Cassandra's situation was a combination of mind control and years of abuse and gaslighting. For some background information, they actually did treat her like a daughter (against her will) for years. It's really dark
That is such a beautiful moment. It really shows the strength of Critical Role storytelling and the friendship between the players. Travis and Ashley role played this super sweet and toughing moment and the rest of the group waited and grinned through the whole thing. So many D&D games are "So when can we kill something"? and miss the beauty of role play.
8:45 In the actual game. This happened: Sylas/Matt took control over Grogs mind. He turned completely against his friends for a couple of rounds...Then as Travis/Grog said: Wait! I am raging & a barbarian can I even be charmed? Matt checking the rules. No you cannot. That is why it is good to keep your special feats in mind guys. Grog was right back fighting the Brierwoods
@@AGhastlyGengar IIRC, Anders went before Grog in the initiative order. Since Grog hadn't had a chance to rage yet, he was still vulnerable to mind control.
A bit of an explanation: keylith does not have a connection to a single entity, as a druid she draws her powers from her connection to nature. As for dark entities, there are a lot. There is a number of dark gods, called the betrayer gods, and even without them there is a whole slew of demon lords, devil princes, all of the hells and the abyss and gods knows what else floats around in the astral sea. Then there are also some demigods and so on, i think you get the idea.
I bought the audiobook and loved it. I hope they see this comment and listen/read it. I love it when I watch a reaction and see new people appreciate the relationships the same way I did during the live streams. Even more than that I love how they appreciate the teamwork and the way powers work and how it's displayed in the show.
Plants with albinism can't produce chlorophyll and don't have any means of making energy for their growth, so they leech nutrients off of other plants around them. Vampire plants are real and a vampire druid in an all-white forest sounds rad as hell
For how "gods" and "powerful entities" work in the world of D&D, think of it kind of like Greek mythology. There are many godly beings(some good, some bad) and there are many powerful entities of all kinds. Much like Greek mythology sometimes powerful beings will lend their strength to creatures/humans to suit their own wants/needs, and others will have a more possessive or parasitical bond. In the animated series I believe you've only heard a handful of these names mentioned casually. Many of these beings require a large following to further their own strength with faith and worship.
"If Keyleth dies, we have to riot" - iconic quotes of 2022. You got so many important things right, I can`t! Everlight (Pike`s goddess) and Keyleth nature powers are not connected (in the direct meaning of connection), they just exist in the world. And Sun Tree is absolutely full of light and goodness, it was created by a benevolent sun god :3 Next episode is wild.
Great reaction looking forward to the finale! On character deaths (re 16:13, no spoilers), this is probably the only show that is immune to the "they've gotta kill someone for plot" thing - remember this is based on a game that has combat mechanics like hit points and damage from dice rolls, so if a character dies in a true-to-canon Vox Machine / Critical Role show it's always unscripted!
Granted this specific death...wasn't really taken from the campaign. Vex got hit with it instead of Keyleth, in the campaign. But yes, in general, no character is safe. Everything (deaths happening and revival success) come down to dice rolls.
Pike vs Sylas is SUCH a good fight Also: in the game, Vex was the one to get hit by Delilah's spell (so keyleth didn't actually save her the way she did in the show). That being said, I like how they did it in the show because it was sort of the culmination of Vex and Keyleth's relationship issues, since, as you said correctly, there's no way Vex could antagonize her anymore after she saved her life
Yeah, they switched the death from Vex to Keyleth probably to make a future brush with death MORE powerful and significant, like it was in the campaign.
A big reason there is virtually no filler and they don't stretch out the episodes to fill them with something insubstantial is that the Briarwood arc runs from episode 24-38 in Campaign 1 (of those, 24-35 have been adapted into the 10 Briarwood episodes in the animation). With each episode clocking in at about 4 hours, there's over 45 hours of content to draw from. True, a lot of table time is taken up by combat compared to animation time, but still, they had to condense and trim things down to squeeze as much as they could into these 10 episodes (and link the first two episodes in). They had the opposite problem of having to fill the time with something. ;) Also, another reason that there isn't really any 'filler time' is that there's seven characters to spread the focus on, and unlike many other shows they are all equally important in the overall scheme of things. It's not "Percy and his band of friends" or Scanlan and the crew" or "Vex and the Vixens" where there's a clear main character and the others are the supporting cast. Also also, the Titmouse crew is really good at their jobs. And the Critical Role people were closely involved with the creation process the whole way. All of these things help explain why it's such a tightly scripted, well animated show that, even when it changes things, very much keeps the spirit of the original. :)
The reason why it feels that they're not trying to extend the plot and are packing it with solid content, is because it's actually a summarisation. This is the short version of literal hundreds of hours of gameplay. They've actually had to cut out and trim the content a whole lot... Which makes for this feeling of the episodes not having any fat to trim or gratuitous extra content
"Romance isn't dead." Sylas - Vampire. Delilah - Necromancer (Mage who manipulates life and death). Maybe romance is just un-dead? Doesn't explain Twlight. But then, nothing does.
Delilah, 'Bring my Sylas back, honour our Bargin' The Whispered one, (AKA Vecna) 'Bitch please I already brought him back once for you, it's not my fault you couldn't keep him alive, that said, if anyone could make Demands of Vecna I would bet Delilah is right up there with Oorcus (The God of the Undead), In D&D Charm's ability can't make you do something you wouldn't do anyway, so on some level, Cassandra must have hated Percy for leaving her, for Sylas to be able to exploit it as he did. Everyone seams to forget, there is one more name on the list Percy has yet to kill, she ran away at the start
Something you missed at the end of episode 5 is that the "family" that was hung on the tree wasn't a family - they were Whitestone residents who happened to resemble Vox Machina. The little girl was given a wooden version of Pike's holy symbol, for example. In both the game and the show Keyleth (Marisha Ray) is the first to notice. At the end of e5 when it goes to black you were talking over it (I was waiting for your reaction and didn't get to see it) and missed hearing Keyleth say, "It's us." This was a gruesome wanted poster, telling all of Whitestone who to look out for and what they planned to do with Vox Machina.
For the record, characters can and do die in Critical Role. Because it is a role-playing game with results dependent on dice roles, there is always a chance that the dice do not land in someone's favor. Granted it's a lot easier to fight back death in D & D, if you have a skilled cleric, the right level of magic available, and a pricy diamond, two of the most common spells would be Revivify and Resurrection. Revivify is pretty much a sure thing, so long as you can get to the one who died within 1 minute, have the needed spell slot left, and a diamond worth 300 gold. Any longer than 1 minute for any reason, and you have to step up to Resurrection, you have more time can kinda be done whenever, though sooner is better, takes a much higher spell slot, and requires a diamond worth 500 gold... also, it's not a sure thing. With Resurrection dice roles come back into play.
With Matt all resurrections have a chance of failure, and it grows the more times, so the first death is pretty easy to come back from the second is a 50/50 the third is really hard and the fourth you are dead dead....
@@andyme3541 yeah, he has homebrewed the rules to make death harder to come back from the more you die... so it means more to actually fully die. Also he incorporated an actual ritual for the spell instead of it being instantaneous.
15:05 There is a pantheon of gods called the prime deities. They include the Everlight, goddess of redemption who Pike serves, and the Dawnfather, god of sunlight and the harvest. Other gods will be referenced in subsequent seasons. You don't have to be a follower of a god to do magic. Keyleth is in fact is very suspicious of divine immortal entities. 4 loose categories of magic you see here include divine magic (Pike), Druidic magic (Keyleth), demon/abyssal magic (Percy), and arcane magic which is like non-affiliating neutral magic which the gods taught humanity long time ago. While clerics and paladins get divine magic channeled from their gods, arcane magic was accessible and created from scratch without needing to commune with exotic immortal entities like gods or demons.
When you asked how many dark/light entities are there: In DND land there are soooo many powerful beings that can give you power. Gods, angels, fey, demons, devils, and more! Not to mention that some people don't need outside influence and are born with magic (sorcerers), while some others aren't born with it but gain it through study and hard work (wizards). But, just for simplicity sake (and avoiding spoilers): Pike gets her power from a holy goddess (cleric), Keyleth gets her power from nature itself no gods involved (druid), Scanlan gets his power from the magic of SONG (bard), Delilah gets her power from striking a bargain with an entity that wants her help with something (warlock), and Percy gets his from.. well, you'll see.
15:15 quick rundown to help the research: Keileth is a Druid, with Nature related powers; Scanlan is a Bard, and need an artistic expression to cast his spells and Pile is a cleric, channeling the power of a goddess. It’s an oversimplification, but helps. Just for the sake of completion, Vex is a Ranger with limited spells and Grog rage can be considered a form of magic.
The people hung from the Suntree were made to look like the members of Vox Machina. If you back to the episode and pause you will notice the guy is painted like grog, they bolted horns into a redhead to look like Kiki, they dressed the children to look like Scanlan and Pike. Etc.
Interesting note and funny you say Hadouken...in the live play sessions...Sunbeam Hadouken is what Travis(Grog) called Marisha's (Keyleth) Sunbeam spell...also in the live play session Silas was killed with a combo of Sunbeam and holy which took the shape of Holy Sunlight Dicks..as they were described
Hadouken!! I said the same thing when I watched lol I've absolutely loved watching these episodes again with you two! Looking forward to the finale and season 2!
I think that working from a dnd based story fundametally brings good tension. If someone died in game they die in the show. You really can't have meta information when thinking about story structuring etc. (ofcourse not spoiling here if or when it happens) And ofcourse this just applies to those who haven't watched the stream.
Great reaction! Can I also just say that I really appreciate that you make a point about needing to have access to the original series if we want to see the full reaction. You add your own value with your awesome reactions without taking anything away from the original creators. Looking forward to seeing you react to the final episode... then we all have to wait patiently for season 2. But that is already in the making, so it's just a matter of when, not if.
20:17 now what happened to the people hung up in the tree is one of the really slow burns in Critical role, and it blew all our minds when it was revealed waaaay down the road!
Your comments about the number of times they go back to the family in effigy and wondering if it's foreshadowing are insightful. Not sure if it will tie in to future seasons. If I think about it, it might, at least in a cameo kind of way or something. Honestly, there have already been more tie-ins and synergies than I had expected, and I'll take whatever I can get and I'll love it. It's an expansive, persistent world at this point, with lots of content to reference, much like certain other media universes we might alk be aware of. They're throwing everything that works into this, and that's awesome.
There are many Demons & Devils in D&D yes they are two different races, both Evil but Demons are Chaotic while Devils are Lawful. the Prime Dieatys important to this series are The Dawn Farther, The Everlight, The Matron of Ravens, (this one succeeded where The Whispered one failed) The Knowing mistress, & The Wild Mother none of the major Devils or Demons really appear in this campaign
Absolutely love this dynamic duo !!! You ladies are fire. I’m a huge fan of shows with bad ass ladies and having two bad ass ladies react is fantastic!! Wish you two did Arcane together 🍻 keep it goin ladies🔥🔥
My dnd party had an encounter with people trying to summon the whispered one, and we brought an aberration (patron) to the fight, the aberration took the power of the ritual/dark energy orb thing and became our bbeg
This series is based upon a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. The player characters can *die* in the game. Nobody is safe, main characters can definitely end up dead.
I think the tree was channeling the evil energy from Delilah's ritual out and dissipating it. Like drawing out a poison. Also, I can tell you that if you want to know more about the aftermath of what happened here, once you finish this season, you should watch Critical Role's current campaign. It takes place 30 years after Vox Machina, with a different group of characters (but the same cast). But it's set in the same world, and some things happen that does bring up the events of this series. They're about 30 episodes in right now, so you would have a bit of catching up to do. And I do recommend watching the series in order (so campaign 1, 2, then 3), but you could jump straight to 3 without missing much as long as you'd seen the animated series.
@@theanyktos There's some mention of late campaign two events, and a few characters we meet in campaign 1. But so far (though that could change shortly) most of the big spoilers are confined to the events that you see in the animated series. So while I do agree it's better to just go all the way through, if someone was curious, 3 would be a decent jumping on point.
@@cryofpaine Yea, the 'spoilers' in campaign 3 seem to not be spoilers if you've already watched 'Vox Machina' season 1. I assume that has been Matt's intent all along.
@@cryofpaine Well, there's also the point in Campaign 3 where they receive a letter from the Lady of Whitestone. That's quite a big spoiler considering the current state of affairs at the end of Season 1 animated series.
I’m a novice to D&D but there are multiple deities, demons, and Demi-gods in Matt Mercer’s world of Exandria where the campaigns take place. Deities of light, storms, the forces of nature, dark evil, even gods of trickery. Most that I know are from their second campaign after Vox Machina, but I won’t spoil anything in case they make an animated series for it.
No the ritual didn't work. As they said it was supposed to happen during the solstice, but it was also said that it was still a few days away, the action of our heroes forced the Briarwood to act sooner than planned. Not to mention that no blood sacrifice was made, so the whispered one could not cross over. But it did do something, as you will see...
It actually did work. The Briarwoods succeeded in performing the ritual *despite* those setbacks. Problem is they just didn't know what the ritual's results would actually be.
I won't spoil anything, and I'm sure other people have pointed this out as well, but just because a character's storyarc isn't complete, or it doesn't fit well in the moment doesn't mean they can't die in this show. You're making assumption based on your knowledge of well used narrative tropes (which is totally fair, and works reasonably well for most media), but you have to remember this is based on a DnD game, which by its very nature is largely improvised and has an inherent element of randomness. If the players make bad choices and/or the dice just are not in their favour, player characters can and do die. And it doesn't matter that they're a main character who hasn't had a chance to explore all of their backstory yet, or a beloved NPC who was just about to get a major win in life, or a character who serves an important narrative function. It's a lot like real life that way. I'm not saying that's necessarily what happened here, just speaking in general. Plotarmor is not really a thing here. And by the same logic just because a character's main character arc is appearantly over, doesn't mean they necessarily die or leave.
But this is actually in line with how things played out in the campaign. Keyleth didn't get to talk to the Sun Tree until the NEXT time they came to Whitestone after the Sun Tree had healed significantly. So if they are going to do the Sun Trees voice...it will be in season 2, probably.
I’m sure others have said in the comments but just in case, “the whispered one” is *actual* Vecna, not the stranger things villain they named after him
Multiple demons and gods/goddess exist in the world of Dungeons and Dragons and the world that Matt created for this game turned animated show is filled with great lore and mystery pulling from multiple sources.
By virtue of critter Arsequeef, here you can find the epic moment Keyleth obliterates Sylas Briarwood with her sunbeam in the D&D live stream vs. the moment in the animated series. Fun side by side: ua-cam.com/video/_hmjQjGJM_k/v-deo.html&list=PLqQNeBzVn7SheXXfvazjBFpxuEwkL6viO&index=10
The people hung on the tree don't really have any more affect, until campaign 3. One of them is reanimated and is one of the player characters. That story arc takes place maybe 40 years after the first campaign.
Here's the Sun Tree moment as it happened in the campaign and the show. Would be cool to see you 2 react to this. No Spoilers. There is a char on the tree that isn't in the show but he won't be either so no biggie. ua-cam.com/video/HGgpO13Icu8/v-deo.html
the ritual didnt fail, the briadwoods succeeded. vox machina was to late, whatever they wanted to do ... they archieved it and its now happening whatever that is xD
It did fail. Matt has said it failed because they didn't do the ritual on the solstice because of Vox Machina making them speed up their plans. It didn't do what it was supposed to do...not completely.
To answer your question about the hanged family. So this is a bit spoiler kinda, so if you intend to watch the actual live play show specifically campaign 3 don't read this. Marisha the actress who plays Keyleth play a new character named Laudna who is revealed to be one of hanged women on the tree. Her character is sort of this half dead half alive creepy looking woman.
Spoiler below so be warned if you really don't want to know. . . . . . . . . . ...no, it did not fail. The ritual 100% succeeded despite the setbacks and premature activation. The big bad has been brought back and is now setting things in motion for his eventual return to power. The Briarwoods served their purpose.
“Keyleth” and “death” can’t be stated in the same sentence without mentioning “cliff” and “goldfish”!!! All us Critter’s familiar with Campaign 1 know this well!!! 😂🤣
The people on tree...... I'm not sure if they go much further into who they are but if you're really interested... check out Critical Role campaign 3 episode 17.... 😉🤯
I always thought why feed off Casandra and not your wife? Then I thought; "Well the source of her power is that necklace so best not get a chance to lose it." Than why not feed from her wrist?: "She carves her symbols in those, a puncture might create an mistaken accent." Well then the only other places I can think are--....Nevermind.
@@Starsaber222 This. The tree only talks to them the NEXT time they are in Whitestone after it has healed a bit. So it could still happen. They had Keyleth set fire to the roots...which was a cringe af moment in the campaign...so they will probably have her talk to it and build a relationship like she did in the campaign.
Could you guys please do Doctor Who!!!! Please! I’m really interested of ur opinion on the Female doctor and Jenna Coleman being on The Sandman and Doctor who. 😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖
Cassandra's situation was a combination of mind control and years of abuse and gaslighting. For some background information, they actually did treat her like a daughter (against her will) for years. It's really dark
If you like the dynamic between Pike and Grog, there is a beautiful moment in the live game where Pike is trying to teach Grog to read.
It's really sweet.
No flowers for Groganon...
That is such a beautiful moment. It really shows the strength of Critical Role storytelling and the friendship between the players. Travis and Ashley role played this super sweet and toughing moment and the rest of the group waited and grinned through the whole thing.
So many D&D games are "So when can we kill something"? and miss the beauty of role play.
Theres a few "Mom Pike" moments too with Grog, that are really charming.
"We regret to inform you that the warranty on your vampire husbando has expired."
🤣🤣🤣
8:45 In the actual game. This happened: Sylas/Matt took control over Grogs mind.
He turned completely against his friends for a couple of rounds...Then as Travis/Grog said: Wait! I am raging & a barbarian can I even be charmed?
Matt checking the rules. No you cannot. That is why it is good to keep your special feats in mind guys.
Grog was right back fighting the Brierwoods
And that whole incident with Anders never should have happened.
@@AGhastlyGengar
The thing with Anders is a Dominate effect, which is more like full body puppeteering.
@@AGhastlyGengar IIRC, Anders went before Grog in the initiative order. Since Grog hadn't had a chance to rage yet, he was still vulnerable to mind control.
A bit of an explanation: keylith does not have a connection to a single entity, as a druid she draws her powers from her connection to nature. As for dark entities, there are a lot. There is a number of dark gods, called the betrayer gods, and even without them there is a whole slew of demon lords, devil princes, all of the hells and the abyss and gods knows what else floats around in the astral sea. Then there are also some demigods and so on, i think you get the idea.
Yes, the world of D&D is not binary good/evil with one deity for each. There are as many as the DM decides.
If you want to know more about Vax and Vex’s past, they have a novel: Kith and Kin. Won’t be any spoilers for upcoming seasons.
Came here to say this… glad I wasn’t the only one who thought this
Laura and Liam voice their characters in the audiobook version
@@msbowman Putting their voice over skills to good use
I bought the audiobook and loved it. I hope they see this comment and listen/read it.
I love it when I watch a reaction and see new people appreciate the relationships the same way I did during the live streams.
Even more than that I love how they appreciate the teamwork and the way powers work and how it's displayed in the show.
"Don't use dark magic", i don't know, bring back Keyleth as a dark druid half-elf vampire, sound really sweet actually :D
Plants with albinism can't produce chlorophyll and don't have any means of making energy for their growth, so they leech nutrients off of other plants around them. Vampire plants are real and a vampire druid in an all-white forest sounds rad as hell
For how "gods" and "powerful entities" work in the world of D&D, think of it kind of like Greek mythology. There are many godly beings(some good, some bad) and there are many powerful entities of all kinds. Much like Greek mythology sometimes powerful beings will lend their strength to creatures/humans to suit their own wants/needs, and others will have a more possessive or parasitical bond. In the animated series I believe you've only heard a handful of these names mentioned casually. Many of these beings require a large following to further their own strength with faith and worship.
"If Keyleth dies, we have to riot" - iconic quotes of 2022.
You got so many important things right, I can`t!
Everlight (Pike`s goddess) and Keyleth nature powers are not connected (in the direct meaning of connection), they just exist in the world.
And Sun Tree is absolutely full of light and goodness, it was created by a benevolent sun god :3
Next episode is wild.
I can't wait for goldfish just to see their reactions based off their reactions here.
@@andrewwebb3248 That's gonna be a while.
Great reaction looking forward to the finale! On character deaths (re 16:13, no spoilers), this is probably the only show that is immune to the "they've gotta kill someone for plot" thing - remember this is based on a game that has combat mechanics like hit points and damage from dice rolls, so if a character dies in a true-to-canon Vox Machine / Critical Role show it's always unscripted!
Granted this specific death...wasn't really taken from the campaign. Vex got hit with it instead of Keyleth, in the campaign. But yes, in general, no character is safe. Everything (deaths happening and revival success) come down to dice rolls.
Pike vs Sylas is SUCH a good fight
Also: in the game, Vex was the one to get hit by Delilah's spell (so keyleth didn't actually save her the way she did in the show).
That being said, I like how they did it in the show because it was sort of the culmination of Vex and Keyleth's relationship issues, since, as you said correctly, there's no way Vex could antagonize her anymore after she saved her life
deleting this post will remake it in a way after the next episode but I realised it might have been a bit spoilery by mistake
@@andyme3541 on the bright side, based on their clothing, I think they watched the last episode long before we got to see their reaction.
Yeah, they switched the death from Vex to Keyleth probably to make a future brush with death MORE powerful and significant, like it was in the campaign.
Keylith also admired the strong, confident, assertive Vex, and had a thing for *both* twins.
A big reason there is virtually no filler and they don't stretch out the episodes to fill them with something insubstantial is that the Briarwood arc runs from episode 24-38 in Campaign 1 (of those, 24-35 have been adapted into the 10 Briarwood episodes in the animation). With each episode clocking in at about 4 hours, there's over 45 hours of content to draw from.
True, a lot of table time is taken up by combat compared to animation time, but still, they had to condense and trim things down to squeeze as much as they could into these 10 episodes (and link the first two episodes in). They had the opposite problem of having to fill the time with something. ;)
Also, another reason that there isn't really any 'filler time' is that there's seven characters to spread the focus on, and unlike many other shows they are all equally important in the overall scheme of things. It's not "Percy and his band of friends" or Scanlan and the crew" or "Vex and the Vixens" where there's a clear main character and the others are the supporting cast.
Also also, the Titmouse crew is really good at their jobs. And the Critical Role people were closely involved with the creation process the whole way.
All of these things help explain why it's such a tightly scripted, well animated show that, even when it changes things, very much keeps the spirit of the original. :)
I'm... I'm so psyched for you guys to watch The Mighty Nein. Matt Mercer and these nerdy-ass voice actors created such beautiful stories.
The reason why it feels that they're not trying to extend the plot and are packing it with solid content, is because it's actually a summarisation.
This is the short version of literal hundreds of hours of gameplay. They've actually had to cut out and trim the content a whole lot... Which makes for this feeling of the episodes not having any fat to trim or gratuitous extra content
"Romance isn't dead."
Sylas - Vampire. Delilah - Necromancer (Mage who manipulates life and death).
Maybe romance is just un-dead?
Doesn't explain Twlight.
But then, nothing does.
Delilah, 'Bring my Sylas back, honour our Bargin'
The Whispered one, (AKA Vecna) 'Bitch please I already brought him back once for you, it's not my fault you couldn't keep him alive, that said, if anyone could make Demands of Vecna I would bet Delilah is right up there with Oorcus (The God of the Undead),
In D&D Charm's ability can't make you do something you wouldn't do anyway, so on some level, Cassandra must have hated Percy for leaving her, for Sylas to be able to exploit it as he did.
Everyone seams to forget, there is one more name on the list Percy has yet to kill, she ran away at the start
About the Family hanging from the Tree, watch Campaign 3 :)
Pike taking on Sylas was freaking dope, but Keyleth's moment was just so beautiful
Something you missed at the end of episode 5 is that the "family" that was hung on the tree wasn't a family - they were Whitestone residents who happened to resemble Vox Machina. The little girl was given a wooden version of Pike's holy symbol, for example. In both the game and the show Keyleth (Marisha Ray) is the first to notice. At the end of e5 when it goes to black you were talking over it (I was waiting for your reaction and didn't get to see it) and missed hearing Keyleth say, "It's us." This was a gruesome wanted poster, telling all of Whitestone who to look out for and what they planned to do with Vox Machina.
Not gonna lie, this annoyed me in unreasonable ways, especially when you hear them here contemplating what the (very obvious) meaning of them was.
Love that you love this show! So excited for the future of Vox Machina and any of the work from Critical Role.
For the record, characters can and do die in Critical Role. Because it is a role-playing game with results dependent on dice roles, there is always a chance that the dice do not land in someone's favor. Granted it's a lot easier to fight back death in D & D, if you have a skilled cleric, the right level of magic available, and a pricy diamond, two of the most common spells would be Revivify and Resurrection. Revivify is pretty much a sure thing, so long as you can get to the one who died within 1 minute, have the needed spell slot left, and a diamond worth 300 gold. Any longer than 1 minute for any reason, and you have to step up to Resurrection, you have more time can kinda be done whenever, though sooner is better, takes a much higher spell slot, and requires a diamond worth 500 gold... also, it's not a sure thing. With Resurrection dice roles come back into play.
With Matt all resurrections have a chance of failure, and it grows the more times, so the first death is pretty easy to come back from the second is a 50/50 the third is really hard and the fourth you are dead dead....
goldfish
@@andyme3541 yeah, he has homebrewed the rules to make death harder to come back from the more you die... so it means more to actually fully die. Also he incorporated an actual ritual for the spell instead of it being instantaneous.
15:05 There is a pantheon of gods called the prime deities. They include the Everlight, goddess of redemption who Pike serves, and the Dawnfather, god of sunlight and the harvest. Other gods will be referenced in subsequent seasons. You don't have to be a follower of a god to do magic. Keyleth is in fact is very suspicious of divine immortal entities.
4 loose categories of magic you see here include divine magic (Pike), Druidic magic (Keyleth), demon/abyssal magic (Percy), and arcane magic which is like non-affiliating neutral magic which the gods taught humanity long time ago. While clerics and paladins get divine magic channeled from their gods, arcane magic was accessible and created from scratch without needing to commune with exotic immortal entities like gods or demons.
When you asked how many dark/light entities are there: In DND land there are soooo many powerful beings that can give you power. Gods, angels, fey, demons, devils, and more! Not to mention that some people don't need outside influence and are born with magic (sorcerers), while some others aren't born with it but gain it through study and hard work (wizards). But, just for simplicity sake (and avoiding spoilers):
Pike gets her power from a holy goddess (cleric), Keyleth gets her power from nature itself no gods involved (druid), Scanlan gets his power from the magic of SONG (bard), Delilah gets her power from striking a bargain with an entity that wants her help with something (warlock), and Percy gets his from.. well, you'll see.
Things we learned:
1) Grog is a simpleton with simple solutions. You can't seduce him.
2) Stay away from "zippertwats"
15:15 quick rundown to help the research: Keileth is a Druid, with Nature related powers; Scanlan is a Bard, and need an artistic expression to cast his spells and Pile is a cleric, channeling the power of a goddess.
It’s an oversimplification, but helps.
Just for the sake of completion, Vex is a Ranger with limited spells and Grog rage can be considered a form of magic.
The people hung from the Suntree were made to look like the members of Vox Machina. If you back to the episode and pause you will notice the guy is painted like grog, they bolted horns into a redhead to look like Kiki, they dressed the children to look like Scanlan and Pike. Etc.
They were strung up as a waring.
Your guys' reactions have been a joy to watch.
Interesting note and funny you say Hadouken...in the live play sessions...Sunbeam Hadouken is what Travis(Grog) called Marisha's (Keyleth) Sunbeam spell...also in the live play session Silas was killed with a combo of Sunbeam and holy which took the shape of Holy Sunlight Dicks..as they were described
Hadouken!! I said the same thing when I watched lol I've absolutely loved watching these episodes again with you two! Looking forward to the finale and season 2!
I think that working from a dnd based story fundametally brings good tension. If someone died in game they die in the show. You really can't have meta information when thinking about story structuring etc. (ofcourse not spoiling here if or when it happens) And ofcourse this just applies to those who haven't watched the stream.
Cant wait for Season 2
Just found out today that season 2 is allready in production.
Nice call back about the missing holy water. Demons don’t have friends.
Great reaction! Can I also just say that I really appreciate that you make a point about needing to have access to the original series if we want to see the full reaction. You add your own value with your awesome reactions without taking anything away from the original creators. Looking forward to seeing you react to the final episode... then we all have to wait patiently for season 2. But that is already in the making, so it's just a matter of when, not if.
2:28 yeah, it's undead
20:17 now what happened to the people hung up in the tree is one of the really slow burns in Critical role, and it blew all our minds when it was revealed waaaay down the road!
Your comments about the number of times they go back to the family in effigy and wondering if it's foreshadowing are insightful.
Not sure if it will tie in to future seasons. If I think about it, it might, at least in a cameo kind of way or something.
Honestly, there have already been more tie-ins and synergies than I had expected, and I'll take whatever I can get and I'll love it. It's an expansive, persistent world at this point, with lots of content to reference, much like certain other media universes we might alk be aware of.
They're throwing everything that works into this, and that's awesome.
SPOILERS FOR CAMPAIGN 3 OF CRITICAL ROLE...
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yes, we do get to see at least one of them.
There are many Demons & Devils in D&D yes they are two different races, both Evil but Demons are Chaotic while Devils are Lawful. the Prime Dieatys important to this series are
The Dawn Farther,
The Everlight,
The Matron of Ravens, (this one succeeded where The Whispered one failed)
The Knowing mistress, &
The Wild Mother
none of the major Devils or Demons really appear in this campaign
Absolutely love this dynamic duo !!! You ladies are fire. I’m a huge fan of shows with bad ass ladies and having two bad ass ladies react is fantastic!! Wish you two did Arcane together 🍻 keep it goin ladies🔥🔥
My dnd party had an encounter with people trying to summon the whispered one, and we brought an aberration (patron) to the fight, the aberration took the power of the ritual/dark energy orb thing and became our bbeg
This series is based upon a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. The player characters can *die* in the game. Nobody is safe, main characters can definitely end up dead.
I think the tree was channeling the evil energy from Delilah's ritual out and dissipating it. Like drawing out a poison. Also, I can tell you that if you want to know more about the aftermath of what happened here, once you finish this season, you should watch Critical Role's current campaign. It takes place 30 years after Vox Machina, with a different group of characters (but the same cast). But it's set in the same world, and some things happen that does bring up the events of this series. They're about 30 episodes in right now, so you would have a bit of catching up to do. And I do recommend watching the series in order (so campaign 1, 2, then 3), but you could jump straight to 3 without missing much as long as you'd seen the animated series.
Yea, I saw it as the tree purging out the darkness. That being a big part of why it failed - sort of.
Ooh, I wouldn't go straight to campaign 3. There are spoilers in there. Unless that's not a concern I guess.
@@theanyktos There's some mention of late campaign two events, and a few characters we meet in campaign 1. But so far (though that could change shortly) most of the big spoilers are confined to the events that you see in the animated series. So while I do agree it's better to just go all the way through, if someone was curious, 3 would be a decent jumping on point.
@@cryofpaine Yea, the 'spoilers' in campaign 3 seem to not be spoilers if you've already watched 'Vox Machina' season 1. I assume that has been Matt's intent all along.
@@cryofpaine Well, there's also the point in Campaign 3 where they receive a letter from the Lady of Whitestone. That's quite a big spoiler considering the current state of affairs at the end of Season 1 animated series.
My favorite thing from Critical Role campaign 1: SPINNING ORB OF DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM
I’m a novice to D&D but there are multiple deities, demons, and Demi-gods in Matt Mercer’s world of Exandria where the campaigns take place. Deities of light, storms, the forces of nature, dark evil, even gods of trickery. Most that I know are from their second campaign after Vox Machina, but I won’t spoil anything in case they make an animated series for it.
No one ever expects the apogee solstice!
For a fun Stranger Things connection, look up the Whispered One's true name.
They sort of tell you the name of the entity Percy is entwined with in the subtitles. So I don't think it's a spoiler to say it's name is Orthax
Yeah, they dont say it in the campaign, verbally. But it's in the subtitles multiple times.
No the ritual didn't work. As they said it was supposed to happen during the solstice, but it was also said that it was still a few days away, the action of our heroes forced the Briarwood to act sooner than planned. Not to mention that no blood sacrifice was made, so the whispered one could not cross over. But it did do something, as you will see...
According to Matt in the post-campaign wrap up...
It actually did work. The Briarwoods succeeded in performing the ritual *despite* those setbacks. Problem is they just didn't know what the ritual's results would actually be.
I won't spoil anything, and I'm sure other people have pointed this out as well, but just because a character's storyarc isn't complete, or it doesn't fit well in the moment doesn't mean they can't die in this show. You're making assumption based on your knowledge of well used narrative tropes (which is totally fair, and works reasonably well for most media), but you have to remember this is based on a DnD game, which by its very nature is largely improvised and has an inherent element of randomness. If the players make bad choices and/or the dice just are not in their favour, player characters can and do die. And it doesn't matter that they're a main character who hasn't had a chance to explore all of their backstory yet, or a beloved NPC who was just about to get a major win in life, or a character who serves an important narrative function. It's a lot like real life that way. I'm not saying that's necessarily what happened here, just speaking in general. Plotarmor is not really a thing here. And by the same logic just because a character's main character arc is appearantly over, doesn't mean they necessarily die or leave.
I was laughing in the last one when you were saying one character was going to have to die.
In Dungeons and Dragons there are enumerable demons and devils and evils as well as good counterparts for each.
Also we don't get to hear the trees "voice" in the series. In the game he was affectionately nick named Mathew Macanatree. Lol
But this is actually in line with how things played out in the campaign. Keyleth didn't get to talk to the Sun Tree until the NEXT time they came to Whitestone after the Sun Tree had healed significantly. So if they are going to do the Sun Trees voice...it will be in season 2, probably.
1:53 That is a different name for Vecna, btw.
'Why did it fail?'... '... I feel like it worked... just at a slower start...'. - such an interesting train of thought, isn't it?
For the Algorithm! Bidet Fellow Critters!
Bidet!
3:25 so would you say she’s like a…
…wait for it…
…cassandwich?
If you look more closely the characters on the tree were villagers that resembled Vox Machina as a dark message.
This episode is so great! Regarding Vex and Vax, and their relationship, their story will be delved into in s2.
I’m sure others have said in the comments but just in case, “the whispered one” is *actual* Vecna, not the stranger things villain they named after him
In the show Vex struck the killing blow on Silus but it was better for the story to have Keyleth do it.
Love you achara 💖💖💖💖💋
Multiple demons and gods/goddess exist in the world of Dungeons and Dragons and the world that Matt created for this game turned animated show is filled with great lore and mystery pulling from multiple sources.
They do such great predictions for things that they don't even know about yet. Going and get their friend back ala Search for XXX.
Steph plays D&D!
The family becoming zombies on the tree ;)
There is an entire pantheon of gods and what are called betrayer gods. Some are connected, some are not. About Keyleth...no spoilers...keep watching!
By virtue of critter Arsequeef, here you can find the epic moment Keyleth obliterates Sylas
Briarwood with her sunbeam in the D&D live stream vs. the moment in the animated series. Fun side by side:
ua-cam.com/video/_hmjQjGJM_k/v-deo.html&list=PLqQNeBzVn7SheXXfvazjBFpxuEwkL6viO&index=10
The people hung on the tree don't really have any more affect, until campaign 3. One of them is reanimated and is one of the player characters. That story arc takes place maybe 40 years after the first campaign.
This is a story based on a Dungeons & Dragons game. Death is always a possibility . . .
Have you been able to experience an in person game of D&D yourself yet? Would love to hear a first timer's perspective!
20:37 ...Well one of them does return in campaign 3 in a major way. As does Lady Dhelila in a way
You forgot your "Sup Braw"
Here's the Sun Tree moment as it happened in the campaign and the show. Would be cool to see you 2 react to this. No Spoilers. There is a char on the tree that isn't in the show but he won't be either so no biggie. ua-cam.com/video/HGgpO13Icu8/v-deo.html
the ritual didnt fail, the briadwoods succeeded.
vox machina was to late, whatever they wanted to do ... they archieved it and its now happening whatever that is xD
It did fail. Matt has said it failed because they didn't do the ritual on the solstice because of Vox Machina making them speed up their plans. It didn't do what it was supposed to do...not completely.
Isn't the Whispered one suppose to be Vecna?
Yes. He started off being called the whispered one in the campaign. But eventually his true name is revealed.
Far down the road we get a tidbit of info on the ppl from the tree
To answer your question about the hanged family. So this is a bit spoiler kinda, so if you intend to watch the actual live play show specifically campaign 3 don't read this.
Marisha the actress who plays Keyleth play a new character named Laudna who is revealed to be one of hanged women on the tree. Her character is sort of this half dead half alive creepy looking woman.
Did it fail?
Spoiler below so be warned if you really don't want to know.
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...no, it did not fail. The ritual 100% succeeded despite the setbacks and premature activation. The big bad has been brought back and is now setting things in motion for his eventual return to power. The Briarwoods served their purpose.
"The family hanging on the tree... I don't know if we'll get to see them again".
**Spoiler**
Not in this series at least 😅👀
“Keyleth” and “death” can’t be stated in the same sentence without mentioning “cliff” and “goldfish”!!! All us Critter’s familiar with Campaign 1 know this well!!!
😂🤣
The people on tree...... I'm not sure if they go much further into who they are but if you're really interested... check out Critical Role campaign 3 episode 17.... 😉🤯
I always thought why feed off Casandra and not your wife? Then I thought; "Well the source of her power is that necklace so best not get a chance to lose it." Than why not feed from her wrist?: "She carves her symbols in those, a puncture might create an mistaken accent." Well then the only other places I can think are--....Nevermind.
There was a Massive amount of Cringe that wasn't included in the Cartoon, the Sun Tree speaking was just one example.
Everybody loved that, except for you. But I agree that it would have been cringey if that were included in this show, it just doesn't fit the tone.
@@elbruces It also didn't happen during this story arc, so we might get it at some point.
@@Starsaber222 This. The tree only talks to them the NEXT time they are in Whitestone after it has healed a bit. So it could still happen. They had Keyleth set fire to the roots...which was a cringe af moment in the campaign...so they will probably have her talk to it and build a relationship like she did in the campaign.
Could you guys please do Doctor Who!!!! Please! I’m really interested of ur opinion on the Female doctor and Jenna Coleman being on The Sandman and Doctor who.
😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖😖