There are stranger things than kids enjoying tabletop role-playing games

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They’ve just entered the Manor of Trollskull Alley, a halfling water elemental, half-demon Paladin, a half-elf bard, an elven druid and a dwarven cleric. The Paladin is cross-checked by an inscrutable force. It knocks him 10 feet, and when he looks up, he can make out the bare impression of a valet, but its clothes are tattered, the velvet jacket smooth with age, its face showing signs of decay. The dwarf sees it, too. They’re pretty sure it’s a poltergeist.

Then the screaming begins.

The setting is high fantasy, but the venue is Pierrefonds. The game is Dungeons & Dragons.

Dungeon Master Greg Piggins is at the head of the table, with his eldest daughter, 14-year-old Kassandra, across from him. Aria, who is 11, is at his left hand. Lana is just six — she comes and goes, but she has a character in this game if she decides to play. Two of the other players, Emilie, 14, and Noah, 15, are friends of Kassandra, who reveals herself through role play as a peacemaker and helper, sometimes keeping the others in check and always aware of what’s going on around her. Liz is the other grownup player; she’s there to wrangle teens back toward the adventure when their conversation strays, and she’s there because she’s an experienced player and role model.

This isn’t D&D like you might remember it. It’s not hidden away in a Stranger Things basement, and it’s not a mostly boys’ game.

“It’s for boys and girls and non-binary people and all the Homo sapiens,” Noah says.

Dungeons & Dragons was the first published tabletop role-playing game, in the early 1970s. Players create characters using rules defined in the Player’s Handbook and keep track of their strengths, weaknesses, health and wealth using pencil and paper. Each race and class (such as elf and ranger) has unique abilities, like sword-fighting or casting spells. How their hero looks and dresses, their background and motivation is up to each player.

The Dungeon Master, or DM, is the narrator and steers the game, but world-building is collaborative, as players form a team and react to their quests. The DM sets the scene and players act out or explain their response. They use skills like charisma or healing, and roll a 20-sided die to determine whether they succeed in their action. Those are the mechanics, but tabletop role playing is about three things: storytelling, banter and snacks.

The goal isn’t to kill each other, but to build a team relying on each other’s skills and respecting their limitations.

Piggins played RPGs throughout high school and CEGEP and beyond. He’s been playing with his daughters for years, but he revamped this campaign several months ago. In it, an unlikely benefactor has given the deed to Trollskull Manor to this motley crew. They are exploring their surroundings and getting a feel for the alley shops and NPCs — non-player characters who are acted out by Piggins, using a variety of tones and accents.

Their ears are ringing. Liz magics some light and the screaming subsides, but the poltergeist builds up enough strength to yell “Get out of my house!” before vanishing through the ceiling.

Aria can hear things moving around upstairs and leads the group to the second floor, cornering the poltergeist. After rolling for charisma, Kassandra and Emilie speak to it in Elvish, and it reveals it was once the keeper of this manor. Aria asks him how he died.

“Fear.”

“That’s BS,” Noah says, and Piggins steps in: “Language.”

“I only said BS. I could have meant brussels sprouts.”

They’re learning more than etiquette and critical thinking. Piggins challenges them with vocabulary: Derelict. Desiccated. Ostentatious. Brig. He and Liz give them book and movie recommendations.

They’re learning about budgeting, as each player has 10 gold on them, and if they tip too much silver on a bowl of hot chocolate, they have to keep track of that. There’s economics, too, as they discover that when Trollskull Manor closed down, many peripheral businesses in the alley failed.

Plus math: succeeding in an action isn’t just a roll of the dice — it’s the roll plus or minus special abilities times the number of dice. And science: which melts more elegantly in hot chocolate, an Oreo or a Fudgee-O?

Of course, it’s mostly drama.

Kassandra says, “Everyone is talking high fantasy, but sometimes you’re all, ‘Hey, dude.’ ”

“Sometimes it degenerates into a musical,” Piggins adds, “because anything can be a song cue.”

That’s proved when Piggins describes a mysterious figure at the bar, Emilie says “It looks suspicious,” and they break into a rendition of Don’t Be Suspicious from Parks and Recreation.

As soon as Piggins’s voice lowers into storytelling, they’re quiet and the joshing stops. They want to be pulled back into the narrative.

If they’re asked what brought tabletop gaming out of the basement and into the light, they’ll say in unison: “Stranger Things,” the Netflix series that was launched with four boys playing D&D. But Piggins’s wife, Rosie, whose role during this campaign includes snorting when a joke or reference is particularly bad, believes it started with The Big Bang Theory, the sitcom that introduced the wider world to geekery.

Even the fast-food wars have exploited RPGs. In burger chain Wendy’s Feast of Legends, heroes must vanquish “the Ice Jester and his rogues gallery of frozen fiends” who think it’s OK to not use fresh beef. It’s a clear jab at their competitors, but it’s also a well-designed, 80-page campaign that’s free to download.

Celebrities, too. Vin Diesel created a campaign called Vin Diesel DMing a Game of D&D Just for You. Felicia Day, Stephen Colbert and Dwayne (the Rock) Johnson are among the most famous tabletop gamers.

Piggins is standing now, and looking very seriously at the team. “I need you to roll for intelligence, but I need you to roll really well or it’s going to go badly for you.” Even a helpful DM can’t do much if you keep rolling sixes.

Over the course of three more hours, the team explores Trollskull Alley, gathering information from a woodworker, a blacksmith, a shady bartender with murky ambitions, and an ethereal elf. They learn of feuding gangs and discover something resembling gunpowder in the manor’s basement. While they’re examining a magic book, there’s an explosion in the alley. It’s a fireball, their friendly neighbourhood ghost tells them. There are at least 10 casualties.

As a dying gnome (they break into Stayin’ Alive) hands Aria a small sculpture, the Watch and the Wizards show up.

There’s panic and disorder.

Piggins ends the session.

AT A GLANCE

Role-playing games are not limited to the high-fantasy Dungeons & Dragons, or its well-known competitors Shadowrun and World of Darkness. Some games focus more on rolls of the dice while others engage players more in the storytelling — a good game master will find a comfortable middle ground for their team.

There are games for all tastes, including science fiction, cyberpunk, vampires and werewolves, even old-school detective or superhero campaigns. Not to mention My Little Pony: Tails of Equestria.

Primers and FAQs for newbies to Dungeons & Dragons are available at dnd.wizards.com. You can also check out your local gaming store, including Gamerz Café (4820 St-Jean Blvd., Pierrefonds), Le Valet d’Coeur (4408 St-Denis St.), Three Kings Loot (1118 Ste-Catherine St. W., Suite 204) and others. You can download Wendy’s tabletop game at feastoflegends.com.

hjuhl@postmedia.com

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CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misspelled Emilie’s name. The Montreal Gazette regrets the error.