Critical Role to Use D&D 2024 Rules For Campaign Four, Expands to Three Tables and Thirteen Players

Critical Role will continue to use Dungeons & Dragons as the play system for its upcoming campaign, with the cast expanding to three distinct tables consisting of a total of 13 players. Today, Critical Role announced new details about its new campaign, which is set to air on October 4th. The new campaign will feature the full founding cast members as players, alongside several new players. In total, the cast includes Laura Bailey, Luis Carazo, Robbie Daymond, Aabria Iyengar, Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson, Matthew Mercer, Whitney Moore, Liam O’Brien, Marisha Ray, Sam Riegel, Alexander Ward, and Travis Willingham, with the previously announced Brennan Lee Mulligan serving as GM.

The campaign itself will be run as a "West Marches" style of campaign, with three separate groups of players exploring the world. The groups are divided into gameplay styles, with a combat-focused Soldiers group, a lore/exploration-focused Seekers group, and a intrigue-focused Schemers group. All three groups will explore the world of Araman, created by Mulligan for the campaign.

Perhaps most importantly, Critical Role will not be switching to Daggerheart for the fourth campaign. Instead, they'll be opting for the new 2024 ruleset of Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. Daggerheart will be represented at Critical Role via the Age of Umbra and "other" Actual Play series, as well as partnerships with other Actual Play troupes.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Do you think ToV would suddenly get as big as D&D? I don't.

I never said anything about suddenly. In fact, I would expect the player base to experience a contraction as Wizard was no longer putting out material.
But the committed hard core would settle on a clone, it might be ToV or one that Jermery Crawford and Chris Perkins or Mike Mearls knocks out in the aftermath, or some other existing close enough game. I would actually expect that a successful supplier of adventure material with a clone to hand (or one that is decent and fairly promptly supplied) similarly as to how Paizo were able to capitalise on their adventure paths to get traction for Pathfinder against 4e.
It would probably take decades to get back to the current levels assuming that people still play and are interested in ttrpgs.
It could even be Daggerheart with their media footprint.

 

[Reynard]

I think the point is valid, but maybe ToV isn't that clone. Do we honestly think, though, that if WotC stopped producing new books that however many millions of people there are playing D&D right now would stop because of it? That doesn't make sense to me. If I'm running a D&D campaign, first of all, I already have the books and don't need a new one to keep running the game.

By the time it would start to matter, other game publishers / developers would step in to fill the demand with something almost exactly like D&D.

I think most of D&D's players are pretty casual and ambivalent about it. It's a thing to do. They play because someone is GMing whatever new module WotC put out. I legitimately think that if WotC got out of the D&D business, the vast majority of them would go find something else to do with their time.

Of course there are hard-core new players -- just like most of us here on EN World were back in the Before Times. But if we are honest with ourselves, how many of our friends played because WE did the work, and stopped when we went off to school or the Army or whatever?

Again, I never said D&D would disappear without WotC. But it would absolutely contract dramatically, and I believe it would happen pretty quickly.

I mean, just as a tangential example, look at the number of people suddenly ready to abandon Daggerheart -- a brand new game that is still being actively supported with both media and supplements-- just because CR chose D&D. The fan base is unreliable.

 

[JConstantine]

It's interesting to me that people always say that D&D 5e succeeded because of CR.

This line has always been laughable to me. The 5e starter set had been out a year by the time the first episode of CR aired, and the PHB 7 months. 5e had already reclaimed it dominance, and was going from strength to strength. CR's initial success was due to established 5e players tuning in, with campaign 2 seeing an influx of non-gamers due to CR's popularity as a streaming show. For D&D, CR's popularity was a case of "win more".

 

[Reynard]

This line has always been laughable to me. The 5e starter set had been out a year by the time the first episode of CR aired, and the PHB 7 months. 5e had already reclaimed it dominance, and was going from strength to strength. CR's initial success was due to established 5e players tuning in, with campaign 2 seeing an influx of non-gamers due to CR's popularity as a streaming show. For D&D, CR's popularity was a case of "win more".

I'd love to see some evidence for these assertions.

As I recall it, 5E brought back a lot of lapsed players who had mostly gone to Pathfinder (I'm one of those) and was doing well by D&D standards.

But the sudden uptick and climb in popularity was because of the exposure Stranger Things gave AND the fact that Critical Role allowed folks to experience what playing D&D was actually like (something missing prior to APs).

CR did not "cause" 5E's success but it definitely contributed.

 

[AlViking]

I'd love to see some evidence for these assertions.

As I recall it, 5E brought back a lot of lapsed players who had mostly gone to Pathfinder (I'm one of those) and was doing well by D&D standards.

But the sudden uptick and climb in popularity was because of the exposure Stranger Things gave AND the fact that Critical Role allowed folks to experience what playing D&D was actually like (something missing prior to APs).

CR did not "cause" 5E's success but it definitely contributed.

Based on the estimates we had, there was no sudden uptick in sales after either CR or Stranger Things. The upward trend in sales was pretty steady.

There's no correlation, much less proof, that either thing had much influence.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

I'd love to see some evidence for these assertions.

As I recall it, 5E brought back a lot of lapsed players who had mostly gone to Pathfinder (I'm one of those) and was doing well by D&D standards.

But the sudden uptick and climb in popularity was because of the exposure Stranger Things gave AND the fact that Critical Role allowed folks to experience what playing D&D was actually like (something missing prior to APs).

CR did not "cause" 5E's success but it definitely contributed.

We don't really know, at least I have not seen anything like real hard data on the matter. What I have seen is Google trends showing increased search activity relating to D&D coinciding with Stranger Things and CR. It is a plausible theory but no proven. I am sure Wizards has the sales data that could confirm or refute the hypothesis but this is not available anywhere that I know of.

 

[Reynard]

Based on the estimates we had, there was no sudden uptick in sales after either CR or Stranger Things. The upward trend in sales was pretty steady.

There's no correlation, much less proof, that either thing had much influence.

Let's see those curves, my dude.

 

[Aldarc]

Nah, most game stores are barely able to keep the doors open. Most can barely pay half a dozen part-time employees who don't get any benefits like medical/dental.

How many game stores do you know with owners who own $5 million houses and drive $200,000 cars?

Sorry, I don't think most game stores make enough money to so glibbly bid adieu to something with the customer base D&D has.

You may be misunderstanding me. I have not and never said that game store owners are rolling in cash. So congratulations on successfully tilting that windmill. D&D and TTRPGs are a drop in the bucket for most game stores. Magic the Gathering is where the bulk of their ill gotten gains come from. They may barely be able to keep the doors open, but it's MtG more so than D&D that helps with their revenue.

 

[JConstantine]

Wait, so one of the major 2nd tier publishers in the industry benefitted, you think that means it is "nonsense" that D&D massive footprint is harmful to new, smaller games?

Interesting.

Paizo benefits from D&D for exact reason Steve Jackson laid out with GURPS. That's true for the smaller games as well. There is simply a percentage of players who move on from their first game, look at others and get invested in RPGs as a hobby - the larger the hobby, the more that is as a flat number. While any game could be someone's first, D&D is the gateway game. If D&D didn't exist, those smaller games wouldn't suddenly see more play, the hobby would just shrink.

 

[kermit4karate]

You may be misunderstanding me. I have not and never said that game store owners are rolling in cash. So congratulations on successfully tilting that windmill. D&D and TTRPGs are a drop in the bucket for most game stores. Magic the Gathering is where the bulk of their ill gotten gains come from. They may barely be able to keep the doors open, but it's MtG more so than D&D that helps with their revenue.

Ha! Perhaps I am misunderstanding you because I didn't see where you cited your source. "D&D and TTRPGs are a drop in the bucket for most game stores. Magic the Gathering is where the bulk of their ill gotten gains come from."

I'd be interested in how you came to that determination.