Critical Role: Moonward Stars Talk Expanding The World Of Midst With Liam O'Brien & Marisha Ray

Summary Moonward expands Midst universe with new characters on a mission to find the fallen moon in The Fold.

Moonward features iconic Critical Role stars Marisha Ray and Liam O'Brien in a collaborative, narrative-focused storytelling experience.

Midst creators Sarah Wile, Matthew Roen, and Xen Hartzell bring a unique storytelling style to Moonward unlike anything Critical Role has done before.

Critical Role is expanding the world of Midst with Moonward: A Midst Roleplaying Story, which will follow a new set of characters as they set off on a dangerous mission to discover what happened to the Moon after it fell into The Fold. Midst began with the moon falling out of the sky into a dark void of nothingness known as The Fold. Moonward, for the first time, will explore what exactly happened to the moon after the events of the Midst podcast.

Moonward: A Midst Roleplaying Story stars the talented trio known as Third Person who starred in and created the original podcast, Sarah Wile, Matthew Roen, and Xen Hartzell, with Critical Role founders and stars Marisha Ray and Liam O'Brien jumping in as well. These five will collectively tell an improvised collaborative story unlike anything Critical Role fans have seen before. Unlike Dungeons & Dragons or Candela Obscura which use dice Moonward: A Midst Roleplaying Story does not use any defined gaming system. This will give fans insight, for the first time ever, into how Third Person has crafted the rich and twist-filled story of Midst.

Related All 8 Critical Role Main Cast Members & Who They Play Critical Role features a cast of eight nerdy voice actors who each play a bevy of characters during the tabletop actual-play’s three campaigns.

Screen Rant interviewed Midst creators and stars Sarah Wile, Matthew Roen, and Xen Hartzell about their new project with Critical Role, Moonward. The trio has stayed hidden in the shadows for year, but in this interview, they shared their journey, including teaming up with Critical Role and how MIdst first began as a TTRPG before becoming the podcast it is today. They also discuss playing in front of the camera and telling a collaborative story with O'Brien and Ray.

How Midst Joined Forces With Critical Role For Moonward

I'm so hyped for Moonward, and I was actually able to talk to the Critical Role crew at Comic-Con. Liam made a point to say how excited they are for everyone to see it. So I cannot wait to check it out. Can you guys tell me a little bit about Third Person and your journey partnering with Critical Role?

Sarah Wile: We've all been friends for a long time. We met in college. Midst started as a project post college for us to simply stay in touch and have a joint project to work on. To express ourselves creatively, hang out in a fun way, and all collaborate on a world building shared project. For a long time it really was just for our own enjoyment. It was purely a hobby. Eventually, somewhere down the line, we did start up like a Patreon and start to pour a little bit more of our time and resources into it, but when when Critical Role came along and invited us in it really changed our world in a huge way. It went from being a hobby project to what we're doing full-time. Of course, the scale that we're able to do things on is very different now. I mean something like Moonward could never have come along before. Well, if it did come along it would certainly be very different than what it has proven to be.

Can you talk to me a little bit about Moonward and the style of play with this? Because it looks different from anything I've ever seen before?

Matthew Roen: So in general, Moonward is a style of tabletop role-playing game that In the absence of dice, in the absence of math rocks, and rule sets, and campaign settings, was really just the opportunity to do that same kind of live role-playing storytelling that is so much of that role-playing experience. That table talk, that chemistry, the joint Greek chorus storytelling kind of experience. Sarah Wile: What's relevant to this, I forgot to mention, and sort of our origin story. This has been mentioned elsewhere, but Midst wasn't a podcast originally. It was just a creative project together, but then eventually a game that we would run for each other and did a few sessions of that before. Oh, you don't have to have a button. We realized we wanted this to be something more visible that we could share with the world. Yeah, Midst was originally a tabletop game. We built together. The three of us became friends for many reasons, but also largely through our love of games, role-playing games, TTRPGs. Our initial project was to create a role-playing game for ourselves and each other. That was called Midst, and it was a tabletop gaming system. No dice were used. It was purely a narrative game. But soon we realized that while it was an okay game, it was something we wanted to share with the wider world. So we transitioned Midst into an audio podcast, audio drama format. So it in fact started as a game not unlike Moonward. Matthew Roen: From the beginning we have used this the phrase that Midst is more than just a podcast because the original podcast was supported by original art that Sarah was kind enough to do. We did a lot of in-universe ephemera that we call the appendices that accompany and kind of help flesh out the universe of the story. Xen Hartzell: Basically we just looked at whatever we wanted to do. What would give us joy and found an excuse to incorporate it into our project.

Moonward Is A Wholly Unique Experience: "We Had To Do It The Way We Would Do It"

Can you guys talk to me about having Liam and Marisha at the table with you for Moonward and this new story in this universe?

Sarah Wile: Boy, it was amazing. I mean, they're rather good at this, as it turns out. I definitely had some nerves and jitters going into it. I was a little bit starstruck, but I'm usually the most nervous about anything before it gets started, like in those moments before the curtain comes up so to speak. But the actual experience of sitting with them around a table and playing with them very quickly felt natural and easy and fun. They're just so welcoming, and they're so good at playing make-believe, and they're just so much fun to pretend with

What can you guys tease about the story and some of the characters that we'll seeing in Moonward?

Xen Hartzell: Well, the very first thing, quite literally, that happens in the original Midst podcast is that the moon of the small world of Midst literally falls out of the sky and disappears into a cosmic void, known as The Fold. Moonward is a story set immediately following the events of the original podcast in which a small crew of individuals gather together to voyage into the void in search of Midst's fallen moon. They are searching for possible survivors. They would like to know what happened to the Moon. Where did it go when it fell out of the sky? What became of it? Together on this expedition we go to find out, together, the answers to those questions. They are all going into this for their own reasons. They're a pretty ragtag team. They're not all part of one unified organization or something like that. Matthew Roen: What's the thing that unites them? It's this voyage Into the depths in pursuit of this this fallen planetoid. The moon of Midst and what mysteries are revealed. What strange adventures they go on, can you experience via Moonward?

Talk to me a little bit about your storytelling style because it's different than anything else I've experienced when I'm listening to the podcast. I'm very excited to see it at the table as well.

Xen Hartzell: I find it a tricky thing to discuss style because it really feels like we couldn't do it any other way. We tried, when we were developing our narrative voice for Midst, a variety of different ways. We eventually just realized that we had to do it the way we would do it. So it's not so much something that we are doing on purpose as just it's just the way we are. Matthew Roen: I will say I think it's a very natural thing for people to tell stories. I think the flavor of the narrative voice that we ended up taking throughout Midst and what is present very much. So in Moonward it if kind of that experience of almost sitting around a campfire or sitting around a table with a group of friends who know a story or are making up a story as they go, and you're just sort of there with them hearing the tale, sort of feeling in each other's sentences. Xen Hartzell: Signing in if you remember something differently, or you have a correction you want to make that's part of it, that adds to the storytelling experience. Matthew Roen: The idea of the Greek chorus in theater or the narrator roles in Shakespeare plays helping contextualize and explain what's happening to the characters. This is just sort of a variation on that kind of theme, and we're all just sort of in there together figuring out, Okay, how do we place the tracks before the train engine gets there? How do we tell the story together? How do we bring it to a satisfying resolution? So it's stylistically more similar maybe to that kind of live improvisational storytelling, then it is a crunchy mathematic-driven mechanical tabletop role-playing game, but at its core it is that same. Sitting down with a group of friends exploring your characters, exploring a world that you're trying to figure out together and see what kind of mysteries are out there.

What is it like being on camera when you're playing with Moonward?

Sarah Wile: That's definitely something we're still getting used to. I did appreciate that during Moonward we weren't able to see any live feeds of our faces. You know how when you're on a Zoom call. You always end up fixating on your own face. That would have been super distracting. So I'm glad that distraction was taken away and it really helped us. I forgot about the cameras to be honest. Once the game got started, it was so the way the studio was set up all the lighting you're gonna lose your mind. It looks so cool. There was a fog machine all these different functions. Yeah, so it was just a very immersive space to spend time in and the cameras were quickly an afterthought. But it's definitely not like our native turf performing on camera.

About Critical Role's Moonward

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Moonward: A Midst Roleplaying Story is a four-part mini-series set shortly after the events of the Midst podcast and features a cast of characters on an unsanctioned rescue mission to the sunken remains of Midst’s destroyed moon. Only problem is this moon currently resides in a cosmic ocean of spooky darkness known as the Fold and the Fold is filled with tearrors that cause unknown reality-bending mayhem to those exposed…what could possibly go wrong? Are you with us so far? In this adventure, our cast will weave a tale together without any defined gaming system

Moonward episodes 1 and 2 debut August 7 at 7pm on Beacon, Critical Role's YouTube and Twitch.