Rating: 
Summary: Useful for beginner DMs
Review: A seasoned DM probably wouldn't get much out of this book, but for those just starting out, it provides a lot if inspiration for building memorable games.
Rating: 
Summary: Save your money
Review: Having leafed through this book at the local bookstore my first impression was that it didn't have much to offer. I was ordering the Monster Manual II and figured I would get this as well to get the free shipping. With the savings in shipping I didn't pay much for this book, but I should have just paid shipping. My first impression was right. Anyone with any imagination at all can come up with stuff as good as this. I have owned the book for a couple of months and haven't used a single thing out of it. If you have ever run a game, or watched a good fantasy movie ( or Indiana Jones for that matter ) you don't need this book. Save your money and get some good treats for you next session.
Rating: 
Summary: Good idea seeds, not much else
Review: I purchased this book hoping that I would be treated to something along the lines of an updated Grimtooth's. What I got was a mixed bag of good advice for building your own traps and challenges, coupled with traps that fell far short of that advice. Some of the challenges are so poorly worded that you have to read them two or three times to figure out what the text is actually describing. The figures vary from very well annotated to not anontated at all. The solutions to the puzzles are frequently ones that even experiences D&D gamers would never think to try, because they suggest utilization of abilities in a manner other than they were intended. Setting all of that aside, there is a bigger problem: most of the traps make no sense. Who would have built such ludicrous mechanisms? Who would have populated them with such an odd assortment of creatures? How do such creature survive if they depend upon PC adventurers wandering into these traps as their sole means of food?!? Aargh. It comes down to this: if you were a wizard powerful enough to build some of these traps, you would have used your powers to build better ones. Summary? Good advice, but I wouldn't bother with the traps.
Rating: 
Summary: Well done, but worthless
Review: I realy like the artwork and the level of detail of the different traps that are described.
So for that part, the book is surely worth your money.However, there is no rules on trapconstruction (sure they are in the DMG and "Song And Silence".
The traps you find have no calculated prices.
The advice on building puzzles is nice, but building a puzzle that fits in your campaign still is up to your imagination.
Some of the traps are smart, but all in all, I feel this book does not offer you anything.
As a DM setting up traps is the fun and joy of the game and if you need this book to do that, I think you should consider asking one of your players to take over DM'ing.
After all, what is being a DM about besides setting up traps and "ugly" encounters? The content of the book would urge me to give it one star only, but the pro's mentioned in the first lines have raised it to two..... (doubt doubt doubt doubt....)
Rating:
Summary: what a waste
Review: I thought this book would be chalk full of traps and challenge ideas for dungeons/caves etc, but it turns out to really just have four examples of setting where there are challenges. So you buy a book, to possibly place four ideas in your adventures and that's it. It is the worst buy I have ever made for a role playing acessory.
Rating:
Summary: what a waste
Review: I thought this book would be chalk full of traps and challenge ideas for dungeons/caves etc, but it turns out to really just have four examples of setting where there are challenges. So you buy a book, to possibly place four ideas in your adventures and that's it. It is the worst buy I have ever made for a role playing acessory.
Rating:
Summary: Reasonable for generic adventuring
Review: I'd hoped for a bit more emphasis on traps and puzzles, and instead found a tome filled with what I would describe as "encounters." At the worst, there are some rather odd interpretations of what sort of odd encounters one might theoretically find in a dungeon, but there are so many presuppositions to the encounters as to render them useless in any but the most generic ways. That said, there are some interesting ideas in a few of the encounters, and the scaling of the encounters to match party levels is solid. If you're desperate to add some random (and I do mean random) encounters, take a look, but generally speaking I'd recommend finding longer modules with better story arcs.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Resource
Review: I'm a recreational gamer and I DM less often than that. This book is full of great ideas for begining DM's to advanced DM's. There are so many encounters for various levels, plus there are helps to increase or decrease the CR for each encounter so that it can be adapted to make more or less challenging. I enjoy making my own adventures and this is a great addition to my core collection.
Rating:
Summary: Great traps, average artwork
Review: The challenges cover a very wide range of levels with suggestions on how to tweak a challenge to make it suit the strengths/weaknesses of a DM's players. The book is quite dense for 126 pages, stuffing each page with detailed information on setting-up, presenting, and solving the traps. The artwork matches the mainstream AD&D adventure artwork, which is to say average to poor. It would be nice to have higher quality artwork to be scanned in to a computer and presented to the players for the clearest possible explanation of some very complex mechanical and magical challenges. Book of Challenges is very comparible to Legends & Lairs Traps and Treachery series, however the Book of Challenges stays away from the traps a lone thief disarms into an encounter for the party to get involved with. So in the end, a good buy, but room for improvement.
Rating:
Summary: Good idea seeds, not much else
Review: The format of the book is less useful. I was expecting something closer to a Monster Manual but for traps, and I was disappointed. Each "challenge" is formatted like a mini-encounter rather than a single trap or puzzle explained. Some challenges are 2-3 pages long. I prefer a bit more quick-use format structure so I can just pull out the encounter and plop it into my adventure just like a monster from the Monster Manual. I prefer Traps & Treachery by Fantasy Flight Games which has that type of structure.
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