Despite their popularity, video games may not be challenging or creative enough.

Enter Dungeons & Dragons, a fantasy storytelling game that allows the players to become heroes.

Every Tuesday afternoon, groups of JHop students gather in the journalism classroom to play Dungeons & Dragons.

It’s a chance to spend time with friends and it’s easy for new members to get into the fun, although it may be helpful to research the game beforehand and come to the first meeting ready to play.

Club sponsor Cameron Lemery provides game rules and character sheets.

Mr. Lemery – who is an avid Dungeons and Dragons player himself and a former dungeon master – said he was motivated to reboot the club at JHop last year based on the appeal to help scholars create fantasy worlds.

The game’s lessons on problem solving, communication, and math can help scholars in the classroom. And there’s one other bonus, he said.

“But also giving students a safe space who want to be able to…spend time with their friends and venture in the fantasy world they create,” he said.

New member Sophia Muscari, an eighth grader, said she joined the club to meet new people and so far she likes it.

“I think it’s going to be something that I’m interested in,” she said.

Club veteran Lily Wells, also an eighth grader, said she mostly plays D&D outside of school and thought it would be fun to join the club at JHop.

A member since sixth grade, Lily said the hit TV show Stranger Things may be a major force in boosting the game’s popularity.

“Definitely, it influenced me,” she said. “I think that’s where a lot of people got introduced to D&D.”

Join The Club

Dungeons & Dragons club meets at 4 p.m. every Tuesday in 5-110. Experience is not necessary.