Originally Published 01 April, 2026

I Was Wrong About D&D 5e...

This past weekend, I had an opportunity to play some Dungeons and Dragons as a player. While I’m generally a forever DM, it’s nice to get the opportunity to take a break from those duties. An old friend invited me and a couple of other people I didn’t know for a one-shot in Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.

In the past, I have voiced the incorrect opinion countless times on why I mistakenly thought D&D 5e wasn’t a good game, or at least why I couldn’t appreciate it’s grandeur. I used to think of the game as a bland and soulless corporate product with all of its edges shorn off to appeal to a newer mass audiences raised on video games, which was somehow contrived by the designers to create one of the least supportive system for choice-driven games, and whose sole purpose was to be a vehicle through which Wizards of the Coast could sell more and more power-crept expansions, fringe-rule splatbooks and revised character options, which turn the game into a microtransaction-infused hellscape and, paired with the success the system saw through Stranger Things and Critical Role, channels players into wildly different and frequently contradictory assumptions, all of which culminates to an inelegant hack-and-slash narrative game that fails spectacularly on both counts, while also poorly succeeds to even be a beginner-friendly entry into RPGs, nor in any way captures the elegance of the original incarnations of the game despite desperately trying to appeal to those players, and overall isn’t something I had any amazing experience with when it was the only game I played. But now that my way of thinking has been fixed, I can appreciate how terribly wrong this mindset is.

This friend threw me on a text chain with a bunch of other people for us to create our characters. He held a couple of stipulations, though. No human characters were allowed, and we started at level 4. I decided that I would try something different from usual and embrace the best designed character class ever made in D&D: the warlock.

As a brief overview, Warlocks differ from other magic-users in that they have a-one-size-fits-all spell system. They forsake the flexibility, decision-making and almost every trade-off required for wizard types, in favor of raw power and the ability to fit every roll in combat. However, in a brilliant move, the DM dashed my dreams by stating that another player picked warlock first.

“Why can’t we both be one?” I foolishly proclaimed. “We can fill similar roles and try to compliment each other in battle while having redundancy in case one of us gets taken out of action. Besides, there are so many different subclasses that we surely can feel unique from one another.” My reasoning was nothing short of fundamentally flawed.

The DM spoke thus: “Yes, but you would be eroding his character’s design space. You must pick another.”

I decided to choose to play as the rogue, and started making my character. I am pretty familiar with the character creation rules, but it always takes me a long time to create a character. Luckily I had the foresight to ensure my rogue readily prepared well in advance.

The day arrived and the five of us sat down to play. Unfortunately, one of the players forgot to make his character. The DM handed him a blank sheet, and he started scribbling on it. I turned to the DM and wrongly asked him to set the scene.

“We have to wait until he’s done with his character.”

“He can listen, right? Surely we’re not going to just sit here.” I looked upon my fellow players, rightly garnering no sympathy. “Whatever. It will only take like 5 minutes, right?”

I sat listlessly skimming my copy of the Players’ Handbook. Looking up, I saw that the dungeon master and one of the players were on their phones, another stacked an impressive tower of dice, while the other scribbled away at his character sheet. When I checked the clock, it showed that 40 minutes had passed while he was cross-checking spells, abilities and die rolling for good stats. By the time the character was complete, the dice-stacking player had seemingly fallen asleep while everyone else sighed a collective breath of relief. The final party consisted of a half-orc fighter, a tabaxi warlock (cat people), a gnome bard and my elvish rogue. Thus, we started the game.

We were in a rural farming community when suddenly, a scream rang out. We go to investigate and encounter a dead body, and a woman standing horrified. She tells us that her cousin Darrow Carpenter was just killed in the middle of the street. She suspects that it was his childhood rival, Lucifer Melfoy. She knows that he has a hideout near the town’s graveyard.

“Why don’t we go to the tavern and see if anyone knows anything about Lucifer Melfoy.” I suggested.

“Ummmm… There’s no tavern in town” The DM looked more than a little flustered.

“okay, is there a town commons or something?”

“No. There’s nothing like that. It’s just a normal medieval town.”

“What if we went to the graveyard.” The fighter suggested.

“That’s a great idea!” The warlock proclaimed.

We get to the graveyard and the DM says this:

“As you walk into the graveyard, you notice that the sun glints off one of the headstones. As you get closer, you notice that it says ‘Here rests Peter Carpenter.’ Further away, you see a small shack sitting at the edge of the graveyard.”

“Let’s go look at that shack” The fighter said.

We agree and see that it’s barred shut with a large and ornate lock.

“Can I break it?” I ask the DM.

“ummmmm… roll a strength check”

“17”

“No, you can’t do that. It’s magically locked and you have to find a key.”

“Let’s just look the shack. It’s probably not anywhere else.”

After a long time of aimlessly searching, the DM finally caved and told us that the key is buried in Darrow’s Father’s grave, not anywhere near the shack and that we were stupid for not figuring it out. We headed there, grabbed shovels and started digging up the grave. We released the casket from the earth and dumped it out. Darrow father’s skeleton had a chain around his neck with a solid gold key. For laughs, the Warlock draws a pentagram in the dirt, while the bard and him start throwing the bones and the two of them danced a tango. Suddenly a mustachioed town guard comes up and responds to our definitely not suspicious activities.

Bard: I tell the guard that we’re just pedestrians out for a late-night stroll.

Warlock: Yeah! We’re just minding our own business.

DM: Well that is pretty obviously incorrect, right?

Bard: I rolled a 16. Oh wait, plus my proficiency; 19.

DM: Well, never mind then. You successfully convince him that nothing suspicious is going on, and he turns to leave.

Bard: As he leaves, I use my sleight of hand skill to steal his mustache… Ooh, an 18!

DM: Umm, well, you take the mustache off his face without him noticing. But that’s it-

Bard: I roll to seduce the guard! Nat 20.

DM: Well, I can’t argue with that.

We all stood in awe at that moment. There was no truer representation of the heart of D&D — something so incredibly out-of-nowhere, unrealistic and blatantly cartoonish happening just like that. It brought tears of exultation to the eyes of all who witnessed it.

The key opened the shack, which contained a staircase leading down in the graveyard, and we readily dove inside the first proper dungeon of the game. We went down the stairs and opened a door. On the other side were a handful of skeletons.

“Wait, I want to sneak up on them” The warlock proclaimed after we burst through the door.

“Well… okay sure. You don’t burst the door and instead wait outside.” The DM flips through the player’s handbook for a bit. “Does anyone know where the stealth rules are?”

“I think they’re in the rogue class section.” The fighter’s player said

“Why would they be there?” Warlock added

“Rogues sneak, don’t they?”

“I think they’re under exploration.” I chimed in

“No, they’re under abilities” The bard proclaimed

This went on for about 15 minutes before we decided to rewind time to before the door was opened. Knowing the skeletons were in the room, we all prepared to launch a stealth attack at the skeletons. We won surprise and were able to gain the upper hand in the fight.

We all rolled initiative and I was able to go first. I used my movement to run into battle and rolled to attack the skeleton. The die plopped on the table, turning up with a natural 1.

“Well, I guess I missed. Your turn.”

“No, you have a critical failure now… Hang on.” The DM describes: “Well, you trip as you run up to the skeleton, and fall on your sword. You take… 5 damage.”

“So you’re telling me that there’s a 5% chance every time I swing my sword, there’s a chance for control of my own character to be wrested away from me and for him to do something completely out of character for a lithe and canny rogue? I’ve never heard of a better system!”

The rest of the players smiled and played out their turns. The fighter ran up, attacked one of the skeletons, then used action surge to attack another. Both dropped to piles of bones. Then, the warlock used his Eldritch Blast cantrip to obliterate another one of the skeletons, before moving behind a pillar for the end of his turn. Lastly, the bard cast Cloud of Daggers, to finish the rest of them off.

After about an hour of combat, we had dealt with the skeletons. We chose to do a short rest so that we can regroup. After the short rest, we headed through a doorway to the north. We see a treasure chest in the middle of the room. Nothing else except a door to the East.

“What are your guy’s passive perception scores?”

We told the DM. “This is obviously a trap” I said, and the other players concurred.

“Nooo. It’s totally fine.”

We elected to walk past the chest and made our way across the room. Suddenly the floor falls out beneath us.

“You fell for my trap! I knew you’d think that the chest!

I was struck with awe and admiration at this trap, that had no foreshadowing, and removed our agency from the start. I had never experienced something more enjoyable.

After the floor fell out, we found ourselves in another room. Blocking the way was a closed portcullis.

“I think we should try to lift it.” The bard suggests.

Fighter: “Alright then. I roll a strength check to lift the portcullis. 12”

DM: You failed

Fighter: “I’ll try again; 8”

DM: Fail

Me: I’ll try; 11

DM: Doesn’t work.

Warlock: “Let me go. 15”

DM: Nope.

We all tried to succeed at lifting the gate, but it took 9 rolls until the Bard got a lucky 17 to lift the gate. We go through to the next room and find a man in black robes with greasy blonde hair holding a wand.

“You fools! I, Lucifer Melfoy, killed Darrow Carpenter and I’m going to get away with it, as soon as I deal with you!” All of a sudden, he turns invisible. Since he’s invisible, gets surprise and attacks the fighter with advantage because no one can see him.

In normal combat rounds, the Warlock rolls the highest initiative. He casts Darkness into the room. Then, his player piped up. “Since darkness makes everything invisible, it negates the advantage from Lucifer’s invisibility!”

DM: “I’m pretty sure that’s not how that works”

Fighter: “No, I think it is. I saw a YouTube Short on it.”

DM: Just because you both can’t see each other doesn’t mean that makes everyone easy to hit.

The Warlock pulls out the PHB. “On page 173, it states: “If circumstances cause a roll to have both advantage and disadvantage, you care to have neither of them, and you roll 1d20.”

DM: Alright then… I guess that works.

The rest of us sat there in awe, stunned at the player’s genius play. Obviously, the explicit rules of the game should come before any attempt of recreating real-life. And the Warlock’s killer rhetoric in convincing the DM how to play the game was nothing short of masterful.

Now that we had regained the upper hand, the rest of us were able to promptly finish off Lucifer.

“No! You’ll never get away with this!” Lucifer exclaims as he dies.

We leave through a door to the west, which leads to a room holding bags of gold coins.

“You all gain a level!” The DM proclaimed. “Also, we’re going to end things here.

I left the night feeling as though my perception had finally been corrected, and everything about this experience informs me that D&D 5th Edition is the greatest RPG that has ever been made. I will no longer encourage other people to play any other RPG, because why would you ever need to?

Stay tuned while I completely shift my world-view and content strategy.

This blog is, and always will be, 42% human-generated.