Critical Recap: Critical Role C3E31 “Breaking Point”

Hello! Welcome to Critical Recap! I’m Dani Carr, the Critical Role Lore Keeper. Let’s dive into our recap of Critical Role Campaign 3 Episode 31 Breaking Point!

IRA’S DEPARTURE

Imogen tells Ira that the telescope showed her the cage surrounding Ruidus, leaving out the city on the moon’s surface. As Ira looks through the telescope himself, FCG casts detect thoughts and gets a sense of Ira’s hungering curiosity, but the Nightmare King’s mind is protected from any further delving. Ira adjusts the scope, finding something specific but saying only that he can see what “they” are doing, referring to the Unseelie Court and their Exandrian allies.

Ira continues to speak cryptically, saying that he wants to watch the court fail and wants to be there first and make the choice for them. He takes credit for the machine the Unseelie built and tells them that the Exandrian allies are Otohan Thull and an elf named Ludinus Da’leth, who Orym recognizes as a leader of the Cerberus Assembly. The Unseelie are close to finishing their device but Ira’s advantage is that he’s been forgotten and the court’s attention is on the Calloways, so now they must part. With that, Ira vanishes with the Moontide Crown.

THEORIES

Imogen explains that she and Orym saw a city on Ruidus and describes the cage of latticework around the moon. Hondir shows them a depiction of the Divine Gate, which resembles the cage. Theories abound: are the flares caused by the gate weakening or Ruidus’ power growing? Does Ruidus power the Divine Gate? Is it a prison for the two forgotten gods? Do the parties have similar or opposite goals? Orym explains that the Cerberus Assembly is a group of powerful mages who advise the king in the Dwendalian Empire.

Orym finds the Veilscatter Scope, which Ashton immediately smashes with their hammer in order to see if it’s magical. It was magical, but it still shatters. Laudna mends the lens, but it is unknown if it will work the same. Birdie shows Ira’s chest of belongings to the group. Imogen takes a pouch of gems while Laudna examines a bundle of blank vellum paper, but she is unable to find any writing. There is a supply line map of the Hellcatch Valley that indicates something involving Treshi east of Bassuras – possibly the Unseelie’s base of operations. FCG contemplates reaching out to Dancer to see if she could understand the telescope.

MEMORIES

Ashton comments on the holes in the Calloways’ memory. Ollie explains that Birdie befriended Morri while taking care of her house to pay off a debt to her family. The Calloways only asked her to keep Fearne safe and out of sight with no contract or exchange, only a promise to pay her back. Ollie allows FCG and Imogen to examine his mind. They find multiple blurred and smeared memories revolving around their arcane work with Ira.

They try to rebuild a memory of Birdie crying, where she seems intent to leave, but Ollie gets a nosebleed. Fearne encourages them to continue, but Imogen and FCG stop, not wanting to hurt him. It’s clear that the Calloways have had their memories altered repeatedly. Fearne gives her parents the music box from Taste of Tal’Dorei. Bells Hells decide to stay the night to rest and go to Paragon’s Call tomorrow.

At Ashton’s suggestion that Ira may have hidden things out of the others’ reach, Orym hops up to the hole in the ceiling to take a look. He sees notches in the rock of directional arrows, with scrawled notes and dates. Laudna joins Orym and realizes that this is a measurement of Ruidus’ path across the sky over the past couple of years. She sees the sylvan word for ‘curiosity’ on a stone, pointed to the east – possibly toward the Panagrip Sands.

LETTING THE FEELINGS OUT

Meanwhile, Imogen and FCG talk to Fearne, encouraging her feelings and telling her that it’s okay for Fearne to be angry with her parents. FCG gives Fearne the space to say her feelings out loud so she can get them out. Chetney gives her a doll to use, which she names Caviar. Fearne confesses that she is very mad and feels like her parents abandoned her and wants to hurt them. She has no idea where to start in order to have a relationship with them.

Before that, she needs to be honest. Fearne sits down with Birdie and Ollie and explains how upset she is. This wasn’t what Birdie and Ollie wanted but they thought it was right at the time. They missed her and wanted to return to her but every time they had the courage to leave, something came up or they’d have a brush with the Unseelie. They were afraid of losing Fearne forever. They are not asking for her forgiveness, but they do hope to make it up to her in time.

Fearne tells them that she has a child, conveniently leaving out that her child is a monkey named Mister. Fearne will work on trying to forgive them and getting to know them and they encourage her to go at her own pace. They’ll support her from whatever distance she is comfortable with and they love her no matter what. Fearne enjoys their company and thinks they might even make memories together that they’ll both remember.

SENDING

Orym and Imogen discuss needing to prioritize research in Yios and the Vasselheim texts. Orym sees leadership in Imogen, but he also sees how she struggles with her anger and being overwhelmed. He’s there for her to lean on, to give her a gut check when needed. Imogen is worried that her powers might come from something evil, but Orym doesn’t think she’ll bend to it. She asks him if she should contact Otohan and he tells her to trust her gut.

Orym asks her to cast sending to his leader, Keyleth, and give her an update on the fey influences and the Cerberus Assembly. Keyleth tells Orym to stay the course carefully while she pulls threads of her own. The course is figuring out why Keyleth and Zephrah were attacked by the Gray Assassins. Orym’s only guess right now is that she had theories about the leylines. Orym uses the sending stone to check in with Dorian.

Meanwhile, Ashton takes out the Hishari helmet from the Twilight Mirror Museum and stares at it before sleep. FCG casts sending to Dancer, asking for her current status, but her response is a scared one, asking how he found her and what he wants. In the night but in full sight of Orym and FCG, Fearne cuts down two of the purple crystals hanging in the Calloway’s garden and puts one in Laudna’s dollhouse and the other in Imogen’s bag before sleeping in the same room with her parents.

HEY THERE DELILAH

In the morning, Laudna finds the purple crystal in her dollhouse and assumes that her dolls’ love manifested it, though Imogen disagrees. Laudna goes to retrieve her dolls and hears Delilah in her head. Imogen throws the rock against a wall and it shatters, its color diminished. Delilah warns Laudna that she’s on a dangerous path and that not everyone is looking out for her like Delilah is. Laudna goes outside to talk to Delilah and Orym tells Imogen that Fearne put the second rock in her bag.

Delilah tells Laudna that she is wandering around dangerous magic. Delilah is trying to keep Laudna safe – if Laudna dies, so does Delilah. Laudna asks about Ruidus, but Delilah is more interested in the upcoming solstice. Great things can be achieved now. She’s excited to see what others are up to with a solstice this powerful. She encourages Laudna to get involved. Laudna returns to the others, attempting to shake Delilah out of her head.

STRESS

With the encouragement of their friends, FCG again attempts to contact Dancer via sending. Dancer’s response is fearful and angry, begging him to leave her alone, that she barely got away and never wants to see them again. She tells FCG that he knows what he did. FCG experiences static and flashes in their mind. FCG takes 4 stress points and fades, going silent and unresponsive. Imogen casts detect thoughts and hears a cacophony of different voices.

Chetney attempts to ‘reset’ FCG by bonking them on the head with his mallet. This causes FCG to snap to life and attack Chetney, his eyes red and his speed enhanced. Laudna, recalling Delilah’s insinuation that her friends would betray her, digs her fingers into FCG’s head, critically injuring them as Delilah tells her that she can only rely on herself. Power pulses through Laudna even as she tells FCG (and herself) that “this isn’t who you are”.

Fearne casts heat metal to knock FCG out, but before he loses consciousness, FCG harshly tells Fearne that her parents got rid of her and tells Laudna that she was never alive. Orym removes FCG’s buzzsaw and notices that the blades of grass on FCG’s chest resemble a bloody streak of fingers. Orym ties a rope through FCG’s wheel and hangs them upside down from the ceiling. Ashton stands by to protect FCG as Fearne heals him.

BETTER TOGETHER

FCG wakes up as his normal self with no memory of the encounter. Ashton tells FCG what happened and FCG apologizes, shocked by their actions. Ashton thinks back to when he found FCG, recalling that one of his eyes was damaged and had to be repaired – FCG is the one-eyed creature who killed their friends. Imogen looks inside his mind again, finding memories of the others opening up to him and taking on other people’s trauma and experiences. They need to find Dancer and maybe someone who can look inside FCG.

Ashton thinks they should accept that everyone here is a potential powderkeg and not turn against one another. It’s FCG’s responsibility to work through his trauma, but they can support him. Orym steps up and tells them all that they have to be better together. They need to commit to taking care of each other should one of them fall out of line. FCG isn’t sure if he can control himself, but they will try and the others will help.

Imogen comforts Laudna, who is deeply remorseful for her attack on FCG. Imogen knows that Delilah got in her head and reminds Laudna that Delilah is using her. Laudna wonders if FCG was right about her never being alive. What if she was always a blank canvas? Imogen tells her that she has a bigger spark than anyone she’s ever known. They’ll fix this. Bells Hells and Birdie return to Bassuras while Ollie and Hondir stay behind to fix the telescope.

That is it for Episode 31 of Critical Role!

FINAL THOUGHTS

• FCG has a terrifying kill mode! But what specifically causes the stress points to build and why doesn’t he remember when it happens?
• Imogen knows she has another gnarlrock shard in her bag now, but she didn’t get rid of it like she got rid of Laudna’s.
• The Calloways’ memories are confirmed to have been tampered with! What did they see and what did they forget??
• Ludinus Da’leth is involved! The Cerberus Assembly rears its head again!!
• Lest we forget, there is a CITY on the MOON and a MINI DIVINE GATE. WHAT?!

Anyway, catch Episode 31 next Thursday, September 1st at 7pm Pacific on twitch.tv/criticalrole and on youtube.com/criticalrole or a week later on our podcast. Is it Thursday yet?