Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I\u2019m delighted to be returning to the Legend of Vox Machina, touching down in a moment of crisis and calamity for our poor adventurers. Having just secured a platemail vestige for Pike and beaten a dragon in the bargain, they returned to Whitestone to see it bathed in fire, the sky alive with Thordak\u2019s nightmare brood. This attack marked the end of their alliance with the devious Raishan, and the beginning of a new quest: killing that asshole Anna Ripley.<\/span><\/p>\n So basically, it seems like we\u2019ve surmounted the third act finale of Mercer\u2019s overall campaign structure, in keeping with the villain-slaying standard of the Whitestone and Thunder Herd act finales. DnD is an eternal compromise between player agency and narrative necessity; stories aren\u2019t structured arbitrarily, their rise and falls of drama are paced so as to cultivate reader interest, offer moments of release, and ultimately reward the reader for their investment. As such, while DnD campaigns are often more freewheeling than your average fantasy novel, a skillful DM will still infuse them with the structural momentum of a traditional narrative, drawing rising action together into cathartic peaks, and then humbling the party before starting that rise over again.<\/span><\/p>\n Incidentally, my party\u2019s own ongoing campaign has just reached a similar point, having recently defeated the vampire Strahd with some kind of holy hand grenade. We\u2019re actually in a much trickier spot, as the self-contained nature of the Curse of Strahd campaign means we\u2019re now left with no dangling threads to pursue, and essentially have to reinvent a reason why we\u2019re even traveling together. I\u2019m doing my best to make some player-side sense of our ramblings, but have to admit I\u2019m becoming increasingly nostalgic for my days of DM-side campaign control, as the richness of a player character is in large part a reflection of how meaningfully they can interact with the DM\u2019s world. Let\u2019s enjoy Mercer and Percy showing exactly how that\u2019s done as we return to Vox Machina!<\/span><\/p>\n Episode 7<\/b><\/p>\n We open on a fresh set of beautiful backgrounds, this time detailing an alpine village that seems divided between the farming of watery paddies and the mining of precious minerals. Apparently this is actually Ripley\u2019s hometown, as we see a much younger Ripley fixing a minecart<\/span><\/p>\n These flashbacks are a great privilege of this adaptation; even if you had the DM simply convey this entire scene via exposition, it would possess little of the impact of literally seeing a young Ripley going about her business. I actually feel like it\u2019s a good thing in DnD terms that I don\u2019t learn particularly well via spoken words versus through images or text \u2013 because of that, I also never assume my players will care about a scene or character simply because I\u2019ve described them. Investment in DnD must necessarily be forged through action, through drama in the present tense, through things the players can personally interact with<\/span><\/p>\n A group of mages known as The Assembly arrive to steal their mines. Thus Ripley\u2019s motivation is firmly established: she must build weapons capable of contending with magic-users, so she will never feel this helpless again<\/span><\/p>\n Jumping back to the present, Percy has realized why Ripley revealed Whitestone\u2019s location: to steal their supply of Residuum. I appreciate how Mercer is continuing to weave the consequences of Percy\u2019s initial arc throughout this Chroma Conclave arc, maintaining a sense of continuity and consequence while also allaying the sensation of conflicts being entirely seasonal. I imagine that mysterious orb from the end of season one will eventually come back into play in some calamitous fashion as well<\/span><\/p>\n Percy states the rocks left in their vault can only be found on the isle of Glintshore. An appropriately conclusive response to what was presumably an excellent investigation check<\/span><\/p>\n Performing investigations in DnD is tricky precisely because \u201cInvestigation\u201d is an actual skill in the skill list; if you want investigation to incorporate more interaction than just rolling that specific skill check, you have to flex a bit, either incorporating a need for multiple skill checks or progressive investigations (so, \u201cyou think you might recall this stone from a book\u201d being the first success, then you actually have to find that book, etcetera)<\/span><\/p>\n Vex wisely notes that Ripley leaving this stone is essentially an invitation<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYou said I\u2019m a changed man. Let\u2019s hope you\u2019re right.\u201d One of the best ways to convey player characters reaching a bonding threshold: trusting each other\u2019s judgment over their own<\/span><\/p>\n Excellent beat of Percy and Vex fretting over revealing their relationship to the team, followed by the team lamenting how obvious those two are being. There\u2019s plenty of fun, fertile drama in navigating romantic relationships between characters, and this phase is one of my favorites to actually write \u2013 the awkward adjustment period, when you\u2019re both giddy about being a couple, but not actually sure how to act <\/span>as<\/span><\/i> a couple. I had an inordinate amount of fun writing that dynamic for my first novel, and have since indulged in it while writing non-player characters as often as possible<\/span><\/p>\n Of course, I also love the \u201cattempts at greater sincerity\/intimacy only invoke friction\u201d preceding phase, exemplified by something like Toradora\u2019s drama. Currently having a lot of fun writing through that phase with two of my other non-player characters<\/span><\/p>\n The team elect to fly to Glintshore, demonstrating the odd caravan of transport faculties that often define later-level parties. Between Vex\u2019s broom, Vax\u2019s wings, and Keyleth\u2019s giant eagle form, they\u2019ve got just enough flight capabilities to manage it<\/span><\/p>\n We watch ants carry leaves along a vine before the focus shifts behind them, tracking our heroes through the forest. I\u2019ve actually been trying to improve my use of the DnD equivalent of \u201cestablishing shots\u201d \u2013 the brief expository text that introduces a new scene or region. Pure descriptive copy tends to wash over me in speech, so I try to be brief yet evocative, drawing in as many senses as possible \u2013 what is the sound, smell, and texture of this place? It\u2019s hard to craft atmosphere in DnD, but it\u2019s well worth the trying<\/span><\/p>\n The next hour or so of Vax carefully poking at traps is mercifully summarized. Even if an area seems likely to have traps, making the players trap check <\/span>everything<\/span><\/i> generally just slows the game down, so I tend to limit my traps to however many achieve max comedy. A chest full of spring-loaded scorpions should be used sparingly<\/span><\/p>\n Percival admits he\u2019s in love with Vex, and in classic Vex fashion, she freezes and then exits the scene. Vex\u2019s insecurities are an excellent supplement to the overall party drama, provoking friction with Vax, Percy, and even Keyleth. For my party\u2019s own current campaign, we\u2019ve made a point of plotting out key areas of philosophical disagreement between our characters, such as to more gracefully promote drama and character growth. Player characters that agree on everything don\u2019t tend to feel particularly distinct or memorable<\/span><\/p>\n Distracted by Percy\u2019s confession, Vex trips right over a wire, and an entrancing smoke overwhelms the party<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYour love, it kills.\u201d A brief flashback to Vex\u2019s dead mother offers some context for her anxieties. You can theoretically create a player character without a meaningful backstory, but that naturally undercuts the sense that your character is on some sort of emotional journey, following an arc from where they began towards who they\u2019ll become. We are built of our past experiences, and denying such experiences makes your character a cipher<\/span><\/p>\n Ripley introduces Percy to the factory while the rest of the party are paralyzed by \u201cdelirium gas.\u201d A fine enough device for challenging their personal development, similarly to how the sphinx challenged them back in season two. For players who are actually invested in their characters\u2019 emotional development, psychological gauntlets like this can be a chance to show off, to flex how far their avatars have come<\/span><\/p>\n And of course, Percy being tempted to the dark side by Ripley is just another variation on that same concept<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cMy imperfections don\u2019t make me weaker. They make me who I am.\u201d Well said, Percy. From what I\u2019ve seen of their actual sessions, the Critical Role team are preposterously adept at coming up with a killer line or speech when the opportunity calls for it; I do what I can to plot out what I am able, but some talents you can only admire, not effectively imitate<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI will not be complicit.\u201d \u201cProgress cannot be stopped.\u201d Percy and Ripley\u2019s conflict is the most compelling within this story, as Ripley\u2019s the only antagonist with an actual point \u2013 scientific progress <\/span>will<\/span><\/i> proceed, and in a world ruled by magic, attempting to fight back through science has a nice egalitarian ring to it. It\u2019s the least gamified conflict in a campaign otherwise defined by seeking dragon balls to fight unquestionably evil dragons<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cA library? Words, all words? Why are there no pictures!?\u201d Bless Grog. Keeping a character or two simple does help the dramatic balance<\/span><\/p>\n Ooh, some nice smear-heavy cuts for Percy and Ripley\u2019s duel<\/span><\/p>\n The moment of truth of course comes <\/span>after<\/span><\/i> his victory, when he must decide whether he is still the vengeful executioner, or if he can let this go<\/span><\/p>\n But though Percy has changed, Ripley has not. She greets his mercy with a gunshot<\/span><\/p>\n And Done<\/b><\/p>\n Well, that\u2019s what you get for trying to redeem folks, I suppose. Nonetheless, even her refusal to accept Percy\u2019s offer here further bolsters Anna Ripley\u2019s position as the most compelling non-player character in this campaign, a character with perfectly understandable motivation who has been drawn into a violent, antagonistic role through her unflinching faith in her convictions. Seeing her cross both words and weapons with Percy has me feeling eager to craft such similarly compelling antagonists for my own campaign; I\u2019ve likely been too generous in terms of character redemption in the past, and could probably stand to add a character or two the party can\u2019t quite rehabilitate. It\u2019s a good Vox Machina episode that leaves me so eager to steal something!<\/span><\/p>\n This\u00a0article\u00a0was\u00a0mad<\/a><\/em>e possible by reader support<\/a>. Thank you all for\u00a0all that you do.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wrongeverytime.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/November04111522.jpg?resize=584%2C329&ssl=1\")
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<\/p>\nLike this:<\/h3>\n