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Crafter of worlds, forger of a new dawn

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Gods of Exandria

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Critical Role: 10 Years of Storytelling

Campaign 1, Episode 115, "The Chapter Closes." // Taliesin Jaffe, in "As D&D booms, 'Critical Role' makes its own kind of nerd celebrity" by Sarah Parvini // Campaign 3, Episode 31, "Breaking Point" // On Loving by Forugh Farrokhzad, tr. Sholeh Wolpé // The Legend of Vox Machina at NYCC 2022 // 8-bit Stories // Campaign 1 Wrap-Up // “Without You Without Them” by boygenius // Campaign 2, Episode 141, "Fond Farewells." // Campaign 3: Behind the Set // Letters to Milena by Franz Kafka // Campaign 1, Episode 115, "The Chapter Closes." // Explanation of the final Vex’ahlia playlist by Laura Bailey // Liam's Quest: Full Circle // Backwards by Warsan Shire // Exandria Unlimited: Kymal, Part 2 // Explanation of Fearne’s second playlist by Ashley Johnson // Lighthousekeeping by Jeanette Winterson // San Diego Comic-Con 2023, Critical Role: Fireside Chat & Cast Q&A // Exandria Unlimited Cooldown: Divergence Episode 4 // Campaign 3, Episode 23, "To the Skies." // Explanation of the final Percy playlist by Taliesin Jaffe // "For Good" by Stephen Schwartz // Campaign 3, Episode 91, "True Heroism." // Exandria Unlimited: Calamity, Episode 4, "Fire and Ruin." // Campaign 3, Episode 121, "A New Age Begins."

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Remember when this campaign and cast got announced and we all thought that Brennan and Liam were going to have a tragedy-off when in reality they were secretly coming together to maximize their joint slay (secretly making a love letter to Matt with their love for storytelling)

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Ludinus Da'leth, the ultimate villain of everything we've seen from Exandria so far, in a meeting with Essek: "you're a bitch, caring about people"

Essek Thelyss, who learned about the power of friendship Yesterday: "and you're a friendless loser"

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Lost and Found.

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““These guys are just weird, that’s what they are. It isn’t much else. Don’t give them the power. Look, are they a threat to democracy? Yes. Are they going to take our rights away? Yes. Are they going to put people’s lives in danger? Yes. Are they going to endanger the planet by not dealing with climate change? Yes. They are going to do all that. But don’t lift these guys up as if they’re some kind of hero. A bully has no self-confidence, a bully has no strength. The fascists depend on fear. The fascists depend on us going back. But we’re not afraid of weird people. We’re a little bit creeped out but we’re not afraid.””

— Minnesota Governor, Tim Walz

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I'm thinking about the Matron of Ravens one day telling her champion, her first and most trusted ally since ascending to godhood, that she's going to leave him for some time.

I'm thinking about Purvan Suul, months or years later, following a raven until he arrived in front of a hovel. Inside it, there was a family. A mother. A father. A young girl with dark hair and green eyes, swaddled in blankets.

I'm thinking about Emhira's parents, not understanding why this stranger decided to take care of them but being infinitely grateful for this blessing - a skilled ranger bringing food and helping find shelter whenever their family had to move was more than anyone could hope for in times like these.

I'm thinking about Emhira, still young and mostly human, growing up looking up to this man who was so close with her he could have been her second father. Begging him to take her hunting, to teach her how to make and repair arrows. Playing with his wolf who was always so very gentle with her. Learning about Fate and Death and Gods.

I'm thinking about Purvan, patient as death, answering all of Emhira's questions but never pushing her in any direction, even when he saw her talking to ravens or idly drawing in sand symbols no one had ever showed her.

I'm thinking about Purvan and how, one day, this girl who was his god who was a little and vulnerable thing he had protected for the past decade and half, finally remembered. How she smiled at him in just the right way or placed a hand on his cheek with this look in her eyes and he knew. And he fell to his knees, heart bursting with prayer and joy and relief and said: "My Lady, welcome back."

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Ashton attacking the Nox Engine

You can say he... rages against the machine

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online friends

“my friend the electrical engineer,” i say, or of someone else: “my friend the Canadian,” “my friend in Denver.” and i am down south, states and miles away.

“how did you meet?” they ask, puzzled by how far-flung my friendships. “the internet,” i say, a little proud, a little defensive because the next words are inevitable.

they always ask with a mix of amusement and horror. always. “have you met in person? no? how can you be sure it’s not an old pervert in his mother’s basement, a serial killer on the prowl?”

how can we be sure of anyone? the man who married a pastor’s daughter, then shot his pregnant wife in the back of the head–they thought they knew him. but these anonymous souls: they’re my friends.

we talk of books and ideas, family and differences in where we live and why we do what we do, and trade stupid jokes like candy, sweet and inclusive and joyful. my friends. my soul friends, who i meet on the internet.

friendships are not born of handshakes. they’re born of shared things and shared interests and sometimes just because you’re human and i’m human, and that praise God is enough. even over the internet, that is enough.

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Taliesin's closing remarks:

"Friends, colleagues, precious audience, they say that art is as close to immortality as most could ever hope to achieve. And therefore, it is always covered by the powerful, and it is prescious beyond measure to the creators who would see their visions realized.

"Tonight, our Circle of the Silver Screen have reminded us of a vicious truth: Art demands sacrifice. And all that raw material has to come from somewhere."

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A classification of Candela Obscura series

As a liveplay, the different Candela Obscura series are interesting, because the Vibe changes every time with the different group setup. So if you're not sure where to start, here is my totally unscientific classification:

Series one: The Vassal and the Veil

The introductory one. Look at this new type of game we have! It is turn of the century inspired so there's street urchins and madams and prim ladies and weird professors, the kind of characters you find in a Dickens novel. Also it's narrated by Matt so Much Body Horror ensues. It's spooky and sad and American Gothic but weirdly, probably the lightest series of the four out now.

Series two: Needle and Thread

The PTSD edition. Now that you know the setting, let's dump a bunch of trauma in it! What is the value of a life? Of a soul? What is it that makes us human? How do fight you supernatural phenomena while still haunted by the ghosts of your past self? Your past life? This one has some of the better action sequences of all the Candela series. The vibe is Lovecraft meets Rambo and I will not elaborate on this.

Series three: Tide and Bone

In which Aabria turns the dial to eleven. There's body horror, there's monster fucking, there's that thing Sam does where he fucks you up with his character's backstory. The world is an unjust place even without all the supernatural horrors and capitalism is going to get all of us killed. The vibe here is a little bit more Dark Horse comics, because the characters themselves are Weirder and less grounded than in the other series.

Series four: The Crimson Mirror

In which Liam tries to murder the characters. As a dm, he has been given a Large Set of Knives with which to stab his characters but he's still just constantly swinging at them with a giant mallet also. This one is High Drama with lots of flashbacks and grappling with how to reassemble a life that has been torn to shreds. Heavy Edgar Allen Poe vibes. This one has some of my favourit acting in the series.

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This inspired me to write a fic of Caleb and Essek having a conversation about Caleb’s history

look man. look

essek saying "bren" out loud, claiming a position on caleb's side as the mouthpiece of his regards to astrid, did something to me. i can't tell if it opened a wound or punched me or gave me a hug. all i know is that i am feeling so many emotions right now

more under the cut because i'm about to get rambly:

"bren aldric ermendrud" is a separate character from caleb widogast. he's a young boy learning how to make magic. he's a deeply traumatized and indoctrinated teenager. he's the boy who curled up with astrid and eadwulf in a freezing tower for warmth all night.

essek never met bren. he met caleb and he's never known him as anyone else. if i'm remembering correctly, caleb never even said the name "bren" to him during the campaign, and neither did any of the nein.

essek knows caleb widogast. he knows the man who held up the object of his worst crime and then kissed him in the bowels of a ship and made a floor of infinite stars for them to walk through together. he knows the person who healed over bren's wounds—thinly, but enough. he knows the man that the boy has become.

astrid knows bren. she barely knows who caleb is. she still calls him bren after hearing him referred to as caleb repeatedly. she can't know him as the man he is, she only knows the boy. there's some of bren in caleb, but there is no caleb in bren.

essek saying "bren sends his regards" is him gauging astrid's reaction, on one level—if she freaks out, which she did, she's in opposition to caleb's cause and thus a threat. on another level, it's essek delivering a very different subtextual message from caleb: "the boy who loved you is giving you one final warning."

because essek is a threat to astrid. their last meaningful interaction was slinging spells at each other in the blooming grove. and that's funny in a "current boyfriend vs ex girlfriend exclusively fight each other" kind of way, but it's also deeply tied to caleb's recurring theme of transformation. "bren sends his regards" also means "i have healed enough to love enough for someone else to know this name and use it with my consent. and this someone else is your enemy. what does that make you think i've become?"

it also does a fantastic job of communicating subtle offscreen discussions that have happened over the years since the end of c2. we don't have the details of when or how caleb told essek his birth name, but we know that he did, and we know from all of c2 that the name bren occupies a place of immense emotional weight for caleb. it functions similarly to a deadname in terms of who uses it and for what purpose. trent exclusively calls caleb bren to wound him and place himself in a position of power. astrid calls him bren to remind both him and herself of who they used to be—same with eadwulf, though obviously he's not here.

the first time we hear essek say "bren" is on caleb's behalf and confronting one of the narrative representations of caleb's trauma. it's four words that manage to communicate "i, your enemy on a hundred levels, can speak for both the man i love and the boy who loved you, because i know him in his entirety."

astrid knows bren and essek knows caleb, but only essek can speak for both. because at some point, caleb gave bren to essek. and we know this from four words. four IMPROVISED words.

god. this moment is just so fucking good

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look man. look

essek saying "bren" out loud, claiming a position on caleb's side as the mouthpiece of his regards to astrid, did something to me. i can't tell if it opened a wound or punched me or gave me a hug. all i know is that i am feeling so many emotions right now

more under the cut because i'm about to get rambly:

"bren aldric ermendrud" is a separate character from caleb widogast. he's a young boy learning how to make magic. he's a deeply traumatized and indoctrinated teenager. he's the boy who curled up with astrid and eadwulf in a freezing tower for warmth all night.

essek never met bren. he met caleb and he's never known him as anyone else. if i'm remembering correctly, caleb never even said the name "bren" to him during the campaign, and neither did any of the nein.

essek knows caleb widogast. he knows the man who held up the object of his worst crime and then kissed him in the bowels of a ship and made a floor of infinite stars for them to walk through together. he knows the person who healed over bren's wounds—thinly, but enough. he knows the man that the boy has become.

astrid knows bren. she barely knows who caleb is. she still calls him bren after hearing him referred to as caleb repeatedly. she can't know him as the man he is, she only knows the boy. there's some of bren in caleb, but there is no caleb in bren.

essek saying "bren sends his regards" is him gauging astrid's reaction, on one level—if she freaks out, which she did, she's in opposition to caleb's cause and thus a threat. on another level, it's essek delivering a very different subtextual message from caleb: "the boy who loved you is giving you one final warning."

because essek is a threat to astrid. their last meaningful interaction was slinging spells at each other in the blooming grove. and that's funny in a "current boyfriend vs ex girlfriend exclusively fight each other" kind of way, but it's also deeply tied to caleb's recurring theme of transformation. "bren sends his regards" also means "i have healed enough to love enough for someone else to know this name and use it with my consent. and this someone else is your enemy. what does that make you think i've become?"

it also does a fantastic job of communicating subtle offscreen discussions that have happened over the years since the end of c2. we don't have the details of when or how caleb told essek his birth name, but we know that he did, and we know from all of c2 that the name bren occupies a place of immense emotional weight for caleb. it functions similarly to a deadname in terms of who uses it and for what purpose. trent exclusively calls caleb bren to wound him and place himself in a position of power. astrid calls him bren to remind both him and herself of who they used to be—same with eadwulf, though obviously he's not here.

the first time we hear essek say "bren" is on caleb's behalf and confronting one of the narrative representations of caleb's trauma. it's four words that manage to communicate "i, your enemy on a hundred levels, can speak for both the man i love and the boy who loved you, because i know him in his entirety."

astrid knows bren and essek knows caleb, but only essek can speak for both. because at some point, caleb gave bren to essek. and we know this from four words. four IMPROVISED words.

god. this moment is just so fucking good

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critical role said "THE BELLS HELLS AND THE CROWN KEEPERS ARE INTERTWINED AND SO IS VOX MACHINA AND SO IS THE MIGHTY NEIN AND SO IS THE RING OF BRASS AGES AGO AND WE ARE ALL SO SMALL IN THE FACE OF THE GODS AND ARCHMAGES AND THE COSMOS EVEN LARGER. BUT FOR THAT, WE ARE MIGHTY"

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I finished my rewatch/relisten of the Vox Machina campaign in mid-December (although I recently re-embarked on the second half of the Chroma Conclave arc hoping season 3 of TLVOM will be announced (released?? ����) by the time I reach "A Bard's Lament"). Predictably, I bawled, AGAIN, but by then I'd already been scribbling and sketching ideas for this for... a couple of weeks? Hence the little WIP preview last month.

I'll never shut up about this moment. It's just as beautiful as it's heartbreaking, in- and off-game, especially taking into account all the context of characters/people involved.

Also, bonus, because after I finished sketching that 6th frame I thought a hug was needed.

"You broke my heart." and all of ours as well 💔

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“Ladies should be seen and not heard,” and she is there, just behind the speaker, a smile on her lips and mischief in her eyes.

“Silence is a virtue,” and she is there, pulling faces, fingers in her ears and tongue peeking out to brush her chin, a gleeful obscenity.

“Loose lips sink ships,” and she is there, a cutlass in her hand, ready to sail for the Spanish Main at dawn, the colors already hoisted in her heart.

She doesn’t have a lot to say, but she allows others to speak for her with giddy willingness, bending their pious proverbs to her own ends.  She finds her strength and her divinity in the space between the silence and the sigh, the blossoming room where she can undermine her own ideals and make of silence something screaming.

Ladies should be seen and not heard?  Fine, then, she will make of their precious ladies a spectacle too grand to be ignored.  She will make sure they can be seen from space.  Silence is a virtue?  Then silence enough should make them virtuous; they need not a single virtue more.  Loose lips sink ships?  Then she will build a graveyard all her own, schooners and galleons at the bottom of the sea.

Do not tempt the quiet ones, for their vengeance will be swift and unrelenting.  But she smiles and smiles and sips her tea, and the ones who worship her—either willingly or because they have no given choice—understand that her wrath, when it descends, will be unending.  And they love her for it.  Oh, how they love her.

They do not sing her praises.  Instead, they hold them close and quiet in their hearts, and she is theirs, and they are hers, and all those who fail to understand their bonds will one day see them in the screaming silence of the dawn.