Meditative Meanderings: Small Town Dungeons and Dragons

Sunday, August 16, 2020

Small Town Dungeons and Dragons

Critical Role Second Campaign Characters, L to R: Yasha (Ashley), Fjord (Travis), Jester (Laura), Nott (Sam), Beau (Marisha), Caleb (Liam), and Mollymauk (Taliesen)

A couple of years ago, T started watching a live-streamed game of Dungeons and Dragons. The players and the Dungeon Master (DM) are all first-rate voice actors of anime and video game fame. But, more than that, they are friends who started playing over five years ago as a birthday present to one of the group of eight. That one-shot morphed into a homebrew game based in a wonderful world called Exandria, as devised by the creative mind (and voice) of Matthew Mercer. Matt led the players: Marisha Ray (who was dating Matt at the time; they are now married), Sam Riegel, Liam O'Brien, Ashley Johnson, Taliesen Jaffe, and another married couple, Laura Bailey and Travis Willingham. A couple of years later, they were approached by Geek and Sundry to play their home game live on Twitch. Thus, Critical Role started.

The cast of Critical Role, L to R: Liam, Ashley, Travis, Laura, Matthew, Marisha, Taliesen, Sam

I could go on and on about Critical Role and all that they have done, along with many other live-streamers, to bring D&D mainstream. But after watching for a while, we got the itch to play. First, T played a short campaign (eight sessions) with younger brother J and J's wife Ems, plus a couple from our church. After they finished up as the DM was leaving for law school, T decided he wanted to DM ... and he has created a homebrewed world that combined Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition (5e) with the video game world of Elder Scrolls. After much planning of his world of Varmmyr, T, E, and I started playing with neighbor C, and in the eighth session, her husband D joined the party, now consisting of four plus the DM.

One of our first battles!!

I can't tell you how much I look forward to Sunday afternoons and four hours in another world. My character is an Aasimar (a part-angelic race) Light Cleric named Fionnlagh (pronounced "Finlay"); Fionn is basically a demon hunter sent by her mentor, Benedict (yes, based on St. Benedict) to help quash a demonic cult; this is Fionn's first solo assignment, and she has been sent to meet with one of Benedict's friends, Leland, a priest. Once she entered the small town of Eda'Linn, she goes to the temple where she is to meet Leland, and they are ambushed by demonic beings who quickly kill Leland before Fionn can get any answers from him...besides finding a letter from Benedict about a girl Leland has recently taken into his care.

Also in the temple, Fionn meets a small girl named Tehn (pronounced "Ten"--E's character) who was under Leland's care and seems to have magical powers that Benedict is very interested in--according to his letter to Leland. They also meet a Tabaxi (cat-person--C's character) named Ember who is very handy with bows and arrows. These three start an adventure, all for different reasons, tracking down the source of the demonic attack and learning to trust one another along the way.

After several adventures in and around Eda'Linn, the trio travels to Port Eroth, and on the way, they come across and fight alongside a human named Ethrond who is an Eldritch Knight (D's character), and he joins the party since he has several contacts in Port Eroth. And thus the foursome starts tracking down the clues that will lead them far from Eda'Linn and Port Eroth across the mountains and into the Ghodeir Desert where they discover an archaeological dig that seems extremely hinky. And many fights and adventures, mummies and curses, come their way.

Fionnlagh in her Iconoclast's Aegis Armor

We have now returned to Port Eroth at the end of our first arc. And has it ever been amazing!! When we returned to the Port near the end of our last session, Fionnlagh was finally able to hand over the Abyssal Sigil Stone to the Orc Prior Durmak, whom her mentor Benedict had told her to meet, telling him that they had kept the Stone from the mummified Ashen Prince, preventing his complete resurrection. Then Prior Durmak put Fionn through her paces in fighting a Shadow Demon ... with the caveat that she could not destroy the wooden warehouse in which she fought it.

After decimating the demon (and not damaging the warehouse), Fionn is offered membership in the Iconoclasts, a secret espionage-type group within the Order of the Fallen Star. Above is her new armor which gives her two more points to her Armor Class, among many other awesome benefits. Plus, Fionn was very touched that Ember had sneakily followed her when she met and then completed her "test" with Prior Durmak, even to the point of congratulating her after her win.

T voices so many amazing NPC (non-playing characters), draws so many awesome maps, creates so many fights and adventures for us, that we have a blast, and four hours just fly by every Sunday afternoon. This afternoon, we'll be starting our 27th session since beginning the campaign in early January; we've missed only one week, I believe. We'll bee off to the floating city of Vellestra for a bit of shopping and other fun!!

One of T's maps of the underground caverns through which we sought the Ashen Prince.

Even though C and D live three streets down, we went to Zoom for our sessions once the pandemic hit in mid-March. They work from home, but C also has some health issues that keep her careful, as does T, so we may meet on C and D's deck outside if a particular Sunday is forecast to be cool enough. Unfortunately, today's temperatures are supposed to reach 100 degrees, so meeting outside is a no-go this week.