How to Start a D&D Night at Your Church

Starting a Dungeons & Dragons night for your church may seem intimidating at first, but if you break it down into several steps, it becomes quite easy and gives your community another opportunity to build relationships and minister to people. First, let me state that Dungeons & Dragons isn’t the only option out there. It’s the most well-known, but if you’re looking for something similar but different, you can always go with Pathfinder, The One Ring, or Dungeon World. If you want something that includes outer space and is science fiction-oriented (instead of fantasy), there is a Star Wars tabletop roleplaying game (TTRPG), a Star Trek game, Scum & Villainy, or any of the Warhammer 40k TTRPGs. Cyberpunk RED, Shadowrun, Tales from the Loop, and the Fallout RPG are great near-future or alternate history sci-fi games. And if you want a system with many options, Savage Worlds, FATE, and GURPS all have many settings built on their rules systems.

Which brings me to the first thing you’ll need to start a game night at your church: a consensus among your players. If you’re trying to start a TTRPG night, find out what the players want to play. Sometimes a player will suggest a game because they already own the books and want a chance to either run or play that system.

From there, you need a Dungeon Master or Game Master (GM). The GM could be a leader in your church (youth group, young adult group, adult community, etc.) or one of the attendees who may also be interested in playing. If the GM doesn’t own the books required for the game, and another member of the group does, see if they’d be willing to loan the books to the GM. If they’re not willing, or no one owns the books yet, move on to the next step.

This step is important. If you do not own the books go out and buy them. Do. Not. Download them from any website that offers them for “free” unless that website is the publisher’s (note: you can download Disciple Gaming Ministry’s Royal Priesthood Roleplaying Game for free because we offer it at no cost). Downloading from an archive site, your friend’s private server, or a “file sharing” group is piracy, which is stealing. This is something Exodus 20:151 clearly prohibits, so find somewhere legitimate to buy the book(s). Many publishers offer digital-only versions of their game systems for a lower price than the printed books, and others offer a free .pdf if you purchase their books. There are ways to stick within a reasonable budget in a way that also honors God.

So now you have books, players, and a GM. Presumably, you have a space selected either at your church or someone’s house, which means you only need character sheets paper, pencils, and dice. The types of dice will be specified in the game rules, so check the books you bought to confirm what you need. Common dice include a four-sided die, one to four six-sided dice, an eight-sided die, two ten-sided dice2, a twelve-sided die, and a twenty-sided die. Many game companies offer free .pdf downloads of their character sheets so you don’t have to cut the example sheet out of the back of your book(s) to photocopy them, and many companies allow for photocopying of the character sheets for your games. But I recommend printing from .pdf for a better quality.

Of course, if you need help planning and setting up your first few sessions, Disciple Gaming Ministry would love to help. We can also train your church members how to GM a game and lead their group for a long-term campaign.

Other accessories can be added, like maps, miniatures, currency tokens, etc., but these are the essentials. Once you get started, remember to honor God with your game and have fun!

Sources and Notes

1 At Disciple Gaming Ministry, we encourage people to read the Bible using an accurate translation that is also easy to understand. With that being said, the translation we use is the ESV® Bible. The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

2 The ten-sided dice are often called percentile dice because one will be marked 1-10 (though the “10” may be a 0) and the other will be marked with tens (10, 20, 30, etc.), ending in 00 in the “100” spot. A great article explaining how to read these dice as a 100-sided die can be found at https://dicedungeons.com/blogs/inside/how-to-read-d100-roll?srsltid=AfmBOopkdxZbvPxOFs3nK8ldSoF0XAx5xT8LxaSCK9udosTvkgK_GjNn.