That is just how role playing games go sometimes. You don't always get the ending you want and each player has a say in what their character does, not the chat

I think it's worth bearing in mind that Twitch chat is a VERY small minority of viewers, and them being terrible on occassion is not reflective of the broader viewerbase.

I've wanted Robbie back for over 80 episodes, so basically since he left, I'm excited for it! The change up is fine, all of our favorite tv shows have shakeups like this, it is no different. Keeps the show fresh.

I hate that the chat was so rude to the lead up to Dorian rejoining the group. It was awesome! I've enjoyed all of the ExU content, and I want them to do more, so I hope this doesn't sway them away from doing more side stories in the world of Exandria.

What im hearing is that DnD Beyond doesnt want my money anymore. I already refused to buy digital books because I buy physical books and im not paying twice. So, if I cant get individual items anymore for a buck or 2, then you get no digital money at all. And ill look to move to a different online tool

The thing with Critical role, I was calling that they would have multiple parties with this campaign, with the eventuality that they would meet up. We keep having more cast members being added as “guests” but these guests keep coming back. I think that we are looking at Dorian replacing Sam as a whole. The idea that we have an entire other pool of players, leads me to believe this is how the main cast will take a step back, be it character death, or a new campaign all together. These players will rotate in and out based on current events. With the OG cast of crit roll cycling out of the main story. The fact that they were doing a big push for Dorian apparel and dice last night before the show stated already told me that Dorian was coming back as a main cast member. I would imagine that this whole campaign is gearing us up for the eventuality of crit roll moving away from dnd 5e and leaning more onto dagger heart as it’s completed. The world of exandria will never be the same and things will change because of it. Also, with all of the Dorian Murch prior to the episode even starting, tells me this part at the very least was scripted.

Why do people think THERE head cannon is more important than the story being told by the creators? Head cannon is NEVER actual cannon.

She was given the chair when I think fans wanted to mourn FCG loss with Bells Hells, I felt it was a jarring disconnect and the follow-up with Dorian joining was great in the Dorian joined, but lost emotional impact for me at least for both FCG and Dorian’s brother. I would have felt the emotions better with FCG loss then cut to Crown Keepers, the cut to Dorian dealing with brother ad. FCG loss in that order.

Loved last night's session. The feeling of losing and not just losing but failing to save those you are with sucks but the dice told a story. It was heart breaking to watch Opal's memories disappear and then to see Morrighan get shattered when she fully saw what was happening. Heart breaking but great storytelling. Aabria's DM style is fine. She was working with two people who normally don't play RPGs. Those folks need to calm down. The chat last night was getting really toxic which seems to be a reoccurring theme for Critical Role chats.

After Thursday's episode, I honestly felt as if Aabria's bad habit is railroading the PCs she sits down to play with. That's one. Two is breaking from what Dorian's spell actually did, "because narrative goals." Three, taking way too long on the back-and-forth between Opal and Lloth, which is not how Lloth is, if you have read any of the Bob Salvatore books. Lloth would have literally just used Opal to kill off the Crown Keepers, similar to how Delilah is still thought to want to use Laudna. The difference is, Lloth is a Chaotic Evil goddess, Delilah is a failed necromancer who got beat not once, not twice, not three times, but got beat four times by two different groups. That said, it's gonna be interesting to see where Dorian fits in to Bell's Hells now, given one part of the main group dealt with that village on Issylra, when they saw the tyranny of organized religion. At the same time, even Dorian can understand that preserving the gods is the only way to preserve the world, which is why I don't think he's gonna become anti-god, rather, I think he'll become an anti-hero even more than Ashton. As for Sam, this is the hardest thing to predict. Why? One, Sam IS NOT coming back as Scanlan. Matt has said at different numerous times that once a campaign finishes, he, not the cast member that created the PC, takes control over prior PCs. This is a fact that seemingly everybody has forgotten, with the only exception being, of course, Betrand Bell in the beginning of C3. That exception may exist because Bertrand was not a main campaign PC, being created specifically for the "Search for Grog" and "Search for Bob" one-shots. That said, it is very hard to see Sam not coming back for the remainder of C3. He wants to play this game with his friends. That said, when Tary came in after Scanlan left at the end of "A Bard's Lament" in C1, it was a complete shocker. Nobody expected a pseudo-rich-kid who was gay and had family issues to come in, and by the end of his arc, win over cast and viewer base alike. But Sam pulled it off. That said, I would love to be a fly on the wall between Liam and Sam as they hash out what Sam's next character is gonna be.

I didn't even realize you could buy individual items from books. I've never seen that option on the app or the website

Shutting down individual purchases sux for players most books only have a handful of pages for players, we should be able to just buy the nessisary parts like they have been from the start... this is more wotc/hasbro "dnd isn't making enough money" bullshit... I used to buy the pertinent parts, now I just won't buy anything.

Are you kidding me!? Like heck I’ll buy the entire source book!!! If I’m going so far as to purchase just one or two items from a book, I’m definitely not thinking it’s worth purchasing the entire one and just outright will NOT do so. It’s one thing to ask someone to fork over $1-$2 but asking for $30-$40-$50 is way too much

Dorian being back is nice. I’m sure Sam will be back to. The thing is I really don’t think Dorian is gonna do anything against the party it makes zero sense. Sure he hates lolth but guarantee killing multiple friends, thousands of ppl, and scores of good beings just to give the middle finger to one goddess doesn’t seem in character

People getting upset at the very brief cast switch for what is essentially a D&D let’s play is fucking wild to me. It’s like someone bitching about how someone chooses to play Skyrim.

I see Hasbro still Hasbroin' 🤷🏾‍♂ As for CR: Three characters had in-depth conversations with their respective gods to stop everyone from killing each other, while Aabria was goin' hard portraying an evil god that was done fuckin around, with players that actually cared about each other. First hour or so did drag a bit cuz of all that, I guess, but the end result was unreal. As for that chat...I saw one mf wrote "DIversity the DM", among other things (some of it from subscribers) - there were big feelings on deck that weren't even about D&D. I'm about this CRU era, though, and eyyy, Dorian's back (and we'll see what HE does next) 🙌🏾

Btw: In other news, Pelgrane Press's 13th Age 2e has hit Kickstarter on May 7th.

The problem with the chat is fanbois taking any criticism as a direct attack on themselves. Some people, myself included, don't care for Abriyah's DM style. That's not an attack on her as a person, it's a disagreement with how she runs the game (an hour and half for 2 rounds of combat? Come on.) The chat turns toxic when people can't accept legitimate criticism and insist that anything against their own opinion is "toxic", or must come because the critic is actually secretly a misogynist or -phobe of some sort.

Whilst i haven't watch 90% of this campaign travis wasnt in it for the first few episodes then killed of beltram then had another few episodes off and brought in chetney and considering the full impact would you want a character to die then immediately get replaced

I miss the old days when you could buy a single class, single monster, or single dungeon adventure and not have to buy an entire 300 Page book that you would never use. It just seems like it would be much better from wizards of the Coast if they would be more tuned to releasing smaller individual stuff even if it's only online and not in print.

I was one of the guys in the chat that commented on Abria's DM style but I didn't mean it in a bad way. I like her DM style but I just don't think it fits with the "tone" of the world that Matt has built. This also doe'st mean I don't like her. I know some..in fact a lot of persons in the chat were outright attacking her for her DM style

Wait, yesterday was Thursday? Sheesh, I got my days mixed up. 😂

Sam told us when he was going to come back already though. Campaign 4.

Please be less spoilery with your headlines. I haven't finished the episode and when I log on to KZfaq to continue, the first thing to greet me is "Dorian evil arch". It's far from the first time. Ienjoy your content, so I don't want to hide your videos grom my feed.

Are you happy about the Critical Role cast change? How do you feel about D&D Beyond changing the way you buy? Let us know!

I was enthralled with CR last night...Although I thought Dorian would go on to Bells Hells...I am wondering if Sam Riegel is in good health, or some other situation is making him drop out of DR. For now, Dorian seems to be an interesting character. Can't wait for the rest of the story!

I'm disappointed that D&D Beyond removed the ability to buy individual items. Sometimes, you just need one race or subclass to make that perfect character, and you don't want to buy a whole book for it.

I feel like we’re living through a fallout renaissance and I can now die happy 😇

i certainly hope you haven't put spoilers in your damn thumbnail

WotC's just begging to have people stop using their site.

In regards to the DnD beyond thing my boss and I discovered that at work and ranted about how bs it was. I was wondering if it would get picked up by KZfaq channels and glad the knowledge of this bs is getting out there.

abrayas dm style is grating to say the least,i mean her whole personality is grating tbh

Yeah not gonna do that I have physical books so no

Aabria did them dirty...

FCG wasn’t killed off, they sacrificed themselves to save their friends.

That D&D beyond change is pure bullshit. That makes me so mad!

Ok, I understand that its not ideal that DnDBeyond took away buying bits and pieces. But it just isn't a very valid complaint. Especially from all those saying they only buy real books anyway. In the history of DnD, has anyone ever been able to buy a single sub-class, feat, or item? No. So, what a lot of you are saying is that nothing really changed for you. Just like the first 46 years, you'll have to buy the whole book if you want something from it. For people like me, who just got heavily into DnD this year, all my books are digital. And I'm not upset about it. Also, as most do, only one person needs the digital books. Then make a campaign and share the damn books. Share the cost between your party. Especially if only one player wants a specific thing. Then make that person buy it. This is not the tragedy many are making it out to be.

I think critical role ended the crown keepers because it was not popular. Their numbers for streaming dipped anytime it was crown keeper time

Given that (while I repect his skills) Sam is my personal least favorite main cast member (hey, somebody's gotta be!) and I quite like Robbie, I am perfectly content with recent CR developments. On a more general level, I continue to like and support that they're switching up formats with EXU, different guests, and whatever else. And I've never cared that much about how the actual plot of CR develops. See, if I want things to have happened differently, that itch is EXTREMELY easy to scratch - in the event that nobody else has written the perfect (for me) fan fic yet, I'll just do it myself! And get the extra benefit of exercising my creative muscles, myself, as well as discussing my tiny niche preferences in exhaustive detail with others who are into the same very niche ideas (which is how nerds make friends). Win - win - win all over, if you ask me.

If anyone plans to buy into WotC platforms like Beyond, they should know they will be playing by WotC/Hasbro rules, and that means maximizing shareholder value first, way ahead of satisfying the userbase. The only thing users can do to change that is leave en masse, but even that can cause them to simply drop projects instead of improving them.

Not a WotC defender, but if they had added mico transactions people would have been pissed. They remove micro transactions and people are pissed. People are dumb.

Re: Sam Rigel At nearly 100 episodes, I seriously doubt there is enough campaign left to introduce a brand new character. He might pop in as Scanlan or Beth for an episode or two, but...

D&D Beyond has always sucked, and now it sucks more.

indeed, I could not stand Aabryia in my Bells Hells... she's so gratuitoulsy evil-leaning

Blocking this channel! Cant you guys wait for the Monday release???!! Just your thumbnail and description gives so many SPOILERS!!!! WTF????!!!!

Thinking it's time to drop my twitch sub. Kinda sad for me, since I've been a constant subscriber since the G&S days. Campaign 1 and 2 were great. EXU and Campaign 3 just feel way too forced and honestly, uninspired. The chair swapping of the last two episodes is just the straw that broke the camel's back. I realized that I honestly don't care about the story and most of the characters.

All the more reason to avoid D&D Beyond…

Bummer about the spoilers in the thumbnail. That kind of jacks up the situation for us podcast listeners. Don’t do that.

Tha art for the LoTr game looks like shit 😂

Spoiler Comment. I usually do not mind Aabria's style- it's not my favorite, and I wouldn't want to join a game with her, but having her on as a guest DM never bothered me before. This last arc really got on my nerves, though. It felt like a DM crossing over from "I am going to challenge you and play these bad guys like they want to win" to full-on "I have to win." The worst offense came last night, and though it was a small thing, it encapsulates what I get frustrated by. Robbie used the spell Chromatic Orb. It is a level 1 spell with a very specific use and clear rules. You roll to hit one target--successful, do your damage. Because he chose to go with Thunder, being thematic with his class as a bard and an Air Genasi, Aabria decided that that is a "More spread out damage type" and had it damage his brother, which played a role in his death later. That is not how the spell works, nor is there anything in its text to suggest it does--that was an in-the-moment interpretation that only served _her_ goals, not the players. Not cool. If I were a player with a DM doing that, I would not return for the next session. It is one thing if a player misreads a spell and makes a bad choice-by all means, make them responsible for reading and understanding how their spells work. In this case, he did use the spell exactly the way it works, but she added more to it that not only worked against the way the player (and certainly the character) would have gone through using it, but she did so because she was aiming for a specific outcome. It took away agency; it actually cheapened the moment because it no longer felt natural or earned, and it highlights that tendency of Aabria to bend (or break) rulings to serve her goals without first running it by the table--not something I tolerate personally. That said, there's no excuse for people to be toxic, but I would understand anyone broaching reasonably worded complaints or critiques.

I loved Aabrya's style

I swear I can not get over your sensationalist articles full of subjective takes.

I'll say it even if no one else well, Abria is a horrible DM. The Crown Keepers are a bad idea. Don't like what I said, I don't care.

wait aabria dms actual Campaign 3 episodes?? that fucking blows. i can't stand her dming at all. now i don't even want to bother continuing campaign 3.

In my opinion, the little side story last week was one of the worst episodes of CR I've ever seen. It was truly awful. And I don't care that they switched the cast for a week. It was just terrible story telling and boring/confusing as heck

Critical role way to many players! Make the show slow and tedious!

No Sam no ty fam

Sam kills the robot character to try to save the channel and it was such a waste no pay off for the cliff hanger and I guarantee he has his new character in the first 3 episodes when (bells hells

just goes to show Aabria sucks at her job, sorry...I just, I tried..I watched all of EXU and I hated it, I just CANNOT understand how people accept her way of story telling. She makes combat scenarios so unnecessarily long and drawn out, guys I LOVE watching 1 person take 40 minutes to do 1 turn, I get it Aimee chick doesnt play alot of Dnd..it show throughout all of EXU, but dam her and Aabria are a really awful fit together. If you replaced BOTH of them, or simply aabria with several other prominent DM's, show would of been vastly better. If this is CR'S future going forward then I'm totally done, I hate these side stories, I hate these guests except well robbie hes amazing...but I am here for the main cast, and the stories they create, it just feels like to me they have gone out of their way to alienate the very people who supported them during their crappy audio/camera lay outs of C1, experiment of C2.. For just mindless drools.

I remember people bemoaning the fact that they had to spend 30 bucks to buy a Complete book to get access to just one feat, spell or Prestige Class. The more things change, the more they stay the same! In all honesty, I am kind of surprised that they are cutting this subsystem out, as it was effectively a micro transaction, which is something WotC will be leaning into with the VTT. I do think their prices were probably too low. The goal should be to allow you to buy something but always push you up towards buying something more expensive. Like, buy a spell for 4 dollars, buy all the spells for 15, buy the whole book for 40.

Another reason why critical role fans deserve less.

Aabria is the worst thing to ever happen to Critical Role.

I was hoping Ashley was leaving

Honestly, i don't see the amount of rage these videos talk about. There's always one nasty loud mouthed opinion and everyone else just vibing, so maybe this is clickbaity as hell. Secondly, do they understand we maybe have like 40+ more episodes to go? Stuff can happen. Not all stories have happy endings. People whine that it's scripted, but when stuff goes off the rails, they get mad about that too? Well, it's not scripted people! Stuff happens! People make choices. The chat was just rude and toxic, so ringing the alarms like there's something the matter isn't it.