Critical Role Reveals Soldiers' Table and Motivations

The first of Critical Role's three tables has officially been revealed. Near the end of last night's episode, the Soldiers were revealed as Kattigan Vale (Robbie Daymond), Teor Pridesire (Travis Willingham), Thimble (Laura Bailey), Tyranny (Whitney Moore), and Wicander Halovar (Sam Riegel). The group's initial objective will be to track down the smuggler Casimir Gavendale, who betrayed a conspiracy to rescue condemned rogue Thjazi Fang and then left the city in pursuit of Teor's brother Cyd Pridesire.

Casimir's Crow Keepers (a thieves guild) had attacked Thimble immediately prior to the campaign, leading to her not delivering a glyph that would have transported him to safety. Meanwhile, Kattigan and Teor are old associates of Casimir, as they had all served in a mercenary group that rebelled several years prior to the start of the series. Tyranny and Wicander are joining the party as Casimir had dealings with Wicander's family House Halovar, and Wicander is seeking to rectify the wrongs of his family. Tyranny is seemingly loyal to Wicander, having made a pact with him to enter the Material Plane.

Two more tables will be revealed in Critical Role, presumably by the end of the next episode. One group, the Schemers, will likely look to take on the Sundered Houses and their growing influence on Dol Majkar, while the Seekers will likely be tasked with protecting Occtis Tachonis (Alex Ward) from his family and also exploring the state of the afterlife in the aftermath of the gods' death.

 

[nyvinter]

This is also the head of a family of death-themed sorcerers that make the evil cultists faction aligned with demons and a chained celestial in their basement scared. "They should have gotten weak like the rest of us but they keep growing in strength."

Even if we've only seen Occtis before, everything we've heard about them has not been good and it was obvious they were the ones doing the on-going coup at the school since that were their domain. And this is the head of that family?

Brennan is too much of a Tolkien fan not to consider "wizards are both subtle and quick to anger."

 

[Charlaquin]

Not, really. No. There was plenty of back-and-forth during the scene. Several exchanges occurred between them. Marisha had plenty of warnings. She chose to keep going. It wasn’t rocks fall, you die. It was two NPCs telling her to stop, including her friend. She didn’t listen.

Well, I mean, she did listen. And she walked away from that interaction alive, and thanks to a lucky saving throw, unharmed. Which I think you and I are at least in agreement was awesome! I was even fine with him saying “if you keep talking to me, I’ll kill you where you stand.” That was a very clear and direct warning that the character was in immediate danger, which she heeded. Had he actually just killed her instead of giving that warning, that would have struck me as too fast of an escalation with too little warning. But, that isn’t what happened, so this is all hypothetical anyway.

 

[TiQuinn]

All well and good, except that this was said super-powerful NPC’s very first scene, and it went from 0 to 100 immediately, which left the players no opportunity to learn this was not a character to be messed with. I understand “mess around, find out” but there was no mess around phase here. It very nearly went directly to the finding out.

Of course, it didn’t actually happen that way, and the way it did happen I thought was pretty awesome. Everyone got to learn how dangerous and quick to anger this character was, in a visceral and scary way. From this point on, anyone who messes with this character is asking for whatever may happen as a result.

It made for great drama. And in game terms, there’s no reason that he had to “kill” her character. She was going to lose actions each round, meaning Primus could’ve decided to humiliate her with more spells but not actually attack her, which would’ve also been harrowing.

 

[nyvinter]

The curse did not come from Primus.

 

[Charlaquin]

The curse did not come from Primus.

Was that confirmed in the Cooldown?

 

[TiQuinn]

Was that confirmed in the Cooldown?

Yeah, it was as you said. Mulligan said she would’ve been unable to take an action each round and they discussed how it confirms how evil Occtis’ family is. I don’t think that would’ve come from the dean.

 

[nyvinter]

I'll have to rewatch but I'm fairly certain Brennan said in the episode that the curse didn't come from Primus when Murray were rolling insight/perception after the curse failed.

 

[Charlaquin]

I'll have to rewatch but I'm fairly certain Brennan said in the episode that the curse didn't come from Primus when Murray were rolling insight/perception after the curse failed.

I thought he just said that Primus wasn’t performing any spellcasting components but not necessarily that he wasn’t the one casting. But I could also be the one misremembering. I do remember that the implication seemed to be that it wasn’t from Primus, and my assumption was actually that he had some invisible henchman in the room doing it. Which I thought the scene at the end of the episode kind of soft-confirmed for me. But, I was holding the possibility in my mind that it may have been Primus after all and he may just have some special ability to cast without components.

 

[nyvinter]

Fair! I could very much be wrong.

 

[TiQuinn]

I thought he just said that Primus wasn’t performing any spellcasting components but not necessarily that he wasn’t the one casting. But I could also be the one misremembering. I do remember that the implication seemed to be that it wasn’t from Primus, and my assumption was actually that he had some invisible henchman in the room doing it. Which I thought the scene at the end of the episode kind of soft-confirmed for me. But, I was holding the possibility in my mind that it may have been Primus after all and he may just have some special ability to cast without components.

They do seem to fight with overwhelming force. Six ghouls at the end of that episode! Woof!