#more caduceus meta tonight

[c-is-for-circinate]

ragingratbastard replied to your post: I still have a LOT of things to say about the Iron...

I do think a lot about how even after a year Clay still feels like a newbie and how none of his ties to the nein are particularly strong, especially in comparison to Molly who knew them for a much shorter amount of time but had stilled established amazingly strong relationships with each member of the nein before his passing, it just makes me real sad in a way

It makes me sad, too!  Also, it’s fascinating, which of course makes me terribly happy, so it’s really just a very confusing position to be in all around.

I think a lot of what it comes down to is...so much of what bound the Mighty Nein from the beginning is the feeling that none of them, not a single one of them, actually have anywhere else to go.  Any homes they ever had between them are lost, and they don’t have a whole lot of options besides each other.  There’s a desperate codependency inherent to the whole group.  They need each other.  It’s the only alternative to being entirely alone.

They also understand each other, because everybody who started out in the M9 can recognize that feeling of being lost and adrift from personal experience.  They can all empathize with loneliness and doubt, with self-recrimination.  Having literally nowhere on the planet to call home hurts.  When the Nein found each other as a new family, they found other people who knew that exact same hurt from the inside.

Except for Caduceus.  Caduceus is so sure he still has a place waiting for him at the end of this adventure.  He doesn’t need these people to echo or comfort his core loneliness, to be his new family, because he still believes he has one out there somewhere.  These people are his friends and coworkers.  He needs them to fix his home, not to become his home.

It’s such a contrast to Nott, who’s recently been faced with the possibility that she could maybe someday get her old home back after all, and is straight-up melting down over it.  It’s so unlike Jester, who went back to Nicodranas and then left again, Fjord who spent two months out at sea and then rode inland away from it as fast as he could.  Yasha and Caleb are terrified of running back into their old lives.  Beau’s refused her family and keeps ducking the Cobalt Soul at every opportunity.  But Caduceus still has the hope of returning in his heart, and he’s still using the tools and the rules that surrounded him his whole life.

I’m not sure this can change, unless Caduceus is somehow pushed to the point of needing the group emotionally for something his family cannot fulfil.  Finding out his whole family is dead would probably do it, but that honestly feels too boring for me to expect Matt to go there.  We did that with Percy.  What would it take, then, for Caduceus to face things or need things he has no faith in his old family to ever again provide?  Maybe he needs to see too much and experience too much and change.  Maybe he’ll dig in his heels against changing and finally find his siblings out in the great wide world, and discover that they’ve changed, that they’ve turned away even as he was trying to save things for them.  I’d be super into that.

Of course, if the group picked up another New Guy, well, he’d be the Old Guy then.  Depending on the new New Guy’s issues, the fabric of the group would change all over again.  The main core of group bonding would eventually be different, and Caduceus would help write this new one.  It wouldn’t need to be based on codependance and having no other options then.

(I vote against that option on every possible level, of course--but it would be hella interesting.)

[eponymous-rose]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E133 (April 13, 2021)

(Little distracted tonight! Please excuse any and all omissions.)

Tonight’s guests on Good Morning Quebec are Marisha Ray and Travis Willingham!

How are Beau and Fjord feeling about their leadership responsibilities among the Nein? Marisha: “Beau has always admired Fjord and respected his ability to speak like an adult. It does feel like-- are Beau and Fjord the only adults in the room?” Travis points out Caduceus and Caleb’s leadership as well. “In that conversation, at least, just because I want it to be a tiny bit meta, a lot of it’s just mindset. Fjord knows that Beau is a world-breaker, can kick that ass, and the idea that part of the focus would be diverted towards how can we get out here, it was feeling a little bit more like we’re done for rather than we can do this. It was his way of doing the old coach reminder of stop thinking of the ways you’re going to get out of this and start thinking of the ways you’re going to dominate this.” Marisha mentions that Beau and Travis are kind of the two who aren’t saying goodbyes, and yet they’re two of the only ones who just have the Nein. “Even Caleb was allowed to say goodbye to his cat! We don’t even have that. It’s just the Nein. They are the ultimate goodbyes for us, if it comes to that. But hopefully it won’t come to that.” Travis: “There’s a certain drive that comes with not having wrapped it up in a pretty bow.”

On Fjord’s decision to have the Rangers engage: “Yeah, that one stings. I was suffering from the good ol’ regurts almost as soon as it happens. I realized it was just Essek and Fjord, and he was just asking me, and boy there were a lot of horseshit RP things going around my head.” He kept in mind that the captain has to be decisive and focus on his people. “I in no way thought of Dagon at all. Fuck, did I send Dagon to his death? Did that headstrong dude go, nah, I’ll do my own thing and get out of there? I hadn’t really experienced that kind of instant regret in a gameplay situation yet. But in leadership moments, or when you have to make a decision like that, sometimes it’s important to take a fucking minute and think about what you’re doing. Even in D&D. I wish I had taken a moment to say, how far away are they? If you engage them from afar, can you slow them down long enough? Set an ambush if you can, but at least be at max.”

On Beau’s meditation attempt that ended in contact with Lucien: “I think I know exactly what he was trying to do. He was trying to put another fuckin’ eye somewhere on me. I was remembering Keyleth putting her hand in the spinning black orb of death under the Ziggurat and I rolled a natural twenty.” Travis asks if she thinks she and Caleb are “next up in the queue” now that so many of the Tombtakers are dead. “Yeah. I’m gonna get turned.” Travis: “I’ll kill you real good, Beau. I’ll take Caleb first because he made me promise, but I’ll get you good, too.”

On Fjord now having more information about Vandren: “I love it. I feel like such a fuckin’ moron. It never occurred to me for one second that a shipwrecked person that survived would have maybe just wound up on the nearest island. Nope. Didn’t even bother to do the Castaway grid and check the nearest body of land. I’m a fuckin’ terrible D&D player.” Fjord washed up extremely far away from the wreck. “I love that he’s there. I cannot wait to go find him and have a conversation. I just don’t know which will come first: going to Darktow and confronting Sabien or going to see Vanden. But both of those things are on the list, for sure. Just for closure, I mean, damn.” Brian asks if Fjord is okay with Jester having reached out. “Yeah, totally. Fjord is a big dummy in a lot of ways.” He mentions that Fjord has a lot of ideas in his head about what it means to “be a man” that keeps him from asking for help when he needs it. “When Jester did that, it just reaffirmed his feelings for her and how she feels for him. It’ll take those kind of people in his life to help him along to the things that he wants when he’s too stupid or shy to acknowledge it himself.”

How about that alliance with Essek? Marisha: “Here’s the thing. Beau wasn’t like, ooh, allying with Trent, that’s icky because of moral reasons. It’s not that. The more allies, the better in this moment. Teaming up with Magneto kind of situation. But Beau’s whole concern was is this going to distract you from the overall mission. I couldn’t imagine walking alongside someone who had just tortured me in the way that Trent has. We spent so many episodes watching Caleb have these post-traumatic flashes of when he lit his family on fire. Caleb’s a shotgun, he’s such a good damage-dealer, and if he can’t cope with it. That was Beau’s concern.” Travis: “And just to go along with your Magneto reference, Essek is one powerful person. Trent brings the acolytes. But we recognize that if we stop the Tombtakers and Lucien then we probably have to stop Trent and the Vollstruckers. But I wanted to open it to Caleb, because we gotta face that motherfucker at some point.”

Cosplay of the Week: an amazing Yasha! (krisjaded on Instagram, photography by adambenfer on Instagram)

On Beau’s plan to put a possible eavesdropper off their trail at Pumat’s: “I mean, everything is a long shot.” Taliesin suggested the idea. “I said Darktow because I thought, hey, if he tries to follow us to Darktow, he’ll probably get murdered. He’ll never make it back. We have no idea. It could have been completely transparent, or maybe he’ll be stupid enough to actually try it.”

Fan Art of the Week: a lovely Caduceus! (by arcanum.dice on Instagram)

How’s the relationship with Yasha been going? “It’s so new! And fresh and weird, and she’s trying to remember to be like, oh, that’s right! You’re my girlfriend! I owe you some attention, that’s right. It’s nice to have somebody. We were talking about not really having anyone to say goodbye to in this round of goodbyes, Beau is looking to the future and those relationships are keeping her afloat.”

On seeing more of Aeor, looking forward to it? Travis: “I really want them dead first. If collections of explorers and expeditions from the Cerberus Assembly and the Dynasty have turned up stuff they don’t know what to do with yet, what the fuck are a bunch of chuckle-dicks like us going to do with it?” They’re interested in a distant sort of way - there are bigger issues at hand.

Travis mentions that he’s never been quite so emotionally invested in the game before and notes that was at the root of his competitive attitude at the end of the last episode. “The lines were so blurred in that way. It’s just a testament to the never-ending learning process that comes from this game that I underestimated my entire life.”

[loquaciousquark]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E111 (Sept. 29, 2020)

@eponymous-rose‘s internet is out tonight, so I’m here late and without coffee! Let’s see how many typos we can fit into an hour and a half episode.

Tonight’s guests: Ashley Williams JOHNSON, oops!! & Liam O’Brien!

We open with Brian in light-up vented sunglasses and Henry at his side, as always. Dani is very excited to be back and has fun-buns in her hair tonight. So cute! Everyone talks about how much they’re Zooming these days for work, and Liam mentions he and Matt & Marisha did a digital cocktail night. He and Dani arrange on camera to have a distanced, masked meetup in the park so Dani can see Liam’s dog again.

No announcements! Tonight, we’re discussin’ episodes 110 and 111.

Starting with the end, Brian jumps right to it by asking how they feel that Molly is alive. Liam 100% thought we’d be back to him, but still wasn’t ready when it happened. Caleb doubted he was alive. Both Liam & Ashley marvel at the numerology that keeps cropping up throughout the show. Brian hates not being able to see it at the same time the show happens live; Ashley was biting her tongue not telling him spoilers. (He doesn’t want to hear spoilers unless Yasha dies so he can be there for Ashley if needed.) Brian says he has a little reality trauma from the night Pike died in the pre-stream game; it was the first time he’d realized how much it affected the players.

Ashley’s realized how much she misses unpacking the game with Brian when they get home. She just has to sit with it until everyone else gets to see it. Brian: “Instead she comes home and I have to fill her in on the Real Housewives of Amarillo, Texas.”

Reunion dinner with Trent! Liam talks about how the way things unfolded with Trent is not at all how he imagined it in his pre-game creation; he’d expected more of a fracas, more of an unexpected clash. “Caleb might have been a different person if he’d run into these people earlier in the story. The M9 changed him before [Trent & co] came back and got to him.” He’d imagined Astrid & Eodwulf to be complicated encounters, but says what Matt’s designed has been even harder than that. A fight on a mountain is one thing, but walking into a room with “what Trent dropped, is impossible to cope with.” It also means that if what Trent said is true, anything Caleb does now is effectively of Trent’s design, even killing him.

He doesn’t think Caleb would have gone anywhere near Trent & co without the M9. “The Mighty Nein--it took a long time--but they cracked Caleb open like a walnut.”

He thinks what Matt has done is much more murky than the simplicity of murder, such as the Briarwood arc. He can’t just exact his revenge now.

Liam says that the tempation to tinker with time is no longer as all-consuming as it was. He might still be tempted if Matt dangles a bunch of carrots in front of him, but he thinks that now it might be better to make sure that that kind of thing doesn’t happen anymore for anyone else (!!!). “It’s still a nugget in his brain and it’s still possible he could be tempted by the drug, but what he wanted in the beginning was entirely selfish, but now that the M9 are involved he owes it to them, to the people of the country, even on the Dynasty side--is so complex that if Caleb were to get that carrot and chase it, he would be risking everything.”

Ashley agrees that most of their choices are no longer black and white. Many of the situations feel more like real life. Liam agrees and says he’ll sometimes make decisions that he’s both really happy with and regrets at the same time. They both look forward to what Matt will reveal in Act 3.

Brian feels it’s tough to gauge how deep they are into what Matt’s planned for the campaign. Liam says that thanks to Matt’s skill, he really doesn’t know what Caleb wants right now.

Ashley agrees, and talks about how she created Yasha to have more to overcome than Pike. She loves what Matt’s doing in terms of allowing each of them to overcome more emotional hurdles than physical ones in this campaign.

Going back to Molly’s grave was very exciting for Ashley since she wasn’t able to be there when he died in the game & wanted to do what she could to honor him. Yasha, however, was very hesitant but knew what needed to be done. She’s not very open with her emotions, but both she & Ashley were stressed. They all could feel the energy in the studio & knew Matt was about to do something mind-blowing. Liam: “You could feel all the dust in the air coalescing around Taliesin.”

Brian trips over Eodwulf. Liam tries to help him find some pronunciation shortcuts. Ashley: “You say it so beautifully.” Brian: “Thank you.” Ashley: “Not you.”

Caleb knows how wickedly intelligent & ambitious Astrid is, and was heartened by the wavering he saw in her at the dinner. However, he can’t trust her until he knows why she’s where she is.

He really feels that if they’d had this dinner 60 episodes ago, Caleb might have tilted back along the evil axis and he would have had to retire the character. He had a playlist entirely for if Caleb turned evil and left the party.

The vision of Zuala was a huge deal for Yasha, even along every other instance she’s had of being mind-controlled, etc. “That’s guilt I think she will always carry with her, but at least she’s starting to forgive herself.” Losing the chains, sprouting wings again--Ashley reiterates that she didn’t know that was even a possibility, she just picked the skeletal wings because they were dope--were huge moments in the character development. Ashley’s glad Beau was there at the moment of the first flight; Ashley thinks of the quotation “Happiness is only beautiful when it’s shared,” and because Yasha tends to keep things very much to herself, having someone there to share it made it more impactful. “That was a cool moment. There’s been a lot of healing for Yasha these last episodes.”d

Ashley also says sometimes in that moment, when all eyes are on you in a one-on-one with Matt, everything goes muffled like Saving Private Ryan. “Wub wub wub.”

Dani feels that the only way she could even have the conversation with Zuala was to let her go in the first place.

Liam thinks one of the things that Yasha & Cad share is that still waters run deep. He loves how much Yasha hangs back sometimes, only to then reveal some new moment like the fighting pit. Apparently Ashley also has a knife collection, and uses that metal side of herself when she wants to let that new side of Yasha show.

Cosplay of the Week: Crystal Armstead (@riyuski on twitter) in a Reani cosplay. Beautiful!

How does Liam feel about the return to Rexxentrum? Very, very complicated. Caleb loves magic and lights up when he sees it, which is wrapped in the Soltryce Academy; he brought folks to the dance hall for the same reason, which was wanting the M9 to see the things that he loved about the city.

Yasha felt the same way about visiting the Chantry of the Dawn. It was a memory of a very traumatic moment (almost killing Beau), but given everything that’s happened between then and now it was cathartic to see again. There’s been a lot of healing in the past few weeks. It also felt like a physical representation of Yasha’s growth, the last time she was controlled against her will like that (or at least, until she was mind-controlled by Vokodo. Ashley sighs, aggrieved.)

Brian: “The tower really feels like a love letter from Caleb to his friends.” Liam: “It is, and a love letter from Liam to his friends.” When he looked at Caleb’s spell list, he remembered how amazing the mansion was in Campaign One and how many role-playing moments it led to and knew he wanted to incorporate it. However, he knew it could never be the same as Scanlan’s mansion because Caleb doesn’t have the same improvisational genius as Scanlan does. Liam has been “tinkering with this machine” for over a year, waiting for the moment to reveal it. He loves that he got a chance to see Jester’s room in time to have her tower room reflect reality. He’d discussed the tower extensively with Dani & Matt. Brian: “Hey! What am I, chopped--what’s the saying?” Ashley: “Chopped cabbage?”

Ashley marvels at the design of the dome. Liam talks about how Caleb knowing Caleb has been abused has been slowly getting better, but he also loves now being able to juxtapose that healing with his innate love of magic and how beautiful he finds it, how he loves to use magic as his artistry. The Soltryce Academy wasn’t “Welcome to DEATH SCHOOL,” it was the Sorbonne. It was amazing, everything he wanted. It was only one bad apple within that recruited him and turned it all bad.

Liam also points out how much it means in real life to be able to express his love and care for his friends in person too.

Ashley talks about how much she loves Yasha’s armor in a meta sense because it’s so cool and useful, and great for her armor class, but struggles with what it represents in game. She might not be able to let it go due to its sheer utility, and she may have to find an in-game reason to justify keeping it.

Ashley segues a moment into talking about her velvet top which apparently has a matching velvet scrunchie. She’s asked to demonstrate the scrunchie and ties her hair up in a way that I have never in my life seen someone do with a scrunchie before, and my hair’s been waist-length most of my life. I watch it again in slow motion. How did she DO that??

Caleb’s been looking for the right time to tell Jester about his past for a long time. She’s a good person and makes him feel like he might be capable of becoming a good person at the end, because that’s how she saw him. Liam knew from Laura that Jester wouldn’t condemn him, but Caleb put it off as long as possible. He also wanted to take the time to make sure Caduceus & Yasha knew the whole story too before they went to dinner with Trent.

Liam was also relieved to get it out, because he could never remember who knew and who didn’t, and now he doesn’t have to track it anymore. “Now we can move forward. Now we can heal wounds, maybe.”

Ashley feels Cad picks up a lot, more than most people realize. Yasha was really affected by Cad’s line: “Patience can be good, but it can lead to apathy.” She really feels it opened her eyes, and she appreciated the simplicity of him pointing out her hair’s growing back white again. Having a friend notice “hey, you’re changing for the better” really means a lot. She’s interested in seeing how this means things might change with Beau.

Dani points out that it also reinforced for Yasha that she can want things too--she can be patient and just continue to be with the group, as she’s wanted, but it’s okay to want more than that too. Ashley remembers Veth asking her what her purpose is. There’s a part of her that knows Yasha is still figuring that out, and she’s interested to see how Yasha will continue to change. She’s always spent her life serving somebody--the Sky Spear, Obann--and then even after she joined the M9, it was very centered on “what do you need, what does the group need, how can I help with our next job?” She’s going to have to take some time to figure out what she wants.

Fanart of the Week! Lovely Yasha & Beau flight art by @JMNP7888. The wings look amazing!

Brian: “One of the things we want to talk to you about, Liam, is about the Vokodo fight and the FUCKING disintegrate spell.”

Liam: “That was one of the most insane 60-90 seconds of gameplay that ever existed for the table, and definitely for me, in the entire history of the show. A lot of people think I just went, oh man, just bet it all on black. But what if I told you that...I Larkin’d the first 20 seconds of that fight and then at a quarter to midnight, I forgot that the reflection was a thing? I just forgot it was a thing! I spent that whole battle thinking I’m just here to banish things. I might buff my friends a little bit, maybe I’ll counterspell, but I’m just here to banish. And it didn’t work and it didn’t work and then it did! Finally it did and Jester made it work and then he was GONE. And then everyone got greedy and it was done but we brought him BACK. And it was a quarter to midnight and I’m not an animatronic D&D lesson machine, I’m just a guy playing D&D at 11:45 at night, and he came back and everyone started Goodfellas circling him and kicking him, and Beau & Yasha are gonna kill him, and then it’s my turn? Disintegrate! And then the room was quiet, and then time passed, and Matt asked, you really cast Disintegrate? And I said yes, of course, and Matt started rolling dice, and in the back of my head I started wondering why he asked if I was rolling Disintegrate. Oh no. In the back of my brain, I was like, well, just tell him that’s not what you did. Tell him you didn’t remember the reflection thing. But he’s already rolling dice! You can’t take it back now. Hold on a second. I’m going to take you on the journey I went through. I was thinking: you have a spell save of 17. This thing wasn’t that fast. +1, +2, maybe? Anything under 14 is okay. That’s 70%. 70%. That’s okay, right? And still no one said anything to tip me off that I was in ELDRITCH MADNESS at that point, no one said anything about the reflection! And then I realize it can reflect back on us, and I realize this is...disintegrate. And then I started becoming morbidly, macabre-ly fascinated at the puppet dance of death I had created. Well, this is a mess. I have made a mess. Let’s just sit in it. And somehow, nonsensically, spectacularly, it worked out in my favor. I went home that night and I got in bed next to my wife, who was fast asleep, and I stared at the ceiling going, dude. Duuuuuuuude. Duuuuuuuuuude.”

He apparently also told his therapist about this and how terrible it was and how close he “danced myself to the precipice like a crazy person!” Marisha (as told by Liam): “Epic roll, though.”

Matt told Liam that night that if it had been reflected, it would have gone back on him. “If a player throws an M80 in the middle of a room, it would reflect on that player who threw it.”

Ashley talks about how interesting that Yasha is not performative, and yet has been doing these public performances with the harp. It’s a great experiment for Ashley--Yasha doesn’t like the attention, but feels like she is making something beautiful for the world.” She’s trying to change something about how she views herself & her place in the world. She was raised to be a weapon for the Sky Spear, but she’s also extremely gentle and loves flowers & beautiful music, and the further away she’s gotten from the tribe, she’s falling in love with gentle, beautiful things. 

Liam also points out it easy (real, but simplistic) to make an entire character centered around a single personality trait: “I’m angry all the time. I’m sad all the time.” He thinks it’s more realistic to see nuance in personality.

Liam can see some paths for Caleb to find peace & do good. He doesn’t know if Caleb is conscious of those. He thinks it’s a huge step forward to admit he was molded in this direction at all and that it wasn’t all his choice, but doesn’t know if this is the same possibility as redemption.

He also mentions Essek in this answer: there was/is attraction there, both intellectual and physical--the forehead kiss was a big marker of that--and he’s interested in seeing where that goes because he’s invested in Essek’s redemption arc on its own, but Essek is not as high on the list as other things Caleb/the M9 need to work on. He loved the “high spy times” of the Essek arc and the tangled-up-ness of feelings getting involved at the same time as intense commitment to duty.

Liam always felt Matt would bring Molly back in some aspect, even though Caleb always demurred because he doesn’t believe in fate. Dani and Brian agree that this is the start of a new act.

Ashley cried at the Vilya reunion. She thought that was an incredible moment and was so glad to see Keyleth. Liam: “Keyleth as part of our story is everything to me. That story is really important to me, so getting just a glimpse of her again was so important to me.” They could all see how that affected Marisha & how special it was to her. Liam: “It was such a great note in her song or color in her painting. She achieved magnificent things and was powerful and great, but had a very heartbreaking and sad ending, so to have this sliver of joy go back in is so complex and beautiful and masterfully done.”

Aaaaaaand that’s all for tonight! Remember, no Critical Role this week. Talks will be back in two weeks. As always, don’t forget to love each other. <3

[dungeonsanddragonsfifthedition]

boylore! no! 7/24/2020

my internet was fucked today! oops! but i have some notes!

in 🥺 news: he was TERRIFIED at the idea of losing his memory! and then he DID lose his memory! he was the first of the nein to regain it but it still ate him alive like 🥺🥺🥺 he was SCARED! i've talked a lot about caduceus' relationships with time & selfhood lately and it's just... 🥺 it's a lot. not gonna reiterate the last 3 weeks of meta right now but like. cool to see that realized, y'know?

in mom of the year news: melora gave him a hug and apologized to him. i love her. if everybody gave caduceus a hug i would feel better i think. but as we see jes' struggle with artagan, which hurts me so much, melora is a nice balm. i love her.

in cad is learning to speak up news: he retroactively stood up for himself about the volcano thing! he offered several plans! he communicated! except of course when it mattered.

in cute news: he was just cute tonight. excited about a plank of wood! telling caleb to get legs! i love him!

in He's Gay Your Honor news: this really was an episode of gay catching and holding. while it was obviously more of a fc episode on fjord's front (the desperation! the concern! the panic!), cad was unwilling to hurt fjord, even as his mind wasn't his. i expect fanart. thanks.

cad playlist tomorrow! and the fan-organized caduceus week starts in a few days! i might have a bonus boylore for the playlist, and i'll have some meta out for the week! if you have any particular cad stuff you want analyzed, send me an ask! yeehaw!

[moiraineswife]

Caduceus’ Tea Meta

Sometimes I think about what Taliesin brought Caduceus in to achieve, the circumstances of his arrival, the function he was supposed to serve both narratively and mechanically for this group, and the tragedy this has created within himself, and I get Emotional. 

Molly had just died. Fjord, Yasha, and Jester were all taken. The party was fractured, and beaten, and broken, and they crawled into the Blooming Grove trying to find a shred of hope, and peace. 

And they found Caduceus. 

They found Caduceus, a gentle giant, soft-spoken and welcoming who, despite the fact his family were missing, and his home was slowly dying around him, the last one remaining, just fretted about not having enough cups to serve them all tea. 

And I think this has been the most consistent thing about Caduceus, in all his time with the nein. Not having enough cups. 

Caduceus was never meant to be a replacement for Molly - either as a clone, a complement, or a foil. He was made to make sure that what happened to Molly never happened again to any of the rest of them. 

And he’s done that job so well. He’s done that job too well. 

Every beat of Caduceus’ arc so far has been about someone else. Even when he’s not buffing them in combat/mechanically, he’s buffing them narratively, and emotionally, and he’s often doing it without any of them being aware. 

The sword he travelled to repair he ended up giving to Fjord, as a beautiful symbol of him becoming a paladin of the Wildmother and finding that faith for himself. 

And tonight’s happenings were another great example of his role and his purpose and his role as support. (I am NOT saying Caduceus is a “supporting” character in this group - in case ur about to bail on me rn like ‘wtf taryn that’s so rude???’ PATIENCE). 

He made his insight checks with the Gentleman. He sat quietly. He steered the conversation away and did what needed to be done. 

Then he came back later. Alone. The best way to approach a man and a situation like this, as he well knew. 

He served his tea. And he asked about his home. He asked if someone could go back to check on it. He  spoke in the most candid way we’ve seen him in a long time. He was scared, he was lonely. So lonely. And afraid. 

But then he used this narrative, his narrative, his story, his goal, to ultimately “overshadow” that moment of his own and make it about someone else - make it about Jester. He used it to speak about family, to gently coax the gentleman into having an open talk with Jester, into the foundations of the two of them having a relationship together - and that will be built on the back of Caduceus’ selflessness, of his support, of his cups of tea. 

I’ve seen some meta about people being like ‘wow, damn, Cad spoke to the gentleman about his loneliness and how much he misses his family, and asked him for help rather than his party, to avoid distracting them from their goals at the moment. His friends never listen to him/make him feel he can talk to them wow they’re so shitty...’ And I agreed with that a bit, but I don’t now. Not fully, anyway. 

For a little while, really since Cad gave the sword to Fjord/made that about his transformation/rebirth/arc I’ve been worried that he doesn’t really have a story of his own. 

And then I realised that THAT is his story. That is his arc. That is his journey. 

Caduceus has spent his entire life making cups of tea. He’s spent his life cultivating the graves of those who’ve died and been laid to rest in the Blooming Grove. He’s spent his life serving the Wildmother. He’s spent his life looking after people - dead and alive. It’s what he does. It’s who he is. 

And it makes him a wonderful person. It makes him kind, and compassionate, and insightful. It means he always know what to say or do for his friends. He always knows when they need a little tea, and the only worry he ever lets them see is that he doesn’t have enough cups for all of them. 

It also makes him lonely. 

It makes him lonely because, in the end, he doesn’t have enough cups. He’s always one short. And the one who always ends up going without is himself. 

Everyone else has to be taken care of. And everyone else is always in a lot more need of that tea than he is himself. Caduceus has never, in all his life, put himself first. That’s just not what happens when you’ve got a hundred siblings, a dying home, graves to tend, a goddess to serve, and a ragged group of people with bright future’s and world-shaping destinies to keep together.

He can’t burden them with his problems. He can’t let them see that he’s uncertain, and scared, and lonely, and all these other things that he hides so well. Because they need him to be their hope, and their guidance, and their support cleric. 

He’s necessary to them, he’s so necessary. And he knows that. I don’t think Cad is insecure about his place in the group. And I don’t think he’s overly humble either. He knows these dumbass fuckwits need him. He knows they’d be dead without him. He knows they’d probably have fragmented and separated and let their threads of fate unravel all those months ago if he hadn’t served them tea and joined them. 

He’s needed. And he’s wanted. And he’s necessary. And he’s loved. And he’s valued. But he’s lonely. He’s lonely because they’ve all let him in, but he hasn’t really let any of them in. He’s lonely because, while the table is always set, and the tea is always poured, there’s always one less than there needs to be. And so he’s on the outside in a strange way, even though he’s the heart of this group, he’s never drinking tea with them. Not in the way that counts. 

And I think (I hope) that Caduceus’ story, and Caduceus’ arc, and Caduceus’ journey will be about him having one. It will be about him realising that he gets to have that, too. 

These people have whatever destinies he’s seen for them. They have all this potential and power and greatness waiting inside to blossom. And maybe he doesn’t. Maybe he’s just there to help them, to support them, to buff them through whatever they need to do to save the world. But he can still have a story, too. 

It doesn’t have to be huge. it doesn’t have to be world-ending. it doesn’t have to shape the future of creation. It just has to be his. Because he deserves it. Because you can only be the thing that holds everyone together on your own for so long before you need someone to hold you up, too. 

I’m so ready for that moment. I’m so ready for the moment when Caduceus falls, and this entire fucking party gets down on their knees to lift him back up again. 

I’m ready for him to say ‘I need you’ and for them to agree without hesitation - because how can they not? 

I’m ready for him to put himself first, and for this party to encourage him to do that, and to do it more often. 

I’m ready for him to break, to be scared, and to be lonely, and to know that he needs, and wants, and deserves their support in turn. 

I’m ready for him to pull up a chair, sit down at the table, and ask them to pour him his own goddamn cup of tea*. 

*(but much more politely, because this is Caduceus we’re talking about). 

[utilitycaster]

in semi-lighter news here are some thoughts on spells each of the spellcasters will have access to:

Fjord: took a second level of paladin! He now has 2 first level spell slots and can prepare six first-level paladin spells (this includes several of those smites that people have pointed out he can cast at L5 for pretty impressive damage; he also gets some of the spells the clerics use a lot, like bless, command, and detect magic; compelled duel, which I have seen a paladin use in my home game to great effect since it’s a good way to force an enemy to attack you, a heavily armored tank, instead of the squishy spellcasters; and heroism which from C1 we know can be cast via kissing so like, great ship moment opportunities in this Chili’s tonight these spells.) I also wonder if we won’t see a return of some of Fjord’s lower-level warlock spells now that he has two more low-level slots (which will not refresh with a short rest) - given how much melee he does, armor of Agathys isn’t a bad idea. Also, not spells, but with the exception of great weapon fighting (I don’t think his sword is a two-handed weapon? I may be wrong) any of the fighting styles look pretty good. He hasn’t been using a shield, but Jester’s got an old shield, and I like the narrative choice of protection fighter, but dueling or defense are both pretty fitting as well.

Team Cleric: HEROES’ FEAST!!!!! which will be very useful against a high level enchanter’s fear effects, should that situation arise. Also I just cannot wait to see what our noted pastry obsessive and vegan foodie clerics respectively choose. I once went to a very upscale prix fixe vegan restaurant while on vacation in Seattle and I’m imagining that is Caduceus’s version of a Heroes Feast. Also, Harm (more a Jester spell, think Inflict Wounds but nastier and with a saving throw instead of an attack), Heal (the “save Gilmore” special), and True Seeing (which, for the record, includes and goes beyond the limitations of see invisibility - they can see through any illusions, see scrying sensors, etc).

Caleb: could take the Pumat Swole spell (Tenser’s Transformation), probably won’t although who knows? Investiture of Flame on the other hand is extremely on-brand. There’s a lot of weird necromancy stuff at this level for wizards and I doubt he’ll want to take that; he does, like the clerics, get access to True Seeing, which does seem likely. Other highlights: globe of invulnerability (also on-brand) and disintegrate (poetic in a meta-way, not Caleb’s usual type but like, it’s a great damage spell. DISINTEGRATE TRENT IKITHON CALEB, DO IT.)

Nott: no new access to spells, but she does learn a new spell (enchantment or illusion, 1st or 2nd level, off the wizard list. Personally, I kind of like the idea of her taking Mirror Image, having seen the Cadogeist put it to such excellent use, but she also can take Hold Person which is pretty handy. I also have decided to stan the spell Shadow Blade forever but it’s really not Nott’s kind of thing.

[princessamericachavez]

Let’s talk about Fjord

This has been a long time coming, especially given how most of the fandom tends to overlook the depth of Fjord’s past and current trauma or downright vilify him for it... but I’m not here to talk salt, I’m here to talk about all the sweet little tidbits about Fjord we learned tonight in Talks.

So let’s review:

a. Fjord feels more comfortable in the City of Beasts than in the Empire/Menagerie Coast: 

Now, hey, let’s take a break and consider this, yeah? Because Fjord has spent all of his life fighting and denying the “monster” side of him, to the point of self-harm. He’s crafted himself to look and act as an exemplary human (when he doesn’t even know if the non-orc part of his blood is human at all). Only in the past few months with the Mighty Nein has he started to accept himself. Letting his tusks grow —under Jester’s gentle watch— has been a huge step for him and his self-image. 

And yet. When they were traveling across this other lands, we never really saw Fjord complain. He never brought up that he felt watched, that he felt judged, that he felt out of place. That’s just how good his mask is (and part of his “no one cares” mentality that we will touch in a moment). 

He might not even fit in here entirely either —he’s destined to be forever a half-blood no matter where he goes— but the fact that he feels more comfortable here than he ever did before talks about just how deep-rooted his trauma is. As Travis put it “it’s having an interesting effect on him” and hopefully it will be one of further self-acceptance. We already saw him comment to himself that the stubby tusks had helped him intimidate Umanon. The very same thing that ostracized him as a child, is a powerful asset here.

b. Fjord is desperate to connect with his bloodline. 

Now, we’d seen hints of this longing before. On a meta-level, there was Travis complaining that Fjord didn’t get to meet the lonely half-orc on their way North, but we’ve also had several IC hints. Consider how Fjord found an orcish tusk in Lorenzo’s bag of teeth and kept it. Think about the value he puts into family. Think about him saying, of course, Jester would want to meet her dad. Think about the weight and importance he puts in the family. Think about how set he is in reuniting families —be it Jester with her mom or Nott with her son or even Beau with her estranged parents. Think about him choosing to name himself Captain Tusktooth of all things and despite his lack of them.

The way Travis put it tonight, though, wasn’t just curiosity, it was desperation. It was the need to sit down and ask “are you a monster, for real? Am I really a monster, too?” It’s just the need to be acknowledged. It’s the need to understand what it is in his blood that has made him a target all of his life. It’s getting some damn answers for once. It’s being a part of something. 

And how heartbreaking is it that his first proper encounter with his own species had to be this three drunken assholes that tried to hurt his friends and disregarded him as a weakling? And, yet, how satisfying is it that he got himself and his friends out of that problem, not by force but by outwitting them? By taking this side of him that he’s carefully crafted through his painful youth and using it to get the upper hand?

c. Fjord’s “tough love” and understanding of the world. 

Listen, as much as the two previous things were sad, I think nothing broke my heart as hearing Travis talk about Fjord’s perspective of the world. It makes sense, though. Of course, it does. He grew a nobody in an orphanage where he suffered at hands of other children and was probably never aided or defended by a single caring soul. What does it do to a child, to grow knowing no one is going to come to your rescue? That no one cares? That no one will?

And then Vandran, the one person that has apparently shown Fjord the most kindness in his life, reinforcing this idea, telling him “yes, no one cares, no one is going to care about your problems, so you just deal with them and keep pushing forward”. Of course, Fjord grabbed that ideology —that already aligned with his perspective of the world— and held on to it, turned it into a shield with which he could face an uncaring world. As “tough love” as it is, Vandran gave him a tool to turn his pain and anger into a way to keep moving. Was it the most emotionally healthy advice? Probably not, but it kept Fjord alive.

We’ve seen the side effects of this attitude come and bite Fjord in the ass, though. From not sharing his Uk’otoa dreams at first because they are his problem to deal with, to taking in the responsibility to deal with Avantika and the whole pirate deal... it’s made his allies distrust him, thinking he withholds information out of shadiness rather than a sense of sole responsibility for his issues. Like, think of being sure that the M9 would not come and rescue him from the slavers. After being rescued, he tells Beau and Caleb that he did not expect them to come. Why would he. No one ever has. No one has ever cared. He tells them he expects better of himself because that’s the only person he’s ever really been able to rely on. 

Until now. Until the Mighty Nein. After being rescued, he tells them that he hasn’t had many kindnesses directed at him in his life, and as much as it sounds like a “cool guy” line, really, really, really think how real that is, how much pain there was in Fjord’s shaky breathless laugh as he said it. I don’t care what anyone says or thinks, Travis is fucking BRILLIANT roleplayer that has been planting the seeds and hints of Fjord’s trauma and pain, playing the subtle long game, really thinking deeply about how his past affects him and it’s all slowly boiling to the surface and it’s perfect.

Going back to how the M9 have changed Fjord’s perspective, though, think about how much they care. They do care, and they show it, and they help, and show up, and go out of their way to help and protect Fjord in a way no one ever has before. 

Jester bribing someone to get Fjord a recommendation later just because he said he wanted to get into a super fancy magic academy. Beau, Caleb, Nott and Molly risking (and giving) their lives to rescue him and the others from the slavers. They spent months out in the open see and surrounded by pirates and death threats just to help him get answers about his powers and his mentor. Jester yelling “don’t worry Fjord, you’re going to be okay!” or “I’ll protect you, Fjord!” and assuring him “I’ll heal you if you start to hurt”, keeping his secrets about his past, constantly asking about how he feels and what he wants and what he needs. My dudes (forgive me as I get momentarily shippy) but when Travis says Fjord is in awe of Jester’s light and happiness, how he’s never met anyone like her, how her light is contagious... the more we learn about the shadows in Fjord’s past, the more apparent it becomes how significant her light is to him (platonically or otherwise)

And speaking of light, fourth and final matter

d. Fjord is looking for an out. 

And not just any out. Fjord is looking for a higher power to help him stop Uk’otoa or, at the very least, break his connection to the serpent. 

And here is where I throw a huge HAH to anyone who claimed Fjord to be evil, shady, power-hungry or willing to betray everyone or some shit. 

My guys, Fjord is willing to give up the very power that —for the first time in his life— has allowed him to defend himself and those he loves, just to do the right thing. Fjord is actively thinking of ways to fix his situation. Fjord is step by step turning his back on the dark promise of rewards and reaching for the light like a drowning man.

How will that look, you ask? Well, Travis did bring up a significant word tonight: Paladin. 

From a purely ttrpg point of view, all Fjord needs to multiclass to Paladin is a couple extra strength points that he could easily get the next time he can up his stats. 

From a narrative point of view, though, how wonderful would it be? This boy, this man, who grew up being shunned, hated, attacked, disregarded as a monstrosity... This kid who everyone called an evil shady monster, who people distrust on sight, who didn’t think himself important enough to be helped by anyone... 

I would KILL for paladin Fjord. Like, shutting up every single person (in and out of game) that called him evil or a monster by becoming a god's champion, a paragon of good, literal knight in shining armor, tusks and all. TUSKS AND ALL. 

Jester seeing Fjord in full armor, shining like the sun with a light of his own, blessed by a deity of his own, tall and proud... and her just being filled with pride, telling him “see, Fjord? I told you, you’re just like a knight in shining armor!”

I’m curious as to which god Fjord would choose to follow, though. 

The Wildmother might seem like a far fit given how different Caduceus’s approach to, well, everything is to Fjord, but reading up on her she’s “the goddess of wilderness and the sea. She watches over nature, good harvest, grants protection from washing away in storms, guides the passage of ships, and protects smaller folk” which seems like SUPER fitting given Fjord’s backstory. 

The Moonweaver would be an interesting nod to Molly’s faith, but also a good fit to Fjord’s tendencies towards hiding his true self behind a perfect mask since she “is a chaotic good deity of moonlight and the autumn season, as well as the patron of illusions and misdirection [...]  she is largely considered to be the deity of love and protector of the trysts of lovers. Those who work in secrecy and trickery often ask for her blessing.” (also Fjord needs all the luck in love he can get)

The Changebringer is an interesting option too, I think, since she “is the goddess of freedom, trade, travel, and adventure. She encourages her followers to venture into the unknown” and we all know how curious and impulsive Fjord can be, it’d be fun for him to have a deity that encourages his thirst for adventure now that he’s enjoying his new life and getting to know and do more than he ever dreamed.

The Stormlord is a weird mix since he’s the god of war and fighting but also worshipped by sailors of the Menagerie Coast, which Fjord could feel closer too. 

(also either the Stormlord or the Wildmother might have some kind of direct interest in Uk’otoa not rising again, so they seem likely to help)

I —for one— would love to see Fjord as a paladin of the Traveler, just because the idea is hilarious and I have no idea how it would work.

Either way, though, Fjord has a super interesting road ahead. His past and present are coming to the surface and this arc his subtly giving us a lot of what will shape his future.

Tl;dr: Fjord is a good boy who has suffered a lot and I will fight the next person that calls him evil. 

[pinkevilbobdoesthings]

So this is for the prompt Healing .This might be a bit loose of a use of the prompt, but eh.

Here’s “The Adventure Begins”.

_________________________

Caleb had never really given the days of the week much thought. They would come and things would happen, so why have a favorite? None of them had ever stood out to him as special. At least, that was before he started dming for his friends. Now he had to say that Thursdays were the best day of the week.

The group had only been playing together for a couple of months, but Caleb was already finding himself getting really into it. Now most of his free time was spent imagining new scenarios for his players, The Strong. That night’s game was promising to be a good one.

The Strong had just finished their first dungeon and gathered the components the local shopkeep, Phillip, had requested. Now all that was left for them to do was return to the village and get their money.

“Fiona should be the one that gives Phillip the supplies,” Nott suggested. It tripped up Caleb at first that her wizard had his old name Bren, but he was getting used to it.

Fjord nodded his head. “Maybe she can get us a bonus.” His fighter, Captain Tusktooth, had already been banned from price negotiation after accidentally insulting Phillip’s mother.

“Just leave Traci out of it,” Beau said. “I don’t want to do an awkward flirting session with Caleb ever again.” Caleb had to agree with that.

“That sounds like a fine plan to me,” Caduceus said. He played the firbolg cleric, Caduceus. No one was certain if he really understood the point of dungeons and dragons.

“Does that sound good to you, Jester?” asked Yasha, aka Janet their gnome rogue.

Jester smiled. “Like you guys can keep Fiona away from Phillip.” Fiona being her human bard barbarian.

“Okay, you’ve successfully made it to the village. So, what are you guys going to do now?” Caleb asked.

“Well, Fiona’s going to go to Philip’s shop,” Jester said.

Fjord grabbed a handful of chips from the communal bowl in the middle of the table “We’ll wait outside.”

“Right, so Fiona goes into the shop,” Jester said. “Is Phillip there?”

“Behind the counter of the shop, you see the familiar sight of a pale red tiefling, Philip. He smiles as he sees you come in and goes ‘Miss Fancypants. You’ve returned. Were you successful?’” Caleb liked doing Phillip’s voice. It was softer than his own and was the first NPC that Caleb had a firm grasp of.

Jester nodded. “‘Yeah!’” She did the cutest voice for Fiona and Caleb couldn’t blame Phillip for being infatuated with the bardbarian. “Fiona pulls out everything that Phillip requested from her bag. ‘Here you go!’”

“Phillip’s smile grows wider. ‘You will never cease to impress me Miss Fancypants.’”

“‘Wait until I play for you sometime. I’m going to be performing at the inn tonight.’” Jester leaned forward with a big grin on her face.

Caleb pulled out some of his notes. “‘I look forward to.’” Everyone else at the table ooohed as Jester giggled. “‘Let me go get your payment.’ Phillip grabs his crutch and makes his way to the back and keeps talking to you. ‘I’ve heard there’s good work for folk like you up north in Bucher. Folks say that there’s a kobold colony that needs wiping out up there.’”

“How’s that spelled?” Beau asked.

“B-u-c-h-e-r,” Caleb said.

Jester frowned. “‘I think we were hoping to stay here a bit longer.’”

“‘There’s not much work for you here after this.’ Phillip returns to the front with a bag of coins. ‘Here you go 45 gold just like we agreed.’”

“Fiona smiles and takes the money. ‘We’ll miss this place’,” Jester said, bt she still seemed a little sad.

Caleb rolled a die. Seventeen. He rolled another die and added two to it. Eight. “‘Then you’ll need to come visit us sometime then.’ Suddenly a spear pushes through Phillip’s chest and he slumps over dead. On the other end of the spear is a gnoll.”

The whole table erupted into screams. “You can’t do that!You can’t just kill Phillip!” Nott yelled. Jester just sat there wide eyed in shock.

“Things don’t always go as you have planned.” Caleb had actually been planning for this attack since the start of the campaign. He hadn’t expected them to get so attached to Phillip, but that made the moment all the more poignant. “What does Fiona do Jester?”

Jester sat there quietly for a moment. There were a few different options. She could run out to the others to let them know what happened, attack the gnoll by herself, or scream to bring the other characters to her. “Fiona jumps over the counter, pulls the spear out of Phillip, grabs her healing potion, and pours it into Phillip’s mouth.” Or she could do that.

“But that’s your only healing potion,” Caleb pointed out. He didn’t mean to have her waste her items on an npc.

“Well, I don’t have any healing spells, so I’ll have to use the potion,” Jester said. The Strong were only level four and only had a couple of healing potions including the one Fiona used on Phillip.

Caleb scanned the table for complaints, but the rest of the players seemed okay with Jester’s decision. He rolled for the potion and added it to Phillips sheet. “Phillip gets back up and stares at you. Don’t forget that gnoll’s still there. Actually, it’s going to attack you now. Does a 19 hit?”

“Yeah, that definitely hits,” Jester said.

Caleb rolled again. “That’s 3 damage.”

Jester wrote down her new hp count. “Okay, so Fiona picks up Phillip and disengages from the gnoll to get them both out of there.”

“Picking up Phillip counts as an action. So if you want to disengage, you’ll have to leave him there,” Caleb pointed out.

“Right, so I pick up Phillip and leave triggering the gnoll’s reaction then.”

Caleb stared at her. Phillip was just an npc. He could understand getting hurt for another character, but not an npc. Npcs were disposable. “Does 14 hit?”

“Just barely misses,” Jester said. Relief filled Caleb. He would never forgive himself if he killed Fiona Fancypants. “Fiona carries Phillip out the store and yells ‘GNOLLS!!!’ for everyone to hear.”

“And that’s when gnolls start to swarm the village. Everyone roll for initiative,” Caleb said.

Jester bit her lip looking at her notes. “Wait, Fiona didn’t grab Phillip’s crutch and he has a bad leg. If I put him down, can he get to safety?”

“He can crawl,” Caleb said.

“Okay, then Fiona will just hold him until she can put him someplace safe.” Jester mimicked like she was holding someone in real life, and Caleb could feel a blush creeping up on his face.

“You’ll get disadvantage if you do that.”

Jester shrugged still holding an invisible Phillip in her arms. “Fiona can handle it.”

“Alright then. Okay initiative. Anyone get 20-25?”

******************

Somehow the Strong managed to survive the encounter even with Fiona at disadvantage for most of the fight. Most of the group agreed that it was a fun game, but Beau did threaten Caleb if he tried to pull something like what he did to Phillip again. Jester was the last one to leave that night.

“I had a lot of fun,” Jester said. “Fiona got to save Phillip!”

Caleb smiled. “Have to admit that took me by surprise.”

Jester raised her eyebrows in confusion. “Why? Fiona adores Phillip. Besides I know that you like playing Phillip, and it’d be really sad if your character died so early in the game.”

“Oh, danke.”Caleb never really thought of it before, but if he had the option, it was Phillip that interacted with the party. It was also a lot of fun to have Phillip talk to Jester and flirt with her a little bit. Even if he wasn’t good at it. “But I’m the DM. My characters are just npcs and don’t matter much. They’re not that interesting of npcs anyways.”

“Don’t sell yourself so short Caleb,” Jester said with a hint of a pout. “Phillip’s part of why I come every week.”

A blush crept over Caleb’s face. “Really? Then I guess he better move to Bucher so you can keep seeing him.”

“That’s good cause Fiona would be heartbroken otherwise.” Jester grinned brightly, but then became more serious. “Caleb? Do you think that Phillip feels the same way about Fiona?”

“That would be meta knowledge.”

“Cay-leb,” Jester pouted. “I won’t cheat or anything. I just want to know for art purposes.”

Caleb could feel his heart beating hard as he thought about how Phillip felt about Fiona since it was the same way he felt about Jester. “I think he holds Fiona very dearly.”

Jester squealed. “But he doesn’t realize how Fiona feels about him yet does he?”

“He doesn’t believe that someone as amazing as Miss Fancypants could love a man like him.”

“He’s wrong you know. Fiona could love him real easily.” For once, Jester appeared to be one hundred percent serious.

“What about Captain Tusktooth?” Caleb asked.

Jester waved away the comment. “That’s just a fling. Besides, Fjord isn’t really interested in pc romance.”

“Ah. I’ll need to keep that in mind then.” Caleb closed his DM screen and set it on his books.

“You better. Fiona needs a whirlwind romance. I’ll see you later!”

Caleb watched her as she left and sighed. He knew that nothing could ever happen between him and Jester. But that’s what the fantasy of Dungeons and Dragons was for.

___________________________

Notes:

Phillip and Fiona Fancypants were created in the Widojest discord. We ship them so much.

[returnofismasm]

I rewatched the scene with Ava in preparation for the likely heist tonight, and the whole thing about the residuum is so weird. Well Ava herself is really weird, but everything about that quest giving is just...off. For one thing, from a meta perspective, if you asked me to line up every PC from both campaigns, Caduceus is the last one I’d think would have a heist as part of his personal story arc. 

It’s pretty clear that Ava is lying, or at the very least, isn’t telling the whole truth about how the ring was taken from her. Part of her prevarication is probably due to Reani being there, since Reani just told Nott to her face, “If you steal something, you’re evil and I’ll have to kill you.” It is admittedly unclear if Ava heard that, but she’s also known Reani for awhile and knows how she thinks.

But at the same time, she says she doesn’t know what refined residuum is. She didn’t know how much it was worth. And yet, the first thing she does when Caduceus says they’re also interested in trade or work is say “Hey kids, wanna do a crime?” 

Which brings me to a couple of points: Ava knows what refined residuum is, and she knows how valuable it is. And for whatever reason, she didn’t really want to give it up. But she wants that ring more. 

So what does the ring do? We probably have a 50/50 chance of finding out, depending on whether or not Caleb is in the position to cast Identify on it. Ava stated it has a “subtle” enchantment, which could mean a lot of things, but not “Explode your face off.”  It’s Elven in make, which makes me think it might be an artifact from Molaesmyr. The cataclysm that destroyed it is within a generation of most elves, so it’s possible the ring is nothing more than a personal family heirloom Ava wants to recover. 

But at the same time, “Find this ring for me, Caduceus” makes it seem like there’s something about this ring that will directly impact Caduceus specifically. Something he’ll want, or something that he’ll desperately want to keep out of the hands anyone. Is is affected by the Savelierwood curse? We know the books collected by the Woodset Otters Auditors were showing signs of it. Does it raise the dead? That’s not very subtle. What does this ring do? Why did this noble family take it for their personal museum?

[thekgalaxy]

Laura's point tonight about Jester being more than her crushes is hitting me so right, because I can't remember the last time I read any fan analysis of her character that wasn't about her relationships or lack thereof with other characters. On the one hand, I get it, she's by far the most emotionally available and empathetic character and a lot of what she does is informed by the shit the other characters have going on. She's also a romantic, so there's a lot of potential there, meta and otherwise. But on the other hand, then why don't we hear more about her friendships? I cannot remember reading anything focused on her bonds with Caduceus or Nott, and honestly nothing really about her friendships with the others in a non-romantic context. Yasha is the only relationship that is treated mostly as platonic that's gotten attention as far as I've seen. Her every interaction is picked apart for shipping potential but I've rarely seen her motivations attributed to character decisions outside of romantic love. To be clear, I'm ship neutral, I'd be fine if any of them happened or none of them did. But it's curious to me that so much of what could be going on with her character might get overlooked in the shipping.

[indigoire]

Insomnia is kicking my ass right now so I might as well dive into some meta. 

We had a good Talks tonight, and I really enjoy how much insight we got into Caleb. A couple of people have already pointed out how much of a foil he is to Fjord lately. Believe you me, I could talk foils all day. Both Caleb and Fjord are magic users who have incredible potential and are messing with bigger darker powers than I think even they can comprehend (though they both have a decent idea). They are both smart, driven, charismatic, and liars. Time will tell if they’re a good influence on each other or not, but they certainly both walk that tightrope of “do I do good or do I seek power?”/”do I help or do I hurt?”

(Sidenote: it certainly is interesting to see Caleb acting as a mirror for multiple people, and one can argue he’s even a foil for Beau, Empire kids with murky pasts and all; not sure what that says about him.)

I won’t make any judgement calls on Caleb and Fjord’s relationship, as the “blood pact” was one moment out of many, and Fjord until this moment has been a good force in Caleb’s life, helping him play nice with the others, helping him guide the group as a whole. It’s definitely an interesting dynamic, one I’m interested to see develop even further.

But, and I’m probably part of a very small minority, I feel like we’re only talking Fjord and Caleb, when come on guys, Taliesin’s right there! Caleb may be a foil/warped mirror to Fjord, but he’s also a complete inverse of Caduceus. 

If Fjord and Caleb are like water and fire (or, maybe more accurately, like the ocean and an inferno), Caleb and Clay are like fire and earth/grass. Opposite in every way, but complementary too. Since day one I’ve wanted Caleb to absorb a little of Caduceus’s chill. I’ve wanted some of Cad’s energy to rub off on Caleb and have him find a little bit of calm. But I feel like Caduceus could use a little of Caleb’s drive as well. As others have pointed out, Caddy just doesn’t want to speak up about his wants, and even his overarching goals are more for a higher purpose, less for himself. Which is great on paper, but not good for the person. Everyone needs to be selfish sometimes. I know I’ve lightly dragged Caleb about this in the past, but at his core he is a selfish person (who’s been conned into caring about his friends against his will), and I think last episode really highlighted that aspect just a bit. 

What I’ve wanted for Caleb since learning about his ultimate goal, the goal to go back in time and stop himself from murdering his family, is for the Nein to change his mind. Because inevitably he will have to decide between the Mighty Nein and never having met them because he changed the past. Maybe he will find a loophole that allows him to change things but keep the present the same--but knowing Matthew’s DMing style, probably not; none of his game’s immense powers come without a price. Caleb will have to decide between his friends and his family at some point. And as amazing as it would be to see Liam O’Brien completely throw Matt’s campaign off the rails time-traveler style, I also want to see Caleb torn by this decision. We know that he’s already become closer to all the Nein, Nott being the first to worm her way under his defenses. 

So, bringing this back to Caduceus, I want to see Caleb and Caduceus learning from each other. This is part of why I (and many others) found the locket scene so captivating: it was a selfless gesture on Caleb’s part. Out of game, Liam wanted Taliesin to have his locket back, in game, Caleb has no real reason to give Caduceus the periapt. Caduceus’s response was endearing as well--he already sees Caleb as important, and he wants to help him get to where he needs to be. It’s supportive and sweet. But I digress.

I want to see Caleb learning that others will support you without any goal in mind--Caduceus was on Caleb’s side from the start, the locket was just a nice bonus for him--that Caleb doesn’t need to manipulate to get help. Caleb’s MO seems to be making deals/pacts and in fact he made one with Caduceus already, though Cad has yet to call in any sort of favor or remind him of any debt owed. He doesn’t have to bargain for help, and I want to see him learning this from our cleric as time goes on. 

On Cad’s side, I want to see some selfish desire on his part. I want to see him want something for himself. The shipper side of me wants Caduceus to, say, desire one (1) wizard, but just wanting his own well-being looked after would be enough. Honestly, and I hadn’t even considered this before bringing up the periapt, but Caleb encouraged this just by giving Caduceus the locket, to help keep him stable in battle. He’s indirectly saying “look out for yourself” and for Caduceus, who’s had to look after graveyards and mourners his whole life, who’s had to look after the Nein since Molly’s death, who’s had to deal with almost drowning to death two or three time now and yet STILL FOLLOWS THE M9 INTO THE WATER, this is a big step. 

So. To sum up, I would like to see Caleb and Caduceus, opposites and inverses as they are, to learn and grow from being around each other. Caleb to accept help without owing favors and to be more chill. Caduceus to be more selfish about needs and wants and to have a bit more drive. 

If they can just meet in the middle, I’ll be a happy camper. 

[c-is-for-circinate]

Post-ep 106 reaction

I have many disparate thoughts tonight, and as usual I’m sure I’ll be more coherent tomorrow if I remember to post at all, but here are some things I’m thinking right now:

Someday, SOMEDAY, I am going to put together the essay I’ve been sitting on for ages about Critical Role (and d&d in general) and how it impacts the dynamics of religion to turn gods into actual people who you can have individual person-like relationships with.  It is far too late for that tonight, but I am SAYING IT NOW because fuck, it’s coming.

I think I’m finally on board with Beau and Yasha.  I’ve fluttered between vaguely interested and vaguely disappointed for such a long time, not because I don’t adore both Yasha and Beau and their interactions with one another, but because in some ways it just felt so very... “these are the two lesbians, they are the Only Two Lesbians In The Main Cast, of course they’re endgame,” and that bothers me as both a queer lady and as a storyteller.  Tonight’s glorious awkwardness aside, though (and fuck that awkwardness was glorious), I’m having some real feelings about the fundamental attractiveness of someone being attracted to you. Pining for someone unattainable is romantic, of course, but it gets old, and grown-ups learn how to get over it sooner or later.  Pining for someone who might be unattainable but might not be, well, that’s complicated, and that can go on for ages, but the longer a situation like that goes on, the more it becomes something you don’t expect or even really want to be resolved.  If you really thought it could work, you’d say something.  And there’s a lot of emotion that goes into wishing something could work, and hoping maybe it could, and wanting-but-not-daring, and complicated layers of self esteem, etc etc etc, but-- Look, you can pine for the perfect unattainable maybe-straight girl who you’ll never have to negotiate an actual relationship with forever, but sometimes right in front of you there’s somebody who actually looks back when you look.  And that looking back is worth so much.  It means so much.  It’s worth choosing to look at someone who looks at you back.  That’s a love story I’m here for.

Partway through the episode I was thinking about my meta for tonight, and I was thinking about Beau and Yasha, and it occurred to me to wonder just why the fuck there’s shipping discourse everywhere you look in CR fandom these days.  I know it’s always been around, but it’s felt so virulent lately, and I wondered why, and then I came up with a theory for part of it. I think it’s been really easy to focus on ships lately because the characters are mostly at a point in their own personal journeys where a lot of their other, intense and non-romantic development has...not ended, and not even gone away, but reached a natural plateau for the moment.  The war between the Empire and the Dynasty is over, and the Mighty Nein made it happen.  Holy shit, right?  It meant so much, and it cost so much, and it forced them to make decisions and grow and choose sides and stick to things in ways they never had before, and it was so much all the time.  And meanwhile in the background, Fjord kicked a patron to the side and got a new goddess, and Veth battled alcoholism and lost and won and lost and then also got her fucking body and family back, and Beau faced her father and Caleb faced Trent and Caduceus found his family and Yasha lost herself and then found herself and then had to face what she found.  It’s been so much, for so long. And now it’s not, really, any more.  Sure, they all still have issues--but those issues are for the moment avoidable.  Caduceus’s family is safe and his duty is discharged and he doesn’t have to deal with the reasons why he didn’t go home with them if he just keeps not going home.  Veth doesn’t know how to be a mother and a wife and an adventurer, but hey, she’s on Rumblecusp now, right?  It’s the same for (ALMOST) all of them: personal growth has been exhausting and they are Not Worrying About It right now. Which leaves room for character analysis to head in a more romantic direction.  And yes, it is super fucking pertinent that the one character who is drowning in the very throes of intense personal arc stuff is Jester--the object not just of various party members’ affection, but of 95% of shipping vitriol that’s been thrown around lately.  She’s the one person who is too busy dealing with or trying not to deal with her own shit to have time for romance right now, and she’s the center of everyone’s focus--of course it’s a mess. And like, I think about “no romance before level 10!”, and I think about how these characters have grown and changed, and I think this particular plateau is pertinent not just because it’s a resting place for these character arcs, but also because of where these characters have gotten to.  Right now, finally, finally, the M9 have each collectively and individually figured out so much about who they are.  They know themselves, what they want and care about and will stand for, so much better than they did at the beginning of the campaign.  What they don’t know yet, and the question they’re all vaguely avoiding and feeling their way around the edges of trying to answer, is what happens next? And romance is part of that.  Falling in love is about saying I want, which most of the M9 have just barely grown into being able to admit.  Actual romance and relationships are in a sense about saying I can have.  Not just the wanting, but the getting.  Making choices, going after things, making plans for the future--that’s all inherent in the situation. And those are the things the M9, without a clear direction or goal in sight, are set up to start really tackling next.  Which puts them in a position where romance is an obvious and focal part of character interactions.  Both for themselves, and for us as audience.

At some point, I need to do some serious thinking about Beau and Caducues, and about when and where we see Beau actually asking for things.  She asks him for things: tea, more tea, food, caretaking things, but she doesn’t whine at him for healing spells like she’ll whine at him for caffeine, just offer a general “I mean, if anyone wants to do some healing” to the group.  It’s interesting.  I’m interested.  I think I’d need to backwtch some episodes to decide what I think.  (But also: Caduceus gives Beau things, readily and sometimes even more than the others.  He gives her Tongues and Holy Weapon.  And what does that mean, for him?)

I know there was more but that has hit the limit of what I can do at 1:30 AM.  Thank you, all, and have a good night.

[eponymous-rose]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E71 (SDCC Edition!)

Tonight’s guests? EVERYONE. This is a recording of the SDCC panel from this past weekend!

There’s a table read of the first three pages of Vox Machina: Origins Volume 2, to be released August 14!

Ashley gets asked about the fate of an NPC from the first campaign. Ashley: “Uh. They all died.” Matt: “That’s your fault now.”

Lessons learned through the journey of CR? Liam: “It’s all about the people you travel with.” Matt: “If you can stick to making friendship a priority in your life, good things will come.” Their friendship has been the most important thing to maintain and check in with. Sam highlights how amazing it’s been to watch the community grow year after year.

Favorite RP moment that didn’t involve their own characters? Sam: “Well, that takes me out.” Travis: “I was such a fan of Vex popping out of the water in the bathtub.” Sam: “Anything Matt Mercer does is a pretty fantastic roleplaying moment.” Liam: “I think a certain pirate woman reaching the end of her line.” Laura: “I think Scanlan’s whole... (gestures) as much as I hated it personally.” Marisha: “There were some Percy-Vax standoffs that were pretty great.” Matt: “Percival and Grog having the fight underneath the Keep shortly after the Chroma fall.” Liam: “I really liked Percy and Vex in Syngorn.” Taliesin to Marisha: “I liked you at the Pirate King, busting out all that Cobalt Soul stuff. I wasn’t prepared.” Marisha: “Neither was I!”

Matt talks about how adapting the show to the animated series involves some creative truncation, but also involves holding his ground about what’s too important to change even if it doesn’t tie a perfect narrative bow. “This isn’t mainstream media, this is Critical Role! Some things should be messy. Some things are their own threads.” He’s enjoyed watching new people come up with new takes, and he’s excited to cast some of the NPCs.

The idea is floated of a full-day Sam Riegel DnD Beyond telethon. Sam: “Marisha, can we--” Marisha, glaring: “Uh-huh.”

What has Marisha taken away from Keyleth’s and Beau’s different experiences with leadership, in her leadership role IRL in the company? "I feel like Beau helps me be more assertive in my opinions.” Travis: “We don’t argue with Marisha very much, because she punches people in the face more now.”

Liam’s spell choices are a balancing act between trying to accomplish his own goals and trying to optimize the group’s performance. He’s taken Seeming for the party, but the opportunity to use it hasn’t arisen yet.

Taliesin gets asked “Is there X number of character deaths that would keep you from playing in this campaign?” Taliesin: “There’s really only one way to find out.” Matt: “Is it double digits?” Taliesin: “I at least have two more undeveloped ideas that hopefully will be used in the next campaign.” Liam: “Let’s get to that fourth character!” Taliesin: “I hate you all.”

Missed opportunities and plot threads? Matt can’t go much into it, because for both campaigns 1 and 2, there’s a chance they’ll wind up going back there. There’s a facet of campaign one’s story they got to continue with a one-shot that will be airing soon. He’d hoped there would be more delving into Thordak’s history, and there is another Horn of Orcus out there. Also the Clasp’s relationship with Emon. Ashley is still haunted by “that gosh-dang box”. Matt: “I answered that already.” Ashley: “I DON’T BELIEVE YOU. I DON’T BELIEVE YOUR ANSWER.”

Was Nott seriously considering leaving with her family? Sam, as Laura slowly reaches for his throat: “Yes, absolutely.” He’d been going back and forth with that for a while now. “Nott loves traveling with this gang, but she really wants to be home.” He called Matt about it to warn him that Nott might not be in the campaign anymore. “But I think what happened on Thursday was right for the moment, and we’ll see how it plays out.”

Matt gets asked about how to avoid min-maxing as an experienced DM when he gets the chance to play in someone else’s game. Matt notes that there’s nothing wrong with min-maxing if everyone’s on board with it, but that, the more that you play, the more you might enjoy trying something off-the-wall. There’s also the importance of respect when playing at the tables of less-experienced DMs, where you remind yourself that it is their table. Taliesin: “Part of the fun of the meta-game of D&D is that it’s changing all the time.” He points out that the Magnificent Mansion used to be considered a dump spell until Sam really showed what it could do. Taliesin highlights the challenge of experimenting in these less explored areas.

Sam gave Nott a kid in her backstory because he loves his own kids so much and wanted some of that feeling in the game.

Matt’s favorite Sorrowsworn? The Lonely, which is why he wanted to use them in the game the first chance he got.

Taliesin and Matt are asked if they might release Molly’s whole backstory at the end of the campaign. Matt: “When this campaign’s over, we’ll definitely do that.”

Caduceus is hoping some of his family’s at the Kiln, and potentially some of the other families. “He’s built of expectations. We’ll see how it plays out if those expectations aren’t met.”

“I feel that Yasha is obviously in the best hands with Matt. I, personally, I love the storyline. It’s so much to play with, and it goes with a lot of the backstory that I wrote, and a lot of what Matt prepared, and stuff that I don’t even know, and stuff I do know. I love it! I feel really good about it, but I can’t wait to come home and see what’s going to happen if Yasha comes back.” Matt: “Depending on when you come back, there’s a good chance you’ll have to make a new character.” (The general tone here is that it would be an in-the-meantime thing.)

Matt gets asked how he makes sure everyone in the party gets their time in the spotlight. “It doesn’t always work out, but trying to consider what aspects of the story can play to their individual strengths. You can offer opportunities for each of them to shine, hopefully.” He also highlights that a lot of it is the players respecting each other at the table and being comfortable with the expectation of equal time to shine. “Communication is the key to a good, healthy game group.” Laura also highlights that you as a player can engage other players’ characters if you notice they’re fading into the background a bit.

There’s a brief foray into Evanescence. As you do.

What advice would Matt give himself if he could go back to the first campaign? “Don’t stress so much about what people on the internet think about you. Guard this wonderful little lightning-in-a-bottle family and you’ll be fine.”

If Beau were a druid, what would her go-to wildshape be? Marisha: “I shouldn’t curse. A DAMN OWL. Take that, Thaddeus.”

Marisha: “I feel like the Mighty Nein has turned into fighting for the everyman.” Laura: “I feel like Vox Machina, though, we felt we knew who the good guys were. As the Mighty Nein, I feel like everything’s so gray, and it’s harder to make that choice, and therefore what steps up is everything around us and needing to protect the people who are victims of the bigger picture.”

Matt gets asked how to manage his DM-life balance in terms of parceling out prep time. “It can vary. Whenever I’m driving somewhere, if I have more than 20 minutes of a drive, that’s usually my brainstorming period.” He also tries to keep weekends free with no prep and instead reserves a couple evenings a week to prep, although it sometimes bleeds through to early Thursday morning. “I prepare more than I used to,” largely because of the Internet’s watchful eye in terms of continuity.

[loquaciousquark]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E63 (May 21, 2019)

Sorry it’s late, guys. @eponymous-rose has narrowly avoided being blown away by tornadoes and I’ve narrowly avoided drowning in equally dangerous paperwork, so here we are at the end of all things. Preroll is post-its of donors for Red Nose Day.

Tonight’s guests: Sam Riegel & Liam O’Brien.

Tonight’s announcements: We’re opened by Mark Hulmes instead of BWF. He dabs. No one blinks an eye. After the music open, we find out BWF’s neighbor’s kid stole his keys and then he lost his wallet. It hasn’t mattered, because he’s about to be Mr. Ashley Johnson & people just keep giving him what he needs. They’re still raising money for RedNoseDay. Thursday morning, the Colbert one-shot airs on the Critical Role Youtube. You can donate at critrole.com/rednoseday. Mark Hulmes joined Taliesin & BWF today for an episode available on the CR Twitch.

Episode 63: Intervention

CR Stats: Caleb cast his 700th spell, Gift of Alacrity, on Caduceus. Nott rolled her 40th natural 1 this episode to understand the local sewer system. This was Caduceus’s first HDYWTDT. Everyone mourns that someone stole the Golden Snitch from Matt’s bag.

It’s more stressful not knowing everyone’s motivations, both within the party and the game world. Sam talks about Yasha’s mysterious past and Beau’s dangerous ties to the Empire, especially given how much they understood in the first campaign about (at least) who the bad guys were. Sam feels like once they have a shred of information, he wants to jump on it ASAP and make big, bold decisions on them. He’s dealing with the discovery that this might be not as great an idea. He’s not experienced this kind of “trepidation, failure, uncertainty...I don’t like this game. I don’t like it at all!”

Caleb likes using the little bit of dunamantic magic as a taste of a drug--each little hit makes him want more and more and more.

Danimancy? Make a Carrcana check. Sigh, Sam.

Sam made two big mistakes in the last fight: he missed the gender of the dragonborn, so he thought that one of the other voices Matt was doing was actually the dragonborn giving orders (and therefore the one in charge, while the drow was the one taking orders). He also saw the dragonborn leaving and was worried that he was waiting on the party to give him (Nott) the go-ahead to kick things off. He recognizes he put Caleb in a terrible position both in a meta yes-and sense and in the Nott-Caleb team sense.

The world devolves into campaign slander and propaganda. Everyone’s in it, including BWF and Dani. #samforpresident

Caleb told the Brightqueen about his past because he feels like they’re on a very tight timeline, looking for very slight drips of information like gold. He thought it was worth the shot.

Sam desperately wants to know what the missing years in Yasha’s memory hold. BWF tells him to get what he can out of her while she’s here; her show’s been renewed for another season. He sounds genuinely bitter as he says it, but he notes at least it’s the last one. :(

They ask Mark Hulmes about what Charm does for people. He helpfully tells us it doesn’t say if they remember or not. Sam also points out Nott has blown up Caduceus before, so doing a few more points to Yasha is *wigglehands*.

Caleb did not mean to kill the horse on purpose. Sam tries to get him to confess that on camera, but instead Liam needles him about not cuddling Henry.

Cosplay of the Week: @andy_srivastava’s cosplay of Beau. Gorgeous!

Both Sam and Nott feel the fight’s outcome was his/her fault. He expects her to feel very guilty next week. Sam genuinely felt and still feels bad about it. He also prefers hashing out reactions the night things happen instead of having to wait a week for the next Thursday. He feels it’s more genuine.

Caleb is very worried about Jester’s mom and Astrid’s crew finding ways to use her mom as leverage. He’s also worried about the kid, but is glad Shakaste is going to get him. Liam also always imagined running into his old crew against the backdrop of the Empire, and is now very worried that if he runs into them soon he’ll have the added perception of being a traitor since they’re in the Dynasty.

Liam and Caleb both were surprised he was given hints of dunamancy so freely. He looks forward to learning more.

Liam totally understands how easy it is to miss things now. He’s constantly looking things up and reading in an attempt to understand his spells, and therefore missing parts of the battle. He greatly sympathizes with Marisha. Sam, on the other hand, is finding it hard to adapt to rogue life; he doesn’t like the necessary “out there, bold choice” nature of rogues in D&D and having the pressure of making big decisions very fast. He prefers Scanlan’s nature of sitting in the back, casting spells, and being more reactionary than instigatory. Liam always is afraid of picking the wrong spells, and finds it much harder than Vax. BWF: “Dagger dagger dagger...dagger dagger dagger dagger?” Liam: “I kept track of that fine, it’s everyone else that was wrong.”

Sam is shocked the D&D Beyond campaign bit has dragged on. BWF calls his rebuttal “bogusly weak,” and Sam looks genuinely aghast. It’s hilarious. “I don’t know how he got to you, Brian, but this feels like coming on Fox News! You’re a partisan hack! I won’t take it anymore, but I love attention, so I will stay.”

Nott is super interested in the dodeca’s ability to give people different bodies, but Caleb is still the clearest path to getting her body back. It’s complicated because the Dynasty souls are “chosen” and Nott’s not likely to be so.

Liam is very excited to see this magic system Matt has created in dunamancy. Did he create it in response to Liam or had he already thought about it? Sam tells us he’s always been thoughtful about fate and the subverting of it. Liam is so pumped because in campaign one, fate strings existed and were uncontrollable, but in campaign two we’ve “developed physicists, tinkering.”

In re: Essik, Nott’s just happy Caleb has found a friend. She wishes he’d bring him home more often.

Sam finally busses Henry’s cheek and affirms to us that he actually loves dogs. Everyone in his family is voting for a new dog except for his daughter, who wants a cat.

Liam doesn’t want everything to be cat-themed, but likes retouching a few spells here and there for flavor. He also wanted to differentiate it from Scanlan’s Bigby’s Hand. Sam thinks he should reskin more spells.

SPOILERS FOR C1 IN THIS QUESTION. Sam talks about rogue high-stakes moments as genuinely, surprisingly stressful. Liam says Vax was stressful but exhilarating, especially when it came to moments that conflated poor meta decisions vs roleplay decisions. He specifically mentions Raishan’s chase as a terrible in-game decision but one that was right for the character. He and Sam will always do what’s right for the character, even if it’s bad narratively in the moment. Sam says he got a lot of support from the group thread this past week, though. END SPOILERS FOR C1.

Fanart of the Week: a gorgeous Caduceus portrait by @larndraws.

Nott trusts Shakaste to get Luke traveling safely. Sam also drops a bombshell on the world by telling us Luc is spelled Luc. It’s just that no one’s ever asked. Heavens!

Caleb’s made an effort to tell people he cares for them, but he fears it at the same time. He’s afraid he’s going to be put in a position where he needs it too much. Brian asks if he believes he’s truly irredeemable: Liam says there’s a certain road where he could feel he atoned, and there’s a road that might lead to balance, but there’s never a brass ring that he could reach that could let him relax entirely. I don’t entirely understand the metaphor, but I get what he means.

Sam likes that the theme of this campaign seems to be “atonement and reconciliation” compared to the first campaign’s “finding family.” There’s a bit of that in this campaign too, but he likes how everyone has something in their past that they’re clinging to, and he’s interested to see who will be able to resolve it, who will be able to handle it, and who won’t be able to let it go.

Mark Hulmes come on to talk about the Stream of Descent, which happened last weekend. He’s the DM for High Rollers, which airs at 9am Pacific on Sundays.

BWF talks about how C1 had a lot of the Hero’s Journey in various forms, and C2 feels a lot like “what it means to be good.” He doesn’t feel they fit the “antihero” archetype very well.

Liam thinks that if Caleb were going to leave the campaign, he’d have done it already.

Part of Caleb’s generation was to create a character the world would shun, and seeing if he could find a way to find compassion for them. He mentions the poem written for the Boston marathon bomber a while ago. BWF talks about how it’s a really interesting character choice because it depends on the rest of the table being willing to stick around and seek out that redeemable quality in your character, even when you’re making decisions that are true to the character but bad for the table/the rest of the group. You can’t always expect that to work with every group you play with.

Mark talks about Calliana being the other end of the spectrum from Caleb, because she also has a history of having done very terrible things, but she was taken in by a family who helped her understand she’d been manipulated and it was not her fault. He’s desperate for his recently mentioned package to be picked up because she has some messages for Caleb in it. Now she tries to see the best in everyone she meets as a result of her history. He has a whole folder of fanart of Calliana on his wall. Awwww.

It’s still never gotten old for Liam or Sam either.

Mark endorses Sam for President. Good job, foreign fellow. Is it Thursday yet?

[daturanerium]

let’s give beau the spotlight for a hot minute.

so this ep is going to be.....pretty heavy. i think we can all agree on that. most likely there’s going to be some falling out between the empire kids--bowlgate 2.0, anyone? people have already done a shit ton of meta on caleb and his choices and feelings right now, but I haven’t seen much on my girl beau so here’s her point of view (from what i can gather from the last couple eps and talks) 

quick disclaimer: I agree caleb made a good decision in giving up the beacon! beau, however, has a lot of reason to be angry with him (and the rest of the party) about it. that’s what i’m going to be talking about. 

let’s start at the beginning. beau met up with her mentor darion, who she thought had been injured or dead. darion is a huge role model for beau, and also the only person who takes beau seriously and believes in her. as a result, beau takes what darion says to heart. Darion tells her a lot of important things when they meet up, but something that really stuck out to both beau and i was “don’t get too close.” beau hesitates, then responds with, “i haven’t.” both us as the viewers and (presumably) beau know that’s a lie. she doesn’t agree with darion’s lone wolf view of life, shown when a minute later she asks darion about naming her birds. upon first viewing it looks like a joke question (and maybe it was and i’m just reading into this too much!) but i see it as a deeper question in disguise: why not let people in? they may surprise you. darion shuts that down pretty quick (“I named a bird once and it flew away from me. that’s why I don’t name my birds.”), but beau is still left feeling conflicted. mix that conversation with darion’s earlier ALL KRICKS ARE EVIL mentality that beau so heavily disagreed with that she openly calls them out on it--we’ve got a solid recipe for some Angsty Conflicting Feelings. on the one hand, beau and darion are very close and beau looks up to and respects them like no other authority figure. she’s constantly trying to prove that darion trusting her was not a bad move, and will do a lot to impress them. on the other hand, beau is starting to realize that darion might not be as good as they claim, or that at least their judgement is clouded heavily by prejudice and hatred. that is something beau doesn’t want to be a part of. so does she continue with her training with darion and hopefully get the praise, recognition, and belonging she’s always wanted? or does she allow herself to get close to the m9 and leave darion’s flawed teaching behind? her oldest mentor or her new friends--it’s a tough choice. (and a pretty great parallel to caleb’s story, which, as an avid empire kids fan, fascinates me to no end. but that’s different meta lmao)

now, the fight in the well. i’m not going to get into this too heavily because i feel like most of it is pretty simple to figure out. beau had some pretty great moments in there. when caleb first gets possessed, her first reaction is to grab his hand and ask if she has to kill him. hello???? juicy. she made a promise to keep caleb in check, and this was a strong reminder of that. later, when yasha is the one to get possessed, it’s beau that gets her out of it (YOU. ARE IN. A TOXIC. RELATIONSHIP!) with both caleb and caduceus down. and it’s beau that rips the heart straight out of the beast’s chest. this fight was beau’s reminder that she’s ride or die for these people--she’s attached. we don’t really know, but it could be a point where she started to make up her mind on her inner conflict between darion and the m9. 

and then, last episode. oh boy. things start off okay (hello everyone that beaujester scene with the other traveler follower was fantastic), but everything turns to shit pretty quickly with the whole...….slave thing. that was about the only thing on talks marisha talked about openly--beau hated that, and for good reason. fjord and jester hop on the slaveholder train a little too quickly for her comfort, with fjord pushing her in the mud for no good reason and jester literally using her as a footstool. meta-wise, we’re aware that the majority of this was done as a joke by laura and travis, but it still happened in canon and beau was not enjoying it in the least. her only real comfort here was that caleb was equally as uncomfortable as her the whole time--at least he’s on her side here. because the way she sees it, the people she’s (presumably) decided to stick with only pretend to respect her. when given the chance, they’ll step all over her just like everyone has before. and that really sucks. 

okay, now what everyone’s waiting for: the Moment, the last twenty minutes of the episode, and what will maybe happen tonight. caleb, in a panic, pulls out their hail mary: the beacon, or the dodecahedron. he presents it to the bright queen, saying that while he is from the empire, he is certainly no friend of the empire. good for him! we love character growth! even though that was probably less character growth and more of a desperate, last minute play to save his friends’ lives. the problem is, caleb was only speaking for himself here. beauregard is a member of the cobalt soul, which, although technically neutral in this war, have spies everywhere. they’re well known for their collection of knowledge as well as their espionage. specifically, beau is an expositor, which is apparently tasked with “pursuing the secrets and evils of the world and exposing them to the light.” when the bright queen and her court find out that beau is a part of not only the cobalt soul but the expositors, chances are pretty high that she’ll at the very least be kept a close eye on. more likely, she’ll be confined to a certain area and interrogated pretty heavily, maybe even locked up. we don’t know a lot about the bright queen’s court or the xhorassian government, but we can assume they don’t take well to potential spies. 

now, we as watchers have had two weeks to think about this whole scenario. what went well and what went wrong. but beau has had all of six seconds. and beau, as we know, can be a little quick to jump to conclusions. so when caleb hands over the beacon, her first thought isn’t thank god. it’s more along the lines of holy fuck i’m going to be outed as a spy and killed. caleb, in her eyes, made another rash decision for the whole party that could get her in some serious trouble. we also have to keep in mind that beau is still under the impression that caleb’s only with the party for protection. during their infamous “don’t go” moment, caleb responds with (paraphrased) “i’ll consider it”. to us, that him not wanting to admit he cares for them. for beau, who tends to view conversations from a very surface-level perspective, sees it as nothing more than exactly what he said--noncommittal. so when he pulls out the beacon here and only mentions himself when talking to the bright queen, i think it’s reasonable for her to think that he’s only doing it to save his own hide. she’s had some good, soft moments with him, but as far as she can tell they’re pretty one-sided. 

so, tl;dr:

beau was having conflicting feelings on darion’s teachings and wasn’t sure weather she should continue getting close with the m9 or follow darion’s advice to please her

during the crazy-ass battle in the well, beau was reminded that she loves the people she’s with and is ride or die for them. it can be assumed that she made her decision to stay close to her friends

last episode, the gross slavery thing made her realize that the people she chose to stay with don’t respect her

caleb handing over the beacon (and the rest of the party putting her in a position in front of the queen of xhorass to begin with) could put beau in a really difficult position, since she’s an expositor of the cobalt soul and Potential Spy Material

during caleb and beau’s inevitable fallout tonight she’ll probably call him selfish, and while we know that isn’t true, we should also make sure to view the situation from beau’s perspective and understand that it’s a pretty justifiable conclusion based on her background, history with caleb, and current situation

tonight’s gonna be crazy, folks. things are going to be said. things are going to happen. this is a major turning point for all of the charaters and their story, and everyone’s feeling tense and conflicted. we love some good drama and inter-party conflict, but let’s try not to pick sides too heavily on this one. 

[c-is-for-circinate]

An incomplete list of things I want to write about from episode 97 when I have time, which is probably tomorrow because I’m gaming tonight and fuck I have not prepped the battle map and I do not have the loot specced and also my place is a wreck.

“You are Nott the goblin I first met”, and “you are the second love of my life,” and that entire relationship and the very first time Caleb has ever said the word “love” in this campaign.

Also--Veth is Nott, the goblin we first met, because only Nott would crawl under the table and paralyze Essek in the middle of a dinner party and uuuugh.

Speaking of Essek, aside from the Essek everything meta, which I definitely need to do (and I need to rewatch all of Essek’s stuff so far, because I never quite trusted him and I never quite mistrusted him but now that we know who he is I need to understand everything we’ve seen so far)

I want to ask so many questions about what Essek’s been doing in his Thane disguise.  Is there a real person whose place he’s taking, or has he spent the past thirty years of this deal with the Empire carefully building this charade?  What has that been like for him?  Has Essek Thelyas, in fact, slept with Jester’s mom?

Okay and back to talking about sex, I am not a die-on-any-hill shipper but I have so many emotions and also questions about so many things in this episode?  The Beau and Yasha fish market date was so much.  Caleb and Essek was so much.  I sat down in that seat shipping neither of those pairings but now I have so many questions.

Caduceus always choosing Beau to be the person he decks out with spells and turns into a walking badass.  (How often does it actually work?)  “How would you like to be your best self for an hour?”, and Cad with no idea how to help Beau with what she’s going through right now (Cad who’s thought of Beau as the group’s Competent Adult for months, which is such a fascinating thing to think), and Beau who spends an hour high instead.

Possibly more than anything at all--Matt’s plans and what the party does to them, and the ways they surprise him, and the patterns all of those surprises take.  Matt wanted Essek to get away so badly.  He was happy enough to let them find out that Essek was the mole, but he wanted Essek to escape so badly, and what did he think would happen?