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The Dungeons & Dragons role play in game is about storytelling in worlds of swords and sorcery. It shares elements with childhood games of make-believe. Like those games, D&D is driven by imagination. It's about picturing the towering castle beneath the stormy night sky and imagining how a fantasy adventurer might react to the challenges that scene presents. > Dungeon Master (DM): After passing through the craggy peaks, the road takes a sudden turn to the east and Castle Ravenloft towers before you. Crum bling towers of stone keep a silent watch over the approach. They look like abandoned guardhouses. Beyond these, a wide chasm gapes, disappearing into the deep fog below. A lowered drawbridge spans the chasm , leading to an arched entrance to the castle courtyard. The chains o f the drawbridge creak in the wind, their rust-eaten iron straining with the weight. From atop the high strong walls, stone gargoyles stare at you from hollow sockets and grin hideously. A rotting wooden portcullis, green with growth, hangs in the entry tunnel. Beyond this, the main doors o f Castle Ravenloft stand open, a rich warm light spilling into the courtyard. Phillip (playing Gareth): I want to look at the gargoyles. I have a feeling they're not just statues. Amy (playing Riva): The drawbridge looks precarious? I want to see how sturdy it is. Do I think we can cross it, or is it going to collapse under our weight? Unlike a game of make-believe, D&D gives structure to the stories, a way of determining the consequences of the adventurers' action. Players roll dice to resolve whether their attacks hit or m iss or whether their adventurers can scale a cliff, roll away from the strike of a m agical lightning bolt, or pull off som e other dangerous task. Anything is possible, but the dice make som e outcom es m ore probable than others. > Dungeon Master (DM): OK, one at a time. Phillip, you're looking at the gargoyles? Phillip: Yeah. Is there any hint they m ight be creatures and not decorations? DM: Make an Intelligence check. Phillip: Does my Investigation skill apply? DM: Sure! Phillip (rolling a d20): Ugh. Seven. DM: They look like decorations to you. And Amy, Riva is checking out the drawbridge? trjm ll`rby

In the Dungeons & Dragons game, each player creates an adventurer (also called a character) and teams up with other adventurers (played by friends). Working together, the group might explore a dark dungeon, a ruined city, a haunted castle, a lost temple deep in a jungle, or a lava-filled cavern beneath a mysterious mountain. The adventurers can solve puzzles, talk with other characters, battle fantastic monsters, and discover fabulous magic items and other treasure. One player, however, takes on the role of the Dungeon Master (DM), the gam e's lead storyteller and referee. The DM creates adventures for the characters, w ho navigate its hazards and decide which paths to explore. The DM might describe the entrance to Castle Ravenloft, and the players decide what they want their adventurers to do. W ill they walk across the dangerously weathered drawbridge? Tie themselves together with rope to minim ize the chance that som eone will fall if the drawbridge gives way? Or cast a spell to carry them over the chasm ? Then the DM determines the results of the adventurers' actions and narrates what they experience. Because the DM can im provise to react to anything the players attempt, D&D is infinitely flexible, and each adventure can be exciting and unexpected. The game has no real end; when one story or quest wraps up, another one can begin, creating an ongoing story called a campaign. Many people w ho play the game keep their cam paigns going for months or years, meeting with their friends every week or so to pick up the story where they left off. The adventurers grow in might as the cam paign continues. Each monster defeated, each adventure completed, and each treasure recovered not only adds to the continuing story, but also earns the adventurers new capabilities. This increase in pow er is reflected by an adventurer's level. There's no winning and losing in the Dungeons & Dragons game--at least, not the way those terms are usually understood. Together, the DM and the players create an exciting story o f bold adventurers who confront deadly perils. Som etim es an adventurer might com e to a grisly end, torn apart by ferocious monsters or done in by a nefarious villain. Even so, the other adventurers can search for powerful magic to revive their fallen comrade, or the player might choose to create a new character to carry on. The group might fail to complete an adventure successfully, but if everyone had a good time and created a memorable story, they all win. ## Worlds of Adventure The many worlds of the Dungeons & Dragons game are places o f m agic and monsters, of brave w arriors and spectacular adventures. They begin with a foundation of medieval fantasy and then add the creatures, places, and magic that make these w orlds unique. The w orlds of the Dungeons & Dragons game exist within a vast cosm os called the multiverse, connected in strange and mysterious ways to one another and to other planes of existence, such as the Elemental Plane of Fire and the Infinite Depths of the Abyss. Within this multiverse are an endless variety of worlds. Many of them have been published as official settings for the D&D game. The legends of the Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Dark Sun, Mystara, and Eberron settings are woven together in the fabric of the multiverse. Alongside these worlds are hundreds of thousands more, created by generations of D&D players for their ow n games. And amid all the richness of the multiverse, you might create a w orld of your own. All these worlds share characteristics, but each world is set apart by its ow n history and cultures, distinctive monsters and races, fantastic geography, ancient dungeons, and schem ing villains. S om e races have unusual traits in different worlds. The halflings of the Dark Sun setting, for example, are jungle-dwelling cannibals, and the elves are desert nomads. Som e worlds feature races unknown in other settings, such as Eberron's warforged, soldiers created and im bued with life to fight in the Last War. Some worlds are dominated by one great story, like the War of the Lance that plays a central role in the Dragonlance setting. But they're all D&D worlds, and you can use the rules in this book to create a character and play in any one of them. Your DM might set the cam paign on one of these worlds or on one that he or she created. Because there is so much diversity am ong the worlds of D&D, you should check with your DM about any house rules that w ill affect your play of the game. Ultimately, the Dungeon Master is the authority on the campaign and its setting, even if the setting is a published world. ll`rby