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Critical Role Episode #26 - spoilers!
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<blockquote data-quote="Harzel" data-source="post: 7466060" data-attributes="member: 6857506"><p>One point of order:</p><p> - Ms. Burch is Ashly, without the 'e'.</p><p> - Ms. Johnson is Ashley, with the 'e'.</p><p></p><p>Second: I assume most know about Talks Machina, their 'after-show'. If you care enough to invest the hour to watch it, it can be revelatory, particularly when something dramatic happens about which there are questions.</p><p></p><p>As to the specifics of the OP:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Handled as a player or as a DM? (All your commentary here seems to be about what Ashly did, but most of the subsequent discussion seems to be focused on the DM response.)</p><p></p><p>As a player, I'm not sure I can say, since I'm not sure I would have thought of doing what Ashly did. As far as foreshadowing goes, I'm guessing <em>Ashly </em>didn't think in advance about how Keg would react to being in combat with Lorenzo, and I'm willing to take that as representing that <em>Keg</em> didn't really think that far ahead either. It is not uncommon for people to react differently to the reality of a circumstance very differently than they do to the anticipation of that circumstance.</p><p></p><p>As a DM, if the players were like the CR cast, I would do pretty much what Matt did - go with the suggestion. If the players were more like <em>my</em> players, I would have a short conversation with the player to understand what they were really trying to get at, but I would probably end up in the position - ok, I'll take account of what you are telling me about your character's mental state, but you just tell me what you do and I will decide on the mechanics. The mechanics decision would depend on the particulars of the case.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>The matter of the death saving throws has been pretty well addressed. As to the death being pre-arranged, I don't see any evidence of that in the stream, and what was said on the subsequent Talks Machina made it quite clear that it was quite unexpected by Taliesin. And in fact that the death was 'perfunctory' as you say seems to me to weigh heavily <em>against</em> it being pre-arranged. I mean, if you were going to arrange it, wouldn't you arrange to make it a bit more heroic?</p><p></p><p>As to the details, I will add that Matt did say that Lorenzo was going to make two glaive strikes on Molly and made two dice rolls, but he skipped his usual practice of announcing what he rolled. Also he usually asks the player either what the PC's AC is, or if the announced roll hits and he didn't do that either. That departure certainly confused me in the moment - I had to rewatch the sequence to see that he actually did roll the dice. So I can understand being left with the sense that Matt just narrated the death, but that is not what really happened.</p><p></p><p>My speculation: AFAIK, Matt relies on the players to track their HP. So when he announced Lorenzo's intentions, probably all he knew was that Molly was hurt and might get knocked down. In the course of 12 real-time seconds, Molly knocked himself out and Matt rolled two numbers that he knew were hits, which changed the situation to Molly is dead. At that point, I think Matt was just trying to focus on finding an at least somewhat meaningful narration and figuring out whether Lorenzo was going kill them all.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>On TM, Matt said that without Keg stepping in, any of the M9 that did not flee would have died, even if that meant a TPK. I think it is a fair speculation that at least subconsciously Matt was probably 'very open' to the remaining party members finding a plausible way to survive, and Ashly provided one.</p><p></p><p>At the time, Lorenzo thought he was full up with prisoners (mentioned in the abduction scene in previous episode), not realizing he had just flash-frozen three of them (oops).</p><p></p><p>I think Taliesin was sad and upset, but not in the sense of feeling screwed. Molly was very much a part of his own undoing.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Harzel, post: 7466060, member: 6857506"] One point of order: - Ms. Burch is Ashly, without the 'e'. - Ms. Johnson is Ashley, with the 'e'. Second: I assume most know about Talks Machina, their 'after-show'. If you care enough to invest the hour to watch it, it can be revelatory, particularly when something dramatic happens about which there are questions. As to the specifics of the OP: Handled as a player or as a DM? (All your commentary here seems to be about what Ashly did, but most of the subsequent discussion seems to be focused on the DM response.) As a player, I'm not sure I can say, since I'm not sure I would have thought of doing what Ashly did. As far as foreshadowing goes, I'm guessing [I]Ashly [/I]didn't think in advance about how Keg would react to being in combat with Lorenzo, and I'm willing to take that as representing that [I]Keg[/I] didn't really think that far ahead either. It is not uncommon for people to react differently to the reality of a circumstance very differently than they do to the anticipation of that circumstance. As a DM, if the players were like the CR cast, I would do pretty much what Matt did - go with the suggestion. If the players were more like [I]my[/I] players, I would have a short conversation with the player to understand what they were really trying to get at, but I would probably end up in the position - ok, I'll take account of what you are telling me about your character's mental state, but you just tell me what you do and I will decide on the mechanics. The mechanics decision would depend on the particulars of the case. The matter of the death saving throws has been pretty well addressed. As to the death being pre-arranged, I don't see any evidence of that in the stream, and what was said on the subsequent Talks Machina made it quite clear that it was quite unexpected by Taliesin. And in fact that the death was 'perfunctory' as you say seems to me to weigh heavily [I]against[/I] it being pre-arranged. I mean, if you were going to arrange it, wouldn't you arrange to make it a bit more heroic? As to the details, I will add that Matt did say that Lorenzo was going to make two glaive strikes on Molly and made two dice rolls, but he skipped his usual practice of announcing what he rolled. Also he usually asks the player either what the PC's AC is, or if the announced roll hits and he didn't do that either. That departure certainly confused me in the moment - I had to rewatch the sequence to see that he actually did roll the dice. So I can understand being left with the sense that Matt just narrated the death, but that is not what really happened. My speculation: AFAIK, Matt relies on the players to track their HP. So when he announced Lorenzo's intentions, probably all he knew was that Molly was hurt and might get knocked down. In the course of 12 real-time seconds, Molly knocked himself out and Matt rolled two numbers that he knew were hits, which changed the situation to Molly is dead. At that point, I think Matt was just trying to focus on finding an at least somewhat meaningful narration and figuring out whether Lorenzo was going kill them all. On TM, Matt said that without Keg stepping in, any of the M9 that did not flee would have died, even if that meant a TPK. I think it is a fair speculation that at least subconsciously Matt was probably 'very open' to the remaining party members finding a plausible way to survive, and Ashly provided one. At the time, Lorenzo thought he was full up with prisoners (mentioned in the abduction scene in previous episode), not realizing he had just flash-frozen three of them (oops). I think Taliesin was sad and upset, but not in the sense of feeling screwed. Molly was very much a part of his own undoing. [/QUOTE]
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