a sideblog for my critical role habit

a place to reblog critical role stuff with reckless abandon and occasionally write things / Ao3 Spoilers abound! I don't really tag past campaign spoilers, so proceed with caution. I tag actively-streaming series "critrole spoilers" and “cr spoilers” until about Tuesday following the air date (after the ep is available on YouTube).

[utilitycaster]

(affectionately, as Thimble fucking demolishes the shadows) a HORRIBLE fairy. a BLOODTHIRSTY little creature.

[undead-knick-knack]

They're going to the Dol-Makjar Gay Pride Parade 🏳️‍🌈

[ccattnipp]

Up✨

[ginawankenobi]

Hero’s Handiwork (or, an introduction to chalk)

[littlebosslady7]

Thaisha Lloy Lore drop from @quiddie on her instastory.

[twinklestarss]

“Hey, everybody. We're meeting downstairs in an area that is slightly more secret, but to my understanding, not the most secret.”-Hero D'vyen

Campaign 4 Episode 28: Chasing Shadows

[redjennies]

y'know I never gave much credence to the theories that Thjazi's spirit was literally tied to Julien's shadow curse, but I will admit, in light of recent information, it is by far the funniest answer to "where in the afterlife is Thjazi Fang?"

[redjennies]

where in the afterlife is Thjazi Fang? wrong answers only:

in Julien's shadow making mocking gestures when no one's looking

right behind Nullus Tachonis no matter which way he turns, Bugs Bunny-style

trapped in a gem (classic)

hiding in a tree in the Golden Orchard

at the bottom of Olbalad's coffin hanging out with Termina and Lady Cormoray

Rumblecusp

[rudplant]

i have actually been thinking about all these little "hal won't be happy about me involving his kids into this" and "hal will kill me if anything happens to you" comments we've heard throughout the campaign and

i kinda believe that hal trusts his children more than that??? he knows that his daughters are not little girls but young brilliant women and he acts accordingly. i mean of course he would never put them directly in danger, of course he protects them, of course he wouldn't want them to be harmed in any way BUT

he very well knows that they are capable and smart. and they have each other, and they have elodie, and they have him and he has them, and they are not alone. he doesn't tell them everything but he's not actively hiding stuff or something. he gives them the opportunity to know things they get to know. he's honest when he says that everything's bad

he lets shadia use the paint and the blades even though he himself does not feel very confident about them

he lets hero be around and organize their little conspiracy teams

and yeah sure, he would potentially kill anybody who put his kids in danger (or is the source of the danger). but he's not as overprotective as people think about him and obviously not as overprotective as thjazi was towards him

he worries about his kids a lot but he also believes in them a lot, at least from what i see

[narcoticwriter]

The Sundered Houses gathering according to the tables: They're planning something that might put the entire city in danger! They have a ritual and there's going to be casualties and sacrifices! We need to be ready for complete fallout!

The Sundered Houses gathering in reality: Hey, Primus? This is an intervention. What the fuck are you and your family doing?

[haffkaff]

Wick’s first attack roll of the campaign was to punch Julien and I think that’s incredible

[navpike]

someone should make a list

[mingus-archives]

Have we considered that Essek was able to constantly available to help the nein teleport because he was shirking all of his shadowhand responsibilities?

[gros-chat-fait]

The Banners years.

[emily-axford]

CRITICAL ROLE: CAMPAIGN 4 Episode 28: Chasing Shadows

[captainofthetidesbreath]

the table (non-Azune players) laughing when Brennan says the table (House Einfasen) laughs is such a great bit

[redjennies]

it feels like there's a direct line from the question that kicked off the Shapers War being "why can't I keep my family safe?" and the reveal that Sylandri directly controlled which elves were allowed to have children. between "we were the only people that knew we were doing it without a reward. the land that was promised to us after death was the same as life, just more suffering. endless wasteland, choked by ash and fire." and "an eternity, to have all of your complexity, all of your possibility, all of your dreams folded into an idyllic paradise where you would be punished for the most minor infraction?" no wonder the orcs were the first to kill their god and the elves were the last. whether it was a certainty or not at the time of the Shapers' War, the elves had to know there was at least a chance this rebellion would end in a slow extinction event for their people, and I'm inclined to believe this might be in part the reason they named their god-slaying weapon The Last Arrow. therefore, Vaelus and those who fought for Sylandri were likely asking themselves the same question that motivated the Lloys to build the Pariah Blades.

it's also interesting in the difference between the elves of the Old Path and the practitioners of other races. if the ability to have children was decided to only be granted to the most faithful then elves like Hannan and his wife were foregoing the possibility of ever passing on their traditions to their biological children as the other races of the Old Path could. of course, biological family isn't the only type of family, but it does mean the elven druids had to put themselves in more danger in order to find others who shared their beliefs. there were no generations of secret worship. they had to intentionally seek each other out just to learn about the Path, let alone find community with each other, and if they were discovered, if they confided in the wrong person, they were persecuted the most harshly by their goddess of life and nature.

in the blessing of Azgra, the orcish druid Agari Shadow blesses him most of all for "his honesty, because of all the gods of Aramán, ours was the only one who never lied about what he truly was." Sylandri is initially set up to be seen as the kindest of the Shapers, the Green Mother who allowed her people to live in an eternal paradise even after death, and slowly, that portrayal has been peeled back as we learn more about Vaelus and Hannan to something just as malicious as Azgra. for all his cruelty—and make no mistake, he was cruel and the orcs suffered greatly under him—Azgra did not leave a blight on Kahad as he died, as far as we know. his Barrowdell is deemed the only positive Barrowdell in Aramán. in her final moments, Sylandri was so spiteful thst she damned her people, both those who were faithful to her and those who weren't, to genocide rather than see them flourish without her.

[kerosene-in-a-blender]

Thinking about how Thjazi not breaking the glyph was a snap decision. He didn't plan his own execution in advance as part of a masterstroke play, based on how he was joking with Hal he clearly expected to escape using the glyph. And then he saw that falcon, presumably Mara the Wing. Others have mentioned that he likely chose to die because what he was doing with the blood from the River Gavzidra required someone be in the Tenebral Reaches, and him seeing Mara signaled to him that her passage had been blocked, and he realized he had an express if one way ticket to exactly where his plans needed someone to be. So Thjazi chose to allow his own execution to proceed, and rushed out his last words to Hal in the scant few seconds he had. Circumstances very suddenly required him to willingly sacrifice himself for his cause, and he made that choice very decisively even as he was clearly scared to die. Thjazi was certainly a lot of things, but one of those things was that he was a man who was willing to give up everything if it meant living out his ideals.