The writing is good and the art is fantastic but the balance... oof. Multiple concentration spells as a second level feat makes this a easy dip. The ability to hand out multiple inspirations at fourth level. Paladin's Devine Sense, only better. Mage's Find Familiar only better. Cleric's Guidance only better. Turn Undead only better. Upcasting spells for free. Screwing with Counterspell. And that doesn't even get into the sub classes, all of which have very powerful effects.

If you're running a table filled with min/maxed characters and over powered homebrew, this class will fit right in. If you're running a table of average characters from the core books, this class is going to stick out like a sore thumb.

I have been following the works of this author in other medium. Much thought, consideration, planning, and quality goes into Mr. Tate's work. My favorite of this bundle (so far) is the Blood doman Cleric. Clerics and Paladins are among my favorite class to play in D&D and to see a new entry in a sorrowfully slim archetype of 'how a power is used denotes moral alignment,' I will be itching to use this darker take on a Cleric class- regardless the backdrop of good, evil, or in-between campaign. The rest of these classes I am eager to pour through and see how they are linked and again feel the excitement of inspiration of what class I want to play and the story that might evolve from the practices irrevocably maniupulated by the descovery that life as fuel may provide.

I have just finished reading this and while I am pleased overall, I did notice a decently large amount of spelling and gramatical errors. Something I should not be seeing as far as I am concerned. At least not in this amount. Other than that I was pleased overall with the artwork (some was just a bit too simplistic). The layout was great, well organized and consistant. Even with it's faults, I would still recomment this product for lovers of Ravenloft.

My group had a lot of fun with this one-shot. Very memorable scenario with good RP with the townsfolk and investigation in the first half and the horror and combat of the second half. I dropped it into our current events in the Triboar area (forgotten realms) during the summer equinox festivities while they were having downtime following the Sunless Citadel adventure. Took place over two sessions with some other player character activities in the first session. This would easily be a single session if focused only on the plot presented here.

PRO

1. Village of Womford map and npcs are a handy resource. While my game occurred in Triboar, this village is added to my library to pop out during other travels.
2. Group enjoyed the investigation and making more connections with npcs in their starting town
3. Creatures and combat were unique and flavorful - pun intended :) They were horrified and grossed out and still talk about them.
4. Chain of events is flexible so that some may or may not occur depending on PC actions
5. One PC is a halfling who keeps going on about pies. How could I not include a module with a pie eating contest!
6. Amush I did not use in this scenario will be used in a future event - with the elves reskinned as Uthgardt barbarians.

BE AWARE

1. The infection process is hand-wavy. 100s could be infected already with no end in sight. Like carla could hand out cookies to every kid in town not just the one farmer. My mental solution was the physical transformation was occuring so rapidly, it could only prepare the one victim - the farmer. Then relying upon him for stage 2 of its master plan. And I dropped that Mortimer had already been making practice pies (which then somehow infected the elves for a trail ambush encounter). The eating contest was going to be the mass infection event.
2. Excorcism and possession is also hand-wavy and easy. This was fine with my group (no cleric), but you may have a player character then wanting to do exorcisms as well. Just be aware if your campaign will have other instances of infernal creatures or possession.
3. final enemy is a pure melee brute. I added a ranged attack that did acid damage and produced a vomit spawn minion. This help divide the PCs attacks beyond just focus down one target. And further grossed them out.
4. There's an ambush fight on the trail that I left out. It felt superflous and would have padded out the time to run the second evening. I also found it odd given my comments above about endless infection - if the end boss also infected elves how much further would they have already kept spreading it? Keep it if you really need to drain party resources / spells before the finale but maybe just make them hunters, goblinoids, barbarians or some other random encounter.

I ran this for my local AL group. This is a very fun adventure with some devious traps that kept my party on their toes the entire way through. I made some minor tweaks to the combats, but mostly cosmetic changes and I think running everything as written would absolutely be fine. The final battle features some monsters that I have not seen before in other AL modules that are delightful and terrifying. Overall the module is very well written and provides good direction on how to manage the different encounters and the difficulty is reasonable without being overwhelming.

My only complaint is that the puzzle near the end is not really solvable without rolling high enough on a couple of checks--there isn't really enough information presented to be able to work out what the answer is supposed to be if the PCs fail to hit the DCs and essentially get stuck unless the DM just gives them the answer. If I were to run this again (and I probably will!) I would probably rework this in some way, but other than this one fairly small element, everything else is extremely well done and I would highly recommend.

This is a really nice adventure in that it tests the sturdiness of the toughest builds, reinforces goals, tasks and teamwork amongst parties. It gives a taste of the power of a Tier 4 game in just a little snapshot. It was challenging to run as a DM in a good way (maximizing flight is always hard), without feeling impossibly complicated.

You could easily take many characters to their breaking point and even desperation and frustration, change tactics slightly and those players could feel resilient in their groups ability to surve, and not feel like you handed them a layup victory.

I also very much enjoyed reading the inspiration for the one shot and where it came from. Well done.

Simple and lovely map, everything including the architecture fits together nicely.

We concluded the short campaign today, and it received high praise from all my players. The campaign is exceptionally well-written, making it accessible and enjoyable even for non-native English speakers (myself and my players). It's enjoyable to prepare for and even more enjoyable to play.

My advice for new buyers is to read it twice: once for a quick overview and a second time for detailed note-taking and highlighting.

-----SPOILERS FOR PLAYERS BELOW------

My players were exceptionally lucky with their rolls during the campaign, nearly unraveling the mystery on the in-game first day. They even discovered the heart within the chalice. I was hesitant at first about allowing them to find the heart, but I'm glad I did. Their excitement and joy were on a next level, leading to days of discussion about the discovery.

Before the first in-game day concluded, they boldly confronted Alkrist and Bookwyrm without considering the consequences. Bookwyrm framed them for stealing books, resulting in their imprisonment. Duncan Rhodes, the author, generously provided me with some creative suggestions for managing the game. I am deeply grateful to Duncan for his assistance and for crafting such a magnificent adventure.

I also opted to replace the game Miiirym plays with the party with "Knuckle Bones" from the Cult of the Lamp, as some of my players were familiar with it at the time.

The players were at level 4 and faced only one battle encounter with The Beast of Candlekeep (a scripted battle). They avoided a confrontation with Manshoon by jumping from the top of the tower and using feather fall after triggering the lever. Inspired by a suggestion by Duncan, I transformed the tower into a rocket, prompting one of the players to ask, "Is that a Jojo reference?"

It took us five 4-hour sessions plus an additional hour to wrap everything up. This campaign stands out as one of the best, if not the best, short campaigns I've ever run, a sentiment echoed by my players.

Thank you, Duncan, for this incredible murder mystery adventure.

I have thoroughly enjoyed the author's take on the Artificer and its many varied uses. I love playing the class, and have in almost every addition. If you love the class, you will find something in this book to add to your repetoire.

This is loaded with cool stuff! I'm definitely using it in my campaign so I can hand out personalized items to my players. They're already pumped about it. Awesome work!

This class write up is fantastic. I have been wanting a Shaman class for a while now, since I feel it is uncovered ground in the caster class area. This Shaman does not disappoint. There are two mechanic here that I really like: the "raging" buff for a caster with the Anestrial Awakening and the new, non-healing, use for Hit Dice in the Spirit Journey ability. There are plenty of options here which will allow you to make any type of Shamen to fit your desired concept. I have to mention the art as well. This creation contains a bunch of top knotch art that will inspire you with many ideas for creating Shamans to play. I highly recoment this innovative class offering from Dragonix.

This is one of my party's favorite holiday one-offs. Even though they know how the adventure will end my party wants to play it again at a higher-tier challenge.

That snow globe at the end is a pretty powerful magic item and it has resonated throughout the rest of their adventures when they need some AOC damage in a confined space.

This was everything I could have ever wanted to help run this campaign. The distance measurements alone were fabulous.

I just ran my party through this and we all had a good time. Marth, Duke, Jerry, and Anabelle were fun NPC's to play. Fowldra was a good challenge and a nice way to end the adventure.

There were a few speed bumps that didn't hit until we started playing it through. Textual contradictions like Percival's parents dying at sea and yet Percival's sister, Annabelle, is the daughter of one of the brothers. The whole business of the family all being in one room in the beginning and then somehow dispersing throughout the mansion, including the crime scene room, required some major hand-waving to justify. Some potential alibis would have been nice.

Pros: Easy read given its just encounters and general directions for each part. An imaginative DM could make good use of this module to stitch an epic defence story for the players.

Cons: Unfortunately I expected more for this price. The value just isn't there, compared to other more flavorful and content-rich modules. Monster choice is intriguing and appropriate given it is an assault on the school, but the plot/story doesn't gel well with some of the monsters.