Critical Role: Call of the Netherdeep

Dungeons & Dragons, 5th Edition

by Wizards of the Coast (Contributor), Matthew Mercer (Project Lead), James J. Haeck

Can You Change Fate?

An epic Critical Role campaign for the world’s greatest roleplaying game.

The greed of mortals has awakened a powerful entity long thought destroyed. For eons, this mighty champion of the gods has been imprisoned in the darkest depths of Exandria. His name has been forgotten, as have his heroic deeds. Languishing in despair, he calls out for new heroes to save him.

Inspired by the campaigns of the hit series Critical Role, this adventure begins in the Wastes of Xhorhas and leads to the glimmering oasis-city of Ank’Harel on the continent of Marquet, and from there into a sunken realm of gloom, corruption, and sorrow known as the Netherdeep. Above it all, the red moon of Ruidus watches, twisting the fates of those who have the power to shape the course of history.

Critical Role: Call of the Netherdeep contains seven chapters of thrilling adventure, new creatures and magic items, and a poster map of Ank’Harel.

First major adventure module within Critical Role’s world of Exandria, taking players from levels 3-12.

Multi-continental story that spans the scarred Wastes of Xhorhas, introduces the continent of Marquet, and eventually plunges players into the Netherdeep—a terrifying cross between the Far Realm and the deep ocean.

Bursting with lore and all new art depicting Exandria.

Includes new magic items and creatures and introduces new rival NPCs.

Genres: Dungeons and Dragons, Fantasy, Role Playing Games, Fiction, Reference, Gaming, Games

224 pages, Hardcover

First published March 15, 2022

About the author

Wizards of the Coast LLC (often referred to as WotC /ˈwɒtˌsiː/ or simply Wizards) is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games. Originally a basement-run role-playing game publisher, the company popularized the collectible card game genre with Magic: The Gathering in the mid-1990s, acquired the popular Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game by purchasing the failing company TSR, and experienced tremendous success by publishing the licensed Pokémon Trading Card Game. The company's corporate headquarters are located in Renton, Washington in the United States.[1]

Wizards of the Coast publishes role-playing games, board games, and collectible card games. They have received numerous awards, including several Origins Awards. The company has been a subsidiary of Hasbro since 1999. All Wizards of the Coast stores were closed in 2004.

Reviews

[Essi · Rating 5 out of 5]

a solid 4½ stars rounded up. it might need some tweaking and additional tasks and locations not detailed in the book, with the rivals obviously needing some further thought (though still very well fleshed out!). overall the story and most characters are excellent (the location for the last two parts in particular is A+). looking forward to running it!

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a lot of good stuff in here, but ultimately, I don't feel that it works. Admitedly, that is based just on having read through the book rather than running or playing it, but I bought the book with the intention of running it, and having read it, I no longer wish to do so.

The biggest problem I have is the rivals, which seem like a recipe for disaster. Depending on how things play out, I can easily imagine them taking too much focus away from the player characters, or dying very early on and leaving a hole in the plot, or becoming staunch allies to the player characters and completely wrecking all encounter balance. There's just too many ways for them to go badly wrong.

Still, for an experienced DM whose willing to put in the work to overcome these players, or for a Critical Role superfan, there's enough here to be worthwhile, with interesting NPCs and lore, cool locations and set pieces, some great artwork, and so on. But if you are planning on running it, expect it to be a little bit of a fixer-upper.

[Pádraic]

Broadly speaking: really good. Interesting and inventive, dark and messed up but never not fun, one of the upper tier adventures that WotC have put out for 5th edition. Now let's get detailed.

I've never watched an ep of Critical Role, so any easter eggs or references or whatnot, if present, were totally lost on me. But I don't think that really matters, the bones of this adventure are strong enough that you don't need any previous experience with the setting to be quickly engaged with what's going on. I will say that the lore is very specific and pretty crucial to the events of the adventure; you could move this to another setting, but it'd be more work than just changing the names around, and the book doesn't include tips for that like some of the adventures do.

The introductory section is mostly standard, with some other little bits about running a session zero, and establishing with your players how dark and terrible they've comfortable with getting. This is important, given how dark and terrible things get later on, particularly in chapter 6. Here's also where we get our guidelines on how to run the rival adventuring party, a much-touted feature prior to release. There's some helpful tips provided for how to manage interactions and reactions, and the multiple statblocks provided ensuring that the rivals level up alongside the players is very cool. I read a couple of reviews concerned that the players would just murder the rivals and that'd be the end of that. My concern goes the other way: I'm worried my players would convince them to join forces and suddenly I'd have a double-sized adventuring party to deal with. I think either way you've got to make the rivals complicated, real people with their own internal conflicts. Inevitably it's very difficult to predict who your players get attached to, but the book does its best to try and back you up, updating you on what the rivals are up to throughout the adventure.

Anyway, the adventure! Chapter 1 is fantastic, a city in the midst of a festival, filled with games and contests for the players to participate in, encountering the rivals one at a time, being challenged in different ways, before coming together to compete in a race that ends in revealing the wider plot. There really is something for everyone here, although personally I'd replace the game where you just? harvest rice? That doesn't sound fun. Otherwise, a light-hearted intro, and it'd be a good way as well to introduce new players to the mechanics of the game in situations that aren't life or death.

Chapter 2 puts you on the road, and does its best to make travel not tedious. I think it mostly succeeds, the random tables have good entries, a lot of which vary or can be varied depending on previous actions of the party, or what the rivals are up to.

Chapter 3 concerns a grim town holding back a demonic invasion, and the dungeon beneath it. This is a bleak place, and I think you'd better foreshadow the change in tone along the journey so your players aren't completely sideswiped by it. We're also introduced here to three factions that have different relationships to the main plot, and each want different things. It's a good opportunity to dangle each of them in front of the players and see how they feel about them, because they'll be relevant come the next chapter. And then, inevitably, the dungeon. And the dungeon's really messed up! Truly a series of horrific and nightmarish rooms, with painful choices and also painful spikes. My concern is that it might be a bit too dark, but in my experience players have a way of leavening even the darkest situations. As ever, make your own judgement based on your own group.

Chapter 4 teleports us to a different continent and a huge desert city. The details provided on the different district are useful but not overwhelming, but this is where I think the adventure gets bogged down. It's possible that it wouldn't feel so in play, but the amount of faction missions is too high, particularly if the players are trying to window shop on different factions. It doesn't help too that plenty of these missions are small and don't seem vital compared to what else has been going on.

Regardless, chapters 4, 5, and 6 are basically a route straight down. First a drowned city, with ghosts and magical corruption and fun mechanics for the large air bubbles maybe collapsing while you're in them. Then the Netherdeep itself, definitely the darkest (in both senses of the word) part of the adventure. Wandering through someone's ancient and cursed memories, maybe trying to make things right as he could not. Fighting corrupted sea creatures lit by the red haze of that terrible stone that drains your energy. Collecting pieces of this forgotten hero's personality to grant access to the centre of it all. And then finally the heart, a multi-stage bossfight that has drastically different endings depending on previous actions and also how compassionate and attentive your players are.

All up, yeah, one of the better adventures released for this edition. I have some concerns about how some of it would be in play, probably a little (or a lot) less neat than the book seems to think. But these are quibbles really, and there'll always be quibbles. This is a great time, and one of those adventures I'd happily both run and play.

[Simone · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unusually deep and meaningful story for a D&D adventure. Best I've read so far, it needs some "heavy" role-playing so make sure the whole group is comfortable with that before considering to start it.

[Walker Jinks · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m a relatively new DM and have been looking for an adventure that would engage and reward differing approaches to problems. Some light research brought me to this book and I will say it has exceeded my every expectation. My players are friends of mine on goodreads so I won’t spoil anything (as I haven’t run it with them yet). But this adventure has such an interesting and diverse world with a carnival of characters, I am so excited to get started on it with them. It’s also open ended enough at parts to really let the creative side of your DMing shine through. I will admit I’m a fan of Critical Role but this adventure stands out completely independently of the show and have yet to find a premade DnD adventure of this caliber. Exceptional

[Coriander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall, I really enjoyed reading through this and am excited to some day run it with players. I like the blend of literal and more story-based or emotional challenges, as well as the overall construction of the storyline. It has great roleplay/acting prompts, which is exciting but which also means I personally wouldn't want to run it with strangers or even new friends -- for me this is a, 'people I'm comfortable being vulnerable with' DMing challenge.

There are two holes I anticipate in trying to run it though, the biggest of which is, with the overall structure of the rivals, how do I prevent my players from being like, 'eh, they've got this problem sorted out, we should go pursue other things'? Sometimes it's hard to telegraph/communciate to players what is a plot thread for them versus just a background detail of the world. The narrative makes the assumption that, with how the rivals are introduced, your players will stay at least a little competitive with the rival party once the vestige is found. But genuinely, I'm not sure mine would.

The other hole is the joining of factions. I guess it's maybe possible to run the adventure such that the party never joins a faction. But the faction quests are pretty important to the milestone leveling and gradual buildup of the adventure. And it looks from read-through like getting introduced to the factions in Wildemount is pretty....incidental? optional? possible to accidentally skip?

So those are my concerns, plot-wise, about how I'd keep the adventure moving forward with a table of cats (I mean, players) to herd

Anyway, I won't know for certain until I've run it, at which point I might update, but those logistics-of-DMing concerns are what knock this back from 5 to 4 stars for me on the first read through. Overall, I'm really impressed with how this adventure is developed: I think it does a great combination of leaning in to the genre and expectations of DnD and subverting some of the ideas of what an adventure is and how the characters might solve the problems they encounter.

[Geordie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the second Critical Role book I've read, and it's a huge improvement over 'Explorer's Guide to Wildemount'. There's a well-organized campaign length adventure, with some clever challenges and excellent descriptions. Players will need to be open-minded and resourceful to beat it, and it's bound to keep them on their toes in all the best ways.

Mostly.

So, the descriptions shine, and the introduction is very clever, but there are also some choices that were very strange. Choice number one, the second arc in the book is one long series of random encounters. They're kind of necessary for the PCs to level up before the third arc, but, they are 90% disconnected from the main plot, and it feels like something much better could have been done rather than just - 'Guess what, ANOTHER monster wanders up and starts trying to eat you!' That, to me, is boring and disjointed. Another arc requires the PCs to join with one of three rival factions in order to get anywhere, conducting their missions and taking part in their politics. This does not feel like a great idea to me, because I know a lot of players/characters who would have no interest in this kind of scenario.

Besides the specific problems, there some general issues too. The suggested level progression is found once at the beginning of the book, not mentioned again at the recommended spot where PCs should level up. The encounters are consistently higher CR than appropriate, for both major encounters and irrelevant ones. And at some points there are so many additional rules and circumstances that a DM will be burnt out just remembering them all. The next-to-last chapter is prefaced by almost six pages of notes on running the chapter, not to mention additional notes throughout the chapter, and references to other places in the book! Sheesh!

So, a lot of good is to be found in here, a good DM could make it a lot of fun. But there's also a lot of strange choices and hard work for a DM to deal with.

[Alesha Montgomery · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have fully read this through but have not play tested it yet, but I am going to be starting a game with it soon.
I am a huge critical role fan, my players have at least watched the animated show that just came out, and a couple have actually watched first 20-ish episodes.
I feel this is worth noting because this does take place in that IP world of Critical Role.
I would say that you need 0 experience with Critical Role as a player or DM.
The book doesn't lean on the characters of the show but instead relies on the world and that to me makes it much stronger.
that being said this module has some interesting components to it such as a rival adventuring party that depending on how your characters interact with could be helpful allies or hated foes.. or in the middle with some players getting along with some in the rival group but not others.
Another cool mechanic that pops up toward the 2nd half is a corruption effect that work its way into your players. giving a sort of chance for powerful actions at the risk of worsening corruption.
I love the chance to give my players a "Devils bargin"
This book is not a sandbox, its more linear. That is not to say its a railroad, there are plenty of branches and choices that matter, especially dealing with how to deal with the rivals, what faction to join later, even how your players want to solve/end the story.
A book that is not needed but could be useful to be a companion to this is the
"Explorers guide to Wildemount." as this book takes place for the first half in Eastern Wildemount in a place called Xhorhas. It could be helpful if you want to know more about the setting and also gives a few starter quests from level 1 to 3 which is good because this book starts at level 3.
Overall I am excited to play this.

[S.M.M. Lindström · Rating 5 out of 5]

An adventure module set in Exandria, the world of the actual play show Critical Role. You can follow along with the setting and plot if you're unfamiliar with the show, but I think you get the most out of it if you're a fan.

That said, it's been ages since I've had this much fun reading a module! I prefer to DM homebrews and writing campaigns and one-shots "from scratch" because I think it's fun and because I rarely find modules flexible enough for me to do the amount of improve I prefer. I might because I'm so familiar with this world, but this module felt both easy to remember and open to several ways to play it. The organizations and NPCs are memorable, the dungeons are fun, and the final section was truly inspiring when it comes to building up a final boss encounter both in difficulty and atmosphere.

Being someone who hasn't used many modules because they haven't been my thing, please take my endorsement with a grain of salt. But I really did enjoy reading this! I wanted to keep reading simply because I was enjoying the story and characters, with the added bonus of inspiring combat planning and dungeons!

[Leonardo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Regardless of being a Critical Role fan, this has been one of my favorite adventures to read in recent times and I can't wait to run it.

I actually would be very interested to run it multiple times just to see the differing approaches by different groups of players/adventurers.

The adventure does a great job of offering a certain path to the PCs without railroading them.
However, how the characters proceed after the events of Chapter 1 and during Chapter 2 and the end of Chapter 4 provide the biggest challenges for the DM in regards to the continuity of the adventure. This might lead into quite a bit of extra work to avoid said railroading in order to create an organic path to later elements of the story.

Likewise, while I love the use of the rival group of adventurers, they are also the greatest point of concern/could create the most work for the DM, depending on how the relationship with the PCs plays out.

I will likely revisit this review once I have run this adventure later this year.

[Rowena Knill · Rating 1 out of 5]

This has to be one of the worst adventures that WotC has published. The shame is that there is a lot of potential here. The concepts are great, however the authors forget the key point that roleplaying games are not novels. RPGs are about interactive storytelling, and player agency matters. Call of the Netherdeep is full with NPC's that matter more than the PC's, faux choices, and literal cut scenes where players can do nothing.

The good parts is that the monsters are much tougher than the standard, and the combat can be a welcome challenge for the experienced roleplayer, but might be a struggle for new players. If the DM is willing to rewrite large parts of the adventure, there are gems to be found here.

Ultimately the game plays like a video game more than a tabletop game. This game promised so much more than it delivered.

This review written after a complete campaign playthrough.

[Amélie · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazing adventure I can't wait to take my players through (we just finished chapter one). Loads of Easter Eggs for CR fans (and I probably missed half of them) but I think it still stands well on its own.

My only, minor complaint (partially due to my inexperience as a DM, and to the fact that my party has a tendency to go off-track and not even on purpose) is that I feel that some parts could do with more guidance, or options/ideas for when the party is determined (in spite of itself) not to do the thing. But then again, improvisation can be cool too.

Finally, I loved the rivals and am definitely enjoying role-playing them so far - such a great idea!!

[Jerrod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very clearly Crit Role, combat is always optional. The power of Woke Culture can always trumped anything interesting with the MacGuffin of woke.
Dm spent hours preparing and you want to derail that check.
Besides the shortfall of playing a different game I really like how it is designed and payed out. One thing to keep in mind, is that as you get further into a module, the likeliness you’ve diverted from the story increases. Matt does a great job listing possible past outcomes and potential future reactions to that. I like the others group, for existing, as potential ish enemies.
Short of it, this actually makes for an intriguing adventure I look forward to running.

[Zachary Barth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Currently running this campaign and I have enjoyed the content. I have had to make a few tweaks and homebrew some things into it, but overall a solid bones to work from.

One thing with running this campaign is the need to do some outside research of Critical Role's Exandria. Which I enjoy doing, but for those that don't particularly like research and deep lore, this can be frustrating. Though, you can definitely run this as is if you wanted to without much knowledge (I just personally wouldn't enjoy that as much)

Give it a try!

[Marcel Plessis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pretty good adventure! I cannot wait to send players through this one. It is one of the only (and best) underwater adventures out there. What I like best about it is that you can either run it in one as a stand-alone campaign or redeploy the dungeons and locations in your own homebrew campaign. Of course, the new monsters, items, and NPCs are fantastic additions too!

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can see why some might think the adventure has too many rails, but I have to give it credit for how consequences are handled in regard to the rivals following the characters and the incredible use of horror and forgiveness for the villain. I'll have to run it and see how it goes to determine if it gets that extra star, but I eagerly await the day to do so with my players.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is overall a great role-playing story. Light on combat but still really fun! The end is a large dungeon crawl however 2x over and is very different from what the rest of the story brings. However there is something in here for everyone and can bring a great new world and story to your group!

[Bridget · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fun adventure, something you would expect from the minds behind Critical Role. This one requires a little more work from the DM since they will be running a rival group of adventurers.

This is a good way for a group to experience areas of Exandria outside of Tal'dorei.

[Benjamin]

I found this at my library and flipped through it; I've never listened to/read any Critical Role stuff, so this is all new to me, so I'm not a good judge, especially at the speed I skimmed through -- I'm just recording this to remind myself that my library has it in case I want to go read it.

[Megan Mellino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a great adventure. Campaign's not finished, I just finally read the last chapter! (Wanted to be surprised along with my players so I only stayed a chapter or two ahead.) Highly recommend for any Critters who are looking to DM their first campaign- or anyone who is, really!

[Carol Lai · Rating 5 out of 5]

Currently running this adventure for a couple of friends. It's really fun for both DM and players.

[Abbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just finished reading and am currently playing through the module. My players seem to be enjoying it so far (we're only on chapter 2)

[Cori · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was fantastic for the one-off game I played with my friends. We only played the Festival of Merit portion and had a lot of laughs. I did not complete the book, but it was great inspiration.

[BlackfishGirl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aware that this is not strictly a 'reading' book but read it pretty much cover to cover after I got it for Christmas! Looking forward to running this!

[Anita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love the story. been running two Sessions and can't wait to interweave the Character's Stories with this campaign

[Jamie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Moon's haunted.
*But seriously, I enjoyed this one and would love to run it! NPC rivals or allies who pseudo-level with you and a story that has ties to current plot lines. The multi-phase boss (or, I guess, multi-option boss) based on the party's actions. It felt like a choose your own adventure in all the right ways. I love when an early level adventure impacts what happens later in the story, too. I also liked the nice detail of ruidium creeping up like a flip book through the entirety of the book. Very pretty!

[J.J. Valdez · Rating 4 out of 5]

i wish I'd been given more guidance with the rivals, but gods, what a fun story to run!