CritRole Sideblog

But fundamentally, VM is a college frat party that got impossibly attached to each other in the process of trying to do some good.

The Mighty Nein are a group of confrontational, distrustful pariahs who are vulnerable to outside influences that try to manipulate them into a villain arc. But after they completed trauma dumping and crisis bonding, they closed ranks and ground every single one of their personal demons to smithereens.

In essence, the MN are an exclusive, protective battle blender that only saves the world in order to save each other.

Bells Hells are defined by extreme stress. VM was trying to save the world, and the MN were on a self-actualization journey. Bells Hells have to do both of these things at once.

They're quick to trust, which opens them up for numerous betrayals. They don't have enough power to protect against the losses of friends or family. All they've got going for them is their collective aura of tragic weirdness and their full-on willingness to kill immortals (fucking delilah).

See You Back at the Bonfire: Checkpoint Based Resurrection in D&D

Artsource

Between doing a writeup on soulsborne inspired campaign settings and another on the oldschool/newschool disparity between challenge and story, I got to thinking about death and its place in gamified narratives. Darksouls was the obvious influence, but I couldn't help but think of Dungeon Meshi, World of Warcraft, and supergiant's Hades.

Back in the day death was common in d&d, the challenges were unforgiving and the characters were expendable as they were simple. High level might as well have meant "high scoring", as the rewards for overcoming deathtraps and monsters with save-or-die abilities were directly translated into character progression. Death in this instance amounted to a combo breaker, being sent back to square 1 in a roguelike to do it all again. Over time though we started getting attached to our avatars, especially those of us who played primarily for story, leading characters to become too emotionally or mechanically complicated to feed into the blender.

This leaves the modern DM in a bit of a lurch: death by mooks or misadventure denies a satisfying (or heartwrenching) endpoint to the story you're collectively telling with your players. Look no further than Critical Role, where there are a small number of plot-meaningful deaths ( Vexhalia in the Tomb, Mollymauk to the Iron Shepards) and then a much larger tally of obligatory moments where someone fails one too many death saves and requires the use of a spell slot. The DM is forced to play with gloves on much of the time, holding back from creating real challenges because they don't want to kill any of their characters at the wrong time.

What I’d like to propose is that when it comes to challenge vs story we can have the best of both worlds if we’re a little more freehanded when it comes to resurrection. It'll take some tinkering and it won't fit for every story, but as a baseline assumption to the d&d formula, I think it could be quite useful.

They are rolling like dogshit and losing spell slots left and right, have less PCs than the VM fight at the Key, have taken exhaustion points and soo much damage, and their healing is being sabotaged.

But they still managed to complete their encounter in less than 1 episode. They managed to avoid all the obstacles leading to the boss fight. They had no deaths.

This party build is legit insane. Theyre so mobile, cant pin them down. Their casters control the battlefield. Their tanks are basically immortal. They have 2 guaranteed Divine Interventions, 2 Mass Heals. They have 1 Vestige, and an unending well of tricks in Fjord and Veth. They are dripping with advantages, resistances, and rerolls.

"I just think about the time we've spent together, and I start to fantasize about the way things could've been, about different choices and every little thing that's come our way, and those thoughts fade into a dream as I slip off to sleep to the sound of your breathing."

+ Sam taking emotional damage

I had to draw... the soft bois...

Pallette Practice with my favorite boys

so fwiw I phrased the question a bit differently to Taliesin and Liam based on the vibe of the conversation I was having with them

To Taliesin - Question was asked: "So. Orym and Ashton. What the fuck is up with that?"

Taliesin's Repsonse: Ashton was/is into Orym but realized like they were so damaged and felt it wasn’t fair to Orym to be with them until they dealt with their shit AND ALSO soft touches hurt but firm touches don’t so they are also unsure if Orym could handle that all the time. To which I said, “Orym has two hands is all I’m saying” and Taliesin laughed and said that was true.

-- To Liam - Question was asked: "You’ve spoken about how Dorian has been really crucial to Orym’s healing process, but it did seem like Orym was willing to playfully test the edges of those boundaries with Ashton for awhile too?” Liam's response: By the time things had really gotten rolling with Ashton, Orym realized he’d really fallen for Dorian hard to which I said "and what's not to love about Dorian?" which Liam repeated.

Hello all! Here's the Cartographer! A class about wandering the world in pursuit of its wonders! You are able to see and speak with the spirits of places and ask them to guide you. I really enjoyed making this class, so I hope you enjoy it as well!

... while discussions of good practices in homebrew design will be seperated out like this.

First notes: I LOVE the idea of a cartographer as a player class, it's a clear adventure-fantasy as vivid as playing a questing knight or a fortune seeking scoundrel. If you wanted to go just a little more generic/general with It I might reccomend a name like "The Seeker", which has just as strong a connotation of going out into the unknown but is also perhaps more flexible than someone who's specifically there to make maps.

When you're making a whole new class, rather than an archetype for an existing one it's important (and correspondingly difficult) to ensure it fits into a distinct thematic and mechanical niche. Finding designspace that hasn't already been filled is a great canvas to play around in, as is aking yourself " what if X functioned like Y".

Speaking of niches, it's important to ask just what kind of role the cartographer is supposed to hold, and how we could adjust the mechnics as presented here to help it better fit that.

The cartographer is about exploration, so why not just play a ranger?

The cartographer has nature spells, why not just play a druid?

I think the obvious awnser is that the Cartographer is (or perhaps, could be) an exploration based support class. Specifically, I think it could provide the option of a spellcasting primal class that doesn't require as much work as the druid. I play with a lot of new people who want to do a nature themed magic character and being able to put something infront of them that doesn't require memorizing a huge spell list would be a massive weight off my shoulders.

Honestly, "casting primal spells like a warlock" is a selling point in and of itself, and I think one of the easiest and most decisive improvements would be to drop it's current spellcasting framework and replace it with a 1:1 replica of how the warlock pact-slot-on-short-rest system works, save that it draws from the druid spell list.

If it ain't broke don't fix it. If a preexisting class already has a functioning mechanic, it's offten better to copy it outright (with relevant adjustments) than trying to reinvent the wheel.

Using the spell-list for a pre-existing class will not only save you a lot of work in your document, but will also make it widely compatable with future offical materials/the wide selection of 3rd party materials. It saves both you, players, and DMs time.

My second big critique is with the "Speaker of the Wilds" class feature as their signature class ability, which summons a helpful spirit to guide them after spending time in a location.

If the class is about discovery and venturing into the unkown, having an ability that gives them immediate awnsers undercuts that. Instead, lean into the idea that the spirit provides "direction" towards a goal (Saftey, the key to this locked door, the path to riches) both fufills the fantasy AND lets the DM lead the party directly into encounters and other challenges. Perhaps rename the ability " Seek the Path", and open its interpritation to things like guiding breezes, unusual jolts to the compas, or just good vibes. This resource should also be limited, say wis+proff per day, letting the player declare they want to "Seek the path towards X" and having their character hold concentration on it.

That said, "Speaker of the wilds" is still a fantastic name for an ability, and the idea of a character that can freely converse with nature (whether it be animals or terrain features) to ask for gossip/directions is a delightful tool to give players early. Perhaps make it work off the same daily pool as "Seek the path", or model it off "Lay on Hands" and give them a number of questions they can ask equal to 5X their character level, being able to spend 5 of them all at once to freely converse with a character. Give the dungeon delving archetype the ability to speak with objects/bodies and you're all set.

Finally, I want to point out what I think is this class's most glaring flaw at first blush, namely that it lacks a signature combat ability at first level.

Every non-fullcaster class needs to have a combat gimmic, both to distinguish it from other people in the party and also to give the player something to DO. Combat is a big part of D&D afterall.

If this is a class all about learning, I say lean into that, let them spend questions from "Speaker of the Wilds" on a successful weapon hit to ask the DM what a foe's weaknesses or vunrabilities are, or get bonuses against targets that've been identified with a proper knowledge check.