The Fall of Campaign 3

Critical Role is as popular as ever...but some fans seem to have had enough of Critical Role Campaign 3.

I love these people and everything they do feels like I'm sitting with them, listening in on the fun. Even when it's slow I just enjoy hearing their voices and being apart of this huge aspect of their lives. The cast of Critical Role love dnd, they share their enjoyment with us but we are not responsible for that enjoyment. They would play with or without us. Sit back, relax, and quit complaining

The first series of Critical Role I watched was Campaign 3. And loved it from the beginning. Once I caught up to the current episodes I started watching Campaign 2. And I have to say that your (the community’s) thoughts on C3 are my thoughts on C2. It feels very disjointed and it’s been difficult to stick with watching it.

in my humble opinion c3 made the classic mistake of writing a book and dropped the cooperative storytelling.
the story of c3 is more important than their charakters it is about the world, things that are happening without beeingable to be contained, and with charakters who never would be ready for it within the timeframe they are given.
the other campaigns where about the charakters and they took the time to develope those and give people the time to connect to them.
this developement is not given in c3 because hey you have x in game days to be there and there and stop that BS, notime for your charakters to be developed and grounded to link with the audience.
i couldn´t connect to any of the main casts charakters, and the frequent guest star drop ins always disrupted a building up group dynamic in my opinion.

the world building brilliance of matt mercer shares the same problem i have with the MCU i don´t want to see all the different movies series and whatever else they came up with, to understand the whole shebang, i want to follow the story of the charakters not the story of the world.

i hope for campaign 4 if there is one at all they go back to what had them have succes, charakter driven story, not world driven story.

Just haven’t connected to the story of campaign 3. That’s all. No biggie. Plenty of other content to consume and enjoy out there. And I can still enjoy the first two campaigns.

Honestly, I’ve really enjoyed campaign 3! I love the misfits story line, none of these guys have any business in this fight, and I connect with the characters more than the other campaigns.

I just watched Espisode 80 of CR Campaign 3 and enjoyed it just as much as ever.

The most interesting episodes of C3 for me were when Orym, Fearne, Laudna etc were separated and I didn't have to watch Laura's overacting to try and make her character interesting. That and Emily and Amy are just delights and true chaos demons.

I'll be honest I went into this video rolling my eyes thinking this was another video looking to hate on critical role. I'm happy to say that you have proved me completely wrong. I am only about halfway through campaign 2 atm because I too ran into issues with pacing and characters when Campaign 2 started all those years ago and stopped watching around EP 26, I only recently started watching again and am enjoying it a lot. I skipped through most of Chapter 3 for spoiler purposes but I did watch Exandria Unlimited Calamity, which enraptured me so thoroughly I binged the last two episodes in one night.

This was a great video and it sounds like I managed to avoid a lot of the drama surrounding early C3. Looking forward to getting to it after Campaign 2.

Imo it's hella impressive that despite growing into this multi-million moloch they retained the soul of the show which really just is bunch of loving friends having fun at the table.
And I find it completely understandable that they wish foe some more time with their families, and time to organise themselves every once a month. Just because you love your job doesn't mean it can't be tiring, last thing I want is for them to feel burned out by something they're so passionate about.

Like look at Travis Willingham, that's the goofiest, most down to earth, approachable CEO I ever heard about

I think a lot of people go in with expectations and get disappointed. C2 was literally just a one in a million campaign, it just had that element to it. C3 has a different feel, and I honestly kind of love how clueless and human they seem against C1 and C2's characters

Everyone is so fucking annoying. Just don’t watch, we don’t need your ridiculous reason why you think critical role is over. I heard the same shit about c2 but now apparently it’s the magnum opus of cr.

Bro this is the same argument Bethesda fanboys give for starfield; it gets good after however many hours. No, duplo! I'm not gonna watch exandria unlimited, and I'm not watching campaign 1! They sell it as a standalone so that's how I critically view it. Also adding in that it will continue to grow at the end there? C'mon, you're a little starstruck shill. They don't have half of the audience they used to. Ad counts have gone up during the videos because bot viewers are a thing. Lol vocal minority sure but a much larger silent piece of the pie just walked away without saying a word.

I feel I have an interesting take on this whole situation as I've only been a critter for only a handful of months, which means I get the unique opportunity of catching up on 2 campaigns.

Granted I started my CR journey in C3 where I just needed something to listen to while at work that wasn't simply 20-30ish minutes and I would have to find something new to listen to. So I got the chance to listen to episode after episode and cranking out about 2-2 1/2 episodes per day while at work, on top of staying up late and listening to even more CR. I'm seeing a lot of people complain about CR C3 and how it just doesn't feel the same as C2, which I agree with, but the change as a bad one, which personally I disagree with.

I am currently going through C2 right now and I'm currently at the part of C2 where Caleb says his very famous line while presenting the beacon to the Bright Queen. While I still have maybe about 20ish episodes left before I'm caught up to roughly where I eventually managed to get caught up to C3 before catching their live streams live. Personally speaking (and this totally could be bias since I've "grown up" more with the C3 cast than C2), I prefer C3 over C2 for a multitude of reasons. For one, I feel the cast gets into the big overarching plot of the campaign far sooner than in C2. In C3, it is roughly around episode 9ish where I feel they get sent onto a quest where they eventually get tied up into the main campaign plot. C2 just feels like a weird group of misfits who are all just helping each other with their backstories with no overarching "plot" per say. Granted this isn't a bad thing at all, but personally it felt like C2 took far longer to get going versus C3.

The other thing that I prefer in C3 over C2 is that the characters just feel like I'm listening to a bunch of DC characters who all have extremely dark backgrounds and make me want to question my own morality. In C3, yes the cast has a lot of different backstory that has them all sorts of messed up, but they still are very fun and enjoyable to follow along, there's light to the darkness. Not to say that all of the Mighty Nein were dark and dreary (especially Jester), but still it seemed like it was all doom and gloom for them. If you want to talk about a group of people getting caught up into something that's well over their heads, the Mighty Nein feel like that more so than BH.

Now I am enjoying C2 a ton now after things have started to get going more, but still I love C3 and find that story way more enjoyable in more of a long form audio book style with back to back episodes to listen to, but I do get why it may feel more disjointed and all over the place because of all of the breaks CR are taking in-between episodes.

It lost me. While the player split up was an interesting idea, it just wasn't gripping anymore.

To me c2 made me feel like i was watching people play an rpg, which is also a show, and i really enjoyed it.

I cant exactly put my finger on why but c3 makes me feel like im watching people trying to make a radio show first and play an rpg second, which i wasnt finding fun so i stopped watching.

I would rather see them evolve then stay stagnant and limited. Growth in this story line is paramount!

I'm guilty of comparing experiences but as a veteran to DnD I realized early on that not every campaign is going to catch my interest. I didn't watch most of Campaign 2 but I personally love C3. It's just how DnD is and people will learn that or leave.

Idk what yall yapping about, i love campaign 3 so far

I started with Campaign 3, and I feel like I enjoy the more serious tone of 3, going back to Campaign 2 which feels like a wild mess of trying to be the funniest of the group rather than focusing on serious backstories and overarching story. But I'm pretty early into it.

Robbie *Daymond not Draymon

I think the community is just bloated at this point, meaning we get more hate watchers.
I say, I enjoy the show and the cast.

I joined in during the first run of ExU, where I got to see Matt play a PC, and seeing Ashley's, Liam's and Robbie's PC carry on into c3 was really cool

i recommend using more visuals instead of placing yourself in front of the camera. the way you write your script makes it sound candid yet you continuously look down at your script. remove 95% of you being on camera and your content would be way better. just saying

Honestly thought this was wisecrack due to the logo of your channel and the thumbnail for the video. I was too lazy to leave.

I lost interest almost right at the start. I tried to get into EXU but didn't like the new characters, or how the DM was running things. Then low and behold the filler series is a the intro to campaign 3. Still didnt like the characters, Travis was killed off early, and the prerecordered aspect just sucked. Part of the huge appeal for CR was that it was live and got to go through the rollercoaster with them, hell it was awesome seeing them dickin around in twitch chat at times. By the end of the changes and the new direction of the show it just feels like they're catering towards twitter freaks and hack outlets like kotaku rather than the long term fans of the show.

Most of the time fanbases are just wrong, not that they’ve ever really been right.

I dont know if anyone even finds this video from the algorithm anymore but I feel like I struggle to stick with C3 (still in the early 50s at this point, roughly 20 eps behind at time of comment) because the show seems to insist on itself too much. The cast, other than Travis, are trying so much to perform and act (and well, I give them that), but it loses some of that feeling of friends playing a game. I started with C2 and am watching C1 for the first time and in spite of how sloppy and messy the campaign can get with learning the game, being more argumentative, etc etc, it felt more genuine to the D&D experience. It felt more like being at the table while listening. C3 is coming into some exciting pop-off moments, Matt is going ham, but the table energy is just weird I guess.

Honestly, this might sound strange, but this entire Ludinus storyline feels much more suited for the Mighty Nein than Bell's Hells. I think they ended c2 because they were kind of emotionally exhausted, which I understand, and I still kind of get that feeling from how much more the players are personally interested in catching up with c1 characters than c2 ones. But as much as the M9 were unsung heroes, and as much as they started out as a statedly morally grey group of de facto mercenaries, they grew to be quite effective problem solvers and heroes. Plus, as their final fight showed, they were kind of especially geared towards dealing with magical threats. A few hints in c2 lead me to believe that this entire storyline was at least partially set up by the time they were hunting the Angel of Irons cult and Matt basically expanded it to be the central plotline of c3.

I actually do think the prerecorded aspect is a massive change,the high wire act that is live theatre warts and all..just doesn't feel the same as prepackaged and 'safer' content to be frank. Critical role is probably cresting their wave and dying off and that would also be a natural death..and that's OK.

That so cool its all connected.

All the dc movies are connected, that makes them good, right?

Oh, they're piles of trash even though theyre connected?

The issue is, the team cant be themselves, due to the backlash from whiny children that cant handle graphic/adult stories of a world thats more violent and unforgiving. Campaign 3 is the culmination of woke stupid. Thats why it sucks.

Matt needs to create new worlds. Its a shame this genius is so focused on building this one universe. He is capable of creating so many universes and indoctrinating new discussions, new fans, and new world building.

The fluffed up Amazon product that is now Critical Role is so far from its origin, its near impossible to enjoy these days.

Waiting for episode 72 of C3 and counting, I'm in for it. They don't seem tired to me, it seems that they are enjoying all right.
(maybe spoilers ahead)





But, yes, there were moments I was like "What, seriously? Well... ok then...". Like, the romance between automatons was a stretch imo (I mean, sure, let it be romance between automatons. But in this case it felt rushed, there was no build up to that relationship). And Laudna + Imogen, also a stretch. I know Laura likes to roleplay romance everytime but it seemed too soon imo (if only it was a accidental kiss that would make both of them question their feelings about each other, but no, it was straight up power lovers girlfriends all of the sudden – and, yes, I know they have a long backstory and there were some cases os jealousy, but for me, wasn't enough. It was missing more building up to that point, like it was for Beau + Yasha and Fjord + Jester).
Also, in the last episode (71) Fearne says to Laudna "Ok, it's time for you to practice [the fire ball spell] a little", but Laudna used Fireball just the day before at Imahara Joe's place. I was like (?????)

Oh well, details... .-. And if I offended anyone, I'm truly sorry, it was not my intention.

I really like campaign 3. Predathos a cool idea and very scary, Ludinus is a good villain and the whole gods bad vs gods good dilemma being presented is pretty compelling. The only issue I have is the one several others in the comments have brought up.

This campaign has essentially been in its final arc since the group were level 3 and hasn't really slowed down since. Travis may hate shopping episodes but they and slower episodes like them kind of served to create opportunities for some great roleplay between party members and break up the action a bit. On top of that, past campaigns had a lot of stuff going on at the same time whereas C3 has just the one thing really but it's huge and world-spanning and time-intensive. Some of the things Vox Machina and the Mighty Nein had to deal with were big and important for sure but Bells Hells have essentially been fighting the apocalypse since before they had level 3 spell slots and, while I'm a fan of the different tone and pacing, I can see why it's not for everyone.

Really I feel like my main issue with campaign 3 is every one feels the need to whisper all the time. The campaign has a quiet, slowness to it. Because everyone is low energy and talks softly. Vox machina in campaign 1 were loud and ready to take on the world. Campaign 2 had Jester, Nott and Beau. Full of energy and won’t take shit likely, But for some reason everyone has a meek attitude kinda like Caleb, and I love Caleb so I don’t understand how I get put to sleep from it all. Ashton really is the only that can speak up but they don’t have the charisma to do anything.(I’ve only seen up to episode 24 and it’s really hard to push on through I have to say. I’m just going to wait until it’s finished because I can’t take these early slogs.)

I used to watch Campaign 3 while I was working, so I've watched upto Episode 62. I know I need to start catching up again it's been a while.

But I have to say I can agree with every point made. the problem for Campaign 3 is definitely been a pacing issue but it's also been a leadership problem, early on Dorian was essentially like the defacto leader which was weird coming from EXU where Orym was the actual leader and the only one of the crew by the end who was good aligned and Dorian was the right hand to Orym. But Campaign 3's story just flowed beautifully with Dorian and Bertrand leading so with both characters departures really seemed to cut off the heads of the group. Don't get me wrong for I love Chetney as he's definitely won me from the get go and continued to do so. It's just the problem came from the rest of the group trying to pick up the pieces.

Imogen and Orym are affected the most as both seemed like they didn't want to take on the leadership and initiative. However with the overarching story kinda pushing Imogen directly into the spotlight especially with how Laura plays Imogen as reserved and hiding away from everything in reference to story and combat (Main example I have for Imogen is Episode 33 when they saved a person they needed to work with and then sold them out immediately permanently losing them an ally as she was put on the spot ontop of things later in the episode which I won't disclose for spoilers), it just ends up feeling alittle forced for her character to lead.

Where as for Liam I feel with Orym got his taste of leadership in EXU and was unhappy hence the backseat he took allowing Dorian to take over as the leader, as Orym led a group of Chaotic people that didn't really take him seriously. It feels Liam either wants to or is forced to take control when the story demands it but doesn't truly want to take leadership in fear of those same repercussions.

It's why I don't really like either character however after Episode 51 it's exemplified when both Imogen and Orym take the backseat properly. As Chetney and FCG with Laudna taking the reign's that really started to make the story and fit the characters better imo.

Early on in Marquette there was originally 3 of the 8 characters from there being Ashton and Imogen being born and raised and Betrand who'd been living there for a long period of time. Laudna, FCG then the trio from the Crown Keepers being from across the globe only arriving more recently. So with the loss of Bertrand and Dorian, the refusal of leadership by Ashton, it was solely put on Imogen's shoulders with Orym trying to back her up which didn't work for either of the characters.

Sorry this is gotten alittle too longwinded and probably will never be seen anyways but it's definitely a thing I've pondered over the duration of time, I still love Campaign 3 and Critical Role as a whole as it's gotten me into DnD so heavily. It's just for me being able to look back to the struggles of what it made for the first 20/40 episodes to get it to where it is now is kinda important, especially with EXU's Kymal being a beautiful 2 part continuation to Dorian and the Crown Keepers story that I wish we can get more for later on, followed by EXU Calamity being such a powerful short campaign of 4 parts.

My biggest problem with C3 is when they all got teleported away from eachother Party 1 seemed way to relaxed about it like the stakes we were building up to..were just thrown to the wayside they acted goofy and had fun not faulting them for that but i can see how that would take anyone out of the immersion Party 2 handled their reactions to everything well in a sense they still felt like the world was gonna break if they didnt figure something out. Laudnas reaction to meeting up with them was perfect breaking down and getting upset cause party 1 had a good time and party 2 had to sacrifice their ideals and someone they traveled with and giving into Delilah i think when theyre together they balance eachother out really well also no hate to guests i enjoyed them i dnt fault them at all I know everyones gonna hate me to even say this but Matts dicision to tp everyone is truly the root of the problem besides that time frame ive enjoyed C3 was very hard to watch party 1 thats all il say.

I know nothing about Champaign 3 as i got bored of Champaign 2 when they got to the underdark, wasn't really feeling the party. I can't put my finger on it but something about C1 was different that made it better.

Maybe i think for both me and others that it's fatigue. hours on hours of character roleplay can get boring to sit and listen to imo. as much as i like C1 i still got drained when the focus shifted to vax and kelyth.

Hell, it could be the setting. I would be tuning in right away if they announced a Champaign set in a sci-fi setting or a cyberpunk one.

they are going too woke, is that problem. M9 was the best and its all downhill from there.

that moment where the last 4-6 episodes has made this campaign tied to EVERYTHING and is some of the best content they have put out yet

I'm dissapointed by the bias you're showing each step of the way, also 90% of the points you bring up are copy-paste from Reddit threads. Even reasoning, description and points are the same. Is that how the content is supposed to be made these days? It's evident in so many of your videos. Anyway Campaign 3 is underwhelming, not because it's really bad, but it's bleak by comparison with Campaign 1 and 2, which were great. But let's be honest here, fans expect greater things from professional D&D players, not worse, growth not decline. If you were to compare C3 with a random homegame it would be unbelievably good, but if you compare it with the content that CR had already provided so far it's far less significant. Nothing changes the fact that fans are bored with the story and bored with the characters. Nothing changes the fact that most of the characters are simply not likable, nothing changes the fact that the seams are showing like when they try to push Imogen as the party leader, which has nothing to do with the plot, but everything with the fact that they agreed upon it beforehand - it shows. We can sit here and debate all we want, but the fandom is clearly showing that there is something wrong going on with this Campaign, check reddit posts from C1/C2 and from now, it's as easy as that. If you start deflecting you're done, just look at Volition Studio - a short story of how to shut down the company: instead of listening to fans they deflected and kept on pushing their agenda. And yes there are various different reasons, from stock market, ESG, DEI and CSR, to the personal lives and decisions, time management etc., but in the end the fact is that it lead them to close up shop.

As a new critical role fan that’s late for 3rd campaign(episode 8 atm), I really like the “game” part of critical role. However, I must admit that I’m not attached to the cast to the point of skipping sponsored segments and even the “new” intro, which I find a bit too flamboyant, pretentious almost. I have nothing against them being successful: making a living out of your passion is amazing and I wish only the best for them.

People forget that it's a frigging D&D game, written by one guy and rest just play in the sandbox he created. Not like Mercer has a team of writers behind him and a script that the cast follows. The players are doing what they think is fun in their opinion. Of course some storylines and hooks are not as interesting as others, but that is to be expected when you are just one guy. Mercer is not a frigging god. You're not watching an HBO show.

When I first saw the intro to campaign 3, I thought it was interesting since they brought in old characters to work with new ones since those older characters seem quickly discarded at the time but as mentioned in the video the bone grinding pacing made me wanna cave my skull in since It either seemed as if they jump the gun too fast or not at all leaving me disinterested, which resulted in me stopping around the time they revived Laudna. Calamity however was a complete refresh since it gave new characters that the audience could love dispite it still being prerecorded.

While it is better for the cast to do pre recordings, the chat and cast interactions were something that was unique and one of a kind enhancing the show acting like dry timber to a open flame since early on the cast was being gifted pizza's, merch was being bought out insanly fast, live show audience interactions were being done, the drama and actions of players felt real and not scripted or fake, the game felt real. An example of this is during campaign 2 episode 93 when the party was trying to strike a deal with Isharnai (aka the hag) Marisha was willing to give up her character to not only help her characters family but to help Nott return to normal and while the party was puzzled and distraught unknown what step to take and what sacrifices has to be done, Jester went in and blew everyone's minds leaving the entire cast and the audience SHOOK. Or if you want a pre-recorded example, how about episode 123 where Ashley accidentally summoned a dragon suprising everyone.

To me, If you comapre what you see before with alot of what you see from campaign 3, they've gone from a campaign shown to a large audience to a show rehersed and acted to no one.

Asking me to watch 120 hours of something before it gets good is insane.

C1 blended the overarching campaign story with the personal backstory arch's perfectly, C2 focused too much on the personal back story's for me and the larger story kind of seamed to appear and it was over. I have just gotten to around episode 30 for C3 and have largely felt like there is too much focus on the larger world and NPC tasks. . .

Campaign 1 - The Epic One
Campaign 2 - The Deep One
Campaign 3 - The Weird One