Thoughts: Critical Role

Natural 20!
When I wrote my previous blog entry about Force Grey (and Matt Mercer), I realized I needed to go back and watch more Critical Role so I could make a proper blog entry about that series (which is produced by the Geek & Sundry Twitch.tv folks). Basically, I spent the last 2 weeks using most of my free time to watch various D&D videos and I have had a really fun time. In fact, it's easy to get lost in the fantasy worlds of others; it doesn't help that we had to cancel the weekly sessions for both the game I DM and the game that I play in. But I digress...

Critical Role stands out as an amazing online RPG campaign series with superstar Matt Mercer as DM with his team of voice actor players. They originally played Pathfinder off camera (you know, for fun, as friends), but converted to the new D&D rules before going live with their Twitch stream sessions; they also have a large group with 7 players plus the DM. Thus have have some homebrew additions and some house rules, but the adventures mostly resemble D&D 5E (being played by theatre people).

I have read some criticism of the series that it seems a bit fake and I agree that when I first tried watching the series that some the characters seemed "too dramatic" or "over the top" at times, but I realized that's just because they are overdoing it because they are voice actors who enjoy playing to the camera. Once you get used to it, it feels more authentic and develops into something more watchable.

You can start with the beginning of the series at this link:
http://geekandsundry.com/shows/critical-role/page/5/

The series began in March of 2015 and continued regularly since then (and it's still going); the story arcs have some side treks and such, but mostly can be delineated as:
*     Episodes 1-16 = Kraghammer
*     17-23 = Vasselheim
*     24-38 = Percy's family
*     39-83 = Chroma Conclave

Over time they have had a lot of guest stars come in for short bursts, including popular RPG nerds Felicia Day, Wil Wheaton, Chris Perkins, and Patrick Rothfuss. With the popularity and success Matt Mercer has received (in just 2 years of this - though clearly he was already a well-established anime and video game voice actor), I wonder how much longer the show will continue; they may decide they don't need him anymore if he permanently moves onto other projects (or they could stop at some point) so it'll be interesting to see what happens.

For now, I highly recommend the series - especially for people who are learning how to play tabletop RPGs (or just for people who have a lot of free time and want to be entertained). My main warning is that there are some repetitive video segments and such that can be skipped. I also remember reading advice on one of the Reddit forums that if something annoys you, just skip ahead 5 minutes and keep watching. Speaking of Reddit, Matt Mercer and the crew actually interact with the community and use the feedback from the online forums and social media (via Twitter).

Thoughts: AI Team C

C Team!
"I love it when a plan comes together..." (oh wait, that's the A-Team).

I caught up with the Acquisitions, Incorporated "Team C" series, enjoying almost every minute of it. You can find the series at the Penny Arcade website, along with the rest of the AI podcasts and videos:
http://www.acq-inc.com/cteam/video

Jerry Holkins, as DM, decided the K'Thriss character had lost his memories and thus his levels (and his sorcerer multi-class) which was needed for him to be in a lower-level group (but it's really annoying from a narrative standpoint and - I assume - means he can't rejoin the main AI team even though he was in their last liveplay session):

I like the new characters:

Unfortunately, watching these videos makes me like the Omin Dran character less and less; I already thought he was a power-hungry person who felt the need to control the lives of others (because of the way he constantly micro-managed and belittled the other characters and because of the way the player would meta-game table-talk to the other players, telling them what to do both in and out of combat), but seeing the concept transforming into "Omin sends the C Team on missions" as Jerry Holkins DMing them into those situations has only reinforced my dislike of Omin.

Jerry Holkins does a great job of DMing and running the game, but the way that Omin has recruited the characters is weird and controlling. I wish they had used a different plot because the intro adventures that bring them together was a bit too strange for my tastes. What's worse is that in the behind the scenes interviews, Jerry Holkins said he was excited about DMing the game because it allowed him to explore his character Omin's backstory (which worries me, because these adventures should be about the player characters and not about Omin).

Because of the strange way the characters came together (not their fault), there was some initial awkwardness. Eventually, the new group meshed together and found their groove. I am looking forward to watching their future sessions. I just hope it turns into a more traditional D&D experience and that it focuses on these characters having a good time adventuring together.

Thoughts: SourceFed Plays D&D

Improv Storytelling?
When SourceFed's SourceFedNerd channel came out with a "SourceFed Plays Dungeons & Dragons" series of videos back in November of 2015, I originally stayed away from the videos because they clearly were not playing D&D (and it rubbed me the wrong way that they kept calling it D&D - even though it wasn't - and just giving a disclaimer that it was really improv storytelling). But I recently went back and watched them and I really appreciated the humor of the series; I just had to let go of the "D&D" labeling that was clearly just there to attract viewers because of D&D's recent return to popularity (thanks to 5E).

For a link to a YouTube playlist of the series, use this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnXX4j3toqc&index=1&list=PLHB2mSAiOCkHwDjcgO7B4NHGFH4yPmRYI

Maude, a former Nickelodeon child star, moderates the series as the supposed DM (but she seems to be arbitrarily making up rules for their game of pretend that involves occasionally rolling a d20). The 3 players look like: 1 son of Michael Scott from The Office, 1 son of Tim Curry from Clue, and perhaps the brother of PewDiePie of YouTube fame. After 4 episodes the cast switches out some, but they actually handle the transition really well.

The series is good for a laugh and I realized how refreshing it was to watch adults play pretend, not entirely bound by rules. Some of the unintentional humor that I noticed was that one of the players was supposed to be a dwarf ranger, but he kept playing his character as if he was a thief/rogue; either he misheard or misunderstood (or perhaps purposely played that way because that was what he really wanted to play).

With the recent closure of all things SourceFed, it looks like we will never get more of these videos. The first series was 10 episodes of about 35 minutes each (thus about 6 hours), the second series was a similar length, and then the 3rd one was a shorter series of videos. Like many other online RPG videos, they generated a lot of Reddit commentary via the SourceFed Reddit forum.

Overall
If you're looking for a rules-light entertaining series that is a much lighter commitment to watch through than most, I highly recommend these guys. If it's going to bother you when they don't follow any D&D rules, then don't watch this series at all. They clearly set out to just have fun playing an improv game of pretend and it is very entertaining to watch that unfold.

Thoughts: Binwin's Minions

Where is Binwin Bronzebottom?
During the last couple of weeks I have been on a mission to get caught up on my D&D liveplay podcasts and videos. I made some blogs about Acquisitions, Inc. (AI) and Force Gray; in the AI blog I pointed out that Scott Kurtz had resigned from the group (off camera) after the "Holiday Special" that was released January 2017 (which I watched via my Amazon Prime membership, but is probably online somewhere). I expected to find some online drama or evidence of shenanigans, but instead I found a professional response in which he explained that after a decade of playing the character with the group, he was ready to move on. The AI page lists the following info:

Kurtz explained that, essentially, even though he was being compensated well for his public appearances that Acquisitions, Inc. was property of the Penny Arcade group (the guys who play Omin and Jim) and thus they were the ones mostly making a profit from the experience. They also dictated, with Wizards of the Coast, when and how often the gaming sessions took place. The original commitment was small, but after 10 years Penny Arcade had decided they wanted more AI and Kurtz didn't want a heavier workload so he professionally resigned and kept the rights to his character Binwin. Kurtz has thus written a Binwin's Minions spinoff series comic with some liveplay and a digital app/game in the works.

You can read the comic at Table Titans (it's pretty funny and has characters on a campaign to pay their debt to Binwin after he has to pay to resurrect them):

https://tabletitans.com/binwins-minions/binwins-minions-page-1

Chris Perkins actually DM'd a Binwin's Minions sessions at PAX South (where he did the AI liveplay without Kurtz). They captured audio, but not video, of the experience and it's available online:
https://soundcloud.com/tabletitans/binwins-minions-pax-south-2017

From listening to it I think that, as with any new project, the session felt a little awkward at first. I thought it was funny, but also strange, to have a D&D session in which the players viewed themselves as expendable "meat-shield" minions to be killed off by traps and such while one player character was the focus of surviving. I suppose it could work for a one-shot or as a marketing gimmick (which it seems to be here), but it certainly sounds like it wouldn't work for a long-term campaign.

Somehow I doubt we will see much liveplay Binwin in the future (but I could be wrong). I can't help but think that everyone is trying to publicly present a professional image and not burn bridges, but there's some sort of hidden drama going on. And that's ok because, as we all know, RPG groups have drama and that's a part of life. People come and go from groups; characters come and go from adventuring parties. We got an amazing decade of Omin, Jim, and Binwin together. It only makes sense that eventually they parted ways.

Reflections
I have to say that as entertaining as AI is (and I will happily watch every new session/episode they come out with) that if I was a player in a group with a character who behaved the way Omin Dran does then it would get old to me. A PC who is the "boss" of the other PCs and constantly tells them what to do or not do in both combat and social interactions would be really annoying to the rest of the players. I assume it works because AI is a special theatrical way of playing D&D, but it wouldn't work well in most campaigns.

Thoughts: Force Grey

Use the Force?
While looking at dnd.wizards.com today, I noticed an "article" which was a podcast interview that featured Dylan Sprouse (from Zack and Cody) talking about how he has been playing D&D since he was a kid and, apparently, not only is he part of a PUGCrawl D&D liveplay group (which he tweets about for live sessions - and looking at his Twitter he did another event today promoting new D&D products) - but he also made a guest appearance in "Force Grey: The Lost Episode" (which I somehow totally missed).

On the internet Matt Mercer is known as a "DM God" and people aspire to be like him (which I don't blame them for since he is so entertaining with the voices and emotion - though, if I was going to nitpick his style, he needs to stop telling the players what their characters think and feel because I believe the DM should set the scene and then ask that as a question of the players, but whatever - other than that, he is amazing); for readers who may not be familiar with him, he is a voice actor who does YouTube videos with Geek & Sundry. He has a regular D&D group full of voice actors and he was the guy who famously got Vin Diesel to play D&D with them while Vin was out promoting one of his movies.

When Wizards of the Coast was promoting the Storm King's Thunder storyline not only did they have Chris Perkins running the Acquisitions, Inc. group in "tie-in" adventures with giants, but they also brought in Matt Mercer to run a new group called "Force Grey" (as part of the legendary Waterdeep adventuring group dedicated to protecting the city - though they ironically left Waterdeep as adventurers tend to do). I watched the episodes without realizing that there was an extra one made after the Acquisitions, Inc. cloud castle battle. This "Force Grey: The Lost Episode" hilariously shows Matt Mercer DMing the Force Grey group showing up at the cloud castle after the Acquisitions, Inc. team has left. It fills in a gap in the Acquisitions, Inc. storyline and made for a funny crossover location (though I wish they would have actually had the 2 teams meet up as a super RPG event, like what sometimes happened in D&D Encounters/Adventurer's League/Expeditions.

Not only did they miss out on having the teams meet up for a huge battle, but they were also missing some of the Force Grey team members; Matt Mercer did a fine job with having their characters there at the beginning and end of the session (run by him and sidelined, of course). Dylan Sprouse made for a fun replacement, playing a firbolg druid. I was happy to see that, like me, he plays the druid with a creative spin and used the beast wildchange and animal interactions in fun ways.

Inspiration
Already familiar with Force Grey as a part of the Storm King's Thunder (since the major storyline NPC the frost giant Harshnag is written as a part of the Force Gray team), I mentioned them and had them as part of the campaign lore. Harshnag teamed up with my group's characters and nicknamed their team "Force Green" since they were so nature-oriented. Sadly, in our game Harshnag died a hero's death facing the ancient dragon enemy that plagued the group (and I don't think the Force Green name has really stuck yet, but I still have some hope).

FOE Log 20

Federation of Explorers (FOE)
Homebrew Campaign in the Forgotten Realms

Session 20: The Bone Naga Necromancer
Regnar (human ranger), Zen (half-elf monk), the 2 dwarf fighter brothers (Tacklinn and Orsik Ungard), and "Scorchin' Ray" Sunsoaker (human cleric) continued down the trail toward the necromancer's lair (that they needed to kill in order to get the monks to help the dwarves). They met the human Tavin who was waiting to kill a headless horseman on a nightmare. Regnar decided to stay and help Tavin.

(Left to Right: Ray, Zen, Tacklinn, Orsik)

Ray, Zen, and the Ungard Bros continued on, making it to the necromancer's keep (which was a desecrated dwarf temple). In the courtyard they defeated 21 dwarf zombies and an ogre zombie.

Down one level they destroyed 2 death dogs, 2 ghasts, 1 ghoul, 5 shadows, and a magic trap. On the next level they took out 2 more dwarf skeletons, more traps, and a minotaur skeleton. On the final level, they defeated the bone naga necromancer, 4 spectres, and the army of zombies (in the pit below). During the battle Zen went all "Thunderforge" attacking the Vecna shrine (which Orsik finished destroying).

They got the loot and head back down the road hoping to meet up with Regnar and Tavin before the arrival of the nightmare and headless horseman...

SAGA Log 1435 Vault of Madness

The RPG Saga continues...
For the 2016-2017 campaign year, I weaved these modules/stories together thus far (with the theme that some ancient enemy that both "The Vampire Queen" and Strahd had made a deal with was somehow connected to the yuan-ti "Dark Whisperer," whose agents had manipulated Oberon and Iymrith); the team is now trying to deal with the ancient yuan-ti cult:

  

The Skull Mountain Drawing from D&D Basic, 
Palace of the Vampire Queen,
Kingmaker [Modified to be in the Feywild],
Dwarven Glory,
Curse of Strahd,
Reverse Dungeon,
Storm King's Thunder,
Cloud Giant's Bargain,
and Serpent's Skull [Modified]

Saga Log 1435
Module: Serpent's Skull Adventure Path [Modified]
Note: At this point Mercy and Blood were KIA (with Mercy's body lost in the desert sands), Ori "retired" running his dwarf island kingdom, and Laz was MIA (hanging out with Drizzt)...

On the jungle island (which they believe to be part of the legendary "Purple Rocks") Pylia the half-elf bladesinger, Drizmar the drow rogue, Blue the satyr paladin, and Pezok the kenku rogue decided to engage in a strategy discussion before proceeding into the jungle with the evil yuan-ti cleric and/or the 30 frogfolk warriors (with their froghemoth, shaman, and chief). They decided to send the frogfolk group the long way around, they found the dead witch's journal (with a map to the "Holy Snake" cave temple), and showed the yuan-ti cleric the map/journal before heading toward the human whaling village.

They travelled through the jungle, rested, and found the cleric’s dead slaves and guards that had been killed by rocks (dropped by flying monkeys). They left the evil cleric outside while they investigated the human whaling village. They met the druid water genasi leader (wearing an ancient Netherese Fenwick symbol); she reincarnated Blood (who came back as a rock gnome). The team proceeded to the sorcerer hut, discussed ancient magics (disjunction, magical suppression, etc.), and recruited the evoker and diviner sorcerers in exchange for the witch’s book and the map so the other sorcerers could rescue the human slaves there. During the conversations they discovered that the sorcerers were actually yuan-ti wearing magic rings that made them human. The group led the sorcerers to the evil yuan-ti cleric and let them magic missile her to death.

The team went around the beach, met up with the frogfolk group, and used the diviner's abilities to spy on the Vault of Madness. Pylia used a scroll to teleport 9 of them there (leaving behind Pezok and the 30 frogfolk warriors). Pylia, Drizmar, Blue, Blood, the evoker, the diviner, the froghemoth, the chief, and the shaman battled/killed 6 giant apes (3 of which were winged); the froghemoth died during the battle.

The new ape king (a paladin) came and spoke with the group, negotiating to allow them access to the Vault of Madness; Blue gave the ape king the magic decanter that converted any liquid into wine. While the group rested, the ape king's people had a huge celebration in the "City of the 7 Statues" (which had rainbow banners).

They knew the riddle that "You must enter the Vault of Madness to get the crystal skulls, but no magic items may leave the vault." Drizmar worried that they would lose all of their magic items if they went in with them; Pylia and Blue assured him that was why they had the sorcerers with them. The evoker and diviner cast spells at the vault that removed 4 of the 7 arcane symbols (after eating the monkey brains they were offered for breakfast). The frogfolk chief and shaman died when they went into the Vault of Madness. Note: As the team was sucked into the Vault of Madness, they saw a group of enemies rushing into the room to kill the ape king behind them.

In the Vault of Madness the team killed 14 ooze-covered aberrations, destroyed a gelatinous cube and clay golem, dealt with traps, made their way to a water-filled area with piranha fish (that Blood's fey spirit guardians killed), ignored some kuo-toas, and made their way through a flooded tunnel. In the next section the group killed flesh-eating vines, ooze mephits, mudmen, and an earth elemental. They made their way to a gate/door labeled "Vault of Silence" with arcane warnings that the next area would be silent. Pylia still had her "telepathic web" spell active.