The Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) Club at MHS is a club where students can learn and play Dungeons and Dragons, a turn-based role-playing fantasy game. The DnD club meets every Friday in Room L44 from 3:30 to 5:15. The club consists of about 16 members, including the core four officers, Vice President and senior Aarsh Patel said in an interview.
“Now, it’s kind of different how many people attend online versus in person because now everyone doesn’t have the time each week to make it every Friday after school for a couple of hours,” Patel said. “We do have about half the group make it in person, and the other half kind of play online whenever the time is for them.”
DnD is a game of roleplay, exploration, and combat, Patel said. Each game is called a campaign and is run by a Dungeon Master, Patel added.
“Campaigns are stories created by the Dungeon Master, who is the creator of these different worlds and stuff,” Patel said. “They direct a group of people, or a party of adventurers, as they call it, through the world. They build the world, but the party directs the story like an open sandbox,” Patel added.
A typical meeting at the club usually consists of multiple campaigns running simultaneously, Patel said.
“Occasionally, we’re going to send out announcements and stuff, but [the] majority of the time, it’s running these campaigns,” Patel said.
Campaigns don’t have a fixed amount of playing time. A campaign can last for years, DnD club President and senior Sugie Nguyen said in an interview. It requires dedication from all players, Nguyen added.
“You can have five or so players, and all it takes is one person to not stay as committed as the rest of the group,” Nguyen said. “They drop out and everything starts becoming all messed up because the Dungeon Master has to plan for your character’s leave and people easily lose interest that way.”
It takes a weekly commitment to make it on time, and you don’t want to let the other players down, Nguyen said. You have to be reliable and be able to work with a good schedule, Nguyen added.
“If you’re able to handle your own schedule, then Dungeons and Dragons is a really good game to play,” Nguyen said.
Players can choose pre-generated characters or create an original, personalized character. A player uses a character sheet to fill out their attributes, stats, and more based on the race and class they have chosen for their character. With all the different options and combinations, players have a wide variety of characters they can explore and become.
“I’m interested in getting to know more of the characters,” freshman and new member Kate Chua said in an interview. “I really just want to get a pet and stuff in the story, if it’s possible,” Chua added.
The club and its members are very friendly, Chua said. According to Chua, her first meeting was on the 3rd of December.
“You can make a lot of really good friends,” Chua said. “They’re really nice and they welcome you really nicely.”
According to Chua, she had taken a break from DnD in middle school and forgot a lot about the rules and the game over the COVID lockdown. The club members helped and guided her when she needed it, Chua said.
“I believe that the main goal of the club is to really just provide a space for students to relax and destress from school in general and life,” Patel said. “I want to create an environment where you can play and enjoy DnD.”