The Red Gathering is the first part of the second Hillsfar trilogy from Baldman Games, produced as part of the CCC program for the Adventurers League. The characters need to protect a Red Wizard of Thay from assassins, fighting oozes, assassins, invisible stalkers and golems and bring him to safety.

This is a simple adventure. The interest mainly comes from the combat encounters, which provided varied opponents and interesting situations in which to fight them. The highlight is the fight against some black puddings, which takes place in a cold-storage cellar cooled by brown mold. If the players use fire to defeat the puddings, then the mold spreads and causes more problems. It’s an interesting situation, which is very dependent on the skills of the players and characters to overcome. We ran this with three tables, and while my table (with a cleric casting spirit guardians) was able to deal with the threats effectively, another table almost saw a TPK.

The framing story is that the characters are asked to guard a meeting between the Red Wizards and the rulership of Hillsfar. The Red Wizards want to help rebuild Hillsfar, as they are helping with Mulmaster’s efforts. The opening section of the adventure involves an opportunity for roleplaying with the nobility and the Red Wizards, but I found that difficult to run – especially with a group of players that weren’t that interested in interacting. Some DMs and players will likely enjoy this, but there’s no story reason to role-play, so it was easily skipped part to the action: the assassination attempt and the escape.

The adventure gives two options for escape – above or below ground – both of which lead to different second encounters. The paths converge on the Temple of Tempus, where the final encounter (another combat) occurs.

There’s nothing particularly special about the adventure. It’s fun to play and doesn’t overcomplicate things. Roleplaying-inclined groups could likely do a little more with the characters than I did, as there are hints of more interesting interactions. Story-wise, it hints at interesting things to come in the next instalments of the trilogy. Despite being billed as a 4-hour adventure, all three of our 6-player tables finished it in about 2 hours. I note that the black pudding monster entry excludes its “split” ability; I went back to the Monster Manual to make certain it maintained this.

Overall, despite this adventure never coming close to greatness, it still provided us with an entertaining experience. Recommended for combat-loving groups.