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Causal factors in the rise of D&D (IMO): 1. The demographics of Gen X. 2. The publication of 5e 3. Pop culture tie-ins (see 1) 4. The growth of streaming 5. Lost Mine of Phandelver I’ve probably forgot something, but those are the big five in my mind, and I think 1 dwarfs everything else.

My understanding is that Felicia Day suggested the switch because D&D is better known.

You’re aware that CR started as a private game, right?

They literally did do it for free originally. I also run my games for free. It is possible for something to be both a job and a passion.

See, I think it's about "punishing" the players, in a fun way, for playing their characters like they're dumb. It's not heroic to go charging into an unknown, potentially dangerous situation without exercising a little due caution, it's stupid. After the first trap or two, if they wanna keep...

I would argue that Critical Role has built a much more diversified business than WotC.

There's no "maybe." It isn't close. On some stockholder reports D&D barely rates a mention, just being lumped in with WotC, whereas MtG is a pillar not just of WotC but of Hasbro. It's just a much, much more profitable game. We have game store owners who post here; presumably they can share. I...

I like it! The first game of my current home campaign took place in a driftstone quarry:

I think D&D owns the fantasy genre for TTRPGs. Period. Everyone else is fighting for its scraps, for the reasons that you cite. It's a big enough genre that those scraps can still be enough to support some awesome games, don't get me wrong, and I wish them well. But I think anyone thinking that...

I point out that according to Hasbro's reports to investors (so, pretty reliable unless they want to go to prison), MtG dwarfs D&D in terms of revenue. Like, five times as much.

I just watched the Fireside Chat with Mercer and Mulligan, and they talk a fair bit about having the main architects of D&D on their team, so that when they need a new creature or item or whatever, Perkins and Crawford just make it for them and it almost feels canon.

I think that it is mostly DM types (i.e. 90%+ of the people on this forum, I suspect) that are driven to try out different TTRPGs and mechanics. It's a lot of expense, in terms of time, money, and effort, and as you say, your average player doesn't see the value in the proposition. I can get my...

Monster Manual 2 would be very welcome - one thing I've noticed about using books that have come out since the 2024 rules update is that older monsters feel both weak and one dimensional. In the 2024 book, most monsters are not only tougher but have some kind of tactical option, even if it's...

Hot take: maybe the Critical Role cast just love playing D&D as much as they've always said they do. Ashley Johnson has said in multiple interviews that, if CR all went away tomorrow, they'd still be getting together every week to play. She's waxed poetic about how much D&D, specifically...

Agreed - he’s become increasingly negative and often feels like he’s rooting against WotC.

He's never run a campaign remotely as long as CR C1-3, each of which come in at many hundreds of hours. I think that may be one of the reasons that this is being described as more like three campaigns that sometimes link.

The Unsleeping City is New York - it's not like Mulligan had to invent the New York Stock Exchange, the Statue of Liberty, Staten Island, etc. It's apples and oranges comparing it to someplace like Zadash, just one of many cities that Mercer built from scratch for Exandria. I'm quite familiar...

Same - I cut back and forth.

I have questions about Brennan Lee Mulligan's ability to run an epic CR campaign - his campaigns have always been much shorter and rely far heavier on improvisation than Mercer's. He doesn't do remotely the world-building prep that Mercer does, by his own admission. Though splitting it into...