what is dnd

Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game where players form an adventuring party to explore fantasy worlds, embark on epic quests, and level up in experience. The game was originally created and designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson and was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TSR) . In D&D, each player creates their own character to play, and these characters embark upon adventures within a fantasy setting. A Dungeon Master (DM) serves as the games referee and storyteller, maintaining the setting and playing the role of the inhabitants of the game world, known as non-player characters (NPCs) . The game has undergone several editions, with the most recent being the 5th edition released in the second half of 2014. D&D is a collaborative storytelling game with a baseline set of rules to make the game more fun, fair, and challenging. It is a popular and successful tabletop role-playing game that has influenced countless fantasy and sci-fi novels, video games, and movies.