The Mighty Nein Animated Series to Debut on Prime Video on November 19th

The animated adaptation of Critical Role's second campaign is set to debut on Prime Video next month. Prime Video released some new information about The Mighty Nein animated series, including its release date of November 19th. Several new stills were revealed via Rolling Stone, as well as the reveal of several guest stars appearing in the animated show. Mark Strong will play Trent Ikithon, Ming-Na Wen will play Dairon, Anika Noni Rose will play Marion Lavorre, Alan Cumming will play Gustav Fletching, and Auliʻi Cravalho will play Toya.

The Mighty Nein is an adaptation of Critical Role's second campaign, which ran from 2018 through 2021. The campaign featured a group of misfit heroes who were drawn into a conflict between the Dwendalian Empire and the Kryn Dynasty, with the group uncovering corruption and deceit in both countries.

One key difference to The Mighty Nein compared to the previous Critical Role animated series The Legend of Vox Machina is that episodes will run for over 40 minutes. The cast is describing the series as more of a drama than The Legend of Vox Machina.

 

[Parmandur]

Is this the season with the controversial death?

This os the series that will have that, and I think odds are they will get there in fhe first season...but that's a distinct "maybe".

 

[Charlaquin]

Mollymauk Tealeaf dies due to an unfortunate series of choices. Burch made a very dangerous decision, Jaffe used a HP sacrificing ability and refused to back down, and Mercer was like "Well... okay" and executed the character. Could he have backed off and delivered a less final fate? Yes. Was Jaffe absolutely asking for it, in the spirit of playing his character? Also yes. Could Burch have been more cautious? She was a guest, but still yes. Was everyone tired after a very long game? Yes.

For whatever it’s worth, my two cents on the matter is:
I think Matt’s call was perfectly reasonable. Taliesin made kind of an unforced error for sure, but in his defense, it was kinda what the class he was playing was built to do, and I kind of understand him wanting to play aggressively. And like you said, it had been a long game and everyone was tired.

Ashly Birch prioritized roleplaying in a way that was actively detrimental to her character’s effectiveness in combat, which in my opinion is fine when it only affects your character, but can become a problem when it affects other players’ characters, which it did here. But, I recognize that it isn’t my table, and as there were no hard feelings among the cast, I think it was perfectly acceptable. Moreover, the response from a lot of fans, particularly towards Birch, was completely inappropriate.

And I’ll say again that in the long term, it was hugely impactful on the overarching story. Any finger-pointing about whose fault it was, if any, falls ultimately flat in the face of that being a defining moment of the campaign. The goal of D&D is to have fun and create exciting, memorable stories, and in that moment they absolutely succeeded in doing so. That’s all that really matters at the end of the day.

 

[Reynard]

This os the series that will have that, and I think odds are they will get there in fhe first season...but that's a distinct "maybe".

Yeah, I meant to write "is this the campaign that has that" but my brain was in TV land.

 

[overgeeked]

FYI: they've altered the storyline a bit

Yep. They've been clear about that for awhile now. The controversial death might also be altered. Not sure, but it's possible. There's not a lot I'd want them to change of the major beats, so here's to hoping they didn't go wild.

 

[Charlaquin]

Yep. They've been clear about that for awhile now. The controversial death might also be altered. Not sure, but it's possible. There's not a lot I'd want them to change of the major beats, so here's to hoping they didn't go wild.

It seems like that death scene would translate very well to animation with no changes. In fact, both of the elements that made it feel weird in a gameplay context would be completely invisible in any realtime portrayal.

 

[Parmandur]

It seems like that death scene would translate very well to animation with no changes. In fact, both of the elements that made it feel weird in a gameplay context would be completely invisible in any realtime portrayal.

Yeah, and while it is clear they did not plan for it to happen in the tabletop Campaign, something that they build the TV show around will allow it to be some pretty slick storytling I reckon.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

It seems like that death scene would translate very well to animation with no changes. In fact, both of the elements that made it feel weird in a gameplay context would be completely invisible in any realtime portrayal.

Yeah, it was a drama-first choice. The push back was from critters who wanted to see a campaign-length arc from a character, like they'd been trained to expect with campaign one.

 

[overgeeked]

Yeah, it was a drama-first choice. The push back was from critters who wanted to see a campaign-length arc from a character, like they'd been trained to expect with campaign one.

To be fair, that's effectively been the baseline for D&D since the Hickman Revolution back in the 1980s.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

To be fair, that's effectively been the baseline for D&D since the Hickman Revolution back in the 1980s.

Oh, neither side is wrong, other the people who decided that death threats were a reasonable reaction to anything that happens on Critical Role.

 

[overgeeked]

Oh, neither side is wrong,

Yeah. It's not about who's right. People being shocked about character death in D&D is not a new thing is all I was trying to say. Expecting PCs to survive has been a thing since the mid-to-late 80s.

other the people who decided that death threats were a reasonable reaction to anything that happens on Critical Role.

Yeah, those people are wrong. I came in after all that. I was surprised by the death when I got to it and floored when I realized just how toxic people were about it.