Watch Chris Perkins' First Episode of DICE, CAMERA, ACTION

WotC has just launched an official Dungeons & Dragons web show called Dice, Camera, Action. It stars Chris Perkins running a game for Holly Conrad, Jared Knabenbauer, Anna Prosser Robinson, and Nathan Sharp. They are playing Curse of Strahd, so only watch it if you don't mind major spoilers. The video is nearly two-hours long. Enjoy!

[video=youtube;a1ZbgywIF6Y]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1ZbgywIF6Y[/video]​

 

[MrHotter]

Okay, I've watched all of the first episode and part-way through the second one... and can state quite clearly that my opinion of this show is mixed-to-slightly-negative for one huge reason:

None of the characters EXCEPT for Evelyn want to accomplish anything.
....

Yea, I'm not feeling the energy yet. I think the format has something to do with it. If they were sitting around the same table the dynamic would be different. Having everyone on video chat means that they can't really talk over each other so they spend a lot of time looking at their computer.

It also does not help that everyone is strangers. The banter has been polite with some teasing, but if they were old friends they would be having more fun with each other.

For a completely different take on Ravenloft you may want to listen to the Board with Life guys do the the I6 module. That was much more fun to listen to (it's an audio podcast). It's only 10 episodes long if you just listen to the Ravenloft ones. Before they even get out of Barovia they've already made so many bad decisions that usually end with burning down whatever building they are trying to protect. https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/board-with-life-radio/id867611785?mt=2

I'm going to keep watching Chris and the gang. I'm planning on running CoS and I'm thinking it will get better as the players get more comfortable with the format and the game.

 

[CrusaderX]

Okay, I've watched all of the first episode and part-way through the second one... and can state quite clearly that my opinion of this show is mixed-to-slightly-negative for one huge reason:

None of the characters EXCEPT for Evelyn want to accomplish anything.

Right now you have a SINGLE character trying to do things... and the other three PCs are basically making faces, complaints and not doing a damn thing but simply following the paladin along because the game requires them to. For a game that is meant to get other people to want to play... those CHARACTERIZATIONS SUCK. ESPECIALLY when you have THREE OF THE FOUR of them acting this way.

Characters have WANTS. They have NEEDS. They NEED something, and it's watching them try to attain that something which makes for compelling drama. But right now... Strix, Diath, and Paultin have not shown us a single thing that they want or desire or are looking for. They're just there... acting as an ass-faced Greek chorus whining every time Evelyn makes a choice to help someone. They are passively trying to stop the actions Anna Posser is throwing out there by ridiculing all of her choices.

Pretty much. Comments on the YouTube channel said that Anna should tone down her roleplaying. Which is ridiculous. Anna doesn't need to tone it down, the other players need to step it up.

 

[iserith]

Okay, I've watched all of the first episode and part-way through the second one... and can state quite clearly that my opinion of this show is mixed-to-slightly-negative for one huge reason:

None of the characters EXCEPT for Evelyn want to accomplish anything.

Right now you have a SINGLE character trying to do things... and the other three PCs are basically making faces, complaints and not doing a damn thing but simply following the paladin along because the game requires them to. For a game that is meant to get other people to want to play... those CHARACTERIZATIONS SUCK. ESPECIALLY when you have THREE OF THE FOUR of them acting this way.

Characters have WANTS. They have NEEDS. They NEED something, and it's watching them try to attain that something which makes for compelling drama. But right now... Strix, Diath, and Paultin have not shown us a single thing that they want or desire or are looking for. They're just there... acting as an ass-faced Greek chorus whining every time Evelyn makes a choice to help someone. They are passively trying to stop the actions Anna Posser is throwing out there by ridiculing all of her choices.

In improvisation, we call this negging. Deliberately stomping on the offers given to you to start or continue scenes. And by doing so... you can STOP SCENES DEAD. For if the paladin wasn't saying "Let's go here!" or "Let's help this person!"... the party would be doing jack all right now.

Horrible, horrible, HORRIBLE character choices made here, and makes for a very irritating show to watch. It's why Critical Role is so much better than most of the other RPG shows of this point, because every single character has a WANT or a NEED, and is always trying to go after it... rather than acting as the fly in the ointment because it's "funny" or because the player hasn't really thought about who their character is or what they want now that they're trapped in this realm.

What this show needs desperately is for [MENTION=82759]WotC_Trevor[/MENTION] to tell the three performers besides Anna to come up with a reason for your character to actually want to accomplish things here so that they become ACTIVE participants in the show, rather than passive wastes of space. Because the show is going to die if they don't... because we as an audience SIMPLY WON'T CARE about them.

I'm going to finish this second episode, and I hope against hope the other three characters actually find a desire to being being active. Because they desperately need it.

Couldn't agree more and this is very common in actual play videos/podcasts in my experience.

I will add that there is a disconnect in tone. Chris seems to be playing it straight Ravenloft; the players seem to want to make jokes all the time. I can appreciate the humor, especially since many players in AP videos fail to recognize they have an audience to entertain. But trying to crack jokes all the time in Ravenloft as it is being run isn't a fit in my view.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Pretty much. Comments on the YouTube channel said that Anna should tone down her roleplaying. Which is ridiculous. Anna doesn't need to tone it down, the other players need to step it up.

Yeah, there's two different things about Anna's portrayal of the character that could be addressed, so we don't really know which side the comments might be talking about.

First, there's the "character" itself in the roleplay-- extremely happy, extremely helpful, "Southern" voiced, rather naive, and pretty oblivious to the comments going on around her.

Then there's the character's actions in the roleplay-- finding or coming upon situations or problems, and choosing to help the people involved just because the character is a good person.

If the comments are complaining about the former, then sure I can kind of understand it because a lot of times people get annoyed with the Superman / goody-two-shoes type of character... we being a rather cynical society and all. I personally would rather see her acknowledge it when the others ridicule her and then stand up for herself because it gives the character more presence and strength (which is all about what a paladin is with that really high CHA) but I'd rather see Evelyn as-is than the blank space the other three characters are.

But if the comments are complaining that she's actually doing things... finding problems to solve... then those people can go screw themselves. The last thing anyone wants to watch is four characters being led through the plot by the DM because they are passive wastes of space. At that point the game becomes the REALLY worst kind of "railroad"... not one where the DM is forcing the players to follow his track, but the one where the DM is having to pull the PCs along the track because the players just refuse to make ANY choices whatsoever.

For a show we are supposed to watch... that provides no drama and no reason to watch in the slightest.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Couldn't agree more and this is very common in actual play videos/podcasts in my experience.

I will add that there is a disconnect in tone. Chris seems to be playing it straight Ravenloft; the players seem to want to make jokes all the time. I can appreciate the humor, especially since many players in AP videos fail to recognize they have an audience to entertain. But trying to crack jokes all the time in Ravenloft as it is being run isn't a fit in my view.

Yup. It's the exact reason why the Friday livestreams WotC posted were always so blah to me too. No one was a performer, so they provided no "performance". And really... you need performance for something like this to hold a person's attention. No one wants to watch people just sit around and goof off.

Which is why Critical Role has been as successful as it has been, because every single participant is an actor. They know how to inhabit a character and they know how to remain in character and they know how to give their character wants and strive for things to give the show propulsion. They know how when it's time to be serious and when they can afford to fool around... but even more important the fooling around is in character. It's the characters who provide the humor based on who they are, rather than the players making jokes at the expense of the game. As you say... the players aren't treating the tone of Ravenloft with the way deserves.

I'd have no problems if the PCs occasionally made a joke as a way to lighten their own mood because of how oppressive being in Ravenloft is. But that's not what we're getting. We're getting a bunch of players uncomfortable, unwilling, or unable to actually immerse themselves into the setting, have their PCs react with any semblance of honesty, and instead making jokes and meta commentary about what is going on.

And that's just not compelling to watch.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I agree with a lot of what you guys are saying. However, I do think that Anna/Evelyn could tone it down a little. I think that she's been so forceful and forward with the role playing that the others are taking a back seat. They kind of see her as the one who instigates the action, and they let it happen. Kind of par for he course for a paladin in a Ravenloft game.

That may not be the case, it's very hard to know for sure, but I've seen games where one person dominates the game because they are the loudest and most "aggressive" (for lack of a better term) role player, and the others tend to clam up.

I'm not trying to knock Anna...at times she's by far the most entertaining...but at other times I just want her to allow the others to take the lead a bit.

I do think that the format is the biggest challenge. And I agree that the other players could perhaps try and "say yes" a bit more to help move things along. But looking at the situation, I don't know if I can blame players for being hesitant given the scenario. I mean, I'm already familiar with the module so I know what's going on....but if I didn't, it would all be sufficiently creepy to put me on guard.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

It also does not help that everyone is strangers. The banter has been polite with some teasing, but if they were old friends they would be having more fun with each other.

I don't know exactly how "strangers" they are. For example, Jared is a friend of Holly's husband if not also a friend of hers, and Nate is at least a friend-of-a-friend to both Holly and Jared. I think it is just the format of everyone video-chatting rather than being in the same room that is amplifying things that wouldn't seem so "big" otherwise.

...and I can't help but expect there is some measure of what I refer to as the "Required Reading Effect," in the players that don't seem to be as interested in actually doing the adventure at hand. I call it the Required Reading Effect because that is when I first realized I was having it myself; a book that I probably would have chosen to read had I found it on a library shelf on my own and read the blurb was so uninteresting to me that I could not, even when trying, make any meaningful progress in reading it, and the only reason for it was that the choice whether I would read the book or not was taken away from me and made by whoever decided upon the Required Reading list for my school.

 

[iserith]

Yup. It's the exact reason why the Friday livestreams WotC posted were always so blah to me too. No one was a performer, so they provided no "performance". And really... you need performance for something like this to hold a person's attention. No one wants to watch people just sit around and goof off.

Which is why Critical Role has been as successful as it has been, because every single participant is an actor. They know how to inhabit a character and they know how to remain in character and they know how to give their character wants and strive for things to give the show propulsion. They know how when it's time to be serious and when they can afford to fool around... but even more important the fooling around is in character. It's the characters who provide the humor based on who they are, rather than the players making jokes at the expense of the game. As you say... the players aren't treating the tone of Ravenloft with the way deserves.

I'd have no problems if the PCs occasionally made a joke as a way to lighten their own mood because of how oppressive being in Ravenloft is. But that's not what we're getting. We're getting a bunch of players uncomfortable, unwilling, or unable to actually immerse themselves into the setting, have their PCs react with any semblance of honesty, and instead making jokes and meta commentary about what is going on.

And that's just not compelling to watch.

I've watched some Critical Role, but not a lot. I didn't like the way the DM handled some of the conversation of the game.

DCA also has a lot of asking to make checks and players asking questions - it really turns me off. I feel like it could be really good though if everyone paused and had a good Session Zero to get on the same page.

 

[The Grassy Gnoll]

I watched the first one of the WotC twitch and I was ... Bored.

Lack of engagement, lack of any sense of character bar the paladin, whose character is kind of irritating. If the other three also conveyed a character then hers wouldn't seem so overpowering and consequently the "tone down the RP" would subside.

I've read that Chris P is more serious in his own games than on AI - perhaps the players here are trying to create another AI. But there is definitely a disconnect going on there. The AI guys are very close irl which lends an easy tone to the banter and there is a remit to be a show designed to entertain a big ass room at a convention, consumed en masse. The podcast is a more intimate entertainment format, which doesn't need the constant zingery of comedy to work so well, being consumed singly or in small groups although many of them.

They all seem a bit...immature? Sounds harsh, I know.

A bit more "yes and" buy in from the others would enliven things I think but as it stands for me, with a backlog of Critical Role to catch up on, I know where I'm going to invest my precious leisure time.

Sorry Chris, but I think you've been let down by the players.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I've watched some Critical Role, but not a lot. I didn't like the way the DM handled some of the conversation of the game.

DCA also has a lot of asking to make checks and players asking questions - it really turns me off. I feel like it could be really good though if everyone paused and had a good Session Zero to get on the same page.

I agree. For something like this, I would have expected a bit of preparation as a group ahead of time. Especially given that not all seem to be familiar with 5E. I was kind of surprised by the lack of familiarity with some of the mechanics and class abilities. But mostly it would have been to establish mood and theme and group dynamics.

Maybe thy did that, though, and the dynamic is that they're a group of selfish types who get dragged into action by their paladin friend. I mean, as a concept it works, but it certainly doesn't have the vibe of being intentional.