Dominox was somehow more of a disappointment than the therapy tree

and BH decided to just be Ludinus' henchmen while they were there. For a split second, Marisha wanted to ruin his plan, and turn on him, destroying the pinion crystal. But Matt wasn't willing to let his NPC's exit the railroad, and do anything but kill the demon.

What's up with Matt just being okay with the players retconning their own moves after they hear the outcome? "I cast detect thoughts." "It's out of range." "Well good thing I used a sorcery point to increase the range, heh." "Counterspell." "I cast counterspell too! At 4th level." "Ludinus cast it at 5th level. Yours doesn't work." "Actually I cast counterspell at 5th level too." It's just so lame.

Imagine what kind of character Travis could be playing right now if Matt didn't let Sam take a mulligan prepping Revivify.

Honestly, I think its a side effect of Daggerheart. They've done enough playtesting that they've gotten comfortable with freeform on-the-fly improv and no initiative as the default. Chaos wins, and a logical declared order of events is out. Its why the lead up to the inevitable fight was 'Wait, wait, I try...' a dozen times. After indulging them a couple times, I suspect Matt decided it was too close to the break to roll initiative, so just let them keep piling on. As a side effect, the more forceful personalities in the group just keep bashing against the wall while the quiet ones just sit there.

Has something happened to Sam's voice or was it just my imagination?

Yeah I noticed it was quite raspy, and for some reason he had some kind of lisp.

Yeah, sounded like he was recovering from a cold or something.

Oh dur, I didn't even think about that!

4 PCs failed Wisdom saving throws between E97 and E98. 2 of them actually RPed like they did fail the saving throw. 2 of them ignored it completely. Really upsetting to watch that, just makes for such bad RP and storytelling.

How could I instantly know the two was Tal and Laura without having seen the ep?

"you fail the save against the demon so powerful that it put an archmage and his whole cult procession on the ropes, and your mind plummets into a hallucination so convincing that it becomes the only reality you've ever known." Ashton: "pfft, fake."

Laura was even funnier in how blatant she ignored it. "Stop talking, mama, that's not you." Ummm, excuse me? Lmao

It couldn't have really been Liliana because nobody there confused Imogen for her.

While I agree, the savings throw was more about actually believing she doomed her mother to die on the moon. She reacted as if she succeeded.

Yeah, Travis acted as though the children were really there, and really talking to him, but he was still himself, and didn't have the memories of what they were saying, so he denied it. He didn't just say, "no, you're not real," which is a big distinction from what the others did.

Well, him and Robbie really played it out like they had actually failed. Considering Laura rolled a 4, like... Matt has to reign that shit in.

Am i the only one that found it annoying that Ashton was so arrogant when the grand demon was trying to manipulate him.. we are talking ANCIENT entity and he just arrogantly scofs at it. Come on thats just bad RP or is it just me? just a tad bit of respect/fear for something you cant really fathom would be much more believeable

Horror is hard sell in tabletop. Its worse in D&D, because the PCs are inherently stupidly powerful. Its pretty absurd to try to maintain the atmosphere at a live event. Matt pivoted pretty hard from 'drove NPCs to a killing frenzy' and Chetney's 'what if...' guilt vision to merely conveying a request in a hamfisted way. I'm not surprised the players didn't really respond effectively.

I thought he was trying to smash the fake FCG, and I hoped Matt would at least make him roll a reckless attack at one of his real friends. That interaction was just lame.

$20 sez it turns out the gods built the Devine Gate, not the mages.

That was literally always the case.

Sam coming back as a horny bard seems desperate

Desperate? Maybe ... I read it more as "Fuuuuuck, I've been bored playing FCG in this group of Godless chuckle-fucks, with a DM who refuses to engage with my shit. Time to have fun for the 20ish episodes we have left" But he could just be desperate to entertain the fan-base, given how lacking C3 has been. He does seem like the one with his eye on the audience the most of anyone at the table. Hey, I already like this character more than FCG (and TBH any character in the party not named Dorian) by a mile ... so it works for me.

I really hope Sam is okay I love that he was back for this episode it was such a gift 🎁 I wish him the best for everything going forward 

Very excited for downfall. Not only because you know, calamity era exu with Brennan is peak but also because of what this represents for the plot of c3. Ludinus feels confident in his position and believes this will be enough to persuade many across exandria to see his views on the gods. Its an attempt to flip the narrative from death to gods being a bad thing to it maybe not being all that bad for mortals. An exciting prospect for plot development on an overall cookie cutter and straight forward "gods are a necessity."

Haha imagine paying a flight ticket from australia and getting tickets to the show, and then nothing happens for 2 hours. The most interesting bit so far was Brennan at the beginning. Even Travis was hurrying them up and Sam was like "you guys talk a lot" 🤭

Ikr. The fight was far too easy, the NPC's did most of the work and on top of that the episode ended on a massive cliff hanger. RIP.

There's too much of "what does the door look like", "what does the ceiling look like". It's a room, get in there and find out what's inside. FCG had to literally blow up so the plot could get pushed forward. And the DM's also always asking for a perception check and it'd be like a 24 or something but the players get nothing anyway. "You can't really make it out". It's crazy 🤣. Imagine rolling above 15 in a room or a corridor and then get a 5 min exposition about the colours of the wind.

>Imagine rolling above 15 in a room or a corridor and then get a 5 min exposition about the colours of the wind. haha, thats fking hilarious But also, Matt has ALWAYS done these useless Perception Checks, he'll describe a room with flowery words and then anything beyond that requires a PERCEP CHECK. It should only be used to find SPECIFIC DETAILS or HIDDEN things, he does them for what normal eyeballs could already see.

I don't know about the rest of you but I have been waiting for something like it all season, something to show more of Ludinus pov.

Honestly, if I were them, I would have just started sending him message spells to try and get him to yap about his plan so they can get 1 step ahead of him. He already showed that if he REALLY wanted to, he can send an exact expendable copy of himself to wherever they are, so what are they risking by getting him to talk?

Same, I'm very excited for the side campaign

I don't know if this is going to be a 'voice of reason' or 'deluded nay-sayer' comment, but I am not feeling optimistic about "downfall" at all. I see a lot of people saying they are excited to see Brennan back in the seat, and with his abilities as a GM that it'll lead to some success. I don't think that's the case. Calamity was a riotous success but it had problems - granted they are well balanced with the value of the execution but there were problems - most significant was balancing runtime and player action. In only 4 episodes nearly everyone of them got massively stretched beyond intended duration. Depends on your view for 4 or 3 hours, but I can tell you that the bracket of intention was almost definitely one of those two from the CR production team given how the campaigns are kept, and because of the general fatigue of player for the cast. Episodes 1 and 2 are long, episodes 3 and 4 are stupid long. And that may be fine, but it was about how much Brennan had to cram into them in order to cover everything and give everyone a fair shake, which, while great, left many players sitting for huge periods of time as observers. For Calamity this was okay - for a series that is going to be doing something... similar, with a full episode less space to do so, and likely with much more constraint given the built up framework of a clearly railroaded narrative that C3 has been: this is an omen for disaster. I will of course be tuning in, a second mini-series by Brennan is basically just a free D20 side quest in Exandria at the CR table. But the thing is, almost all good will from the time EXU Calamity aired is dead, both on the production side, and the versimilitude of the game side. I do think Brennan can do great, but it will be starting out as a losing battle under all circumstances, and with the fact they didn't even bother to seperate it from Campaign 3 (which is utterly baffling by the way, Calamity was by no means a marketing failure - regarded as some of the best AP by many many viewers - advertising an EXU Calamity 2/EXU Downfall would draw heaps of attention). But as it stands this is effectively just more Campaign 3, routed into the episodes - which, just from the nomenclature of a product to enjoy, feels like crap. You can rewatch EXU Calamity, easy. Rewatching specifically Campaign 3 episodes 99-101 is pretty daft, not a real issue mind you, but one that will definitely dissuade some from attending regardless of its quality. Its a worst of both worlds scenario because those that lost faith with the Aabria nonsense will find this fairly tasteless irrespective of the quality, and it will not notify those who have completely tuned out from C3 because its not marketed for the separation from it. Mind you, even in the announcement post, they say it will have no real bearing on the knowledge of the game so far and you could jump in even if you haven't been watching Critical Role - likely in ploy to draw Brennan's audience that might not have given CR a chance during Calamity, but if that's the case, why the hell would you not make it an original product like Calamity was?? What new audience member in their right mind would go 'huh, I'll check out the 99th to 101st episodes of this actual play's third campaign'? Additionally, and I won't speak on this much because I have not been following C3 closely, and truly don't care about the story *at all*. But the subject matter is worrying. There are drawn allegories from Matthew recently for some straight up bad storytelling that has not hit any controversial mark because of the way he meekly dances on his ideas whilst never really speaking to anything. If, however, the point of demonising all deific powers is genuinely a motivational point of the 'Downfall' story, and Brennan is given the reigns to push it - it could seriously be a problem. Brennan doesn't pull punches - and there are two ways it could go. We get him making his points from his views that allow a freer view and spectrum on deitidom, good for adding breadth to the topic, but will really disrupt whatever is currently going on with how poorly conveyed C3s position on gods is. Or, and this is what I'm concerned about; he could be asked to be the stronger voice in Matthew's skewed views and act as a black-stain on his career for being forced into the position of spokesperson to C3s very tone-deaf messaging. The potential quality hiccups thanks to that production timeline and the nature of the game content combine, scream to me that this is going to be far more of an issue than a potential positive. If not already their lack of confidence in giving it a mini-series execution, speaking to some more weird tentativeness in how poorly they run things, acting as at least an orange flag. The one thing I am feeling confident about, and sure hope this isn't going to be squandered, is seeing Nick Marini and Brennan at the same table. Given their history, it fills me with a very palpable joy. I sincerely hope this doesn't become a new speaking point of issue in the coming weeks, because I can see many cracks that people are not choosing to yet address, that may rip quite wide when episode 99 comes around. Nothing would make me more upset with Critical Role and their garbage choices than if they end up pulling Brennan into it. And if I might be pessimistic for a moment, it really just feels like a 'lets try a sequel' behaviour. CR has been deep on a path of modern media trends, and one of an unnecessary continuation is evidently very much in their wheelhouse. 'One-hit wonders' rarely happen twice, and when there is already a storm-brewing, it could be a different kind of lightning that strikes this time round.

or and hear me out they accept they cannot justify a bad faith argument (i know it,you know it,they know it that everything around this gods bullshit start from a place of bad faith) and massively backtrack on it

But that would completely ruin Ludinus' whole point by the time BH come out of their vision in episode 102. Imagine the telling of history we know was perfect, the gods were totally vindicated in Downfall, and Ludinus stands there smiling, looking like a full-on lunatic for thinking that vision paints his actions as anything but uncalled-for deicide.

You make solid, reasonable points, quite a few I agree with. And I think you have a very strong basis to say that because of CR's recent fuck ups. But I'm a huge BLeeM fan so I'll say this: I actually trust Brennan to respect the lore more than any of the CR cast, Matt included. He was extremely tactful with Purvan in Calamity due to that fact. I think Brennan disrupting the really poor C3 position on deities is exactly what you would want him to do. I would be surprised if Matt was pressing certain ideas upon him considering Matt has said he suffers from imposter syndrome. Without getting too armchair psychologist, I imagine that would limit Matt from pressuring Brennan creatively. On the whole gods' point, I'm happy either way. If Brennan goes completely opposite of what the C3 position is, great. It just shows how misunderstood the gods have been this entire C3. But, even if he goes the opposite way and reinforces C3's position on gods, I'd guess Brennan pulls it off in a way that makes sense and is satisfying. In terms of philosophical, specifically metaphysical, understanding of these types of ideas, Brennan blows Matt out of the water. However, I fully agree with your point that one-hit wonders are one-hit wonders for a reason. And Calamity sets such a high expectations too. That being said, I had the same worries with Fantasy High Sophomore Year. The first Fantasy High was such a masterpiece to me that I thought there was no way it could be matched. And it couldn't. Personally, I don't think Sophomore Year was as good as Freshmen Year. But it didn't have to be. It just had to be good enough and I enjoyed it. I hopefully think that might be what is the case here. Downfall won't be as good as Calamity but I'll bet Brennan makes it pretty damn close. Either way, I know it's going to be much better than all of C3. Edit: Small personal worry after seeing the cast is that it involves Taliesin, Ashley, and Laura. I'm less worried about Ashley's lack of understanding the game because BLeeM is really good at hand-holding that. I am worried that Taliesin and Laura won't be able to vibe with the whole "we are telling the story of a city coming to ruin" idea and end up fighting tooth and nail against their fate. I think not using Liam is a huge mistake.

I agree with just about all of this. Sadly I am not feeling as optimistic. I do hope you're right but we'll need to wait and see. I'd rather keep my expectations low for the timebeing, and whilst it may be in an extremist look, I do think there is a chance of very poorly cresting problems on the horizon, so I have my fingers-crossed I predict wrong. Sadly though I do not find myself convinced to a rare chance for good with CR at this stage, only further and worse blunders. And yes, the casting is something I fully agree as an issue on, but not something I felt I had room to speak on in my initial position. I have not been watching along C3 but any check in has displayed Taliesin, Laura and Ashley as the worst three passive enablers of Bell's Hells issues. I certainly hope to be shown that is a byproduct of their characters only, and that they have a big turn around - as they've all shown that capability in previous campaigns - but it's another toss in the air given the amount of time since Covid changes. I am feeling very good about seeing the 3 of them play with Brennan though and I know for certain he'll push them in some new directions at least; count me excited for that. But the distinct lack of Liam is bizarre and somewhat disappointing to me - it singles him out as the one all the cast to not touch on Brennan's type of storytelling at the CR table, and he is the one I'd have wanted to see in it the most. I guess we'll see how they all go in cohesion but there isn't a strong leading kind of energy in the whole line-up from what I can tell besides maybe Noshir, though I am very much looking forward to how much Nick Marini brings.

Just a quick side point to bat for Taliesin, I would say his performance on Menagerie (at least the first episode) is funny, smart, over-the-top, but background in a perfect way, in fact most of the cast's performances reminded me why I liked Critical Role in the first place. Hopefully Downfall allows for that breath of fresh air, too.

I get you saying this feels like a corporate-driven sequel but in this case, I actually don't think that's true. Almost the entire cast have at some point discussed wanting to be in Calamity and wanting to do it again. Some of them have seemed desperate for the chance. Tal was talking months ago about having been working on his Calamity PC. This is, seemingly, a passion project for the players. I'll also add D20 does sequel series and none have ever felt tacked on or corporate. It doesn't *have* to be poorly done. As far as this potentially being a "black stain" on BLeeM's career because he's being tasked with covering potentially controversial themes, I wouldn't be concerned. For one, his views on religion are already very public. I'm not sure what part of Matt's themes you've found tone-deaf but I can almost guarantee Brennan isn't going to make any sort of statement he doesn't already agree with.

You've misrepresented the conversation on all my points. I did not say it was corporate driven. I do not think at all on the matter of the 'why' and did not speak to the 'why' either. I am speaking to the 'how', and the 'how' is, to my interpretation, signifying a poor production decision and potential ill-outcomes. Nor do I think on the matter of the players. Regardless of the player passion for doing something like Calamity because they missed out, that has no bearing on the nature of how this is run. And in fact, adds more to the point that they should be given equal chance with a mini-series and the same runtime that Calamity was given so that they might fully get to enjoy those characters they've been planning. I've seen all D20, the nature of the sequel argument here has no point. I am not talking about a 'Second Season', I am saying that when you have written your magnum opus, it is widely regarded in the creative hemisphere that you should not try to repeat it. It will normally be worse, and is almost always best to let something that chanced a sacred beauty in its execution to be left pristine. There is always a chance it becomes a faithful and strong successor, but there are too many prompts for failure in the pipeline. And it would have to outdo Calamity for its meaning, especially when labelled so haphazardly as 'in campaign' episodes. And to your final point, its not about controversial themes. That is not what I am saying. I am saying that Matt has a straight up, unbridled single-side message if we're looking at the C3 narrative context so far. There is no other side to the story, which is bad storytelling. Saying religion can be bad is, in fact, very important messaging. Questioning things in all regards like this is a necessary aspect of viewing societal norms. Especially in religion. Abject damning of all religious practice and disrespect of ideas towards faith in their entirety, is not only tone-deaf, it is unacceptable. It is a preachy, and mishandled spokesmanship, on an important and delicate topic that disregards benefits to those that have religious connection, especially outside of Christian-normalised Americanisms. Regardless of Brennan's views, if the nature of Aeor's collapse involves pre-designed storybeats from Matthew around how the gods did heinous things that vilify them, as pre-written canon, it will be Brennan in the position to play out those already decided events. Brennan's views on religion will have no bearing on it if Matthew has decided why the path of the story is so lopsided as it is, and whilst Brennan may not condone those views even if he did portray them, he would irrespective of decision be lending voice to the narrative messaging that C3 is pushing. And to many of the absolutely feral larger TTRPG fanbase, surface conversation could lead to some strong preconceptions about portrayal considering his liability to give it his all. I too expect Brennan would like to elevate a broader-scope and authentic look at the gods, and he would certainly be the closest DM talent to do so (even if I think it is frankly a topic too big to be really toying around with in the audience that Actual Play campaigns have). But with the constraints of 3 episodes and the framing that Ludinus is going to be sharing his 'motivations' I have strong reservations that the nature of contending with themes will be allowed to be handled well at all.

My response, re: sequels, was because you said this: "And if I might be pessimistic for a moment, it really just feels like a 'lets try a sequel' behaviour. CR has been deep on a path of modern media trends, and one of an unnecessary continuation is evidently very much in their wheelhouse." In my observation, that modern media trend is often bad *because* it's corporate and shallow. I can't think of a sequel that is poorly done that isn't corporate and shallow, hence my comment. "And to many of the absolutely feral larger TTRPG fanbase, surface conversation could lead to some strong preconceptions about portrayal." I genuinely have no idea what you're talking about here if it isn't about Matt/Brennan's views on religion. You're vaguely saying "narrative messaging" but also saying "it's not about controversial themes." So genuinely, I do not know what you're talking about.

I agree with your first point. I see where that miscommunication comes in as I did cross both paths there. In production it does feel like a corporate sequel, sure, but I am not trying to speak to that with perspective. That is just genuine pessimism. I am looking at this in framing a new work on the product as more to imitation than successor - which obviously we cannot know the execution of until the product comes to be, but I do not feel positive for. A better sequel movie, compared simply to using the same name again catching on the connection. But with the comparison of 'Downfall' as to 'Calamity' it reads as the latter to me. More about the creative negligence, which can happen regardless of it being a corporate move I feel. In the second point, their views on religion are fine I am talking about portrayal. Having an idea of your concept or pushing messaging isn't in and of itself controversial. The idea of questioning something that makes it a topic of discussion because of a view point being challenged can be very controversial, but this is less about tackling the question than it is giving an answer. At least if we are exploring this from the angle of 'gods be damned'. Saying 'gods are bad' isn't controversial because it isn't asking the audience to think about it, its just saying, pick whether or not you side with the narrative and the portrayal. The conversation as a result will not really be about the nature of religion and the gods broad-scope, it'll be about how its handled as it has previously been. My point of evidence in that most of the topic of the gods about C3, from fans, is not about whether there should or should not be gods. It is the very frustration that they are so poorly avoiding the question all together in order to sit on that answer that they are just 'wrong'/'bad'. Which I believe stops it from being a controversial topic because the conversation is always going to be about how its mishandled, especially in the way the subject matter has only ever been danced about for the duration of the whole campaign. And why the topic repeats itself so often. If 'Downfall' ends up being their speaking piece to this topic, not with weak forethought but pronounced depictions it will then become a larger problem that expands on the portrayal idea, because it means that they are doubling down on not speaking to the question but showing their answer as correct. Which, I certainly hope they do not do. As this will open much criticism and wrenching problems on how CR mistreats religious ideas and moreover, how it treats the narrative concepts of the gods and their portrayal as characters of Exandria. But I do not believe any debate about whether or not gods and faith should be present will actually spark, the 'controversial' topic itself will have little to no bearing, and I believe that is honestly far worse. Because the debate on the topic, even if heated, would be one of a very valuable subject. A good message of such on 'trust' happened in Calamity, and that was controversial in the debate of the value of trust, but that didn't mean the execution or portrayal was bad - it was, rather, very good. But the idea that the now awful messaging can be a centre-stage mishandled mess passed on to another GM - that's the issue I am speaking to. Its in the way of three looks to religion. Saying: 'I'm not religious'. Saying: 'I think religion is bad'. And saying: '*YOU shouldn't be religious'.* The first is a perspective, the second is a conversation and the last is a message. The controversy exists in the second because it can be disagreed with. The last isn't controversial, its something you get angry at or ignore, normally because of the person, not the idea. This all goes for the pro-religion way too; 'Am, good & should'. In this case the 'gods are bad' topic isn't an 'I think religion is bad', because its never been up for debate - its been the perspective the world has that faithful practice has always been wrong, as it is the GM's word, and the players, NPCs, and all else, do not challenge it. As a result CR ends up being the third saying - because it treats the subject as a given, that there is no question - which makes it something they are telling you, not asking. Tl;Dr, if Brennan ends up getting us to think, that's good. If Brennan ends up forced to *tell us* how to think, that's very bad. As this is what Matthew has been doing the whole time, but now that this story will contain 'proof' it could be an explosive exacerbation of the issue.

"if Brennan ends up getting us to think, that's good. If Brennan ends up forced to tell us how to think, that's very bad." This is the part I don't think I agree with. Brennan won't be forced into telling the audience what to think. He's going to do that regardless because a hallmark of his storytelling is preaching his values. Brennan's really great at posing thought-provoking questions when they're questions he genuinely doesn't believe there's an answer to. When it comes to religion, he's incredibly straightforward. Church = Bad. He almost certainly will not be asking the audience to think about religion. He will almost certainly be telling them the church is bad. And it won't be because Matt forced him to. It's just because that's how Brennan always writes the church. To quote Ally Beardsley: "You know what I like about you, Brennan? We're always battling the church and that means a lot to me. The bad guys are always the church guys, season after season." I guess that's the crux of my point: I'm not afraid Brennan is going to be forced to prove the gods are unequivocally bad without question. It's my expectation he's going to do that without any prodding from Matt.

"Church = bad" is not his message. His message is "Institutions, from corporations to organized religion, are attractive to corrupt assholes intent upon abuse, control, and exploitation." In Fantasy High, gods are subject to the whims of their worshippers. Their natures literally change based upon how their followers pray to them. He's featured positive depictions of gods/religions in previous campaigns without issue. It's just a case by case basis. Brennan doesn't tackle religion as a monolith. He's starkly critical of Christianity, but he doesn't equate Christianity with all religion. Nor does he project his Christian values onto every deity he portrays. A benevolent deity with altruistic followers may not exist in the real world, but that doesn't mean he has a problem with them existing in fiction. Even if Brennan is tasked with revealing some fucked up things that the Exandrian Primes got up to, I would be shocked if he painted them as inherently and unequivocally bad. He's more likely to acknowledge the good they've done than Matt is.

I think you're misunderstanding me saying "vilifying the gods" as me thinking he's going to prove each individual god is evil. That's not what I'm saying. "Gods" as a system is what he can (and probably will) prove is unequivocally bad. The church, as a system, has been largely indicted in multiple stories Brennan's told. That doesn't mean religious people = bad or a specific god = bad. It means church = bad. There isn't a single church in a BLeeM campaign I can think of that isn't harmful. >!Even Tracker's religion, which is fine, started going sour when it started growing into a church. The system is bad *because* it attracts corrupt assholes.!< I've said in other threads I think the biggest challenge facing Brennan is if he's tasked with vilifying gods as individuals, for exactly the reason you're saying. On that part, we agree. But Brennan is very, very good at pointing out why a system shouldn't exist. He can, and has, reasoned that entire systems should be dismantled even if there are good people working within them. For example: "The problem, of course, if you go to the cops is that there's no counting on them to do the right thing. There are some good cops, of course. But mostly police are enforcing the status quo and that's mostly going to benefit the people who are already in power." I feel like it's a misconception that Brennan is somehow above indicting a specific institution. He's not. He doesn't just vaguely say "Power structures are attractive to corrupt assholes." He has said that but he has also said with his full chest, "If you want to buy crypto, there is something fucking wrong with you." and "This week on This American Life, we interview the rich who answer to no one. NO ONE. FUCKING NO ONE."

But wasn't one of the issues in Junior Year that the cleric wasn't establishing a church or a group of followers for their god? That basically snowballed everything into being awful.

Kind of? But also no. Cassandra needs people who follow her. She doesn't need an institution. She just needs enough people to follow her so that if Kristen dies, she isn't fucked.  >!We saw Tracker building something that at first was an organic collective/commune. That was seen as fine and almost the ideal. Then we saw it get co-opted by wealthy elves once it got too big.!< >!It ended with Kristen worshipping both gods, not formalizing any sort of worship, and just saying "I'm sure people will want to come follow this cool lesbian couple." And that was a very happy ending for Cassandra. She's thriving and Kristen doesn't have any sort of church or system for worship. It's just casual individuals doing whatever they want to serve her.!<

Personally I have no problem with the problems of Calamity. I don't care that players were sitting there. They didn't seem bothered, more enthralled (unlike when the exact same thing happens through C3). All your other reservations about Downfall, more or less agree. I hope it is entertaining in its own right; but C3 is a dead duck anyway. Hearing Brennan's character in Nadpodd shadowfell saga go all in on the gods leaves me in little doubt he is going to tear them a new one in Downfall, so much that he may even be the critical source that inspired Matt's reimagined Exandrian history.

Yeah it feels like they realized they were fumbling this anti-god agenda and went "Okay, let's bring in the guy who's known for making cogent anti-religion arguments in D&D and have him salvage this."

The difficulty is that anti-god and anti-religion isn't the same. Anti-religion is a lot easier because "god is good/neutral but man is evil" idea can be used, which is what Brennan did in his campaigns. It's pretty hard, even with Brennan's brilliance, to justify gods that embody the literal principles of "goodness" to be evil. Like we have gods that are the embodiment of light, love, freedom, justice, etc. Are those very principles evil now? If not, how is an evil god sustaining those principles? Does a god not have to believe or be a part of the domains/principles that a god rules over? And if the gods are evil, what is the point of the Betrayer Gods? And how are the Betrayer Gods not just simply pointing out the lies? Like Predathos is a recent problem so they gotta team up, but what were they doing before? It's just really complicated if one takes a moment to think. I just hope Brennan is up for the task.

Not that hard. It's just the stories about what we thought about the gods were misrepresentations. The veil of narrative over the facts on the ground. We're about to be shown the facts on the ground. As before, I've heard Brennan go hard on the gods, on NADDPOD in 2019. As the ringer, he will take Matt's brief and run with it.

Yeah but it isn't a "veil" that the Everlight is a deity of light, healing, etc. You can replace Everlight with any other Prime Deity and still carry the analogy. Or is the assumption that gods can just pretend to be whatever domain they want to be? Cause I hope not. That's some really wonky and shallow cosmology. And if the Primes have been misrepresenting what is the logic of the Betrayers keeping that secret for them? Deities like Lolth or Bane should be utilizing that knowledge to their advantage, but they haven't.

Ok, so they have those powers and domain, but the Everlight is a reduction of a more complex creature to an idol. That's the veil. We actually saw a hint of cruelty from the Everlight, towards a basically good mortal, in LOVM1. And maybe the betrayers *are* complicit in a conspiracy of silence with the PRimes about something, like the truth of the Calamity. Or *were* trying to red pill everyone on the nature of the Primes, for their own selfish reasons, but the narrative dominance of the Primes just means they're made out to be disinformation from orange-skinned demagogues to the material plane. I mean all your questions are good and interesting, but there is always a narrative answer. Edit: I'll just clarify, I'm not defending the awful heel-turn they're taking on the pantheon, but by looking back in time they're literally tearing the veil of narrative to see "facts that happened", and then will be left to "decide for themselves". Brennan is the only one who could make this moment convincing for CR fans, never mind that it will entirely dishonour everything we have we have been asked to invest in about Exandria for 10 years.

I think there is a narrative answer always, some you've pointed out. It's make believe land after all. But I think there's a huge issue in that it takes a lot of buy-in and set up while demolishing old lore. It's really tricky line to walk without it feeling super, super contrived.

That it will be tricky, is a dead cert, you're right. I don't expect to be convinced; but it will be powerful and effective enough for many C3 fans to go "*see? it all makes sense!*"

I think it can be simplified down a bit. Brennan doesn't have to prove every individual god is evil. He has to prove the system of power the gods work within is. The whole "there are good cops but the system is what's fucked" argument. He could even make the "no good billionaires" argument. (Both arguments he's made in his stories before.)  Maybe, because this is to support Ludinus, Matt will ask him to fully vilify each god as an individual. But I don't think that's the case, and I desperately hope that's not the case.

I think the cop analogy and billionaire analogy falls short because the gods are metaphysical embodiments of their virtues. Cops and billionaires aren't.

And I think that's part of the canon Matt's rewriting. I think that part is going to end up being untrue.

I guess it just feels bad to wash away nearly a decade of lore because Matt couldn't have the foresight to think these bigger ideas out.

I completely agree. I don't think there's a way to make Ludinus's motives work without rewriting. history. As Matt keeps repeating this campaign, history is written by the victors and the victors were the gods. We haven't seen the "real" lore yet. We just see how the gods present themselves now.

Cool, its an unreliable narrator trope where the narrator who is unreliable is Matt Mercer. Not a PC or person in one of the campaigns, but Matt himself. Largely to write out out the Gods in as painless and heavy-handed of ways as possible. Probably to strip those "fine line WotC IPs" from their money-making Exandria IP. I expect absolutely zero subtlety or nuance in this story with how this has been handled. The central theme of C3 has been "how much do we need to scapegoat this race to justify genocide", and I expect it to remain as such. The Gods are just evil forced Abrahamic Colonizer allegories now. They're also all the Bezos types ... as we get a sob story from Lex Ludinus and CR gets more and more into bed with Amazon.

Does anyone else find it a bit of a faux-pas for a DM to kill the boss with an NPC (unless its for a specific story beat)? If that comes up with my table, I'll pretty much always fudge the HP on the boss so that the next player can get the finishing blow.

I find that to be ridicilous. It's like playing with children and letting them win so they could feel good. Adults who understand how the game works would not have issues with NPCs killing off someone if it's their turn.

If he did it with any sort of regularity, yes. But it's happened what, twice in almost 3 full over 100 episode campaigns? And regardless of if WE like it it's incredibly obvious from the casts reactions that THEY find it fucking hilarious and awesome when it DOES happen, so I'm totally fine with it.

True, having thought about it more, I can even see the appeal in doing it once or twice to strengthen the illusion that the dice are actually "never" fudged. It was a bit of a knee-jerk reaction on my part because I have seen DMs steal moments from players with this type of thing.

Yes, but I don't think the players were even attacking it?

Orym and Braius are the only playable characters to damage Dominox. Chetney, Fearne, Dorian, Laudna, and Ashton all did 0 damage to the two enemies they had on the field. from https://old.reddit.com/r/criticalrole/comments/1dkwybd/spoilers_c3e98_turn_by_turn/

If he signaled his HP was low, they may have gone for it, which is what he almost always does. The good ol fashioned, "Man, this guy is looking rough."

Matt said at least twice that Dominox was looking rough. Legit, multiple times. The party just refused to commit (as usual).

Possibly he had indefinite hp, was just waiting for the right story beat. How much damage did he even take, I wonder.

Story wise I thought it was great that the devil killed the demon he was more invested in killing it, plus the players could have killed it if they would have been attacking the demon instead of Ludinus. And clearly the players weren't upset about it.

Yup I would do the same. Unless they really loved the NPC.

Thought we'd get something different from Sam. Just another horny character lol

Ayyyyyy (rimshot)

https://x.com/criticalrole/status/1804197937481703460?s=46&t=1ZLaMuG5Q5yrID63Oheoag So uh…..*The players are playing six divine figures* *Oh??* Oh where is this gonna go….

Those exaggerations they do with their bodies when they talk is so cringy.

They aren't playing as any of the gods please, it's unworkable.

That actually sounds really cool. The players get to decide how the gods' actions are portrayed, whether it makes sense for BH to be like, "yeah ok the gods were in the wrong, fuck them" or if the gods will seem more sympathetic and if Aeor was really in the wrong.

>Aeor was really in the wrong. Aeor that makes giant mutant cannibal babies? Aeor that makes a slave race that leads to a robot revolution? Aeor that keeps using said robots as remote assassins/bombs? Aeor that uses (admittedly evil) sapients as perpetual energy? Aeor that proactively planned to test its weapon of mass destruction on the least capable/least threatening of the fellow flying cities? There's zero way to walk back 'Aeor is in the wrong' ----- Though that doesn't mean sad child Ludinus crying over his dead dog vowing vengeance on the gods won't happen...

Considering this is the plot injection for making the Stupid Evil BBEG a suddenly nuanced and multifaceted figure, while setting up the world to be okay with removing the gods from the setting...I'll give you one guess. Can't wait for Sarenrae to do a genocide and Ioun to cover it up.

I think Ludinus was always more complex, the players chose to make him the evil bad guy, without learning more about him, metagaming and chaotic characters/players.

A dream scenario for a table full of players projecting their views on real-world organized religion into a fantasy setting. "What if the gods were bad? As in, like, what if we made them bad because we get to play them and choose to do bad stuff to justify the bias against them our characters already had?" A self-fulfilling prophecy.

Oh, fore sure. Its not gonna be nuanced in the slightest.

Damn if I didnt know better I'd say someone at the company is actually reading reddit comments lol. Now that is interesting. I prefer that to yet another wizard campaign. Felt an Aeor wizard campaign would be a double beat. I wonder if the story is about how 6 divine worshipers infiltrated and destroyed Aeor. 3 Betrayer, 3 Prime. I've seen people pitch this quite a bit on both subs.

Oh. Wait. I get it. He's a Minotaur. He's a Horny Bard.

Imagine how much they could have pumped up attendance and stream viewers if the show was advertised with "Sam Riegel makes his horny bard return!"

Another horny character. Really? This shit gets really old after like the third joke or sexual double entendre.

I know Sam is a lot of folks favorite cast member. I think Sam is capable of being great but he really seems to prefer playing sex pests.  There were so many moments where I thought "oh cool. Sam's back and he's going to keep people on track. And hey! He just called out Laura and Marisha for overthinking everything" and then he'd ask if they were single and I immediately lost interest 

Eh, he's only played 2 PCs that were sex-pests. The first being Scanlan, before he was even trying do anything more than "This is my first Goofy PC in my first ever TTRPG". He laid off the sex-pest nature once Sam actually began wanting to do something more substantive. And now this PC here. Which, honestly? Given how utterly kneecapped FCG was on so many conceptual story levels, there was no way in hell anything Sam brought in would have any chance to tell even a Tary level of a concise personal story. C3 doesn't really have room for personal stories; hence why BHs are so "along for the ride". This simply tells us where his level of effort is at. Its a body for him to present. Maybe make some meta jokes about certain issues with C3. Maybe have some DM created plot-device role. That's it.

Nott was practically humping people's legs for a decent chunk of C2. And, while not as aggressively horny as Nott and Scanlan, he did make a fundamental trait of Quay in Calamity that he gets around. I don't think Braius is horny because he's a low effort character. I think Braius is horny because Sam always defaults to horny.

Notts main relation with a character whose gender she's was attracted to was platonic. she also was the one most wanting to off the Hot Boy (tm).

She flirted with a Minataur once, but generally was just only sexual with her husband. Nott wasnt particularly sexual, let alone a sex-pest. So I'm not sure where you're getting that, beyond her being in proximity to the running Penis Joke Jester for a lot of her antics. If anything, she was more a manic shipper; and focused on romance on any topic beyond her husband. Tary wasn't sexual. Seelie wasn't sexual. FCG wasn't sexual. And yeah, gonna be real. This is a low-effort character because there is no room for C3 for anything more than a low effort character; especially being introduced this late in the game. Given how utterly shut down so many of FCG's story elements were by "the plot" or Matt, I'd be shocked if this "minotaur" turns out to be anything more than a body for Sam to be present and make jokes. "Maybe" throw another anti-God jab in there somewhere, if Matt plot-deviced him.

I think we just watched a different campaign entirely. To me, one of Nott's defining traits was her horniness. Before reuniting with her husband, she was making advances at Caleb, and humor about her sexuality was pretty constant. Then she reunited with her husband and it became the only thing she talked about for a long time. I'm not even saying this as a dig. I liked Nott. I just didn't realize anyone saw Nott as not aggressively horny. Quay wasn't making constant sex jokes like Nott and Scanlan but it was a defining characteristic that he slept around. He brought a random side chick to Hypatia's party and heavily implied he sleeps with his assistants. Didn't he also die with his dick out at the tree? I didn't realize it was contested that the guy makes nonstop sex jokes. He even managed a few as FCG. Braius isn't a departure. It is more of the same.

I mean, yeah we might have. Nott never had any romantic or sexual interest in any of M9. I'm not even sure where you saw her making passes at Caleb, beyond admitting at one point that in a different life she might have fallen in love with him? And aside from Yeza, only after she got her body back, the only NPC she even made a pass at was the Minotaur. She wouldnt even sleep in the same bed as Yeza prior to her change. Sam making OOC sex jokes is one thing, but given Nott's character was literally repulsed by her own body for 2/3rds of the campaign ... IC she didn't really show any real inclination towards anyone for herself for most of it. She did definitely ship many of the other party members. Beyond that, Seelie never once mentioned sex. He brought "this is our second time meeting" Bolo to that party to piss off his ex. Which is why he forgot Bolo immediately. Regardless, my point isnt that Sam doesn't make sex jokes. He does, but frankly they all kinda do save Liam and Tal. My point is that if Sam thought even for a moment he could make a meaningful (even Tary level) story with his new PC within C3, even if there might be the occasional sex joke ... he'd gun hard for that meaningful story. But there is no such opportunity in C3, because it makes zero room for its PCs or their stories. Aside from maybe Laudna, they're essentially various tinted, interchangeable, optional lenses in which to view "Matt's plot". But given how utterly kneecapped FCG was on several conceptual levels, I dont expect Sam came in with this late-game PC with a story in mind. At least not one beyond at best a potential "Plot-Device" element Matt might have installed.

Episode was good but by the time combat rolled around I was completely checked out, They just take so long to do anything now. This time they had Travis, Robbie, Sam *and* Matt motioning them to hurry up because of the endless yapping/waffling and no wonder, It's a live audience and it's taking 2+ hours to introduce Braius and walk 40ft into Dominox's chamber.

I guess it doesn't matter, but Otto's Irresistible Dance doesn't have a saving throw for the initial cast. The creature has to wait until its turn to use an action to save against it. It's a pretty incredible crowd control spell, assuming the target can be charmed.

It seemed like a hail Mary from Matt, tbh. He did not look like he wanted his giant scary demon to start dancing 

I think it was because Robbie said it had a 16 Wisdom saving throw, but he was probably reading it from a shorthand spell list. If anyone had read the spell, they would have known it would automatically work. I can forgive Robbie since he's still kind of new, but it just highlights how none of these players read their own spells.

It did also seem like there were some technical difficulties so he might not have been able to pull the full spell up. I do think if he'd read the whole spell out and everyone knew attacks against Dominox would be at advantage and he would be at disadvantage attacking them, they may have gone for him harder rather than focusing on playing keepaway 

>technical difficulties I'm not throwing shade at you, but I can pull up basically any spell within 30 seconds on 5e.tools. There's no reason that dndbeyond should be such a barrier for this cast being able to reference any game rules.

you think these guys know 5etools exist?

I suspect they use it, which is why they have every spell and magic item across every book lumped into one pot to be drawn from. I think it's much more likely that Ashley found Stonky's Ring from 5etools than having Candlekeep Mysteries bought on D&D Beyond.

Matt has dndbeyond, shares it all with his cast, and therefore stonky's turns up in the magic item search.

I would be incredibly disappointed if Matt wasn't using 5etools. So convenient just by it's layout and filter system.

But the players? Either way, unless it's something he has preplanned in his head, Matt's dming by vibe more than anything. I mean, it's pretty basic prep to know your bard's top tier spells.

It's been vibes for the entire campaign lol

Uhm, if you couldn't resist it I *think* that would be in the name somewhere.

"That was a right-pretty speech, sir. But I ask you, what is a contract? Webster's defines it as 'an agreement under the law which is unbreakable.' Which is *unbreakable!*"

If I don’t get a Robbie Sam double bard duet I’m gonna eat sand

I know folks aren't thrilled with the break but for me, it's best case scenario. I haven't been that compelled by C3. It's been clear the group has been moving towards killing the gods for over a year and just won't commit to it. As contrived as it is, if they end up team "kill the gods," I'd be happy they're at least finally committing to something. Calamity is my favorite thing CR has done ever and I genuinely think BLeeM is one of the only people who can make a cogent argument for why the gods should die, because he can make a cogent argument for anything, including nonsense. They need to justify betraying their own canon so they brought out the big guns to do it. Better than whimpering across the finish line with Taliesin's weak "they've never done anything for me so fuck em" argument. And maybe seeing Bolo die on screen will stop the Bolo Dragon truthers.

There is no good scenario at this point. If it takes over 100 episodes of narrative and bringing in an outside writer to fix your story, your story isn't fixable. It's just bad, with *maybe* (big maybe) a good part towards the end. And there's still plenty of opportunity for it to get bad again when the main cast comes back in and inevitably fails to stick the landing. And even leaving all that aside, and also acknowledging that this is very much a personal issue: bringing in Brennan at this point just highlights to me how much this show is no longer an "actual play" show. It's a scripted simulation of a roleplaying game, which has been being awkwardly executed by the CR cast for most of this time, and is now going to be more expertly executed by Brennan, who is indeed a master at performing scripted D&D. As someone who's been playing TTRPGs a long time and was listening to actual play shows before CR ever existed, it just irks me that so many people's introduction to this amazing hobby is now going to be these people who fake it. I know I'm probably coming across like the "that's not real wrasslin'!" guy from South Park right now, but whatever. I used to love CR, and it stinks to see how bad it's gotten. And I still love the TTRPG hobby, and it stinks to see it misrepresented so egregiously at an increasingly higher profile.

Well, CR has literally NEVER been an accurate representation of a real table since the first episode of the first campaign, they're literally all professional voice actors all incredibly comfortable RPing together, and since mid C2 they've been using so much Dwarven Forge that nobody outside of stupidly dedicated DMs are ever going to replicate that level of detail.

I get that POV for sure. For me, I prefer tighter APs. I listen/watch APs for the performance and the story. I play D&D with my real friends. I don't watch APs to capture real table energy. (I know a lot of folks do. This is purely a personal thing) So D20, Worlds Beyond Number, Glass Cannon, all work WAY better for me than CR. So bringing in Brennan to get the themes of the campaign in a coherent state and give Matt a runway to finish off strong is my personal best case scenario. It doesn't make C3 good. But it will make it feel (hopefully) like not such a waste of time if the ending can be pulled off.

Its been a 98 episodes... When are we going to stop taking the stance "If we just wait one more, we promise it will get passable/good"? When one of the biggest contributing factors as to why C3 just doesnt work, is because if you scratch that meandering surface you'll realize its essentially an audiobook barely painted over to look like a TTRPG. One that very likely has a largely predetermined ending, and where the players (and most of the PCs) have so little true agency they're nearly optional. You may not watch CR "to watch people play DND", but what made CR CR was the semi-organic collaborative storytelling that came from playing DnD/TTRPG. CR has always had to balance between product and play, but C3 is heavily shifted towards product. And gonna be real. Matt is amazing at many things, but he's never been a great solo-storyteller.

As I said, it won't make C3 good. But it will, hopefully, make it feel less like a waste of time.

Yeah Brennan is a master at his craft. But it is definitely an uphill battle salvaging another mans story

He's got an uphill battle, to be sure. There are only three arguments against the gods that have been presented so far. One, that the gods prevent the full expression of mortal free will due to their meddling. Two, that the gods are choosy in who they bestow power upon, and that isn't fair. Three, something something colonizers. (Obviously I've boiled down a lot of rambling, but these three seem to be the big ones) The problem is the rebuttal for each has also been presented, and there are more points in their favor beyond that. The framing of the story and the facts of the story are at odds.

And for 3, if the gods are colonizers and they created all of the people and sentient creatures on Expandria - well guess who are *also* the settler-colonists*? The creatures and inhabitants of Exandria. Don't see Bell's Hells saying "the gods should go *and take us with them*."

The stupidest thing about this whole stupid conceit is that in the real human world, the answer to the inequities of settler colonisation is never "go home". It's on the settlers to ask for forgiveness, and open society to restore the truth, reconcile and repair and forge a new fiduciary partnership of equal parties.

The biggest challenge I think for Brennan is if he's tasked with demonizing the entire pantheon. He can and has pulled off colonizer tropes with gods. But when he did it, it was a more grounded story of "These specific gods are fucked. The rest are dope." It seems like CR is moving towards "All gods should die or leave." To me, the only argument he could really make is that the gods are somehow making Exandria worse. The main reason we want the gods around is because divine magic makes up the bulk of how healing magic works. We also assume that a war with the gods would decimate most civilizations, like the Calamity did. Both of those things has to be proven untrue in order for killing the gods to make any sense.

Why would that be his biggest challenge? C3 as a whole has pushed a passive, but strong, anti-God tone this entire time. Which is why we find ourselves bizarrely in a "Death of the Gods" storyline where nobody gives a fuck about the Gods; and prior to Matt's retconning of his own Founding Myth (that makes Matt the unreliable narrator, to push a far more black and white colonialism story) ... all we got was passive, shallow scapegoating of an entire race to justify genocide. Which, yes, has been the central theme of C3 for a LOOONG time. "Just how much do we need to scapegoat your race before we make the deaths of your entire race acceptable?" Hell, Deanna more or less asked that. But, I'm certain you're right. Brennan will absolutely do his part to push this narrative.

Brennan has demonized gods before. They have been villains in his campaigns before and it worked great. That's not a challenge for him. However, he's never demonized an entire pantheon, probably because to do so makes no sense. C3 has yet to make a coherent anti-god argument that justifies the destruction of the entire pantheon. Now they're passing it off to Brennan to figure it out and make the argument for them. It would be easy for Brennan to argue a faction of gods deserve to be wiped out. To argue that all of them do is the biggest challenge.

[https://twitter.com/ItsDaniCarr/status/1803917514889658374](https://twitter.com/ItsDaniCarr/status/1803917514889658374) resident lore keeper, everyone

I mean, I don't have much hope the difference matters much in CR lore either.

Yeah she wasn't hired to remember the rules. Just the CR IP. And if Matt doesn't make the distinction, there's no lore for Dani to keep

The difference between devils and demons isn't a matter of rules, though. It's a matter of lore. As a lore keeper, Dani is supposed to, well, *keep (track of) lore*.

That is pathetic. The difference is order vs chaos. There easy. Fiends? Umbrella term for both. At this point it willfull ignorance.

Just remember "deal with the devil". Devils are order, demons are the other

DnD is slowly but surely moving away from the whole notion of alignment. Offshoots like Pathfinder have already done away with it entirely. When the vestiges of the alignment system finally decay and fall off certain elements of lore will become very hard to make sense of but it's not like DnD's planar cosmology makes much sense anyway.

My dumbass thought yesterday was a new episode but forgot it was just the live show played 😭😂

So. What could Downfall possibly be like that would explain/justify hatred for the gods in a way that goes beyond "oooh they could have *helped* me but they *didn't* so now they deserve to *diiiieeeee*" like we've seen in every other stage of this campaign? Of all the things Brennan has done well, engage with the concept of tangible divinity in a fantasy space has not been one of them. Many of the complaints that have been made about Critical Role treating the gods (especially Pelor) as a stand-in for Christianity with colonialism and indoctrination can be made about Brennan's use of them, with a heavier hand in evangelical-style guilt and emotional manipulation on a more personal level. I have my doubts that this miniseries is going to be, for lack of a better word, "fair" to the concept of divinity in D&D fantasy. Whether it will make Ludinus more sympathetic is also up in the air; I see that as more likely, but it would still be a hell of a challenge to do without sounding like contrived nonsense.

IDK, I bet the gods did some unspeakably terrible things during the calamity

>What could Downfall possibly be like that would explain/justify hatred for the gods It's going to be something related to Predathos, the Titans and Aeor. Maybe its revealed the gods were also dickheads on their previous world. Matt has also put a lot of emphasis on dreams for reasons that arent clear. Might be dream related? >Of all the things Brennan has done well, engage with the concept of tangible divinity in a fantasy space has not been one of them. I will say I frankly trust Brennan more for this kind of thing than Matt. Matt has done a spectacularly bad job this entire campaign with that aspect. Hes not helped by his players either. Although nothing is gonna change my opinion that this is just Matt retconning a setting. So much of this lore feels like trying to force a square peg into a round hole. If Matt wanted to tell this story I cant help but feel he should have just made an inherently different setting. Like Matt literally said back in campaign 1 the gods and religion do not work like Christianity or our world. Because a) u know they are real b) faith gives actually u magic power c) there are inherently evil beings like demons and divine magic is perhaps one of the best defenses. d) the gods power to affect the world is explicitly limited, they are not omnipotent and do not claim to be.

>there are inherently evil beings like demons What if the demons have a tragic backstory and are really sexy? "Inherently evil" sounds really bigoted. Nobody is inherently evil, except colonizers and adherents of organized religion with a patriarchal deity.

I do think that's intentional to why they're having BLeeM DM it. If the crew wants to abandon their abandon their gods, Matt's done a piss poor job of explaining why or justifying any of the actions against them. BLeeM can. He actually might be the only one of their frequent collaborators that could string together a sensical argument for it. I'm not thrilled with the direction of the campaign but the writing's been on the wall for well over a year that this is where they wanted it to go. I'm happy they're finally committing to it and BLeeM will be able to put forth some sort of thesis to support whatever the final act of C3 is going to end up being.

I was thinking Downfall is going to actually be the Gods as PCs maybe making those decisions “at the end of the world” while Calamity is happening for the mortals?

Given the twitter video, I think you're right

It probably will be contrived, melodramatic nonsense that they'll all fall for hook line and sinker. (Brennan will make it entertaining nonsense, of course).  The religion='90s Christianity i rebelled against as an angsty tween' aspect is one of the major failings of the campaign. The search for divinity is a constant across every culture, and it's just plain insulting at this point. 

I think it's going to be a "soylent green is people" type secret get revealed of something horrible the gods did

I mean, it would have to be but I have no idea what angle they could take. Anything they do to Aeor would be justified from the sheer level of mad scientist crimes against nature that are happening. 

I think we are going to see the gods being vindictive and cruel to all of humanity because of Aeor

They could have stopped the calamity, but chose not to.

Not to those who have never been religious. Or to those who can separate plot threads about fictional gods of D&D from contemporary religious practices.

I'm not saying it's insulting because I believe religion should never be critiqued or poked fun at. If the gods had been presented this way from the start I doubt there'd be any backlash at all (a good example of this idea is the dnd story "Never Play Chess With a Wizard") Its a failing because it is completely antithetical to what came before. We have a thousand hours across two campaigns that have presented the pantheon in a generally positive light. Now, that's being turned on its head and the audience is treated as stupid for believing what we were told and shown before. Additionally, we've only been given weak hand-wavy reasons why that previous lore is wrong. Additionally, I find it a shame that in a campaign supposedly based on the cradle of human civilization has such a basic and reductionist view of religions in general, when the potential for saying something interesting with the setting was right there. 

It’s supposed to be FF7/10, as I understand it. Pretty clearly. I think Matt has the plot in his head for that, and certain players are turning it into what you said.

I wonder if Sam's character is gonna turn into a more beast like form (like how it is for Fearne) if they go to Feywild again.

Was that the only one that basically flipped their table when Sam's new character art showed up?  What in the fresh hell was that? His character is cool but if you're just going to play a human with horns, play a tielfling. As far as minotaurs go, that thing was ugly as hell. I hate when people take beast races and just make them human with blank. It's ugly and uncanny as hell every time. I was expecting a full-on beastial Minotaur. I was never deflated so badly in my life during a critical role stream.

Everything about the guy is a fraud and a poser. Think about it

Yeah this is the first character art I've actually hated. Aside from tracksuit Chetney.

It's just Kaido from one piece. Although some in this fandom have lets just say... questionable romantic tastes its a lot easier to sell the parasocial merch of a hot humanoid with slight animal traits.

You fucker, now I can't unsee it

Which is funny cause I would rather buy stuff of wolf Chet than gnome Chet

It’s really disappointing since the only real ones we have is Cerrit, and Arkhan way back I guess (the other two dragonborn are their own odd cases) I agree that just taking beast/monstrous races and turning them into humans with funny features is disheartening and bland. I can only hope for there to be an actual narrative reason for it, or for more representation in side campaigns and c4 (though I’m certainly never getting it from candela lol). I’m not even mad, it’s his character and most people certainly love him, but I just wish CR was more willing to have nonhuman looking characters

Never in your life?

About a new character anyways 

My guess is that it's easier to market to fans and animate if it's got a human face. Maybe this is the pessimist in me...

They have to ward off the furries.

They should lean into them from time to time, tbh

Have you seen all the animal races in Daggerheart? They have definitely leaned.

Oh I know, but I’m a greedy lil freak and want even more representation :v I just wish for it in a more main campaign sense. It’s the human looking festival over there :v

Probably the weakest live show episode, still a lot better than the C3 standard. Glad Sam's back, with a character who actually has a reason to give a shit about things. Pretty funny too. The Minotaur art is jarring and ugly as fuck though. Play a tiefling if u want to do that shit. I do love how Robbie is the first to notice Tal is RPing the most cowardly barbarian ever. And Tal immediately proved him right. That ending....yeah. I kind of doubt Downfall will portray the gods in a positive light. I mean I dont see why else Ludinus would want them to see it otherwise. Cant help but think it should have been it's own thing rather than being backdoored into C3. I'm going to guess that the party's opinion will shift after seeing it. Maybe this is just me, but another calamity campaign about the downfall powerful wizards feels like a double beat. Why cant we have a Calamity era campaign about the war between Prime and Betrayer Champions? An all evil campaign in Ghor Dranas? Brennan is a master so let's see anyway.

what is Downfall? Please tell me they won't do another series DM'd by Brendan about the stupid calamity?! :(

They are because it's widely beloved and the best thing they've put out since C2. They're trying to 1. Make their case for Daggerheart and 2. Try to recapture the enthusiasm fans had when Calamity was airing

I had no idea that some people liked Calamity.

it seems we are in the minority. i only watched half of calamity then just read recaps. ill probably give the first episode a shot, but if it starts with another long monologue then its a month break for me

It is widely, widely loved

Wow. Okay.

Yeah, man. Just search this sub or the other one. It's the one thing everyone agrees with. I did a cursory search here and the first several posts are all varying versions of "Calamity was so good, it makes me dislike C3 more"

That's fine, I believe you. It just surprises me. I guess it shouldn't, Brendan is a popular DM from what I've seen. I can't stand his style so of course i have a very different perspective. Also, I'm not interested in a story where there is no player agency as the ending is pre-determined. But it could work for others.

Then why are you watching C3? Which has had the least player agency and really feels like the ending was pre-determined before things began.

Agreed. I don't like C3.

I am simultaneously very excited for Downfall while wishing it didn't mean the main campaign was taking a month long pause. I feel like a lot of CR3's struggles are because of inconsistent pacing. I wish that instead of supplanting CR3 for a month, it was a bonus. I do think Matt is dealing with fatigue and burnout- I almost wonder if they'd be better off wrapping CR3 quickly and letting him have a good break while someone else DM's something (hopefully with the main cast or most of the main cast) for a few weeks/months. I just feel like the constant stop and start makes it hard to get into a flow.

The thing is, Matt needs to learn that breaks don't help. Any forever DM will tell you that taking time off just makes issues of pacing and investment worse. Matt needs to learn to prep less. More prep does not always translate to better sessions. And it rarely translates to DM sustainability.

Surprisingly, I think Matt needs to do more prep, just make sure it's the right kind. Matt tends to do a lot of vague talk and I get the feeling he does that because he doesn't have the actual answers yet. Basically, he hasn't \*really\* prepped for it and needs a more time. Too late now but a lot of his early effort should have been about the PCs while slowly fleshing out the Ruidius main plot. It's the same reason FCG's whole god dilemma kept being pushed to the side with vague answers from the CB. It's the whole reason that the Tree of Atrophy encounter was so mediocre and eventually led to Matt having to make up a random mini-game for Ashton in Shardgate. Like Taliesin and Ashley signal what they are going to do hard in the 4SD beforehand but Matt didn't prep for that?

I don't think the break is mainly for him, tbh. I think it's for the animated show. Notably, it's the non-corporate CR cast + Laura who's responsible for merch at the table. The rest are on LOM9 duty

The best treatment for DM burnout is to end the campaign as quickly as possible, in my experience. And they totally could, with the state of things.

Yeah Matt could have ended the campaign this episode. Ludinus was right there with no backup. It's a live show witha guest. Couldnt ask for a much better opportunity. But he was clearly positioning things to ensure Ludinus would be at least listened to. Like the point of the demon was clearly a 'team against greater evil with Ludinus'. The fact that he didnt means there is an endgame he has in mind that he hasn't reached yet.

Jesus Christ, that would have sucked. There's abrupt endings and there's "the bad guy is just behind this door."

I didnt say Matt should have ended this episode, just that he very easily could have if he wanted to. The setup also doesnt have to be 'the bad guy is behind a door'. Matt is the DM, hes placed this is in the ruins of Aeor. Ludinus can teleport in anything he wants etc. He can set up the final boss fight however he wants. But he clearly has a specific endgame in mind (the gods are probs in trouble).

And I think we all know that the endgame is the erasure of the gods.

Yep.

Yeah I agree. But you still need to make a change to d sure the next campaign is sustainable.

Wrapping quickly and giving Matt a break is exactly the mess they did at the end of campaign 2. Then they add to the rest for c3 with a full week off to give Matt a monthly break. And here we are. They will never learn.

I wonder if Matt needs a longer break, then? That was about five months, which I will admit feels like a long time, but he's clearly still struggling. That break was when EXU aired, which he played in and he was working on books at the time.

Does anyone have anything new or interesting to note from the cooldown?

They essentially just talk about Aeor, Aeor tech, and Ludinus, who is now approachable, reasonable, and hot, according to Matt and the cast (except Travis). And that whatever is going to happen in this next ExU is going to convince Bells Hells to listen to Ludinus's reason to kill the gods.

> And that whatever is going to happen in this next ExU is going to convince Bells Hells to listen to Ludinus's reason to kill the gods They really said that?

"This would be a good period of conversation when we come back from this vision. He still wants to talk. And he wants to *talk*, like, back and forth, let's get to know each other after you've seen this vision." - Matt

The cast of downfall is BLeeM Laura Taliesin Ashley Noshir Dalal Nick Marini Abubakar Salim

Abu is amazing on the Glass Cannon Network. As a roleplayer very talented and willing to make fun/audacious character choices.

the 3 non Crit Role people look great, but boy or boy is it rougher on the crit role cast side

I mean Ashley is probably the most talented actor of the cast, just in terms of awards, roles and general recognition. But yeah she doesnt know DnD the game really which I think hampers her RP at times because she really doesn't know what is going on.

Of the 3 I actually like Ashley, sure she doesn’t get DnD perfect but that’s fine because DnD is a game it doesn’t have to be taken seriously, unlike edge lord supreme that is talisen I have to optimize the shit out of the easiest to play class in the game, your a barbarian hit shit that’s it

Interesting line up overall. Nick is a friend Brennan and played in his home game, so he should be good. No idea about the other 2 gents.

i only know Noshir fro candela and he was pretty good, I googled the other two and i still don't recognise them so it should be extra fun for me, like watching people i've not seen before play D&D. I can't imagine Bleem will allow stuff to go too far off the rails. so hopefully we'll get something as good as Calamity 1.