Who Are You?

anonymous asks: Are you one person, a collective of people, or two gnomes standing on each others shoulders wearing long coat?

Guys, I think they’re onto us…

There are three of us at the core.

@trenchantwit manages the site, answers the DM-sided questions, and runs the Twitter account. If you’re asking CritRoleStats a question, he’s probably the person you’re talking to. He also started the site, so, you know. Props and stuff. (He’s also super humble.)

@thesingingbadger is the other main poster to the site, coordinating with volunteers, and accumulating data for the lists we put out. TSB wanted to make a whole bunch of references throughout this post, but is attempting to show restraint.

@kathatherine is the stealthy one, doing mostly behind-the-scenes tasks, working on character proficiencies, and converting recorded rolls to the natural values. Kathatherine is like a patient Vax; she stealths along until she’s ready and suddenly-wham! She sneak attacks you with massive, awesome posts like this.

And, of course, there is everyone else who helps us with various stats, from watching for stats through old episodes, working through character sheets, and logging rolls. Notable contributors include:

• @dragonmustang01, who has compiled spell lists for all relevant characters;
• @quadz08, who has logged well over half of all rolls ever rolled;
• xotes, who has logged a significant amount of damage;
• @rusty-diamond, @arosebyabbie, @ashesofvalkana, @starstuff84, @tux3d0_mask, and Don Dresser, who have trawled many an episode for rolls, catch phrases, Matt’s verbal tics, and other requested stats;
• @tiamat_zx and @puzzle-dragon, who keep our Vaxleth page up to date.

There’s a lot more, too, who are all awesome. Y’all are awesome.

cmdrdara asks: Just want to say that you guys and gals do amazing work! Thank Sarenrae for doing what you do. <3

Thank YOU! And totally, SaRaeRae is our wing-deity.

foolhappy asks: I love you, Crit Role Stats team. <3

The feeling is mutual. <3

Welcome, TheSingingBadger and Kathatherine!

CritRoleStats started out as a relatively small endeavor, in which I would live-tweet monster stats as they happened and then flipped through the archived videos to figure out how many times the dice rolled a Natural 20. However, as the show continues and more people find more things they want to know, it’s become quite a bit for one person to handle, even with the invaluable support of the network of Critter volunteers.

With that, I’d like to formally welcome two volunteers who are also now the public face of Crit Role Stats here on Tumblr: @thesingingbadger and @kathatherine. They have been instrumental in the behind-the-scenes part of the blog, cleaning up the notes we have, checking and double-checking stats, and handling the digital paperwork when I’ve been too lazy to deal with it. They will also be helping to answer questions and make posts, in addition to helping organize the group effort of knowing all the things.

And, as always, we want to continue to thank the Critters who continually help with logging, tracking, and updating stats behind the scenes. This would not be possible without all the hard work you all put in!

Critical Role Charities of 2015

In the spirit of Critterism, Hoomanism, the holiday season, and just basically being generous (as this community is wont to be), we present the charitable organizations that have been represented on Critical Role for 2015. We love the kindness that circulates among the critters, and we strongly encourage the continuation of this generosity. Merry Critmas, Happy Voxanukkah, and critical success to all!

Over the course of the show

• 826LA
  
• Gamechanger
  
• Extra Life and the Children’s Miracle Network
  
• Doctors Without Borders
  

Critter’s Guide to Critmas

• Pablove Foundation
  
• The Planetary Society
  
• The Nature Conservancy
  
• First Book
  
• First Place for Youth
  
• Operation Supply Drop
  
• My Friend’s Place
  
• Amnesty
  

Donations Made by Critters

• World Wildlife Federation
  
• Adopt a Species by the Smithsonian National Zoo
  
• Defenders of Wildlife
  
• Oxfam and Oxfam Unwrapped
  
• Heifer International
  
• Save the Children
  
• Boys and Girls Clubs of America
  
• People’s Shakespeare Project
  
• International Foundation for Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders
  

Rankings Updated, and Thanksgiving Week Announcements

http://critrolestats.com/rankings has been updated through Episode 33. Don’t forget to check it out every Tuesday after an episode; we update all of our stats and rankings for running projects there after the episodes are available on Youtube.

As a reminder, there is no new Critical Role this week (yeah, sorry, sad fact is sad). However, CritRoleStats is thankful to have a chance to catch up on our backlog. Starting tomorrow, from Nov 25 through Dec 1, we’ll launch a Monster Analysis each day from episodes pasts, including several monsters who were hinted at without actually becoming encounters. Hopefully those, combined with incoming gifs, an awesome podcast, Critter art and fanfiction, your own D&D game, and other Geek and Sundry novelties (including the weekly comic and Spotify playlists) will be enough to tide you over for the off week!

And assuming that isn’t enough and you need to rewatch old episodes, we would always welcome help logging various stats from old episodes. If that sounds like something of interest, take a look at a goal or two from here, keep an eye or ear out during your rewatch, and send us mail. Thanks!

Announcements: New Stats and New Stats Critters

We have added Kill Counts and DM Crits to the Rankings and Running Stats page. We are all working on many more, and we will try to keep the current stats as current as we can. Huge thanks to @quadz08, @clericofkord, @dragonmustang01, @kathatherine, @thesingingbadger, @burdenedwithnopurpose, @arosebyabbie, and @luscinias for their work on the (rather large) Kill Count project.

Speaking of these fine individuals: Over the course of compiling stats and writing articles, we’ve been very fortunate to have a number of volunteers help us make the task of watching all of these episodes much more manageable. The sheer magnitude of some of these projects has forced them onto my back burner in favor of others. I have been very grateful to the volunteers who have continued to log total damage taken, total damage dealt, all rolls, and recently requested stats even as the new episodes come out.

With that, I want to formally introduce a number of our volunteers who we welcome to the Crit Role Stats team. All of these individuals have put in a lot of their time and effort to help us know what we know, and will be helping us keep our stats up-to-date as the show continues (on their own time, of course).

@quadz08, @dragonmustang01, and @thesingingbadger have taken charge on the most daunting project of all: gathering All PC Rolls, as well as finding a very large portion of our more recent projects.

@clericofkord has kept track of damage dealt and taken in well over half of the current episodes. She has also helped significantly in finding stats for other projects.

@Vaxleth (@ashesofvalkana on Tumblr) is currently head of the Vaxleth moments stats. She was also one of the first Critters to help us gather Scanlan songs and PC crits.

@TUX3D0_MASK has helped us fill in the holes we seemed to have missed in our fervor to complete other projects, and is helping us catch up on the newer requests, as well.

@kathatherine has served as Chief Organizer, sorting the notes we’ve received, updating our progress documentation, ensuring that no work is lost or unnecessarily replicated, and making sure timestamps are accurate. She’s saved a lot of time and effort, and will continue to help us stay on track!

In addition, we want to thank all of the other Critters who have helped in any other capacity. We welcome all help that we receive, and we love all of you!

Notes on Wild Shape

So, I’ve gotten a little lazy on the druid department since my current campaign doesn’t have one, and I’m a bard in a game where we do have one (go wife!). A critter on Twitter pointed out that Keyleth seemed to be expending a lot of uses of Wild Shape, and was wondering if she had more than two uses. Here is what was found, by the combined efforts of @HuynhLinda and @Herkyavello:

In 5e, all druids with shape-changing abilities get two uses, period. The class doesn’t get any room to increase that, nor does DMG have any built-in items (though a DM could create it, if they thought it would work). This makes sense, as the ability to turn into an Earth Elemental twice during a battle would be kind of broken.

The bright side of this is that 5e allows druids to regain both uses after a short rest. This prevents PCs from spamming it in the middle of combat without severely hindering them over the course of a day’s work.

I found that Pathfinder does allow increased uses at certain levels (e.g., 5 uses at level 12). Since the crew is coming over from Pathfinder, I figure this is also plausible, but after rewatching Keyleth’s uses in both Ep21 and Ep5, it appears they are indeed still following the rules laid out in 5e.

Thanks again to @HuynhLinda and @Herkyavello for making me learn something!