Thread by @AlexandraErin

The lack of an actual on-ramp product for D&D since the 90s has been something that has weighed on me before. Back in the 4E days when I mentioned this on the then-official forums, I got a chorus of boos from people who think it's *better*, if not *necessary*, to be inducted.

https://twitter.com/smolrobots/status/1397184471284256775

I was from a small town that didn't have a hobby store, I couldn't drive, and if my siblings and I hadn't (mostly) figured out what RPGs were and how to run them ourselves, I would never have gotten into the hobby.

And the kind of starter kit products that proliferated around the 80s and 90s really helped a lot there.

I think 5E has a good half-step towards this in having a "basic rules" packet that is free for download and about the level of complexity and completeness of the starter packs of yesteryear, but it's not as solidly oriented into "get yourself playing".

For my money, the best beginner DM product that Hasbrizards of the Coast has put out? The Stranger Things D&D Boxed Set. You want to know how to run a game and you have no idea? Get that along with the core rulebooks.

The adventure that comes prepackaged with the Stranger Things boxed set is presented as if it were a small child's homebrewed adventure with notes to himself about how to keep things moving and what to do if the players get stuck.

So while it's not exactly an instruction kit for creating an adventure, it perhaps gives a better sense of what one is and how to run it than most prepackaged adventures do, even ones intended as a tutorial.

I would say no? Like, the references to the show will just go over your head, but the D&D rules are just D&D rules and the adventure is just a D&D adventure with Stranger Things monsters.

https://twitter.com/AnaMardoll/status/1397195260451770378

Like, even if you don't know who any of the kids are supposed to be, the hand-drawn monster illustrations are still going to be equally charming or not to you.

Here's a thread from a couple Christmases ago, when I got it.

https://twitter.com/AlexandraErin/status/1210242415250030592