Perhaps it was inevitable that it would end in blood and betrayal: Thedisadvantages of wearing emerald stone paladin lying dead on the floor, betrayed by the cleric, who had been evil all along; the thief deciding whether to trust the gnome sorcerer with the magic stone that could save or doom them all, the elf ranger unsure who to shoot — the ostensible bad guys or his own teammates.

For four of us, it was the first time we had played Dungeons & Dragons in more than a decade. Another of our group had never played, and was curious. The final player in our entourage hadn’t played in ages when I invited him, but snuck in a game beforehand, which turned out to be useful.

While I’ve known people who’ve played D&D regularly for years, it’s only lately that it’s seemed to come back into the popular vogue, mostly because of the 2014 release of the game’s fifth edition, which greatly simplified the rules. For years, the game seemed intimidating, necessitating mountains of rulebooks and degrees in mathematics.

“It’s a wonderful marriage between all of what you remember of (classic) D&D and what came after that,” says Garrett Colón of Westboro, who is the senior local coordinator for the D&D Adventurers League, which sets up official games for D&D’s owner, Wizards of the Coast (which is owned in turn by the Rhode Island-based Hasbro.) “The rules are light, and there’s not a lot of heavy number crunching. It gives you that accessibility without sacrificing something.”

That “something,” for many, is storytelling and role playing, which is often a main attraction: The opportunity to craft a giant adventure tale with a group of friends. Clearly, the changes to the system worked, because the buzz it generated was immense. First, it came from expected sources: Serious gamers and gaming/sci-fi websites such as i09 or Geek & Sundry. But then, the buzz started coming from unexpected sources: A local political activist, a local teacher, my brother-in-law. A mention on Facebook drew a torrent of interest and nostalgia.

"I have to restock the 'Player's Handbook' every week," says

Sorana Gatej, marketing manager of That's Entertainment in Worcester, which sells the game but does not currently host events.

Amid all of this, a question emerged: Was it possible for a bunch of people who have either never played or not played in ages to get the D&D Starter Kit and, using only that and the copies of the rules online, play a game in just one day?

“Absolutely,” says Colón. “It’s a really nice starting kit,” he says, noting that he’s seen it used to get both children and returning adult players up to speed quickly. “It doesn’t have some of the number crunching that it used to have. Once you start throwing the dice, it’s a lot more intuitive.”

David Neilander of New Britain, Connecticut, the manager of the Battle Standard gaming store in Auburn, says he’s seen a definite increase in interest in the game recently, including interest in the Wednesday night games organized by the store. Indeed, especially when the rules were released, demand for the game was outstripping the store's ability to provide: He had more trouble finding people to run games than he did finding people to play, with 15 people showing up at one point for a game that usually has a maximum of seven players. Now, he himself runs some games, as do other employees, and sometimes they have to split the players into two groups.

“People who wouldn’t normally play the game are getting into it,” he says, adding that some experienced players don’t like the new edition. “This one’s much simpler, much easier to get into. It caters to new players better.”

But let’s be honest: There’s still some number crunching, at least at the beginning. We used premade characters — some from the box set, others from the D&D website — and I rewrote their backgrounds to make the game more about interacting with each other than battling hypothetical orcs. That saved us some time, but it took us a while to relearn how to use the combat system — how to decide if your character hit the hypothetical orc, and how much damage you did — but after some discussion and misadventure, we got it all sorted. And once we did, things moved quickly.

We finished the first third of the game — a barroom brawl of my own writing — quickly, moving on to two parts adapted from the starter kit: A goblin ambush and then a quest into a dungeon to thwart a dragon’s evil plan. That’s where the betrayal and blood happened: The cleric had actually been a spy for a dragon-worshiping cult, and the thief, who had the stone they needed all the time, was having severe trust issues. By that point, even though there was still dice rolling, we were more lost in a story than we were lost in a math problem. The game took seven hours all told, but it flew by rapidly.

So yes, it’s completely possible to pick up the game cold and even play it in one day, although both Colón and Neilander recommend popping into a store and sitting in on an organized game. In addition to the Battle Standard, there are also organized D&D games at The Whiz in Westboro.

“The one that comes in the starter box takes a dedicated group of friends to get through the whole thing,” says Neilander. “In-store events, some last just a few hours, some longer … In the store, a lot are one and done," he said, adding that even in the ongoing games, "You can jump in, and it won’t feel like you’ve missed anything.”

Email Victor D. Infante at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @ocvictor.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette:

Dungeons & Dragons makes a comeback

View comments