#i only like orym and dorian was ok in exu

[werehounded]

this is a personal thing but i'm SO glad i grew out of asht/on being a comfort character bc whoo-ee his fans are like. nearly as cunty as he is and i don't use thsat word with a positive association lol

[septembermonologues]

everyday I think about how dorian constantly asked if things were ok with orym or if things were what orym wanted to do or how much dorian checked up on orym in the beginning of C3 and JUST. AUGH. I don't want to assume how dorian would have been like if he had stayed, maybe he would be swept up with everything as well. maybe as someone who doesn't feel comfortable talking about himself he would give orym space. or maybe orym hides his feelings well and dorian wouldn't even notice BUT SOMETHING. SOMETHING!!! tells me that there would be moments where dorian would check in with orym more often and and AHHHHHHHHH GET THEM BACK TOGETHER PLEASE CR PLEASE

anon i think i would have a heart attack if i had to see the date that you sent this because it has been months and also dorian is fully back. however. my excuse is that you got me working on a compilation i was thinking about making anyway and because im perfectly content with crumbs its 9 minutes long only two episodes of exu in so who's to say if i'll ever actually get anywhere with it.

BUT. to your point hopefully. i'm thinking about how in episode ONE of exu dorian was really kind of the only one who didn't shrug off orym's hesitation about stealing something for poska and even tried to find another option that he would have been more comfortable with. to me even if there's not a 'real' heart-to-heart dorian is right there to give orym actual space to air out his frustration/hesitation without like. idk. talking over him or it going in one ear and out the other so he has to constantly repeat himself.

[utilitycaster]

the good swordsman short king orym for the ask meme perhaps?

I should note before this that I feel that "short king" should be used only for characters who are short within the context of their race, ie, a normal-sized halfling is not a short king. but I digress.

First impression: fine. like. not in a bad way, just clearly the Just A Guy in the Crown Keepers.

Impression now: once you do cool shit that is paladin in vibes if not in actual class I adopt you. He just got very interesting.

Favorite moment: I mean recency bias but everything he did in episode 63 was in fact a high water mark for him. I mean the top 3 there were grabbing Hevestro with a grasping vine from the sword; the nod to Laudna (the Nodna); and the declaration of war ft. locket destruction.

Idea for a story: I do want to know what he was doing in the five-ish years prior to EXU; he indicated he may have done some travel and I'd like to know more! I'm guessing some missions in Tal'Dorei? Has he hung out with Jarett?

Unpopular opinion: paladin in vibes aside, while I wouldn't be mad if he took paladin levels, I'm more interested in him staying a fighter. I am a strong advocate for, when it makes sense, incorporating traits without them being explicitly reflected in one's mechanics, ie, you can have a relationship to a god without being a cleric/paladin/subclass with divine elements, or you can play an instrument without being a bard, or whatever. Purvan was a ranger, after all.

Favorite relationship: I'll admit whenever people get super fanon-y about sharing a bed I get annoyed because it's like. ok do they get along when they're awake? But Orym and Fearne have had some good moments as of late. I also really liked him playing off both Laudna and Deni$e this past arc. (I ship him with Dorian but due to the separation we haven't gotten a ton)

Favorite headcanon: I think he was very close with Will and his family from quite young, and he considered being an herbalist, actually, but between his admiration of Derrig and also both Will and Lita's encouragement he became a Tempest Blade.

[elliesgaymachete]

Ok first thoughts on all the characters let’s go:

Imogen: I love her. I’m in love with her. I love the charming southern belle vibe Laura’s got going on. I feel like she’s keeping a secret. I love that she’s got a bit of social anxiety. I love her. I think she is currently my favorite

Laudna: Definitely keeping some secret and I can’t wait to find out what it is. I love her vibe of being naturally creepy/scary but wanting to actually be fun and nice and sociable and it just doesn’t go her way because of how she looks. It’s adorable.

Ashton: I LOVE their chill barbarian vibe. No epic “I would like to RAGE” just a casual “yeah sure I’m gonna rage” and dealing a fuckton of damage and whatever the fuck is going on with his crazy probably mercer homebrew subclass 😂 iconic.

Fresh Cut Grass: I think the only surprising thing about this character was the fucking name. It gets me every time. I’m so excited to learn more about them and his past and whether or not they have a soul 👀 I’m intrigued. The name will always make me laugh though

Orym: genuinely SO excited he’s back. Liam said he wanted to be just a guy and kinda go with the flow for c3. I was a bit worried he spent that with Orym in EXU but he’s back!!! He gets to just be a guy! So happy for him

Fearne: My chaotic beloved oh my god. I missed her. She was full chaos immediately but also clicked SO well with these new characters and I fucking loved it. It was also great to see Ashley already comfortable playing a character and just havin a good time!

Dorian: Ahh what a lovey anxious little bard. How this chaotic party will probably give him even more anxiety. Not sure how long he will be sticking around but I love the familiar EXU face and hopefully/maybe means more EXU cameos? 👀

Bertrand: I cannot believe. I just. I didn’t expect this. Why. How. Who. Travis. WHY. I love it.

[fia-bonkginya]

ok i know i’m several weeks late for ep 1 analysis BUT. my favorite part of exu so far, having only watched the first episode, is the immediate group dynamics, especially with orym!! 

like okay. we all know that orym has the group braincell 95% of the time (and that dorian has it the other 5%), and the whole group knows that too, and so they go to orym for advice, look to him to make plans, etc etc. and that makes sense! but it also goes a step further than that

because the thing is. orym is the one with the braincell, sure. but he’s also the one with the Plan and, more importantly than that, he is (right now) the one with boundaries. the rest of the crew is just fully down to clown- whatever you throw at them, they’re ready to do it. but orym is not!! he’s uncomfortable with stuff!! he has a line!!

and the squad recognizes this, and they immediately try to do things in a way that orym is more comfortable with. in that first job, when they have to steal, they let orym take the lead! they’re doing this, and he’s not going to love it, so they let him take charge, so that he can be as comfortable with it as it’s possible for him to be. and then that very very quickly turns to them looking to him for confirmation on everything. that whole episode, they were all looking to him, making sure that what they were doing was okay. and i just think that’s really nice and i look forward to seeing where else it goes!!!

[caleb-wigodast]

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 7 OF EXU

(alt ending to the battle where purple lady didn't show up)

(also im almost certain i got facts about who was where in the battle wrong but idc)

[Read on AO3]

Dorian fell to the ground, the last of the stone guards taken out as the rest of the group gathered a few feet away. He stormed (haha, get it?) up to them with frustration and pain evident on his face.

"What was that?! Why did you all leave me!?" he spat.

The others looked at him with a mix of confusion and shock.

"I thought you could handle it yourself? You seemed to be doing well so far," Orym questioned, cocking his head slightly.

"I only had a spell to get me out of there and I assumed a lot of your stuff was like, a radius effect or something," Opal shrugged.

"I needed to get Fearne out of there, she was looking pretty hurt. And c'mon, you're Dorian Storm! I knew you could take that guy out no problem!" Dariax encouraged with a blinding grin.

Dorian clenched his fists as the voice in his head spoke, "You let them down, they expected you to handle things yourself. You depend on others too much, they don't care about you enough to be there for you, they're just going to leave you like everyone else."

"Dorian? are you ok?"

He didn't realize tears were spilling from his eyes until he tried to make eye contact and realized they were squeezed shut. He opened his mouth to take a breath to steady himself but all that came out was a sob.

Dariax was the first to rush over, wrapping his arms around Dorian's torso in a firm hug. Fearne and Opal followed soon, and even Orym and mister joined as they all enveloped Dorian in a hug.

The thoughts inside Dorian's head began to spill out through his mouth, "you let them down, you're useless, you can't protect them, they're going to die under your leadership, you should've been more like your brother."

They words came out in a distorted voice that was not his own, it made his chest rattle as he sobbed out the hateful words into the bone-crushing hug.

"You could never let us down, Dorian," Fearne assured, rubbing Dorian's back.

"The way you took out that stone thing was amazing!" Opal insisted.

"AAAA AAAA" said mister, sitting on Fearne's shoulder.

"You do a great job of leading the group," Orym comforted, giving a pat to his thigh.

"You're literally like the coolest ever!" Dariax enthused.

Dorian tried to pull all of them in closer for a hug (as if that were possible) as he continued to let himself cry.

"I'm sorry we weren't there to help you, Dorian," Fearne apologized, mister gave an apologetic "AA AA" as well.

"You're a lot more powerful than you think, really, and you have to give yourself credit where it's due," Orym insisted.

"We honestly didn't expect you to need our help," Opal confessed.

"That's not a bad thing! You just gotta have more confidence in yourself, buddy!" Dariax encouraged.

Dorian let himself smile into the crushing hug, maybe they were right, maybe the voice in his head was wrong... maybe.

"Thank you," he croaked as he let himself hug them back in full.

[hugahufflepuff1]

Ok spoilers from EXU.

Remember when during the discussion they talked about when they went into the fey or like a hole and Dorian and Fyra Rai were the ONLY two left trying to Coax each other to leave and they'd stay? And in Dorian's dream he saw Fyra wrapped up in BLACK TENDRILS and the spider queen said she was wrapped up in " older things… MEANER things.. meaner than her(spider queen)" What if Fyra gave herself to the Sorrow king of the Seelie Court because she didn't want Dorian to suffer. And we got a snippet of Dorian being cruel and he said " it's not your choice" or something ( some of this is discussed about the pre game of EXU) Anyway… (spoilers for this episode) what if the BLACK TENDRILS around Dusk is the same thing. And Morri ( the rabbit woman, hate myself for not remembering the correct term for her) was sent out by Nana Morri. So I would LOVE to see if Orym, Fearne and Dusk might get separated from the Bells Hells and then they have EXU come back and they meet up and SHIT GOES DOWN. This is all HYPOTHETICAL and could be WAYY off. But ohhh boy imagine if Fyra has been sacrificed to the Sorrow king by Dorian ( I mean he FOUGHT but the hole was closing and he said Fuck This and says to Frya " it's not your choice" In a cold dead voice and leaves her) and they were the ONLY two who remembered. I could be TOTALLY wrong.

[utilitycaster]

Sorry if this question is a little too broad and hypothetical, but I’m genuinely curious. Do you think that the issues Campaign 3 currently has are just bad luck this time around, not anything inherently not working with what they’re doing overall, but just some compounding mistakes and unfortunate coincidences? Or do you think they’re from more broad issues with how Critical Role sets up and runs games. Like, if you were give the chance, would you overhaul just campaign 3’s set up, or would you want to implement those sorts of changes across the board?

You know, I think it's really hard to say, because a lot of what is going on behind the scenes is speculation on my part. I will say that this isn't a problem with Campaigns 1 and 2, so I don't think it's a problem with how they run campaigns. I think it's a combination of bad luck and my totally unproven hunch of Matt not wanting to say no:

Having everyone build characters in relative isolation allows for some amazing reveals, but it means the DM needs to be a little more willing to say "hey, this isn't going to work for this party makeup". If I recall this did come up in Campaign 2 in which he told Laura "hey, you are the only healer, hope that's ok".

The issues I've brought up of too-close ties to previous campaigns are also unique to this campaign, as obviously that wasn't a thing to worry about in Campaign 1, and it was something enforced for Campaign 2. I think some connection is ok (Orym originally gave me pause but he's working for me now) but the degree to which Laudna is tied to Tal'Dorei and the Briarwoods while also having no real ties to Marquet is a problem for me.

I think having consultants and worldbuilders for Marquet is absolutely the right call, but I think it may be putting Matt into a situation where he is less able to cut or skip something that's not working; he's an experienced DM but it's one thing to kill your own darlings and it's quite another to kill someone else's and I wonder if that's why the plot is like this - he wants to include everything.

I also think that having longer-term guests who are much more tied into the plot can work - I think Dorian largely did work quite well - but as we just saw I think having a guest play an antagonist really fucks the metagame because of that dissonance between character and plot desires vs. table etiquette; again, had Yu been played exactly the same way but as an NPC I'm fairly confident they'd be a smear on the floor of Imahara Joe's, but you don't want to just kill someone else's character. That's also new in Campaign 3 and I think maybe it would be worth holding off on long-term guests until this party feels a bit more...solidified.

Like, again, I think the problem is that there's far too much on the plate. Previous campaigns were just the cast and Matt and he was not trying to incorporate EXU, other worldbuilders, and multiple long-term guests with significant plot points. This has led to a situation where the party composition and lack of certain abilities has become a much, much bigger problem than it has to be, and that's the bad luck I'm referring to - they happened to build a party that is uniquely not right for the story, and the course corrections should have happened much earlier and now the corrections are introducing new issues. And to be clear: I like incorporating these things but I think it requires the DM take a much firmer touch in some other areas, because they are already ceding a degree of control. But that's all specific to how they're doing Campaign 3