I was trying to decipher why I was seeing such bad CR takes on my social media, makes sense to see its extremely defensive C3 stans. "Why would the party not immediately kill the apex of all evil, a monarch??" I dunno man maybe look up the history of Spanish government in the 20th century.
YEAH it's giving "why does Ross, the largest friend, not simply eat the other friends." Like it's fine if you like Campaign 3 and aren't vibing with Campaign 4 - there are plenty of perfectly valid reasons why that might be the case - but like. if you were beating the drum of being the Woke Politically Aware Campaign Fans you might want to demonstrate a more nuanced and historically informed understanding than "Gods Bad Kings Bad Sorcerers Good."
To tie this back to my more vague post about the themes, like, a pretty overarching, massive, and heavily telegraphed message of Campaign 4 is "The act of revolution is worth it; it is also a grueling, painful act that comes with impossible-to-predict and far-reaching ramifications, and requires sacrifice, compromise, and getting one's hands dirty." We are in a world that might end because killing the gods -a necessary act of liberation - created massive and spreading blights upon the land. Two of these displaced the families of sorcerous human nobles, who have used this opportunity to spread influence worldwide and who are trying to establish authoritarian control in the orcish seat of the revolution. And to that point, another theme about revolution is "it is never one and done and you cannot rest on your laurels" because as we see, the revolutionary council is falling apart after a mere 70 years. Like, Campaign 3 simply doesn't depict a revolution and Campaign 4 depicts the aftermath of several and the beginnings of yet another, so maybe sit this one out.
idk I have a big post about all the arguments that came up in the wake of Campaign 3 that is in drafts and whenever I want to make too salty a post I look at it but don't post it but it kind of comes down to like. if you like Campaign 3 because it has your blorbos doing things then this is not about you. But if you think it is saying politically deep let alone revolutionary things, or anything particularly groundbreaking in fantasy, actual play, or storytelling...that's just. ignorant, stupid, or both. And we're seeing that here. I think Campaign 4 is very well done but I don't think it requires like, Finnegan's Wake level care to grasp what is going on. It does, however, require a more intelligent and nuanced touch than "but why are the people fighting for self-determination in Dol-Makjar not instead deposing the king of a neighboring country zero of them live in?"
