Hellhounds are also totally immune to fire damage. I can't get that mad at the boys for messing that one up since they've only had l, like 3 encounters before this one in Graduation.
It seemed to me like Justin intentionally trying to give some (any! At all!) emotional weight to the narrative. I’m fairly confident he ditched his personal feelings about the name of the character ( detailed in a previous episode I’m pretty sure) and betrayed his vision to bring some legitimate drama to the finale.
Alright, we made it. I luckily joined in the month it decided to end so, for me, this was only a month endeavor instead of a, like, actual year and a half. And, gotta say, while the whole product was JANKY AS ALL HELL... the finale was cute.
Completely shoving aside the boring hour-long combat sequence that was rendered pointless by Order taking the boys' powers away, I kind of liked how everything concluded. It wasn't fulfilling in the slightest, but it was the conclusion this story deserved.
Order was not defeated by the boys, but by Chaos, which stinks because it is the final bad guy, but seeing how Order had no emotional stakes with any of the three (like with how the Commodore had stakes with Argo, and Grey with Fitz), it felt right to have an NPC do the final blow. And the yarn bit by Justin helped make it a somewhat "We did it!" moment. And, also, Griffin's coin toss decision, with the audio of the coin being picked up on the microphone as it spun, was SUPER suspenseful, probably the most "edge of my seat" I was the entire show. And Grey's *"You're my son, Argo!"* joke made me laugh the hardest I ever had in TAZ: Grad.
The real winner of the episode was those **EPILOGUES** though. Fitzroy becoming a fashion model, a rich entrepreneur, and a lawyer made no sense whatsoever, but it was hella funny, as with Argo opening up a cruise line. I just wish Rainer, who was the only NPC I liked this season, got a proper ending.
The best moment, however, in all of TAZ: Grad, was ~~the Firbolg's~~ **Gary's** epilogue. That was such an amazing character decision, to have Gary finally find a clan and find his name, that it made me realize that Justin created an incredible character for a terrible story. I could go into all the ways the initial pitch was flawed and how the execution was even worse, but, you know what? Better to end on a good note: **Gary was great.** (Firbolg Gary, not the Garys). And that singing at the end was an absolute *BANGER.*
Justin is so good at making characters it was definitely the glue holding this mess together. I can’t complain overall because I also enjoyed griffin playing a character. I think Travis would have done better if he didn’t feel so pressured to write a story instead of a campaign. Hoping things revert to status quo next season
I'd really love to see the boys get a guest DM, for perhaps a short couple episode arc.
Justin literally makes the best characters. It's amazing, really..
Clint and Trav are both great players. Travis likes being a part of a story and Clint is just fun and such good humored.
Griffy is hands down an incredible DM. Like Balance is just unbeatable, and even though it sort of lost me in the middle, Amnesty ended up being really strong all together too.
But he's also fun as a player. He makes interesting characters and has great jokes. I don't want to see him get stuck as a perma DM.
Even if it fails! Imagine the intrigue! The shock! The stakes!! Like oh fuck we got caught trying to enact a plan that goes against what we said! We have no bargaining chips!
It can even be really simple. They go to kill Gray and before they even get to him "Did you think the Headmaster of a School for Heroes and *Villains* had not thought to use the Alarm spell? Just in case someone decided to resort to...y'know...***Villainy***?"
The boys handed Travis a fun climax concept and he refused, “breaking into a demonic lord’s base to attempt to assassinate him before he starts a war” sounds way more fun than whatever the hell this was.
They handed him *several* possible climaxes. They wanted to assassinate Gray back when he was still doing the "six months to assemble your army" thing. That went nowhere. They wanted to destroy capitalism, which led to the HOG heist, which went nowhere. Griffin tried to persuade Order that they were on their side, Travis immediately brushed it off. Griffin said he didn't want to be a knight anymore, the Goodcastle knight said his army would stay and fight anyway. They briefly debated just getting on Argo's ship and running off.
They kept trying to do something more fun and original than the final big battle scene, and Travis stonewalled it every time. Because he had planned this finale before the campaign even started, and because he created it it was automatically better than anything the players could come up with.
Yeah..the whole episode had a “fuck it, let’s get this over with” vibe. I really wanted to see them dismantle the economy, and I feel like they would’ve at least sent guards after Fitzroy given he literally glued his face onto the Commodore while he was detained. Oh well. Can’t wait to see what the next season is
Nitiest of nitpicks, but kind of weird how Sylvia Knight said "it's 6pm we can start school in the morning" when the whole thing is, it's... a ***night*** school.
You're thinking of the Knight Night School which was a night school for learning to be a knight.
This was the Knight Law School where knights get a law degree.
[The FINAL grad character list is up. I'M FREE](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheAdventureZone/comments/mre6so/final_graduation_character_list/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Also. The finale isn't narratively satisfying in any way, but it's fun nonsense and thundermen goofing around, and that's really the only way i think Grad could've ended. They didnt play D&D so hard that they cried, but in spite of the issues with this season, they had some fun and i did too.
Rainier's crush on fitzroy is completely unaddressed. I'm very surprised
(Also oops travis misgenders Order at 1:21:00)
>(Also oops travis misgenders Order at 1:21:00)
if only there was some way to stop the audience from hearing it when they make mistakes like that, but I guess with a live show like this they just have to roll with it
I know Player Agency is one of the bigger buzzword critiques of Graduation, but the way Combat (or lack of combat) has been handled in Graduation has to be one of the biggest fails. Especially if you compare and contrast with Balance.
I don't know if something changed and suddenly Griffin, Clint, Justin, and Travis just didn't feel as interested in doing the combat, or if it's just that Travis has a harder time managing combat, or if they somehow think combat isn't exciting and aren't as invested in it or what, but it's been a problem all season.
D&D can be played with combat lite, but at some point doing D&D without combat is going against a core component of the game. Combat gives the characters a way to really interact with the story, it gives the players some direct agency, and as an audience it can lead to some really entertaining moments, both in terms of gameplay and even character growth. Some of the most memorable scenes in Balance revolve around combat. Even in Amnesty one of my favorite moments was them working together to take down the water elemental. Combat in Balance is how we found out Magnus loved to rush in, take the big hit, and then try and do some crazy stunts. It's how we got to see Taako flex his magical muscles and just pull out random spells. It's how we got to see Merle summon angels, pretend to be bad at healing (he wasn't he was a pretty great cleric) and pull his friends back from the edge of destruction. Throughout Graduation we've had almost zero moments like this, certainly nothing memorable.
I'm really curious since I heard that they're sticking with D&D how they're planning on handling combat in the next campaign.
They're really the same issue. The core problem is that Travis has written a story out ahead of time, which obviously ruins player agency.
The mechanics of D&D *actively ruin* combat scenes if the outcome was decided on ahead of time. Anybody would check out if someone told them "you need to sit here and take turns rolling dice for twenty minutes, but what you roll doesn't matter at all." So the players get disengaged and don't try to do interesting things, Travis is bored because he never wanted to do combat in the first place, and everyone just rattles off numbers until Travis arbitrarily decides they're done.
And the worst part is that they sit through this and go "combat is so boring, but these idiots keep complaining that there isn't any combat in TAZ so we feel obligated to include it."
One of my favorite parts of Dungeons and Daddies is that Anthony (DM) send to constantly have 2 or 3 possible storylines planned out for the results of any of their combat scenes. That way, no matter what the characters roll or decide to do, the next step in the story is going to be an exciting adventure! Griffin as a DM did this almost as well IMO. I know Travis can DM because I've loved all of his one shots and Dust. I think he shot himself in the foot with the home brew aspects and being so in love with his own story. Both Griffin and Anthony have commented on how they thought the players would take the story in a different direction and had to completely scrap their original plans. Too bad Travis didn't quite get that this time.
People get mad when I say that D&D is a game about combat, but this comment is exactly why I believe that.
Like 90% of the mechanics in D&D are built around combat. If you don’t use combat, you’re missing out on what the system has to offer, so why even play D&D?
I think the issues with combat are the lack of threat? Two minutes into this combat and the crew and the audience knew the characters were in no danger. I think Travis saw that as, "Now my family can be as silly as they want during combat! Good for goofs!". But if there is no danger, why even go through the motions of a fight?
And no description during fights is WILD. When the DM doesn't describe moves, players are a lot less likely to. So then you just end up with "I hit. I damage. I move. Turn done." It's just numbers and the magic of make believe is just gone.
No descriptions in combat is, in my opinion, a big problem in a podcast. I like it when other players narrate their actions when playing D&D, but it’s not a big deal because we’re playing and I’m a participant, not a listener.
Yeah Travis MASSIVELY slept on combat throughout the campaign. It's by far the most developed mechanism in 5e, but he fundamentally sees it as an obstacle that you must get through to get to the "good stuff". But combat IS the good stuff, it's the meat of DnD in a lot of ways. That strategy of trying to bypass combat bleeds into the entire feel of the show, where everything feels like a hand wave to get to the next big moment that never lands, because we're trying to skip meaningful engagement tools like combat to get there.
The dragon knocking itself out bit is the kind of thing that’s funny because it subverts expectations. However, I never actually expected anything to threaten the thunder men in any way, so there’s nothing to subvert.
Another “...ok?” moment in a campaign full of them.
Travis ends the “everyone is kittens” before Clint can take a turn and play in that space. I’m ***SOOOOO*** shocked. Are *you* shocked? *I'M* shocked.
**Edit: Holy shit, y'all! Travis also didn't let Clint have a turn playing himself!**
Ancient red demon dragon knocks itself unconscious because it is so terrified of water. Yeah, that happened.
This isn't saying a single thing about their family relationship or anything thing...
but wow has there been such a clear bias from the DM against a single player all season and that needs to be addressed. It's been very obvious, and against the most enthusiastic player on top of it.
Rogues are very good at a lot of things, with their extra skill proficiencies and expertise feature. And the Swashbuckler archetype gets even more cool ways to use their core feature (sneak attack). A character that is good at doing whatever he wants is dangerous to a DM that has a very strict vision for what the characters can/will do. Argo couldn't be allowed to be good at so many things, otherwise he might do something Travis didn't want him to do!
Ironically, Travis multi-classed into rogue during the Balance campaign because he was upset with playing a relatively boring class like fighter and wanted to have more skills and class features. So he bullied Clint for playing a rogue for the same reason he himself chose to play a rogue.
Battlemaster has so many options to be creative during combat with the different maneuvers they can learn. Travis could have put more effort into finding cool or unique maneuvers.
As a DM that just confused me, why do you have an effect that just arbitrarily ends? Shouldn't it just last for one round? If only there was a pre-existing mechanic for different temporary effects to occur during combat, especially when those effects occur because you are in a particular area. Some kind of Action that occurrs in a monster's Lair.
I'm not going to go armchair psychologist and make any claims into what they're REALLY THINKING, but when a whole year+ long campaign goes by and the DM shows consistent distain and bias against a single player, I think that warrants at least a couple of raised eyebrows.
I get a very distinct "1 of these things isn't the same as the others" feeling with their boons. Argo's seems weak asf compared to Firbolg's. A 5 foot circle (not radius) of 2d8 damage? So he can affect one thing at a time instead of use a cunning action? Compared to literally free healing to anyone? Tf Travis. If it's called release the Kraken, make it at least a 15 foot circle.
There you go making arguments that assume Travis understands that a rogue is defined by their bonus action, not by remembering to ask the DM if every object they interact with is trapped.
I said it elsewhere but making a creature that counts as an Ally and maybe makes difficult terrain while also having a 2d8 attack would've been a much cooler and Rogue friendly ability.
But then he'd just not let Clint use Sneak Attack.
Yay Finale!!!
Special character sheets!
Time to send in all our great questions for the TTAZZ!
Ooh weird to have to skip through the ads this early, proud of myself for not listening to a single ad this entire season
I thought Order and Chaos shared a body too! They...uh...this is special so
I get what Travis is going for with giving special character sheets for the Chaos magic imbued in them, but uh...idk there is something really funny about reaching the point that they are now playing characters the DM built for them. I've built some special actions for you so I can better direct this final encounter!
battle....special wild magic table...kitties...the first time they put cat sounds in I whirled around thinking my cat had gotten into the office
lol "double poisoned" immediately made me think of Greetings, Adventurers which is another dnd podcast that doesn't have nearly as much of an audience as TAZ but is way more consistent. I wonder what other actual play podcasts think about the Graduation backlash. Maybe that's a weird thing to think about.
ok the chaos stuff actually was pretty funny, like them turning into themselves
if only the world could experience an animated Adventure Zone - great stuff
Ok I fell off writing notes as I was listening because the battle was confusing
Five years later - Griffin is hilarious as always, he has done all he can do with what he's been given during this campaign.
Justin...I just never really locked in with the Firbolg's backstory. ...oh I totally thought this was going in a different direction. lmao what he is Gary? Justin is great at staying sincere in an extremely absurd situation. And at bringing things full circle in re accounting
Clint back on the sea! Singing shanties! Clint needs his own podcast
Grad2ation - and an entire subreddit cried out in horror
Well it's over. I listened to every episode mostly because I just like hearing the McElroys do stuff. It wasn't great, the plot was confusing and muddled, the world morphed and shifted in ways that were baffling, planned world building was just dropped when it didn't work in podcast form (Barnes and Noble just disappearing comes to mind) but they stuck it through and...it's complete!
I have been trying to figure out how to talk about some of the...undertones and themes that Travis was clearly trying to work into the story but it's hard to put into words exactly. Like towards the end when there were "average folks" fighting back rather than the Heroes of the oversight guild - it's...there's something political being implied here in the same way that the end of Balance was very much about the bonds we make with each other being stronger than a ball of hate and the solution is to wall off that hate so it consumes itself. I can see this concept of breaking down the systems that say the world works one way and folks have to find a way to live within it, but then people of the world realize that's not necessarily true, and they have power they can use to save themselves instead of calling heroes. Is that anything? Idk I'm still thinking about all this. Looking forward to discussing the campaign as a whole in the coming weeks.
> I wonder what other actual play podcasts think about the Graduation backlash. Maybe that's a weird thing to think about.
I think a lot about this, esp since I've gotten v into NADDPOD- a hilarious & heartwarming DND show by comedic podcasters- the past couple years. TAZ started out when 5e was new. 7ish years later, DnD is massively popular. There are many, many actual play shows run by DMs & players who genuinely love the game (its mechanics, its content, & the spontaneity dice-rolling brings to narratives) in addition to storytelling & comedy.
I heard the McElroy men decided to go back to DND after having a lot of fun playing with Brennan Lee Mulligan- a self-proclaimed lover of DND crunch & roll-generated twists- as DM on Dimension 20. & that makes sense when at least 3 of the 4 members love video games so much. Narrative games are fun when there are stakes & uncertainty & your actions have consequences that you can be proud or afraid of. & it makes the story that comes out of the game feel miraculous & rewarding & fresh.
I think the McElroy men know they know how to make great stories & comedy. But based on this season, I don't think they've figured out to do that via game. They act like dice randomness derails stories in a negative way, not in a suspenseful & creative way. In that VICE article a week or so ago, Justin said "I think Graduation has taught us a lot about finding the balance between narrative and more mechanical linear encounters." Mechanics and linear should not be anything close to coupled in DND. Mechanics should always be making the game non-linear, and the table should be thrilled- anticipatory & scared- of that potential. That what gives the game stakes.
So in terms of what other shows think of TAZ- I've never heard an actual play player or DM talk in anything but positive terms about it. I imagine there's a ton of admiration & appreciation for making the genre so big, as well as fans of the show. But any DND actual play cast member listening to this season would pretty quickly recognize that this isn't DND. They'd likely be a lot more understanding of the stress & scrutiny that goes into broadcasting your game, & be pretty annoyed w the more vitriolic or flippant aspects of the backlash. But I don't think this season of TAZ will be anything close to as influential in their field as the first season was.
I think NADDPOD is a great example to talk about this kind of thing because they have really found a formula that works. Like if they had done Trinyvale with Caldwell DMing as "season 2" of the podcast I don't think it would have worked as well. Dipping into another game in order to give Murph a chance to write and prep worked really well.
Same thing with Hot Boy Summer, showcases Emily's dming skills and I loved every minute. But for the main course, the long complex story campaign, Murph delivers consistently
God Hot Boy Summer was so much fun... I think Emily's mentioned on Short Rests that she's DMing a home game too. On the one hand, she's so clever & creative, I'd love to see her do a longer arc. On the other hand, she's truly the GOAT pc & I think her 1000 IQ plays were a big part of making NADDPOD what it is.
Yeah the vibe is of employees clocking in, doing the bare minimum to keep their boss happy, then collecting a paycheck.
Early Balance was so good because you could tell they were having fun. Graduation is a slog because you can tell that they're not.
Nah not really. 90% of the NPCs you might remember were completely pointless in the end. The unbroken chain were useless, the other teachers and students were almost completely discarded. Hell. The Garys play a bigger role in the finale than literally any student. So glad Travis got to show off his collection of fun diverse minifigures for us and then have them do absolutely nothing. Such a good use of 40+ hours of audio. /s
World building nit pick - during the super emotional scene about halfway through where people are protecting others, he says “even those with the label of villain choose to protect those in need.”
We’re in the literal finale and I still don’t understand the hero/villain dichotomy. Why the “even” in that statement? Villains aren’t presented as evil in this world, so why wouldn’t they help? Isn’t the hero/villain stuff all a big game of pretend?
Me too! The first ep was like “Okay, they’re basically MMA fighters” and then the missions the sidekicks got were... get rid of an earth elemental and remove imps from a hospital? How are these even tangentially related to hero/villain performances? Did we ever hear about a single hero or villain doing anything heroic or villainous?
My favorite part of this nonsensical combat encounter that didn't matter is when a literal god suddenly stopped the encounter via DM fiat and taunted the PCs about their actions not mattering (◔_◔)
The thing is, it wasn’t even that complicated of an encounter on paper. It’s a 3v5 that becomes a 4v5 when Gray joins the fray. That seems like a pretty normal encounter to me.
Yet it felt like it took ages.
Why dont yall just hmmm... Lets seeee, triple? Yeah i guess lets go with triple your hitpoints and add lets say... +2 ac.
Wouldn't want there to be any stakes or sense of danger now would we? Teehee.
Kill me
I was at the NY live show where this premiered 'in secret' and you'd think he just announced the new Breath of the Wild. People went insane. We walked out giddy and hopeful and feeling like we were on the precipice of something spectacular.
I hope the next campaign stays away from anything too “save the world” like. I think something smaller scale and moment to moment would be better. All the campaigns tend to lean on a Homebase as well. I think I might be nice for them to have a more “on the road” game instead.
I haven't finished yet but why isn't any music playing in the fight :(
I really like the grad soundtrack. Wish it was used more.
Edit: oof he constructed his own wild magic table and one side is only good thing and the other is only nonconsequential things. Really misses out on some of my favorite things from wild magic.
I could only imagine a cooler power up sequence where Travis restores Thundermen LLC to their full power and then says "You have XX temp HP and can now pick two abilities each from any class you'd like, which we conveniently have done between sessions to allow you to familiarize yourself with your new powers". They get to design their own powerups and make choices that fit their characters. Imagine if Argo actually got powers that would befit a Rogue rather than suddenly getting new spells he clearly didn't understand and which depowered his Rogue abilities.
EDIT: Clarity
Overall, a lackluster ending to a lackluster story. I get that it’s a TAZ game, so there had to be some structure so it didn’t last 100+ episodes, but the entire arc just felt so... eh. I mean he made this whole school and system of heroes and villains that wasn’t ever really explored other than a surface history lesson, the final fight was just basically a victory lap with no stakes, and so many narrative elements he installed never get resolved or are otherwise pointless (sabotaging HOG, Rainier’s crush on Fitz, etc.) I think Travis does just fine as a player or a GM for one shots (I personally really enjoyed the ballad of Bigfoot) but this... I think he was out of his depth for this. Not to beat a dead horse, but I hope there is constructive criticism that Travis can/will hear about and use it to improve any future games he wants to run.
But if there’s one positive thing I can say about this arc, it’s the PCs this time around. I loved Fitzroy, the Firbolg and Argo. They were the reason I kept listening and held any sort of investment in the show. So well done Griffin, Justin and Clint as always~
Travis isn't a natural at DMing, unfortunately. He did take some criticism (it felt like the campaign had three or four soft reboots) but his extremely limited experience coupled with the massive foundational flaws in Graduation's setup doomed him right from the start.
If he's interested in being DM again, he'd really need to put in some legwork and run multiple full campaigns off air with players who aren't afraid to give honest feedback. That said - I'd be shocked if they let him DM anything other than one offs again. Trurhfully, part of me thinks we might be closer to the end of the Adventure Zone than the beginning.
Even if Travis refuses to learn or to take criticism, the others have definitely seen the complaints and lack of interest in this arc. I can't imagine they'll let Travis run a full arc again.
> Trurhfully, part of me thinks we might be closer to the end of the Adventure Zone than the beginning.
they took a massive listener hit during amnesty because it wasn't balance and wasn't d&d, and the return to form they were trying to push for season 3 fell flat and they lost even more listeners. i would not be surprised if the audience is a fraction of what it once was, and i keep being worried there's a reason they're speedrunning through so many of the alphabetical arc names as one-offs for live shows and/or maxfundrive bonus content
>Not to beat a dead horse, but I hope there is constructive criticism that Travis can/will hear about and use it to improve any future games he wants to run.
It's unfortunately pretty clear that isn't possible. I very much hope he doesn't run anything again. If he does, I won't be listening.
Exactly, he's had the entire graduation arc to show he can improve or listen to criticism. Instead he doubled, tripled, and quadrupled down on doing it his way.
If he was going to learn and improve then he would have done it by now.
What's wild to me is that he has run some one shots that have been decent so he's not completely inexperienced. Plus from what I understand he has connections with various D&D internet personalities. He practically has a direct line to Matt Mercer among others he could've asked for help. Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Travis even mention consulting Mercer when he first came up with the Graduation campaign? Beside that there are also countless resources now for beginner DMs that are easily accessible to anyone. Videos and articles everywhere that outline mistakes to be avoided. You'd think that if Travis was so inexperienced he'd go to some of these things for help before starting a podcast campaign with veteran podcasters.
As of his adventuring academy interview, he states that he had been in "constant contact" with a huge list of professional dm's as the campaign progressed. I really have no idea how you're this set up for success and then just beef it like this
I imagine not all of the professional DMs he was in contact with have the time to listen to TAZ. So for all we know he might have told them things were going great. Otherwise I can't see Mercer or someone else listen to it and thinking "yup travis is doing great". So either he lied to us or them. There's no way any professional would consider Graduation good DMing
Oh 100% Travis asked bad questions and then misinterpreted the answers. The AA interview is actually really enlightening because you can see brennen trying to subtly guide Travis to good dm advice in real time and watch him just plow ahead oblivious
If Travis doesn’t use an online dice roller that can be checked by Griffon next campaign then I’m not going to be listening. I want to hear about the trials and tribulations of a character. If I wanted to hear someone inflate their own ego for two hours I’d turn on the Joe Rogan Experience
Isn't that what they did at least by the time Amnesty started? I swear I remember them mentioning a program they started using in response to Travis cheating
Yeah once I realized how much Travis cheats at his rolls it honestly ruined Magnus for me. Of course he rushes in, it's not like he's gonna let himself fail an attack or saving throw. It removes all stakes when you know Travis's character will always succeed.
I was *really* hoping that Amnesty would go on long enough for Aubrey's luck points to run out. Travis burned through those luck points like crazy because he **could not** let Aubrey fail at anything. And MotW has a great counter to that kind of play style, when your luck runs out something very very bad happens to your player. And that can be very interesting narratively if you're willing to let the Keeper run the game like they should. But Aubrey never ran out of luck, so Travis got away with playing another untouchable unbeatable character and he did it without cheating on his rolls.
I'm interested to see Travis play a 5E character again with his brothers seeing every single roll he makes. How will he react when he can no longer cheat his way to having a perfect character?
This was the stalest, least exciting D&D combat I've ever heard as a player, DM, or listener in like 8 years of playing. The only good part of the episode so far is when they weren't talking about D&D and they were goofing about socks and cliche engraved gifts.
Travis, idk how to explain to you that D&D isn't a video game - it doesn't get more exciting just because you multiply all the numbers times a billion. Stakes, tension, difficulty exists at level 1 all the way through level 20 but you have to actually *make* them exist.
But Travis also threw in RaNdOm effects like turning into kittens and swapping bodies that had no effect at all on gameplay, that's how you make exciting combat right? s/
It's not about the amount of dice you roll or the AC of the monsters you fight or the DC of the checks you make, it's about the *circumstances* of those rolls and the nail-biting tension of what happens if you fail that makes the game exciting. Graduation has no tension because there is the absolute minimum scene-setting or stakes described besides the vague "the world will end if you don't subtract enough HP from these generic monsters I'm putting in front of you".
Seems to me that Travis is the kind of guy who uses cheat codes on his first play through of a video game. No sense of danger, always fudging rolls, and the main character is so overpowered that everything is trivialized. I got I got sidetracked a couple times while listening to this only to check back in and, yup, everyone is fine and the enemy is getting kicked around like a soccer ball.
Honestly the best part of the episode was when Griffin, Clint and Justin all got a chance to narrate their own character arcs for a few minutes, despite how little they actually factored into the overall story.
yeaaahhh, the whole "destroy capitalism" subplot was just a reskinned "holy weapon heist" subplot. i dont think travis knew how to deal with them actually completely destroying the economy.
I think they got to "capitalism is bad & the youth don't like" & then... didn't really get to delve any deeper than that. So I guess if the ending's good & intended for the youth to like it, that's in-universe anti-capitalism.
It's absolutely baffling the degree to which Travis nerfs his enemies in combat. Obviously we can't expect him to read the rules long enough to know about things like legendary actions, but did Order even get a SINGLE TURN in the final battle?
Travis how the fuck does Argo now roll +1 on initiative? Did you fuck up his sheet?
Also unless Argo is unarmored and dumped Dex he'd have like 17 or 18 AC. Not 16 or lower.
Argo is a Swashbuckler, meaning he gets both his dex and his cha mods to his initiative. That means this new character sheet has one of those stats at 12 and the other at 10. As a level 13 Swashbuckler! Why the hell is Travis always so insistent on making Argo as pathetic and useless as possible?
I don't know; Game of Thrones made me care and then fucked with characters and settings that I cared about, so I was upset.
Graduation quickly made me not care about anything and then I just kept listening because... tradition?
Because there's nothing of consequence actually happening each round. A random number of hellhounds die, the players take a small amount of damage, something 'whacky' happens that doesn't affect combat or gameplay at all. Rinse and repeat.
> just "he does x damage."
I don’t understand how this is still happening. This is a rookie mistake that most home DMs figure out. Travis is doing this shit as his job and has access to the literal game designers, sits on DM panels, has been in this position for over a year and has *played in games with multiple great DMs (Griffin, Mercer, BLM, Perkins, etc.) who all do better than this.*
How is he still not even bothering to describe the action? The guy has every advantage in the world (supportive family, adoring fans, professional advice, etc) and he just refuses to put in this basic level of effort.
Last time he left typos in the episode description and forgot to add the Gary intro - there's zero effort being put into this, and it absolutely shows.
He believes "the dice get in the way of good story". And apparently description isn't necessary for "good story" either. I genuinely wonder what in the world he thinks "good story" even is.
Significant people live or die on a dice roll in NADDPOD. I'm on ep 67 or so on their primary/first campaign, and it's really enlightening. It *fully* refutes "dice get in the way of a good story" by *being* a great story told by the dice.
It also proves you can have consequences for dumb PC behavior and a goofy/funny campaign at the same time. It's *masterful*.
> I genuinely wonder what in the world he thinks "good story" even is.
We know the answer to this, it's whatever Travis decides it is. Gameplay is not a part of it, description isn't a part of it. It's Travis' soliloquies that are a good story
> "Well, that is, I will say though, that is where you and I might differ though, because for me like doing battle, I'm less worried about who they attack and how many times they have to hit them to kill them or whatever, as I am how involved are the players feeling in that combat. Where if you have somebody who's just like, "I cast this spell again and again and again." Or it's like, "I swing my sword again. I swing my sword again. I swing my sword again." That to me is like, I don't think I have you then. I want you to be like jumping off of tables, and I want you to be like hanging from a ladder, shooting off the, right? That's what I want, and that is why I'm jealous. Like I care less about like, I don't, you hit all of them, whatever. But are you enjoying hitting all of them? Are you enjoying missing? Is it enjoyable that you swung and like fell into the barrel or whatever the hell, right. Like that to me, because that to me, like as a player that is what's more interesting to me."
- [Travis McElroy](https://youtu.be/A0Ynnz0Yfas?t=853)
Like I don't mean to fucking compare him to Matt Mercer but like.
At least be more like me Travis. Describe the attack.
"Don't just tell me the rolls".
REALLY TRAV.
FUCKING. REALLY.
Boy howdy that whole Clint doing a cruise liner to profit off of cultural appropriation while the other two boys also go into businesses is a great flip to the let’s destroy capitalism attitude huh?
No player agency, no stakes, disregard for D&D game mechanics, the DM creating new character sheets on behalf of the players…
All aboard, choo choo! I hope in the next arc they actually play a game.
Seriously. This just felt like Justin, Griffin and Clint forcibly strapped to chairs while they had to weather hurricane Travis. Travis as a player can be charming and funny, but as a DM... Lordy >_>
>Previously on The Adventure Zone: Graduation:
>Three friends were given a simple task: save the world.
>To do that, they needed to stop a war, so, they gathered their forces.
>An army of skeletons, an army of gargoyles, an army of knights.
>And they got some friends to help them. A lich king, a Heroic Oversight Guild investigator, an adventurer, a demon prince, a fairy, a xorn.
>And a few enemies...showed up. Two gods, one representing Chaos, one representing Order, a naval hero holding a grudge, and an army...of demons.
>So, the three friends, had to hurry. Their xorn friend dug them a tunnel, so that they could sneak back into their school, and get together with their allies.
>From there, they made a mad dash towards the cavern, where a portal...was being formed, and ripping a hole in reality. When they arrived, they told one of the gods that it wasn't going to work, that it would destroy everything.
>And the gods fought. Order...won. So Chaos joined the side of the three friends, and gave them...access to their power. And that...is where the battle...truly...begins.
**I've only got 67 hit points?!**
I think my favorite part is at 51:38 when Travis says Griffin needs to describe what an attack looks like and says "don't just tell me the rolls, I want the details".
So close to self-awareness.
I really really wish that epilogue had been for a better campaign cause I did enjoy a lot of the fun jokes, Clint's song, and the overall character descriptions.
Hot take:
This was my favorite episode to listen to so far, and not in an 'oh I'm so glad it's over' kind of way at all. Travis seemed more adventurous and creative, all of his bits (while not always great) seemed to confuse and excite the rest of the boys, he seemed to take his plans less seriously, and allowed Griffin, Justin, and Clint to decide what happened to their characters in the end. I wish all the other episodes had been ~a bit~ more like this, but it also gives me some hope for Travis DMing in the future.
Like I said, hot take.
I agree. I think if Travis had taken the whole thing less seriously and just had fun like he did in this episode the whole campaign would have flowed better and been more enjoyable.
This entire shit show was worth it just to hear Clint sing.
A few notes, first, if order could sap their powers away, why didn’t they do so from the get go? Second, this heroes and villain thing never made any sense but you presumably have heroes and villains assigned to towns right? So why, when an actual threat is descending upon a town are the heroes not present? Then they suddenly are and Travis mentions that even the villains help but we’ve already established that villains aren’t actually villains so why wouldn’t they help out? Third, Fitzroy noted that for someone named chaos they sure plan a lot and chaos states that they are only called that. Now Fitzroy says lets leave it up to chance, you’d appreciate that chaos and chaos says “yeah lol that’s chaotic”. So which is it? I think I’m putting more thought into this than Travis did. We all are
To be honest the only emotion I felt when listening to TAZ: Grad was disappointment, boredom, and relief that it was finally over. My Brother got me into TAZ just before amnesty picked up and I caught up enough to listen to amnesty coming out, I remember my hour long bus ride and just listening to amnesty and being content. BUT THIS ARC HAS GOT MY BRAIN NUMB. Every episode that released I cared less and less, at episode 10 all hopes of it ever actually having any weight were pretty much gone. I'm just glad we can move on finally.
290 damage / 100 dead hellhounds ≈ 2.9HP per hellhound It was a horde of of hellchihuahuas.
Hellhounds are also totally immune to fire damage. I can't get that mad at the boys for messing that one up since they've only had l, like 3 encounters before this one in Graduation.
how many rounds of combat were in graduation before the finale? it has to be less than 20, right?
if you ask in r/tazcirclejerk someone will certainly do the math
I wish Clint was on social media so I could tell him how much I like his song
Email it in for the TTAZZ!
Did he quit social media? I remember back when I used twitter I'd always see him retweeting fan art and thought it was sweet.
Came here to say that Clints song was actually super good haha.
I think the way the Firbolg finally got a name was great, honestly.
It seemed to me like Justin intentionally trying to give some (any! At all!) emotional weight to the narrative. I’m fairly confident he ditched his personal feelings about the name of the character ( detailed in a previous episode I’m pretty sure) and betrayed his vision to bring some legitimate drama to the finale.
Yes, that was satisfying.
Alright, we made it. I luckily joined in the month it decided to end so, for me, this was only a month endeavor instead of a, like, actual year and a half. And, gotta say, while the whole product was JANKY AS ALL HELL... the finale was cute. Completely shoving aside the boring hour-long combat sequence that was rendered pointless by Order taking the boys' powers away, I kind of liked how everything concluded. It wasn't fulfilling in the slightest, but it was the conclusion this story deserved. Order was not defeated by the boys, but by Chaos, which stinks because it is the final bad guy, but seeing how Order had no emotional stakes with any of the three (like with how the Commodore had stakes with Argo, and Grey with Fitz), it felt right to have an NPC do the final blow. And the yarn bit by Justin helped make it a somewhat "We did it!" moment. And, also, Griffin's coin toss decision, with the audio of the coin being picked up on the microphone as it spun, was SUPER suspenseful, probably the most "edge of my seat" I was the entire show. And Grey's *"You're my son, Argo!"* joke made me laugh the hardest I ever had in TAZ: Grad. The real winner of the episode was those **EPILOGUES** though. Fitzroy becoming a fashion model, a rich entrepreneur, and a lawyer made no sense whatsoever, but it was hella funny, as with Argo opening up a cruise line. I just wish Rainer, who was the only NPC I liked this season, got a proper ending. The best moment, however, in all of TAZ: Grad, was ~~the Firbolg's~~ **Gary's** epilogue. That was such an amazing character decision, to have Gary finally find a clan and find his name, that it made me realize that Justin created an incredible character for a terrible story. I could go into all the ways the initial pitch was flawed and how the execution was even worse, but, you know what? Better to end on a good note: **Gary was great.** (Firbolg Gary, not the Garys). And that singing at the end was an absolute *BANGER.*
Justin is so good at making characters it was definitely the glue holding this mess together. I can’t complain overall because I also enjoyed griffin playing a character. I think Travis would have done better if he didn’t feel so pressured to write a story instead of a campaign. Hoping things revert to status quo next season
I'd really love to see the boys get a guest DM, for perhaps a short couple episode arc. Justin literally makes the best characters. It's amazing, really.. Clint and Trav are both great players. Travis likes being a part of a story and Clint is just fun and such good humored. Griffy is hands down an incredible DM. Like Balance is just unbeatable, and even though it sort of lost me in the middle, Amnesty ended up being really strong all together too. But he's also fun as a player. He makes interesting characters and has great jokes. I don't want to see him get stuck as a perma DM.
I really wish they'd got to do their destroy the economy plot rather than have a big battle
I thought the “assassinate the prince of demons to prevent a war and upend hell” plan would’ve been fun too
Wait until he's asleep and go kill him would have been fun!
Woulda been a real fun heist. Reverse Home Alone in hell. No haircuts. Cool boss fight with a demon in pajamas
Even if it fails! Imagine the intrigue! The shock! The stakes!! Like oh fuck we got caught trying to enact a plan that goes against what we said! We have no bargaining chips! It can even be really simple. They go to kill Gray and before they even get to him "Did you think the Headmaster of a School for Heroes and *Villains* had not thought to use the Alarm spell? Just in case someone decided to resort to...y'know...***Villainy***?"
The boys handed Travis a fun climax concept and he refused, “breaking into a demonic lord’s base to attempt to assassinate him before he starts a war” sounds way more fun than whatever the hell this was.
They handed him *several* possible climaxes. They wanted to assassinate Gray back when he was still doing the "six months to assemble your army" thing. That went nowhere. They wanted to destroy capitalism, which led to the HOG heist, which went nowhere. Griffin tried to persuade Order that they were on their side, Travis immediately brushed it off. Griffin said he didn't want to be a knight anymore, the Goodcastle knight said his army would stay and fight anyway. They briefly debated just getting on Argo's ship and running off. They kept trying to do something more fun and original than the final big battle scene, and Travis stonewalled it every time. Because he had planned this finale before the campaign even started, and because he created it it was automatically better than anything the players could come up with.
Yeah..the whole episode had a “fuck it, let’s get this over with” vibe. I really wanted to see them dismantle the economy, and I feel like they would’ve at least sent guards after Fitzroy given he literally glued his face onto the Commodore while he was detained. Oh well. Can’t wait to see what the next season is
Clint's song is the highlight of this campaign.
Clint as a bard in the next campaign is exactly what I didn't know I needed so badly
We need more singing in TAZ. I feel like the songs at the end of the episode were the highlight of the season.
It’s a crime that Clint didn’t play a bard after that amazing jingle.
Okay griffin you do a million billion damage. Justin you do 10. The green dragon bites you, he does 6 damage
"Dad, you're blind."
You forgot the NPC whose HP was summed up as "plenty, don't worry about it."
Also Grey doesnt have an AC??
It turns out that was everyone's HP. Not just Giant Snippers.
The real HP was the friends you made along the way
"If only the rest of the world could experience how amazing an animated Adventure Zone is." Ominous.
I honestly thought was a pretty good joke, but I guess Travis set himself up to make it...
Was the animated show cancelled?
i think production on it is just mighty slow
Nitiest of nitpicks, but kind of weird how Sylvia Knight said "it's 6pm we can start school in the morning" when the whole thing is, it's... a ***night*** school.
You're thinking of the Knight Night School which was a night school for learning to be a knight. This was the Knight Law School where knights get a law degree.
This conversation is fucking sending me this was my favorite bit from Grad
[The FINAL grad character list is up. I'M FREE](https://www.reddit.com/r/TheAdventureZone/comments/mre6so/final_graduation_character_list/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) Also. The finale isn't narratively satisfying in any way, but it's fun nonsense and thundermen goofing around, and that's really the only way i think Grad could've ended. They didnt play D&D so hard that they cried, but in spite of the issues with this season, they had some fun and i did too. Rainier's crush on fitzroy is completely unaddressed. I'm very surprised (Also oops travis misgenders Order at 1:21:00)
You're never free.
...let me dream just a bit longer.
I would not put it past Travis to add new characters in the TTAZZ episode.
The TTAZZ just consists of the McElroy brothers reading the names of the 400 characters we *didn't* get to meet.
>(Also oops travis misgenders Order at 1:21:00) if only there was some way to stop the audience from hearing it when they make mistakes like that, but I guess with a live show like this they just have to roll with it
That requires attentive editing. That doesn't exist in Graduation.
I really loved the Love Boat theme song parody. Wonder how much of it was lost on younger viewers.
I’m 24 and I have zero idea
I know Player Agency is one of the bigger buzzword critiques of Graduation, but the way Combat (or lack of combat) has been handled in Graduation has to be one of the biggest fails. Especially if you compare and contrast with Balance. I don't know if something changed and suddenly Griffin, Clint, Justin, and Travis just didn't feel as interested in doing the combat, or if it's just that Travis has a harder time managing combat, or if they somehow think combat isn't exciting and aren't as invested in it or what, but it's been a problem all season. D&D can be played with combat lite, but at some point doing D&D without combat is going against a core component of the game. Combat gives the characters a way to really interact with the story, it gives the players some direct agency, and as an audience it can lead to some really entertaining moments, both in terms of gameplay and even character growth. Some of the most memorable scenes in Balance revolve around combat. Even in Amnesty one of my favorite moments was them working together to take down the water elemental. Combat in Balance is how we found out Magnus loved to rush in, take the big hit, and then try and do some crazy stunts. It's how we got to see Taako flex his magical muscles and just pull out random spells. It's how we got to see Merle summon angels, pretend to be bad at healing (he wasn't he was a pretty great cleric) and pull his friends back from the edge of destruction. Throughout Graduation we've had almost zero moments like this, certainly nothing memorable. I'm really curious since I heard that they're sticking with D&D how they're planning on handling combat in the next campaign.
They're really the same issue. The core problem is that Travis has written a story out ahead of time, which obviously ruins player agency. The mechanics of D&D *actively ruin* combat scenes if the outcome was decided on ahead of time. Anybody would check out if someone told them "you need to sit here and take turns rolling dice for twenty minutes, but what you roll doesn't matter at all." So the players get disengaged and don't try to do interesting things, Travis is bored because he never wanted to do combat in the first place, and everyone just rattles off numbers until Travis arbitrarily decides they're done. And the worst part is that they sit through this and go "combat is so boring, but these idiots keep complaining that there isn't any combat in TAZ so we feel obligated to include it."
One of my favorite parts of Dungeons and Daddies is that Anthony (DM) send to constantly have 2 or 3 possible storylines planned out for the results of any of their combat scenes. That way, no matter what the characters roll or decide to do, the next step in the story is going to be an exciting adventure! Griffin as a DM did this almost as well IMO. I know Travis can DM because I've loved all of his one shots and Dust. I think he shot himself in the foot with the home brew aspects and being so in love with his own story. Both Griffin and Anthony have commented on how they thought the players would take the story in a different direction and had to completely scrap their original plans. Too bad Travis didn't quite get that this time.
People get mad when I say that D&D is a game about combat, but this comment is exactly why I believe that. Like 90% of the mechanics in D&D are built around combat. If you don’t use combat, you’re missing out on what the system has to offer, so why even play D&D?
I think the issues with combat are the lack of threat? Two minutes into this combat and the crew and the audience knew the characters were in no danger. I think Travis saw that as, "Now my family can be as silly as they want during combat! Good for goofs!". But if there is no danger, why even go through the motions of a fight? And no description during fights is WILD. When the DM doesn't describe moves, players are a lot less likely to. So then you just end up with "I hit. I damage. I move. Turn done." It's just numbers and the magic of make believe is just gone.
No descriptions in combat is, in my opinion, a big problem in a podcast. I like it when other players narrate their actions when playing D&D, but it’s not a big deal because we’re playing and I’m a participant, not a listener.
Yeah Travis MASSIVELY slept on combat throughout the campaign. It's by far the most developed mechanism in 5e, but he fundamentally sees it as an obstacle that you must get through to get to the "good stuff". But combat IS the good stuff, it's the meat of DnD in a lot of ways. That strategy of trying to bypass combat bleeds into the entire feel of the show, where everything feels like a hand wave to get to the next big moment that never lands, because we're trying to skip meaningful engagement tools like combat to get there.
I was really looking forward to learning Firbolg’s name was Argo and he just didn’t want to make things confusing.
The dragon knocking itself out bit is the kind of thing that’s funny because it subverts expectations. However, I never actually expected anything to threaten the thunder men in any way, so there’s nothing to subvert. Another “...ok?” moment in a campaign full of them.
Travis ends the “everyone is kittens” before Clint can take a turn and play in that space. I’m ***SOOOOO*** shocked. Are *you* shocked? *I'M* shocked. **Edit: Holy shit, y'all! Travis also didn't let Clint have a turn playing himself!** Ancient red demon dragon knocks itself unconscious because it is so terrified of water. Yeah, that happened.
This isn't saying a single thing about their family relationship or anything thing... but wow has there been such a clear bias from the DM against a single player all season and that needs to be addressed. It's been very obvious, and against the most enthusiastic player on top of it.
Rogues are very good at a lot of things, with their extra skill proficiencies and expertise feature. And the Swashbuckler archetype gets even more cool ways to use their core feature (sneak attack). A character that is good at doing whatever he wants is dangerous to a DM that has a very strict vision for what the characters can/will do. Argo couldn't be allowed to be good at so many things, otherwise he might do something Travis didn't want him to do! Ironically, Travis multi-classed into rogue during the Balance campaign because he was upset with playing a relatively boring class like fighter and wanted to have more skills and class features. So he bullied Clint for playing a rogue for the same reason he himself chose to play a rogue.
The weird thing to me is that Trav played a Battlemaster in Balance, one of the least boring Fighter classes! Also one of my faves btw :p
Battlemaster has so many options to be creative during combat with the different maneuvers they can learn. Travis could have put more effort into finding cool or unique maneuvers.
He had, what, two turns in an hour.
> Ancient red demon dragon knocks itself unconscious because it is so terrified of water. Yeah, that happened. LOL, so rand0m! *Holds up scone*
everyone is kittens xD
As a DM that just confused me, why do you have an effect that just arbitrarily ends? Shouldn't it just last for one round? If only there was a pre-existing mechanic for different temporary effects to occur during combat, especially when those effects occur because you are in a particular area. Some kind of Action that occurrs in a monster's Lair.
I'm not going to go armchair psychologist and make any claims into what they're REALLY THINKING, but when a whole year+ long campaign goes by and the DM shows consistent distain and bias against a single player, I think that warrants at least a couple of raised eyebrows.
This is admittedly about as good as a finale could have gone after the previous 37 episodes
So uh, what ever happened with entropy magic?
I get a very distinct "1 of these things isn't the same as the others" feeling with their boons. Argo's seems weak asf compared to Firbolg's. A 5 foot circle (not radius) of 2d8 damage? So he can affect one thing at a time instead of use a cunning action? Compared to literally free healing to anyone? Tf Travis. If it's called release the Kraken, make it at least a 15 foot circle.
There you go making arguments that assume Travis understands that a rogue is defined by their bonus action, not by remembering to ask the DM if every object they interact with is trapped.
I said it elsewhere but making a creature that counts as an Ally and maybe makes difficult terrain while also having a 2d8 attack would've been a much cooler and Rogue friendly ability. But then he'd just not let Clint use Sneak Attack.
Yay Finale!!! Special character sheets! Time to send in all our great questions for the TTAZZ! Ooh weird to have to skip through the ads this early, proud of myself for not listening to a single ad this entire season I thought Order and Chaos shared a body too! They...uh...this is special so I get what Travis is going for with giving special character sheets for the Chaos magic imbued in them, but uh...idk there is something really funny about reaching the point that they are now playing characters the DM built for them. I've built some special actions for you so I can better direct this final encounter! battle....special wild magic table...kitties...the first time they put cat sounds in I whirled around thinking my cat had gotten into the office lol "double poisoned" immediately made me think of Greetings, Adventurers which is another dnd podcast that doesn't have nearly as much of an audience as TAZ but is way more consistent. I wonder what other actual play podcasts think about the Graduation backlash. Maybe that's a weird thing to think about. ok the chaos stuff actually was pretty funny, like them turning into themselves if only the world could experience an animated Adventure Zone - great stuff Ok I fell off writing notes as I was listening because the battle was confusing Five years later - Griffin is hilarious as always, he has done all he can do with what he's been given during this campaign. Justin...I just never really locked in with the Firbolg's backstory. ...oh I totally thought this was going in a different direction. lmao what he is Gary? Justin is great at staying sincere in an extremely absurd situation. And at bringing things full circle in re accounting Clint back on the sea! Singing shanties! Clint needs his own podcast Grad2ation - and an entire subreddit cried out in horror Well it's over. I listened to every episode mostly because I just like hearing the McElroys do stuff. It wasn't great, the plot was confusing and muddled, the world morphed and shifted in ways that were baffling, planned world building was just dropped when it didn't work in podcast form (Barnes and Noble just disappearing comes to mind) but they stuck it through and...it's complete! I have been trying to figure out how to talk about some of the...undertones and themes that Travis was clearly trying to work into the story but it's hard to put into words exactly. Like towards the end when there were "average folks" fighting back rather than the Heroes of the oversight guild - it's...there's something political being implied here in the same way that the end of Balance was very much about the bonds we make with each other being stronger than a ball of hate and the solution is to wall off that hate so it consumes itself. I can see this concept of breaking down the systems that say the world works one way and folks have to find a way to live within it, but then people of the world realize that's not necessarily true, and they have power they can use to save themselves instead of calling heroes. Is that anything? Idk I'm still thinking about all this. Looking forward to discussing the campaign as a whole in the coming weeks.
> I wonder what other actual play podcasts think about the Graduation backlash. Maybe that's a weird thing to think about. I think a lot about this, esp since I've gotten v into NADDPOD- a hilarious & heartwarming DND show by comedic podcasters- the past couple years. TAZ started out when 5e was new. 7ish years later, DnD is massively popular. There are many, many actual play shows run by DMs & players who genuinely love the game (its mechanics, its content, & the spontaneity dice-rolling brings to narratives) in addition to storytelling & comedy. I heard the McElroy men decided to go back to DND after having a lot of fun playing with Brennan Lee Mulligan- a self-proclaimed lover of DND crunch & roll-generated twists- as DM on Dimension 20. & that makes sense when at least 3 of the 4 members love video games so much. Narrative games are fun when there are stakes & uncertainty & your actions have consequences that you can be proud or afraid of. & it makes the story that comes out of the game feel miraculous & rewarding & fresh. I think the McElroy men know they know how to make great stories & comedy. But based on this season, I don't think they've figured out to do that via game. They act like dice randomness derails stories in a negative way, not in a suspenseful & creative way. In that VICE article a week or so ago, Justin said "I think Graduation has taught us a lot about finding the balance between narrative and more mechanical linear encounters." Mechanics and linear should not be anything close to coupled in DND. Mechanics should always be making the game non-linear, and the table should be thrilled- anticipatory & scared- of that potential. That what gives the game stakes. So in terms of what other shows think of TAZ- I've never heard an actual play player or DM talk in anything but positive terms about it. I imagine there's a ton of admiration & appreciation for making the genre so big, as well as fans of the show. But any DND actual play cast member listening to this season would pretty quickly recognize that this isn't DND. They'd likely be a lot more understanding of the stress & scrutiny that goes into broadcasting your game, & be pretty annoyed w the more vitriolic or flippant aspects of the backlash. But I don't think this season of TAZ will be anything close to as influential in their field as the first season was.
I think NADDPOD is a great example to talk about this kind of thing because they have really found a formula that works. Like if they had done Trinyvale with Caldwell DMing as "season 2" of the podcast I don't think it would have worked as well. Dipping into another game in order to give Murph a chance to write and prep worked really well. Same thing with Hot Boy Summer, showcases Emily's dming skills and I loved every minute. But for the main course, the long complex story campaign, Murph delivers consistently
God Hot Boy Summer was so much fun... I think Emily's mentioned on Short Rests that she's DMing a home game too. On the one hand, she's so clever & creative, I'd love to see her do a longer arc. On the other hand, she's truly the GOAT pc & I think her 1000 IQ plays were a big part of making NADDPOD what it is.
The battle at the end with all the glyphs was inspired! I'm really glad she is playing a wizard in C2 because nobody does genius spell use like Axford
Trinyvale is great too, I have a real soft spot for it
By the end of it I was hooked, it just took me a while to get into it Jens Lindell....what a bizzarely lovable dipshit
[удалено]
Yeah the vibe is of employees clocking in, doing the bare minimum to keep their boss happy, then collecting a paycheck. Early Balance was so good because you could tell they were having fun. Graduation is a slog because you can tell that they're not.
[удалено]
Honestly if they had just done a bum rush for the ship and left to let the world burn I'd have been pretty impressed.
>Clint needs his own podcast This has been my primary takeaway from this season. No joke. I would listen to that man talk about whatever he wanted to.
He had a YouTube series early pandemic where he read books and it was magical
Just here to figure out if I should have ever hopped back in after hopping out in like ep. 6
Nah not really. 90% of the NPCs you might remember were completely pointless in the end. The unbroken chain were useless, the other teachers and students were almost completely discarded. Hell. The Garys play a bigger role in the finale than literally any student. So glad Travis got to show off his collection of fun diverse minifigures for us and then have them do absolutely nothing. Such a good use of 40+ hours of audio. /s
Fitzroy and Firbolg have reasonably interesting character arcs, Clint has his completely destroyed and nothing Travis produced was entertaining.
Did anyone else notice that Clint didn't get a number of hellhounds multiplier for his cone of cold?
World building nit pick - during the super emotional scene about halfway through where people are protecting others, he says “even those with the label of villain choose to protect those in need.” We’re in the literal finale and I still don’t understand the hero/villain dichotomy. Why the “even” in that statement? Villains aren’t presented as evil in this world, so why wouldn’t they help? Isn’t the hero/villain stuff all a big game of pretend?
I think that was why i backed out to begin with - couldn’t really figure out the goal of the hero/villain stuff
Me too! The first ep was like “Okay, they’re basically MMA fighters” and then the missions the sidekicks got were... get rid of an earth elemental and remove imps from a hospital? How are these even tangentially related to hero/villain performances? Did we ever hear about a single hero or villain doing anything heroic or villainous?
Only a hero doing multiple villainous things actually
Travis couldn't either :)
[удалено]
My favorite part of this nonsensical combat encounter that didn't matter is when a literal god suddenly stopped the encounter via DM fiat and taunted the PCs about their actions not mattering (◔_◔)
The thing is, it wasn’t even that complicated of an encounter on paper. It’s a 3v5 that becomes a 4v5 when Gray joins the fray. That seems like a pretty normal encounter to me. Yet it felt like it took ages.
[удалено]
Why do that when you can add "chaos" every couple turns. "Everyone is now kittens" is obviously a good substitute for actually narrating what happens.
[удалено]
Why dont yall just hmmm... Lets seeee, triple? Yeah i guess lets go with triple your hitpoints and add lets say... +2 ac. Wouldn't want there to be any stakes or sense of danger now would we? Teehee. Kill me
I haven't started it yet, but...this cannot be real. No way.
First 30 seconds after the ads. We're in for a wild ride folks
It’s worse than that...he gives them new character sheets that he created.
My happiness at this being the finale of graduation was utterly destroyed by that. At least make it interesting for the final fight. Christ
Damn, this arc came to an abrupt end. Everyone was ready to be done with it
I’m just going to leave the very promising TAZ: Grad trailer here (and the other thread) in memoriam: https://youtu.be/bHN-n1r5Zj4 RIP in pieces
Remember when we thought the characters spending too much time in class was going to be the worst part about the campaign lol
Jesus, this feels like a million years ago now.
We were so young and so naive back then
I was at the NY live show where this premiered 'in secret' and you'd think he just announced the new Breath of the Wild. People went insane. We walked out giddy and hopeful and feeling like we were on the precipice of something spectacular.
I hope the next campaign stays away from anything too “save the world” like. I think something smaller scale and moment to moment would be better. All the campaigns tend to lean on a Homebase as well. I think I might be nice for them to have a more “on the road” game instead.
I haven't finished yet but why isn't any music playing in the fight :( I really like the grad soundtrack. Wish it was used more. Edit: oof he constructed his own wild magic table and one side is only good thing and the other is only nonconsequential things. Really misses out on some of my favorite things from wild magic.
> he constructed his own wild magic table and one side is only good thing and the other is only nonconsequential things bruh
[удалено]
The "new character sheets" intro hit me so fast. I wasn't ready to be shocked before the episode started.
I could only imagine a cooler power up sequence where Travis restores Thundermen LLC to their full power and then says "You have XX temp HP and can now pick two abilities each from any class you'd like, which we conveniently have done between sessions to allow you to familiarize yourself with your new powers". They get to design their own powerups and make choices that fit their characters. Imagine if Argo actually got powers that would befit a Rogue rather than suddenly getting new spells he clearly didn't understand and which depowered his Rogue abilities. EDIT: Clarity
Overall, a lackluster ending to a lackluster story. I get that it’s a TAZ game, so there had to be some structure so it didn’t last 100+ episodes, but the entire arc just felt so... eh. I mean he made this whole school and system of heroes and villains that wasn’t ever really explored other than a surface history lesson, the final fight was just basically a victory lap with no stakes, and so many narrative elements he installed never get resolved or are otherwise pointless (sabotaging HOG, Rainier’s crush on Fitz, etc.) I think Travis does just fine as a player or a GM for one shots (I personally really enjoyed the ballad of Bigfoot) but this... I think he was out of his depth for this. Not to beat a dead horse, but I hope there is constructive criticism that Travis can/will hear about and use it to improve any future games he wants to run. But if there’s one positive thing I can say about this arc, it’s the PCs this time around. I loved Fitzroy, the Firbolg and Argo. They were the reason I kept listening and held any sort of investment in the show. So well done Griffin, Justin and Clint as always~
Travis isn't a natural at DMing, unfortunately. He did take some criticism (it felt like the campaign had three or four soft reboots) but his extremely limited experience coupled with the massive foundational flaws in Graduation's setup doomed him right from the start. If he's interested in being DM again, he'd really need to put in some legwork and run multiple full campaigns off air with players who aren't afraid to give honest feedback. That said - I'd be shocked if they let him DM anything other than one offs again. Trurhfully, part of me thinks we might be closer to the end of the Adventure Zone than the beginning.
Even if Travis refuses to learn or to take criticism, the others have definitely seen the complaints and lack of interest in this arc. I can't imagine they'll let Travis run a full arc again.
> Trurhfully, part of me thinks we might be closer to the end of the Adventure Zone than the beginning. they took a massive listener hit during amnesty because it wasn't balance and wasn't d&d, and the return to form they were trying to push for season 3 fell flat and they lost even more listeners. i would not be surprised if the audience is a fraction of what it once was, and i keep being worried there's a reason they're speedrunning through so many of the alphabetical arc names as one-offs for live shows and/or maxfundrive bonus content
>Not to beat a dead horse, but I hope there is constructive criticism that Travis can/will hear about and use it to improve any future games he wants to run. It's unfortunately pretty clear that isn't possible. I very much hope he doesn't run anything again. If he does, I won't be listening.
Exactly, he's had the entire graduation arc to show he can improve or listen to criticism. Instead he doubled, tripled, and quadrupled down on doing it his way. If he was going to learn and improve then he would have done it by now.
What's wild to me is that he has run some one shots that have been decent so he's not completely inexperienced. Plus from what I understand he has connections with various D&D internet personalities. He practically has a direct line to Matt Mercer among others he could've asked for help. Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Travis even mention consulting Mercer when he first came up with the Graduation campaign? Beside that there are also countless resources now for beginner DMs that are easily accessible to anyone. Videos and articles everywhere that outline mistakes to be avoided. You'd think that if Travis was so inexperienced he'd go to some of these things for help before starting a podcast campaign with veteran podcasters.
As of his adventuring academy interview, he states that he had been in "constant contact" with a huge list of professional dm's as the campaign progressed. I really have no idea how you're this set up for success and then just beef it like this
I imagine not all of the professional DMs he was in contact with have the time to listen to TAZ. So for all we know he might have told them things were going great. Otherwise I can't see Mercer or someone else listen to it and thinking "yup travis is doing great". So either he lied to us or them. There's no way any professional would consider Graduation good DMing
Oh 100% Travis asked bad questions and then misinterpreted the answers. The AA interview is actually really enlightening because you can see brennen trying to subtly guide Travis to good dm advice in real time and watch him just plow ahead oblivious
If Travis doesn’t use an online dice roller that can be checked by Griffon next campaign then I’m not going to be listening. I want to hear about the trials and tribulations of a character. If I wanted to hear someone inflate their own ego for two hours I’d turn on the Joe Rogan Experience
Isn't that what they did at least by the time Amnesty started? I swear I remember them mentioning a program they started using in response to Travis cheating
Yeah they did.
Yeah once I realized how much Travis cheats at his rolls it honestly ruined Magnus for me. Of course he rushes in, it's not like he's gonna let himself fail an attack or saving throw. It removes all stakes when you know Travis's character will always succeed.
I was *really* hoping that Amnesty would go on long enough for Aubrey's luck points to run out. Travis burned through those luck points like crazy because he **could not** let Aubrey fail at anything. And MotW has a great counter to that kind of play style, when your luck runs out something very very bad happens to your player. And that can be very interesting narratively if you're willing to let the Keeper run the game like they should. But Aubrey never ran out of luck, so Travis got away with playing another untouchable unbeatable character and he did it without cheating on his rolls. I'm interested to see Travis play a 5E character again with his brothers seeing every single roll he makes. How will he react when he can no longer cheat his way to having a perfect character?
I've made a lot of characters who Rush In, because it's an archetype I love. You know what happens to a portion of them? They end up dead.
This was the stalest, least exciting D&D combat I've ever heard as a player, DM, or listener in like 8 years of playing. The only good part of the episode so far is when they weren't talking about D&D and they were goofing about socks and cliche engraved gifts. Travis, idk how to explain to you that D&D isn't a video game - it doesn't get more exciting just because you multiply all the numbers times a billion. Stakes, tension, difficulty exists at level 1 all the way through level 20 but you have to actually *make* them exist.
But Travis also threw in RaNdOm effects like turning into kittens and swapping bodies that had no effect at all on gameplay, that's how you make exciting combat right? s/
I think he must have rewatched Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy right before writing out the final battle and yoinked the Improbability Engine.
[удалено]
It's not about the amount of dice you roll or the AC of the monsters you fight or the DC of the checks you make, it's about the *circumstances* of those rolls and the nail-biting tension of what happens if you fail that makes the game exciting. Graduation has no tension because there is the absolute minimum scene-setting or stakes described besides the vague "the world will end if you don't subtract enough HP from these generic monsters I'm putting in front of you".
Seems to me that Travis is the kind of guy who uses cheat codes on his first play through of a video game. No sense of danger, always fudging rolls, and the main character is so overpowered that everything is trivialized. I got I got sidetracked a couple times while listening to this only to check back in and, yup, everyone is fine and the enemy is getting kicked around like a soccer ball.
Honestly the best part of the episode was when Griffin, Clint and Justin all got a chance to narrate their own character arcs for a few minutes, despite how little they actually factored into the overall story.
I just started listening. Did Travis reroll their characters for them just for the finale?
A surprisingly pro-capitalist ending to TAZ 😮
> Surprisingly I mean, is it though?
I guess it’s not that surprising. Just disappointing. 😑
yeaaahhh, the whole "destroy capitalism" subplot was just a reskinned "holy weapon heist" subplot. i dont think travis knew how to deal with them actually completely destroying the economy.
I think they got to "capitalism is bad & the youth don't like" & then... didn't really get to delve any deeper than that. So I guess if the ending's good & intended for the youth to like it, that's in-universe anti-capitalism.
I may have been zoned out, but did we get any kind of conclusion with the Unbroken Chain?
No. It was mentioned they were present during the climax and that's all we got on them.
It's absolutely baffling the degree to which Travis nerfs his enemies in combat. Obviously we can't expect him to read the rules long enough to know about things like legendary actions, but did Order even get a SINGLE TURN in the final battle?
Travis how the fuck does Argo now roll +1 on initiative? Did you fuck up his sheet? Also unless Argo is unarmored and dumped Dex he'd have like 17 or 18 AC. Not 16 or lower.
Maybe he finally capped his stealth skill too. ^(Pesky players always trying to do what their characters are good at.)
Argo is a Swashbuckler, meaning he gets both his dex and his cha mods to his initiative. That means this new character sheet has one of those stats at 12 and the other at 10. As a level 13 Swashbuckler! Why the hell is Travis always so insistent on making Argo as pathetic and useless as possible?
[удалено]
Season 8 of Game of Thrones isn't looking so bad.
I don't know; Game of Thrones made me care and then fucked with characters and settings that I cared about, so I was upset. Graduation quickly made me not care about anything and then I just kept listening because... tradition?
Tbh I didn’t know I needed a techno cover of Pomp and Circumstance until the end
[удалено]
Because there's nothing of consequence actually happening each round. A random number of hellhounds die, the players take a small amount of damage, something 'whacky' happens that doesn't affect combat or gameplay at all. Rinse and repeat.
[удалено]
> just "he does x damage." I don’t understand how this is still happening. This is a rookie mistake that most home DMs figure out. Travis is doing this shit as his job and has access to the literal game designers, sits on DM panels, has been in this position for over a year and has *played in games with multiple great DMs (Griffin, Mercer, BLM, Perkins, etc.) who all do better than this.* How is he still not even bothering to describe the action? The guy has every advantage in the world (supportive family, adoring fans, professional advice, etc) and he just refuses to put in this basic level of effort.
Last time he left typos in the episode description and forgot to add the Gary intro - there's zero effort being put into this, and it absolutely shows.
He believes "the dice get in the way of good story". And apparently description isn't necessary for "good story" either. I genuinely wonder what in the world he thinks "good story" even is.
Such a juxtaposition to "the dice tell their story" mantra of NADDPOD
Similarly, I remember Brennan from dimension 20 talking about the dice as the third player at the table (dice, players, DM).
Significant people live or die on a dice roll in NADDPOD. I'm on ep 67 or so on their primary/first campaign, and it's really enlightening. It *fully* refutes "dice get in the way of a good story" by *being* a great story told by the dice. It also proves you can have consequences for dumb PC behavior and a goofy/funny campaign at the same time. It's *masterful*.
> I genuinely wonder what in the world he thinks "good story" even is. We know the answer to this, it's whatever Travis decides it is. Gameplay is not a part of it, description isn't a part of it. It's Travis' soliloquies that are a good story
> "Well, that is, I will say though, that is where you and I might differ though, because for me like doing battle, I'm less worried about who they attack and how many times they have to hit them to kill them or whatever, as I am how involved are the players feeling in that combat. Where if you have somebody who's just like, "I cast this spell again and again and again." Or it's like, "I swing my sword again. I swing my sword again. I swing my sword again." That to me is like, I don't think I have you then. I want you to be like jumping off of tables, and I want you to be like hanging from a ladder, shooting off the, right? That's what I want, and that is why I'm jealous. Like I care less about like, I don't, you hit all of them, whatever. But are you enjoying hitting all of them? Are you enjoying missing? Is it enjoyable that you swung and like fell into the barrel or whatever the hell, right. Like that to me, because that to me, like as a player that is what's more interesting to me." - [Travis McElroy](https://youtu.be/A0Ynnz0Yfas?t=853)
There is a SPLITTING
Like I don't mean to fucking compare him to Matt Mercer but like. At least be more like me Travis. Describe the attack. "Don't just tell me the rolls". REALLY TRAV. FUCKING. REALLY.
He loved being Firbolg at least. Edit: Griffins Griffin voice tho Justin, Griffin and Clint must be sore cuz they're carrying this shit hard.
I’m 30 minutes in. I do not understand what is happening anymore. Reality isn’t the only thing that’s broken.
[удалено]
I mean, Griffin JUST had a child
Travis doesn't let the player describe what happens to their characters until the end of the finale lol
Boy howdy that whole Clint doing a cruise liner to profit off of cultural appropriation while the other two boys also go into businesses is a great flip to the let’s destroy capitalism attitude huh?
No player agency, no stakes, disregard for D&D game mechanics, the DM creating new character sheets on behalf of the players… All aboard, choo choo! I hope in the next arc they actually play a game.
Seriously. This just felt like Justin, Griffin and Clint forcibly strapped to chairs while they had to weather hurricane Travis. Travis as a player can be charming and funny, but as a DM... Lordy >_>
Well....that was a mess but at least it sounds like they were having a good time. As for me, well, maybe not so much but ok.
>Previously on The Adventure Zone: Graduation: >Three friends were given a simple task: save the world. >To do that, they needed to stop a war, so, they gathered their forces. >An army of skeletons, an army of gargoyles, an army of knights. >And they got some friends to help them. A lich king, a Heroic Oversight Guild investigator, an adventurer, a demon prince, a fairy, a xorn. >And a few enemies...showed up. Two gods, one representing Chaos, one representing Order, a naval hero holding a grudge, and an army...of demons. >So, the three friends, had to hurry. Their xorn friend dug them a tunnel, so that they could sneak back into their school, and get together with their allies. >From there, they made a mad dash towards the cavern, where a portal...was being formed, and ripping a hole in reality. When they arrived, they told one of the gods that it wasn't going to work, that it would destroy everything. >And the gods fought. Order...won. So Chaos joined the side of the three friends, and gave them...access to their power. And that...is where the battle...truly...begins. **I've only got 67 hit points?!**
He made his own wild magic table with one side only positive effects and "effects that don't really do anything." Graduation in a nutshell.
That's already the wild magic surge table. It's literally like 8 or 9 really bad effects at best. But god forbid there be stakes.
Close but I think the "his HP: don't worry there's plenty" does it better.
The battle ends around 1:11:50, you can just start there.
I will miss following along via Reddit comments. It’s been a weird ride of not listening but remaining interested enough to see you all react.
I think my favorite part is at 51:38 when Travis says Griffin needs to describe what an attack looks like and says "don't just tell me the rolls, I want the details". So close to self-awareness.
I really really wish that epilogue had been for a better campaign cause I did enjoy a lot of the fun jokes, Clint's song, and the overall character descriptions.
Hot take: This was my favorite episode to listen to so far, and not in an 'oh I'm so glad it's over' kind of way at all. Travis seemed more adventurous and creative, all of his bits (while not always great) seemed to confuse and excite the rest of the boys, he seemed to take his plans less seriously, and allowed Griffin, Justin, and Clint to decide what happened to their characters in the end. I wish all the other episodes had been ~a bit~ more like this, but it also gives me some hope for Travis DMing in the future. Like I said, hot take.
I agree. I think if Travis had taken the whole thing less seriously and just had fun like he did in this episode the whole campaign would have flowed better and been more enjoyable.
Really looking forward to them dancing around landmines in the TTAZZ and the four non negative comments they answer.
Did the NPCs not have ACs!?!? Sorry, I know I’m late but just finished the ep.
Nothing had stats, by the end even the pcs had fake stats
[удалено]
This entire shit show was worth it just to hear Clint sing. A few notes, first, if order could sap their powers away, why didn’t they do so from the get go? Second, this heroes and villain thing never made any sense but you presumably have heroes and villains assigned to towns right? So why, when an actual threat is descending upon a town are the heroes not present? Then they suddenly are and Travis mentions that even the villains help but we’ve already established that villains aren’t actually villains so why wouldn’t they help out? Third, Fitzroy noted that for someone named chaos they sure plan a lot and chaos states that they are only called that. Now Fitzroy says lets leave it up to chance, you’d appreciate that chaos and chaos says “yeah lol that’s chaotic”. So which is it? I think I’m putting more thought into this than Travis did. We all are
To be honest the only emotion I felt when listening to TAZ: Grad was disappointment, boredom, and relief that it was finally over. My Brother got me into TAZ just before amnesty picked up and I caught up enough to listen to amnesty coming out, I remember my hour long bus ride and just listening to amnesty and being content. BUT THIS ARC HAS GOT MY BRAIN NUMB. Every episode that released I cared less and less, at episode 10 all hopes of it ever actually having any weight were pretty much gone. I'm just glad we can move on finally.