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The tower stands alone on the moonlit plain, a clear target for the intrepid adventurers trundling towards it. They cover the final stretch on foot - with goblins about, you can’t be too careful. A quick clamber to the tower’s upper levels finds them vacant save for a sleeping gob, easily dispatched with a shot through the arrowslit. The rabble on the first floor, however, poses a larger danger. Though engrossed in their cards, the goblins still outnumber our heroes and charging into combat may prove a deadly mistake. As the elven adage goes, “Work smarter, not harder,” and the party’s thief just happens to speak the monsters’ language. Creeping on tiptoe around the tower, he shouts in Goblin – “Korg, you cheater!” Korg, surprised and affronted by the accusation, throws down his cards, and, after our golden-hearted scoundrel injects a few more well-placed barbs, begins a brawl that leaves half the goblins dead before our heroes kick in the door and mop up the rest. So began the journey of Alton Tosscobble, the halfling rogue I played in my very first Dungeons & Dragons campaign. I can still feel the giddy rush when a 10-year-old Ian tore the wrapping paper from a 3rd Edition Player’s Handbook, a gift from my father. My older brother received the Dungeon Master’s Guide, and my future changed. The game hooked me from the moment I cracked the front cover. I would lay on my bedroom floor and roll up character after character, never to be used, purely as an imaginative indulgence. In the Jefferson Mall’s Barnes & Noble, I would roost among the rulebooks until we left, poring over the endless possibilities. Eventually I took on the mantle of Dungeon Master, crafting tombs and tales for my friends to experience. Now, after years away from that mantle, I find myself a DM again and it has me thinking.
D&D is in vogue right now. So many of my peers express their interest in playing, intrigued by the prospect of cooperative storytelling and forging your own destiny. Rolling dice introduces an element of chance which separates D&D from other narrative forms. Like the allure of a roulette wheel, the game's inherent unpredictability keeps me slavering for the next session. Although the sheer amount of material for the game is undeniably overwhelming, your game can be as involved or as improvised as you want. It can be gritty and gory, or completely devoid of weaponry and combat of any sort. Intimidated by the prospect of creating and running your own world? Countless prewritten campaigns and one-off adventures alleviate the burden of invention. Disillusioned with traditional fantasy tropes? D&D provides a blank slate where you can realize the fiction you want to see. For over half of my earthly existence, Dungeons & Dragons has been a tried-and-true, never-failing scaffold for my creativity. From the most unlikely corners of mythology, folklore, and the eccentric recesses of the creators’ minds, I’ve raised mountains, dug tombs, birthed heroes and villains, and planted whole planes of existence in the cosmic multiverse. When I’m struck with a wild and half-baked scheme, it’s the vault where I store my craziest concepts. In a nutzoid, hectic, too-big world, it’s my anchor to friends across the continent. When theatrical work dries up, it’s my stage without footlights. So I doff my hat to you, all you wizards and warriors and weavers of whimsy. I’m honored to count myself among your ranks.
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