Tag: cr spoilers

Sleep-deprived and spoilery ramblings

You know what, I’m actually kinda proud of the M9 this week.

Like, when the plank king asked them why they chose to sail the seas, become pirates, and end up at his place, the honest answer would be “because we make horrible decisions, escalate the situation rather than face the consequences, and once we’re committed, we go all in and don’t know how to back down.” That… Is the story of how they basically got into and out of all story arcs so far. And the clusterfuck that was them getting into this whole pirate business by stealing the ship in the first place was probably the most egregious example.

Come to think of it, “because we’re idiots who make horrible life choices” would have been a great answer in pirate court.

Anyway, my point is, this is the first time in this campaign when they actually didn’t unnecessarily escalate the bad situation they were in. Well, except for Caleb, of course. They could probably have parted with the pirate city on better terms than they did if he’d just behaved, but hey, it’s just Liam doing Liam things at this point, and on the grand scale of things, it wasn’t even close to double-crossing an ancient dragon with 3 party members present without a rest after fighting another ancient dragon, so we should all really count our blessings.

But all in all, I’m really proud. They understood their limitations, somewhat, stuck to the decent part of their initial plan, mostly, and got the hell out of dodge of a situation that was completely beyond their control. And it worked! Nicely done, people.

It is kind of a shame about Avantika, that’s for sure, she was… Fascinating. Honestly, the most fascinating thing was how me and my friends were panicking about Beau lying in pirate court, and then Avantika just came in and lied more and worse. And the power play with Beau’s punches of truth… Rrrrr.

Also, her death felt a little like Lorenzo’s; kind of premature, definitely not what Matt had planned, but probably for the greater good. Girl was unhinged. I’m kinda glad we don’t have to wait for her to turn into PotC3 Calypso or something. The larger plot isn’t going away any time soon, either, so hey.

And much like Lorenzo, the party completely legitimately outplayed her in a way that made it impossible for Matt not to give them the ending they got. That’s another thing. They’re learning. And I’m looking forward to how Matt has to design future arc villains if he wants them to survive the first few encounters.

I have been with this show through any number of variations on Scottish or posh British accents, that time they went to fantasy Arabia, I have never had an issue with anyone going Texan or vaguely Eastern European or Pretend Irish and even the German has grown on me. But this new pirate person finally has an accent that I can’t deal with. I understand about half of what he’s saying and what is he supposed to be

Things that are helpful right now: Acknowledging the genuine hurt some people feel and reassure them that no one is out to get them, that this is just how the dice fall sometimes, that not everything will be grimdark from now on. Explain what other people might get out of a dark but tactful narrative, eg. Ashly opening up about her partner or Liam talking about his mother again. Firmly tell people blindly spewing hatred off without dismissing that most people are perfectly reasonable and amiable but also grieving here.

Things that are not helpful: Big man DMs taking to twitter and starting a duet of “let the ripped up character sheets hit the floor”, calling for more deaths to shut the whiny bitches up with the occasional rape joke for flavor.

arkhamarchitecture:

Are all the people saying Matt shouldn’t have killed Molly new to D&D shows? Like, actual D&D shows, not TAZ. TAZ is fine but it’s not D&D. I’m genuinely asking because I feel like it’s mostly the people who are new to the show and didn’t watch Campaign 1.

If you watched Campaign 1, you already know that sometimes things happen and there’s nothing you can do about it. 

And you can’t say “Well they can kill people but not the queer characters!” because there’s too many queer characters. Molly was pretty far from the only queer character on the show. Going solely off the 5 person party with Keg, there were more queer characters in the group than there were straight characters and we don’t even know Caleb or Nott’s sexualities so that’s just me assuming they’re straight.

I loved Molly. I will continue to love Molly if he gets rezzed. If he doesn’t, I’ll love whoever Taliesin’s next character is. 

But damn ya’ll. This is what you sign up for in a real D&D show. The great part of a D&D show like Critical Role is that you know for a FACT that there’s no director behind the scenes dictating who gets hurt or when or if they do at all. It’s all down to dice, planning, and personal decisions by the players. But the buy in for that – the price you pay to know that nobody is ever out to get anybody on the party, no matter how queer they are – the buy in is that sometimes shit just happens. It’s nobody’s fault. That’s D&D. Sometimes you roll some bad dice.

If Molly dying now, 25 episodes into this new campaign, is enough to cause you to stop watching then that’s okay. I understand your grief and hurt, I’m glad the show could touch you so deeply that you don’t think you can recover from it and keep watching. I’m also glad it happened now. Because this can and will happen again in the future. And it’s going to hurt a whole lot more when we’re 100 episodes in. 

If it hurts you this much now, so much so that you think you can’t take it, go ahead and back out. It’s okay! Nobody’s blaming you. Not every show is for every person. Don’t force yourself to stick around and end up getting hurt again later. If you’re on the fence, give it a good hard think. Because everyone who watched Campaign 1 all the way through can sympathize that losing a character you loved and identified with hurts. But boy it hurts a lot worse when it’s 115 episodes, not 25.

Y’know what

kier-ruse:

Unfollow me if you think that Matthew Mercer is a bad person. 

Unfollow me if you think Mollymauk dying was “burry your gays”

Unfollow me if you’re going to genuinely be hatefull to some of the most supportive and kind people to ever make a show.

i’m sick of tumblr trying to find some moral highground to hate something whenever something doesnt go their way.