picked Caer Konig) it seemed like things are pretty well defined in terms of quests and there are plenty options for different player characters to help the towns.

In terms of additional guidance, I do wish there were some blurbs at the beginning and ending of the first two sections regarding what aid each town can provide something like "If you go to Caer Konig, they might supply some marksmen... Or they could reach out to their neighboring goliath tribes for aid" kind of thing. I had to read a couple times and reference the charts at the beginning of our session to be able to clarify to my table what their choices mean. The sub-quests are nice and fun though.

For part 3 I really like the way difficulty scales based on previous successes along with party strength. It provided for a lot of tension in the ramping up combat encounters, and the wandering Verbeeg was a fun addition as well. Overall it was a great time as a solo table experience and I want to try it again as a proper Epic.

This was a very fun epic to run! We ended up having 3 tables of players and so we modified our structure a bit. Each DM ran one of the competitions, then the players got to go around and mingle with NPC's played by the DMs and HQ volunteers. I think the carnival atmostphere was the highlight of the event for the players.

The quests afterwards were nice and straightforward and for players who played DDAL10-00 it was very fun to see Mother Tusk's companions again. The time for each quest seemed to vary a bit though, the Yeti hunt went by a lot faster than the Mammoth raid for example.

The battle against the Giant's army was a great set piece. The wandering Giant was great and the table interaction, while limited made everyone feel like part of a bigger force. Overall I think it's a great first epic for someone to run to see how they feel about these larger events.

It's Pay What You Wand and fills in some major holes of the WDDH Chapter 2 quests. Using these expanded faction missions and the DDAL08 Map trilogy helped make Chapter 2 an experience that my group enjoyed fleshing out the City of Waterdeep. Great work!

This is super helpful in fleshing out Waterdeep in general and your Dragon Heist campaign in particular! Without this module I was still very confused about the motivations and personalities of some of the WDDH villians and didn't have a clear picture of the Zhentarim faction split. If you're looking for hooks and through-lines in your WDDH campaign, or looking to flesh out WDDH factions this is a great addition, I'm using it with the Alexandrian Remix and it's been going great!

This functions as a mix of map support for the first 5 DDAL10 modules (DDAL10-01 to DDAL10-05) and is super helpful in getting players engaged if they don't enjoy theater of the mind. The Maps are lovely in presentation, and fill in some very solid gaps in what the modules present. The maps for modules that include random encounter tables also are great extra maps to add to your Icewind Dale campaign.

The maps for modules 1 and 5 are highlights to me because they include additional GM version map information or before/after maps on certain events that are lovely additions to the story telling.

In addition to all this hints and tips are included with using the maps which is fantastic, thanks!

The maps for the Ice Maze are terrific tools to use for that part of the module and add to the "Lost Woods" vibe of that scene. Once again just solid help after the actual AL module left things a little lacking in terms of map support.

I really like the inclusion of the tips on how to use the maps, that's very helpful!

The maps for the murder investigation and random forest encounters were great additions. I wish the Wyrmdoom Crag maps lined up a bit closer to the Wyrmdoom Crag HC configuration.

I really like the inclusion of the tips on how to use the maps, that's very helpful!

I really like the inclusion of the tips on how to use the maps, that's very helpful! I also particularly like the map inclusion for the sacred spring to add atmosphere to the investigation of the area.

I wish the river map had been a little bigger, I ended up using a different map for that battle to account for the ability to players to fall into the ice and slip downstream.

I really like the inclusion of the tips on how to use the maps, that's very helpful!

Will be updating this review as I continue DMing the RoTFM campaign But here it is so far:

The DM's Notes and How to Run Guides are a great, as are the encounter reference notes and the maps included. The maps in particular are awesome additions that add to the Hard Cover options.

Chapter 1: IN PARTICULAR! The additional details and Schedule for Torg's Caravan is an awesome inclusion for The Cold Killer, and I really really really loved the way the authors tried to think through the logic and logistics behind the sacrifices to Auril, great stuff!

Chapter 2: I really love the discussion of structure in Chapter 2. Especially I enjoy the alternate structure options presented! My table has been enjoying the campaign but feeling a little aimless so these options are great!

Chapter 3: Not there yet.

The art is lovely, the maps work great and the module structure of the netherese outpost is simple that the lack of keying in the outpost map isn't a big deal. The super helpful feature of this map pack is the GM version of Feral-Tongue's encounter, makes it very easy to overlay and figure out who's in range of Chardalyn structures in terms of when to apply the Chardalyn formation effects.

This was a very fun adventure! I ran this with a table of mixed players, some who had played Season 10 Hardcover and hadn't met Frostclaw before, some who had done DDAL10-01 through DDAL10-04, and some who had done bits and pieces.

It felt very satisfying to finally put an end to Frostclaw for the party, starting the module off with that fight was a great decision after the build up of the previous modules. It felt very cathartic for the players that had been fighting her for the past few weeks and she and her Chardalyn appendages were a cool fight for the players that hadn't met her before.

I like the change in dynamic between Old Goat and Kaskur, that they were not at odds here was very cool, I made the 3 Goliaths that accompany Kaskur to fight Frostclaw be Souljoined seeking revenge for Rikurr's death to add some more flavor.

The Netherese outpost was also a cool little dungeon. The door puzzle I thought was good but I would have preferred if there were some clues to the correct stones that history/arcana/investigation checks could have provided written in the module so I didn't have to make them up myself. My party ended up brute forcing the door by juicing their Barbarian, I think we all really liked that the puzzle had two different possible solutions and loved the depth the door gave to insights on High Netheril culture. I really liked the Mud Mephit encounter as written but didn't run it as the party successfully snuck by. Although two party members had the Story Award: One Man's Junk they were intimidated by the Ooze Elementals and thought that the Mud Mephit from last time was annoying and unhelpful so bypassed the room. This bit of roleplay was fun to watch.

The other two rooms were simple enough to look around.

The final encounter with Feraltongue was interesting, I feel like even with the scaling of the encounter for the party to strong/very strong Feraltongue was not a difficult fight, the party burned through his HP too fast with a Gloomstalker Ranger and a Barbarian. The Chardalyn formations added some additional challenge but the party worked through Feraltongue's wildshapes fast enough that they saved Kaskur and knocked out Feraltongue without much problem. I would have given Feraltongue more HP, or a higher AC in Polar Bear form do to the Chardalyn on him to give him more time to use his abilities if I could.

I liked the fact that the Chwinga Blessings from DDAL10-04 were used, in fact I really liked that previous story awards came into play here in general. One PC gained the story Award for Chardalyn corruption at the end of this session and the whole party got song og vengeance so I'm curious to see what these awards will do in future modules. I do wish that the Content Catalogue was updated to help DM's forshadow the effects of these Story Awards as they play through the season.

My only knock is that the module structure makes running it ad-hoc with minimal prep hard. I wish the Story Awards and effects were presented at the beginning of the module to make sure an unprepared DM knows what information is important, I read the whole thing ahead of time so no worries there for me personally, but if AL is designed to be "show up at the local store and run this" then the layout should be designed around that sort of minimal prep execution.

Overall a very good module, and feels like a great halfway point through the season.