In this installment of Critical Hit – A Major Spoilers Dungeons and Dragons Podcast: What happens when you reach the end of the tunnel?
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14 Comments
Thank you for the season update!
Wow.. Stephen did warn at the start not to listen to it on a stormy night.. which i didn’t.. but I listen to it while out on my daily walk (which happen to be at dusk today). and I had decided to take a new path through a small forest. So as I walked through this unknown path I was listening to the gang walk into the shadowdark…really felt like I was there with them.. found some paths that led to a house as well.. no monsters in front or at least i didn’t walk close enough to see it :P
I really love what you guys (and gal) do! I have a question though (This probably isnt the place to ask it but oh well). Are you going to do another character swap quest like with Sir Brenson and ect.?
Anything is possible… ;)
Obviously Matt may know something I don’t, but the character swap arcs in the previous seasons had specific reasons for existing. In season 2, Rodrigo wanted Steven especially to get some experience playing a different type of character, and he wanted to tell the story from a different perspective. In season 3, the other characters were created because Steven wanted to play a monk and because the plot necessitated the splitting of the party. Instead of having half the group play for the entire “talk to the dark gods/collect the stuff” arc, extra characters were created to keep everyone engaged.
Given how much “the other side lives” episodes distract from the main characters and storyline, I would think Rodrigo would need a strong narrative motivation to do it again, beyond just, “hey it was kinda cool to do that, so let’s do it again.” And that totally may happen. How crazy would it be to have Adriana play Camis and lead a party of Eladrin from the Fields of Autumn so we can see what has happened in the Feywild to the Eladrin after Spud banished the party to the natural world? That might make Adriana go crazy, so maybe Rodrigo would have to have her be an NPC or something, but I think the idea would be cool.
Well, I wasn’t wrong. I also wasn’t quite right. Kammis, also, is apparently the correct spelling. Really wish these comments had an edit button.
I did not, nor do I know trust The Hogba
Fantastic episode, still LOVING it after all this time.
I’m so disappointed that the party is already out of the Underdark. I mean, clearly this plot arc isn’t focused on the Underdark primarily, and the Underdark probably deserves its own dedicated plot arc, but traipsing through it in a few episodes without a single combat encounter with a classic Underdark foe is somewhat saddening.
I wish Rodrigo would sometimes take a firmer hand with the party than he does, and I wish the party would be more willing to play along with potentially interesting characters and situations, even if those characters and situations are also potentially dangerous. The inept, panicky attempts to avoid engaging with *anything* in the underdark/underfey have potentially resulted in (depending on what the Hogba does) the party moving through two entire realms without a single meaningful encounter, whether that be RP, combat, or skill. TQRD could have showed up anywhere, has nothing intrinsically to do with the underdark/underfey, and is a trusted/liked character, so I’m not counting her (though, obviously, her presence led to some amazing exchanges).
All of Rodrigo’s creepypasta worldbuilding basically got tossed to the side so the party could put its hands over its ears, close its eyes, and run as fast as possible in the hopes that nothing bad would happen. I can’t tell if Rodrigo’s intent was just to provoke a panic response for an episode then let move on, or if he’s trying to respect player agency and so is allowing them to not be where they clearly seem to not want to be, or if there was an off mic discussion of “hey guys we really need to wrap this season up after 100 episodes, so stop with the dicking around and get back to Spud already” or if there’s something else entirely. Regardless of the exact reason, I think the last few episodes have squandered tremendous potential in the interests of rushing headlong back to the FeywIld. If that is the case, I rather wish we’d just gone straight back to the Feywild instead.
Firstly, I think that the trip through the Underdark in a few episodes is key for the possible setup of future events/next season. We are still left with the question of where the entire Drow nation went, and the answer will be something huge, I feel – and may likely be explained by another appearance by TQRD. So, though it can be really disheartening to have the party go through a realm so quickly without a fight or anything really “substantial,” I see this pass-through as the whetting of the appetite for the next adventures to come (likely soon after the defeat of Spud).
Secondly, I don’t blame the party for their “speedrun” of the Feydark. They are under a time crunch, and the last time they acquiesced to a Greater Fae’s proposal, they were set back several months (six, I believe). Not to mention, the place is creepy! lol But I’m in a party currently where we are speedrunning – we’re in a “Tesseract,” a magical labyrinth of rooms that are dangerous, trapped, and ever-changing. There are a lot of bits that the GM puts there that we would normally stay and look at and admire, but we (my character especially) are also on an in-game time crunch and we have something to retrieve from the Tesseract and then get the heck out of there. So I think that the players aren’t so much sticking their fingers in their ears and go “La-la-la, don’t care” – they are being true to their characters: they want to get out of the Feydark, get to the Feywild and stop Spud as quickly as possible.
But hey, we’ve all got our opinions and I’m just adding my two cents. If the recent episodes aren’t your cup of tea (or cup whatever is your favorite beverage), that’s cool. Like Rodrigo said last episode, some people like the fighting podcasts and some like the character building/roleplay podcasts. Cheers!
Just to be clear, I enjoyed the last three episodes. I did not enjoy the “lol wut do we do wif dis well gais” episode for reasons I outlined in the thread for that post. I’m just saying that the Underdark (and Feydark, by extension) has always really captured my imagination. I love the creepy, aberrant, lovecraftian horrors who exist literally to drain your soul and sanity to be found there. It took the party 250 episodes and 5 years to step foot into the Underdark, and with plot-hooks galore outside of it (the Feywild and the elves of the southern continent to name just two big ones), it’s very possible they might not return to them any time soon. Even the Drow problem could very well be resolved *outside* the Underdark. As a big fan of the setting, I am just really disappointed we got to spend so little time there, and the time we did spent there was spent walking through tunnels, making jokes about spiders, and exploring an abandoned city.
Also, I don’t think this is a roleplay/combat divide. I like some roleplay heavy episodes a lot, and I like some combat heavy episodes a lot. And there are other episodes of both types I greatly dislike. My point was that neither we as listeners nor they as a party got to engage with my favorite setting, either in a roleplay sense or a fighting/skills sense. Everyone just kinda rushed through it, which, after spending untold tens of episodes doing random stuff waiting for an unnecessarily huge shipment of cold iron, is disappointing to me.
I’m also a little bummed that we aren’t getting more of a look at the Underdark and the Feydark, but I loved what we got from that last episode, even though it was only a glimpse. The Greater Fae, as played by Rodrigo, continue to make my skin crawl. I love seeing how things that the party has done has changed the entire multi-verse! Clearly, the situations in the Feywild, Underdark, Tuberville, and elsewhere, were a direct result of things the party has done or decisions that they have made. Well done Rodrigo! As for the party, they do seem to be on the fast track to deal with Spud, and once that is done, I’m hoping they go back and clean up Tuberville. Those two “Brothers” really need their comeuppance at the hands of the Torqueltones. Hopefully the devils haven’t killed everyone already! I can’t wait to see what Epic Tier has in store for the party. As they grow in strength, the gods themselves will likely view them with great trepidation, as their madcap antics tip the balance of power in the multi-verse. I hope to be there to listen. :)
It probably can be attributed to Fey magic, but Rodrigo specifically said the new greater fey’s mansion (I’ve already forgotten her name) was ONE story and then they proceeded to be taken UPSTAIRS to meet with her. Was there something there that the players missed or was that just a plot hole / something missed by the DM?
Well I am still 2 Years behind but I have managed to listen to 253 episodes over the course of only 2-3 months. This is taking much longer then anticipated. It has been well worth it though. I am actually nervous to catch up…I am not looking forward to having to wait a week for each episode.
Rodrigo is a genius storyteller. I know some people are disappointed that the group was out of the feydark so soon, but I love the imagery in this episode – spooky, creepy and yet wondrous at the same time. It is just an amazing world that he has created and I am glad we can listen in.