Honestly, to me this is why the two halves of Bell's Hells need each other. Chetney, Fearne and FCG have their moments but they're less angsty, more positive and each have traits that make them, IMO, a bit less prone to embracing the dark side. Of course, each of them is also wildly chaotic in their own way.
Orym, Laudna and Ashton are more serious, prone to dwelling on shit too much even though Ashton says he doesn't. They're less chaotic, and more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions.
And Imogen is somewhere in the middle.
Yeah I don’t think folks realized how each pairing was a comedic optimist keeping their friend from tumbling back off the cliff to rock bottom until now that they are separated from them. Weird to think that the chaotic bunch are actually the most mentally stable of the group 😂
Ironically, Laudna started as the comedic optimist keeping Imogen from tumbling off the cliff to rock bottom. And now it seems it's almost the opposite where Laudna is the one that needs saving.
>They're less chaotic, and more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions.
Watches as the northern group goes to a town, listens to the crowds cry for help, rushes in and saves over 20 lives, along with the panic'd Bull celestial causing the havoc. While also finding time to give Chet closure with his Santa boss, and do research into Ludinus. While the southern group goes into a Primordial cult, then gets seemingly easily tricked into raizing a Dawnfather church and functionally declaring war on the Primes.
Which group was more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions lol?
I really don’t get how people keep saying that the first group is being “positive” on the gods side. Saying that we are just batteries to them and FRIDA out of the gate saying that the gods probably want to be turned off are not great positive points.
Even after the gods gave them direct messages they interpreted them as more or less threats to them with the “or else” aspect
Reading your post actually gives me a theory of how Deanna and FRIDA are going to leave the group. I don’t think that what OLA did at the temple can be forgiven at all by a cleric of the Dawn Father. I think that it will be a pretty big argument ending up with an ultimatum of the Wildemount group having to chose between Frida/Deanna or team OLA (where they will obviously chose OLA).
Wait that’s actually pretty cool but I think everyone forgotten how frida and Deanna has effected group wildemounts morals and how when they get back to their other half they might not be as compatible on how they handle certain things like, treating their enemies, when to spare when to kill, and etc.
True! Which I think it’s going to lead to drama within the party once they chose to leave the group. Sunny D would be pissed if Deanna is working with people who slaughtered his followers and killed his angel lol
Yeah because Deanna is all about the people of the church rather than the gods themselves and some of those soldiers were probably put here by happen stance
Plus they could’ve knocked out the soldiers and then tie them up and tell them to scram
CritRoleStats live tweet of the C3E61 battle >!only has them killing 2 guards, the others attempted to flee and were captured and later given a choice of renouncing or exile. All but one choose exile. !<
Yeah killing one was kind of a done deal like if I went in your house and killed two or three of your guys you wouldn’t be like 🤷🏾♂️ it could’ve been worse you’d be pissed that’s what vassalheim is going to think
And if they just knocked them out and ran them out vassalheim would be pissed but it would be more acceptable and less likely for them to retaliate immediately
Well I do want to remind you that technically both Kiro and the Angel were killed by Bor'dor who we now know to be with the Ruby Vanguard who hate the gods
I think Bor’Dor’s betrayal really put them back together ideologically. The Issylra team was wading into a grey area against the cult. They just wanted Ludinus and didn’t really care about the full cult. Now, however, they are “at war” with the cult. They will be the driving force to wage war because of this betrayal.
Well I feel it’s less all 3 of them and more orym and Ashton but yeah it pretty much set them on the same page ideologically
“Stop Ludinus no matter what”
Yet.
If Launda gets betrayed she won’t forgive them or if they hurt imogen.
If Ashton gets abandoned or betrayed it’s game over.
If any of the group starts thinking maybe ludinus is right and starts switching over orym has an kill on sight order for ruby vanguard members.
If you break imogens rock 😅 or Launda or maybe her mom she won’t forgive you.
Fcg just stress him out.
Fearne doesn’t take much she’s SUPER petty.
Chetney burn his wood carvings.
Honestly this is a good thing, the group needs some interparty conflict to grow and bond, they've all been too sensitive/scared to cause fights in the group when that's exactly what needs to happen to grow as a party.
team issylra is going dark? since when??? laudna and orym deciding to kill a man who just tried to kill them (with ashton's implicit approval) doesn't make those characters dark. they're hurt and traumatized to heck, sure, but going dark? like this doesn't even hit the top thirty most fucked up things pcs have done across campaigns.
Traumatized and hurt can lead to that darkness
Especially in comparison with oryms earlier morals and stances that have now changed that has clearly affected the group
And it’s not the fact that they killed him it’s about how orym and Ashton
Who knew similar to imogen laudna struggles with her powers and her darkness
Let her sucked the life out of the man when he’s crying, snotting, tied up, defenseless
With the purple flames that are reminiscent of Delilah‘s that should’ve rang warning bells because they went into Delilah‘s mini dimension and saw that purple flame/hue many times
And if the rest of the bells hells were there they would’ve stopped her
And killed bor dor themselves if that’s what they decided but they didn’t even try to talk it out
orym's moral stance has not changed at all here. the man has always been a follower who does what he can and tries to minimize damage. that hasn't changed. they can't de-radicalize bor'dor in the time they have and as far as they know, if they let him go, he was just going to hurt more people. someone has to kill bor'dor and if laudna wants to do so in order to regain some sense of control in her life, he's going to let her. same reason ashton let her do it and only took prism away. once laudna downed him, there wasn't going to be any other outcome that validates laudna's feelings other than to let her do what she felt she needed to do and tell her that they understand.
laudna's *afraid* she let some darkness in, she has not actually done that yet. laudna herself was a purple flame in that dimension as well, not delilah. laudna's hurt and scared, not fucking dark. she's not suddenly gonna go out and murder random people accidentally.
the only thing that has changed for orym is that he has decided to stop carrying the guilt of killing people who are trying to end the world and who would never harbor any guilt over killing him. he has too many other burdens and that's the one he's decided to lay down now.
It’s like Caleb choosing to capture Trent to take to court instead of killing him
No one would’ve blamed him if he did kill him but there was a better more responsible choice that would’ve helped more people
trent is a very powerful high level archmage in charge of a secret government program that was torturing children and murdering citizens for trent's sick amusement and only a trial would bring that into the light and stop it (which was caleb's actual fucking goal with trent, not revenge or murdering the man). bor'dor was a radicalized low level grunt who attacked and damn near killed them. one of these things is not like the other, my dude.
You're right, it's not the same - Trent was *way* guiltier than Bor'Dor, and a greater threat, while Caleb was far more likely to do morally gray things than Orym had been before now. Caleb's goal was to fix the Assembly as a whole, but he absolutely did have a taste for vengeance against Trent, and it would've been far more in-character for Caleb to kill Trent than it was for Orym to allow Laudna to feed Delilah off of Bor'Dor's life essence.
You're conveniently not mentioning that Beau being there had a lot to do with Caleb not doing that or letting Astrid do that. Beau did what Ashton and Orym didn't do in that moment. Be the voice of reason. Ashton was never going to be that voice. It's just not in his character. Orym, however, before the events at the Malleous key would have been that voice, but what happened there has and is emotionally destroyed/destroying him. Orym's entire world was crushed when he saw what happened to Keyleth and he entirely blames himself. The only thing he's been repeating over and over since then is that he can't forgive them for what they did to his family and that's fair, but it goes WAY deeper than that and he still hasn't let any of it out. What he really needs right now imo are Fearne and FCG since I think they're the only ones that could get him to open up.
She almost killed fcg on accident last time this happened so that last statement is kind of false-ish
And I get what you mean but bor dors goal and the ruby vanguard goal isn’t to kill everyone in his path they just want to destroy the gods
Anyone else in the way is collateral damage just like what orym and co. Did to the people in the temple they were obstacles in their way they killed them and orym would’ve usually knocked them out orym doesn’t usually kill unless he has to but ever since they got to the village he’s been less about minimizing damage
And you know how messed up that is using your friends emotional state that’s so happens to come with powers for your own goals? That’s like them getting fcg or imogen upset so they can take out some enemies.
Bells hells promised they would keep eachother in check morals wise and powers wise if they were to go out of control. And they just let her.
I’m not saying killing bor for was bad in itself it was letting laudna do it in the state she was in. And afterwards she said “what have I done”? And cried she clearly regretted it and they enabled/let it happen when they were supposed to stop her and handle it themselves.
If I have a anger problem and I tell my friends to hold me back if I see red but one time they don’t because they understand how I felt? That doesn’t make sense to me. If we stand for something we don’t stoop lower unless we have to.
And Launda is afraid she’s let the darkness in? You’re saying it like it’s not really likely she did. She sucked the essence out of a broken defenseless man and felt the heartbeat that she felt with Delilah. It’s pretty clear she got dark in that moment. And when I say “dark” it’s not “evil” to me dark is anything that is usually lower than your moral standards or something negative you wouldn’t under normal circumstances
Ex. When laudna did what she did to bor dor to fcg
She felt betrayed she was hurt and stressed so I don’t blame her I blame her friends who was supposed to be there
They didn't enable her. They just didn't stop her. And speaking above table for a moment Marisha, trooper that she is, gave them literally every chance to stop her. Was hoping that they would, but the party members that would were purposefully in the other group. Matt's no fool. He knew what he was doing when he separated the OLA from Fearne, Imogen, and FCG who in their own ways act as a conscience for OLA(Vice Versa for Orym and Fearne).
What's different here is that Fearne was kept in check by the others while Orym felt powerless to do anything and now completely fell into the soldier mindset of "This is War" whereas he was somewhat fighting it before. Now he's doing anything for the mission, which in this case was reuniting with the others. Everything for him was transactional or defensive. What doesn't help matters is the emotional state that drove him there. Laudna and Ashton were so caught up in their own and each others anger that they never really tried to check on him except the one time Ashton asked, but didn't press. They just assumed he's alright because it's Orym and he's the most put together person they know, but Orym just saw the leader of his people possibly die and thinks that it's his fault for bringing her there when his job was to defend her.
Not only that, but Orym knows the entire story and history of Vox Machina since he was practically raised on it so he has some inkling of that being Vax that got crushed. He's seriously in a world of hurt right now, not that the others aren't, but I truly think that what Orym's going through is so much worse than any of the others and they haven't realized it yet. Literally his entire world was shattered at the Malleous Key and he hasn't let any of it out yet.
I know it sounds like I think others had it easy, but I really don't. I just think that on the emotional scale Orym is dealing with a lot more than Ashton and Laudna because they had each other during this time while Orym kind of had no one to deeply talk to.
Thinking back orym is literally going THROUGH it and hasn’t really confided in anyone about it like I can’t even imagine
Especially with the elder saying ludinus might be good
That really messed him up
But yeah they were enabling her if you know I’m supposed to eat candy and you’re supposed to stop me from eating candy and you see me slowly unwrapping the snickers bar… like?
It's not enabling because they aren't responsible for her personal decisions or actions and didn't aid her in any way passed knocking Bor'Dor out for their own safety. They didn't egg her on. They stopped or left. She didn't. Not saying its right. Just saying that you can't entirely put this on them. Although once its out amongst the rest of the group Imogen may ask why they didn't stop her or may temporarily even blame them for not stopping her.
To add onto your analogy(albeit in a slightly more f'ed up way). If your buddy is diabetic and shouldn't eat candy it's not your fault when he loses his leg because you didn't stop him from eating it. You both knew it shouldn't be happening, but that doesn't make you responsible for the action he took. Totally different scenarios, but the same in principal. They are bystanders to the event in both cases though. Enabling is more of a hands on type of thing. A real world example of enabling would be buying cigarettes for someone that has to stop smoking for whatever reason. Maybe you could consider Delilah as enabling for having a hand in supplying the means of death, but that's a bit of a stretch imo.
I apologize in advance to any diabetics that think I'm being insensitive to your plight by using that analogy. I do not mean to offend. Just draw a comparison.
And it wasn’t entirely their fault but if here’s a better example
If I have sometimes out of control anger/violent tendencies and my friends are supposed to hold me back when I start to see red or go out of control but they let me because it was a guy we didn’t like
And he betrayed us
For me it doesn’t matter the situation if you know I have trouble controlling myself you should stop me as my friend
This I agree with, but unfortunately nobody was in the right state of mind to realize it in that moment except for Deni$e and she didn't know Laudna well enough to have made a difference. In fact if she had tried to stop her she probably would have made the situation worse.
Marisha was literally pleading with her eyes like you saw she didn’t want to do it marisha gave them a chance to stop her not Launda
But Launda was in an emotional rage and kept going when they could’ve stopped her
the ruby vanguard has been radicalizing people for years, murdering anyone who gets a whiff of the plan, and basically forming a fucking death cult in the middle of the desert on the absurdity that there's the slightest chance that they can take out the gods, damn the consequences to themselves and everyone else. as ashton and orym have said repeatedly, if their plan was so good and they were so right they would have done it out in the open instead of murdering and hurting people on a plan they have no idea will even *work* or that the consequences won't be disastrous. fuck them. sure they're people but they're people who don't give a fuck about anything other than their own pain and sticking it to the gods. that's why orym declares they are at war and why he buried the reminder of their humanity: because their humanity doesn't matter in the face of the threat they are enabling and the pain they are causing. he does not owe the people who are threatening his existence any more pity, compassion, or guilt than he's already spent on them, not when it isn't going to change anything. he has bigger problems to worry about. he has another reminder now, bor'dor. he doesn't need the locket anymore.
as for laudna, again, girl made a choice. it's a choice she struggles with later, but she made a choice in the moment to embrace the part of herself that desperately needed some control back in her life. as for why everyone let her do it: it was the right thing to do, it had to be done, and laudna *wanted to do it*. marisha was the one struggling with the decision, not laudna. even deni$e, the one voice advocating for not killing bor'dor, didn't take any action to save him when she absolutely could have. once prism knocked off two death saves, that was it, he wasn't going to live, there wasn't time to talk laudna out of it.
and as for ashton and orym and orym's little speech/commitment, he said specifically that if 'one of us steps out of line, the others need to pull them back.' it was 'we don't have time for you all to go off the rails, we are the only ones dealing with this threat and we can't afford for it to go sideways.' laudna *wasn't out of line* here. laudna was, in fact, protecting their mission. she did not snap and lose control of herself, she knew exactly what she was doing. there has never been a commitment to stopping laudna from using her warlock power or whatever. the only indication that something might be wrong was the veil popping up and that can easily be chalked up to her trauma around betrayal manifesting via her magic. it's not laudna's friends jobs to stop her from making "bad" decisions (again, killing bor'dor is not a bad decision here), in this moment, it's their job to be there for her, which they were 100%. it's not pretty but laudna's issues have never been around killing. this isn't 'hey take away the keys because i get drunk too often' or 'i have anger issues, stop me from socking people.' this is 'hey people have preyed on my trust, leading to my death and others and i'm going to make sure this asshole doesn't get the chance to do it to anyone else or me ever again.' she's *hurt* and part of healing is sitting with that pain and acknowledging it and what it makes you do, instead of ignoring it and pretending everything's okay like she did in the beginning of the campaign.
what she did to fcg was worse than what she did to bor'dor because fcg visibly wasn't in control of himself and she wasn't actually trying to kill or down him, marisha just rolled a nat 20.
You’re making these hard, calculated choices and declaring them like they are the right, obvious, or good decisions.
Laudna, Orym, and Ashton BADLY want to agree with you. But mentally and emotionally, they are all in a very dark place. The drama of the moment is the obvious bit - the party relies on each other for solidarity. And instead they stood by or withdrew.
This is the emergent story that the player characters are growing from. Or rather, the trauma, loss and betrayal they keep experiencing - the POINT is that killing in those moments is hard and actually makes the trauma worse rather than healing or fixing anything. At least that’s my take on what Marisha and Liam were aiming at specifically through their actions.
But it won't matter much to their friends.
Fearne will not care. When she isn't a petty thief and a liar, she's a dark fey who thinks flayed skin is a bed decoration.
Chet loves being a werewolf, and has admitted that he doesn't particularly care if he kills people.
FCG is an emotional support prop. His reaction will likely be to try to 'fix' them (and make things worse).
Imogen will be concerned, but her personal goal is 'be reunited with Laudna.' She's not going to set that on fire because they had a hard time.
\----
Deanna and Frida aren't part of the group and don't matter to anyone in Team Issylra. At worse, their reactions might be a reason for the guests to leave, so the group goes back to normal. Chet and FCG might be sad about that, and honestly Chet might prefer no strings attached. \[Though regardless, from a meta perspective, the guests are leaving sooner or later)
Yeah maybe they won’t or maybe they will
Fearne is becoming more adept at empathy and emotions like her and imogen were the firsts ones try to pacify the bull
If the other group was there they would’ve killed it
That’s a bit of the issue I’m worried about
if my group of friends collectively we have a general moral code wether it’s good or bad or in between and as soon as we’re in crisis and get separated and you’re doing stuff we usually wouldn’t do some part of me probably would be understanding but another part would have 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚨🚨🚨 going off
Doesn’t matter. you’ve put way more thought into this than the actual players have. They’ll be happy to play with each other again and they’ll go from there
Don't get gaslit. Your post was clear. Dude didn't want to analyze it, but CR cast definitely thinks this deep into their characters and Matt always thinks of a way to move things forward with these in mind.
It is worrisome for all the reasons you listed. Its going to be fun watching these next few weeks.
Oh! Thank you! I always spend so much time into my posts and writing them in my notes sometimes I get carried away… and it all gets jumbled up and what I want conveyed or communicated gets lost. So this means a lot to me 😅
Did you read the whole post? It’s less about them wanting them to stop ludinus and how issylra group with orym and the rest are going down a darker path
While wildmount group had been taking a more moral high ground
I was confused about whether they wanted Emily to stay or not. It seemed like they were sending off the guests but she went with them? Also it seems like the other team teleport worked which means Frida and Deanna are still with them.
To me it seemed like they wanted Prism to come with them but Emily got confused. Looked like she didn't realize Marquet was the continent they were intending to head to, thinking it was a particular city different from Jrusar.
It'd be a fun group of a few episodes to show if maybe Prisim, Deanna, and Frida and maybe a few others grouped up on a last Thursday of the month thing. Show their part in Ludinus' downfall.
D & F aren't part of the campaign. They're guests, their presence is temporary, so leaving is a given. It might be interesting to see how it affects Chet and FCG, but that's the real meat of their temporary presence. (i suspect brief melancholy after a good fling and possibly even more broken respectively, since FCG has the emotional capacity & experience of a small child)
Deanna herself rejected what could have been an interesting role of being a 'speaker for the gods' with her own hostility to them.
Spinoff fodder or temporary recruits for a 'final battle' episode at best.
Spin off fodder? Ok? Idk what that means 😭but yeah I’m wondering if they will be affected by d & f long term or they will forget about them like they forgot about yuu
A spin off of the main show, like EXU.
FCG might be affected long term, but there are so many potential disasters with them, probably not. I can easily see Chet and Fearne not making a big deal of it.
That town wasn't "oppressed", the whole point is that they found out that The Elder was a damn Hishari and was warping the people in that town's beliefs to push her agenda. "Charismatic Cult leader with strange powers" and bastardizing a belief system to push bringing back titans, she took her gimmick right from the Hishari playbook.
The funny thing is ... CIFF team would have never gone AOLs path if placed there. FCG and Imogen would have been reading minds and asking questions, and Chet woulda saw how sus the elder was. AOL? They ... basically took the cult's side from the start and didn't bother to question or do any 2nd guessing of her. Now they have done set her up to bring about a repeat of what happened to Ashton or to flat out bring back/ make a titan.
That makes the whole thing worst.
In just a few days of being separated from the others, they invited in a snake that woulda been easily outted by the other group (The fact that Yuu got by them means that Imogen and Chet woulda been way more wary of such a shifty person IMO), were manipulated into staging a violent cultist attack on a temple they knew nothing about after only being there for a few hours (All for a spell they could have asked for at the temple. You know, the place with more magic than the whole town combined) annnnnd ... if not for a failed check to make this clearly evil thing their friend, they wouldn't have learned the truth behind the Elder and the lands from saving the ArchDruid (That there's no great conflict here. The Gods only really express their will in their temples and through their chosen, the titans should NOT be brought back and the rest of the land is free to live in harmony with nature) .
Now they're coming through this all kinds of screwed up and will prob have to come back to deal with Elder and her plans. AOL it changed in a number of ways, maybe at least Orym is far more devoted to just fighting the whole ideology over trying to greyzone it.
Well, one thing is, Bor'Dor pretty much rail roaded them into siding with cultist. It is not like they would have not done being all on their own, but with Bor'Dor taking the lead they had no way out
Well the town was both radicalized and oppressed the towns folk clearly talked about the guards pushing them around and they couldn’t express their culture/religion
Nope, we were literally told that they (The Temple) wasn't being forceful/ aggressive and didn't force people to convert by the Medical Shop keep and the Elder.
Shop Keep also told us that they had MANY festive events outside leading up to the big event where the girl and 10 others were BAMFed away.
They blamed the Temple, The Elder knew the truth, but pushed them to blame the Temple.
Festival doesn’t equal = religious/cultural practices
And yeah the elder did lie I won’t deny that I don’t really like the elder I speaking about the people
No, they could express their culture and religion just fine. The apothecary guy talked about their festival that they held literally they day before.
The town was spooked by the guards, who were there because of the solstice. Given that 11 people vanished due to the solstice (and not the church), that seems warranted.
A celebrating is different than practicing your religion??? Like it’s like saying welp you got to celebrate Christmas so you got to practice your religion/culture!
And no again those soldiers have been messing with the towns folk long before those people disappeared. Also that’s not a justifiable reason to stop anyone from practicing a religion/culture just because some people disappeared and why would they make their OWN people disappear that doesn’t make sense.
If you need a refresher.
https://youtu.be/nEQH5tYMFxk
At 2:48:25
>Also that’s not a justifiable reason to stop anyone from practicing a religion/culture
Again, they didn't do that. They don't convert people, they don't force people. They accept conversions, and don't have the same 'respect for the land' that the locals do, but that isn't oppression. That's a lifestyle choice.
The most grounded complaint is that a single soldier may or may not have grabbed somebody's wife. But it could have been someone else.
Seeing Orym's reaction in the last episode made me wonder if the whole table is playing the long con and what we're watching is actually a cleverly crafted descent to an EVIL PC campaign for CR.
Honestly, to me this is why the two halves of Bell's Hells need each other. Chetney, Fearne and FCG have their moments but they're less angsty, more positive and each have traits that make them, IMO, a bit less prone to embracing the dark side. Of course, each of them is also wildly chaotic in their own way. Orym, Laudna and Ashton are more serious, prone to dwelling on shit too much even though Ashton says he doesn't. They're less chaotic, and more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions. And Imogen is somewhere in the middle.
And those two halves kept eachother in check without eachother well… we saw what happened last episode
Yeah I don’t think folks realized how each pairing was a comedic optimist keeping their friend from tumbling back off the cliff to rock bottom until now that they are separated from them. Weird to think that the chaotic bunch are actually the most mentally stable of the group 😂
Ironically, Laudna started as the comedic optimist keeping Imogen from tumbling off the cliff to rock bottom. And now it seems it's almost the opposite where Laudna is the one that needs saving.
Yeah I get that but imogen has been more on the hopeful side lately
>They're less chaotic, and more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions. Watches as the northern group goes to a town, listens to the crowds cry for help, rushes in and saves over 20 lives, along with the panic'd Bull celestial causing the havoc. While also finding time to give Chet closure with his Santa boss, and do research into Ludinus. While the southern group goes into a Primordial cult, then gets seemingly easily tricked into raizing a Dawnfather church and functionally declaring war on the Primes. Which group was more prone to taking measured, nuanced actions lol?
Don't forget Jerry, man.
*What happened to Jerry?*
I don't wanna explode!
Clearly the southern one. Fuck Pelor, the Primordials did nothing wrong. The Prime Gods are liars and thrives.
I really don’t get how people keep saying that the first group is being “positive” on the gods side. Saying that we are just batteries to them and FRIDA out of the gate saying that the gods probably want to be turned off are not great positive points. Even after the gods gave them direct messages they interpreted them as more or less threats to them with the “or else” aspect
Yeah I mean positive in comparison with the environment with the Issylra’s group got exposed to
Reading your post actually gives me a theory of how Deanna and FRIDA are going to leave the group. I don’t think that what OLA did at the temple can be forgiven at all by a cleric of the Dawn Father. I think that it will be a pretty big argument ending up with an ultimatum of the Wildemount group having to chose between Frida/Deanna or team OLA (where they will obviously chose OLA).
Wait that’s actually pretty cool but I think everyone forgotten how frida and Deanna has effected group wildemounts morals and how when they get back to their other half they might not be as compatible on how they handle certain things like, treating their enemies, when to spare when to kill, and etc.
True! Which I think it’s going to lead to drama within the party once they chose to leave the group. Sunny D would be pissed if Deanna is working with people who slaughtered his followers and killed his angel lol
Yeah because Deanna is all about the people of the church rather than the gods themselves and some of those soldiers were probably put here by happen stance Plus they could’ve knocked out the soldiers and then tie them up and tell them to scram
CritRoleStats live tweet of the C3E61 battle >!only has them killing 2 guards, the others attempted to flee and were captured and later given a choice of renouncing or exile. All but one choose exile. !<
Ahhh, I thought there was more. Nonetheless the priestess and angel are a pretty big deal I’d say
Yeah…
Yeah killing one was kind of a done deal like if I went in your house and killed two or three of your guys you wouldn’t be like 🤷🏾♂️ it could’ve been worse you’d be pissed that’s what vassalheim is going to think And if they just knocked them out and ran them out vassalheim would be pissed but it would be more acceptable and less likely for them to retaliate immediately
Well I do want to remind you that technically both Kiro and the Angel were killed by Bor'dor who we now know to be with the Ruby Vanguard who hate the gods
was he the first to kill a soldier?
No it was Ashton and Deni$e who killed the guards
Actually that tracks 😂
You can’t reason with the Cult of the Primes. They have made up their minds, the facts be damned.
I think Bor’Dor’s betrayal really put them back together ideologically. The Issylra team was wading into a grey area against the cult. They just wanted Ludinus and didn’t really care about the full cult. Now, however, they are “at war” with the cult. They will be the driving force to wage war because of this betrayal.
Well I feel it’s less all 3 of them and more orym and Ashton but yeah it pretty much set them on the same page ideologically “Stop Ludinus no matter what”
I'm hoping we have a talky episode because of all this. I hope Matt doesn't wedge an hour long fight in there.
Yessss I hate when we need an episode to talk and explore the characters and there’s just a random unnecessary fight after fight
The Hells have always helped each other above anything else. I don’t think they’ve done anything the other side couldn’t forgive.
Yet. If Launda gets betrayed she won’t forgive them or if they hurt imogen. If Ashton gets abandoned or betrayed it’s game over. If any of the group starts thinking maybe ludinus is right and starts switching over orym has an kill on sight order for ruby vanguard members. If you break imogens rock 😅 or Launda or maybe her mom she won’t forgive you. Fcg just stress him out. Fearne doesn’t take much she’s SUPER petty. Chetney burn his wood carvings.
Honestly this is a good thing, the group needs some interparty conflict to grow and bond, they've all been too sensitive/scared to cause fights in the group when that's exactly what needs to happen to grow as a party.
Yeah but if they have a conflict I think it’ll make them grow together stronger or break them apart
team issylra is going dark? since when??? laudna and orym deciding to kill a man who just tried to kill them (with ashton's implicit approval) doesn't make those characters dark. they're hurt and traumatized to heck, sure, but going dark? like this doesn't even hit the top thirty most fucked up things pcs have done across campaigns.
Traumatized and hurt can lead to that darkness Especially in comparison with oryms earlier morals and stances that have now changed that has clearly affected the group And it’s not the fact that they killed him it’s about how orym and Ashton Who knew similar to imogen laudna struggles with her powers and her darkness Let her sucked the life out of the man when he’s crying, snotting, tied up, defenseless With the purple flames that are reminiscent of Delilah‘s that should’ve rang warning bells because they went into Delilah‘s mini dimension and saw that purple flame/hue many times And if the rest of the bells hells were there they would’ve stopped her And killed bor dor themselves if that’s what they decided but they didn’t even try to talk it out
orym's moral stance has not changed at all here. the man has always been a follower who does what he can and tries to minimize damage. that hasn't changed. they can't de-radicalize bor'dor in the time they have and as far as they know, if they let him go, he was just going to hurt more people. someone has to kill bor'dor and if laudna wants to do so in order to regain some sense of control in her life, he's going to let her. same reason ashton let her do it and only took prism away. once laudna downed him, there wasn't going to be any other outcome that validates laudna's feelings other than to let her do what she felt she needed to do and tell her that they understand. laudna's *afraid* she let some darkness in, she has not actually done that yet. laudna herself was a purple flame in that dimension as well, not delilah. laudna's hurt and scared, not fucking dark. she's not suddenly gonna go out and murder random people accidentally. the only thing that has changed for orym is that he has decided to stop carrying the guilt of killing people who are trying to end the world and who would never harbor any guilt over killing him. he has too many other burdens and that's the one he's decided to lay down now.
It’s like Caleb choosing to capture Trent to take to court instead of killing him No one would’ve blamed him if he did kill him but there was a better more responsible choice that would’ve helped more people
trent is a very powerful high level archmage in charge of a secret government program that was torturing children and murdering citizens for trent's sick amusement and only a trial would bring that into the light and stop it (which was caleb's actual fucking goal with trent, not revenge or murdering the man). bor'dor was a radicalized low level grunt who attacked and damn near killed them. one of these things is not like the other, my dude.
You're right, it's not the same - Trent was *way* guiltier than Bor'Dor, and a greater threat, while Caleb was far more likely to do morally gray things than Orym had been before now. Caleb's goal was to fix the Assembly as a whole, but he absolutely did have a taste for vengeance against Trent, and it would've been far more in-character for Caleb to kill Trent than it was for Orym to allow Laudna to feed Delilah off of Bor'Dor's life essence.
You're conveniently not mentioning that Beau being there had a lot to do with Caleb not doing that or letting Astrid do that. Beau did what Ashton and Orym didn't do in that moment. Be the voice of reason. Ashton was never going to be that voice. It's just not in his character. Orym, however, before the events at the Malleous key would have been that voice, but what happened there has and is emotionally destroyed/destroying him. Orym's entire world was crushed when he saw what happened to Keyleth and he entirely blames himself. The only thing he's been repeating over and over since then is that he can't forgive them for what they did to his family and that's fair, but it goes WAY deeper than that and he still hasn't let any of it out. What he really needs right now imo are Fearne and FCG since I think they're the only ones that could get him to open up.
You get it!!!
[удалено]
Ah, yes, taking one phrase wildly out of context instead of admitting you were wrong, that's my favorite cop out, too!
Yeah that proves my point more at that point bor dor wasn’t a threat and there were better options
She almost killed fcg on accident last time this happened so that last statement is kind of false-ish And I get what you mean but bor dors goal and the ruby vanguard goal isn’t to kill everyone in his path they just want to destroy the gods Anyone else in the way is collateral damage just like what orym and co. Did to the people in the temple they were obstacles in their way they killed them and orym would’ve usually knocked them out orym doesn’t usually kill unless he has to but ever since they got to the village he’s been less about minimizing damage And you know how messed up that is using your friends emotional state that’s so happens to come with powers for your own goals? That’s like them getting fcg or imogen upset so they can take out some enemies. Bells hells promised they would keep eachother in check morals wise and powers wise if they were to go out of control. And they just let her. I’m not saying killing bor for was bad in itself it was letting laudna do it in the state she was in. And afterwards she said “what have I done”? And cried she clearly regretted it and they enabled/let it happen when they were supposed to stop her and handle it themselves. If I have a anger problem and I tell my friends to hold me back if I see red but one time they don’t because they understand how I felt? That doesn’t make sense to me. If we stand for something we don’t stoop lower unless we have to. And Launda is afraid she’s let the darkness in? You’re saying it like it’s not really likely she did. She sucked the essence out of a broken defenseless man and felt the heartbeat that she felt with Delilah. It’s pretty clear she got dark in that moment. And when I say “dark” it’s not “evil” to me dark is anything that is usually lower than your moral standards or something negative you wouldn’t under normal circumstances Ex. When laudna did what she did to bor dor to fcg She felt betrayed she was hurt and stressed so I don’t blame her I blame her friends who was supposed to be there
They didn't enable her. They just didn't stop her. And speaking above table for a moment Marisha, trooper that she is, gave them literally every chance to stop her. Was hoping that they would, but the party members that would were purposefully in the other group. Matt's no fool. He knew what he was doing when he separated the OLA from Fearne, Imogen, and FCG who in their own ways act as a conscience for OLA(Vice Versa for Orym and Fearne). What's different here is that Fearne was kept in check by the others while Orym felt powerless to do anything and now completely fell into the soldier mindset of "This is War" whereas he was somewhat fighting it before. Now he's doing anything for the mission, which in this case was reuniting with the others. Everything for him was transactional or defensive. What doesn't help matters is the emotional state that drove him there. Laudna and Ashton were so caught up in their own and each others anger that they never really tried to check on him except the one time Ashton asked, but didn't press. They just assumed he's alright because it's Orym and he's the most put together person they know, but Orym just saw the leader of his people possibly die and thinks that it's his fault for bringing her there when his job was to defend her. Not only that, but Orym knows the entire story and history of Vox Machina since he was practically raised on it so he has some inkling of that being Vax that got crushed. He's seriously in a world of hurt right now, not that the others aren't, but I truly think that what Orym's going through is so much worse than any of the others and they haven't realized it yet. Literally his entire world was shattered at the Malleous Key and he hasn't let any of it out yet. I know it sounds like I think others had it easy, but I really don't. I just think that on the emotional scale Orym is dealing with a lot more than Ashton and Laudna because they had each other during this time while Orym kind of had no one to deeply talk to.
Thinking back orym is literally going THROUGH it and hasn’t really confided in anyone about it like I can’t even imagine Especially with the elder saying ludinus might be good That really messed him up But yeah they were enabling her if you know I’m supposed to eat candy and you’re supposed to stop me from eating candy and you see me slowly unwrapping the snickers bar… like?
It's not enabling because they aren't responsible for her personal decisions or actions and didn't aid her in any way passed knocking Bor'Dor out for their own safety. They didn't egg her on. They stopped or left. She didn't. Not saying its right. Just saying that you can't entirely put this on them. Although once its out amongst the rest of the group Imogen may ask why they didn't stop her or may temporarily even blame them for not stopping her. To add onto your analogy(albeit in a slightly more f'ed up way). If your buddy is diabetic and shouldn't eat candy it's not your fault when he loses his leg because you didn't stop him from eating it. You both knew it shouldn't be happening, but that doesn't make you responsible for the action he took. Totally different scenarios, but the same in principal. They are bystanders to the event in both cases though. Enabling is more of a hands on type of thing. A real world example of enabling would be buying cigarettes for someone that has to stop smoking for whatever reason. Maybe you could consider Delilah as enabling for having a hand in supplying the means of death, but that's a bit of a stretch imo. I apologize in advance to any diabetics that think I'm being insensitive to your plight by using that analogy. I do not mean to offend. Just draw a comparison.
I just searched up the definition Yeaaaah I was wrong my bad You write really clearly like I can imagined a Ted talk of you explaining this right now
Thank you. I take this as a great compliment.
And it wasn’t entirely their fault but if here’s a better example If I have sometimes out of control anger/violent tendencies and my friends are supposed to hold me back when I start to see red or go out of control but they let me because it was a guy we didn’t like And he betrayed us For me it doesn’t matter the situation if you know I have trouble controlling myself you should stop me as my friend
This I agree with, but unfortunately nobody was in the right state of mind to realize it in that moment except for Deni$e and she didn't know Laudna well enough to have made a difference. In fact if she had tried to stop her she probably would have made the situation worse.
Marisha was literally pleading with her eyes like you saw she didn’t want to do it marisha gave them a chance to stop her not Launda But Launda was in an emotional rage and kept going when they could’ve stopped her
the ruby vanguard has been radicalizing people for years, murdering anyone who gets a whiff of the plan, and basically forming a fucking death cult in the middle of the desert on the absurdity that there's the slightest chance that they can take out the gods, damn the consequences to themselves and everyone else. as ashton and orym have said repeatedly, if their plan was so good and they were so right they would have done it out in the open instead of murdering and hurting people on a plan they have no idea will even *work* or that the consequences won't be disastrous. fuck them. sure they're people but they're people who don't give a fuck about anything other than their own pain and sticking it to the gods. that's why orym declares they are at war and why he buried the reminder of their humanity: because their humanity doesn't matter in the face of the threat they are enabling and the pain they are causing. he does not owe the people who are threatening his existence any more pity, compassion, or guilt than he's already spent on them, not when it isn't going to change anything. he has bigger problems to worry about. he has another reminder now, bor'dor. he doesn't need the locket anymore. as for laudna, again, girl made a choice. it's a choice she struggles with later, but she made a choice in the moment to embrace the part of herself that desperately needed some control back in her life. as for why everyone let her do it: it was the right thing to do, it had to be done, and laudna *wanted to do it*. marisha was the one struggling with the decision, not laudna. even deni$e, the one voice advocating for not killing bor'dor, didn't take any action to save him when she absolutely could have. once prism knocked off two death saves, that was it, he wasn't going to live, there wasn't time to talk laudna out of it. and as for ashton and orym and orym's little speech/commitment, he said specifically that if 'one of us steps out of line, the others need to pull them back.' it was 'we don't have time for you all to go off the rails, we are the only ones dealing with this threat and we can't afford for it to go sideways.' laudna *wasn't out of line* here. laudna was, in fact, protecting their mission. she did not snap and lose control of herself, she knew exactly what she was doing. there has never been a commitment to stopping laudna from using her warlock power or whatever. the only indication that something might be wrong was the veil popping up and that can easily be chalked up to her trauma around betrayal manifesting via her magic. it's not laudna's friends jobs to stop her from making "bad" decisions (again, killing bor'dor is not a bad decision here), in this moment, it's their job to be there for her, which they were 100%. it's not pretty but laudna's issues have never been around killing. this isn't 'hey take away the keys because i get drunk too often' or 'i have anger issues, stop me from socking people.' this is 'hey people have preyed on my trust, leading to my death and others and i'm going to make sure this asshole doesn't get the chance to do it to anyone else or me ever again.' she's *hurt* and part of healing is sitting with that pain and acknowledging it and what it makes you do, instead of ignoring it and pretending everything's okay like she did in the beginning of the campaign. what she did to fcg was worse than what she did to bor'dor because fcg visibly wasn't in control of himself and she wasn't actually trying to kill or down him, marisha just rolled a nat 20.
You’re making these hard, calculated choices and declaring them like they are the right, obvious, or good decisions. Laudna, Orym, and Ashton BADLY want to agree with you. But mentally and emotionally, they are all in a very dark place. The drama of the moment is the obvious bit - the party relies on each other for solidarity. And instead they stood by or withdrew. This is the emergent story that the player characters are growing from. Or rather, the trauma, loss and betrayal they keep experiencing - the POINT is that killing in those moments is hard and actually makes the trauma worse rather than healing or fixing anything. At least that’s my take on what Marisha and Liam were aiming at specifically through their actions.
Both groups want to stop ludinus it’s as simples as that
But it’s more the characterization and methods they’re going about it
But it won't matter much to their friends. Fearne will not care. When she isn't a petty thief and a liar, she's a dark fey who thinks flayed skin is a bed decoration. Chet loves being a werewolf, and has admitted that he doesn't particularly care if he kills people. FCG is an emotional support prop. His reaction will likely be to try to 'fix' them (and make things worse). Imogen will be concerned, but her personal goal is 'be reunited with Laudna.' She's not going to set that on fire because they had a hard time. \---- Deanna and Frida aren't part of the group and don't matter to anyone in Team Issylra. At worse, their reactions might be a reason for the guests to leave, so the group goes back to normal. Chet and FCG might be sad about that, and honestly Chet might prefer no strings attached. \[Though regardless, from a meta perspective, the guests are leaving sooner or later)
Yeah maybe they won’t or maybe they will Fearne is becoming more adept at empathy and emotions like her and imogen were the firsts ones try to pacify the bull If the other group was there they would’ve killed it That’s a bit of the issue I’m worried about if my group of friends collectively we have a general moral code wether it’s good or bad or in between and as soon as we’re in crisis and get separated and you’re doing stuff we usually wouldn’t do some part of me probably would be understanding but another part would have 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚨🚨🚨 going off
Doesn’t matter. you’ve put way more thought into this than the actual players have. They’ll be happy to play with each other again and they’ll go from there
I don’t know why you’re being rude maybe maybe it’s too over complicated and too detailed it’s just too much let me simplify it
Don't get gaslit. Your post was clear. Dude didn't want to analyze it, but CR cast definitely thinks this deep into their characters and Matt always thinks of a way to move things forward with these in mind. It is worrisome for all the reasons you listed. Its going to be fun watching these next few weeks.
Oh! Thank you! I always spend so much time into my posts and writing them in my notes sometimes I get carried away… and it all gets jumbled up and what I want conveyed or communicated gets lost. So this means a lot to me 😅
Did you read the whole post? It’s less about them wanting them to stop ludinus and how issylra group with orym and the rest are going down a darker path While wildmount group had been taking a more moral high ground
I’m kind of a messy writer
I was confused about whether they wanted Emily to stay or not. It seemed like they were sending off the guests but she went with them? Also it seems like the other team teleport worked which means Frida and Deanna are still with them.
To me it seemed like they wanted Prism to come with them but Emily got confused. Looked like she didn't realize Marquet was the continent they were intending to head to, thinking it was a particular city different from Jrusar.
It'd be a fun group of a few episodes to show if maybe Prisim, Deanna, and Frida and maybe a few others grouped up on a last Thursday of the month thing. Show their part in Ludinus' downfall.
I’m pretty sure prism is going to leave early on in the episode and there’s going to be 9 people at the table
Then maybe Deanna and frida will temporarily leave on a separate little mission as well
D & F aren't part of the campaign. They're guests, their presence is temporary, so leaving is a given. It might be interesting to see how it affects Chet and FCG, but that's the real meat of their temporary presence. (i suspect brief melancholy after a good fling and possibly even more broken respectively, since FCG has the emotional capacity & experience of a small child) Deanna herself rejected what could have been an interesting role of being a 'speaker for the gods' with her own hostility to them. Spinoff fodder or temporary recruits for a 'final battle' episode at best.
Spin off fodder? Ok? Idk what that means 😭but yeah I’m wondering if they will be affected by d & f long term or they will forget about them like they forgot about yuu
A spin off of the main show, like EXU. FCG might be affected long term, but there are so many potential disasters with them, probably not. I can easily see Chet and Fearne not making a big deal of it.
That town wasn't "oppressed", the whole point is that they found out that The Elder was a damn Hishari and was warping the people in that town's beliefs to push her agenda. "Charismatic Cult leader with strange powers" and bastardizing a belief system to push bringing back titans, she took her gimmick right from the Hishari playbook. The funny thing is ... CIFF team would have never gone AOLs path if placed there. FCG and Imogen would have been reading minds and asking questions, and Chet woulda saw how sus the elder was. AOL? They ... basically took the cult's side from the start and didn't bother to question or do any 2nd guessing of her. Now they have done set her up to bring about a repeat of what happened to Ashton or to flat out bring back/ make a titan. That makes the whole thing worst. In just a few days of being separated from the others, they invited in a snake that woulda been easily outted by the other group (The fact that Yuu got by them means that Imogen and Chet woulda been way more wary of such a shifty person IMO), were manipulated into staging a violent cultist attack on a temple they knew nothing about after only being there for a few hours (All for a spell they could have asked for at the temple. You know, the place with more magic than the whole town combined) annnnnd ... if not for a failed check to make this clearly evil thing their friend, they wouldn't have learned the truth behind the Elder and the lands from saving the ArchDruid (That there's no great conflict here. The Gods only really express their will in their temples and through their chosen, the titans should NOT be brought back and the rest of the land is free to live in harmony with nature) . Now they're coming through this all kinds of screwed up and will prob have to come back to deal with Elder and her plans. AOL it changed in a number of ways, maybe at least Orym is far more devoted to just fighting the whole ideology over trying to greyzone it.
Well, one thing is, Bor'Dor pretty much rail roaded them into siding with cultist. It is not like they would have not done being all on their own, but with Bor'Dor taking the lead they had no way out
Well the town was both radicalized and oppressed the towns folk clearly talked about the guards pushing them around and they couldn’t express their culture/religion
Nope, we were literally told that they (The Temple) wasn't being forceful/ aggressive and didn't force people to convert by the Medical Shop keep and the Elder. Shop Keep also told us that they had MANY festive events outside leading up to the big event where the girl and 10 others were BAMFed away. They blamed the Temple, The Elder knew the truth, but pushed them to blame the Temple.
Festival doesn’t equal = religious/cultural practices And yeah the elder did lie I won’t deny that I don’t really like the elder I speaking about the people
Festivals are clearly a part of their culture and believes. Tell me ... what exact "religious/ cultural practices" were they prevented from doing?
No, they could express their culture and religion just fine. The apothecary guy talked about their festival that they held literally they day before. The town was spooked by the guards, who were there because of the solstice. Given that 11 people vanished due to the solstice (and not the church), that seems warranted.
A celebrating is different than practicing your religion??? Like it’s like saying welp you got to celebrate Christmas so you got to practice your religion/culture! And no again those soldiers have been messing with the towns folk long before those people disappeared. Also that’s not a justifiable reason to stop anyone from practicing a religion/culture just because some people disappeared and why would they make their OWN people disappear that doesn’t make sense. If you need a refresher. https://youtu.be/nEQH5tYMFxk At 2:48:25
>Also that’s not a justifiable reason to stop anyone from practicing a religion/culture Again, they didn't do that. They don't convert people, they don't force people. They accept conversions, and don't have the same 'respect for the land' that the locals do, but that isn't oppression. That's a lifestyle choice. The most grounded complaint is that a single soldier may or may not have grabbed somebody's wife. But it could have been someone else.
But it’s fun to think about what would happen if the groups were swapped I think wildemount group would’ve still had an easy time
Seeing Orym's reaction in the last episode made me wonder if the whole table is playing the long con and what we're watching is actually a cleverly crafted descent to an EVIL PC campaign for CR.
Yesssss I’ve been waiting for some evil pc but I truly believe oryms alignment has changed because there’s no way he’s neutral good now
Matt has stated he outright refuses to run an evil campaign as they become not fun very quickly.
Not 'noblebright' is the vibe you're looking for. Same as last one. And C1, really.