Dungeons & Dragons

Dungeons & Dragons is the tabletop role-playing game created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson and first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules (TSR). Since 1997 it has been published by Wizards of the Coast, today a subsidiary of Hasbro.

One player acts as Dungeon Master, describing the world and voicing every monster and non-player character. The others each control a character, together forming a party. They describe what their characters do, and polyhedral dice such as the twenty-sided die decide uncertain outcomes. Over many sessions a campaign takes shape. The fifth edition appeared in 2014, followed by a revised version in 2024.

Live-streamed play has made D&D a fixture of streaming, from Wizards of the Coast's own Stream of Many Eyes in 2018 to actual-play shows like Critical Role. Wikipedia cites an estimated 12 to 15 million players in North America in 2017 alone.