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Critical Role is an American web series produced by Geek and Sundry in which a group of professional voice actors play Dungeons and Dragons. The series is broadcast Thursdays at 7:00 PM PST live on the Geek and Sundry Twitch.tv, with episodes made available the following Monday on Geek and Sundry's official website. Matthew Mercer serves as the show's Dungeon Master, running the ongoing campaign that is the basis for the show. The campaign began two years prior to the series as a one-time Pathfinder game at a birthday party for Liam O'Brien, after Liam and Sam Riegel discussed the idea on their podcast AllWorkNoPlay. The group enjoyed this initial game so much that they continued to play privately until they were approached by Felicia Day's Geek and Sundry network. In order to streamline gameplay for the live show, the game's characters were converted from Pathfinder to Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition before the web series began airing on 13 March 2015. Each stream also serves as a donation drive to support nonprofit organizations such as St Jude's, 826LA, Extra Life, and Doctors Without Borders.

Campaign Structure
The Critical Role storyline occurs in a campaign made up of a series of story arcs that are played over multiple episodes. Between the major story arcs, the characters rest, resupply, or go on side quests. In addition, each character has a backstory, an unfinished part of their history that enters into the campaign at irregular intervals.

Pre-series History
The series takes place in the fictional kingdom of Tal'Dorei, and follows the actions of an adventuring party known as Vox Machina, well known residents of the city of Emon. In their adventures prior to the start of the series, the group saved the family of Uriel, the ruler of Emon. In appreciation, Uriel gave the group seats on the city council, and provided them with a residence called Greyskull Keep, which is located just outside the city. Episode 36 featured a summary of the pre-series history, with artwork created by Kit Buss and voiceovers provided by the cast. Geek & Sundry is also producing a series of web comics that describes a "Winter's Crest Festival" that occurred pre-series. The web comics are written by cast members Marisha Ray and Taliesin Jaffe, and feature artwork by Wendy Sullivan Green.

On-stream Story Arcs

 * 1) The Kraghammer story arc (episodes 1-13) takes place primarily in the Underdark, and culminates in a battle between Vox Machina and a beholder named K'varn that is controlling an entire city of Illithid.
 * 2) The Vasselheim story arc (episodes 15-23) splits the party into two groups to prove their worth to the "Slayer's Take," a local adventurer's guild. This arc features guest appearances by Felicia Day, Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Wil Wheaton, and Will Friedle, adding a new twist to the now-divided adventuring band. This arc also includes the first back-story related episode (Episode 22), as Keyleth visits a related druid tribe.
 * 3) The Briarwood story arc (episodes 23-36) is dedicated to following Percy's backstory, and brings the adventurers up against Lord and Lady Briarwood who are ruling in Percy's ancestral home. The powerful couple turns out to be a vampire and a wizard, and Vox Machina must stop them from completing a ritual that could endanger the entire kingdom.

In addition, there are several stand-alone episodes. In Episode 12, Matthew Mercer shares some tips on how to become a good dungeon master. The episode features a minigame with players who are not part of the regular Critical Role cast, including Geek & Sundry producer Zac Eubank, Nerdist.com senior editor Dan Casey, and comedian Ify Nwadiwe. The three called themselves the Critical Rejects, but were quickly dubbed the "Critical Trolls" by fans of the show. The October 16, 2015 Extra Life fundraiser episode raised over $20,000 for the Children's Miracle Network during the broadcast. This charity episode included a reappearance of the Critical Rejects, as well as three members of the Critical Role cast, Liam O'Brien, Marisha Ray, and Orion Acaba.

Cast and Characters

 * Matthew Mercer as the Dungeon Master.
 * Travis Willingham as Grog Strongjaw the Goliath Barbarian.
 * Marisha Ray as Keyleth the Half-Elf Druid.
 * Taliesin Jaffe as Percy (Percival Fredrickstein Von Musel Kawalski De Rolo III) the Human Gunslinger.
 * Ashley Johnson as Pike Trickfoot the Gnome Cleric.
 * Sam Riegel as Scanlan Shorthalt the Gnome Bard.
 * Liam O'Brien as Vax'ildan the Half-Elf Rogue (and twin brother to Vex'ahlia).
 * Laura Bailey as Vex'ahlia the Half-Elf Ranger (and twin sister to Vax'ildan).
 * Orion Acaba as Tiberius Stormwind the Dragonborn Sorcerer (Episodes 1-26 only).

Guests

 * Felicia Day as Lyra the Human Wizard.
 * Mary Elizabeth McGlynn as Zahra Hydrus the Tiefling Warlock.
 * Wil Wheaton as Thorbir Falbek the Dwarf Fighter.
 * Will Friedle as Kashaw Vesh the Human Cleric.
 * Kit Buss as Lillith Daturai the Tiefling Wizard.
 * Zac Eubank as Snugglelord the Tiefling Warlock.
 * Dan Casey as Salty Pete the Dwarven Rogue.
 * Ify Nwadiwe as Ulfgar Fireforge the Dwarven Fighter.

Reception
Critical Role is a mixture of a traditional weekly show and a modern gaming Twitch stream. Each episode runs from 3 to 5 hours, is streamed live, and is made available on Geek & Sundry's Twitch channel immediately afterward to their more than 10,000 subscribers. As of January 2016, the show has more than a million minutes watched for each episode, for a total of over 37 million minutes watched. View numbers for archived episodes on YouTube are in the 100,000s. Viewer responses to the show have been overwhelmingly positive, with many fans (who call themselves "Critters") creating content such as fanart, fan fiction, character-inspired music, and fan-created merchandise, as well as a statistics tracker and a TV Tropes page for the show. Fans also send in many gifts for the cast and crew, resulting in monthly "Critmas" episodes during which the gifts are opened and distributed.

The show has caught the attention of the publishers of Dungeons & Dragons, Wizards of the Coast; who discussed it at length on their official D&D podcast, along with cast members Matthew Mercer, Marisha Ray, and former member Orion Acaba. The D&D website lists Critical Role as an example of how to stream D&D games online, and D&D game designer Chris Perkins has visited the set during the streaming of Episode 36. In an interview with the online gaming magazine Polygon, lead D&D designer Mike Mearls comments (specifically in reference to Critical Role) about how cool it is to open up Twitch and see D&D streaming. The cast of Critical Role are active participants on sci-fi/comics convention circuits, appearing for panels and signings at the 2015 San Diego Comic Con as well as the 2015 New York Comic Con, where "critical rolls" were available from one of the food vendors.

In a January 2016 article, Polygon describes Critical Role as a "thoroughly modern" show with a business model that is still developing, and Echo Base suggests it may be "the best intro to D&D ever". Players regularly discuss their involvement in the show in media interviews. In August 2015, actress Laura Bailey tells Tech Times how much she'd like to see a video game based on the Critical Role web series. Bailey later describes the Critical Role series as "ridiculously fun" in an October 2015 interview with gaming website Attack of the Fanboy. The January 2016 Polygon article features additional quotes from Bailey, as well as Dungeon Master Matthew Mercer and party rogue Liam O'Brien. In late summer of 2015, well-known voice actor and Nerdist.com contributor Steve Blum visited the set of Critical Role for Episode 28 of his "Blum Room" podcast.

Charity Involvement
During the show, viewers are invited to donate money to 826LA, which is later provided in a lump sum to the charity. Donation amounts and messages appear live on the stream, and a list of donors is read at the end of each session. During Geek and Sundry's 2015 Extra Life fundraiser, a special interactive episode was broadcast. This episode alone brought in over $20,000 for the Children's Miracle Network, and the event as a whole raised over $76,000. In late November 2015, Geek & Sundry's Twitch channel held a special Doctors Without Borders fundraiser, with nearly half of the $10,000 goal being raised during the 4-hour Critical Role broadcast. In December 2015, the cast released a "Critter's Guide to Critmas" in response to the flood of gifts they were receiving, asking them to instead donate to a variety of charities, with a cast member sponsoring each charity.

Related Events
In October 2015, Vin Diesel joined members of Critical Role as well Nerdist.com hosts, Dan Casey and Jessica Chobot for a D&D session coinciding with the release of the film "The Last Witchhunter". The session was broadcast on the Nerdist and Geek and Sundry websites, and was also picked up by news outlets such as Entertainment Weekly. Vin Diesel later discussed his experience with The Independent, describing it as "so much fun!"