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Critical Role |OT| Is It Thursday Yet?
- Thread starter Dream Machine
- Start date
- Video/Streaming OT
You haven't missed much. Lucian has transformed into something vaguely like a beholder. The group had a hero's feast and had some nice words for each other before heading into the chamber to fight him.
Think of it this way, you might finally see Fjord die. It just took the whole campaign to get here.
To say I'm pleased by the news, thank you Matt, is a massive understatement.
Like he suggests I'll countdown these last few episodes with the gang and look forward to what's next.
Like he suggests I'll countdown these last few episodes with the gang and look forward to what's next.
I'm kinda annoyed at just when they realize how much of a ass kicking they can give the M9's story is coming to a end, they pretty comfortably handled phase 1 and they weren't rolling too great at that, as only really Veth and Beau were dissing out the full damage. Really excited to see where this ends, feels like the fight has only just started.
The whole time, I was just thinking the whole fight is Final Fantasy as fuck, particularly since Matt is super open about his love of the series, so it was funny to hear Matt call it out straight-up as Lucien moved into his second form.
I do wish that the fight felt like more of a threat. The saving throws everyone can make at this point are just ridiculous, plus all the ways they can get advantage, so it's hard to see the full effects of Lucien's abilities. When Cad and Jester were able to heal the whole party basically up to full with two spells in between the fights, it made me realize just how little danger they were in. I feel like Matt underpowers his enemies too much because he underestimates how much the party can actually dish out when they're even somewhat focusing. I mean, it's 8 on 1 and the bonus action to remove legendaries felt like an unnecessary boon when most of the party don't even normally have any use for their bonus actions.
Hoping this was the warm-up round, the Bizarro Sephiroth (or maybe even Jenova Life) to Safer Sephiroth (even if in reverse order aesthetically). I just like to see fights that really stress the party, like the first Laughing Hand fight, or the Succubus fight in the caves, or the first fight with the Tomb Takers when they were completely out of resources and had no prep. That desperation is just more fun for me, and I feel like it's earned with it apparently being the grand finale. Fingers crossed for next week!
I do wish that the fight felt like more of a threat. The saving throws everyone can make at this point are just ridiculous, plus all the ways they can get advantage, so it's hard to see the full effects of Lucien's abilities. When Cad and Jester were able to heal the whole party basically up to full with two spells in between the fights, it made me realize just how little danger they were in. I feel like Matt underpowers his enemies too much because he underestimates how much the party can actually dish out when they're even somewhat focusing. I mean, it's 8 on 1 and the bonus action to remove legendaries felt like an unnecessary boon when most of the party don't even normally have any use for their bonus actions.
Hoping this was the warm-up round, the Bizarro Sephiroth (or maybe even Jenova Life) to Safer Sephiroth (even if in reverse order aesthetically). I just like to see fights that really stress the party, like the first Laughing Hand fight, or the Succubus fight in the caves, or the first fight with the Tomb Takers when they were completely out of resources and had no prep. That desperation is just more fun for me, and I feel like it's earned with it apparently being the grand finale. Fingers crossed for next week!
Well, they'll obviously sprinkle some M9 One-Shots here and there (assuming they survive the campaign) as they did with Vox-Machina. They won't pass on the occasion and it should help finishing some arcs like Trent's or Ukatoa's.
I could see them doing a few episodes too, like undeadwood length would be perfect if done well.
I'd blame 5th Ed and how easy it is to survive anything before I blamed Matt.
Ive always wondered how they would handle playing AD&D and characters that aren't superheroes by level 3.
Really loved the Vox Machina one shots, I hope they have a Battle Royal Arena fight again with everyone *magically* max level. And with no Keyleth they don't have a OP Druid turning into a Dragon to fuck them up anymore.
There's two set one shots they may knock out during the break.
There's the VM & M9 one, which isn't necessarily set to be a vs battle. Could actually see a limited split the team reminiscent of the C1 Slayers Take bit, in order to mix and match most of the characters. Tharizdun has strong links to Tal'dorei, so there's potential in having to send them to two other chain sites. Or it is just a battle royale thing.
There's also the Ashley one shot, though there's no way she'll do that without having people at the same table.
Brian was also hyping up receiving the latest Deadlands set, so maybe an Undeadwood S2 can enter production.
There's the VM & M9 one, which isn't necessarily set to be a vs battle. Could actually see a limited split the team reminiscent of the C1 Slayers Take bit, in order to mix and match most of the characters. Tharizdun has strong links to Tal'dorei, so there's potential in having to send them to two other chain sites. Or it is just a battle royale thing.
There's also the Ashley one shot, though there's no way she'll do that without having people at the same table.
Brian was also hyping up receiving the latest Deadlands set, so maybe an Undeadwood S2 can enter production.
Yep, that's reason 1067 why I dislike modern D&D. There's barely any sense of danger, at least mechanically, from very early on.
I'd definitely be down for these, but especially Undeadwood S2. Loved the production of that mini adventure.
Sigh Matts had to turn off replies on twitter again. Brians alluded to some of the stuff that gets said.
This is why i backed away from the fandom, too many people trying to push and be entitled
This is why i backed away from the fandom, too many people trying to push and be entitled
So the eye count is?
Cree had 5. Was flesh monstered by them.
Caleb has 4. Though has seemingly got fairly good countered against any more for now (prettty sure the scroll is still up).
Beau 3.
Cad ( or does he have 3?) and Veth 2.
Fjord and Essek 1.
Jester and Yasha 0.
Cree had 5. Was flesh monstered by them.
Caleb has 4. Though has seemingly got fairly good countered against any more for now (prettty sure the scroll is still up).
Beau 3.
Cad ( or does he have 3?) and Veth 2.
Fjord and Essek 1.
Jester and Yasha 0.
Every time they go into a big battle all I ever see is people post "TPK!" And I'm like why would this time be any different?
I guess that's the essence of good storytelling. You think the characters are in danger when they really aren't.
It is different this time when it is end of campaign. Matt has said in the past that he doesn't really believe in TPKs but if it is the end boss of a campaign like Vecna in campaign 1 he would actually kill off the party and the next campaign would then be significantly affected by it. But if it is a regular boss I'm sure he would have a last minute save, jail break scenario, etc. Last night, he didn't go out of his way to be brutal by focus firing because that really isn't fun for the party, plus he really wanted them to get to phase 2 of the fight to see his cool mini.
Fandom remains an undefeated villain. That's why I only really talk about this show here. It's a big enough group to maintain a discussion, but not so big that people start popping off.
Gross. Why can't people just not be assholes, especially towards people they ostensibly like.
I enjoyed the creature Matt created for Lucian, but I am ready for this campaign to end! There is no tension whatsoever.
I was really sad to not be able to watch live last night. I've slowed down on posting here, but it felt weird watching such a big episode solo.
That said, I was pretty disappointed this is the end of C2. I'm not even convinced the campaign would have been wrapped up well, but this feels like an abrupt cut your losses style end. Contrasted with Vecna, it felt pretty weak. I'm immensely excited for C3 and any one shots or mini arcs they do, but it's sad to me that C2 just kind of slowly died over 50 episodes.
That said, I was pretty disappointed this is the end of C2. I'm not even convinced the campaign would have been wrapped up well, but this feels like an abrupt cut your losses style end. Contrasted with Vecna, it felt pretty weak. I'm immensely excited for C3 and any one shots or mini arcs they do, but it's sad to me that C2 just kind of slowly died over 50 episodes.
This, though, is dumb. It's entertainment people. Step back and have some perspective.
If they aren't feeling this campaign then the best decision is to end it and start again. New campaign, unlimited possibilities, and being back in the studio will be HYPE
I can't tell anymore, do you actually hate Fjord or is it mostly a bit at this point?
On my end, I can say that I like Travis, but agree that his indecisiveness and waffling during the accidental pirate arc was a bit of a letdown and he never really explored the change from Warlock to Paladin with much gusto.
Lots of missed oportunities this campaign. Matt threw at them a lot of interesting hooks that were ignored.
lol i like the idea of fjord but i think hes the most wasted character in the cast (i guess many would argue yasha but ashley has the blindspot excuse at the very least). i wanted him to die so travis can play something else
the most interesting he was as a character was when he lost his powers but still kept fighting to save everyone as a normie against that worm that almost killed beau. i thought when he became a paladin of the wildmother that we'd get some cool growth with his character where he spent a lot of time connecting to himself and the wildmother, becoming a more assertive leader, and would bond with caduceus thru their shared faith but that didn't really happen.
beau and caduceus were doing all the legwork for fjord's character imo. i'm not even a grog superfan like many but at least he was funny and it felt like travis was making logical decisions with his out-of-combat stats and backstory
edit: and we missed out on warlock jester for this shit! but cleric jester was amazing too
I feel you on all that. I was excited to see what Travis would do as a face instead of comedic relief, and it went pretty ok, but roleplaying as a more serious character seemed to make him nervous. He never took to having the spotlight. I mean, look at the last episode, everyone's saying what they think might be their last goodbyes, and he doesn't say anything to Jester (I was surprised Laura didn't push that) or Beau, the people that he's hypothetically closest to.
That was a deliberate choice because he is trying to show confidence that they are all going to survive.
I said it a week or two ago in the Discord, but this city is the first place I felt lived up to its potential in C2. Nothing about the city feels wasted (so far).
I think that's part Travis trying to push the group and part Fjord trying to persuade the group that that wasn't their final time together.
Warlocks can't cast sending so be careful with what you wish for.
This campaign was worth a try, but I think hopefully everyone including the players and Matt have learned that this group needs a bit more heavy handed guiding. And that's totally okay! Now they know, it was definitely worth trying it out.
First off, it goes without saying that Matt and crew shouldn't be harassed just because you don't like the way their game unfolded. Part of the reason why I post in this thread instead of engaging on Reddit or Twitter is that elements of the fan base take shit way too far and I don't want to be associated with that, while it seems like everyone here can discuss their likes and dislikes without getting rabid about it.
With that out of the way, overall this campaign was a disappointment to me purely because of the missed potential of it all. It doesn't seem like we are getting back to any of the major outstanding plot threads (the Assembly and Trent, Ukatoa, the Bright Queen's mental state, the nature of the beacons and the Luxon, remaining cults of the Chained Oblivion) or delving more into any major backstory arcs (the source of the corruption at Cad's place, the status of the Hag, anything with Yasha's tribe).
It feels a bit like we got the Wildmount bus tour, quick glances at amazing sights like Aeor or anecdotes about the people who we encountered too briefly to understand fully, with a lot of the time spend on meandering place to place. That isn't a pure negative, however; it's a testament to Matt's worldbuilding that I feel you could practically run a whole campaign in one area alone.
As for the PCs, there's some I enjoyed more than C1, and some less. I think Sam did a great job again, Beau grew on me as time went on, and I liked that Travis went out of his comfort zone, even if he wound up playing a face that didn't lead on most conversations. I wish Laura played something other than a Cleric as it's obvious she wanted to cast big damaging spells, so she probably should have been a Warlock with Arty as her Fey patron, or something like a sorcerer to mess with the fun options there.
The real disappointment is Ashley and Yasha, although I don't want to be too hard on her as she did miss a ton of game time, but a Barbarian is so mechanically simple by comparison that it made her difficulties in remembering things like rage and reckless attacks stand out even more. She was also the worst off from a story perspective; again, I know she missed a lot of game time and Matt didn't want to have big character moments without her in charge, but I never got the sense that they knew what to do with her. Her being able to atune to the Holy Avenger also felt very unearned, even if I did like the way Matt presented the combat scenario as a way to teach her about some new class features she gained. It felt like she was stuck in neutral while everyone else was moving forward, and only had Matt's dream prodding to propel her.
With all that being said, I don't want to make it seem like I'm hatewatching CR now or anything like that. The above sticks out in my mind and the wasted potential bothers me because there were so many high points - both in Matt's DMing and the players' RP - that I really felt like C2 had a shot to overtake C1 if it could only tighten up the focus and get back on the rails a bit.
I hope Matt decides to give C3 a bit more structure as that's where his players seem to shine the most.
With that out of the way, overall this campaign was a disappointment to me purely because of the missed potential of it all. It doesn't seem like we are getting back to any of the major outstanding plot threads (the Assembly and Trent, Ukatoa, the Bright Queen's mental state, the nature of the beacons and the Luxon, remaining cults of the Chained Oblivion) or delving more into any major backstory arcs (the source of the corruption at Cad's place, the status of the Hag, anything with Yasha's tribe).
It feels a bit like we got the Wildmount bus tour, quick glances at amazing sights like Aeor or anecdotes about the people who we encountered too briefly to understand fully, with a lot of the time spend on meandering place to place. That isn't a pure negative, however; it's a testament to Matt's worldbuilding that I feel you could practically run a whole campaign in one area alone.
As for the PCs, there's some I enjoyed more than C1, and some less. I think Sam did a great job again, Beau grew on me as time went on, and I liked that Travis went out of his comfort zone, even if he wound up playing a face that didn't lead on most conversations. I wish Laura played something other than a Cleric as it's obvious she wanted to cast big damaging spells, so she probably should have been a Warlock with Arty as her Fey patron, or something like a sorcerer to mess with the fun options there.
The real disappointment is Ashley and Yasha, although I don't want to be too hard on her as she did miss a ton of game time, but a Barbarian is so mechanically simple by comparison that it made her difficulties in remembering things like rage and reckless attacks stand out even more. She was also the worst off from a story perspective; again, I know she missed a lot of game time and Matt didn't want to have big character moments without her in charge, but I never got the sense that they knew what to do with her. Her being able to atune to the Holy Avenger also felt very unearned, even if I did like the way Matt presented the combat scenario as a way to teach her about some new class features she gained. It felt like she was stuck in neutral while everyone else was moving forward, and only had Matt's dream prodding to propel her.
With all that being said, I don't want to make it seem like I'm hatewatching CR now or anything like that. The above sticks out in my mind and the wasted potential bothers me because there were so many high points - both in Matt's DMing and the players' RP - that I really felt like C2 had a shot to overtake C1 if it could only tighten up the focus and get back on the rails a bit.
I hope Matt decides to give C3 a bit more structure as that's where his players seem to shine the most.
That's a good call. Did he specifically say something to that effect? I know he did before. Maybe at the grove?
The biggest surprise... is that people didn't think this was happening. They spent several hours traveling the world saying bye to their loved ones. Two(I think?) members vowed that this was their last mission. And they've talked about it on Talks Machina, framing questions with things like "as the campaign winds down" or similar wording. I get that people were holding out hope for conclusions for Trent and Ukatoa and Yasha... But it's felt like the end for a while now. Maybe these plots will be resolved in one-shots, or comics or novels.
Anyway, I for one am super-excited that it's been confirmed, and can't wait for C3. Low-level shenanigans, new characters, and hopefully a more focused storyline.
That's fair - I don't know enough about D&D to be able to say. Most of my experience is either with Critical Role or a few Dimension 20 campaigns, and I do appreciate how far Brennan Lee Mulligan pushes the damage and enemies in fights to give most fights real tension (helped by Dimension 20's structures where fights are their own episodes and have to have high stakes to be interesting).
Yeah, that is very true. I complain about things here because I want things to be appeal more to me, selfishly, but I do like the show a lot and don't want to diminish that for the cast or other fans. I see a lot of people just directly harassing the cast and it's part of a disheartening trend in media consumption and fandom.
I was so amped when they got on Trent's bad side and were panicking, low on resources and their families' lives potentially being destroyed, exactly because it had such great tension. This fight didn't really feel threatening at all, but I'm hoping next form will be more so... If this is the last boss, the idea that no one will even be seriously injured or die despite how much they've built it up would be quite disappointing to me.
Yeah, this matches most of my feelings, honestly.
To the point of Ashley in particular, I agree. I don't know that I have faith in Ashley's approach changing even if she's able to be there for every episode of campaign three, but I think it's just a personality/comfort thing for her and she needs to have a specific kind of character to feel comfortable, and she'll never particularly go for the spotlight. I'm not sure what that character is, but even with Pike (I think?) being out for longer than Yasha, I remember way more moments of Pike because Ashley was willing to initiate certain scenes and ideas that she seems much more hesitant on for Yasha (in part due to Yasha's character, which I think ended up hurting Ashley's ability to engage well).
This was certainly one of my biggest criticisms of C2. I don't know if it was the players, Matt, or both... But even really early on they always just wanted to move on to the next area, never sticking around to flesh out many of the plot threads. When they allied with the Bright Queen and had their house, I thought things were going to improve... And then they moved on once again.
I really hope C3 is less sand boxy, and that they mix the character's plots into an overarching plot, instead of making each one feel like their own campaign.
I think I'm less critical of this campaign. Some parts sort of it felt like they dragged on a tiny bit (the bit after they left Eiselcross), and sure they went around way too many places, but the campaign also had a lot of memorable moments that I enjoyed greatly. It was different from Campaign 1, but not worse in my opinion.
I'm still amazed at the pace they can keep while having that many players on a D&D game. And I'm definitely looking forward to seeing how this campaign finishes, and what they come up with, for the next campaign. Matt's world building is incredible, and that he does this on a weekly basis is just impressive.
I'm still amazed at the pace they can keep while having that many players on a D&D game. And I'm definitely looking forward to seeing how this campaign finishes, and what they come up with, for the next campaign. Matt's world building is incredible, and that he does this on a weekly basis is just impressive.