After that last episode, I’m fully onboard with Bolaire. That’s such a great character hook!
Critical Role Critical Role Campaign 4 Episode 4 is a High-Octane Rollercoaster
- Thread starter Charlaquin
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Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Yeah, I wasn’t sure about him prior to episode 4, but that one won me over.
overgeeked
Open-World Sandbox
No, but it does generally have constraints like pick something from the listed options. Taliesin seems like the kind of person to continually say no, I need to be more special than that. See C2, C3, and now C4. C1 made sense because they converted from PF which had gunslingers as an option. But for both C2 and C3, he made Matt make him custom classes. Dude already has a life, several jobs, and has to prep and run a 5E campaign for 8 players with a worldwide audience.
I really cannot stand OC-style play. Here are your list of options…no, I must be more special than that. 5E is already superhero fantasy. Loaded with all kinds of hero to god options. But that’s not special enough. Taliesin seems to be a pain-in-the-ass kind of player. For example, if playing in a low-magic campaign of all mundane, non-caster dwarfs…he’d show up with a thri-kreen cleric/sorcerer/warlock/wizard…or have the referee make him a custom caster class.
OC as in Original Character, as in the style of play where players have to be painfully, tragically unique. See basically all of Taliesin’s starting characters for CR. At least Cad was off-the-rack. And, mysteriously, it was also his best character by far. Go figure.
Not sure what kind of attempt at telepathy this is.
Retros_x
Hero
Interpreting where your judgemental statements origin. Never claimed its telepathy, just wanting to inform how you come across. But I apologize, I interpreted something wrong:
I assumed it meant OC as in Original Crew to reference the OG critical role players. Now your comments seem to make more sense.
Ok, I think its unusual to have such a strong opinion about players yearning for homebrew. I think its pretty common. Its also common for DM to not allow it if they don't want it. Which brings me to my next point:
Its nice that you are worried about his workload but I think Brennan (or Matt) is able to deny a player such a wish if he thinks its too much. He also has a very big team for these public campaigns with a worldwide audience. And in general Brennan seems like he thinks very differently as you about player wishes outside of the strict rule framework, he basically always makes something like this possible and is homebrewing a lot. Crazy thought, but maybe he even enjoys some fantasy wish fulfillment for his players and don't see players like Taliesin as a pain in the ass like you do.
edit: I should add that I also would deny Taliesin these special homebrew at my table. But I am not a DM for Critical Role, I am a viewer. I only see an interesting character here, not an addition to my workload that I am not willing to do as I would as a DM.
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Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
I’m glad the original Lake Geneva group didn’t share your disdain for characters being “special,” or we’d never have gotten the cleric, the thief, or the ranger. Homebrewing new options to allow the players to realize their unique character concepts is a tradition as old as the hobby itself.
Ulorian - Agent of Chaos
Legend
I think you're both coming at this with different definitions of 'special'. The person you're responding to seems to be of the opinion that this Taliesin is a 'spotlight hog', so stretching the meaning of the word 'special' to an undesirable extreme (haven't watched Critical Role... this is just my interpretation of what this poster is saying, correct me if I'm wrong). You're definition of 'special' makes perfect sense for the context you're placing it in though.
Another tidbit about the origin for Bolaire that came up in the cooldown after Episode 4:
Taliesin apparently came up with idea of Bolaire after seeing the number of sentient weapons that Travis' characters encountered in previous campaigns, and wanted to play with the idea of what happens to these sentient magic items after they've been discarded by their owners. What kind of existence do they have?
Taliesin apparently came up with idea of Bolaire after seeing the number of sentient weapons that Travis' characters encountered in previous campaigns, and wanted to play with the idea of what happens to these sentient magic items after they've been discarded by their owners. What kind of existence do they have?
Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
I definitely wouldn’t characterize Taliesin as a spotlight hog. He has played a homebrew character in all of the campaigns, but he’s far from the only one to do so, and I’m pretty sure every PC in this campaign has homebrew elements. What Taliesin is, is goth. And I know a lot of DMs have a visceral aversion to anything they perceive as “edgy.” But just because his characters tend to have dramatic and dark elements doesn’t mean he actually takes up more spotlight than anyone else.
Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Been mentioned a couple times now in the thread, but yeah, bears repeating. The concept is very specifically tied to D&D.
Retros_x
Hero
No it was meant as being special in the sense of not wanting to use the default character classes or species. The player is definitely not a spotlight hog in the sense of wanting to be in the centre of the scene often, he often is more of the opposite IMO. He just likes high-concept characters. In this case its a homebrewed species.
I wanted to add to the points already stated, that having homebrew species is very common for homebrew settings.
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