I’ll never forget the first time I played Dungeons & Dragons. It was a few summers ago and one of our friends offered to run us through a single session campaign, otherwise known as a one-shot. It was a ton of fun and is the event I attribute to getting me hooked on the game. But there’s one thing that will always stand out to me most about that experience, and that was when we finished the game and our DM pulled me aside and said, “Ari, I play with a lot of people and I can tell when they’re hooked, and you’ve got it.”

That single phrase always stood out to me because of just how accurate it was. He saw something in myself that I never thought would be there, and even as he said it, I thought he was full of shit and just stroking my ego a bit. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t. Regardless of his intent, he was a thousand percent right.

In the past few weeks, I’ve heard his voice echo in my mind louder and more frequently than ever. That probably has a lot to do with the amount of Dungeons & Dragons related purchases I’ve made in that time, a trend that tragically shows no sign of slowing up.

I’ve bought so many fucking dice and I have no idea why. Even before the pandemic, all of the games I played were online, so why the hell did I buy a ton of plastic dice along with a fancy set of metallic ones? Why did I buy a dice rolling box? Why did I buy several digital rule books and modules, and then also buy their physical editions as well?

Because I need them.

Every time I hear my friend’s voice in my head, reminding me that “I’ve got it,” I can’t help but feel like he cursed me. Right there and then, in the middle of our mutual friend’s kitchen, my DM cursed me to an eternity of buying books filled with adventures I will never experience and dice that I’ll never roll.

One day in the future when we’re allowed to congregate once again, I’d like to believe I will actually make use of these physical items that now occupy my bookshelves. But the odds are these will just be items that I’ll be pissed about having to transport when I inevitably move away from here. I just hope that I don’t start buying miniatures next. Like, yeah they’re cool and you can paint them to look like your characters and stuff… Yeah, definitely don’t want to buy those little guys.

Send help…