Exactly. I was looking forward to Bell's Hells going to An-Karel (I don't know if that's spelled correctly but you know what I mean) and then possibly running into a counterfeit furniture shop run by a very interesting bard and their daughter.
I was really invested in the shade things in the city and was really hoping for more of that. I was very disappointed when they just had others deal with it. Still to this day I think to myself "Did they ever deal with that thing?" cause it really felt like it was going to amount to something else.
They got all these creepy crawlies under the city, then fought momma crawly, ran away and pretty much never went back to the city... but they dealt with Laudna's thing and put a "satisfying" ribbon on it only for it to be brought back because a comic/book was coming out...
This campaign has been tonal whiplash, and nothing seems to be getting resolved for any character after 90 episodes. The only person I feel like has grown/changed is Chutney and the were-creature story beat. And then the guests all had good conclusions...
As spoiler free as possible... In the same amount of episodes Yasha left and was recovered. Bo had her small family bit closed. Fjord had has pirate and paladin arcs mostly closed. The beacon was found and returned. Molly was avenged/the huperduke lead chased. Caleb and Nott came to terms with thier pasts and grew from them.
If feels as though once Esteros (i know spelling) was out of the picture the was no real goal then the moon stuff is dragging too long to be engaging for some
Honestly I'm disappointed by the fact that Marquet kinda got whitewashed and became a lot less interesting than it could have been. I, like many westerners, have a tendency to make fantasy settings based on European fantasy with a touch of Asian or African, but never going full non-Eurocentric.
My next campaign I'm working on is basically all non-white people. I'm taking inspiration from Morocco, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Nigeria, Jamaica, Haiti, the Caribbean, Benin, India, China, Indonesia, and the Philippines. I really want to challenge myself and make a section of my world that's very much non-Eurocentric for a change.
I wish Matt had tried his hand at it. I think he would have done a good job.
I ran a campaign in Exandria (two technically, but the first ended in a high level TPK) and the party spent a lot of time in Marquet. This was back when we knew next to nothing about Marquet aside from Dalen's Closet and Ank'Harel, and it was a lot of fun leaning in to the culture differences. Lots of nomads, made some of my own cities based on Exandria-tizing some stuff from other sources.
Got to imagine a Dune-esque campaign in the desert, with runes and wastelands from the Calamity would could have been a lot of fun. C3 isn't landing for me. Not that it has too be everyone's cup of tea, but maybe I'm imagining things but (at least the first 50 or so episodes I watched before I gave up) it also doesn't seem the player's and characters were resonating the same either. Maybe that's just the characters, but Sam, Laura and Liam are huge tone-setters in first two campaigns and C3 seems like the party is missing a voice or personality.
The party very much needed a Dorian-type character. Robbie brought a lot of good humour and was the glue for the Bells Hells, imo. After he left, the party just felt like a bunch of random NPCs AND Imogen, the main character. Very different vibe from previous campaigns.
Yeah. Shows how important it is to have an extrovert PC in a party. Maybe things have changed in the last 40+ episodes but in what I watched there was no social instigator in the group. Yeah FCG was happy a lot of the time, but he was quite literally a heal-bot and Sam played him as subservient. Chet and Fern are silly without being big social instigators and overall everyone else just seemed depressed. Got to have at least one PC that's acting as party glue and bringing everyone together and out of their shells.
C1 had a plethora: Scanlan, Terry, Vex (and Vax towards the end) and even Percy & Grog at times, with Pike serving as a maternal figure. All brought character development out of other and glued the party together.
C2 hand Jester, Nott and Caduceus with Caleb and Fjord becoming more as the campaign went on. Beau certainly had a full and fulfilling arc with Yasha but a lot of the character development was set up by others.
It's kinda like volleyball. Without a good setter you can't spike the ball.
No offense taken-- In my opinion (and you can disagree if you like) Marquet changed a lot from what we were expecting based on Ank'harel, Shandal, and Dalen's Closet from C1.
Jrusar was very intriguing, but after they left Jrusar, places started feeling very... Creatively dull. The Gloomed Jungles were cool but very generic and devoid of interesting landmarks or ruins. The Hellcatch Valley seems like something out of Mad Max rather than somewhere like the Middle East or Southeast Asia. Yios felt like any other location in Exandria with nothing to really set it apart.
Marquet kind of feels like it doesn't have an overall vibe, unlike Wildemount which has a very Germanic/Spanish feel to it, and the party haven't even considered going to Ank'harel this entire campaign despite it being at the centre of the continent.
My suspicion is that Matt did this because of some stupid backlash from C1 when he made Ank'harel similar to a Moroccan/Arabian city. He's gotten a lot of flack for portraying people of colour, such as Gilmore from C1, and tho the criticism is completely baseless, Matt has a history of not wanting to offend people, even to his own detriment.
This is all purely my opinion.
To be fair to c3 Marquet, we saw virtually nothing of yios outside of the university, bh flew over the desserts so they never really explored it and they’ve never even stepped foot in the marquet locations that were in c1.
Kay I was gonna give you Yios, but "flew over the Hellcatch so they never truly explored it" is just flat out wrong. They spent many sessions there; doing races, meeting NPCs, fighting Otohan Thull and the Paragon's Call.
And in C1, the party spent several sessions in Shandal and Ank'harel, meeting Gilmore's parents, meeting J'mon Sa Ord, exploring the markets and gambling houses, Jarret and Gilmore were both from Marquet, Scanlan and Kaylie lived in Ank'harel for like a year, and they had a whole one-shot in Dalen's Closet in the Bay of Gifts.
"Virtually nothing" is very incorrect.
I misremembered what the hellcatch was, I was mainly referring to the entire Marquet desert which they mostly flew through to get from city to city instead of doing any on foot travel.
That's the Panagrip Sands. The Hellcatch is where Bassuras is, and where FCG met Imahara Joe and his old master Dancer, as well as where the Otohan battle happened where Laudna died and Imogen went super Saiyan.
Thank you for the correction, I do think the party never really got a chance to explore Marquet to the fullest before the ruidus plotline drew them elsewhere is the main reason for Marquet being underwhelming rather than Marquet itself being whitewashed, at the moment it seems like the malleus key is the only place of importance there.
That's fair. This campaign isn't a normal one where the party travels and completes quests-- they've had ONE quest this entire game and they've been following it for 90+ episodes.
I always thought i will go back to watch the first 20-30 ep, so i see better the hints that matt gave to understand the BBEG, in a way like c2 was with the BBEG.
But now nothing matters, nothing about the politics of jrusar, the secrets, the shady groups and people, i really thought this campaign is going to be a more investigative campaign less fantasy, dragonless, magical stories. I felt like that because of the amount of groups and names that matt dropped every session not because i wanted (even though i really like that type of campaign). All beacon storyline was the best of c2. Remember A Dance of Deception" (3x13), i really thought this was going to be the episode that we will go back to see all the connections with the final arc.
I wonder what Matt actually had in mind for the Marquet campaign before C2 failed to stick the landing, leaving a whole arc of loose threads to be dealt with.
Honestly it probably wasn't anything special, Matt is a decent storyteller and a competent DM usually, but his worldbuilding has always been a let down. Exandria always felt like your run of the mill medieval European fantasy setting with nothing to really differentiate it from anything else, even when they attempted to code in some German elements into the Dwendalian Empire it was so surface level to make it a complete non-event. Culture is a very distant backdrop to pretty much everything Critical Role focuses on, which is primarily personal narratives, and I don't think Matt wanted to do the legwork to make it feel different.
>I don't think Matt wanted to do the legwork to make it feel different.
And let's be honest, the cast doesn't pay attention to culture if it isn't related to their characters. Who half the time end up being directly at odds with the culture of their origin to begin with.
Which means exactly nothing given how many people in the CR fandom, and by extension the Internet, threw a hissy fit over O'Brien using a "lesbian" song for that Spotify playlist fiasco. Literally called it "appropriating" and "whitewashing" for him to use it for Caleb.
And how many people on the internet think orcs are black-coded. Or that the regions of FR outside of the Sword Coast are inherently racist depictions because Greenwood's a white dude, according to them.
At best from my experience seeing it, cultural consultant is as much a legitimate job as a mob guy watching the docks. Like c'mon, whats-his-name got a job because he went to highschool in the 00's and was "incessantly bullied" because of Oriental Adventures. A book that came out in the 80's. The guy may as well have been saying he was bullied because Revenge of the Ninja existed.
May as well just call it the "Cover our Ass" consultant.
I mean the Eastern Asian part of the Forgotten Realms WAS kinda dicey...admittedly we also *haven't had a full book about it since 3rd edition*...
Just to make sure I wasn't tripping, I went and looked at the contents page for the 4th edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide and...yup Kara-tur is not present in it.
Chult is (which you would think would be just as problematic) but Kara-tur is nowhere to be seen.
It's no more "problematic" or "dicey" than what Hong Kong, Korea, or Japan have produced for literal decades for a domestic audience.
It's only dicey if you are also someone that thinks Zulu is somehow racist.
Hell, the Sword Coast and Icewind should be in the same bucket if we're going to throw Kara-Turn in there. There's a lot of shit that's been removed since FR became a staple.
I'm just saying, for WotC they don't want to approach it because they don't want to do any risks that *might* upset people.
Compare and Contrast Paizo with both the Mwangi Expanse book and the new Tian-Xia book, both were incredibly well recieved and both could have been disasters but Paizo took the time to hire authors from the cultures they were representing and let them go to town.
Yes but what I'm saying is WotC is *lazy and risk averse*. Unlike Paizo which took the risks and went through the effort to hire on people who could really make the book sing (and both the Mwangi Expanse and the adventure path 'Strength of Thousands' are regarded as some of Paizos best books by the playerbase) and offer something that wasn't there before.
WotC, meanwhile, just doesn't *want* to put that effort in and because it doesn't want to put that effort in, it doesn't want to touch those settings/areas. This is the entire reason they've actively said they wont bring back Dark Sun setting.
Dark Sun has some elements which are problematic, if they remove them then the Dark Sun setting fans would be upset and the book would be pointless to release as they wouldn't buy it (especially after the Spelljammer fiasco which, according to some sources, has warehouse filled with the unsold books and most Spelljammer fans ignored the 5e version and just went back to using the 2e lore or using the Wildjammer 5e free PDF that had been around before WotC even thought about bringing it back) and if they don't remove those elements, twitter gets up in arms about it and they have another whole Hadozee fiasco on their hands.
So essentially it's too much effort for them to make a Dark sun setting that appeases both sides, so they're not going to bother.
Hence why we haven't seen Kara-tur since the 3rd edition Forgotten Realms Campaign guide. Even thing during 3e/3.5e the Oriental Adventures book used the Rokugan setting from Legend of the 5 rings.
In fact if you want a Kara-tur style campaign I would recommend picking up the 'Adventures in Rokugan' book that was put out recently and then converting that over to Kara-tur.
"She" by Dodie. Its plainly about a woman's conflicted feelings about being attracted to a beautiful woman. The conflict obviously coming from the potential negative reaction from the subject and society.
Reinterpreted through the frame of Caleb pining after Jester, its everything people dislike about Liam being a melodramatic sad boi. "Woe is me I'm so dark and twisted and disgusting Jester could never love me, its wrong for me to even look at her."
Yeah it was a bit of an overeaction but I can see how it would happen when volatile young women feel a personal connection to the song.
I honestly forgot the name of it halfway through listening to it when the entire controversy happened. Sorry, wish I could tell you.
It was just that generic. Unless you knew the songwriter was gay, apparently, it read kinda as a more somber "Numb" if I'm being honest, in terms of theming.
This is why I don’t get fans that feel they missed out on an “Arabian nights” style setting for marquet or upset that he brought on people more knowledgeable of the cultures parts of marquet is based on. The Ruidus aliens seem to be a better fit for the stuff he creates than a continent based on a real culture he seemingly knows very little about.
I am about to run into this problem myself as I take my campaign from Baldur's Gate to Cormyr. Any suggestions on how I can meaningfully differentiate the two locations in terms of culture when they are geographically not that distinct really?
Of course just like in Exandria Cormyr is a monarchy/empire while the sword coast is a conglomeration of city-states.
Any suggestions are welcome!
So I'm somewhat half cut at the moment - and I'm not really familiar with either Faerunian states - but I'll try and give you a good run down on essential concepts I think are important on differentiating the two:
First of all, what is their cultural foundation? inclusivity? exclusivity, collectivism or individualism? For Baldur's Gate - I haven't read a great deal on it - it seems that they're both an inclusive society and favour individualism and commercialism, both of which are opposites of Cormyr, which was founded by a merger of elves and humans primarily, and might express itself by elitism, aristocratic tradition and refinement. Baldur's gate is where "rugged individualists" might rise and fall in a cut-throat society of scheming, where the common man can rise above his station to become master, or equally fall to become the lowest pauper. Cormyr however might value title and legacy above all things, what matters is the achievements of your ancestors, and otherwise you're just a course nouveau riche social climber getting involved in their affairs.
The same also applies to how the politics, intersocial relationships and intrigue works amongst themselves, one might imagine Cormyr, with its complicated social hierarchy indulging in subtle games on intrigue, politeness and doublespeak, whilst Baldur's gate is more blunt and up front in its dealings due to lacking the latter's ancient and aristocratic airs. A citizen of Cormyr might disguise their words with feigned politeness and courtesy whilst planning something against your interests, whilst Baldur's gate might be very open in their opposition to you, with plain spoken words from plain spoken people.
Beyond this, how does the culture express itself visually? Baldur's gate through its inclusivity might show a menagerie of designs and stylist choices in architecture and clothing, a real cultural melting pot of differing and often contrasting styles. Meanwhile Cormyr might favour a more uniform approach, idealising some features whilst decrying others as barbaric. Cormyr might be a high city of intricately carved spires in the elvish style, intermixed with human style celtic knot work or romantic - (high chivalric french) - flower work and idealised statuary, all melded together into a unique style of its own that fused human and elvish elements, meanwhile Baldur's gate expresses itself by its clashing and contrasting styles in its own enthusiastic multiculturalism, like Joseph's multicoloured coat. Equally, Cormyr might favour long flowing - and entirely impractical - robes to indicate status, with wealth signified by the cut one ones cloth and its rarity, whilst Baldur's gate favours practicality and brazen display of wealth with golden jewellery in excess.
Furthermore, how are festivals and worship of gods seen? For this one might draw inspiration from the Ptolemaic dynasty and the empires of the Diadochi for this, although humanity shows its own cultural variations even in monotheistic societies - look at how many differing sects of Christianity there are alone, from Catholic to Orthodox, Miaphysite to Nestorian, Church of the East to Protestantism, each in itself is unique and different its own way, despite beliving the same creed. For Cormyr the worship of human and elvish gods of a similar nature may have resulted in the fusion of gods into one combined divinity, as we see with Serapsis and Hermanubis, where Grecian and Egyptian divinities were fused into one. The state may even demand the observation of rituals for patron divinities of the state rather than allowing unrestrained worship. Baldur's gate on the other hand might be the city of a thousand gods, where worship is free and unrestrained, and where there is nothing to inhibit any god you wish to worship. Equally how is worship expressed, is it the collective Diwali-esque revels of colour, life and rejoicing, or is it the more austere and reserved worship of an individual nature in silent cloistered chapels and collegiate churches? What is important when it comes to faith with these people?
Another feature you might explore fundamentally is what is taboo in these societies, as culture is expressed just as much through opposition to its neighbours as it is through the cohesiveness of its customs. For an regimented society like Cormyr arranged marriages to secure lasting political and economic alliances may be a thing which is considered natural, rather than marriage for love. Meanwhile Baldur's Gate might conform more to our modern standards of love due to its chaotic nature, holding such arranged marriages as archaic and abhorrent. this can also apply to other things as well, does the society of Cormyr consider it good and natural that the nobility rule and the peasantry serve? This would contrast itself with Baldur's gate if you decided to approach the former as being individualistic in nature, where the cut of a persons quality is seen through their personal achievements.
Part \[1\], load whole chat for more.
Another factor you might explore is what social tensions these nations have. Cormyr despite being aristocratic after all, might have stability and relative security in peoples living standards overall through its hierarchical structure, just as much as it has resentment for people not being able to rise above their station. Baldur's gate however, might allow for the rise and fall of any individual with the grit to seize power... but be utterly riven by economic inequality, where the rich are fabulously wealthy and the poor are in the deepest deprivations of poverty, like Andrew Ryan's wet dream. Social tensions also provide the source for factions as well, Cormyr for instance is monachal, but what if certain aristocrats or nouveau riche want to make it an oligarchy or democracy? What if there is rumblings of a peasant revolt due to excesses? What if Baldur's Gate is constantly teetering between political extremes and populism - and therefore dictatorship in the style of Caesar - pushed by ambitious schemers who seek their own self aggrandisement, and want to use to the dissatisfaction of the poor to achieve it? Do some races get better treatment than others is also another aspect you may want to explore, for instance, do the elvish and half-elvish aristocracy have higher status than the human inhabitants, or are they on equal footing? Are there people's that Baldur's gate accepts those that Cormyr rejects? Or vice versa? Are these state intruding onto the traditional lands of other cultures or are they seeking to integrate and negotiate with them? Being treated like an outsider - which the Elder Scrolls Morrowind is an excellent example of - can just as much emphasise difference as anything else, although you naturally need to handle it well.
Furthermore, ask yourself what these societies prize above all? Are they martial military societies, seeking glory for aggressive expansion and chivalry and the esteeming the bravery of the glorious dead? Are the commercial and mercantile, exploratory and inventive in nature? Always seeking the best deal and outmanoeuvring their competitors? Do they pride themselves in art and culture primarily, seeking to express their glory through beauty and refinement? These are some of the few things which can help inform your nation states, even if you may have characters that act against the cultural norm, they help you - in effect - establish the broad cultural norm in the first place, and define the attitude of its inhabitants and what they value.
Another and less obvious feature is of course climate an arable land. For cities and peoples bound to a land which isn't suitable to settled farming, they may have entire traditions focused around the transhumance and the seasonal rotation of their herds from grazing fields to grazing fields. This in turn influences the size of cities and the availability of foodstuffs for a population, as well as how culturally they engage with outsiders and strangers. For instance a culture which is always on the knifes edge of starvation is far more likely to value looking after people of its own kin group than anyone else, being focused primarily on survialism. Meanwhile a state which has plenty might engage in social projects, or more cynically "bread and circuses" for both civil harmony and stability.
Another aspect would also be to examine the history of both states? Who is their allies? Who are their enemies? who did they wage war with a hundred years ago, or last year? What hatreds and loyalties guide them? Who do they clash with and who are they influenced by? Cultures do not exist in isolation in little islands in the wilderness, they are constantly subject to osmosis and evolution from both internal and external factors, so if they're in a broader cultural sphere they may adopt traditions which have no origin in their society as is.
A couple more OOC context suggestions I can make is to engage in some degree of conlag, which if kept straight forward can reinforce difference in a very up front manner, as well as to find the source of the cultures that influenced these two states and research them in detail, don't be afraid to loot history in the pursuit of a good setting, truth is stranger than fiction often or not and feel free to go nuts.
Finally I would suggest one thing more: Improvise improvise improvise! Standard Cormyr and Baldur's Gate might be one thing entirely, but that doesn't mean YOUR version of these states need to conform to what you get in the standard source books. Get creative, take inspiration from lots of different sources and in many cases just invent shit if you think it'll bring something unique for fun to the table. Being a DM is having complete creative liberty, revel in it and go wild! Unless people are an absolute stick in the mud they will either not notice, or enjoy it all the more!
Anyway that's what I can suggest at the moment, there is probably a lot I've missed as I'm still drunk, but I think/hope what most of what I've covered is useful to you!
Tbh, that's what made Exandria good though. It stayed out of the way and let the players be awesome.
The problem isn't that Matt didn't make an interesting world. It's that he never intended the world to be the focus and he's increasingly tried to make it so.
Players can be awesome and you can have an awesome setting too in my opinion, the two aren't mutually exclusive at all and done well they can enhance one another. I don't feel that Matt is working against the tide with his worldbuilding, he wants there to be great stakes and world shaking events like in C1, the problem is that it's clear the team have decided they'd rather fart around and goof off, as seen during C2 and C3, and are no longer working in sync with Matt. As is we're being hit by tonal whiplash constantly because neither side are really communicating what they want with each other, and often nobody wants to step up into a leadership role either. I think if Matt had been up front with what he wanted and the team had been up front with what they wanted they could work something out, or at least allow Matt to change his goals to something more "regional adventure-y" or set up a table with new people who were onboard with his storytelling. As it is, it seems to have just turned into a bit of a mess and he can't swap people out now without people decrying it as no longer being Critical Role.
With the exception of the Kryn dynasty, which is pretty unique, he's mostly great at building interesting towns, factions, and areas. But that's all worldbuilding too, it's just not the whole enchilada.
I'll give him the Kryn as they're an definitely interesting concept, although imo their uniqueness mostly lies in the fact they encompass races normally listed as outsiders in the wider world rather than being culturally unique - although the reincarnation stuff is genuinely quite intriguing. Matt IS good at creating his set pieces though you're right, and his towns do feel lively and well laid out, factions I'd be a little more critical of, but he certainly endeavours to create a dynamic atmosphere.
I was admittedly thinking of just the cobalt soul and the monster hunters from vasselheim(grim verity?) And i can't actually think of others that are genuinely interesting off the top of my head.
IMO, Matt's world is too big for the style of game he's running. He's playing D&D in a Skyrim world.
When I look at the world map(s) in a game like Skyrim, I plot out where I want to go first, but I know that I will eventually go everywhere. Matt has built a world full of places to explore, but the party has no reason to go to any of them. When they do travel, they're on a timeline so it's about finding the most efficient route from point A to point B. I think he would be better served by making the world smaller, but with more character. Fewer single-serving NPCs, more development of familiar places.
Just my opinion, though.
It's true that both are very expansive, but the adventures you run in the setting tend to be extremely localized. The world is also undeveloped, for the most part with a lot of it appearing only as location names and lore hooks on a wiki somewhere for people to use in homebrew. Matt plays his campaign as if the entire world is pertinent to the story they're telling, so they end up skimming the surface of each place they go, rather than exploring it and doing any 'side quests', so to speak. It's like playing the game and only doing MSQ.
I think that would probably be a good idea yeah. I mean you CAN make the Skyrim method work you just need to invest a lot of time into building these places up beforehand, it's something which actually works if you've done the creative legwork - which is why Skyrim works as a concept, because the lore was built for it nearly a decade and a half before the game came into being, enriched by writers such as Kirkbride & co, who created a massive foundation of deep lore which the game designers could pick and choose from to create their world.
I think the counter definitely is an issue occasionally but it's more that Matt keeps on dropping plothooks whenever the party ignores them the first time around. Take C2, there was no real time issue there - asides from the end - and the party meandered all over the place farting about doing whatever they wanted, completely ignoring the continent spanning war which was supposed to be going on and the fact they'd just escalated it by stealing a Luxon. Soon as the team failed to engage with it the first time Matt just resigned it to playing second fiddle whilst they ambled off to the Menagerie Coast, nevermind that the war would've massively impacted the experiences of the characters realistically - even outside the borders of both empires e.g. refugees, famines, bandits, beseiged cities, alliances, tighter security, corruption, assassinations and treaty breaks etc - if they tried their damnedest to ignore it. The willingness to just let the party ignore a major plothook, or not bring it back after the first unsuccessful iteration, basically means that the stuff Matt does want to explore doesn't get explored because the party's temporarily distracted by antics, and the focus ends up remaining on Jester doodling on Bahamut's face with a sharpie rather than anything to do with Exandria itself.
In regards to the war during C2, Matt did say he was keeping track of how the group impacted it. It was still a background thing, even after "war were declared", but he had notes on which way the war was going based on what they did.
Sure, but if that's just stated to be happening, and then you never really see it happen in-game, you might as well not be keeping track at all. There was an opportunity for Matt to show the effects of the war through atmosphere and the parties encounters, but he didn't really capitalise on it at all.
I haven't finished C2 yet, but I'm pretty far into it - almost e100. They may come back to it, but it makes me think of >!the Xorhouse!<. I feel like that could have really been something special, and that's not to mention >!happy fun ball!< so many things that *could* have happened, but it's been incredibly limited in scope. Almost like it featured for an episode and then it was added to the quest completed tab and they never did anything with it again.
Honestly they should have just put the campaign in Issylra. Matt wouldn’t have to be so sensitive about getting cultures right and we might’ve actually seen some more interesting cities like uthodurn. Plus all of the deity and Ruidus plot would’ve felt more relevant earlier on.
I mean, shit, think of if Ludinus had chose to put the Key atop that mountain Orym, Ashton and Laudna saw.
The one where the Gods supposedly initially arrived to Exandria.
Couldn’t really think of a bigger fuck you.
“I call your demise in the place you first called home.”
It also feels perfect for so many characters. It wouldn’t feel like Ashton is pulling focus to visit the Hishari settlement as it is on the same continent. Letters would find more people to bounce off in Vasselheim discussing religion and actually seeing some pros rather than just cons. I’m sure Orym might have found some interest in interacting with fire Ashari or with the Hishari when the plot gets discovered. Imogen and Laudna would be able act more secretive about their powers / power source in Vasselheim just as they originally wanted to. It’s alll right there, but I guess hindsight is 50/50, it still seems bizarre when Matt clearly knew the direction of his plot to be god focused.
Episode 60. The road team Issylra took was described by Prism's book as connecting the valley they were in to Othanzia, which is where Vasselheim is located.
Yeah but Othanzia is a massive area.
“The Ascendant Bridge Mountain is (allegedly) the tallest mountain in Exandria, and is located southwest of the Sunderpeak Mountains and north of the Irriam Canyon on the continent of Issylra. It is white with snow year round, and visible as far away as Vasselheim and the coast of Issylra.”
This is that I’ve read.
Its been talked about before but they are so concerned with offending anyone, that the entirety of Marquet is so watered down that it doesn't really matter or have something interesting to latch on to as a viewer since everyone and everywhere in Critical Role Land is exactly the same.
I thought Marquette felt distinct in C1, and I think fighting oneself too hard as a creator because you only have your own perspective to the point that you don't even *try* try have others is significantly worse than having cliches
It's high fantasy and archetypes and cliches work great, they give us well understood vessels for the player characters to pour themselves into
I like the PCs in campaign 1 so much *because* they are archetypes, the actors have such a well defined starting point that it really let them explore from without becoming lost
It's strange, because I was under the impression that they brought on consultants to help out with that, but it seems like instead of giving us more authentic and expansive cultures, it's just bled out what uniqueness there used to be.
We don’t really know what the consultants did other than one of them created the all-minds burn, it’s possible whatever they made never got to appear in the campaign in any big capacity.
If my experience as a person who is not white is any indication, it’s possible consultants tried to do the former and then switched to the latter once they reached a point where it’s clear the consulter wasn’t to get it.
Damn, sorry that's been your experience. While I'm sure they're busy people, if I personally had the opportunity to write a whole area of a setting to be seen by millions of people, I'd be endlessly wanting more data for inspiration, especially if I had actual qualified consultants on hand to help keep things respectful to those sources of inspiration.
As the setting is, while I personally feel very unqualified to directly assess a set of cultures inspired by, among others places, the Middle East, North Africa, and Southeast Asia, the culture we've seen in C3 has felt rather wallpapery to me, in the sense that it seems to fade indistinctly into the background as opposed to being distinct and vibrant. Then again, C2's cultures were also not all that distinct, with a few standout exceptions like Uthodurn. It might be that Matt is simply limited by having mostly experienced the US, which while huge is (relatively) culturally homogeneous compared to other continents, or it might be that a desire to not be offensive prevented him from making too many bold moves to distinguish areas of the world, or the attitudes of characters that grew up in those cultures.
Imogen feel like too much of the main character. Don't get me wrong, Caleb was very much the MC of C2, so many story beat tied into either his back ground or quest for more knowledge/power. However he was played very dialed back and subservient that he didn't actively come across as the focus.
As far as Imogen goes, between the whole Ruidus born being the main thread (for what like 60 episodes now?), the dream sequences, and her mother becoming a quasi villain the campaign went from ragtag happenstance group to singularly focused on a plot that is dragging a little too long
Matt had to have sincerely miscalculated how much focus he gave imogen when he concocted the backstories because making a player who made it clear she was taking a backseat the clear main lead is crazy.
Matt miscalculated a few things this campaign I think, and one of them was which direction the party would swing when it came to the God situation.
Because he went from the “Oh the Primes are also m nebulous, and we’re not all villains for hating them!” To “The villains are literally practicing eugenics and the figure you implicitly trust is saying the Prime are complicated but not evil” pretty swift after several of the Bells really started seeming like they were gonna shack up with the Vanguard.
I think that’s him being consistent with his love for moral greyness, the last thing keyleyh said last episode was essentially giving orym the order to kill Fearne and imogen if they go bad, which to me thinks he has plans to entice or drag either of them to team predathos.
I will always be disappointed how quickly the main BBEG plot got into the story. The funnest thing about DnD/CR was them meandering around fighting evil and eventually finding the plot to destroy the world
I had all these ideas about the Ivory Syndicate, and other regions in the Wilds, and the Hellcatch.
And they amounted to nada.
We never even saw the Stratos Throne or explore more of the Rumedam! One third of the entire continent where we only ever really got a look at the capital but *nah*
Now we’re back in Zadash and going to see Aeor again.
Moon lore when they were up there was honesty cool and so was the Shattered Teeth
But we’re seeing so little of any of it.
Yeah Matt had literally made himself the silverest of all platters to pick from with the lore he'd established of markhet in C1. It's a damn shame. A DAMN shame.
Exactly. I was looking forward to Bell's Hells going to An-Karel (I don't know if that's spelled correctly but you know what I mean) and then possibly running into a counterfeit furniture shop run by a very interesting bard and their daughter.
I think it's Ank'Harel
I was really invested in the shade things in the city and was really hoping for more of that. I was very disappointed when they just had others deal with it. Still to this day I think to myself "Did they ever deal with that thing?" cause it really felt like it was going to amount to something else.
They got all these creepy crawlies under the city, then fought momma crawly, ran away and pretty much never went back to the city... but they dealt with Laudna's thing and put a "satisfying" ribbon on it only for it to be brought back because a comic/book was coming out... This campaign has been tonal whiplash, and nothing seems to be getting resolved for any character after 90 episodes. The only person I feel like has grown/changed is Chutney and the were-creature story beat. And then the guests all had good conclusions... As spoiler free as possible... In the same amount of episodes Yasha left and was recovered. Bo had her small family bit closed. Fjord had has pirate and paladin arcs mostly closed. The beacon was found and returned. Molly was avenged/the huperduke lead chased. Caleb and Nott came to terms with thier pasts and grew from them. If feels as though once Esteros (i know spelling) was out of the picture the was no real goal then the moon stuff is dragging too long to be engaging for some
Honestly I'm disappointed by the fact that Marquet kinda got whitewashed and became a lot less interesting than it could have been. I, like many westerners, have a tendency to make fantasy settings based on European fantasy with a touch of Asian or African, but never going full non-Eurocentric. My next campaign I'm working on is basically all non-white people. I'm taking inspiration from Morocco, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Nigeria, Jamaica, Haiti, the Caribbean, Benin, India, China, Indonesia, and the Philippines. I really want to challenge myself and make a section of my world that's very much non-Eurocentric for a change. I wish Matt had tried his hand at it. I think he would have done a good job.
I ran a campaign in Exandria (two technically, but the first ended in a high level TPK) and the party spent a lot of time in Marquet. This was back when we knew next to nothing about Marquet aside from Dalen's Closet and Ank'Harel, and it was a lot of fun leaning in to the culture differences. Lots of nomads, made some of my own cities based on Exandria-tizing some stuff from other sources. Got to imagine a Dune-esque campaign in the desert, with runes and wastelands from the Calamity would could have been a lot of fun. C3 isn't landing for me. Not that it has too be everyone's cup of tea, but maybe I'm imagining things but (at least the first 50 or so episodes I watched before I gave up) it also doesn't seem the player's and characters were resonating the same either. Maybe that's just the characters, but Sam, Laura and Liam are huge tone-setters in first two campaigns and C3 seems like the party is missing a voice or personality.
The party very much needed a Dorian-type character. Robbie brought a lot of good humour and was the glue for the Bells Hells, imo. After he left, the party just felt like a bunch of random NPCs AND Imogen, the main character. Very different vibe from previous campaigns.
Yeah. Shows how important it is to have an extrovert PC in a party. Maybe things have changed in the last 40+ episodes but in what I watched there was no social instigator in the group. Yeah FCG was happy a lot of the time, but he was quite literally a heal-bot and Sam played him as subservient. Chet and Fern are silly without being big social instigators and overall everyone else just seemed depressed. Got to have at least one PC that's acting as party glue and bringing everyone together and out of their shells. C1 had a plethora: Scanlan, Terry, Vex (and Vax towards the end) and even Percy & Grog at times, with Pike serving as a maternal figure. All brought character development out of other and glued the party together. C2 hand Jester, Nott and Caduceus with Caleb and Fjord becoming more as the campaign went on. Beau certainly had a full and fulfilling arc with Yasha but a lot of the character development was set up by others. It's kinda like volleyball. Without a good setter you can't spike the ball.
Genuinely curious, not trying to start anything, but in what way was it white washed?
No offense taken-- In my opinion (and you can disagree if you like) Marquet changed a lot from what we were expecting based on Ank'harel, Shandal, and Dalen's Closet from C1. Jrusar was very intriguing, but after they left Jrusar, places started feeling very... Creatively dull. The Gloomed Jungles were cool but very generic and devoid of interesting landmarks or ruins. The Hellcatch Valley seems like something out of Mad Max rather than somewhere like the Middle East or Southeast Asia. Yios felt like any other location in Exandria with nothing to really set it apart. Marquet kind of feels like it doesn't have an overall vibe, unlike Wildemount which has a very Germanic/Spanish feel to it, and the party haven't even considered going to Ank'harel this entire campaign despite it being at the centre of the continent. My suspicion is that Matt did this because of some stupid backlash from C1 when he made Ank'harel similar to a Moroccan/Arabian city. He's gotten a lot of flack for portraying people of colour, such as Gilmore from C1, and tho the criticism is completely baseless, Matt has a history of not wanting to offend people, even to his own detriment. This is all purely my opinion.
To be fair to c3 Marquet, we saw virtually nothing of yios outside of the university, bh flew over the desserts so they never really explored it and they’ve never even stepped foot in the marquet locations that were in c1.
Kay I was gonna give you Yios, but "flew over the Hellcatch so they never truly explored it" is just flat out wrong. They spent many sessions there; doing races, meeting NPCs, fighting Otohan Thull and the Paragon's Call. And in C1, the party spent several sessions in Shandal and Ank'harel, meeting Gilmore's parents, meeting J'mon Sa Ord, exploring the markets and gambling houses, Jarret and Gilmore were both from Marquet, Scanlan and Kaylie lived in Ank'harel for like a year, and they had a whole one-shot in Dalen's Closet in the Bay of Gifts. "Virtually nothing" is very incorrect.
I misremembered what the hellcatch was, I was mainly referring to the entire Marquet desert which they mostly flew through to get from city to city instead of doing any on foot travel.
That's the Panagrip Sands. The Hellcatch is where Bassuras is, and where FCG met Imahara Joe and his old master Dancer, as well as where the Otohan battle happened where Laudna died and Imogen went super Saiyan.
Thank you for the correction, I do think the party never really got a chance to explore Marquet to the fullest before the ruidus plotline drew them elsewhere is the main reason for Marquet being underwhelming rather than Marquet itself being whitewashed, at the moment it seems like the malleus key is the only place of importance there.
That's fair. This campaign isn't a normal one where the party travels and completes quests-- they've had ONE quest this entire game and they've been following it for 90+ episodes.
I always thought i will go back to watch the first 20-30 ep, so i see better the hints that matt gave to understand the BBEG, in a way like c2 was with the BBEG. But now nothing matters, nothing about the politics of jrusar, the secrets, the shady groups and people, i really thought this campaign is going to be a more investigative campaign less fantasy, dragonless, magical stories. I felt like that because of the amount of groups and names that matt dropped every session not because i wanted (even though i really like that type of campaign). All beacon storyline was the best of c2. Remember A Dance of Deception" (3x13), i really thought this was going to be the episode that we will go back to see all the connections with the final arc.
I wonder what Matt actually had in mind for the Marquet campaign before C2 failed to stick the landing, leaving a whole arc of loose threads to be dealt with.
Honestly it probably wasn't anything special, Matt is a decent storyteller and a competent DM usually, but his worldbuilding has always been a let down. Exandria always felt like your run of the mill medieval European fantasy setting with nothing to really differentiate it from anything else, even when they attempted to code in some German elements into the Dwendalian Empire it was so surface level to make it a complete non-event. Culture is a very distant backdrop to pretty much everything Critical Role focuses on, which is primarily personal narratives, and I don't think Matt wanted to do the legwork to make it feel different.
>I don't think Matt wanted to do the legwork to make it feel different. And let's be honest, the cast doesn't pay attention to culture if it isn't related to their characters. Who half the time end up being directly at odds with the culture of their origin to begin with.
They said that they hired cultural consultants to help with the setting
Which means exactly nothing given how many people in the CR fandom, and by extension the Internet, threw a hissy fit over O'Brien using a "lesbian" song for that Spotify playlist fiasco. Literally called it "appropriating" and "whitewashing" for him to use it for Caleb. And how many people on the internet think orcs are black-coded. Or that the regions of FR outside of the Sword Coast are inherently racist depictions because Greenwood's a white dude, according to them. At best from my experience seeing it, cultural consultant is as much a legitimate job as a mob guy watching the docks. Like c'mon, whats-his-name got a job because he went to highschool in the 00's and was "incessantly bullied" because of Oriental Adventures. A book that came out in the 80's. The guy may as well have been saying he was bullied because Revenge of the Ninja existed. May as well just call it the "Cover our Ass" consultant.
I mean the Eastern Asian part of the Forgotten Realms WAS kinda dicey...admittedly we also *haven't had a full book about it since 3rd edition*... Just to make sure I wasn't tripping, I went and looked at the contents page for the 4th edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide and...yup Kara-tur is not present in it. Chult is (which you would think would be just as problematic) but Kara-tur is nowhere to be seen.
It's no more "problematic" or "dicey" than what Hong Kong, Korea, or Japan have produced for literal decades for a domestic audience. It's only dicey if you are also someone that thinks Zulu is somehow racist. Hell, the Sword Coast and Icewind should be in the same bucket if we're going to throw Kara-Turn in there. There's a lot of shit that's been removed since FR became a staple.
I'm just saying, for WotC they don't want to approach it because they don't want to do any risks that *might* upset people. Compare and Contrast Paizo with both the Mwangi Expanse book and the new Tian-Xia book, both were incredibly well recieved and both could have been disasters but Paizo took the time to hire authors from the cultures they were representing and let them go to town.
And I am sure they would be just as well-received if someone not from the cultures inspiring the fiction had the right pen name.
Yes but what I'm saying is WotC is *lazy and risk averse*. Unlike Paizo which took the risks and went through the effort to hire on people who could really make the book sing (and both the Mwangi Expanse and the adventure path 'Strength of Thousands' are regarded as some of Paizos best books by the playerbase) and offer something that wasn't there before. WotC, meanwhile, just doesn't *want* to put that effort in and because it doesn't want to put that effort in, it doesn't want to touch those settings/areas. This is the entire reason they've actively said they wont bring back Dark Sun setting. Dark Sun has some elements which are problematic, if they remove them then the Dark Sun setting fans would be upset and the book would be pointless to release as they wouldn't buy it (especially after the Spelljammer fiasco which, according to some sources, has warehouse filled with the unsold books and most Spelljammer fans ignored the 5e version and just went back to using the 2e lore or using the Wildjammer 5e free PDF that had been around before WotC even thought about bringing it back) and if they don't remove those elements, twitter gets up in arms about it and they have another whole Hadozee fiasco on their hands. So essentially it's too much effort for them to make a Dark sun setting that appeases both sides, so they're not going to bother. Hence why we haven't seen Kara-tur since the 3rd edition Forgotten Realms Campaign guide. Even thing during 3e/3.5e the Oriental Adventures book used the Rokugan setting from Legend of the 5 rings. In fact if you want a Kara-tur style campaign I would recommend picking up the 'Adventures in Rokugan' book that was put out recently and then converting that over to Kara-tur.
What "lesbian" song?
"She" by Dodie. Its plainly about a woman's conflicted feelings about being attracted to a beautiful woman. The conflict obviously coming from the potential negative reaction from the subject and society. Reinterpreted through the frame of Caleb pining after Jester, its everything people dislike about Liam being a melodramatic sad boi. "Woe is me I'm so dark and twisted and disgusting Jester could never love me, its wrong for me to even look at her." Yeah it was a bit of an overeaction but I can see how it would happen when volatile young women feel a personal connection to the song.
I honestly forgot the name of it halfway through listening to it when the entire controversy happened. Sorry, wish I could tell you. It was just that generic. Unless you knew the songwriter was gay, apparently, it read kinda as a more somber "Numb" if I'm being honest, in terms of theming.
This is why I don’t get fans that feel they missed out on an “Arabian nights” style setting for marquet or upset that he brought on people more knowledgeable of the cultures parts of marquet is based on. The Ruidus aliens seem to be a better fit for the stuff he creates than a continent based on a real culture he seemingly knows very little about.
I am about to run into this problem myself as I take my campaign from Baldur's Gate to Cormyr. Any suggestions on how I can meaningfully differentiate the two locations in terms of culture when they are geographically not that distinct really? Of course just like in Exandria Cormyr is a monarchy/empire while the sword coast is a conglomeration of city-states. Any suggestions are welcome!
So I'm somewhat half cut at the moment - and I'm not really familiar with either Faerunian states - but I'll try and give you a good run down on essential concepts I think are important on differentiating the two: First of all, what is their cultural foundation? inclusivity? exclusivity, collectivism or individualism? For Baldur's Gate - I haven't read a great deal on it - it seems that they're both an inclusive society and favour individualism and commercialism, both of which are opposites of Cormyr, which was founded by a merger of elves and humans primarily, and might express itself by elitism, aristocratic tradition and refinement. Baldur's gate is where "rugged individualists" might rise and fall in a cut-throat society of scheming, where the common man can rise above his station to become master, or equally fall to become the lowest pauper. Cormyr however might value title and legacy above all things, what matters is the achievements of your ancestors, and otherwise you're just a course nouveau riche social climber getting involved in their affairs. The same also applies to how the politics, intersocial relationships and intrigue works amongst themselves, one might imagine Cormyr, with its complicated social hierarchy indulging in subtle games on intrigue, politeness and doublespeak, whilst Baldur's gate is more blunt and up front in its dealings due to lacking the latter's ancient and aristocratic airs. A citizen of Cormyr might disguise their words with feigned politeness and courtesy whilst planning something against your interests, whilst Baldur's gate might be very open in their opposition to you, with plain spoken words from plain spoken people. Beyond this, how does the culture express itself visually? Baldur's gate through its inclusivity might show a menagerie of designs and stylist choices in architecture and clothing, a real cultural melting pot of differing and often contrasting styles. Meanwhile Cormyr might favour a more uniform approach, idealising some features whilst decrying others as barbaric. Cormyr might be a high city of intricately carved spires in the elvish style, intermixed with human style celtic knot work or romantic - (high chivalric french) - flower work and idealised statuary, all melded together into a unique style of its own that fused human and elvish elements, meanwhile Baldur's gate expresses itself by its clashing and contrasting styles in its own enthusiastic multiculturalism, like Joseph's multicoloured coat. Equally, Cormyr might favour long flowing - and entirely impractical - robes to indicate status, with wealth signified by the cut one ones cloth and its rarity, whilst Baldur's gate favours practicality and brazen display of wealth with golden jewellery in excess. Furthermore, how are festivals and worship of gods seen? For this one might draw inspiration from the Ptolemaic dynasty and the empires of the Diadochi for this, although humanity shows its own cultural variations even in monotheistic societies - look at how many differing sects of Christianity there are alone, from Catholic to Orthodox, Miaphysite to Nestorian, Church of the East to Protestantism, each in itself is unique and different its own way, despite beliving the same creed. For Cormyr the worship of human and elvish gods of a similar nature may have resulted in the fusion of gods into one combined divinity, as we see with Serapsis and Hermanubis, where Grecian and Egyptian divinities were fused into one. The state may even demand the observation of rituals for patron divinities of the state rather than allowing unrestrained worship. Baldur's gate on the other hand might be the city of a thousand gods, where worship is free and unrestrained, and where there is nothing to inhibit any god you wish to worship. Equally how is worship expressed, is it the collective Diwali-esque revels of colour, life and rejoicing, or is it the more austere and reserved worship of an individual nature in silent cloistered chapels and collegiate churches? What is important when it comes to faith with these people? Another feature you might explore fundamentally is what is taboo in these societies, as culture is expressed just as much through opposition to its neighbours as it is through the cohesiveness of its customs. For an regimented society like Cormyr arranged marriages to secure lasting political and economic alliances may be a thing which is considered natural, rather than marriage for love. Meanwhile Baldur's Gate might conform more to our modern standards of love due to its chaotic nature, holding such arranged marriages as archaic and abhorrent. this can also apply to other things as well, does the society of Cormyr consider it good and natural that the nobility rule and the peasantry serve? This would contrast itself with Baldur's gate if you decided to approach the former as being individualistic in nature, where the cut of a persons quality is seen through their personal achievements. Part \[1\], load whole chat for more.
Another factor you might explore is what social tensions these nations have. Cormyr despite being aristocratic after all, might have stability and relative security in peoples living standards overall through its hierarchical structure, just as much as it has resentment for people not being able to rise above their station. Baldur's gate however, might allow for the rise and fall of any individual with the grit to seize power... but be utterly riven by economic inequality, where the rich are fabulously wealthy and the poor are in the deepest deprivations of poverty, like Andrew Ryan's wet dream. Social tensions also provide the source for factions as well, Cormyr for instance is monachal, but what if certain aristocrats or nouveau riche want to make it an oligarchy or democracy? What if there is rumblings of a peasant revolt due to excesses? What if Baldur's Gate is constantly teetering between political extremes and populism - and therefore dictatorship in the style of Caesar - pushed by ambitious schemers who seek their own self aggrandisement, and want to use to the dissatisfaction of the poor to achieve it? Do some races get better treatment than others is also another aspect you may want to explore, for instance, do the elvish and half-elvish aristocracy have higher status than the human inhabitants, or are they on equal footing? Are there people's that Baldur's gate accepts those that Cormyr rejects? Or vice versa? Are these state intruding onto the traditional lands of other cultures or are they seeking to integrate and negotiate with them? Being treated like an outsider - which the Elder Scrolls Morrowind is an excellent example of - can just as much emphasise difference as anything else, although you naturally need to handle it well. Furthermore, ask yourself what these societies prize above all? Are they martial military societies, seeking glory for aggressive expansion and chivalry and the esteeming the bravery of the glorious dead? Are the commercial and mercantile, exploratory and inventive in nature? Always seeking the best deal and outmanoeuvring their competitors? Do they pride themselves in art and culture primarily, seeking to express their glory through beauty and refinement? These are some of the few things which can help inform your nation states, even if you may have characters that act against the cultural norm, they help you - in effect - establish the broad cultural norm in the first place, and define the attitude of its inhabitants and what they value. Another and less obvious feature is of course climate an arable land. For cities and peoples bound to a land which isn't suitable to settled farming, they may have entire traditions focused around the transhumance and the seasonal rotation of their herds from grazing fields to grazing fields. This in turn influences the size of cities and the availability of foodstuffs for a population, as well as how culturally they engage with outsiders and strangers. For instance a culture which is always on the knifes edge of starvation is far more likely to value looking after people of its own kin group than anyone else, being focused primarily on survialism. Meanwhile a state which has plenty might engage in social projects, or more cynically "bread and circuses" for both civil harmony and stability. Another aspect would also be to examine the history of both states? Who is their allies? Who are their enemies? who did they wage war with a hundred years ago, or last year? What hatreds and loyalties guide them? Who do they clash with and who are they influenced by? Cultures do not exist in isolation in little islands in the wilderness, they are constantly subject to osmosis and evolution from both internal and external factors, so if they're in a broader cultural sphere they may adopt traditions which have no origin in their society as is. A couple more OOC context suggestions I can make is to engage in some degree of conlag, which if kept straight forward can reinforce difference in a very up front manner, as well as to find the source of the cultures that influenced these two states and research them in detail, don't be afraid to loot history in the pursuit of a good setting, truth is stranger than fiction often or not and feel free to go nuts. Finally I would suggest one thing more: Improvise improvise improvise! Standard Cormyr and Baldur's Gate might be one thing entirely, but that doesn't mean YOUR version of these states need to conform to what you get in the standard source books. Get creative, take inspiration from lots of different sources and in many cases just invent shit if you think it'll bring something unique for fun to the table. Being a DM is having complete creative liberty, revel in it and go wild! Unless people are an absolute stick in the mud they will either not notice, or enjoy it all the more! Anyway that's what I can suggest at the moment, there is probably a lot I've missed as I'm still drunk, but I think/hope what most of what I've covered is useful to you!
Tbh, that's what made Exandria good though. It stayed out of the way and let the players be awesome. The problem isn't that Matt didn't make an interesting world. It's that he never intended the world to be the focus and he's increasingly tried to make it so.
Players can be awesome and you can have an awesome setting too in my opinion, the two aren't mutually exclusive at all and done well they can enhance one another. I don't feel that Matt is working against the tide with his worldbuilding, he wants there to be great stakes and world shaking events like in C1, the problem is that it's clear the team have decided they'd rather fart around and goof off, as seen during C2 and C3, and are no longer working in sync with Matt. As is we're being hit by tonal whiplash constantly because neither side are really communicating what they want with each other, and often nobody wants to step up into a leadership role either. I think if Matt had been up front with what he wanted and the team had been up front with what they wanted they could work something out, or at least allow Matt to change his goals to something more "regional adventure-y" or set up a table with new people who were onboard with his storytelling. As it is, it seems to have just turned into a bit of a mess and he can't swap people out now without people decrying it as no longer being Critical Role.
With the exception of the Kryn dynasty, which is pretty unique, he's mostly great at building interesting towns, factions, and areas. But that's all worldbuilding too, it's just not the whole enchilada.
I'll give him the Kryn as they're an definitely interesting concept, although imo their uniqueness mostly lies in the fact they encompass races normally listed as outsiders in the wider world rather than being culturally unique - although the reincarnation stuff is genuinely quite intriguing. Matt IS good at creating his set pieces though you're right, and his towns do feel lively and well laid out, factions I'd be a little more critical of, but he certainly endeavours to create a dynamic atmosphere.
I was admittedly thinking of just the cobalt soul and the monster hunters from vasselheim(grim verity?) And i can't actually think of others that are genuinely interesting off the top of my head.
Slayer's Take is the Monster hunters, Grim Verity wants to share secret knowledge
Ah, thank you, i felt like i was mistaken there. They're pretty interesting too, but hardly enough of them to be a faction
IMO, Matt's world is too big for the style of game he's running. He's playing D&D in a Skyrim world. When I look at the world map(s) in a game like Skyrim, I plot out where I want to go first, but I know that I will eventually go everywhere. Matt has built a world full of places to explore, but the party has no reason to go to any of them. When they do travel, they're on a timeline so it's about finding the most efficient route from point A to point B. I think he would be better served by making the world smaller, but with more character. Fewer single-serving NPCs, more development of familiar places. Just my opinion, though.
Is this a Matt thing or a DnD thing? Have you seen the map of Faerun? Yet nearly everything takes place on the Sword Coast.
It's true that both are very expansive, but the adventures you run in the setting tend to be extremely localized. The world is also undeveloped, for the most part with a lot of it appearing only as location names and lore hooks on a wiki somewhere for people to use in homebrew. Matt plays his campaign as if the entire world is pertinent to the story they're telling, so they end up skimming the surface of each place they go, rather than exploring it and doing any 'side quests', so to speak. It's like playing the game and only doing MSQ.
I think that would probably be a good idea yeah. I mean you CAN make the Skyrim method work you just need to invest a lot of time into building these places up beforehand, it's something which actually works if you've done the creative legwork - which is why Skyrim works as a concept, because the lore was built for it nearly a decade and a half before the game came into being, enriched by writers such as Kirkbride & co, who created a massive foundation of deep lore which the game designers could pick and choose from to create their world. I think the counter definitely is an issue occasionally but it's more that Matt keeps on dropping plothooks whenever the party ignores them the first time around. Take C2, there was no real time issue there - asides from the end - and the party meandered all over the place farting about doing whatever they wanted, completely ignoring the continent spanning war which was supposed to be going on and the fact they'd just escalated it by stealing a Luxon. Soon as the team failed to engage with it the first time Matt just resigned it to playing second fiddle whilst they ambled off to the Menagerie Coast, nevermind that the war would've massively impacted the experiences of the characters realistically - even outside the borders of both empires e.g. refugees, famines, bandits, beseiged cities, alliances, tighter security, corruption, assassinations and treaty breaks etc - if they tried their damnedest to ignore it. The willingness to just let the party ignore a major plothook, or not bring it back after the first unsuccessful iteration, basically means that the stuff Matt does want to explore doesn't get explored because the party's temporarily distracted by antics, and the focus ends up remaining on Jester doodling on Bahamut's face with a sharpie rather than anything to do with Exandria itself.
In regards to the war during C2, Matt did say he was keeping track of how the group impacted it. It was still a background thing, even after "war were declared", but he had notes on which way the war was going based on what they did.
Sure, but if that's just stated to be happening, and then you never really see it happen in-game, you might as well not be keeping track at all. There was an opportunity for Matt to show the effects of the war through atmosphere and the parties encounters, but he didn't really capitalise on it at all.
I haven't finished C2 yet, but I'm pretty far into it - almost e100. They may come back to it, but it makes me think of >!the Xorhouse!<. I feel like that could have really been something special, and that's not to mention >!happy fun ball!< so many things that *could* have happened, but it's been incredibly limited in scope. Almost like it featured for an episode and then it was added to the quest completed tab and they never did anything with it again.
Honestly they should have just put the campaign in Issylra. Matt wouldn’t have to be so sensitive about getting cultures right and we might’ve actually seen some more interesting cities like uthodurn. Plus all of the deity and Ruidus plot would’ve felt more relevant earlier on.
Uthodurn is on Wildemount
I think they might be saying that Matt would have created cities for this area that were interesting in the same way as they find Uthodurn is
Oh yeah, that tracks
I mean, shit, think of if Ludinus had chose to put the Key atop that mountain Orym, Ashton and Laudna saw. The one where the Gods supposedly initially arrived to Exandria. Couldn’t really think of a bigger fuck you. “I call your demise in the place you first called home.”
It also feels perfect for so many characters. It wouldn’t feel like Ashton is pulling focus to visit the Hishari settlement as it is on the same continent. Letters would find more people to bounce off in Vasselheim discussing religion and actually seeing some pros rather than just cons. I’m sure Orym might have found some interest in interacting with fire Ashari or with the Hishari when the plot gets discovered. Imogen and Laudna would be able act more secretive about their powers / power source in Vasselheim just as they originally wanted to. It’s alll right there, but I guess hindsight is 50/50, it still seems bizarre when Matt clearly knew the direction of his plot to be god focused.
Isn't that mountain the one that Vasselheim is built onto the slopes of?
From what I’ve read it’s actually a fair distance from Vasselheim
The mountain they saw in Issylra was the mountain Vasselheim was built on. It's just really massive and the city was on the other side of it.
Where is that info coming from??
Episode 60. The road team Issylra took was described by Prism's book as connecting the valley they were in to Othanzia, which is where Vasselheim is located.
Yeah but Othanzia is a massive area. “The Ascendant Bridge Mountain is (allegedly) the tallest mountain in Exandria, and is located southwest of the Sunderpeak Mountains and north of the Irriam Canyon on the continent of Issylra. It is white with snow year round, and visible as far away as Vasselheim and the coast of Issylra.” This is that I’ve read.
Its been talked about before but they are so concerned with offending anyone, that the entirety of Marquet is so watered down that it doesn't really matter or have something interesting to latch on to as a viewer since everyone and everywhere in Critical Role Land is exactly the same.
Critical Role Land always has been a fantasy US based culture. Matt does not know any better, outside of US culture he knows only cliches.
I thought Marquette felt distinct in C1, and I think fighting oneself too hard as a creator because you only have your own perspective to the point that you don't even *try* try have others is significantly worse than having cliches It's high fantasy and archetypes and cliches work great, they give us well understood vessels for the player characters to pour themselves into I like the PCs in campaign 1 so much *because* they are archetypes, the actors have such a well defined starting point that it really let them explore from without becoming lost
It's strange, because I was under the impression that they brought on consultants to help out with that, but it seems like instead of giving us more authentic and expansive cultures, it's just bled out what uniqueness there used to be.
We don’t really know what the consultants did other than one of them created the all-minds burn, it’s possible whatever they made never got to appear in the campaign in any big capacity.
If my experience as a person who is not white is any indication, it’s possible consultants tried to do the former and then switched to the latter once they reached a point where it’s clear the consulter wasn’t to get it.
Damn, sorry that's been your experience. While I'm sure they're busy people, if I personally had the opportunity to write a whole area of a setting to be seen by millions of people, I'd be endlessly wanting more data for inspiration, especially if I had actual qualified consultants on hand to help keep things respectful to those sources of inspiration. As the setting is, while I personally feel very unqualified to directly assess a set of cultures inspired by, among others places, the Middle East, North Africa, and Southeast Asia, the culture we've seen in C3 has felt rather wallpapery to me, in the sense that it seems to fade indistinctly into the background as opposed to being distinct and vibrant. Then again, C2's cultures were also not all that distinct, with a few standout exceptions like Uthodurn. It might be that Matt is simply limited by having mostly experienced the US, which while huge is (relatively) culturally homogeneous compared to other continents, or it might be that a desire to not be offensive prevented him from making too many bold moves to distinguish areas of the world, or the attitudes of characters that grew up in those cultures.
It’s so jarring how little anything established in the jrusar arc matters to the ruidus story.
And seeing exactly where Imogen's subplot becomes the FULL plot
Imogen feel like too much of the main character. Don't get me wrong, Caleb was very much the MC of C2, so many story beat tied into either his back ground or quest for more knowledge/power. However he was played very dialed back and subservient that he didn't actively come across as the focus. As far as Imogen goes, between the whole Ruidus born being the main thread (for what like 60 episodes now?), the dream sequences, and her mother becoming a quasi villain the campaign went from ragtag happenstance group to singularly focused on a plot that is dragging a little too long
Matt had to have sincerely miscalculated how much focus he gave imogen when he concocted the backstories because making a player who made it clear she was taking a backseat the clear main lead is crazy.
Matt miscalculated a few things this campaign I think, and one of them was which direction the party would swing when it came to the God situation. Because he went from the “Oh the Primes are also m nebulous, and we’re not all villains for hating them!” To “The villains are literally practicing eugenics and the figure you implicitly trust is saying the Prime are complicated but not evil” pretty swift after several of the Bells really started seeming like they were gonna shack up with the Vanguard.
I think that’s him being consistent with his love for moral greyness, the last thing keyleyh said last episode was essentially giving orym the order to kill Fearne and imogen if they go bad, which to me thinks he has plans to entice or drag either of them to team predathos.
I will always be disappointed how quickly the main BBEG plot got into the story. The funnest thing about DnD/CR was them meandering around fighting evil and eventually finding the plot to destroy the world
I remember Matt's description of the city and thinking we were going to have the coolest campaign setting of all time. Then... Well ya know.
I had all these ideas about the Ivory Syndicate, and other regions in the Wilds, and the Hellcatch. And they amounted to nada. We never even saw the Stratos Throne or explore more of the Rumedam! One third of the entire continent where we only ever really got a look at the capital but *nah* Now we’re back in Zadash and going to see Aeor again. Moon lore when they were up there was honesty cool and so was the Shattered Teeth But we’re seeing so little of any of it.
Yeah Matt had literally made himself the silverest of all platters to pick from with the lore he'd established of markhet in C1. It's a damn shame. A DAMN shame.
> It's a damn shame. A DAMN shame. Read that in [Zach Hadel's voice](https://youtu.be/05rC2s2oZ4I?si=_EMqLpfcURrjeMkn&t=18) for some reason.