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Cr3 - Blog Posts
*side eyes Orym “Bait and Switch” of the Air Ashari*
I love a character raised to be a weapon as much as the next guy. But what really gets me is a character raised to be a shield. Who can’t fathom being needed—or even being wanted— beyond keeping others safe. Who believe they are alive only to insure someone doesn’t die. no matter the cost. Characters who self-sacrifice not because they think they deserve it, but because no one else does deserve it, and it’s their job to protect.
Characters who’ve been told that’s why your important. Your worth something because this other person/ thing is important, and you are here solely to keep them safe.
Bonus points if it’s not a legitimate job they’ve been given. Maybe at one point it was, but now that they are free from it, they haven’t given up that mentality. No one is forcing or asking them to do this, but they need to. They need to in order to be deserving.
I'm not a huge Callowmoore shipper but-
I think that one of the best songs to encapsulate Callowmoore, at least from Ashton's POV is Senses by MICO. Like when I need some angst in my life, I imagine a modern!AU Callowmoore with Ashton singing this song with Fearne in the crowd.
Your welcome.
Currently 6:49am … I LIVED BITCHES! Also there were so many lines that altered my brain chemistry but let’s be so fr the ending line of “and every now and then your champion comes to visit…”
BITCH STOP.
A note for East Coast Critters
If you don't know I'm on the east coast, which means for me the episode airs at 10pm instead of seven. Combined with the fact that I'm insane and the episode is 8.5 hours, I'll be pulling an all-nighter with just enough time for a nap before my 8:30am lecture tomorrow. To my fellow critters in other time zones, stay true, stay caffeinated, more importantly stay hydrated!!!!!
As C3 ends tonight, I can’t stop thinking about Magister Hollow’s note to Patia in Calamity…
“All things end. Lives, stories, even ages.”
Watching Predathos be this little alien baby whose hungry while Matt is traumatizing everyone and all my mind could think of was:
If this doesn’t happen, check my Ao3 motherfuckers—
Imagine— The final scene of Campaign 3
After doing the character epilogues of what everyone does after, we flash forward to like a couple of months after the final battle. Everyone meets in Whitestone and goes to the Slayer’s Cake, with Pike’s help they make a massive batch of maple ginger cookies and go on a picnic. Ashton brings some drinks, Laudna brings some supplies for arts and crafts, Orym brings some muffins from Alma, Braius brings his painting supplies, and Dorian brings his mandolin. Fearne and Orym conjure a bed of flowers for them to sit on, Imogen makes the sky clear, and Pate scares off anyone that would interrupt. They go to Bertrand and Eshteross’s graves. The stones are decorated with small chicken bone dolls, the gambler’s rapier, Eshteross’s cane. Evelyn is there pruning the weeds. They put the last piece of FCG they have left, his wheel, in between the stones and start to recount their adventures while drinking and eating cookies, telling Bertrand and Eshteross all that they missed. A group of ravens flies out of the trees near by at the temple to the Matron, and BH’s know that their friends are there, listening intently. After telling them of Vassalheim and traveling to Ruidus to defeat Ludinus, Dorian pulls out his mandolin, and him and Imogen (plz Robbie and Laura) start to sing a full version of the Ballad of Bertrand Bell, which transitions into the Ballad of Bell’s Hells. As they sing Braius paints the group in this moment of calm, with no red moon in the sky, and smiles on all their faces.
And 30 years later, a new bard in Jrusar, is singing the famous Ballad of Bell’s Hells in front of a beautiful painting in the Spire by Fire.
I don’t claim to be good at art but I made this and I’m proud.
spoilers e97
I have an idea for what that creature was that they fought at the beginning of the episode. During the fight, Matt said something interesting, the creature siphons magic. It did nothing against Orym, but he doesn’t have innate magic. I wonder— is that thing Aeor’s version of the Taxmen? Aeor was clever, it had spies everywhere and in EXU: Calamity it felt like Avalir and Aeor were direct rivals. What if someone saw the Taxmen that Nydas made and took that information back to Aeor? The taxmen siphoned magic and dealt damage “proportional to the highest spell slot a person is holding” in the Age of Arcanum that would be pretty helpful, and the fact that Matt specifically said that creature was trying to take something from Orym and said, “Well your a fighter, you’re fine.” Reminds me so much of the Taxmen. If that thing had hit someone like Imogen or Fearne, I could see Matt asking for their highest spell slot. I don’t know if I’m crazy or maybe it’s because EXU: Calamity is my Roman Empire but that creature had a bigger role in Aeor’s plan.
post e91
just realized that Orym’s deal with Nana Morri is now inert since they won’t all be coming home. So what will happen to his new powers? Will they go away? Will Nana be mad?
I present my Campaign 3 Bingo Card!!! Feel free to use during your watches or add your own squares. for anyone wondering, this was all done on Canva.
I know the font may be hard to read so from left to right-
ROW 1
Possibility Rage: Rainbow sprinkles
Nat 20: HELL YEAH
Old NPC spotted: I'm looking at you Shaun Gilmore
Travis rolls a 100: #RipChetney
Delilah Spotting: Creepy lady do dead things
ROW 2
Titan Fearne: Burn baby burn
Chetney transforms: *howl*
Scars grow: LIGHTINING TITTIES
HDYWTDT: Herdy derty derty
Grim Psychometry: I can't think of anything funny
ROW 3
FCG goes berserk: Murbot
Summon a Reiloran: I want to meet nice aliens
Crying is a FREE action: Free space
Titan Ashton: That's some hard rock *bites lip*
Mister throws shit: Don't open your mouth
ROW 4
Treshi Scry Ball: Please check it regularly
Nana Morri: Please more creepy grandma. Please Mercer.
Whispers: spspspspspspsps
Nat 1: HELL NO
Bad Teleport: Who let Laura roll???
ROW 5
Keyleth Appearance: Sweet baby
Pate is Horny: Um... run?
Chetney carving: When will the horse work?
Changebringer called: Please tell FCG that Exandria is a sphere
Predates vision/dream: give in Imogen. become Wanda Maximoff.
JESTER SIGHTING JESTER JESTER JESTER PRAISE ARTAGAN ITS JESTER
5 CR campaigns/mini-series/one-shots I wanna see
EXU: DIVERGENCE -- Specifically I think it would really rad if the cast wasn't playing Exandrians experiencing the divergence, but if they played the GODS. Like I could so see Travis as the Storm Lord and Marisha as the Matron of Raven, maybe even if they brought Brennan back to play Asmodeus. I think it would be just a really sick parallel to the Ring of Brass sacrificing themselves at the end of Calamity, with the Gods deciding to willingly (or maybe not willingly) lock themselves beyond the Divine Gate.
EXU: ARCANUM -- Pre- pre- Calamity so we get the full experience of the Age of Arcanum. ONE CONDITION: Marisha must play the woman that later become the Matron, and the finale must be her ascension. I just feel like Marisha is so connected to the Matron through Keyleth and Vax, Laudna, and Patia, so anything involving the Matron being a PC has to be Marisha in my mind.
WHITESTONE MINI-SERIES -- You all remember those movies on Netflix about like a town in like 1897 then 1995 and so on? I want that! But with Whitestone. Taliesin DM-ing a Whitestone Mini-series where every episode or every few episodes it switches time would be so sick. Like ep 1 could be the Dawnfather fight, then ep 2 is De Rolos coming to town, then the whole Von Musel fiasco, then it comes back around with the second-to-last episode being the death of the De Rolos and the Rise of the Briarwoods, then the finale could be them all playing Percy and Vex's kids modern day.
RUIDIAN ONE-SHOT -- I need a Cobalt Soul-esque one shot where it's like the resistance on Ruidus against the Imperium and the Mind-Weavers. Pre- Bloody Bridge, of course. But just getting to see more Ruidus would be so sick!!!
CALAMITY AFTERMATH -- I want to see Travis play an older Kir Argupnin so fucking badly. Like maybe they are in Vassalheim or Wildemount. I once saw this theory (I actually think it was in a fan fiction, but whatever) where Elias and Avandrin have a strained relationship when Elias gets older because he connects with the Wildmother, and Elias is actually the Unknown Champion in the lake in the Blooming Grove. Also we could see the start of the Cobalt Soul, if that VERY POPULAR theory is true.
Feel free to add more !!!
Chetney *shakes head*
so of course everyone is joking around about Chetney being Orym’s dad and Travis is feeding into it with the Scanlan joke in e83, but I have a genuine theory. First off I wanna say, I love the Chetney is Orym’s dad theory and hope that it canon because that just makes a lot of sense considering that whispers were had when they insight checked Orym’s mom. BUT here’s something else, I think Chetney is an ancestor of Pike. Think about it for a sec, they both were born in the Bramblewood outside Westruun and they are both gnomes. Back in C1 around e94-ish there was a small arc where Pike’s family came to Whitestone and manipulated here into believing their family had a blood curse. What if Pike’s uncle Augden(?) got that idea from Chetney, a cursed gnome who uses blood magic to fight, and in a way was betrayed when his family left. I’m not saying Chetney is Pike’s dad, but he might be Wilhand or Augden’s dad and might be related to Pike on some level.
CAN WE PLEASE GET A PREQUEL NOVEL ABOUT ALLURA AND KIMA’S ORIGINAL PARTY!!!!! PLEASE.
*DEMON SCREETCH*
Can we just talk about how good the new intro is?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! It makes me wanna see BH's animated!!!!!!!!!!! ITS SO GOOD!!!!!!!
Southern Gothic (Imodna)
So... Is no one going to talk about how Laudna and Imogen are literally the sunxmoon trope but reversed. Imogen is the moon, Laudna is the sun because of their connections to Rudius and the Sun Tree. I don’t know if that was planned or if Laura and Marisha have realized it yet, but that’s so cute.
This is definitely how CR season 3 will ends. I’m calling it.
---
[zzaap]
“Oh hi Schatz ! You’re back early !”
“The moon is haunted.”
“What ?”
“The moon is haunted, Caleb.”
---
To all the people who asked what was written on Caleb’s book :
“Kryn courting : so you’ve decided to date a drow, what to expect in a relationship”
Would you fall in love with me again is so Vaxleth coded
So, just 35 minutes into exu downfall Brennan already has made a bird reference
Do you remember Demid Sunlach?
(Gnomish Archivist of the Cobalt Soul temporarily researched Exandria's two moons at the Vellum Steeple Archive. He left to pursue his studies elsewhere -wiki)
Do you think he will appear in Bells Hells?
they’re endgame to me
This one was overdue! Ashton Greymoore fanart again... But this time his lvl 13 design
"I'm alive because they made me alive."
because something really did ask, have a much too long post about my thoughts on laudna’s individual dynamics with the rest of bells hells.
under the cut because it’s almost 3000 words.
laudna/imogen
i struggle to find something to say about imogen and laudna that hasn’t already been said a million times before. the core concept—the thesis—of their arcs, together and separately, is choice. so much of their backstories are defined by helplessness. laudna was chosen and killed because she happened to look like someone else, she was resurrected because she happened to be there. imogen’s mother left, she was burdened with powers she didn’t understand and meant constant pain and isolation. so, they make sure to constantly emphasize that the other person has a choice in everything. imogen tells laudna she only has to come back if she wants to, even though it would have devastated her to lose laudna forever. laudna tells imogen that the gods can’t control her, that no matter what her “destiny” is, if she wants, they can leave and live in a little cottage and raise horses together. the way they love each other unconditionally is all the more incredible given how cruel the world was to them for so long. laudna’s “you make me better” is true for both of them. they give each other a place to be vulnerable and feel all their messiest, worst feelings because they know the other one won’t judge them. they’ll support each other no matter the choices they make.
something i’ve mentioned quite a few times but never gone in depth about is that imogen and laudna do have a fairly significant age difference, and i do think that affects their dynamic. on the one hand, they both have a bit of arrested development—imogen due to her isolation from the rest of gelvaan from 18-26, laudna because she died at 20. on the other, laudna has so much more life experience than imogen. she spent almost 30 years traveling and interacting with the world even if was mostly people trying to kill her, maybe even because of that. the “laudna is imogen’s aunt/mother/older sister” takes were obviously ridiculous, but laudna does canonically look at imogen and see someone young who she wants to protect in a way she never was. she said as much to fcg after the gnarlrock fight. laudna acts as imogen’s rock, her tether if you will, a lot of the time, and part of the reason she can counterbalance imogen’s anxiety is because of the experience that comes with age. for example, during their conversation in episode 49, laudna is able to stay more “rational” and level-headed even when imogen is scared and overwhelmed.
one of my other favorite things about them, specifically from laudna’s point of view, is that with a few exceptions (the gnarlrock fight, her jealousy of frida), she doesn’t seem insecure about their relationship. again, during episode 49, laudna mentions that she knows they haven’t talked in a while, but she didn’t worry because they “transcend words.” she didn’t need outside assurance from imogen because she felt confident in their love for each other. something i love about that episode 39-49 period is that they didn’t interact a lot, but when they did, they slipped right about in the same kind of intimacy they’d always had—imogen holding launda’s hand when they went into her dream together, laudna’s protectiveness of imogen after she interacted with ludinus. but anyway—that confidence is why i believe the transition from friends to lovers was so easy for laudna. laudna’s unsure of herself, of delilah and what she might do, but she’s absolutely not unsure of the love between her and imogen. that’s why as soon as imogen tells her she’s not a bad person, that she wants to be with laudna in that way, she lets herself embrace it entirely.
in conclusion: they invented romance, they’re the best canon pairing critical role has ever had and one of the best dynamics in general, etc., etc.
laudna/orym
oh my god, WHERE to begin? i feel like my take on their dynamic is slightly controversial. at the very least, i get more push back from people when i post about it than anything else, so let me start with this: orym cares deeply about laudna, i will never dispute that. however, orym is uncomfortable with laudna and has been since the very beginning of the campaign. she’s his friend and he recognizes her beautiful heart and resilient spirit, but he’s uncomfortable with her appearance and her messages in his head, with her macabre humor and her deadness. he can’t reconcile that laudna his friend and laudna the dead woman can’t be separated. laudna’s deadness is a part of her, one laudna embraces. orym, for better or worse, is “normal.” he grew up with a loving family and he had a husband and a career. will and derrig’s deaths were an unbelievable tragedy but one that never challenged his place within the status quo. (sidenote: i’ve always wondered if part of orym’s discomfort with laudna come from the fact that her proximity to death is a reminder of the resurrections will and derrig never got.) he sees himself as a follower, someone that doesn’t stand out, then there’s laudna, who does nothing but stand out.
something i find fascinating is that orym is the first person to find out laudna’s backstory, and it affects him so much he can’t sleep that night and takes a point of exhaustion. he even explicitly recognizes the dehumanization she’s gone through and how laudna’s relationship with puppets like pate and sashimi mirror that. yet, he still never apologizes for trying to disguise her appearance, something without even asking. yes, i get it’s tactical and for “safety” (though that argument falls a bit flat for me when there’s also a glowing rock person and a fully conscious automaton in the group, but whatever), but it still hurts laudna. even beyond that, orym always qualifies his friendship with laudna to other person, making some mention of how she’s dead-looking and isn’t that crazy, wow, almost as if he wants some validation that it—laudna—is weird (one he, interestingly, rarely ever gets, given how enraptured most of the other pcs, including guests, and even some npcs, are with her). he does this even in situations he absolutely doesn’t need to like, for example, when maeve says laudna “looks cooler than i thought.” all this just sucks. it’s not that the love isn’t there, it is. it just isn’t unconditional, and laudna deserves better than that.
finally: the delilah in the room. no, it isn’t orym’s “fault” delilah is back. yes, he was also having an extremely bad time during the bor’dor fight and it wasn’t his “responsibility” to save laudna from herself, but laudna is orym’s friend. he listened to laudna tell him the trauma delilah put her through, he fought through hell to save laudna from her, and still nodded because part of him thought maybe delilah could help him and that was selfish. the fight against ludinus is important to of the bells, but for orym, it’s personal. it’s been his mission for six years. meanwhile, laudna is the one with the least enthusiasm about this. she has no connection to the gods. in fact, she actively thinks they dislike her, but he’s willing to sacrifice not just his safety, but the safety of her and all his friends for a cause they never set out to fight for.
in conclusion: i want to put them in a salad mixer together and watch them go around and around and around and around and around, then let them out to scream at each other a little.
laudna/ashton
if i had to explain laudna and ashton’s dynamic in one word, it would be “projection.” i adore their relationship, it’s one of my top 5 c3 dynamics, but oh my god, so much projection, and it’s so interesting because of that. ashton thinks he understands laudna, but in reality, he doesn’t at all. i’m an absolute sucker for characters that look very different on the surface but in reality are much more similar than they know, and ashton and laudna are that to a tee. they are very much narrative parallels especially regarding their feelings of “brokenness” and how their traumas are physical, visual parts of themselves, but the ways they diverge are almost more interesting.
certain people have said that her conversations with ashton are the only time laudna is “honest” or that, at the very least, she’s more honest with him than she is with anyone else, and i couldn’t disagree more. laudna can be a joyful, optimistic person and deeply traumatized with a core anger she hasn’t truly processed. laudna is a high-charisma character, and in my opinion, part of how that manifests is her ability to adapt her demeanor to the person she’s talking to. she speaks gently to imogen the same way she matches chetney’s hyperactive energy when they go sky-sailing. of course when she’s with ashton, who makes no effort to hide his anger and bitterness and doesn’t want her to be soft, she isn’t. none of these laudnas are more “real” than the others, they’re all laudna. what those people, and ironically, ashton themself, don’t get, or won’t let himself get, is that all those things can be true at once.
with ashton specifically, i don’t think they want to believe that because then they’d have to admit that growth and healing is a real possibility because anger is so much easier to deal with. people talk most about orym’s choices during the bor’dor fight most, but i’m fascinated by ashton’s as well. i wouldn’t be surprised if there was a part, no matter how small, that wanted laudna to break, to prove to himself that he was right and laudna was just as broken and fucked-up as them. so, laudna killing bor’dor was almost vindication, evidenced by their “what have i done?” “nothing i haven’t done.” exchange afterwards.
i don’t want this to sound like ashton doesn’t care about launda, they do. ashton cares about her so much, and besides imogen and fearne, is the most unabashedly into laudna’s aesthetic. i love how much they love all the weird shit she does. i love how protective ashton is of laudna, especially during battles and their willingness to go above and beyond for her—he carried laudna when she was dead despite his chronic pain without complaining once and were willing to make a deal with hexum after going through an entire museum heist to repay their debt. i love the moments when ashton sees how much laudna is struggling and tells her, as gently as he can, to take a moment and do what she can to ground herself. i love that when laudna way too dramatically assumes they kidnapped imogen, their response is “that’s very fair.” it’s all wonderful, and i love them.
in conclusion: I LOVE THEM SO MUCH AND I WANT TO LOCK THEM IN A ROOM AND FORCE THEM TO TALK ABOUT THEIR FEELINGS FOR HOURS.
laudna/fcg
laudna and fcg have been getting more attention in the past few days for obvious reasons and that has me rubbing my hands together maniacally because even though they have very little actual interaction, the subtext is delicious.
besides ashton, fcg might be the character laudna parallels the most, especially their struggle with their humanity (if they’re even human at all), which isn’t helped by the constant dehumanization they face from outsiders, including the almost continuous comments they get when they meet someone new. people look at launda and see a horror while they look at fcg and see a novelty (he’s a robot with personality??), and those both suck. i think, for fcg, laudna is an uncomfortable reflection of himself because everything they’re afraid is true about themself is true about laudna. finding out they had a soul was such an important moment for his character (also remember his early campaign habit of calling other people “soul-touched folks”). as a hollow one, who knows if laudna even has a soul. if i’m honest, fcg seems to think less of laudna than the rest of the party (see: him calling her a “former person,” his speech before casting turn undead including, “no offense to laudna but can you please shine your light and wipe these evil, dead souls off the face of this flat planet?”) and that’s probably why. they have such strict ideas about “good,” which has become “godly,” and “wrong,” (“ungodly”), and within that framework, everything seemed to point to laudna as “ungodly,” which is why their empathy towards her is lacking.
the biggest conflict between fcg and laudna right now is obviously their feelings on the gods. the changebringer brought fcg purpose and tangibly helps them on a daily basis. of course they want to share this incredible thing with everyone they meet, especially his friends. yet, time-and-time again, the world has shown laudna the gods don’t seem to care about her. before someone says anything, pike resurrecting laudna doesn’t automatically mean she has to trust the gods. clerics and paladins spent 30 years running her out of towns for existing and trying to kill her in the name of their gods. if the circumstances were different, there’s a good chance fcg could have been one of those people. for fcg, the world is black-and-white. for laudna, it’s all gray. laudna was able to have a conversation with imogen about the ruby vanguard’s message and the purpose of the gods because she understands the need to question things and thinks that’s a good thing even if she doesn’t agree with the conclusions. fcg’s not there yet, and until he is, their friendship with laudna will never be able to progress past where it is now.
in conclusion: please have a conversation, maybe even two or three. it’d be so good for fcg to learn the world’s incredible nuances and for laudna to see how faith in the gods can be an empowering force for good, not just something beyond her grasp.
laudna/fearne
out of all launda’s dynamics, this is the one i desperately want more of. we’ve gotten so little! almost all their moments are interactions between the three witches that tend to center imogen (making the red-string friendship bracelets and comforting imogen after she talked with relvin come to mind) OR center imogen and fearne’s mutual appreciation for laudna’s… everything. one of my favorite about fearne is that, like imogen, she doesn’t think laudna is gross and creepy, she thinks laudna is gorgeous and charming without any caveats. even ashton, who also loves laudna’s laudnaness, tends more towards “yeah, you’re disgusting and THAT’S why it’s great.”
the other main part of their dynamic i want to sink my teeth into is the coin-toss, more specifically fearne’s guilt over the coin toss. regardless of whether you think fearne lied (i personally find that headcanon FASCINATING but to each their own), she clearly feels so many emotions about having to pick whether to save laudna and orym that she hasn’t even begun to unpack. one of the few sole moments we’ve gotten of them was in episode 42 when laudna asked fearne to help teach her to cast fireball, and in it, fearne, unprompted, blurts out, “how’s it feel being alive again?” almost immediately. she also apologizes to laudna, says they’ll fight any piece of delilah that’s still in there, and tells her, “i missed you terribly for that moment in time.” even when laudna gives her the chance to make the conversation light-hearted, fearne stays so genuine, which is all the more-noteworthy because she’s usually so flippant and almost always keeps her real feelings close to her chest.
some other examples of fearne’s guilt include: the 4sd where ashley said part of why she was so protective over imogen during their separation arc was that she couldn’t bear having to tell laudna anything happened to her and just this past episode when fearne’s protectiveness after laudna made her only cast first-level cure wounds on fcg after they cast turn undead.
in conclusion: PLEASE LET THEM INTERACT MORE. THERE’S SO MUCH JUICY POTENTIAL AND I WANT TO SEE IT EXPLORED.
laudna/chetney
i don’t have that much to say about them except that their dynamic is absolutely delightful. i love that we’ve gotten to see more of it in recent episodes, and i hope that continues.
chetney exists at an interesting place between orym’s genuine discomfort and fearne and imogen’s complete enchantment with laudna’s undeadness. he is sometimes grossed out, but he also seems to accept it as a thing about laudna without too much judgment, or at least, that “judgment” is light-hearted in a way orym’s or even fcg’s isn’t.
i love that they’re the characters with the most life experience (even if laudna is technically the fourth oldest, fcg only has two years of memory and fearne is a 100+ but spent 99% of that time in one place) but also embrace being “childish” and silly together, like the entire sky-sail sequence!
in conclusion: *gently holds* i just think they’re neat!
that’s all! if you read this whole thing, you get my eternal love and gratitude. thank you.
Yeah!!! Here comes Ashton Greymoore with the crystal hammer!!! Ill probably end up doing a series of chibis with all the Bell Hells members(and perhaps Mighty Nein) for myself imo...
alt versions under the cut
yeeah
