#poly Blumendrei

[flashhwing]

if laudna/imogen not real. laudna/ashton equally good. send tweet

[sassy-cass-16]

we got a taste of toxic poly shenanigans with the blumendrei in c2 but c3 is really THE "everyone's fucking everyone" campaign and i am having so much fun

[quinn-of-aebradore]

CR Non-Endgame Ships Poll

Hello and welcome to the project that’s been occupying me all week! A showdown of sorts between 32 Critical Role ships that were not together by the end of their respective campaign! Some notes;

I’ve gone with the phrasing “non-endgame” as some of the relationships featured were together in canon at some point (ex. Blumendrei) or one half/both were canonically attracted to the other/had a crush (ex Widofjord). These are here alongside relationships that are purely fanon (ex. Verinwulf)

Since C3 and present-day EXU are still ongoing, open stories, no ships featuring those characters are included. Anything’s possible. Since EXU: Calamity is a closed story, it gets featured.

All relationships featured here are m/m, f/f, or poly. I have a running list for m/f ships and may do a bracket for them in the future depending on how this one goes. I am not ignoring them.

Each poll will feature art of the characters in question, included with permission from their artists. Links to the original posts will be included and I highly encourage giving them some love if you vote!

Let’s not do ship hate y’all, this is for fun. Please. Campaign for your favorites but keep it civil.

Block “cr non endgame poll” if you don’t want to see this further!

Voting will begin tomorrow (Feb 12) at 6pm CST! All polls with run for 24 hours

Matchup links and breakdown below the cut

Round 1; 

Widofjord VS Percy/Tary

Luciessek VS Fjordwulf

Vaxmore VS Scanvax

Fjolly VS Yussa/Essek

Verinwulf VS Jester/Reani

Polynein VS Blumendrei

Shadowfjord VS Vexleth

Perc’ildan VS Zerxus/Asmodeus

Beaukeg VS Jestrid

Laerryn/Patia VS Vexahra

Jester/Calianna VS Beastrid

Beaureani VS Yashter

Shadowmauk VS Polymachina

Mariking VS Beaujester

Kashvax VS Lucigast

Gilmore/J’mon VS Widomauk

Round 2;

Widofjord VS Fjordwulf

Vaxmore VS Fjolly

Jester/Reani VS Polynein

Vexleth VS Perc’ildan

Beaukeg VS Vexahra

Beau/Astrid VS Beau/Reani

Polymachina VS Beaujester

Lucigast VS Widomauk

Round 3;

Widofjord VS Vaxmore

Polynein VS Vexleth

Vexahra VS Beau/Reani

Polymachina VS Widomauk

Round 4 (Semifinals);

Vaxmore VS Polynein

Vexahra VS Widomauk

Round 5 (Finals);

Vaxmore VS Widomauk

[foxqueen-katarian]

Might do a proper bracket style poll to actually figure out which is the most popular Caleb ship (Shadowgast) because that seems low stakes and easy enough that the anxiety won’t take over.

The real question is do I include the poly ships (Shadowidomauk, Shadowblume, Threefling, Widoforjester, Widobrenatto, ect) or keep it to the pairs +Blumendrei.

[3hobbitsinatrenchcoat]

I have some Caleb Widowgast-themed ships for your ship meme! Shadowgast (Caleb/Essek), Blumendrei (Caleb/Astrid/Eadwulf), Widowmauk (Caleb/Molly), Caleb/Jester, Caleb/Veth (or Nott)... If there are any other Caleb ships you have strong feelings about (positive or negative), feel free to throw those on the pile, too!

original form from @candyskiez

Some explanations:

Shadowgast - INTERESTING COMPELLING COMPLEX SCREECHIBG - I just find them really neat. Two incredibly hurt people who form a healthy relationship DESPITE THE WORLD.

Blumendrei - pleasantly surprised by being canon - was it healthy? probably not. do I want more poly rep? absolutely

Widowmauk - not my thing, but I get the appeal - same appeal as Shadowgast tbh but it's too early for a healthy ship, plus all of Molly's memory stuff. It's not my jam but I'd read it if I found something really good.

Caleb/Jester - neutral - they're both happier with other people I think. Polyshipping is fine I just dont feel anything for this ship

Caleb/Veth - unironically relationship goals - They're just kinda cute, ok? Caleb/Veth/Yeza polycule also falls under this.

[wingkink]

Blumendrei should be winning more poly ship polls than it is.

[my-least-favorite-savior]

Eadwulf was the goth when they were teenagers but he chilled a little as he got older and now out of nowhere Bren’s going to come back and just be goth as Hell with a goth drow boyfriend and Wulf’s going to have to up his game. 

[livvy-maye]

Caleb is the most shipable character in Critical Role

[gilmores-glorious-blog]

caleb widogast and his fucked up german polycule and his pretty purple elf boyfriend and his intense polyamory is something that can be so personal <3

[fakeoldmanfucker]

I JUST READ THE MIGHTY NEIN ORIGINS FOR CALEB AND IF BLUMENDREI AREN'T ENDGAME...

I SWEAR TO GOD MATTHEW MERCER AND LIAM O'BRIEN, I WILL FIND. YOU.

[harpyeda]

Ok now that im less worried ahout them outright asking astrid to come with them to aeor and she killing essek, i can say with a lighter soul that miss astrid beck can gaslight gatekeep girlboss me at any time

that dance sequence was so cool hello she taking the control sometimes and whispering plans cheek to cheek with caleb? Y'all i'm a shadowgast stan first human second but that was good shit

[flashhwing]

Oh and Blumendrei?

A: I love it

okay I know what i JUST said about poly ships but hear me out --

Send me a ship and I'll rate it!

[stardustedknuckles]

On the one hand fuck yeah poly blumendrei, we love to see it.

On the other, it looks like this is the first time some of y'all are accepting this as canon. 🤨

[foxqueen-katarian]

With the addition of Brenottos and Poly Nein there are 21 ships (fucking hell Caleb), so one ship gets a bye the first round, and while I am very tempted to just hand it to Shadowgast because I am biased I figured it was only fair to run a poll for who gets the bye. The other option is I run one three way poll where two ships get eliminated at once.

Ships chosen based on rankings in prior 'Best non-Shadowgast ship' polls.

If the ADHD allows I'm going to actually set up the bracket style Best Widogast ship tournament I said I'd do almost a year ago on Tuesday. I'm posting about this because if I don't the only person holding me to that is me, and I am easily bribed.

[malaismere]

C2 Ship Stats

With the end of C2, I wanted to post the final versions of the ship stats I've been working on based off of number of fics on ao3.

First up - top 5 ships + Fjorester and Nott/Yeza

As you can see....Shadowgast really knocked it out of the park these last few months, didn’t it? For comparison, the first 3 months of C2 had just under 800 fics total. This graph really works as evidence to how big an impact ships being canon is - Beauyasha drops off with the reveal of Zuala, and Beaujester and Widojest both rise with the recognition of the crushes - Beaujester dropping off when Beauyasha becomes canon, and Widojest dropping off with Fjorester becoming canon. Veth/Yeza also hits it’s high point with the reveal of their marriage and their reunion. Other points of interest is that Widomauk peaks with Molly’s death, and you can see the peak from the Essek reveal spiking Shadowgast.

Fjord

Fjord actually spends most of the time with Widofjord as the dominant ship - starting high with the first few months of C2, before subsiding briefly to Widojest, only to rise sharply following the pirate arc. Fjorclay/Teahaw takes over following Fjord becoming a paladin of the Wildmother, and falls with Fjorjester becoming more explicit and Taliesin officially stating Caduceus’ aromantic status in game. For background ships, Fjord/Molly stays a reliably notable presence, although it definitely drops with the rise of Fjorclay, and while Fjord/Avantika peaks during the pirate arc, by the end of the year it’s essentially nil. Fjord/Nott spends most of the time very low, but has notable peaks in mid 2019 and early 2021.

BEAU

2018 is dominated by Beauyasha, but 2019 is dominated by Beaujester. It isn’t until 2020 when Beauyasha hits, but when it does - well, it stays pretty consistently off the charts.Aside from a peak of Beau/Keg following their sleeping together, Beau’s third ship remains a consistent Beau/Jester/Yasha - which is by far the top poly ship in the fandom.

CALEB

Caleb has two ships that break the graph - Widomauk, during it’s high point following Molly’s death, and Shadowgast following the reveal in early 2020 and throughout 2021 while Essek travelled with the party. Widomauk is the dominant fic through 2018 and the start of 2019, but after the introduction of Essek, it really becomes a back and forth between Shadowgast and Widojest. Also notable, Widobrave reaches it’s highest peak with Veth’s transformation.

VETH

The two top ships in the fandom, Beauyasha and Widomauk, have never fallen below 50 fics for a three month period. Veth only has one ship that breaks 50, and it’s her husband during the period where they reunite. Widobrave peaks at 50 exactly with her transformation and the kiss. This graph is also notable as the only one where you can actually see how popular Fjord/Nott is.

JESTER

Top table ships! Fjorester starts and ends as the top ship, but the middle is nothing but Beau and Caleb duking it out. Most notable is the one period in early 2020 where Beauyashter actually ties with Fjorester. Yashter really drops out following Beauyasha becoming canon.

MOLLY

This is a graph of Widomauk with...just a little Fjolly thown in. The Molly/Essek fics at the end are almost exclusively Molly/Caleb/Essek fics.

YASHA

Much like Molly, this is a graph of Beauyasha that also shows some other things. There’s the Yasha/Zuala peak around the reveal of her existence, and Beauyashter actually is the second ship through 2020 and up until 2021, which is impressive.

CADUCEUS

Starts out really Clayleb, then goes really Fjorclay, and ends with a total of 35 ship tags for the entirety of 2020 (aka what Shadowgast has reliably made in a week for the past few months.

I’m not going to do a graph for any of the NPCs because they’re mostly eithe really small or really boring (guess what Essek’s top ship is.) But I will include some Blumendrei because it is actually pretty interesting -

Astrid, Eodwulf, and Trio are combining fics tagged with Bren and Caleb, and not counting repeats, and Trio counts all fics tagged with at least one of these, with no repeats. The peak in spring 2019 is during the build up of first meeting the captured scourger, the peak in December is the introduction of Astrid and Eodwulf in person, and the peak in summer 2020 is the dinner with Ikithon. What’s really interesting is that after that point, there’s a sharp increase in how many of the fics are trio vs being seperate or Caleb/Astrid.

And, not a ship thing - but here’s a graph for the total fics, monthly, for Critical Role - the red dots are for the start of a new arc.

The lowest point from C2 was January 2018 (190) - and the highest point of C1 was December 2016 (245). The second lowest point for C2 was the last month of the hiatus, but it was still above the C1 peak - and the highest has been these past two months, beating out the previous peak of March 2020.

[my-least-favorite-savior]

Every Friday I decide my Caleb Ship of the Week and I do so by asking myself, “Which relationship is the least doomed right now?”