Critical Role Releases New Campaign 4 Trailer

Critical Role has released a new trailer for their upcoming fourth campaign. The trailer, embedded below, lays out the overarching premise of the plot, as well as a look at the full 13-player table that will participate in the early parts of the campaign. The trailer not only explains the background of Araman, a world whose people overthrew the gods 70 years ago, but also hints at more recent conflicts.


A description of the show notes that the show opens with the planned execution of a person named Thjazi Fang. His scheduled execution leads to three groups coming together to seek the truth behind his grim fate, spinning off into its own series.

As announced earlier this year, Campaign 4 will feature three groups of players simultaneously exploring the world of Araman in what's described as a West Marches-style campaign. Early episodes will feature all thirteen players, but the show will eventually break the groups out into smaller tables, although there will still be some crossover between the groups.

Critical Role's fourth campaign starts on October 2nd.

 

[The Soloist]

Rant: The sound mixing is horrible. I had to activate close caption to hear what he was saying.

I loved Age of Umbra. The trailer is promising. I'll give it a chance and listen to the first episode.

[I don't care how CR used to be. I only have S3 baggage with them.]

 

[The Soloist]

To me, it feels like CR has become less about the game night vibe, and more about actors wanting to show their chops.

It could be that with Google analytics and other internet tools, CR is simply giving to Critters what they want - and it please them at the same time.

 

[TiQuinn]

Probably unpopular opinion: the acting is not good enough to be so damn theatrical and dramatic as CR was in the last campaign. Now, the prospect of having thirteen people sitting at a table talking about how much the world sucks isn’t exactly appealing.

 

[Mort]

Probably unpopular opinion: the acting is not good enough to be so damn theatrical and dramatic as CR was in the last campaign. Now, the prospect of having thirteen people sitting at a table talking about how much the world sucks isn’t exactly appealing.

To be clear, there won't be 13 people at the same table, at least not generally . It will be a West Marches style campaign with players at different tables, and movement between. They also said different tables will have different focuses, such as combat or exploration.

That I'm very curious to see, it's an intriguing concept..

 

[TiQuinn]

To be clear, there won't be 13 people at the same table, at least not generally . It will be a West Marches style campaign with players at different tables, and movement between. They also said different tables will have different focuses, such as combat or exploration.

That I'm very curious to see, it's an intriguing concept..

No, but at the beginning they’re going to have everyone and I find that’s always the hardest part to get engaged into any new campaign of CR. The characters are new, the setting is new, and having that many players trying on new personas (again, I think limits on the acting make this really hard) can make it quite a chore.

 

[Nobleshield]

Doesn't sound very "West Marches" to me...

 

[Mort]

Doesn't sound very "West Marches" to me...

Well, they've expressly used the phrase "West Marches style campaign," so presumably they will be going for that.

 

[nyvinter]

Probably unpopular opinion: the acting is not good enough to be so damn theatrical and dramatic as CR was in the last campaign.

Didn't really care about C3 plot and it had pacing issues as well as it was clear players and GM were at odds about it. But I don't think anything CR has done has been as damn theatrical and dramatic as Vax in campaign one. Every interaction had an air of "this might be the dramatic scene!"

I'm looking forwards to this campaign because I don't think Brennan will force things the same way, from the looks of it they've had extensive session zeros to get everyone onboard. And they want to tell a serious adventure about rebellion with some goofy stuff in there because that's what you always get with RPGs.

When things happen, some want to feel comfort and want escapism and other ones want to dive down into it and be a mess and explore what make things bad for catharsis. This is the case with books, with movies, with music, and also rpgs. In 2025, Brennan might want to not do fun escapism.

 

[AlViking]

C'mon guys you aren't any good at starting conspiracy theories, I'm kind of disappointed. Obviously this whole thing is a plot, create a dark and dreary game to show how unfun D&D is so they can push people into playing some other game! Since CR is almost singularly responsible for the success of D&D, this show will obviously cause it's collapse and bringing in a new era of Daggerheart.

Just thinking this is the style of game BLM and the majority of the people playing want to play is just far too simple.

On a more serious note, it will work for some people and not for others. Same as Fantasy High (a very unserious game that does show an interesting twist on standard D&D) is for some people and not others. At some point I'll probably check it out and if it is indeed too dark I'll just find something else to listen to while I'm doing other stuff. Has anyone watched their Daggerheart streams and do they have the same dark tone?

 

[Parmandur]

Ugh...that trailer has lowered my anticipation for the new campaign, significantly. I did not particularly enjoy BLM's last time DMing CR precisely because the story was dark and apocalyptic. Same with Age of Umbra.

Remember when Critical Role used to be fun? A bunch of friends hanging out, laughing, joking, often being a bit smutty, occasionally eating snacks? For me, that was peak CR.

If the trailer is representative of the typical tone - dark, with occasional moments of levity, rather than light, with occasional moments of darkness - then this might be the campaign where I just give up and find something less depressing to listen to while I paint.

Yeah, a big part of the appeal if Exandria was the generic, straight D&D nature of the Setting: just a DM making a standard D,&D workd for his friends with some personal touches.

It wasn't designed to be a product, which is what made it great for playing.