Getting Started with Dungeons & Dragons

Dungeons and Dragons is probably the most popular role-playing game in the world. It's been the subject of a lot of jokes over the years, but now, thanks in no small part to this bunch of nerdy-ass voice actors, or maybe these 80s kids, it's more popular than ever, and more and more people want to give it a try. In D&D, the Dungeon Master creates and describes an elaborate fantasy world of magic and mystery. The other players create characters such as elves, dwarves, warriors, and wizards to explore this imaginary land and complete quests, slay monsters, and get treasure. But how do you actually play Dungeons & Dragons? What do you need? How long does it take? Does the Dungeon Master just make everything up? How does it work? I'm Mark Humes and I happen to know a thing or two about D&D and RPGs. Hello! Hello everybody! I am gonna be your GM for this session. I am the Dungeon Master for the D&D show High Rollers D&D, we're from the UK. Technically it's Peach. It's Peach! One of the clowns rolls out the way! So I've put together this video to show you the basics. This... It's how to play Dungeons and Dragons. One of the most common questions folk interested in D&D ask, what do you need to play? The basics are pretty simple and won't cost you much at all to start out. You're gonna need the following. Some friends. Before anybody comments like, haha, where do I get some of those? You hilarious comedians, you. If you don't have anyone who you know is interested in playing, try looking into Discords, Reddit or Facebook groups. Ask your local gaming store or see if your college or university has an RPG club. There's a lot of folks eager to play out there. You'll also need somewhere you can all get together to play. This could be a friend's house, a gaming store or even a discord server. Some character sheets like the ones shown here will be very useful. A set of dice. Specifically for D&D you'll want a set like this. This includes a 20 sided die as well as a 12, 10, 8, 6 and 4 sided die. You'll also want a copy of the rules! You can download the basic rules of D&D for free from the D&D website. I've included a link in the description below as well as a link to the PDFs for the character sheets I mentioned earlier. The basic rules covers how to play the game, how to make very simple characters, limited to a few races and classes without many options, and a small handful of monsters and magic items for the dungeon master to use. You could also buy a copy of the Players Handbook! This book contains everything in the basic rules as well as additional choices for character creation, high-level spells, and all sorts of bonus information. Alternatively, you can also grab either the D&D Starter Set or Essentials Kit. Both provide the basic rules along with a pre-written adventure for the dungeon master to use, a set of dice, as well as maps and more. They are both a great choice for first time players. One thing I really want to stress is you do not need to dress up to play D&D. Dungeons and Dragons is not LARPing. You might have seen some folks play on Twitch or YouTube wearing elf ears and costumes or other accessories but let me tell you now that these are the exception. Most folks don't do this. If you want to do it for fun, go for it, have a blast, but it is not expected. You may also think D&D needs lots of miniatures and maps or fancy accessories like dungeon tiles, but again, this is not the case. These are accessories that can be nice to have, but they're not essential. Another common question, and one without a firm answer really, is how long does it take or how long do you play for? And honestly, this varies depending on your group and how much fun you're having. Expecting your average D&D session to be somewhere between 2-5 hours where 3-4 is probably the average? But there's no set time limit. If you can only manage 90 minutes that's fine. Wanna play for 7 hours? Go for it! One of the wonders of this game is that it has no strict end or time limit. It's whatever works best for you and your group. As you get ready to play, one of your group will take on the role of of the Dungeon Master, or DM for short. This might already be decided, and it's usually the most experienced member of the group, but if you're all new, then decide who this is going to be. Don't fret over this too much, being a DM might seem scary, but the truth is, anyone can do it with practice. Skills that would be helpful for a new DM would be having a good imagination and the ability to describe things to others, being able to keep track of lots of different things at once, and being able to improvise ideas on the spot. The Dungeon Master is the person who will describe the world, narrate the effects of the player's actions, and control all the other characters and monsters in the world that aren't being controlled by the players. They usually have a good understanding of the rules and should be the one to make any final decisions, if something isn't clear or you aren't sure. Whilst the DM gets to make decisions on what happens when a player does something, decide how difficult something might be, and how the people and monsters of the imaginary world react to the things that the players do, it's important to know that the DM is not the player's enemy. They're a member of the group too, and their job is to work as both referee and narrator to provide a fun experience for everybody. This means the dungeon master is often doing a lot more work than the players, preparing the adventures, managing a lot of different things at once, so be respectful of that. Pay attention to the DM when they're speaking and don't argue with them during the game. If you feel that the DM has gotten something wrong or forgotten something, it's often best to save it for after the game and discuss it as a group together. Every other player except for the dungeon master creates a character. to represent themselves in the imaginary world. Making a Dungeons & Dragons character is a whole process, one that I can't possibly cover in this video, but the basics kind of go as follows. You choose a race, such as an elf, dwarf, halfling, or human, as well as a class, such as fighter, cleric, rogue, or wizard. These help define what your character can do in the world. You also choose a background, such as a noble, a sailor, a blacksmith, or a criminal. to help give your character some personality and explain who they were before they started going on their adventures. These choices create a persona that you will play and use to explore the world that the Dungeon Master creates and describe it to you. Your class and your background will give you proficiency in different skills that you can use to accomplish tasks, as well as abilities and spells that you can use to fight your enemies. You get to decide almost everything else. What does your character look like? How do they speak or act? Where do they come from? Did they have parents? Did they inherit the magical sword Thunderbrand from the ghost of their elven grandfather but it was stolen by cultists of the evil goddess Tiamat? You get the idea. Another quick thing to note, you don't need to have some elaborate backstory or quirky character traits when you start, but the more you can think about your character's past, their goals, how they interact with others, the easier it will be to immerse yourself in the past. in the game. You don't need to know all of this when you start though, you can develop it as you go. One last thing, when you make your character, it's very important to remember that D&D is a cooperative game about going on adventures. Your character should have a reason to work with others and have something that motivates them to go on dangerous, deadly adventures. Playing an edgy, miserable loner or a nervous wreck that wouldn't leave their home might sound interesting, but in reality these characters might not be as fun for everyone else at the table. Make a character that's fun to play, but also fun for others to play with. So you have the dungeon master and the players have created their characters, what now? The dungeon master describes a situation or setting in the fantasy world. A common trope is you all arrive at a tavern. and then presents some sort of opportunity. A merchant might need heroes to stop vicious wolves attacking people on the road, or a tribe of goblins might have stolen the town's grain supply. The DM sets the scene, describing it with how it looks, how it sounds and smells. They might play the part of an NPC, a non-player character, who explains things to the players. Then the DM says the magic words. The players then say what they want their character to do and the DM narrates the effects of their actions. That's it. That's the game. In its absolutely simplest form, that is Dungeons and Dragons. See, D&D isn't like a video game or board game. For the most part, you can do whatever you want. How you approach the problems or opportunities the DM gives you is up to you. You can try and convince the goblins to give the grain back or sneak in and steal it or fight them You could trade them the grain for an illusory birthday cake or make them a real cake laced with poison The imaginative world is your oyster. It's Completely up to you. You can also ask the DM for more questions before you decide what your character does. Can I see any other elves in the tavern? Does the door look like it has any traps on it? Can I tell if the Baron is lying to us? The DM then answers those questions, adding detail and flavor to the world or the scene. Sometimes the DM won't know what those details are until you ask. If they're using a pre-written adventure, it might not say if there are any elves in the tavern or if the Baron is lying or not. This is where the DM gets to do their own thing. Maybe they add an elven bard with a mysterious scar to the tavern, coming up with a suitable reason why they're there. Maybe they decide the Baron is lying about the Mad Wizard's Tower, because that's where he's secretly storing his stolen gold. Where D&D becomes a game and less narrative is when the DM believes that the character has a chance to fail at whatever they're doing. If there is a chance the character will fail, maybe because it's too hard, or because someone else is trying to stop them. Then the DM will ask the players to roll the dice and see what happens. The player rolls a 20-sided die, a D20, and then adds a bonus based on the character they've created. The DM assigns a secret number to determine the difficulty of the task. We call this the difficulty class, or DC for short. If the player's total roll, the result of the dice plus their bonus, is equal to or higher than the DM's secret number, the DC, then they succeed. If it's lower, they fail. Either way, the DM then describes the outcome that happens next. There is a guide for this secret number the DM can use as a reference, but the DM can also adjust it, depending on the circumstances. Trying to pick a well-made lock is made even more difficult if you're trying to do it whilst blindfolded, or trying to enter a castle by climbing over the wall without any tools. Regardless, one important thing to remember is that failure is a part of the game. You are not expected to succeed at everything. In fact, sometimes failing can be more fun and take the story in more interesting ways than if you had succeeded. When you make your character, you record everything onto a character sheet. This is a record of the skills and bonuses and abilities your character has. For some, this is a very daunting part of D&D. The character sheet is intimidating at first glance, but fear not, we'll get through it. It's also worth mentioning that character builder apps and websites like D&D Beyond can be a huge help when making a character, as they do the math for you. The most important thing on the character sheet are the six ability scores. Almost everything else on your character sheet uses these in some way, as a modifier or bonus to something else. The six scores are as follows. Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. Strength is how strong and athletic you are. It's used for swinging swords, climbing, swimming, wrestling. Dexterity, how agile and coordinated you are. It's used for shooting arrows, balancing across things, or dodging explosions. Constitution, how tough and resilient you are. Used for how much damage you can take, resisting poisons. Intelligence is how smart and logical you are. Used for knowing things and investigating places. Wisdom. How aware and intuitive you are, used for spotting danger, reading body language, resisting mind control. Charisma is how influential and confident you are, used for charming, deceiving, or intimidating others. When you make your character, you'll give each of these six abilities a number. That number determines the type of bonus you get when making dice rolls involving that ability. This is one of the more confusing parts of- D&D and it's a holdout from previous versions of the rules but think of it like this. You score each ability with a number from 3 to 18. The score determines the level of bonus you get to dice rolls. This bonus is called the ability modifier. A score of 10 in your strength, dexterity, etc. is equal to a plus zero ability modifier. It's the average for a normal person in the fantasy world. Every even number after 10 results in a better modifier. plus 1 at 12, plus 2 at 14, plus 3 at 16, etc. Every odd number below 10 results in a negative modifier. Minus 1 at 9, minus 2 at 7, minus 3 at 5. So if you have a strength of 16, you get a plus 3 to dice rolls involving your strength. If you have an intelligence of 8, you have a minus 1 to dice rolls involving your intelligence. Below your main ability scores is a big list of skills. These skills are specialized uses of your main abilities. When your DM describes an obstacle to what you want your character to do, they may ask you to make a specific skill check. Or you might ask your DM if you can use a skill to do something yourself. If you were trying to swim across a river, your DM may ask you to make an athletics check. If your DM describes a busy tavern full of rich-looking merchants, you might ask your DM if you can use your sleight-of-hand skill to steal some coins from their bulging purses. Each skill lists which ability bonus you add when using that skill, so athletics has strength in brackets indicating you add your strength ability modifier when using that skill. If you're proficient in certain skills, you get to add another bonus called the proficiency bonus to your dice rolls, as well as your ability modifier. The proficiency bonus is determined by your level. At level 1, it is plus 2 for example. So you add plus 2 to any skill you are proficient in. There's obviously a lot more on the character sheet, but this video would be pretty long if I broke down each thing in detail. So here's a very quick overview. Armor class, a number used to determine how hard you are to hit in a fight, calculated based on the armor you are wearing if you have a shield and sometimes your dexterity ability modifier initiative how fast you react in battle use your dexterity modifier speed how fast your character can walk run etc hit points how much damage you can take before you are dead this depends on the class you are and your constitution modifier saving throws these are worked out just like skills and used when you are attacked or the target of something unexpected or magical such as a pit trap, mind control, or a fireball explosion. Death saves. You get three chances to resist death when you run out of hit points. Hit dice. Can be used to heal yourself of damage during rests. Depends on what class you are. Attacks. Worked out just like skills, except it depends on what weapons you are proficient in using. Melee weapons use strength, ranged weapons use dexterity, and magical attacks use either your intelligence, wisdom, or charisma. Okay. That was a lot of words and terms. Let's slow things down a little bit and let me give you an example of how a simple situation in D&D might be played out. The DM, let's call him Matt, describes that the players have come to a large fast-flowing river that blocks their path to the caves where the goblin thieves have taken the town's grain. A large moss-covered tree has fallen across it to form a bridge, but it's quite narrow. Jasmine decides her character, An elf rogue called Sapphire would boldly try and cross over the wooden log to reach the other side before anyone else, wanting to show off to her new traveling companions. The DM says this is a fantastic idea, and describes Sapphire stepping up onto the log and carefully beginning to make her way across it. As there is a chance Sapphire could slip and fall, the DM asks Jasmine to make an acrobatics check to keep her balance. The DM... secretly decides that the wet moss and damp logs makes it quite slippery and that this would be a pretty tricky task. So he decides that Sapphire would need to be a 15 in order to cross without falling in. Jasmine looks at her character sheet and sees that she has a plus five bonus to her acrobatic skill. This comes from her dexterity bonus and being proficient in the skill. Jasmine doesn't know the number she needs to beat so she nervously rolls a d20. She rolls an 8, and with a plus 5 bonus, gets a total of 13. Sadly, not enough to succeed. The DM describes Sapphire losing her balance on the wet moss as she tumbles into the cold, fast-moving river, before turning to Jasmine's friends and asking, what are they going to do? Simon wants his character, Rev, a halfling paladin, to try and throw something to Sapphire to grab hold of. The DM says absolutely, but asks if Rev is going to use something like a branch from nearby, or if they have something. on their character that they can use. Simon looks at his character sheet and sees that they are carrying 50 foot of rope. They say they want to throw that to Sapphire. The DM decides that Rev can't really fail at throwing the rope to their friend so the rope is caught and Sapphire might be safe but as Rev chases after Sapphire the rest of the party hear a high-pitched cackling coming from the other side of the river. A big thing to touch on is combat. Combat in D&D works almost the same way as what we've already described, but with some tweaks. First things first, the DM will call for everyone to roll initiative. I tell you what you do, you roll initiative! Yes! Initiative is used to determine the order of when everybody gets to take a turn. Normally in D&D, you don't worry about taking turns, with players doing as much or as little as they want, engaging with situations described by the DM in a free fashion. However... In combat, a turn order is important to decide who attacks when. Just like when making an ability or skill check, you roll a 20-sided die and add your initiative bonus and tell the DM the result. The DM will do the same for the monsters, and starting with the highest score, each participant will take their turn. On your turn, you can basically... do two to three things. Move and an action, sometimes something called a bonus action. An action could be swinging your sword, casting a spell, climbing a rope, or trying to scare an enemy off. Moving is just what it sounds like. You move your character. You can move up to your speed as listed on your character sheet. Attacks work just like skills. You get a bonus from either your strength, dexterity, or the ability score you use for your spells, and another bonus if you're proficient in the type of weapon you are using. But rather than trying to beat a number that the DM has set in their mind, you're trying to score higher than the monster's armor class. When you hit a creature by rolling equal to or over their armor class, you then determine how much damage you deal to their hit points. You determine damage based on what weapon or spell you are using. For example, a dagger only deals 1d4, a four-sided dice, of damage, whilst a greataxe deals 1d12, a 12-sided die. Certain classes are only proficient in certain types of weapons, restricting you on what you can use effectively. Whatever damage you deal is subtracted from a creature's hit points, a numerical value of their toughness, good luck, stamina, etc. When your hit points go down to zero, you're knocked unconscious and you're dying. Your allies can save you by using healing spells to give you more hit points or treating you with the medicine skill to stop you from dying. However, if they don't save you and you fail three death saving throws, Your character is dead, finito, gone to the great beyond. Of course, being a fantasy world full of magic and mystery, there may be ways to bring dead characters back to life, though usually this requires a powerful spellcaster or completing an epic quest. Plus, you can always just make a new character to play. There's a lot more to combat, but for the absolute basics, that's almost everything you need to know. The only thing to mention are critical hits. In D&D, When you attack an enemy and roll a 20 on the 20-sided dice, this is called a critical hit, and it deals extra damage. Usually, this is an extra roll of whatever dice you use to deal damage normally, but some DMs may prefer to have critical hits cause double or maximum damage. In older editions of D&D and other tabletop role-playing games, rolling a 1 is called a critical fail or a fumble, and would have adverse effects for any player who did so, like dropping your sword or hitting an ally. But this isn't a core rule of D&D 5th edition anymore. Likewise, critical hits only apply to attack rolls. If you roll a 20 on a skill check or saving throw, it doesn't have any additional effects other than just being a really good number to roll. I want to touch on roleplaying. If you've seen D&D Twitch streams, you might think that roleplaying means doing a funny voice. Daddy! What in blazes going on? The dwarf credit art looks around. Sorry, sorry, Arvel. What's going on? I don't know, tell me! Or having an emotional discussion with your fellow players or DM. Can I write to you if I like leave letters? Can we be pen pals just now? Oh yes! Or vividly explaining in detail how your character fights in battle. It can be those things, but it also isn't. When you think, what would my character do? And then say what your character does. Congratulations, you're roleplaying. You are making decisions for a character based on their personality or backstory, rather than deciding what you as a player would do. When you play D&D, you don't have to do a funny voice or an accent. You don't even need to speak in the first person. Saying, my character walks up to the bar and orders a drink for the party, is just as valid a way to play D&D as going, I walk up to the bar tossing my hair to the side and pulling several coins from my embroidered pouch. Hail and well met, barkeep. My good fellows, my companions, and I would like a round of your finest ales. One might seem more fun to you. One might seem really cringy and awkward. Neither way is right or wrong. As long as you are respecting the world the DM is building, as well as your fellow players'decisions, and you're having fun, you're playing D&D right. The last thing on roleplaying is don't let anyone tell you how to play your character. Your warlock doesn't have to be the edgy, miserable, evil servant of the devil. They might be a spoiled brat who treats her devilish patron like a sugar daddy. Your cleric doesn't need to be a holier-than-thou pious healer who respects all life. They may be a cynical veteran soldier who swears and drinks and embraces their god to try and find meaning in their life. The internet is especially good at telling people their fun is wrong. Don't listen to them, and if they want to fight about that, send them my way. I've got your back. Obviously, there's a little bit more to D&D than all of that. Individual spells have their own rules, classes have unique abilities, and all sorts of other details. But in reality, you'll pick that stuff up as you go. If you can understand these basics, you can start playing and enjoying Dungeons & Dragons right away. And the more you play, the more you'll learn, and the easier all of this will become. I hope that this video has been helpful. If it was, please do consider liking and commenting and sharing the video with others. Places like Reddit, Facebook, Discord are all full of players looking to get into D&D, so any sharing is super helpful. Stay tuned and subscribe for more videos about D&D, LARP, and all sorts of other fancy sci-fi stuff. Until then, have fun, be kind to each other, and unleash your imagination.

But how do you actually play Dungeons & Dragons? What do you need? How long does it take? Does the Dungeon Master just make everything up?

How does it work? I'm Mark Humes and I happen to know a thing or two about D&D and RPGs. Hello! Hello everybody!

I am gonna be your GM for this session. I am the Dungeon Master for the D&D show High Rollers D&D, we're from the UK. Technically it's Peach.

It's Peach! One of the clowns rolls out the way! So I've put together this video to show you the basics. This...

It's how to play Dungeons and Dragons. One of the most common questions folk interested in D&D ask, what do you need to play? The basics are pretty simple and won't cost you much at all to start out.

You're gonna need the following. Some friends. Before anybody comments like, haha, where do I get some of those?

You hilarious comedians, you. If you don't have anyone who you know is interested in playing, try looking into Discords, Reddit or Facebook groups. Ask your local gaming store or see if your college or university has an RPG club.

There's a lot of folks eager to play out there. You'll also need somewhere you can all get together to play. This could be a friend's house, a gaming store or even a discord server.

Some character sheets like the ones shown here will be very useful. A set of dice. Specifically for D&D you'll want a set like this.

This includes a 20 sided die as well as a 12, 10, 8, 6 and 4 sided die. You'll also want a copy of the rules! You can download the basic rules of D&D for free from the D&D website. I've included a link in the description below as well as a link to the PDFs for the character sheets I mentioned earlier.

The basic rules covers how to play the game, how to make very simple characters, limited to a few races and classes without many options, and a small handful of monsters and magic items for the dungeon master to use. You could also buy a copy of the Players Handbook! This book contains everything in the basic rules as well as additional choices for character creation, high-level spells, and all sorts of bonus information.

Alternatively, you can also grab either the D&D Starter Set or Essentials Kit. Both provide the basic rules along with a pre-written adventure for the dungeon master to use, a set of dice, as well as maps and more. They are both a great choice for first time players. One thing I really want to stress is you do not need to dress up to play D&D. Dungeons and Dragons is not LARPing.

You might have seen some folks play on Twitch or YouTube wearing elf ears and costumes or other accessories but let me tell you now that these are the exception. Most folks don't do this. If you want to do it for fun, go for it, have a blast, but it is not expected.

You may also think D&D needs lots of miniatures and maps or fancy accessories like dungeon tiles, but again, this is not the case. These are accessories that can be nice to have, but they're not essential. Another common question, and one without a firm answer really, is how long does it take or how long do you play for?

And honestly, this varies depending on your group and how much fun you're having. Expecting your average D&D session to be somewhere between 2-5 hours where 3-4 is probably the average? But there's no set time limit.

If you can only manage 90 minutes that's fine. Wanna play for 7 hours? Go for it!

One of the wonders of this game is that it has no strict end or time limit. It's whatever works best for you and your group. As you get ready to play, one of your group will take on the role of of the Dungeon Master, or DM for short. This might already be decided, and it's usually the most experienced member of the group, but if you're all new, then decide who this is going to be.

Don't fret over this too much, being a DM might seem scary, but the truth is, anyone can do it with practice. Skills that would be helpful for a new DM would be having a good imagination and the ability to describe things to others, being able to keep track of lots of different things at once, and being able to improvise ideas on the spot. The Dungeon Master is the person who will describe the world, narrate the effects of the player's actions, and control all the other characters and monsters in the world that aren't being controlled by the players.

They usually have a good understanding of the rules and should be the one to make any final decisions, if something isn't clear or you aren't sure. Whilst the DM gets to make decisions on what happens when a player does something, decide how difficult something might be, and how the people and monsters of the imaginary world react to the things that the players do, it's important to know that the DM is not the player's enemy. They're a member of the group too, and their job is to work as both referee and narrator to provide a fun experience for everybody.

This means the dungeon master is often doing a lot more work than the players, preparing the adventures, managing a lot of different things at once, so be respectful of that. Pay attention to the DM when they're speaking and don't argue with them during the game. If you feel that the DM has gotten something wrong or forgotten something, it's often best to save it for after the game and discuss it as a group together. Every other player except for the dungeon master creates a character.

to represent themselves in the imaginary world. Making a Dungeons & Dragons character is a whole process, one that I can't possibly cover in this video, but the basics kind of go as follows. You choose a race, such as an elf, dwarf, halfling, or human, as well as a class, such as fighter, cleric, rogue, or wizard. These help define what your character can do in the world. You also choose a background, such as a noble, a sailor, a blacksmith, or a criminal.

to help give your character some personality and explain who they were before they started going on their adventures. These choices create a persona that you will play and use to explore the world that the Dungeon Master creates and describe it to you. Your class and your background will give you proficiency in different skills that you can use to accomplish tasks, as well as abilities and spells that you can use to fight your enemies. You get to decide almost everything else.

What does your character look like? How do they speak or act? Where do they come from? Did they have parents?

Did they inherit the magical sword Thunderbrand from the ghost of their elven grandfather but it was stolen by cultists of the evil goddess Tiamat? You get the idea. Another quick thing to note, you don't need to have some elaborate backstory or quirky character traits when you start, but the more you can think about your character's past, their goals, how they interact with others, the easier it will be to immerse yourself in the past. in the game.

You don't need to know all of this when you start though, you can develop it as you go. One last thing, when you make your character, it's very important to remember that D&D is a cooperative game about going on adventures. Your character should have a reason to work with others and have something that motivates them to go on dangerous, deadly adventures.

Playing an edgy, miserable loner or a nervous wreck that wouldn't leave their home might sound interesting, but in reality these characters might not be as fun for everyone else at the table. Make a character that's fun to play, but also fun for others to play with. So you have the dungeon master and the players have created their characters, what now?

The dungeon master describes a situation or setting in the fantasy world. A common trope is you all arrive at a tavern. and then presents some sort of opportunity. A merchant might need heroes to stop vicious wolves attacking people on the road, or a tribe of goblins might have stolen the town's grain supply. The DM sets the scene, describing it with how it looks, how it sounds and smells.

They might play the part of an NPC, a non-player character, who explains things to the players. Then the DM says the magic words. The players then say what they want their character to do and the DM narrates the effects of their actions. That's it.

That's the game. In its absolutely simplest form, that is Dungeons and Dragons. See, D&D isn't like a video game or board game.

For the most part, you can do whatever you want. How you approach the problems or opportunities the DM gives you is up to you. You can try and convince the goblins to give the grain back or sneak in and steal it or fight them You could trade them the grain for an illusory birthday cake or make them a real cake laced with poison The imaginative world is your oyster. It's Completely up to you. You can also ask the DM for more questions before you decide what your character does.

Can I see any other elves in the tavern? Does the door look like it has any traps on it? Can I tell if the Baron is lying to us?

The DM then answers those questions, adding detail and flavor to the world or the scene. Sometimes the DM won't know what those details are until you ask. If they're using a pre-written adventure, it might not say if there are any elves in the tavern or if the Baron is lying or not.

This is where the DM gets to do their own thing. Maybe they add an elven bard with a mysterious scar to the tavern, coming up with a suitable reason why they're there. Maybe they decide the Baron is lying about the Mad Wizard's Tower, because that's where he's secretly storing his stolen gold.

Where D&D becomes a game and less narrative is when the DM believes that the character has a chance to fail at whatever they're doing. If there is a chance the character will fail, maybe because it's too hard, or because someone else is trying to stop them. Then the DM will ask the players to roll the dice and see what happens.

The player rolls a 20-sided die, a D20, and then adds a bonus based on the character they've created. The DM assigns a secret number to determine the difficulty of the task. We call this the difficulty class, or DC for short.

If the player's total roll, the result of the dice plus their bonus, is equal to or higher than the DM's secret number, the DC, then they succeed. If it's lower, they fail. Either way, the DM then describes the outcome that happens next.

There is a guide for this secret number the DM can use as a reference, but the DM can also adjust it, depending on the circumstances. Trying to pick a well-made lock is made even more difficult if you're trying to do it whilst blindfolded, or trying to enter a castle by climbing over the wall without any tools. Regardless, one important thing to remember is that failure is a part of the game. You are not expected to succeed at everything. In fact, sometimes failing can be more fun and take the story in more interesting ways than if you had succeeded.

When you make your character, you record everything onto a character sheet. This is a record of the skills and bonuses and abilities your character has. For some, this is a very daunting part of D&D.

The character sheet is intimidating at first glance, but fear not, we'll get through it. It's also worth mentioning that character builder apps and websites like D&D Beyond can be a huge help when making a character, as they do the math for you. The most important thing on the character sheet are the six ability scores. Almost everything else on your character sheet uses these in some way, as a modifier or bonus to something else.

The six scores are as follows. Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. Strength is how strong and athletic you are. It's used for swinging swords, climbing, swimming, wrestling. Dexterity, how agile and coordinated you are.

It's used for shooting arrows, balancing across things, or dodging explosions. Constitution, how tough and resilient you are. Used for how much damage you can take, resisting poisons. Intelligence is how smart and logical you are. Used for knowing things and investigating places.

Wisdom. How aware and intuitive you are, used for spotting danger, reading body language, resisting mind control. Charisma is how influential and confident you are, used for charming, deceiving, or intimidating others. When you make your character, you'll give each of these six abilities a number. That number determines the type of bonus you get when making dice rolls involving that ability.

This is one of the more confusing parts of- D&D and it's a holdout from previous versions of the rules but think of it like this. You score each ability with a number from 3 to 18. The score determines the level of bonus you get to dice rolls. This bonus is called the ability modifier.

A score of 10 in your strength, dexterity, etc. is equal to a plus zero ability modifier. It's the average for a normal person in the fantasy world. Every even number after 10 results in a better modifier.

plus 1 at 12, plus 2 at 14, plus 3 at 16, etc. Every odd number below 10 results in a negative modifier. Minus 1 at 9, minus 2 at 7, minus 3 at 5. So if you have a strength of 16, you get a plus 3 to dice rolls involving your strength. If you have an intelligence of 8, you have a minus 1 to dice rolls involving your intelligence.

Below your main ability scores is a big list of skills. These skills are specialized uses of your main abilities. When your DM describes an obstacle to what you want your character to do, they may ask you to make a specific skill check. Or you might ask your DM if you can use a skill to do something yourself.

If you were trying to swim across a river, your DM may ask you to make an athletics check. If your DM describes a busy tavern full of rich-looking merchants, you might ask your DM if you can use your sleight-of-hand skill to steal some coins from their bulging purses. Each skill lists which ability bonus you add when using that skill, so athletics has strength in brackets indicating you add your strength ability modifier when using that skill. If you're proficient in certain skills, you get to add another bonus called the proficiency bonus to your dice rolls, as well as your ability modifier. The proficiency bonus is determined by your level.

At level 1, it is plus 2 for example. So you add plus 2 to any skill you are proficient in. There's obviously a lot more on the character sheet, but this video would be pretty long if I broke down each thing in detail. So here's a very quick overview. Armor class, a number used to determine how hard you are to hit in a fight, calculated based on the armor you are wearing if you have a shield and sometimes your dexterity ability modifier initiative how fast you react in battle use your dexterity modifier speed how fast your character can walk run etc hit points how much damage you can take before you are dead this depends on the class you are and your constitution modifier saving throws these are worked out just like skills and used when you are attacked or the target of something unexpected or magical such as a pit trap, mind control, or a fireball explosion.

Death saves. You get three chances to resist death when you run out of hit points. Hit dice. Can be used to heal yourself of damage during rests. Depends on what class you are.

Attacks. Worked out just like skills, except it depends on what weapons you are proficient in using. Melee weapons use strength, ranged weapons use dexterity, and magical attacks use either your intelligence, wisdom, or charisma. Okay. That was a lot of words and terms.

Let's slow things down a little bit and let me give you an example of how a simple situation in D&D might be played out. The DM, let's call him Matt, describes that the players have come to a large fast-flowing river that blocks their path to the caves where the goblin thieves have taken the town's grain. A large moss-covered tree has fallen across it to form a bridge, but it's quite narrow. Jasmine decides her character, An elf rogue called Sapphire would boldly try and cross over the wooden log to reach the other side before anyone else, wanting to show off to her new traveling companions. The DM says this is a fantastic idea, and describes Sapphire stepping up onto the log and carefully beginning to make her way across it.

As there is a chance Sapphire could slip and fall, the DM asks Jasmine to make an acrobatics check to keep her balance. The DM... secretly decides that the wet moss and damp logs makes it quite slippery and that this would be a pretty tricky task.

So he decides that Sapphire would need to be a 15 in order to cross without falling in. Jasmine looks at her character sheet and sees that she has a plus five bonus to her acrobatic skill. This comes from her dexterity bonus and being proficient in the skill.

Jasmine doesn't know the number she needs to beat so she nervously rolls a d20. She rolls an 8, and with a plus 5 bonus, gets a total of 13. Sadly, not enough to succeed. The DM describes Sapphire losing her balance on the wet moss as she tumbles into the cold, fast-moving river, before turning to Jasmine's friends and asking, what are they going to do? Simon wants his character, Rev, a halfling paladin, to try and throw something to Sapphire to grab hold of.

The DM says absolutely, but asks if Rev is going to use something like a branch from nearby, or if they have something. on their character that they can use. Simon looks at his character sheet and sees that they are carrying 50 foot of rope. They say they want to throw that to Sapphire. The DM decides that Rev can't really fail at throwing the rope to their friend so the rope is caught and Sapphire might be safe but as Rev chases after Sapphire the rest of the party hear a high-pitched cackling coming from the other side of the river.

A big thing to touch on is combat. Combat in D&D works almost the same way as what we've already described, but with some tweaks. First things first, the DM will call for everyone to roll initiative.

I tell you what you do, you roll initiative! Yes! Initiative is used to determine the order of when everybody gets to take a turn.

Normally in D&D, you don't worry about taking turns, with players doing as much or as little as they want, engaging with situations described by the DM in a free fashion. However... In combat, a turn order is important to decide who attacks when. Just like when making an ability or skill check, you roll a 20-sided die and add your initiative bonus and tell the DM the result. The DM will do the same for the monsters, and starting with the highest score, each participant will take their turn.

On your turn, you can basically... do two to three things. Move and an action, sometimes something called a bonus action.

An action could be swinging your sword, casting a spell, climbing a rope, or trying to scare an enemy off. Moving is just what it sounds like. You move your character.

You can move up to your speed as listed on your character sheet. Attacks work just like skills. You get a bonus from either your strength, dexterity, or the ability score you use for your spells, and another bonus if you're proficient in the type of weapon you are using. But rather than trying to beat a number that the DM has set in their mind, you're trying to score higher than the monster's armor class. When you hit a creature by rolling equal to or over their armor class, you then determine how much damage you deal to their hit points.

You determine damage based on what weapon or spell you are using. For example, a dagger only deals 1d4, a four-sided dice, of damage, whilst a greataxe deals 1d12, a 12-sided die. Certain classes are only proficient in certain types of weapons, restricting you on what you can use effectively.

Whatever damage you deal is subtracted from a creature's hit points, a numerical value of their toughness, good luck, stamina, etc. When your hit points go down to zero, you're knocked unconscious and you're dying. Your allies can save you by using healing spells to give you more hit points or treating you with the medicine skill to stop you from dying. However, if they don't save you and you fail three death saving throws, Your character is dead, finito, gone to the great beyond.

Of course, being a fantasy world full of magic and mystery, there may be ways to bring dead characters back to life, though usually this requires a powerful spellcaster or completing an epic quest. Plus, you can always just make a new character to play. There's a lot more to combat, but for the absolute basics, that's almost everything you need to know.

The only thing to mention are critical hits. In D&D, When you attack an enemy and roll a 20 on the 20-sided dice, this is called a critical hit, and it deals extra damage. Usually, this is an extra roll of whatever dice you use to deal damage normally, but some DMs may prefer to have critical hits cause double or maximum damage. In older editions of D&D and other tabletop role-playing games, rolling a 1 is called a critical fail or a fumble, and would have adverse effects for any player who did so, like dropping your sword or hitting an ally. But this isn't a core rule of D&D 5th edition anymore.

Likewise, critical hits only apply to attack rolls. If you roll a 20 on a skill check or saving throw, it doesn't have any additional effects other than just being a really good number to roll. I want to touch on roleplaying.

If you've seen D&D Twitch streams, you might think that roleplaying means doing a funny voice. Daddy! What in blazes going on? The dwarf credit art looks around.

Sorry, sorry, Arvel. What's going on? I don't know, tell me!

Or having an emotional discussion with your fellow players or DM. Can I write to you if I like leave letters? Can we be pen pals just now? Oh yes!

Or vividly explaining in detail how your character fights in battle. It can be those things, but it also isn't. When you think, what would my character do?

And then say what your character does. Congratulations, you're roleplaying. You are making decisions for a character based on their personality or backstory, rather than deciding what you as a player would do.

When you play D&D, you don't have to do a funny voice or an accent. You don't even need to speak in the first person. Saying, my character walks up to the bar and orders a drink for the party, is just as valid a way to play D&D as going, I walk up to the bar tossing my hair to the side and pulling several coins from my embroidered pouch.

Hail and well met, barkeep. My good fellows, my companions, and I would like a round of your finest ales. One might seem more fun to you. One might seem really cringy and awkward.

Neither way is right or wrong. As long as you are respecting the world the DM is building, as well as your fellow players'decisions, and you're having fun, you're playing D&D right. The last thing on roleplaying is don't let anyone tell you how to play your character. Your warlock doesn't have to be the edgy, miserable, evil servant of the devil.

They might be a spoiled brat who treats her devilish patron like a sugar daddy. Your cleric doesn't need to be a holier-than-thou pious healer who respects all life. They may be a cynical veteran soldier who swears and drinks and embraces their god to try and find meaning in their life.

The internet is especially good at telling people their fun is wrong. Don't listen to them, and if they want to fight about that, send them my way. I've got your back. Obviously, there's a little bit more to D&D than all of that. Individual spells have their own rules, classes have unique abilities, and all sorts of other details.

But in reality, you'll pick that stuff up as you go. If you can understand these basics, you can start playing and enjoying Dungeons & Dragons right away. And the more you play, the more you'll learn, and the easier all of this will become. I hope that this video has been helpful.

If it was, please do consider liking and commenting and sharing the video with others. Places like Reddit, Facebook, Discord are all full of players looking to get into D&D, so any sharing is super helpful. Stay tuned and subscribe for more videos about D&D, LARP, and all sorts of other fancy sci-fi stuff.

Until then, have fun, be kind to each other, and unleash your imagination.

Transcript for:Getting Started with Dungeons & Dragons

Transcript for:
Getting Started with Dungeons & Dragons