Do you know what Dungeons and Dragons is? Of course you do! It’s become super popular again in the last five years or so, thanks to the efforts of programs like Critical Role. Critical Role kind of made it cool to get together and roll dice around on a table, whereas before it was us greasy nerds. All that being said, I hadn’t really been able to dedicate myself to a good campaign. Something always got in the way.
The first campaign I ever played was a single session. What was intended to be several sessions, became a one-shot, because my party member threw a fireball at me and then after a series of bad rolls by the DM, the whole kingdom burned down with magical fire. End campaign.
The second one was kind of a bust.
The third one had some real potential, though. My character was Lemmy Thendrix, and it was a 3.5 game. I was a bard with some crazy high charisma (as it’s supposed to be) and I convinced everyone I ever met that they had “most likely heard of me”. Even some of the higher levels we ran into absolutely knew who I was — at least after I convinced them that they did. That game fizzled out after four sessions, and everyone had to split up and go their own way.
Following that, my fourth campaign only lasted five sessions. She was an awesome DM, and she probably had one of the best lasting impressions on me as a player.
Now, though due to time constraints and scheduling with my friends, we’ve finally picked a new time to play and… now, I’m the Dungeon Master.
Cue maniacal laughing.
I’ve created a homebrew setting with some core traits that remain the same for most DnD sessions. The theme isn’t your standard “World in danger! Save the people from the big bad evil guy!” Instead, I wanted to drum up a world that needed help from adventurers regularly, and because of that, there was a guild that specializes in training adventurers. Our party is a team of adventurers that graduated together. They find work by choosing jobs from a job board. Their first mission was finding little Miss Janna Dovins’ missing cats. Turns out there’s essentially a rat mafia in the sewers, and our party had to take down the dire rat king, Unfortunately, Janna’s cats were dead. Fortunately, they found a burlap sack with kittens in it that they brought back to her.
All that to say, especially right now, DnD can really bring your friends together in a time where it’s hard to socialize. We’re stuck at home, social distancing, and things like Roll20 or Discord can close that gap and make it a whole lot of fun.
Go roll some dice.
T.G. Neal 