On Immersion, Commitment, and Catching Lightning in a Bottle
There’s a conversation that happens in D&D circles about the “Mercer Effect” - this idea that Matt Mercer and Critical Role have set unrealistic expectations for what a home game should be. And yes, it’s true: your DM doesn’t need professional voice acting training. Your table doesn’t need a production budget. Your game doesn’t need to be Critical Role.
But here’s where I diverge from the conventional wisdom: I don’t think it’s a bad thing to aim for that level of immersion.
Notice I didn’t say “production value” or “performance.” I said immersion. Because what makes Critical Role captivating isn’t Matt’s ability to do forty different voices - it’s that every person at that table is fully committed to the story they’re telling together. It’s the investment, the emotional stakes, the sense that these characters and their choices genuinely matter.
And that? That we can absolutely achieve.
I may not have Mercer’s theatrical training, and my players may not be professional actors. But I firmly believe we can tell a story with every bit the same level of character development, mystery, and emotional resonance. We can create those moments where the entire table goes silent because something genuinely surprising just happened. We can build toward revelations that recontextualize everything that came before.
Being autistic gives me a particular advantage in this pursuit: pattern recognition is my superpower. Give me a group of players who are genuinely engaged, and I can spin narrative threads like a jazz musician tracking motifs through an improvisation. I hear when someone drops a phrase that will become the bridge we all cross together four songs later. When a player's offhand comment in session two creates the perfect setup for a payoff in session twelve—I catch it. When character choices, emotional investments, and half-formed curiosities start weaving together—I can feel where they want to go. With players giving me material to work with, I can help those threads find each other and become something that feels inevitable in hindsight but surprising in the moment.
But pattern recognition alone doesn’t create immersion. That requires work on multiple fronts.
I invest heavily in the scaffolding of immersion: curated soundscapes for different locations and moods, physical models and terrain that make tactical decisions feel real and spatial, lighting that shifts with the scene. I spend hours on narrative integration, ensuring that every house rule serves the story, that every mechanical choice reinforces the themes we’re exploring. These aren’t flourishes - they’re fundamental to the experience I’m trying to create.
And with Vallombrosa specifically, I’m setting out to catch lightning in a bottle.
This campaign is different. The structural complexity, the psychological depth of the characters, the adaptable architecture, the moral ambiguity baked into the core narrative - this is designed to be something special. Which means I will not start this campaign until I have a table that is fully bought into that vision.
This doesn’t mean I expect my players to match my level of effort. I don’t need them spending hours building terrain or composing encounter tables. But I do expect them to match my level of commitment - to show up invested in their characters, to engage with the story we’re building, to take initiative in pursuing the threads that interest them.
I need players who understand that when I describe a large manor transforming overnight, that’s not just set dressing - it’s a clue, a thematic element, a promise that observation and engagement will be rewarded. I need players who will form genuine relationships with NPCs like Celina Cross, so that when the supernatural stakes emerge, they matter. I need players who will sit with moral complexity rather than defaulting to “kill the bad guy,” because this story is deliberately designed to challenge easy answers.
The house rules I’ve developed - the wound system that removes survival anxiety, the philosophy that failure creates story rather than endings, the streamlined action economy - all of these exist to create space for authentic character choices. I’ve built a safety net so players can take risks, pursue dramatic moments, make the choices their characters would actually make rather than the tactically optimal ones.
But that safety net only works if players use it. If they trust it enough to be vulnerable, to invest emotionally, to care about outcomes beyond mechanical success.
So yes, I’m aiming for something ambitious. I’m aiming for the kind of immersion that makes players think about the campaign between sessions, that creates organic character development, that builds toward moments we’ll remember years later. I’m not trying to recreate Critical Role - I’m trying to create something with the same level of emotional investment and narrative cohesion, built on the foundation of my strengths and my players’ genuine engagement.
Vallombrosa deserves that kind of table.
I'll bring the thunder. You bring the lightning.