Everyone Should Play More Dungeons and Dragons

Yes, I really am promoting what the title says. I'm not saying everyone should play the video game versions, although there are at least a few based on Dungeons and Dragons video games worth some time. I'm talking about the good old fashioned pen and paper sit next to your stinky, argumentative friends Dungeons and Dragons.

I'm just going to refer to it as D&D from here on. Lots less typing.

Really, I'm saying that everyone should play pen and paper games. There is a huge variety out there like classic D&D (they have five versions out now, from the complex rules smithing of 3.0 and 3.5 to the easy beginner's 4.0 to the 'as simple or complex as you want it' D&D Next that's coming out this fall), pen and paper Star Wars, War Craft, Pathfinder, and more that I'm sure I have no idea about based upon the d20 system.

But you're sitting here thinking "That's all well and good, you handsome devil, but you haven't even begun to tell me why I should even consider your premise."

That's a good thought, citizen. I'm working up to it. If you know how pen and paper games work, you can probably skip this paragraph. If you don't, hold on for a second. with these games, the world everyone plays in is built, developed, and run by a Dungeon or Game Master. He (or she) controls everything about the world that isn't the other people's characters. He controls the npc's, the monsters, the weather, the treasure, and even the experience points. The players, on the other hand, build the characters that they're going to live through in the world according to the rules the GM has set forth. The rules provide numbers and benefits and drawbacks of all sorts that players can choose from and within most rule sets you can achieve a lot of unique characters even with the same race or class.

So now that you know how this type of game works (At least basically. I'm glossing over a lot because, let's face it, it really doesn't matter right here and now), I'll consider getting to my point.

Essentially, D&D and other p&p games are games of imagination. The GM and the players are all imagining the same world, and they're all imagining what's happening. The GM is forced to think broadly, he controls the world and the story, after all. And the players get to focus narrowly.

I think this is great for everyone involved. I mean really, what do most people imagine these days? Don't most of us seem to be limited by what we see on TV and movies, and spoon-fed to by video games? I've only GM'd myself once, and it was great. I created a new and unique world. I designed kingdoms, and gods, and devils. I developed a concrete universe for my players to create their characters in so that they had concrete histories and motivations. I'll admit, I made a few mistakes in my narration, and I had to move before we could finish the story, but just the experience of making a world, isn't that amazing?

Most of my experience with D&D has been through the eyes of a player, though. Like I said, a GM has to think big and broad, but as a player your only real focus is on your character. You choose their race, gender, class, skills, abilities and more. As a player, your character can be wish fulfillment, or exploration of traits you're curious about. Your character can be a reflection of you or be nothing like you. You can play as a paragon of nobility or vileness. I wonder what it says about me that most of my characters end up as madmen... Oh well, crazy and random is fun.

Yep, this was taken during a D&D session.

I love the creativity involved in just about every part of D&D. In fact, one of my little joys is to go online and read people's funny stories. One of the best is about Mr. Bearington and I fully recommend giving a read if you have a minute. Here's another one about the hilarious dangers of introducing a new and untested game mechanic.

But the imagination, man! (or woman, who am I to judge? D&D needs more actual women) You get to imagine new worlds, ferret out details, determine motivations, history, back stories, and more. If you're a writer, what could be better practice for getting into that creative kind of mindset? If you have no intention of writing then you still get to push the limits of your imagination. It's a chance to have some fun and take a step away from rigid mindsets about how things have to be. Go throw a fireball! Go slay a dragon! Why should something mundane keep you from having fun? Expand your mind, man! (Now go back and read that last sentence with a hippie voice. It makes it infinitely better).

And on top of all that fun and benefit, D&D is at its heart a social and cooperative game. Computers my occasionally be involved but the majority of the time you have to be in the same room as your friends, occasionally some strangers, working together to tell a story that can be as fun, beautiful, intelligent, or mind-appallingly stupid as you want (I remember having a barbarian character once who could not for the life of him break through a wooden door with his hands, but broke it with a headbutt. I love the vagaries of the dice). But you will be making those stories and doing those insanely weird and stupid things with your friends.

How many games can really say that? There are board games, sure, but they're so limited. You can most video games these days with your friends, but they come nowhere near to the same level of interactivity and immersiveness as a well thought out game of D&D.

So I recommend, if you haven't played before, getting a set of books (and dice) from Amazon, Ebay, a used bookstore. Heck, buy the books new if you're feeling cocky. Then get your friends together and go on an adventure. And remember, if you aren't laughing about something ridiculous, you just might not be playing right.

Thanks for reading.

PS D&D is only the Devil's game if you play it that way. In which case you better either be trying to stop the Devil, or you need a new group of friends.

PPS Here's my dog. Enjoy.