The tavern door creaks, swinging open before you into a room that glows golden with hearthlight. The clank of mugs and the clink of utensils keeps time for the low, murmuring melody of voices, regulars and wanderers alike enjoying the end of another day. Your party finds an empty table and signals to the barkeep, ordering whatever fare the kitchen’s come up with; after all, any hot meal is better than the hardtack, jerky, and dried fruit that comprises your usual trail rations. Before you have a chance to dig in, however, the wall to your right buckles, bows, and bursts, with an explosion that knocks you off your feet and sends your stew flying into a farmer’s face with a splat. Through the hole clambers a creature on all fours, red and scaled and belching steam that burns your eyes. Its head swivels in a slow pan across the room, and when it fixes its eyes on you, it hisses, and bristles, and charges.
Let’s roll for initiative.
In recent years, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) and other tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs) have experienced a wild surge in popularity, battling their way back into the mainstream after years relegated to the nerdy periphery. 2020 marked the seventh year of monumental growth for the premier TTRPG, with a plethora of new material on the horizon in 2022. With nearly 50 million players worldwide, including many CAMB students (your author amongst them), the questions arise: just what is D&D, and what draws people to it?
Dungeons and Dragons is, at its core, a framework of rules and guidelines through which players collaborate to tell a fantastical story narrated by the Dungeon Master (DM). The DM acts as both a help and a hindrance, guiding players through the world while setting challenges such as puzzles, combat, or tricky situations that they have to navigate their way around. While the D&D rulebooks provide settings in which to play, many games take place in elaborate worlds of the DM’s own creation. The hours of time and dedication to create such a rich and robust environment for each game, which might run three to four hours per session, create a unique and engaging experience for the players.
Created in 1974 by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, D&D’s resurrection nearly 50 years down the line can be attributed to a perfect synergy of circumstances. August 2014 saw the release of the wildly popular Fifth Edition rules (5E), following the widely panned fourth edition; 5E is generally considered friendlier for new players, with a greater focus on fun rather than rules. Shortly thereafter, podcasts such as The Adventure Zone (August 2014), Friends at the Table (September 2014), Critical Role (March 2015), and many others provided easily-accessible introductions to the world of tabletop gaming. Around the same time, many celebrities, including Vin Diesel, Jon Favreau, Drew Barrymore, Dwayne Johnson, Stephen Colbert, Anderson Cooper, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Joe Manganiello, and George R.R. Martin began to share their experiences playing D&D, and the game was prominently featured on popular shows such as Futurama and Stranger Things. Altogether, this served to bring D&D to the front of people’s minds when looking for a fun new game to play.
Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic has further bolstered D&D’s popularity, as players turned to campaigns as a means of staying in touch with friends they can’t otherwise see. Enabled by online platforms such as DnDBeyond, Roll20, and Fantasy Grounds, tabletop gaming has drawn players from all walks of life. Tabletop-adjacent hobbies such as dicemaking, mapmaking, drawing character art, and printing and painting miniatures and figures also became popular pick-ups during the early pandemic days.
If you’re looking for a game, TTRPGs come in all flavors, from dungeon-crawl to character-driven pirate quest to grand space odyssey to a one-and-done walk in the woods where something isn’t quite right. Games are also geared to fit any kind of schedule; some are short, single-session, self-contained stories (oneshots), while others, called campaigns, can have lengthy and complex plots that span multiple sessions over weeks, months, or sometimes even years. CAMB students Patty C. (CPM) and Erin H. (CB) opened the door to their own games in a short interview, giving insight into the draw of tabletop gaming and the expansive adventure to be had therein.
How long have you been playing D&D? What caused you to start?
Patty (P): I've been playing D&D since high school! About 15 years now. I started because I was already pretty entrenched in the text-based roleplaying community (thanks, Neopets) and I wanted to branch out to play with my non-internet friends. Not all of them were comfortable with writing, but we were all pretty comfortable talking, so tabletop roleplaying games made sense.
Erin (E): Three and a half years; I started playing in the summer of 2018. In medical school, there was a group of us who got really into playing board games together. We would have board game nights every few weeks. The host, a good friend of mine, wanted to introduce the group to D&D and organized a summer campaign with ten of us joining. We had a fabulous time, so much so that every member has kept playing in some capacity since.
What makes it appealing? Why do you play?
P: Escapism, if I'm being totally honest. I really enjoy the character creation process. It's nice to think about being someone else for a few hours. And I like a good story.
E: For me as DM, I was drawn initially to the world-building and creative writing aspects. I began writing the campaign while I was working in the hospital during medical school, as it helped me to relax after the intense days. Beyond that, it’s just a ton of fun to hang out with your friends, chow down on snacks, talk in weird voices, and create a dramatic and often hilarious story together.
Who do you play with? How often do you play?
P: I play with my partner, my sister-in-law, and my close friends. We all have jobs and school and [other responsibilities] so we don't play as often as we'd like, but when things are nice and calm, we play every other Sunday.
E: We are all science-related; my current group is made up of four MD/PhD students, a lab manager, a postdoc, and a pre-medical student. We always have an hour before we play where we just eat dinner and chat, and a surprising amount of experiment ideas and potential collaborations have been generated during that time. Weekly is the general plan, with time off during holidays, if everyone is particularly busy, or if I simply need more time to plan.
Does your scientific knowledge and background ever come in handy during games?
P: Maybe, only when I'm playing a character that's scientifically inclined. Metagaming is frowned upon, after all! There are monsters and plants and lore and things that my character wouldn't necessarily know given their background. Right now, one of my characters is an elf warlock that formerly worked as a diplomat. He didn't do much science or nature until he was out adventuring, so there's not a lot of my own technical knowledge that he'd actually have or benefit from. Perhaps the diplomacy skills I've developed from life in academia aid me when my character needs to talk his way out of sticky situations.
E: In playing with a group of science-minded folk, it absolutely comes in handy. I use science as an inspiration for items and plot lines, and my players use it to try and convince me to let them do such things as invent guns and overpower a steam engine.
Do skills you learn in D&D ever come into play in the lab?
P: I'd like to think that D&D has made me a more creative problem-solver. And, maybe, more patient. DMing has certainly taught me about organization and telling a compelling story. Those are helpful skills for planning experiments and writing papers!
E: Absolutely. DMing requires strong communication, organization, and interpersonal skills, as well as the ability to think quickly on your feet. These are all skills which are important for the lab, especially in presenting data during lab meetings and conferences. If you are used to being caught off guard by your players deciding to suddenly go through a dangerous portal, an unexpected question about your research seems much more manageable.
What do you think draws CAMB students towards tabletop?
P: That's a hard question. Everyone is different and there are [many] options for tabletop roleplaying games. There is something for everyone, and I think that versatility might be attractive to students. There's no one way to play D&D, for example. A campaign can take on any genre or tone. It depends on the design of the DM and the wants of the players. Tabletop gaming also rewards players for playing – I certainly feel a sense of accomplishment when the party successfully solves puzzles or defeats foes. I cannot always say science rewards me for playing, no matter how clever and creative I think I'm being.
E: It’s a social and creative escape from the rigors of working towards a PhD, all wrapped up in the fantasy stories a lot of us grew up reading. What’s not to love?
Can you give a brief summary of what your campaign is about?
P: The Harvest Festival is the annual celebration of an accord between the humans of the Rexland, the diverse Free People of the North, the three elf clans, and the dwarves. On the eve of the [Festival], three travelers are unwittingly drawn into a plot to assassinate the leader of the Free People of the North, John Barristone. Blamed for the murder, the travelers must try to prove their innocence and prevent a war between the kingdoms.
E: The campaign started with a simple job offer: a farmer whose wife disappeared ten years ago asked the players to help him find her. Her last known destination was Vaal, her country of origin and a very isolationist nation. After conniving their way in, the players found out that Vaal is a much stranger place than they realized – and that in their search for the missing wife, they may have unleashed forces of an apocalyptic nature.
What has been your favorite in-game moment to date?
P: The party was investigating a location touched by the Shadowfell. Magical despair was leaking into the Material Plane and they were all at risk of succumbing to it. The warlock, able to enter the minds of his companions while they slept, visited his druid friend as she lay in the darkness of her dreams. He asked that she walk with him so that they might find a place to watch the sunrise together. They sat on a hill and waited for the light to break. When it did, she was able to wake up and continue on. It was a poignant moment that none of us expected. There were tears. I think those are the best kinds of moments.
E: The time I was caught off guard by my players deciding to suddenly go through a dangerous portal. One of their allies was trapped through the portal, the plane beyond it poisoning her and anyone else who went through. I expected a fight; I had detailed notes on the enemies and a battle map drawn up and everything. Instead, half my players decided to jump through the portal, and the other half immediately surrendered. I love times like that, when all my preparation goes out the window and suddenly, I’m having to design a new plane of existence and a jailbreak simultaneously.
Do you have any advice for those looking to start playing with a group but don’t know how to go about it?
P: I think one of the best ways to begin is to buy a Player's Handbook (for D&D) and explore the lore and game mechanics. I like to know a little about the things I'm doing before I do them (probably other scientists can relate) so do some research! Then check out a local gaming lounge, store, or cafe and ask if there are groups looking for new players. If that sounds scary, try Discord servers or Roll20.com. I hear there are also Facebook groups for players looking to join a party. I'm also certainly happy to speak with anyone interested in trying tabletop gaming!
E: Ask around! There are more of us than you think; you might be surprised which of your friends has played in the past and would be more than happy to do so again. There are also a few board game cafés in town which offer drop-in D&D sessions if you want to try it out in a low-pressure situation.
D&D Terms
Roleplay: The act of imitating the character and behavior of someone who is different from yourself.
Tabletop Roleplaying Game (TTRPG): A form of improvisational storytelling-based gameplay where a player assumes the role of a fictional character and proceeds through the story by describing their character’s actions aloud. Success and failure is determined according to a predefined set of mechanics, often rolling dice.
Dungeons and Dragons (D&D): A fantasy-themed TTRPG first published in 1974. It remains the most well-known and best-selling TTRPG in the United States.
Dungeon Master (DM): The narrator and referee of any game of D&D. The DM determines what story beats will happen and when, what foes or friends characters encounter, and acts as the final authority where the rules are concerned. Also called a game master (GM).
Session: Individual units of gameplay, usually lasting anywhere from 3 – 6 hours. A single adventure may take one to several sessions.
Campaign: A series of related adventures spanning many sessions.
Player Character (PC): The fictional person a player creates and inhabits during their time in the game.
Non-player character (NPC): The inhabitants of the game world who are not the players. NPCs are usually narrated by the DM.
The Party: The collective group of PCs who have gathered to adventure together.
Metagaming: Times when a player uses real-life knowledge about the game or game mechanics to decide how their character will respond to a scenario, despite their character having no reasonable way to have obtained this knowledge.
Encounter: A scene in which the party comes across a source of difficulty that they must use their smarts and skills to solve – be it combat, exploration, or a social matter.
Initiative: The order in which a fight happens.
Caster: A spellcaster.
Tank: A more hale and hearty fighter who can take more damage.
Melee: A character who fights up close and personal.
Ranged: A character who fights from a distance.
Dungeon Crawl: A form of session or campaign in which PCs navigate a labyrinth containing many an encounter – ferocious beasts, puzzles, traps, and, of course, treasure.
D4, D6, D8, D10,D12, D20: Your dice! The number denotes how many sides it has. The D20 is the most commonly rolled.
Crit/Natural 20: Rolling a 20, the highest possible number, on a D20.
Crit Fail/Natural 1: Rolling a 1, the lowest possible number, on a D20.
Comments