What do you love most about DnD

[Sindal]

Hi guys

So i love dnd.
Ever since my current DM finally gave me the chance to be part of a group I've been hooked into it every since.
To the point that I tried DMing myself, and also found joy in that

And I want to ask you guys, to articulate as much as possible
-What do you love the most about dnd?
or "What keeps you coming back"

Is it the vast amount of potential and options in characters, classes and backgrounds?
Is it the stories that are told between tables? Both heroic, tragic, and sometimes downright silly?
Is it the accomplishment of a plan you thought out going well?
Is it being a power gamer and building an unstoppable hypothetical beast that annoys your dm?
Is it the joy of DMing for others and watching them react to the story you describe and build with them? Or the hijinx they come up with...
Is it the laughs and tears you share with your friends as you spend time with them in a setting where you can 'within reason' do anything?
Is it your attachment to your characters, the life they live and how their story will end?

I'm aware that what you love about dnd can be a good combination of all of these above, but what is 'THE' thing you love

[ImproperJustice]

The chance to sit down with a group of friends and tell epic stories together, occasionally broken by fits and gales of raucus laughter, building a collective history of inside jokes and stories that can be shared for years to come.

I have built some real bonds with friends I roleplay with. Some of us have been gaming together over 25 years, including moving out of state and back, and staying together.

It’s a hobby like no others and like you, I friggin love it.

[Trustypeaches]

I enjoy the fundamental organic storytelling that makes D&D fun: a bunch of people making decisions and navigating the consequences.

[Theodoric]

As a DM, it's A) a fun thing to do with friends that B) allows me to use my talent for understanding rules and systems and C) helps me to develop things like on-the-stop-improvisation and flexibility, which I'm not that great at (yet). That's pretty personal, but it means a lot to me.

[Anonymouswizard]

"What keeps you coming back"

Focusing on this one, because it's the only game most people are willing to play. I've got a decent collection of RPGs, includuing a variety of different fantasy and science fiction games, and whenever I suggest playing one of those I always get asked if we can play D&D instead.

(In my current case it's a lot more understandable, being two players first game run in English we needed something they're familiar with.)

For the things I actually like about D&D? It's difficult, because I've played enough D&D to more easily pick out the bits I hate, but in many ways it's the settings that draw me in. If we expand it to RPGs in general then I just like the mixture of freedom and depth they give, with the game structure not deny any course of action but allowing a group to pick and choose where they go and what they focus on.

[Amdy_vill]

the people at my table and the world we play in.

[opaopajr]

Worlds of Wonder! :smallcool: Maps! :smallsmile: Box sets! :smalltongue:

[Petrocorus]

Focusing on this one, because it's the only game most people are willing to play. I've got a decent collection of RPGs, includuing a variety of different fantasy and science fiction games, and whenever I suggest playing one of those I always get asked if we can play D&D instead.


I'm a bit curious. What other games would you play?

I myself am often in a position of initiating new players to RPG, and i have the feeling that D&D 5E is quite beginners-friendly compared to many other systems that are popular by now. Not to mention this is probably the most popular game.

Back in the 90s (i'm less a grognard than some others apparently), we had WarHammer 1, Star Wars D6 and Cthulhu.
But now, Star Wars and Warhammer have completely changed (I haven't tested WH 4 yet) and i stumbled on the fact that the 20s or the 40s are a more mysterious setting than the Far Away Galaxy or your average fantasy setting to new millenial players.

I've got the feeling that beside D&D, there are not many games that are both very popular and really beginners-friendly.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'm a bit curious. What other games would you play?

Keltia, Traveller, Eclipse Phase, Vampire: the Requiem, Unknown Armies, Scum and Villainy, Shadowrun, Savage Worlds (in particular Fifty Fathoms and Eldritch Skies), The Laundry, and Rocket Age, just off the top of my head.

My last group was one of the few that let me run Unknown Armies, and my current one as I said is doing Adventures in Middle-Earth so it's not getting used to both a new ruleset and playing in English.


I myself am often in a position of initiating new players to RPG, and i have the feeling that D&D 5E is quite beginners-friendly compared to many other systems that are popular by now. Not to mention this is probably the most popular game.

Back in the 90s (i'm less a grognard than some others apparently), we had WarHammer 1, Star Wars D6 and Cthulhu.
But now, Star Wars and Warhammer have completely changed (I haven't tested WH 4 yet) and i stumbled on the fact that the 20s or the 40s are a more mysterious setting than the Far Away Galaxy or your average fantasy setting to new millenial players.

I've got the feeling that beside D&D, there are not many games that are both very popular and really beginners-friendly.

It depends. There's not a lot of popular ones, but there's a lot of beginner friendly ones out there, with stuff like Rocket Age being potentially more beginner friendly than D&D (only resource is Story Points, you likely begin with all the abilities you'll have). The main problem is that they're generally heavier on the setting side than D&D is. Oh, and Call of Cthulhu is still going, although I personally prefer the Laundry RPG.

[Petrocorus]

Keltia, Traveller, Eclipse Phase, Vampire: the Requiem, Unknown Armies, Scum and Villainy, Shadowrun, Savage Worlds (in particular Fifty Fathoms and Eldritch Skies), The Laundry, and Rocket Age, just off the top of my head.

I've never heard of the ones i've highlighted.

Is Savage World beginners-friendly? I'm quite interested in this system, but i never got to try it. Not like if i could buy it anyway by now. At least not in French.

Do you play Keltia in English?



The main problem is that they're generally heavier on the setting side than D&D is. Oh, and Call of Cthulhu is still going, although I personally prefer the Laundry RPG.
CoC is still going for sure. And i was really keen on playing Achtung Cthulhu. Maybe i should simply try this even with beginners and teens.

[DrowPiratRobrts]

The chance to sit down with a group of friends and tell epic stories together, occasionally broken by fits and gales of raucus laughter, building a collective history of inside jokes and stories that can be shared for years to come.



This one's me too. All the improv and jokes and general silliness mixed with all the clever ideas and epic/gripping story moments. When you just play board games you end up putting the pieces back and haven't really done anything in the end. When you finish a D&D session you've created a story (hopefully with people you care about).

[Callak_Remier]

That moment when my pc's realize the carefully constructed machinations and Months of in game time pinning the Group in a No win Scenario.

[Anonymouswizard]

I've never heard of the ones i've highlighted.

Scum and Villainy is a space opera game based on the Blades in the Dark engine (so highly narrative, rather structured characters, players roll all the dice), which despite being named after a line from Star Wars and having a jedi-esque character option is closer to Firefly or Blakes 7.

The Laundry Files is a series of Cthulhu Mythos/spy fiction novels by Charles Stross. The RPG essentially takes Call of Cthulhu (I think 4e) and changes the rules a bit to fit the novels and working for the British government.

Rocket Age is essentially 1930s science fiction played as straight as possible, but set in the 1930s. Think something like Lensman crossed with John Carter of Mars, but where you fight Nazis with ray guns on Mars.


Is Savage World beginners-friendly? I'm quite interested in this system, but i never got to try it. Not like if i could buy it anyway by now. At least not in French.

Kind of? It's not really less beginner friendly than 5e, but combat characters end up being defined by their Edges (Feats). It's somewhat simpler in that you begin with less abilities, and while you'll increase in skill every 2-3 sessions it's not as large a leap as D&D (every 5XP you get a stat point [once a rank only], two skill points, a new skill, or a new Edge, every 20XP is a new rank which unlocks a new set of Edges).


Do you play Keltia in English?

I own it in English, haven't had a chance to play it yet because everybody wants to play D&D. I do however really like the system and setting, and want to get Yggdrassil if it's ever rereleased in English.


CoC is still going for sure. And i was really keen on playing Achtung Cthulhu. Maybe i should simply try this even with beginners and teens.

I find that the main problem is character creation, as some people can have trouble spending their skill points. In play I find new people actually do better than D&D players because they won't try to charge a Shoggoth with a shotgun.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'm going to answer in several hierarchical categories, from broad to specific, because the broad informs the specific.

Why do I like TTRPGs (and RPGs in general)
1. Narrative is important to me. "What happens next?" is the driving motif of my life, and has been since childhood.
2. A sense of exploration--of seeing things I didn't expect. Video games can do some of that, but they're scripted.
3. Having other people in my narrative, so I'm not the one spinning the entire tale, but really experiencing it.
4. It's a social outlet, one of my few.

1 & 2 make boardgames not so much fun for me. I can play them, but I prefer something with an unscripted narrative.

D&D specifically
5. Exploring and fleshing out new worlds. My worlds. Because I have them in my head but they need other people to make them real and to draw out the creativity. I can't write stories because there's no inspiration. But building for a group who want to know what's behind that hill? That gets me going.
6. Fantastic--I prefer fantasy to science fiction, and science fiction to real life. And the science fiction I like is the more stylized "soft" stuff. Because I can do the real science and that gets in the way for me personally.
7. Class and level. Point-buy (even for stats) gives me analysis paralysis and hits my OCD/perfectionism hard.
8. Structured rules to inform decision-making. Having solid rules (even if I change them) gives me a place to stand to wield my lever to move worlds.
9. Character focused (ie not "story game" pure author stance). I want to explore the world through the eyes of a character, not write the world as an external author.

5 makes any game that is fixed-setting (Shadowrun, etc) non-starters for me. I need the flexibility to make my own world. 6 pushes me to fantasy games, not science fiction or "real life" games. 7 cuts out many other games. 8 & 9 cuts out "story games" and heavily narrative-focused games.

5e D&D specifically
10. Flexible system that mostly gets out of the way.
11. Lots of levers I can tweak without breaking things.
12. Strong archetypes.
13. Simple rules.
14. Lots of players.
15. Comparatively cheap and few splats...at core anyway.
16. Very open to multiple settings
17. Fiction first (by comparison to 3e or 4e).

[Knaight]

I don't like D&D as a game; it's pretty far down my list of preferred RPGs, though I like the medium enough that it still has that going for it.

As a phenomenon though? Credit is due to it. 5e pulled a lot of people into the hobby, and I'd consider this a classic case of rising tides lifting all boats. It's also part of the tradition of D&D, to which games in general owe a great deal. Basically all other RPGs wouldn't exist without D&D, video games would be a hollow shell of what they are, and even board games are tied in to that design tradition, what with the amount that design learned in one field of games shifts to the others. I strongly suspect that every game I do like wouldn't exist without D&D, with the notable exception of a scant handful older than it.

[Benny89]

Specific what I love most about DnD:

1. As DM- the variety of DnD world. Planes, Gods, Fiends, a lot of other dieties, monsters, creatures, tons of spells, different types of magic, the rich lore and very detailed world with tons and tons of sources to get new ideas from. Also being able to easy do something new every session for my players because of how much stuff there is in DnD.

2. As a Player- this is the only system I really feel growing from a random joe with sword who barely killed 2 goblins and almost died to a hero that turns ancient dragon to a dust in 3 turns. From cursing on damage restistance to non-magical weapons on enemy to slaying a terriyfing creature with so powerful magical weapons that Kings would like to get them.

There are other stuff I love but that goes to every RPG systems so this is purely "why DnD".

[Kadesh]

Drinking with my mates. Tbh, the game is irrelevant for me half the time, and I don't give a toss about what goes on with it.

[Waterdeep Merch]

I like cooperative team games, creating stories, love artistic endeavors like miniature painting and sketching imaginary people/creatures, enjoy tinkering with mathematics, hosting focused events, finding excuses to cook for friends, and feeling exceedingly clever for my creative problem solving.

TTRPG's are practically tailor-made for my interests. D&D in particular has this fun gonzo-fantasy adventure feel to it.

[Tawmis]

My enjoyment for D&D is two fold...

First, it allows me to weave a story for my players to interact with, impact, and change. My players rarely do what I expect, so I am forced (thankfully so!) to think on my feet and push my creative boundaries, all without making it look like I am thrown for a loop - and to keep the game rolling smoothly and keep the players immersed in the game. It feeds my creative hunger.

Secondly, and just as important, because I am pretty casual as a DM - it also becomes about hanging out with people you enjoy being around, sharing in laughter when things go horribly wrong, and cheering one another when someone does something absolutely epic.

[Petrocorus]

I own it in English, haven't had a chance to play it yet because everybody wants to play D&D. I do however really like the system and setting, and want to get Yggdrassil if it's ever rereleased in English.

I am quite interested in Yggdrasil myself. The system doesn't that simple.



I find that the main problem is character creation, as some people can have trouble spending their skill points. In play I find new people actually do better than D&D players because they won't try to charge a Shoggoth with a shotgun.

Skills are always the problem with Cthulhu. Even worse with Achtung Cthulhu. I was pondering to use Savage World instead, hence my question about this system.

[Anonymouswizard]

I am quite interested in Yggdrasil myself. The system doesn't that simple.

Outside of combat it's no more or less complex than most systems, although it does have the slightly unusual die mechanic. Inside combat I'll agree with you, but it has multiple initiative passes to allow fast characters to act more (which I like), the question of whether to use your limited actions for more attacks or defence, a death spiral, and limited offensive magic, all of which I like. Dex is a bit too powerful for warriors (I'm AFB right now, but I think it governs standard attacks, precision attacks, defence, initiative, and action count), but not quite to the point of 5eD&D


Skills are always the problem with Cthulhu. Even worse with Achtung Cthulhu. I was pondering to use Savage World instead, hence my question about this system.

Yeah, I used to own 6e Co but got rid of it. I did keep Achtung Cthulhu, which is great, and bare in mind running it with SW will lead to a more pulpy, action filled game. Really the great thing about Savage Worlds is that it can still run smoothly with twenty or so combatants on each side, and it isn't any harder to learn than 5e is. So yeah, if anything SW is better for it than CoC, and I quite like the sanity mechanics and Mythos casting rules it gives for SW.

[Petrocorus]

Outside of combat ... and it isn't any harder to learn than 5e is. So yeah, if anything SW is better for it than CoC, and I quite like the sanity mechanics and Mythos casting rules it gives for SW.

Thank you. I kinda want to run a WW2 game, and i'm hesitating between this and Black Sun (don't know if there is an english release).

[Maelynn]

I've always loved games/stories/films with a (medieval) fantasy setting. Whether it was a board game like Key to the Kingdom, a book like Tolkien's or Kerr's, a film like The 10th Kingdom, or a videogame like Lands of Lore. I can't get enough of it. So when I had a chance to play D&D with a few people, I jumped at the opportunity. It's been 15 years now and I still enjoy it.

What I love about D&D is the creativity and imagination it sparks. I can drift off into this other world, much like when I'm reading, and just be part of the story. Even better: I help shape the story.

I've tried some other systems (FATE, Fiasco, SW) and while they are also enjoyable, I keep coming back to D&D because of the theme. I just can't get enough of medieval fantasy. (I mean, I even go to medieval fairs in an outfit that includes a heavy woolen hooded cloak, leather pouches, and a drinking horn, so yeah...)

[TrashTrash]

The stupid things we say that, without context, make absolutely no sense. Both of the quotes in my sig are from friends of mine when we played RPGs.
The potential for all of us to have a real, honest-to-goodness adventure.