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 (it was the first time Sam has multiclassed). 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, considering she had the orb-storage of the ultimate amount of knowledge and could just "Google it", 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 Kali 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.
 * Brennan says that Cerrit was pitched as Jor-El, as someone who helps their children escape the apocalyptic event, as well as being someone who can investigate Vespin Chloras. This, like Luis's pitching of Zerxus as interested in the Betrayer Gods, was very helpful to Brennan as a DM. He also likes that Cerrit's flaws were not corruption, since everyone other than Zerxus was involved in shady dealings (whether that be the work on the Leywright, or Loquatius's influence of the elections). However, the fact that Cerrit's attentions were not on the Ring of Brass mattered just as much as all the corruption.
 * Aabria expected Cerrit to eventually come after Laerryn, but he didn't do so in a way where retaliation made sense.

===@The_Katie_M on Twitter: Travis and Luis, what inspired your decisions to make characters who had children despite knowing that you were telling an apocalyptic story? Did you think the fact that your characters were both dads affected your gameplay and caused you to make different decisions to the other characters?===


 * Everyone found the children's presence in an apocalyptic story very emotionally stressful.
 * Travis felt that because the series was taking place in a city, naturally people would have families and children, and he felt it was an important part of that story to tell. As mentioned before, he was inspired by the story of Jor-El, who helped his son escape a catastrophe, and the idea of someone who is both sworn to protect the city, but who also has a family to take care of; as well as his own experiences as the father of a young child. He thought it would be interesting to put a character in that situation of being forced to choose between the city and his children.
 * Luis does not have children, but he does have nieces and nephews as well as many friends with kids and he wanted to see how he would act playing a character with a child. He also specifically wanted to parallel Zerxus's idea of the Betrayer Gods as parents, but not by blood, with Zerxus himself being an adoptive parent. He also felt the fact that he was a distant parent and Elias was living with Nydas's family was part of this parallel.
 * Lou didn't want Nydas to have children, but he was involved in the backstory of Eadaelus Okiro being Elias's guardian to show how close they had all been growing up.
 * Sam and Aabria discussed if Loquatius and Laerryn would have children, but decided against it because bitter exes without children are funny but bitter exes with children are depressing. However, Luis and Aabria discussed the possibility of Laerryn being Elias's mother. It could have come up if the possibility of Elias being orphaned was discussed, but it never did.
 * Brennan really likes the impact of the backstory on the story, even with the things that didn't come up during the actual campaign, an example being that Zerxus came to Avalir with Evandrin, an Eldritch Knight and First Knight, to investigate his own paladin and oracular abilities, and then when Evandrin died, the city pressured Zerxus to become First Knight because there were no other good candidates. As a result, leaving Elias behind in Cathmoíra was not entirely Zerxus's choice.
 * Brennan also enjoyed playing Maya, Kir, and Elias because orphans are common in D&D and fantasy because it gives them a reason to be wanderers, but in a tragedy, it is important that the PCs have something to lose. He also feels that certain facets of the characters are only revealed when they are with their family, so having that allows the players to show that complexity. Even the relationships that were less at the forefront (Nydas and Eadaelus) or were historical (Patia and Imyr Por'co) help flesh out the person and the world.

Nydas was a pirate who became the key to Avalir's resources. Does he feel as though his dreams were realized even though the city fell?

 * Lou based Nydas in part on the depictions of John Hammond in both the book and film adaptation of Jurassic Park: his goal was both to make the city great, but also to force their rivals to acknowledge its greatness, and the specifics of planar travel bear less importance in comparison to the impression of arcane prowess it radiated. However, when the Tree of Names was on the line, Nydas realized that the thing worth preserving was Avalir itself as a group of people.
 * Luis asks Lou when Nydas realized the impact of his actions and had that "mirror moment", and Lou says it was when Laerryn started casting Blight on the tree and he realized that the prophecy might be true and that he had been hastening it.
 * Brennan asks how it felt for Nydas to become the moral center of the party for that moment, and his shift into a heroic character after that. Lou responds that it happened very slowly, since Aabria initially said that she started to cast Blight but not that she had, so Nydas not only realized the prophecy was true and that he'd helped bring about the fall, but also that he could no longer stop it.
 * Brennan loves this, and also likes how Nydas is, unlike Laerryn and Patia, not an elf, and not originally from a flying city, and is much more pragmatic and aware of consequences. Aabria and Marisha agree.
 * Brennan also liked how Cerrit had left before this. The cast agrees: had Cerrit been there, it would have been a very different fight. Sam asks Travis who he'd have gone after, and Travis says the wizards first, then Zerxus. He also says that while his initial decision was purely an RP choice to save Maya and Kir, he also, before the fight broke out, thought "I'm going to let them fuck each other up first".

===From Andrea: Was Laerryn's urgency to get the Astral Leywright done before the next apogee solstice only so that she could fix or focus on her relationship with Loquatius before he was gone? Or was there something she was hoping to do on other planes she was working towards that involved him as well?===
 * It was both because she realized that this was her best chance to do so, given the information that Calum Staffwright gave her about the leylines, and to fix on her relationship with Loquatius, because she did still have feelings for him. She didn't want to specifically send him to the Feywild; it was more that she felt it could be something they could do together after both the Leywright and her relationship were in the right condition.
 * Sam points out that this was a common thread: many of the characters seemed to feel that once one big project was done, they would be all finished and could focus on everything else. Aabria agrees, and says that it's a great way to enhance the tragedy since the audience knows the characters will probably not finish those projects, or survive.

How much of Laerryn and Loquatius's relationship was planned?

 * Sam finds his conversation with Aabria about Laerryn and Loquatius. Originally, Laerryn's name was going to be Lorwyn and Loquatius's last name was going to be "Hambrick-Zucker". However, Sam immediately changed it to Seelie, referencing Aabria's mention of Elmenore in Exandria Unlimited.
 * The two of them figured out the timeline of their marriage and why they had gotten divorced; Aabria, fresh off the meeting about the Leywright, was leaning into being the antagonist. However, she found she actually became very emotional during the series - originally, the two of them knew they'd be snide towards each other but little else. Sam had also discussed Loquatius's character development with Brennan, hoping that Loquatius would stop lying to himself as much over the course of the series.
 * Brennan was probably the most hands-off on Laerryn and Loquatius's relationship, but he did work with Sam a lot on the story of Elena Tuvaris and how covering up her research into Evandrin's disappearance is what first set Loquatius down the path of being a propagandist rather than an honest journalist.
 * Everyone asks Sam about the speech he gave in and whether the emotion was genuine. It was - Sam was deeply affected by the game, and fell in love with Laerryn over the course of the series. Marisha brings up that Sam has always been focused on bringing in backstory and previously mentioned plot points.
 * Brennan believes the juxtaposition of Loquatius making the decision to stay with the city as it falls and giving a heartwrenching, honest speech, followed by the advertisement for the Market of Wonders, is a perfect joke.
 * Back to the relationship: Aabria's proudest TTRPG choice is saying yes when Sam asked who wanted to be his character's ex. Everyone loves how that story played out, with the two ultimately reconciling at the very end.

How does Patia feel about the deal her grandfather struck with the Gau Drashari? What are Patia's opinions about her grandfather and her family name?

 * Marisha wanted to make her a Kennedy of Avalir, essentially — someone tied to political service in Avalir. Laura's original concept was a politically connected wizard, and while it was initially not Marisha's usual style, she was excited by the opportunity to play a powerful character rather than a scrappy upstart.
 * Despite Por'co's "incredible lineage", Marisha, working on Patia's backstory, forgot to develop her parental relationship and to discuss it with Brennan before the stream. Analysing the backstory, Brennan's reasoning to this lack of parantal connection was, because her "parents were gone", as well as their memory. Imyr, disillusioned by their failure, put all of his expectations on Patia who in return gave her life to accomplish grandfather's dream, which left her completely alone until the very end. During "Fire and Ruin" (E3x04), all of the Ring of Brass members had a living family they tried to reconnect with, when Patia met with a statue of Imyr Por'co, saying to him as her last goodbyes: "Happy Replenishment, grandfather".
 * Brennan almost certain that "Matt fully pitched" the background surrounding the Gau Drashari and came up with the name. Brennan knew that he couldn't get the Betrayer Gods to destroy Avalir because most of them left their focus in Vasselheim. In order to establish high stakes for the players without the gods' threat, he created two Primordial titans that would have roamed the Exandria during the Calamity, if not for the decisions of the Ring of Brass.
 * The process behind the creation of the series was an intense cooperation between Matt and Brennan. In the instance of the Tree of Names, Brennan had a loose idea of an additional barrier for the Betrayer Gods, placed by the druids in Avalir, but forgotten by wizards. The rest was fleshed out by Matt.

Quotations
Brennan: All I'm saying is everyone loves it when Matt says two-thirds of Exandria is gone, but when it actually starts to happen and we're making saving throws for an hour of game time...all of a sudden, people got some shit to say.