Exandria Unlimited: Calamity Wrap Up

is a Q&A episode of Critical Role covering the events of Exandria Unlimited: Calamity.

Did knowing it was The Calamity change how you normally build your characters?

 * Aabria Iyengar normally doesn't optimize a character. However, Brennan Lee Mulligan said that they were likely to die, and she refused. She worked her hardest to create a sturdy character who would survive as long as possible, and she found it fun to see the hit point difference between Laerryn Coramar-Seelie and Patia Por'co. She researched wizards builds and worked with a friend to optimize Laerryn.
 * Sam Riegel said to Brennan that, when they were told they could have as many items as they wished, he was scared to pick items because he felt like he was cheating. Instead, he picked only a Wand of Smiles and a +1 Ring of Protection but still guilty, even though the others had significantly more items. Marisha felt that Luis Carazo asking for a Holy Avenger gave everyone free reign to pick whatever they wanted. Brennan granted the items not only to break them in but to create a sense of Avalir being a height of arcane prowess during the Age of Arcanum.
 * Lou Wilson wanted to "show out" and hesitated to appear on Critical Role playing a bard that was just simply giving Bardic Inspiration. Brennan pointed out both Lou and Sam played multiclass bards. Sam played a bard multiclass because he did not want to learn a new class at such a high level but did not want to play a bard again, so he took Brennan's suggestion to multiclass as a warlock. Brennan highlighted Loquatius Seelie's connection to the Seelie Court, which in turn connects to the ongoing Campaign 3's Fearne Calloway, also of the Seelie Court. Sam admitted that he simply looked up fey creatures in the Exandrian lore to choose a patron
 * Sam and Lou talked about their multiclass level distribution and what their characters' first level is in. Nydas Okiro's first level is in sorcerer and had 4 levels, then 10 levels in bard, which reflected his past as someone who gained influence through his lifestyle rather than his magical talent. Loquatius is similar, with 3 levels in warlock first and then 11 in bard, as he found better means to gain attention and fame.
 * Patia's subclass is School of Enchantment. To reflect Patia's character as Keeper of Scrolls and owner of an orb in which she stores information, Marisha Ray requested that Patia be able to prepare more 10 spells than normal and have every spell scribed. Brennan allowed it, seeing as she could just "Google it" and it would be "bizarre" for her not to. He felt that Dungeon Masters should be generous with requests that are not game-breaking.
 * Travis Willingham admitted that he did not come to their character creation meeting with ideas and builds as instructed, and he instead built off what the others had pitched. As everyone else had magic, he decided to play a martial class and asked Brennan for a suggestion of a subclass that would make a good investigator to keep mages in check. Brennan suggested an Inquisitive rogue. Travis typically builds characters around an item. Fjord in Campaign 2 was built around a pair of bracers. Cerrit was built around a pair of tomahawks used in the Sayoc Hawk system of Arnis, which in turn led to Cerrit being visually based on a Philippine eagle. The group agreed that Cerrit being a non-magic user balanced the group out. Travis said that he felt "out of it" in, which he admitted was probably "perfect" for the group dynamic, because the others were talking about magic and the city and he sensed a rapport among some of the others.
 * The cast then talked about how Cerrit's role scared Aabria, Marisha, and Lou, who had separately and privately met to discuss what they'd been doing in service to the Astral Leywright.

What did you guys (Aabria, Marisha, and Lou) discuss?

 * They mostly discussed how nasty and corrupt their characters were! They specifically covered how long their plotting had been going on, what they'd collaborated on, and how they'd been doing so.
 * Brennan explained the breakdown of where the magical energy was supposed to go in the city and asked them whether or not that was truly happening, and they immediately said they were using that energy for other means. He threw out suggestions for how it might be used, including life-extension for one of the magisters.
 * This led to development of Patia as someone in a role that was usually not seen as important, but in the right hands could become incredibly influential, which in turn brought the "space-race" goal into focus. Aabria jokes that then nothing ever bad came of that.
 * Brennan notes that, as he'd said on the Twitter Spaces chat, "not everyone gets the same amount of presents" - some of the Ring of Brass were more involved in intrigue and corruption than others. Luis was, for example, more focused on Zerxus's nightmares about Betrayer Gods.
 * Going back to character inspiration, since they digressed before Luis's turn: Originally he considered playing a cleric, but then decided on being an Oath of Redemption paladin "to the extreme". He wanted to draw parallels through Zerxus's idea of the Betrayer Gods and his own isolation and unwanted obligation, as he had never wanted to be First Knight; Zerxus imagined the Betrayer Gods to be in a similar situation. Zerxus would have told Nydas more had he caught up to him earlier after the two left the Palazzo Por'co, but ended up mostly keeping the story to himself. He also would have spoken to Nydas after his first encounter with Asmodeus at the Hall of Prophecy, but Brennan deliberately used the distraction of Akami Rowe's murder to prevent it. Luis still might have had Zerxus reveal it during the Zone of Truth scene, but Nydas gave a speech defending Laerryn and Loquatius resisting the spell, so Zerxus held off.
 * Brennan felt, from the character building, that he and Luis have a lot of the same feelings about narrative and character, and that the two communicated a lot about how Zerxus was feeling. Brennan also notes that making paladins Charisma-based in 5e was a excellent choice because the class is about conviction, which can be very dangerous - but interesting - when untempered by wisdom, as seen in Zerxus's choices. Luis agrees that he specifically wanted Zerxus's belief in redemption to be extreme to the point of toxicity, even though it was also rooted in a profound optimism.
 * Marisha said while their motivations were very different, much like Zerxus, the three members of the Ring of Brass who had been plotting regarding the Astral Leywright similarly felt their actions were all justified in service of a greater cause. 'Evil' isn't terribly interesting on its own, but doing terrible things for a cause one believes is for the greater good is.
 * In contrast to that, while Sam played Loquatius as someone who frequently lied, the underlying secret was that he was lying to himself about how he felt about Laerryn, and that he actually didn't want to be lying in the first place. He wanted to be a truthful independent reporter, originally, but ended up as Herald of Avalir.
 * The cast jokes that Cerrit had no flaws, but Travis says he was an absent father and husband, and he happened to be caught on a good day in the series. Wrayne and Cerrit were recently separated because he wasn't paying any attention to her and their family. Travis wanted to explore his own fears, as a busy father and husband himself. Because of the story's premise, he also wanted to ask the question of what one might do given a last chance/one more day to make things right.