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As the two Critical Role GMs sat down for an interview, Campaign 4's Brennan Lee Mulligan presented his predecessor with the kind of problem most TTRPG GMs have run into in some form. You introduce your players to an inn, Mulligan told Matt Mercer, stocked to the brim with characters you've fully fleshed out - from voice to backstory to relationship with each other. Unfortunately, your party doesn't want to go in the inn at all, opting instead to check out a well out back. What do you, as the GM, do?

Well, according to Mercer, Critcal Role's own TTRPG - Daggerheart - seeks to provide an answer.

The interview I'm talking about was one for Variety, in which the co-creators of two of actual play's biggest entry's - Critical Role and Dimension 20, respectively - got to talk about how TTRPGs like Dungeons & Dragons are influencing culture, and how culture is influencing them in turn.

"On the topic of learning as the space evolves and this medium evolves," began Mercer, "Classically, the Game Master and the players come from a place of being very separate. You have the Game Master as the director and the judge and kind of rules the world - this idea and the players are just pieces on the game board. That has evolved over time to be far more collaborative. 

Mercer credits that evolution to "a lot of the indie game spaces and more modern tabletop games, [where] there's been a wonderful shift. And we brought a lot of that into our recent RPG release, Daggerheart, which is empowering the players to build on the narrative along with the GM and finding places for the invitation."

So what exactly does that mean? Well, in a game where the only limit is your imagination, it can mean a myriad of things, but to better explain it in the context of the interview, Mercer brought up Mulligan's previous scenario.

"To take your earlier example of the nervous GM," the voice actor said, "When the player's like, 'I'm gonna go in the well' and the GM doesn't have anything prepared, the GM can say, 'As you walk to the edge and you climb inside, what do you find in that well?' They opened the door to that and then empower the player."

Admittedly, Mercer admits the flip side this is empowering a less-than cooperative player to "be a little shit and go, 'I find all the gold in the world and a vorpal sword.'"

But there's a solution to that too, as Mercer wraps up.

"You can be like, 'As the daydream fades, you stand there holding your dick in your hand in an empty well.' Punish them for overreach, but start teaching them that they can contribute to this narrative too."

Works for me, Matt, especially since my contributions lean heavily on 'trying to seduce the Drakona bartender.' And honestly, what epic story couldn't use a bit more of that?

Critical Role Campaign 4 is streaming now on the group's Beacon, YouTube, and Twitch channels. 

From the lands of Exandria to your very own smartscreens, Popverse has everything you need to know about the TTRPG phenomenon that is Critical Role. Here you'll find:

• Popverse's Critical Role watch order
• An interview with GM Brennan Lee Mulligan
• The cast's appearance at C2E2 '25

...and more. Roll initiative, player. Adventure awaits.