Lysa Chen’s Ruins of Hisari is a D&D Adventurers League-legal adventure set in one of the many ruined locations in Chult. Although intended for a party of Tier 3 characters – that is, levels 11-16 – the first section of the adventure doesn’t contain many dangerous threats, and the outskirts of the ruins can quite easily be explored by a Tier 2 party.

Then the party descend into the crater at the centre of the city…

There are two fantastically cool things about this adventure: the party are transformed into Yuan-Ti (only temporary, probably), and there’s a beholder with snakes for eyestalks, with its eyes held in the mouths of each of the snakes. That’s something I really like: a simple, evocative concept that is also quite disturbing; it’s an impressive achievement to make a beholder even creepier!

Turning the PCs into Yuan-Ti strips them of their powers. They’re suddenly running around with about 60 hit points each and poor ACs and attacks. A combat against three Yuan-Ti Pit Masters, normally an easy fight for the characters, become extremely challenging. Some players will be terribly frustrated by this, and so this adventure is a poor choice for them. For everyone else, it’s a challenge.

The adventure is mostly linear in structure, with some ability to explore and choose the order of encounters. The adventure is heavily weighted towards exploration and discovering interesting features of the dungeon; those combats that do ensue are rarely straightforward, especially if the characters are learning the capabilities of their new forms!

There is also a very strong sense of story, with opportunities for role-playing with the inhabitants of the ruins.

My chief problem with the adventure comes from the transformation. While this is billed as a Tier 3 adventure, there’s only really one encounter that requires that level of party. The rest feels like a Tier 2 adventure. It’s a fantastic adventure, but the mismatch in expectations could cause disappointment.

However, if you have a group that is happy to deal with their loss of power and the challenges that ensue, then you should have a lot of fun with this adventure. Highly recommended.