Critical Role's D&D Game Adapts Matt Mercer's Style With A Rival Party

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Adventuring parties looking to dive into Dungeons & Dragons' new book will have some competition in the form of a rival party from Critical Role. The partnership between Dungeons & Dragons and the immensely popular D&D series, co-designed by game master Matt Mercer, is set in the show's world of Exandria.

In recent years, Critical Role's popularity became so massive that it set Kickstarter records resulting in Amazon Prime picking up The Legend of Vox Machina, an animated adaption of the web series' first campaign. This was not, however, the first time Critical Role partnered with outside companies to expand its brand including a notable two-way partnership with Dungeons & Dragons itself. Prior to Call of the Netherdeep, there have been other works published with the help of D&D such as Explorer's Guide to Wildemount and Wizards of the Coast's game design architect Chris Perkins has even been a guest player on the web series multiple times.

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The newest product of this partnership is the first major Dungeons & Dragons adventure book to be set in Exandria. As reported by Polygon, Perkins explained how Call of the Netherdeep falls in line with the character-driven nature of the web series. One way this is achieved is through the inclusion of a rival party in the Critical Role adventure book, though according to Perkins they do not necessarily have to be antagonists. Game masters are given access to many different tools to subtly introduce this other party to the players, but how they are actually meant to interact will ultimately be left up to how each game unfolds.

This falls in line with the mentality game master Matt Mercer has reiterated in the