Dead Canaries is a DDAL-legal CCC adventure for level 11-16 characters, in which the characters must reintegrate the mind of a wizard who has gone slightly mad as a result of meddling with “tar stones”, magical rocks first seen in the first of this trilogy, Weakness of Rock. The adventure mostly stands alone, and you can play it without the others of the trilogy and feel satisfied at the end.

The adventure begins in medias res with the characters trapped within the mind of the wizard, although they don’t realise that at first. It’s a featureless grey void except for them and an amnesiac wizard, but as they interact with the wizard, it becomes obvious that he has some control over their surroundings, and by making suggestions to him, the characters can exert some control over the environment.

Over the course of the adventure, the characters must confront other aspects of the wizard – his fear, mania and confidence – and get them to reintegrate into the wizard’s personality. The adventure allows this to be done through role-playing or combat – although it’s more likely to be role-playing during combat, which is good, as it keeps everyone occupied.

That’s the majority of the adventure: an introductory encounter where you learn the ground rules, then three encounters where you face aspects of the wizard. With the wizard’s mind fully reintegrated, the adventure ends. There’s one other encounter, which introduces the foe behind the tar stone threat, but if you play this as a stand-alone it can be safely omitted.

One nice thing is that you return to the beginning chamber between encounters, so there’s a chance for additional role-playing with the wizard and each other; having the wizard show improvement as more of his personality is recovered.

The adventure rewards inventive play and enables interesting role-playing opportunities. I think it’s challenging to run well, but even if you’re uncomfortable with the role-playing aspects, the basic combats are varied and challenging. In my own DMing of it, I may not have role-played the wizard accurately compared to his personality in the rest of the series, but it was an entertaining take on the character! (It occurred to me that the partially reintegrated wizard consisting of Mania + Paranoia would act a lot the Sixth Doctor!) The strangeness of the environment can be emphasised to varying degrees depending on the DM and players.

The adventure might not end with a bang; there may not be a big confrontation at the end with the last splinter of the wizard’s psyche. In such a case, the end might feel somewhat underwhelming. However, for us, we confronted the wizard’s Confidence (or Pride) last, and that provided a good end to the adventure.

There’s enough in this adventure to make it different from regular D&D play and thus provide a stimulating experience, while still providing enough recognisable D&D tropes so everyone doesn’t feel lost. Recommended.