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I will clarify I misunderstood the original critique. I wasn't understanding it was only of the DM.
Was this line ad-libbed or planned? Because the set up for "Why would you want to milk a dead cow even once?" was pretty much perfection."You can only milk a dead cow once!"
After the DM sets up the quest, it's all ad lib/improv. When playing, we had certain budget limitations to keep in mind (insurance, SFX, etc) but restriction breeds creativity as it were. The only script the players had was the ad copy.
It's interesting to hear different takes on the show. For me, Kelsey as Blagdor is awesome. Not only is it arresting because it's a female voice, but she has an accent (New Jersey?) and speaks in today's slang. Over the top to be sure, but still hilarious to me. As for the pauses and awkward moments with the fantasy characters as you mention, my view is that it adds to the central premise of the show. The fantasy characters are avatars for the game players, so they are governed by whatever happens with the players. If there's a long silence, they have to stand around looking at each other. To put it another way, for me the show isn't so much about depicting the adventures of a band of fantasy characters on a quest, in which case the dialogue and movement would be much more fluid and natural. Rather, the show is about a D&D game and watching how the players' interactions play out with avatars on screen. I think that's sort of the charm of the project.
Yeah, in the reddit thread our producer claimed that the experience at the table is the desired effect of the product. My favorite parts of E1 are "substantial amount" and "he looks genuine ...ly frightened" and Terkel's facial expression is very exaggeratedly changed.
That was one of my favorite parts, but for a different reason. I liked that the paper said "substantial amount" instead of having a number.
Yes, that was what I meant. It's a huge trope from DMs that the reward is usually vague and just "enticing enough" and Kevin fell right into it, so we mocked it in live-action.
Valid points. Maybe I need to look at it through a different lens as I was expecting to follow the story of the game a little more than what materialized. Regarding Blagdor/Kelsey...I thought similarly to you initially during the trailer, but over the course of episode 1, it wore quickly on me.
Feedback of all kinds is appreciated. We have what we have for season 1; it's wrapped, ready to release, maybe small tweaks like adding a "Previously on..." and so forth. But we are taking every bit of input for season 2 and beyond. We've gotten a ton of response from people outside the hobby which is really what the producers are trying to hit on for true success. That's a reason why the episodes are 30 minutes, so casual audience can tune in. Critical Role is probably the most popular media in the fandom and their "episodes" are weekly 3-4 hour marathons.
I kind of agree that it would have been nice for something to have happened in the first episode, action-wise. that was the fun of playing- at least as a kid. and it'll be hilarious, I'm sure, to see what kind of special effects/props/makeup they use for the actors on this if it's non-human involved. also the inevitable whining that happens when somebody fumbles.
Yeah man, just above you. And you're not stepping on any toes; they're the biggest game in town. Professional voice actors doing characters with a superb DM.
If you check out Critical Role, start with Campaign 2. The first campaign is a million episodes long and they started with poor audio/production quality and the characters were already level 9 bc they'd been playing off camera for years. Campaign 2 just started a year ago, top notch production and they started with new characters, just meeting each other, at level 2. Much easier to get into
So far, this guy is owning it (the live action dude, that is.) The subtle facial ticks when hes standing around waiting, the looks down the nose, physically portraying the chatacters/player's exasperation with.....everything. Hes got a really good grasp on it. Plus, he isnt exactly to trope either ("Male elf? Gotcha: skinny and effeminate.") which is more interesting.
We all started playing pigeon dating simulators, man, and it just kinda evolved from there.
I think this is easily addressed for S2, which is totally gonna be a thing. (I hope!)
much better showing for the DM here, but I agree. I'm no director, but maybe that should have recorded him saying some lines like "And we will pause here...come back for the next epp..." and then edit them in where appropriate. I get that it is one long session, but not for us, the viewer. Its ok, to guide us as well.
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