Critical Failures

If you like satire, are fond of your teenager years geeking out with you're friends over a game of Dungeons and Dragons, and have a low bar for overly clever and interesting prose/plot/characters, this book may be for you.

I'll make this a general review for the whole series (books I-IV).

First of, my 2 stars. I read all the 4 books, and I'm looking forward the 5th one. So this might not be the best of book series, but it is consistent, and I obviously like it enough to keep reading it.
The thing about satire books is that the payoff is constantly being delivered. You don't have to wait for a few chapters to decide to stop reading the book because the plot isn't going anywhere, or you didn't like the characters or some arbitrary turn of events you did not think it should have happened. Every few sentences you get a punch line that makes you chuckle, or close to it. That plus the premise of the books is enough for me to keep reading the series.

And the premise is a group of Caverns and Creatures players (C&C to avoid copyright issues with D&D) are transported against they're will into the world of the game they are playing. They desperately try to find a way out and to stay out of trouble, because everything that happens in the fantasy world has real consequences for them.

A low charisma character really makes you consider your decision to use charisma as a dump attribute. Cooper, the half-orc barbarian, is constantly farting and shitting himself. He also cannot read, and is very gullible. In the real world, low charisma and intelligence are a real disadvantage.

Tim, the halfling rogue is way too short for his tastes. Dave, the cleric dwarf, is uncomfortable with his heavy armor. Julian, the elf sorcerer, is pleased with his ability to cast spells and makes good use of high charisma diplomatic skills. Katheryn, a half-elf Druid, has mixed feeling due to her innate aversion to forests and mosquitoes. And Chad is a bard, a lute playing, song singing, useless bard.

Death is permanent. Well, sort of. You can pay a priest to resurrect a deceased friend, but that costs a lot more then low level characters are able to pay. For that reason, all the adventurers trapped in this world (yes, there are more then one group that suffered the same fate) avoid exploring and consequently, don't get any experience required to obtain new levels.

Pain is real. Killing is real. Farts are real! Nothing is what your average player expects of an RPG adventure. But no matter how injured you are, if you are not dead you can be cured through a healing spell, which makes you feel good again. Actually waaaaayyyy too good, R rated good.

The author makes use of a few of tropes that should be familiar to any D&D player. If you want to get stronger, kill monsters. When leveling up you suddenly feel improved, out of nowhere.