House Rules

The starting house rules are just a set of three principles to follow. Technical rulings determined as a result of game play will be added as needed.

No Metagaming

Metagaming is a term used in role-playing games which describes a player's use of real-life knowledge concerning the state of the game to determine their character 's actions, when said character has no relevant knowledge or awareness under the circumstances.

• Act consistently with your character’s personality traits and with the knowledge they have acquired within the game.

• Don’t read the guides or monster manual during the game. You can, however, refer to your spell and ability details if you forget.

• Avoid questioning game mechanics during play. Make a note of anything that you disagree with. At the end, we can gather those items and make a ruling for future occurrences. Those will be documented on the site to ensure fairness.

Game Immersion

• D&D is intended to be a joint effort at creating a story. This is most effective when you stay in character.

• Act consistently with the character traits you establish for your character. These can change over time. What you should not be is your real-world self. You are playing a part.

• Be unique. You don’t need to be a voice actor, although providing some unique speech pattern adds interest.

• Pursue immersion benefits. I will periodically award bonuses for consistently staying in character, especially when doing so is not necessarily in your best interest. (You have a character trait that says you tend to speak before you think, and you’ve just been insulted by someone really big and ugly. Probably a good time to keep quiet, but what fun would that be?) Benefits will be in the form of things like banking a saving throw modifier.

• Be descriptive. Rather than "I attack with my longsword", try "I noticed he is favoring his left foot, so I feint to the side before attacking from the other side in hopes of making him stumble" Instead of "I cast Cloud of Daggers", try "Pulling a sliver of glass from my materials pouch, I cast it in the direction of the kobold and shout Cloud of Daggers! The glass splits into daggers filling a 5 foot cube centered on the kobold"

Game Pace

On each turn, whether that be a turn during combat or after the DM describes something to you out of combat, you should automatically go around the table in order (can predetermine at beginning of session) and:

• Say anything you feel you need to direct to your fellow adventurers or opponents (“Mordenkainen, can you cast some light over in that corner? It’s making me a bit nervous that we can’t see anything over there and I don’t want to get too close yet”) (“You have to be the ugliest orc I’ve ever seen in my life…did your mama beat all the green out of you as a child?)

• After any response(s), indicate what action(s), bonus action you will be taking

• Keep it close to real time. In other words, when it is your turn in the middle of a fight, it should not take you 5 minutes to determine what spell you are going to use. It should be well under a minute.

• Avoid side conversations (conversations that are not your character talking to someone else in game on your turn), as they are distracting

The roleplaying brilliance of Critical Role

I’m really bad at stealthing. We should go.

— Scanlan

Let’s make this nice and easy. I smack Grog on the ass and say, “Go get him!”

— Vex

I’m freaked out right now. These are very large individuals, I’ve only read about them, and they smell slightly like feet.

— Lyra

The butt flap of my soul is down. I’m well dressed at the moment.

— Percy

As my consciousness fades away, I don’t say anything, but here’s what I think in a split second: Â I think of my friends, that I’ve spent so much time with. Â I think of Keyleth, beautiful, walking under the trees. Â I think of my twin sister as a young girl, folding linens with our mother. Â I think of my sister as an adolescent, smarter than me. Â I think of the woman she grew into, hiking over many, many, many miles together, my best friend. Â My best friend. Â Vex’ahlia. Â And before I can think no more, I say a prayer to Sarenrae to watch over my friends and keep them safe.

— VAX