D&D revival

As a kid I got into D&D.  I started with the basic (red) box and got the expert (blue) box next.  Those were nice but I quickly decided I wanted to play AD&D.  I worked my butt off shoveling snow to earn the money to get the books.  One of my good friends and I would get together and try to figure out how we wanted to play.  I spent the better part of a year taking my D&D books everywhere I might have time to read. Yes, I was that nerd.

Back in the day, only nerds played D&D.  Often you were ridiculed for playing or talking about it.  Add it to the long list of nerd activities we participated in.  mostly we didn’t care and liked being nerds.  But you knew you were an outsider.

As I got older and had more friends, we moved into other role-playing systems because of what the group wanted to do.  Once we all got jobs and started actually hanging out with girls we were dating, we played less and less frequently. We stopped all together in our late 20s.  I missed revs 2 through 4.  From what I’ve heard it wasn’t a big loss.

When the new 5th edition came out I conveniently started to have more time.  The new rules are much simpler than AD&D and clarify a lot of things.  The modules are soooo much better than the old classics.  Those still hold a bit of nostalgic fondness but the new ones introduce a whole world and fleshed out scenarios to save time.  The old ones really were just dungeon crawls for the most part.

Today it seems that its cool to play.  Big Bang Theory, Stranger Things and the number of celebrities coming out that say they play has helped.  The marketing has been great.  The game stores hosting games makes it easier than ever to find a group to play with.  More people playing means that WoTC has more money and incentive to build great content.  You can get all kinds of new material on the Internet.  You can even find troves of videos on YouTube that teach you to play and you can even watch people play to get a feel for the game.

Every year we go to GenCon and maybe Origins; the big game fairs.  We get to see the new stuff coming out and hang out in a community of people that all love gaming.  Its still a big nerd-fest but the attendance by “non-nerds" is off the charts.  More and more people know about it and some are actually jealous when I tell them we are going.  The kids love it and I love sharing that with them.

Its easier to let your geek flag fly now than it ever was for me growing up.  Even in a school of smart, often nerdy, kids it was hard to really let it fly.  I spent a lot of time as a kid hanging by myself because it was easier than being the socially awkward kid that got picked on.  Its different now.  I’m glad that my kids don’t need to work to hide who they are.