Critical Role To Wrap Up Third Campaign, New Exandria Unlimited Miniseries Announced

Critical Role's third campaign will end next week with an extra-sized final episode. Today, the popular streaming series announced that its third campaign would wrap up on February 6th with an 8.5 hour episode. The series finale is being called the "conclusion to this chapter in Exandrian history, and the dawn of a new age." The third campaign followed a group of adventurers who got wrapped up in a plot to rid the fantasy world of Exandria of its gods via a god-eating entity trapped in one of Exandria's moons. Characters from Critical Role's previous campaigns made significant appearances in the campaign, with the cast playing their old characters for limited periods.

Following the finale, Brennan Lee Mulligan will lead another 4-part Exandria Unlimited episode, titled Exandria Unlimited: Divergence. The series will explore the Divergence, a moment when the gods of Exandria removed themselves from the world after a devastating war between pantheons. The cast will also include Matt Mercer, Liam O'Brien, Jasmine Don, Alex Ward, and Celia Rose Gooding. That series will air for four weeks starting on February 13th at 7 PM on Critical Role's various streaming channels.

No plans were announced for a fourth Critical Role campaign. Campaign 3 ended Critical Role's tradition of weekly live episodes, with the show shifting to pre-recorded episodes that aired three times a month. Speculation has grown that Critical Role's cast (which has remained the same for 10 years) would shift, or that the game would abandon Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition in favor of Daggerheart, a fantasy RPG developed by Critical Role's Darrington Press imprint.

 

[Seramus]

One thing my friends and I have noticed is that this campaign is packed with relatively mercurial chaos bringers... and Orym. And I'm sure that has implications for getting to the story and advancing on goals. They should all agree to bring relatively normal characters and make Liam play the oddball for C4.

Still waiting for Liam and Sam to play a grumpy old married couple.

 

[Micah Sweet]

They really do need to start reining in some of meanderings. Also, WTH. An 8 hour episode?

Too much for my blood.

 

[SkidAce]

Too much for my blood.

Well, its not like I've every watched ANY of them end to end one sitting.

I listen while running or diving mostly.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, its not like I've every watched ANY of them end to end one sitting.

I listen while running or diving mostly.

I used to listen at work while I did mindless data entry.

 

[Reynard]

So, was it good?

 

[AlViking]

Well, its not like I've every watched ANY of them end to end one sitting.

I listen while running or diving mostly.

Much the same here. Great to listen to when it doesn't matter if I zone out now and then.

 

[Gorck]

They really do need to start reining in some of meanderings. Also, WTH. An 8 hour episode?

As much as I love Critical Role, this finale felt like the ending to The Return of the King. It easily could have wrapped up several times throughout the 8 1/2 hour episode, but it would suddenly pick back up again and drag on.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

It is pre-recorded but for they will typically play that whole time (with breaks, of course, for food & bio breaks). So 8.5 hours wasn't the planned length, they just played until they were done. So their 7+ hour C2 finale was them playing for over 7 hours.

This one was apparently recorded over two different days, however, only because they mentioned that, I believe, they were filming the day the LA fires broke out and at a break decided it would be best to leave wherever their studio is and later came back after it was safer there/clearer where the danger was/or some such.

I would guess they record in Pasadena, which has a lot of Hollywood-related spaces, as opposed to Pacific Palisades (unless you're a millionaire with a home studio) or Altadena (which is more working class).

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Will the system affect wether or not you all listen to C4?

Nope. Whether the characters mesh well together (C1 and C2, for instance) is a bigger determinant for me.

As long as the system doesn't take over the episodes in the way that GURPS or HERO might (neither of which I can see them using), it's fine by me. The story's the main thing.

I have listened to and enjoyed episodes where they played new to me games and liked hearing a bit about the system, but if the story wasn't compelling, I wouldn't have finished their excellent Monsterhearts episode, for instance.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

As much as I love Critical Role, this finale felt like the ending to The Return of the King. It easily could have wrapped up several times throughout the 8 1/2 hour episode, but it would suddenly pick back up again and drag on.

A recurrent issue with them. Most of the cast tend to want to get their big character beats in. (In contrast, the Dimension 20 casts sometimes have to be coaxed into doing so, since they're so used to furthering what their fellow improv actors do.)