First of all, let me say that this set is absolutely gorgeous. The overall lay-out with the inn and meadow in the foreground and the tower rising up in the background is beautiful and striking. A few angled sections and some splashes of bright colour amidst the greens and browns create visual interest and everywhere you look, there is something to see. As a display piece, this set definitely an eyecatcher.

Seeing the story unfold as you build up the set is a wonderful experience. I had a lot of fun discovering the many intricate details and hidden treasures, potions and traps. The inn and some of the detailing on the tower in particular are a joy to build and to behold. I was slightly disappointed to find that some of the other sections were somewhat less polished. And including that many scenes in the narrative of the set unfortunately results in a general scaling down and lack of space.

The scene is populated by a superb selection of characters and creatures. The player characters are highly customizable, with male and female options for each. But i think most people will agree with me that the real stars of the set are the brick built magical creatures. The dragon in particular is the best i have ever seen in an official set and would have sold really well as a seperate set i reckon. Many reviews comment on how hard it is to position her, but after i turned her thumb claws downward, i found it quite easy to hook them behind the balustrade of the walkway and perch her in a striking pose around the tower.

It is obvious that this set is a labour of love from both the original creator and the development team from Lego. They really tried to give us as much of the D&D experience as they possibly could, while making a visually stunning and high quality Lego set. As a display set it succeeds brilliantly. As a play set it has plenty of features and a tailored D&D campaign to boot, but a lack of space might prove limiting.

This set is great! So many tiny hidden details and surprises. Reading the adventure while building the scenery really helped me appreciate and understand all the little flourishes that went into it! I have three minor criticisms. First, Cinderhowl the dragon has a lower jaw that falls off really easily, so it functions well as a display piece but isn’t terribly practical for using and moving around a lot. The second has been mentioned by other reviewers: the scale of the minifigures relative to the various scenes - particularly the indoor ones - does not really lend itself to play. For example, you can’t fit all the characters into the same floor of the Inn because it’s too cramped (I guess the characters have to shout their questions and commentary through the open door into the main room, lol). I understand why: to use true scale, the number of scenes would have to be cut in half, or else the entire set would have to be made twice as large! The third is probably the gripe that makes me angriest: I bought the set prior to the availability of the Mimic Dice Box that matches the set as a companion. It’s only $20 MSRP but secondary markets are selling it for 4x as much. I didn’t receive the free gift that WAS offered at the time of purchase (the Space Diner, which was also a $20 item). When I called a couple months later yo inquire about the omission of the Diner from my shipment, I asked if I could simply substitute in the Mimic Dice Box instead, since they were the same price. The customer service person told me there was no way. I’ll probably buy every D&D LEGO set that gets released from now on, (already pre-ordered the 12 pack of minifigs!), because I’m a huge fan of both. And the fact that I’m missing out on that Mimic is like a missing tooth that will drive me crazy every time I look upon the rest of my LEGO D&D collection! That said, if you’re thinking about getting this set, do it! You won’t be disappointed…unless you fail to also get the Mimic Dice Box with it.

The set is fantastic! It is smaller than I was expecting but way more detailed and complements the Lion Knight’s Castle really well both in style and scale. I haven’t tried playing the DnD campaign yet but all of the references packed in here are really delightful & are going to add so much fun and an extra dimension to the game. The pricing of this set really feels off though - you get an awful lot more in other sets at this price. The castle at $100 more is considerably more substantial and even the box looks like it has about half the volume of the Natural History Museum which is $50 cheaper.

I have to mention the add-ons too. The DnD campaign book is a fantastic addition but something that absolutely should have been included in the set - especially at this price! On top of that this was AU$30 in rewards points and if you’d seen this in a store next to a regular DnD campaign book you’d be thinking it must have the wrong price sticker.

Pricing aside though the availability of these add-ons is really disappointing. Lego to me is a super fun, relaxing, enjoyable hobby & GWPs are awesome but these did add a level of stress to the purchase. Why not just produce enough copies of the mimic box so everyone who orders the set in the first month can get one? Or have a limited run as a GWP and after that you can buy it with points? And the book I just don’t understand why would you not have it available in rewards for most of the life of the set? For one-off limited promos it’s fine, but not for such set enhancing items so linked to a specific set.
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TLDR : Lovely set & great extras but the inflated cost and severely limited availability takes away from the usual Lego positive experience.

Lots of folks don't think the set is worth the money; the price per piece of this set alone knocks a lot of other sets out of the water, let alone the level of detail, the specialty printed spell scrolls and monster eyes, and the alternate gendered Lego head pieces (which any collector would love to have for their collection; they're great heads to use for any MOC setting where you're not using generic Lego yellow, and you get heads in most every skin tone Lego has to offer). The different builds for potions, desks, weapons, and all the generic hidden pieces and tricks make building this feel like building a D&D dungeon. I've written and run campaigns most of my adult life, and this set felt like someone did that, and then engineered this.

So that's the good; the build is mega fun, the details are amazing. There's so many techniques and piece interactions I picked up from this set that have me stoked for my own MOCs.

Here's the bad: the dragon is FINNICKY. If you're posing, and you have a collection, you can build supports or otherwise, and it's not a huge deal, but if you're PLAYING with the dragon, or anything but gentle in posing it, a significant amount of the pieces aren't supported well. I'm not sure how to fix this issue but the biggest one is the dragon's mouth. I can't pose it without it falling off like 7 out of 10 times.

That being said, I'm a builder and collector, so this isn't a huge issue for me, and the rest of the build is much less finnicky.

It's rare for me to come across a perfect set, and this one is no exception, but with a few minor fixes, it could be, and that's saying a lot. I'm usually a pretty harsh critic.