I love Dungeons & Dragons. In fact, I play in one group that I joined in 2004, and I run two others for kids at our local gaming store. I think when I crossed into DMing is when I paid more attention to various D&D influencers and their projects because I saw them as additional resources to learn from. I know Critical Role is a thing, and I’ve started watching it, but when it first launched I was in the parenting stage where it felt lucky enough to have time to game once a week, and I didn’t feel I had time to watch another group play, so now I am horribly behind and there’s an overwhelming ton to catch up on.
Lately, I’ve wanted something I don’t always need/want a visual for if I’m doing housework, in the parent pick-up line, or on in the background as I do present wrapping and other things. With many television and streaming releases delayed due to various strikes, it’s caused me to look for other sources of entertainment. I mentioned how much I loved Third Eye from Felicia Day, but once I had finished it, I needed something new.
Then I remembered Dimension 20. It was on my list of things to check out already as I know they’re a decently respected D&D play group. Their Box of Doom idea was something I had seen mentioned in an article about play series, and my own groups have a giant d20 that I pull out for certain roles that we call the DM Dice of Authority. It comes out when I have to make saving throws and my players are encouraged to chant “roll low!” at it as a sort of a group bonding thing and oh do they cheer when that giant d20 does in fact roll low. There’s no dance like the happy dance of a Sorcerer who just watched a lot of NPCs fail a saving throw against a Fireball spell for the record. Recently, Dimension 20 dropped a trailer for the newest year of their Fantasy High campaign, and it just felt like the sort of shenanigans that the group I play in would have run so I decided to check it out staring from Freshman Year.
I am so glad I did.
WARNING: Article might contain spoilers for the first two episodes of Fantasy High.
I was in fact right about the shenanigans and the players, and it didn’t take long at all for me to love the character concepts that the players had come up with. I loved how Emily Axford used Fig discovering she was a Tiefling as her shift from stereotypical popular girl to angsty/edgy musician. As someone currently playing an Inquisitive Rogue, Brian Murphy’s Riz was destined to be a favorite as well. At the same time there was something so fun about Zac Oyama’s shy and awkward Barbarian Gorgug who raised by gnomes and is just trying to make friends. I will have to share this video link with another D&D friend who is playing a character cut from a similar cloth to Lou Wilson’s Fabian. The sibling dynamic with Siobhan Thompson’s Adaine and her clearly golden child sister had me laughing hard during the first episode alone. Ally Beardsley’s Kristen is an interesting take on a cleric, and I’m curious to see just where they go with their character.
The setting is just great. I love the John Hughes meets D&D setting. The artists behind the terrain settings and minis are just so talented and the whole set is clearly the kind of thing that many DMs would love to have (I’m working on my collection, but these professional set-ups with teams behind them are honestly at an advantage). I love these adventurer groups that are found families made up of a bunch of misfits, and I love how even Fabian, who expects to saunter in and rule the school, gets caught off guard. I would love to see an official campaign setting for this sort of adventure because I think it would be so much fun to run or play in and it gets my brain going about how characters meet each other.
There’s nice layers to the story with a group of teenage girls being missing and something weird going on with the faculty. It is D&D, so it doesn’t take long at all before these Intrepid Heroes get into their first situation and the situation quickly turns into a chaotic mess of death and corn. The second episode ended on a dramatic enough note that I felt a need to immediately play the next episode to find out how they were going to make that all work out.
While many people love the idea of turning their campaign into a play podcast or web series, there really are challenges to doing that well. As I say to any kid who wants to be some sort of game related influencer, whatever you do has to make your viewers feel like it is worth it to watch you play as opposed to using their free time to play the game themselves. For something like D&D, that means you really have to have a certain flair for the dramatic amongst everyone involved. Like with Critical Role, these are all professional performers, and it shows. Everyone is really willing to be their character and speak as their character. It’s the sort of thing that takes some work, but is so much fun if you see it go down at your table and I’m working at how to teach my young players to do more of that.
Brennan Lee Mulligan is a great DM and I really love watching his voices and how he sets up his story. I am so curious as to what he had planned versus what the players and the dice rolls did that shaped things out. He has a really fun homebrew going on, and I would love if he gets to develop any of his things into purchasable resources the way Matt Mercer has. Playing at his table just looks like it would be so much fun. I also love that Dimension 20 sets up these sort of mini campaigns with smaller arcs as it feels much easier to jump into whichever campaign looks interesting and not be too overwhelmed to catch up on everything.
You can watch the first episode here:
