D&D: Critical Role’s ‘Call Of The Netherdeep’ Delivers Big Story In Small Bites
Critical Role: Call of the Netherdeep releases today. Does the adventure deliver on its promise of deep storytelling and thrilling adventure?
Critical Role: Call of the Netherdeep delivers an adventure unlike many others. It is, at its heart, a story of redemption and what it means to be a hero. What it means to truly save someone.
But Call of the Netherdeep is also the story of a rivalry, a story of failure, and a story with a spine that weaves from chapter to chapter. It promises the “Critical Role” experience, and in many ways, it seems poised to deliver it.
And not through anything super radical. The adventure’s story, while a little different from the typical D&D adventure, isn’t going to blow anyone’s mind with a radical twist. Indeed, the adventure writers seem to lean on the familiarity of the story to weave tone and theme throughout.
But what makes it stand out is that Call of the Netherdeep provides a little more guidance for DMs, and shows how the world might change at every step. Matt Mercer has put together a team to build an adventure that feels like something you’d see on Critical Role. And in many ways, it has it all.
Call of the Netherdeep – Like Critical Role?
On the surface, it feels awfully familiar. The story starts with a celebration or festival. Out of some lighthearted adventure, we meet our heroes, and then things quickly change and shift as a strange being calls for aid. Heroes come into possession of a powerful magic item which they must then take on an epic quest.
It borrows a lot from the things that make Critical Role work so well. There are memorable NPCs (along with guidance on how to play them), unexpected heroes, and Matt Mercer’s homebrewed monsters. It’s got a lot going for it. It doesn’t feel like a standard D&D adventure.
And probably the chief thing here is that the adventure tells you how the characters might succeed, how they might fail, and what happens as a result. For instance, they might actually never get the special magic item. The first chapter of the adventure might want the players being the ones to touch a special gem – but they don’t have to.
Mercer and company have planned for that. They’ve planned for a lot of things. And they update you on the plan as they go. There’s a lot of showing-of-cards for the DM picking up this adventure.
Call of the Netherdeep, the DM’s Friend
As an example, let’s look at the rival adventuring party mechanic. There’s an adventuring party in the book made up of NPCs with personalities, with their own wants and goals and attitudes. They may collectively or individually decide to befriend the party, fight the party, or be somewhat indifferent.
Good, neutral, or evil, in a nutshell. And the game gives you tools to keep track of their attitudes, and at every turn that the PC party interacts with the rival party, gives guidance to show how the NPCs might act, depending on their attitude.
The result is a change that you can believe in because it’s a change you can see. You can see firsthand how the adventuring party shifts from neutral to hostile or vice versa. You might win over an individual adventurer, but they’ll still fight with their team (against you!). It leads to some juicy drama in a real good way.
It makes the story personal by focusing on a real, personal relationship that the player characters have to other people in the world. It’s not just whether or not they succeed on their quest, but how and how the world feels about their actions, that matters in Call of the Netherdeep.
Big Story, Small Bites
And Call of the Netherdeep manages this by not showing too much all at once. It goes broad, then focuses in for a little bit. The first half of the adventure feels sprawling and open – but there’s a pace, a slowdown that allows characters to interact with NPCs and go deeper on the mysteries of the world. Indeed, the adventure hangs upon the players knowing more about the world.
So it doles out some of the signature moves of Matt Mercer in small helpings. Players receive mystic visions. They might have eerie magical effects, even curses that don’t play with the typical D&D rules the way you’d expect. It’s different. It’s fun. It stands out to me as one of the more exciting adventures we’ve seen in recent times.
This adventure feels like something WotC has been reaching for for a long time. As a starting adventure, new DMs will find a lot of guidance here. But veteran DMs will be able to spread their wings with it. There’s so much to love about this book. Without spoiling it, you can follow a twisting path through Critical Role’s world and find one of three different endings. There’s a strong sense of how the world should feel that adds to the immersion of it. Plus, the players might end up with one or more gods mad at them.
What more could you want?
Happy Adventuring
