The video is just over two hours long. I made it through the first hour.
(I didn't switch it off for being bad or anything ... I just rarely find that I can sit through lengthy podcasts so I break them up into manageable chunks. Will totally revisit the second hour with a later viewing)
I actually listened with a notepad out and scratched out my first thoughts.
(I'll try to be spoiler conscious and use the spoiler tags when/where appropriate)
First, I should say that I am pretty new to the actual play podcast space (I'm about halfway through the 1st Critical Role campaign which I listen to as I drive to/from work, but other than that I have next to no experience with podcasts like this).
The gang starts in Baldur's Gate. Fair enough. Most RL campaigns often include a normal start followed by a misty trip in the beginning. It does sort of reinforce that this will be a 'weekend in hell' mode of RL campaign that 5th edition seems to lean into. Like some others here, I do prefer a unified Core and the RL setting to be run as a campaign setting, and not just a place to be escaped from, but there are plenty of ways to skin that cat, I guess.
Sound effects. There were a few glaring ones very early in the show that I thought were a bit overdone (which, thankfully did not continue). I was listening with headphones on, though, so maybe I'm just being picky. But in the scene, when something blew up ... there was an explosion sound added in post that was just a bit much. If there was a bird, you heard cawing, etc. Like I said, only a few instances, but I did not feel like they added to my enjoyment of the tale. Background music was ok though.
Very early on, I could tell that the podcast was going to be geared toward newcomers to the game. As specific game terms popped up for the first time, a little sidebar would appear on screen for a bit. Long Rest was defined, etc. If a character named a spell, a little window popped up with the name of the spell and a synopsis of what it did, etc. It wasn't too distracting, but I did need to pause it here and there to be able to read the info (I hate trying to read/digest something while someone else is speaking over the graphic ... I find it difficult to pay attention to both ... so for my own sanity, whenever a little window popped up on screen, I paused the tale to read the sidebar, then unpaused it to hear what they were saying.
Another thing obvious from very early on is that not all of the voice actors were familiar with D&D. This is a particular pet peeve of mine I guess, carried over from the Critical Role folks who ... after playing something like 20 sessions together can still be counted on to ask the DM something like 'Saving Throw? What's that mean?' The instance that caught my ear was when one of the players cast a spell ... they proudly pulled out a card to read off every part of the card except what the spell did "I cast XYZ. This spell takes my action ... and I can cast it 15' away' ... then nothing about what the spell actually does in the scene.
The first encounter. Ooh boy. I guess I should start with what I did like. The DM led the discussion and asked folks questions after they declared an action. 'What did that look like?' She asked, drawing an answer out of one of the players that just named a spell they had cast. It has been quite a while since I have played FtF and it was neat to see. Meh, I guess I haven't played with new players in a while or had to patiently nudge players toward that sort of descriptive role play when they needed it.
I'm a stickler for the game being first and foremost, a game. I mean, sure, we are telling a story too. But there is a framework there that underpins everything. The game has rules, it has turns, you can do XYZ on your turn, etc. The action economy was non-existent. It was crumpled up, thrown in the garbage, set on fire, the ashes were welded into a steel coffin, and then buried at sea. There was no init. One character went, the bad guy went, another character went, the bad guy went again, then the bad guy cast a spell that affected everyone, then another character went, etc.
It took a
solid 20 minutes to get through the first round (which because there was no discussion of game terms ... I can only assume that a single round had passed ... the only indication I had of that was that the first guy to act declared another action).
Dispel Magic was used wildly incorrectly. Counterspell might have been appropriate, but I got the feeling that this nuance was lost on the players/DM.
During the fight ...
Later in the podcast, the gang made their way to RL. They used the old 'you wake up in a forest' schtick. One thing that stuck out sideways to me was that the DM said to the table, after being awake for like 3 seconds ... "You are now on a different plane of existence." As a RL nerd ... I feel like this was a cheap way to explain that they had been transported to the Demiplane of Dread. There was no dawning realization, etc. No sinking feeling that something was amiss. It was handled in one sentence from the DM to the players in a 'Now that that has been settled, we can get on to the next bit.' Fine, I guess. Just not my cup of tea. I get that they are time limited or whatever on a podcast, and have a lot of story to tell in a limited amount of time, but personally I like it much better with these sorts of tales if the 'We're not in Kansas anymore' realization happens slowly, insidiously, over the course of that first session.
Cursing. An F-Bomb made a (singular) appearance. There was a minor curse word earlier (sh!t) that did not quite rise to the level of being offensive, but as something being produced / vetted by the IP's corporate owner, I did sort of expect this to be a clean version. (I will say that the tone was waaay less offensive than the Critical Role folks who swear like sailors, make lewd jokes about visiting brothels, and have other instances of inappropriate humor embedded throughout their podcasts)
The gang discovers that they are in ...
Minor rules-lawyer moment. A group stealth check was called for. Okay, fine. Group checks can be a great way to have a group undertake something that they can all work on. If half of them pass the check, the group passes. Easy peasy. My rules-lawyer moment was that the group check called for was Dex (stealth) ... and the section in the DMG that describes group checks specifically calls out Dex (stealth) as not being a good fit for group checks ... because one person absolutely can fail and ruin it for everyone.
This observation might just be mean ... but I think the graphics guy working on the video in post has never played D&D before. There were times that character stats were displayed on screen for a moment, like when one of the PCs was bing introduced, or later when an attack caused them to lose hit points or something. Anyway ... when the standard six stats were displayed, you saw two rows of three and then some character art.
3x2 Like so:
But sometimes, due to the placement of the graphic on screen they had to stack the stats differently
2x3 Like so:
It's been a minute since 1st edition ... so I mean ... I could have overlooked the order if it had been:
But what the heck is: Str Dex Int Wis Cha Con ????
Okay, SkiBird ... deep breaths ... get off your high horse.
Onward.
By the end of the first hour ... the gang had an idea of where they were and what to do next. In some of the exposition that got them to this point, the DM all but said that this was a weekend-in-hell campaign.
Specifically ...
All in all, it was enjoyable, but it didn't knock my socks off. Will listen to the rest of it (probably tomorrow) and report back!
One thing I
did like was that there was
a lot less whispering back and forth / side conversations between players (as compared to the folks at Critical Role, I mean). I find it very difficult to pay attention to podcasts like this when everyone is talking over one another.