That's not what I meant at all. Obviously they don't stop the game mid-session for pulse checks. They pulse check after a session, during the weeklong break between games, and make sure the game is still on course. Which is exactly what someone should do, if they're invested in the health of their game.
They have a separate show for this called Talks Machina
Talks Machina is for 90% two players getting asked questions the audience sent in. The checking in with each other happens mostly off screen. We may hear about it during TM, but that's not what that show is about.
On topic, pretty much every month there's at least one topic popping up about players not getting along, a DM feeling misunderstood, someone feeling uncomfortable with a direction the game has taken, etc, and almost invariably it turns out that creating that topic here is the first and only action the person involved has taken. Talking about issues doesn't happen as often as it should. Not that I think that's normally a problem for groups that have been playing together as long and as often as CritRole, but that's the point Yurei1453 was making in the first place.
To be fair more often than not they are asked about what happened in the session and how they felt about it.....its basically as I described but just focused on two members.
Its actually a good take on how to do it IRL too as you can focus on a different person each session to get feedback from or you could poll the whole group each time....which might get to be a bit much for some groups.
it is also really hard to get good answers from players. You have to ask the right questions to get useful feedback. and of course different expectations in group can cause frictions.
but there are tons of videos on youtube about that topic.
That's not what I meant at all. Obviously they don't stop the game mid-session for pulse checks. They pulse check after a session, during the weeklong break between games, and make sure the game is still on course. Which is exactly what someone should do, if they're invested in the health of their game.
They have a separate show for this called Talks Machina
No this is not for checking in, I don't think you understand what is going on here. They play DnD, and like all DnD players do they will talk mid week about the game, they discuss tactics of they know a fight is coming up on a whats app chat Matt is not a part of, they will also touch base to make sure that what one character did in game did not upset another player and are they ok with continuing that. This is something ALL tables should do more often. I will give an example, my current game there was friction in game between 2 characters. That went a little too far over one session and so after the game the 2 players talked and decided that actually maybe they should bring the characters more in line and start finding ways to get on in game more because one got uncomfortable with how the other had spoken to them.
Talks Machina is just a way for the players to answer questions from the community about things they did in game
Ok to get back to the original question, there are many many ways to play a TTRPG, almost all of the points raised about Critical Role are not specific to DnD but it has become more highlighted because the way people play DnD has drastically changed, probably far more then any other system over the years in part because as a systme it has had to stay relevant to how people want to play TTRPG's.
If I give my own personal experiance, I started playing RPG's at 13/14, warhammer fantasy roleplay playing what is, and I personally don't even think it can be argued, the best published campaign for any TTRPG ever written the enemy within campaign. An intrigue roleplay heavy campaign that at that age we really didn't do justice, but it forced us as brand new players to think about roleplaying. After playing that we moved onto Legend of the 5 rings, another roleplay heavy system in which combat is famously deadly to player characters and, if you survive combat, the odds are your character may well end up having to commit suicide anyway to remove dishonour from the family, or because you have been corrupted by shadow taint, or because you need to keep the secrets yo know safe for the Emperor. We considered DnD at this stage but this was the mid/late 90's and we really thought the idea of playing a system that was just dungeon crawl, shopping expedition, dungeon crawl was dull as anything. We played Cyberpunk to get our Matrix fix, the Starwars RPG to experiance flying the kessel run, Doom Town because the idea of using playing cards in place of dice for some things was really cool. We played a bit of 7th sea because, well, pirates but also that keep and roll dice system is to my mind the best dice mechanic of any TTRPG.
From there I went to University where I discovered Vampire the Masquerade, not the TTRPG but the Live action roleplay, a bunch of about 20-30 18-21 year olds dressing up as vampires, hanging out in the upstairs room of a pub as 3 DM's co ran a campaign that had us physically running around the city sometimes hunting some enemy as much as it had us sat in that room in our clans carrying out political intrigue. I also did a bit of fantasy Live Action Roleplay, cos playing before it was even a thing with others to go into woods and fight other people dressed as orcs, undead, or other creatures, using fake swords or foam arrows. I went to a live action paranoia game where 6 individuals roleplayed Friend Computer constantly giving out contradictory instructions to a room of about 110 players and DM's
Our table top roleplay sessions then carried this on with some players method roleplaying to various extents, some much as they do on CR, being in character from the moment they sat at the table. Throughout all of this DnD generically was seen as a game that was Anti roleplay and just about fighting, which none of us wanted.
So watching an episode of Critical roll for the first time just felt natural. I can't say i did all the voices like Matt does, I really am not good at that, but some I have played with did, and do take up an accent as a player. There are those who say Critical Roll is not TTRPG, but for me it absolutely is far closer to how I have done some of my roleplay over 30 odd years. But, i have also played at tables with players who narrate everything in the 3rd person, My character does this, my character says this. I have played at tables where we just want to hit stuff. I have played at tables where we just role dice, no roleplay, no describing attacks, we simply let the mechanics happen and the DM then describes the next room or interaction.
I think those who complain about Critical Role not being DnD are right in that the early iteration of DnD was perceived to largely not be roleplay heavy, that is why my friends and I kept away from it for so so long. Now that may have been an unfair assumption but I know many many many people who agreed with it, entire forums of players who refused to play it for that very reason.
Now days I agree there are players who come into TTRPG's of any description on the back of a stream such as CR and might have an expectation, I have seen DM's be disappointed their players dont enact campfire conversations where they talk about backstory, or how there childhood was, or just what food they like. I think there needs to be a gentle explanation that sometimes players just assume this stuff happens without needing to roleplay it out. But even the members of CR have stated that they assume lots of interaction happens "off camera" (meaning without being played out as opposed to on a stream). I have seen players be disappointed there DM can't "inhabbit" an NPC like Matt mercer does, not understanding that they can still engage with that character, still try and get information out. Recently a player privately expressed concern that, because there character has a high charisma but they themselves are not a great talker, they would be penalised in game for not saying the right thing, I reassured them that all they need ot tell me is, I will try and get pas the guards by lying about what is in the barrels. I might ask what they say is in but it is ok if they can't think I will just get them to roll a deception roll.
CR is not the fictional version of DnD some claim, it is a group of friends who get together and play a roleplay game, and despite what some may assume as someone who has watched every episode I can tell you they do crazy stuff sometimes that if they where aware of the cameras and audience they probably would never do. The other thing I find funny is the idea that a group of people would spend 2-3 years playing Pathfinder, at home, amongst themselves, in the hope that one day they might make a career out of playing a different system online to an audience.
So I think it is perfectly fine to watch CR or any other online game (I like the Dungeon Dudes as well), and borrow things from it, just as I have borrowed stuff from games i have played in, or DM's over 30 years.
Just a note on the "check ins" in CR being a model of good gaming practice. Sure it is, though in my limited exposure to CR, there's a meta component the audience isn't aware of. The.check in thing is coming among ensemble performers, be they actors, acrobats or musicians. It's requisite for a collective, especially a collective made of spectrum of "creative" personalities to maintain any longevity ... if a group is unchecked, especially a group with high flying fame, you wind up with the interventions needed in the Metallica doc "Some Kind of Monster" (for those who sniff at or feel otherwise allergic to CR doing their sharing and caring, that flick may help put the practice in a better context, and give a real example of how things can go south at an unexamined table, plus the movie's aside to Lars Ulrich's art collection helped me model an NPC important to my game world). In acting and performance disciplines these are sorta standardized (and I'd argue their kin if not direct progenitors of a lot of the codifications behind Session 0s and consent/boundary establishments in TTRPGs). What's interesting about CR is that the performers show or at least perform that aspect, although not entirely unique ... the modern dance/acrobatic performances I used to attend in the Before Times are starting to be put on again, and I've noticed almost all of them now have the performers' warms ups being done in front of the audience, with a note or semi-literal spotlight to the actual bonding that takes place amidst the stretches and syncing. But CR does it to such a degree, I'm thinking because they recognize the audience wants it ... which isn't unusual folks have for some time used actors (and I feel folks see the CR cast as "accessible actors" that they feel closer to on some aspirational level) as some sort of paragon for human being, I mean, it's why actors are more frequent guests on talk shows than any other celebrated/celebrity profession. Though it usually shows up that the paragon aspect of the performer was basically kayfabe. In the end the dynamic is what folks defining stuff these days now call parasocial, and the validation/connection being received in the packaging of the entertainment is no different than the one David Bowie lays raw in "Rock n' Roll Suicide."
tl:dr yeah check ins on how folks think the game is going are great, but just like the play styles being contrasted here, there are a lot of ways to do that and the CR model is one model.
To be fair more often than not they are asked about what happened in the session and how they felt about it.....its basically as I described but just focused on two members.
Its actually a good take on how to do it IRL too as you can focus on a different person each session to get feedback from or you could poll the whole group each time....which might get to be a bit much for some groups.
it is also really hard to get good answers from players. You have to ask the right questions to get useful feedback. and of course different expectations in group can cause frictions.
but there are tons of videos on youtube about that topic.
No this is not for checking in, I don't think you understand what is going on here. They play DnD, and like all DnD players do they will talk mid week about the game, they discuss tactics of they know a fight is coming up on a whats app chat Matt is not a part of, they will also touch base to make sure that what one character did in game did not upset another player and are they ok with continuing that. This is something ALL tables should do more often. I will give an example, my current game there was friction in game between 2 characters. That went a little too far over one session and so after the game the 2 players talked and decided that actually maybe they should bring the characters more in line and start finding ways to get on in game more because one got uncomfortable with how the other had spoken to them.
Talks Machina is just a way for the players to answer questions from the community about things they did in game
Ok to get back to the original question, there are many many ways to play a TTRPG, almost all of the points raised about Critical Role are not specific to DnD but it has become more highlighted because the way people play DnD has drastically changed, probably far more then any other system over the years in part because as a systme it has had to stay relevant to how people want to play TTRPG's.
If I give my own personal experiance, I started playing RPG's at 13/14, warhammer fantasy roleplay playing what is, and I personally don't even think it can be argued, the best published campaign for any TTRPG ever written the enemy within campaign. An intrigue roleplay heavy campaign that at that age we really didn't do justice, but it forced us as brand new players to think about roleplaying. After playing that we moved onto Legend of the 5 rings, another roleplay heavy system in which combat is famously deadly to player characters and, if you survive combat, the odds are your character may well end up having to commit suicide anyway to remove dishonour from the family, or because you have been corrupted by shadow taint, or because you need to keep the secrets yo know safe for the Emperor. We considered DnD at this stage but this was the mid/late 90's and we really thought the idea of playing a system that was just dungeon crawl, shopping expedition, dungeon crawl was dull as anything. We played Cyberpunk to get our Matrix fix, the Starwars RPG to experiance flying the kessel run, Doom Town because the idea of using playing cards in place of dice for some things was really cool. We played a bit of 7th sea because, well, pirates but also that keep and roll dice system is to my mind the best dice mechanic of any TTRPG.
From there I went to University where I discovered Vampire the Masquerade, not the TTRPG but the Live action roleplay, a bunch of about 20-30 18-21 year olds dressing up as vampires, hanging out in the upstairs room of a pub as 3 DM's co ran a campaign that had us physically running around the city sometimes hunting some enemy as much as it had us sat in that room in our clans carrying out political intrigue. I also did a bit of fantasy Live Action Roleplay, cos playing before it was even a thing with others to go into woods and fight other people dressed as orcs, undead, or other creatures, using fake swords or foam arrows. I went to a live action paranoia game where 6 individuals roleplayed Friend Computer constantly giving out contradictory instructions to a room of about 110 players and DM's
Our table top roleplay sessions then carried this on with some players method roleplaying to various extents, some much as they do on CR, being in character from the moment they sat at the table. Throughout all of this DnD generically was seen as a game that was Anti roleplay and just about fighting, which none of us wanted.
So watching an episode of Critical roll for the first time just felt natural. I can't say i did all the voices like Matt does, I really am not good at that, but some I have played with did, and do take up an accent as a player. There are those who say Critical Roll is not TTRPG, but for me it absolutely is far closer to how I have done some of my roleplay over 30 odd years. But, i have also played at tables with players who narrate everything in the 3rd person, My character does this, my character says this. I have played at tables where we just want to hit stuff. I have played at tables where we just role dice, no roleplay, no describing attacks, we simply let the mechanics happen and the DM then describes the next room or interaction.
I think those who complain about Critical Role not being DnD are right in that the early iteration of DnD was perceived to largely not be roleplay heavy, that is why my friends and I kept away from it for so so long. Now that may have been an unfair assumption but I know many many many people who agreed with it, entire forums of players who refused to play it for that very reason.
Now days I agree there are players who come into TTRPG's of any description on the back of a stream such as CR and might have an expectation, I have seen DM's be disappointed their players dont enact campfire conversations where they talk about backstory, or how there childhood was, or just what food they like. I think there needs to be a gentle explanation that sometimes players just assume this stuff happens without needing to roleplay it out. But even the members of CR have stated that they assume lots of interaction happens "off camera" (meaning without being played out as opposed to on a stream). I have seen players be disappointed there DM can't "inhabbit" an NPC like Matt mercer does, not understanding that they can still engage with that character, still try and get information out. Recently a player privately expressed concern that, because there character has a high charisma but they themselves are not a great talker, they would be penalised in game for not saying the right thing, I reassured them that all they need ot tell me is, I will try and get pas the guards by lying about what is in the barrels. I might ask what they say is in but it is ok if they can't think I will just get them to roll a deception roll.
CR is not the fictional version of DnD some claim, it is a group of friends who get together and play a roleplay game, and despite what some may assume as someone who has watched every episode I can tell you they do crazy stuff sometimes that if they where aware of the cameras and audience they probably would never do. The other thing I find funny is the idea that a group of people would spend 2-3 years playing Pathfinder, at home, amongst themselves, in the hope that one day they might make a career out of playing a different system online to an audience.
So I think it is perfectly fine to watch CR or any other online game (I like the Dungeon Dudes as well), and borrow things from it, just as I have borrowed stuff from games i have played in, or DM's over 30 years.
Just a note on the "check ins" in CR being a model of good gaming practice. Sure it is, though in my limited exposure to CR, there's a meta component the audience isn't aware of. The.check in thing is coming among ensemble performers, be they actors, acrobats or musicians. It's requisite for a collective, especially a collective made of spectrum of "creative" personalities to maintain any longevity ... if a group is unchecked, especially a group with high flying fame, you wind up with the interventions needed in the Metallica doc "Some Kind of Monster" (for those who sniff at or feel otherwise allergic to CR doing their sharing and caring, that flick may help put the practice in a better context, and give a real example of how things can go south at an unexamined table, plus the movie's aside to Lars Ulrich's art collection helped me model an NPC important to my game world). In acting and performance disciplines these are sorta standardized (and I'd argue their kin if not direct progenitors of a lot of the codifications behind Session 0s and consent/boundary establishments in TTRPGs). What's interesting about CR is that the performers show or at least perform that aspect, although not entirely unique ... the modern dance/acrobatic performances I used to attend in the Before Times are starting to be put on again, and I've noticed almost all of them now have the performers' warms ups being done in front of the audience, with a note or semi-literal spotlight to the actual bonding that takes place amidst the stretches and syncing. But CR does it to such a degree, I'm thinking because they recognize the audience wants it ... which isn't unusual folks have for some time used actors (and I feel folks see the CR cast as "accessible actors" that they feel closer to on some aspirational level) as some sort of paragon for human being, I mean, it's why actors are more frequent guests on talk shows than any other celebrated/celebrity profession. Though it usually shows up that the paragon aspect of the performer was basically kayfabe. In the end the dynamic is what folks defining stuff these days now call parasocial, and the validation/connection being received in the packaging of the entertainment is no different than the one David Bowie lays raw in "Rock n' Roll Suicide."
tl:dr yeah check ins on how folks think the game is going are great, but just like the play styles being contrasted here, there are a lot of ways to do that and the CR model is one model.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.