UNR Dragon Club lets students escape their daily lives
Emerson Drewes reports on the UNR Dragon Club where students come to get away from their everyday stresses.
Inside the William Raggio Building every Friday and Sunday evening folk music echoes throughout the hallways. Students sit impatiently in the auditorium preparing to play their favorite tabletop game, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D).
These meetings are a part of the University of Nevada, Reno Dragon Club. The over 120-member club meets two days a week and breaks off into small groups — or campaigns. The club has almost every room inside the Raggio and a few in the Ansari Business Building booked out for over four hours.
D&D originated in 1974 and was created by Ernest Gary Gygax and David Arneson. However, there has been a resurgence in the past two years and remains a cult classic for many generations.
The game consists of a dungeon master, the game runner and storyteller, and campaign members, typically around four to eight players. The members create characters set with their own personalities, backstory and skill sets; members roll dice to determine their fate and role play to get more information.
As for the club, the origins are unknown, but leadership estimates sometime before 2010.
Students come to the club to escape their everyday life and become rogues, elves, dragon humanoids and so much more.
“In a perfect world, it is a place where you can go and not know who you’re going to be playing a game with,” Dragon Club President, Cameron Tolbert, a 24-year-old music major. “You go and you sit down and you get to meet some new friends and be a person that you’re not for a while.”
Tolbert has been serving as President of the club for about five months and helps coordinate meetings and events for the members, but his love for D&D started when he was in high school.
“So my first ever game of D&D … I was not quite as senior yet in high school,” said Tolbert. “I just heard about it from some friends and I had never played it. So I said, ‘You know what, it would be cool.’”
From there the obsession started as Tolbert educated himself on the rules through YouTube videos. Quickly into his D&D education, Tolbert started serving as Dungeon Master and has remained in that role.
“I was putting myself into a role where I was going to have to teach people the game. So, I had to know all the ins and outs the first time,” said Tolbert. “A lot of D&D is learning how the system works, but then also learning when to throw the system out.”
Inside another room Justin Renner-Brody, a freshman computer science and theater major, is a new member to the club. Adorned in a fedora, Renner-Brody serves as the Dungeon Master for his campaign “Into the Void.”
Renner-Brody started playing D&D as a sophomore in high school, with his friends starting him off with 30-minute increments during lunch. D&D means a lot for Renner-Brody and scratches his storytelling itch.
“For me, it’s a way to tell my stories and get to see how other people interact with the stories,” said Renner-Brody. “It’s slightly a bit like the psychology bit of it. I like seeing what other people do in the world with their characters.”
There are many misconceptions to D&D, all of which Renner-Brody dismisses.
“A lot of people think it’s just a bunch of weird people getting in their basement to do nothing,” said Renner-Brody. “In the end, it’s really just a bunch of friends getting together to do something different, be someone else that you’re not, get rid of the stress of everyday life decisions.”
Cassandra Mitchell, a 21-year-old transfer student and double major in chemistry and biology, is a member in Renner-Brody’s campaign. Mitchell is also a new member of the Dragon Club but has been playing for four years.
D&D helped Mitchell find her place at her previous university and make new friends.
“I didn’t really have many friends when I transferred [to my previous university],” said Mitchell. “So when I started doing stuff, and playing D&D, I got a lot of friends there.”
Like many others, Mitchel joined Dragon Club to not think about her school work or any other everyday stresses.
“I get really stressed throughout the week, and so when I come here, I don’t really think about my O-chem lab,” said Mitchell. “When I come here I get to play Aria who’s an arsonist and burns down jails.”
Students are not required to have experience or any kind of equipment, like dice, dice trays or books, to get started.
Learning how to play D&D can be daunting for new members, but Tolbert and other members encourage everyone to dive in without hesitations.
“Don’t stick your foot in the pool to test the water and get in slowly — like jump in headfirst,” said Tolbert. “If you do that and other people are willing to do that with you. It’ll be fun.”
Reporting by Emerson Drewes for the Reynolds Sandbox.
