Dungeons & Dragons' classification has sometimes befuddled stores in how to place it on shelves. Is it a book? A game? A toy? Some settled on treating it as a board game. That's a classification increasingly obfuscated by the fact that D&D actually spawned several board games.
Why a sand table? Gygax was a wargamer before he helped invent D&D, and sand tables were a malleable form of gaming terrain commonly used for both military strategists and wargamers to easily create maps to scale. Wargaming and its connection to military planning goes as far back as Kriegsspiel, specifically "Free" Kriegsspiel which included a "confidant" analogous to modern game masters. Edward Burnett Tylor made the connection between board games and Kriegsspiel in the June, 1879 edition of Popular Mechanics:
Wesley's Braunstein inspired Arneson's Blackmoor, which in turn inspired Megarry to create the DUNGEON! board game It was originally based off of The Dungeons of Pasha Kada. Jon Peterson explains in Playing at the World:
Is D&D a board game? To the extent that it can require a table and miniatures, it could be. But D&D has moved so far beyond its original roots that a board game is no longer sufficient to encapsulate the D&D experience. Instead, board games have adopted D&D's traits, with their own hit points, level systems, die rolls, and treasure quests. Even though they focus on only one aspect of D&D, adventure board games and their ilk bolster brand awareness for the role-playing game, and that's a good thing.
Technically, a Tabletop Game
Board games share something in common with the original D&D: they both took place on a tabletop. These days, emphasis on "theater of the mind" styles of play don't require a tabletop at all, but early D&D -- itself a direct descendant of Chainmail -- assumed graph paper and miniatures. Both implied that they were centered on a table in front of the players, and co-creator Gary Gygax's games reflected just that, with up to 20 players at his sand table.Why a sand table? Gygax was a wargamer before he helped invent D&D, and sand tables were a malleable form of gaming terrain commonly used for both military strategists and wargamers to easily create maps to scale. Wargaming and its connection to military planning goes as far back as Kriegsspiel, specifically "Free" Kriegsspiel which included a "confidant" analogous to modern game masters. Edward Burnett Tylor made the connection between board games and Kriegsspiel in the June, 1879 edition of Popular Mechanics:
The idea that dungeon crawling is in itself like a board game was not lost on Gygax's peers, who created a board game to mimic dungeon crawling.
The Original D&D Board Game
The first proper D&D-style board game wasn't created from D&D but developed in parallel. Dave Wesely inspired both Dave Arneson and Dave Megarry with his freewheeling Braunstein campaign, which transformed a standard wargame into one with player agency.Wesley's Braunstein inspired Arneson's Blackmoor, which in turn inspired Megarry to create the DUNGEON! board game It was originally based off of The Dungeons of Pasha Kada. Jon Peterson explains in Playing at the World:
DUNGEON! turned dungeon exploration into a competitive board game:
DUNGEON! may have been the first of the D&D-style games, but it certainly wasn't the last.
Modern D&D Board Games
The 4th Edition of D&D has been criticized for its elements that emphasize grid-based combat over role-playing, so it's perhaps no surprise just how much the D&D Adventure Board Games have in common with 4E. Adventure board games, a term Wesley preferred over "role-playing game," were part of the growth of Wizards of the Coast under parent company Hasbro, itself a major producer of popular board games. The WOTC-produced board games, including Castle Ravenloft, Wrath of Ashardalon, and The Legend of Drizzt, each feature common 4th Edition rules such at-will vs daily powers, healing surges, and save-ends effects.Is D&D a board game? To the extent that it can require a table and miniatures, it could be. But D&D has moved so far beyond its original roots that a board game is no longer sufficient to encapsulate the D&D experience. Instead, board games have adopted D&D's traits, with their own hit points, level systems, die rolls, and treasure quests. Even though they focus on only one aspect of D&D, adventure board games and their ilk bolster brand awareness for the role-playing game, and that's a good thing.
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