#dm for criticism!!

[keehlmyself]

practicing art! : today's poor victim is near / nate river.

(please note that i am not a professional artist, nor am i any good. i haven't drawn in awhile and this is me experimenting.)

i am accepting criticsm! if you're willing to give advice, please dm me :)

[essektheylyss]

CRYING at Allura just blatantly volunteering the Nein to go fight the Weave Mind with no buy-in. That's so on brand for the Nein. (Whenever they apparently GET BACK IN ONE PIECE??? FROM WHERE, BABE???)

[sicklyseraphnsuch]

Sam Is a Master Storyteller

I think the turning point in his head was when Matt said, hey TPK - new beginnings.

But that wasn't the clever part. He is SO GOOD at taking the tools given to him for the intended purpose of kneecapping people's hearts.

His core?? We introduced that before the fucking Red Moon beam. That was WAY back before they even met Plane Rider Rin (I believe??) One of the engineers was like oh you got this dangerous thing inside you.

And the clever move was ***EVERYONE FUCKING FORGOT ABOUT IT*** including Matt. That's how you hit people where it hurts. Always have something in the tank to blindside people with. And he held this behind his teeth with every smile. He fucking knew about this last hail mary bomb trapped in his chest. And he never said a fucking word to remind everyone - to let anyone brace themselves for this decision

And when he saw half the party go down - Orym, Ashton, with only Imogen, Fearne, Laudna, and Chet on their last legs... He knew it was time. It was time. And he blindsided everyone beautifully including the DM

Because he was a little Killer Robot. That bomb didn't kill his intended target a millenia or so ago. And instead, it becomes the prayer through which he saves his family.

He has become life, bringer of change.

[imperial-cat]

Reading Orym discourse on twitter is kinda funny, "it's unfair that he has a trump card and can shut down any conversation with it", like, I don't know but, if I don't have a counter argument in a discussion, maybe this means the other person has a valid point?

[jewishdragon]

IM SCREAMING CRYING AND THROWING UP

[mikasasrippedtoenail]

Most people are acutely unaware of the fact that educated individuals make up a very small part of the population. Your access to internet, online discourse, books and other resources is a privilege. When you surround yourself with the elite, you will inevitably have a warped narrative of the reality. This is why lot of women in the West believe feminism isn't necessary.

Their skulls are not bashed by their father for not wearing a hijab nor are they paraded naked as a war prize. Their bodies are not marred to make them ugly enough to prevent soldier rape. Their bones are not broken to make them unable to run away when their husband forces himself upon them. Their genitals aren't mutilated; they aren't stoned to death for going to school. They can vote. They can learn. They can flourish. Yet, most women in the world slave away just for the sin of being born a woman.

The haunting part is that they know. They are aware of the way the western society punishes them. They are aware of the damger that looms over them. They know that they cannot escape the inertia of patriarchy. Yet, they close their eyes and ears. They are willing to jeopardize billions of women to protect themselves and reap the benefits of the small power bestowed upon them, clinging under the cast of their elite class. Their selfish desire overpowers their gulit and thus is destroyed the female solidarity.

[balleater]

despite being more often than not a "rules as written" fan over "rule of cool", i really do love me a good "rules be damned, i'll give you this awesome moment" call. like matt giving fcg the otohan kill despite what her hp was at or brennan giving cerrit an extra mage slayer reaction attack at the end of calamity. honestly, if anything, i think the fact they mostly play by the book makes these moments even better because it really has that extra weight towards those decisions to put the rules aside.

[starving-and-arting]

The Big Three ™

[clar-a-m]

what if when (if?) the bells hells and the crown keepers reunite aabria gets to DM at least the first half of that and for the first time in almost 10 years matt gets to be a player in a main campaign and gets to interact with his friends as a player WHAT THEN

[yashley]

ashley in critical role one-shots* (part 2)

[oddthesungod]

earth, sky and love inbetween 💚💙💚

[ludinusdaleth]

with the obligatory precursor statement of "the gods are not based on any earthen pantheon and thus cannot be drawn directly to any of our dieties, but downfall is heavily intentionally pulling from religious imagery": it is insane (in the best way) of nick marini to show up to critical role for his very first time and play pelor as the messiah shepherd giving food & shelter to poor refugees. whilst boarding a ship of regufees. to nuke the city that harbors them

[cryptidcassie]

The countdown to episode 69 grows ever more chaotic

[criticalyasha]

C3E66 - “That’s your girlfriend..”

[dailyadventureprompts]

Alright, guess it’s time to address the apocalyptic legal elephant in the room:

For those who might not know, WotC plans were leaked to “update” the OGL in what is basically a scorched earth policy with regards to 3rd party material/creators in the hopes of cutting out the competition and forcing people to use their new products. 

As someone who lived through the 4th edition/pathfinder schism, the situation is laughably similar:  D&D is flourishing more than it ever has (thanks primarily to the OGL) but the execs at Hasbro want more of the money spent on the hobby to wind up in their pockets. Oblivious to the fact that the opensource nature of the game is what draws people to it,  they task the design team with creating a proprietary virtual tabletop through which they can sell d&d content without having to worry about books or pdfs being pirated. This rightfully outrages the fandom and burns every scrap of good will they had towards WotC, resulting in a dead edition that’s maligned years afterword as folks hop to the newer, easier game system. 

The thing that’s different this time is that the d&d playerbase has grown exponentially since the days of the first OGL, with 5th edition being the easiest version of the game to run/pick up and so many resources online, there’s almost no barrier to entry besides finding a stable/accommodating group.   Hell, with the explosive popularity of liveplay series you don’t even need to be actively playing in order to be in the fandom.  All of these people are networked together in a fandom hivemind spread across twitter/reddit/youtube and WotC just made an enemy of every single one of them with its shameless and destructive cashgrab.  No streamer or 3rd party publisher wants to give Hasbro 25% of their revenue, to say nothing of having their project “cancelled” if WotC sees it as a threat to any of their current projects ( see the huge number of spelljammer materials published after the company dropped the ball). 

It took about two years after the announcement of 4th edition for Paizo to come out with pathfinder, and I have no doubt the OGL leak kickstarted every major 3rd party publisher brainstorming some legally distinct version of the 5e ruleset. In the coming months I expect to see a number of these surrogate systems floating around the internet in much the same way that the onednd playtest content, but spurred on with the added “fuck you Hasbro” energy. After that, it’s only a matter of time till one of the big streamers picks up one of these systems and popularizes it, not wanting to pay the 25%tithe to WotC. Personally my money’s on Critical Role: they were one of the major factors in popularizing 5th edition and they’ve got the fandom pull to legitimize any claimant to the throne. 

To step away from playing oracle for a bit, I’d like to finish up this post by dunking on WotC:  

*ahem*

HOW FUCKING DUMB TO YOU HAVE TO BE TO TURN YOUR ENTIRE CUSTOMER BASE AGAINST YOU IN ONE NIGHT? This is some new coke/Reynolds pamphlet/invading Russia in winter levels of shooting yourself in the foot. Wizards was on shaky ground to begin with given that they’re coming off a series of notably disappointing products AND trying to launch a new edition/virtual tabletop/battlepass system, but to follow that up with a retroactive rules change that lets them outright steal from or shut down creators? It’s laughable.  Maybe, MAYBE they could have made this work if they were knocking it out of the park with new releases every year and cultivating a base of diehard WotC loyalists, but the fact of the matter is that aside from the brand name, the hobby has largely passed them by. Everything that Wizards does, from player options to settings to monsters to rules modules, someone else does better because they’re willing to take risks and put in the effort. Aside from the elegant simplicity of 5e’s base system, I can count maybe two pieces of actual game design (piety from Theros, ship combat from Saltmash) that I consider usable at my table, which is SAYING SOMETHING considering we’re nearing the end of the game’s ten year golden age. 

I know we’ll weather this storm, we always have, and regardless of what happens I still know my friends and I will enjoy gathering around the table and slinging dice even though we might not be playing “dungeons and dragons” in a couple years time.  I’ll keep my eye on the horizon, and let you know where I find safe harbour.

[ria-the-camel]

I love you I will always love you. But the way you're hurting yourself is scary scary. I don't know what to do with it. You're lying to me, you're hiding important, dangerous things from me. Because you don't want to stop. You don't want me to leave you, and I never will, but you're going to leave me. You believe it's the only way for you to be useful. I can't make you change your mind. I'm going to lose you. I love you.