D&D General How old were you when you started playing D&D?

[Audiomancer]

I started at the end of 1981, when I got Moldvay Basic set as a Christmas present from my mom, followed quickly by the Expert set and then the AD&D hardcovers. I was 11.

I played up until 2E came out, which was about the time I started college. Then I picked up the game again on a whim when I started hearing positive buzz about 5E.

My group broke up about a year before COVID hit, but now my wife and I are plotting to hook my nieces and nephews (aged 3 to 8) so that the nerdery continues into the next generation.

I turned 51 two weeks ago. When my mom looked up my Amazon wish list to get me a present, she saw the rpg stuff there, and asked, “Are you still into Dungeons & Dragons?!”

Sorry, mom…
(not actually sorry)

 

[glass]

I voted for 13-15, but on reflection I am not sure if I was thirteen or twelve. Either way, it was a touch over three decades ago now.

_
glass.

 

[pogre]

I was 8. Played a game with my cousin, who is 7 years older, after Thanksgiving dinner in 1975. Got the box set O-D&D that Christmas. I turn 54 in a few days.

 

[overgeeked]

The tender age of 8-years-old.

 

[Malmuria]

I got the black box when I was about 10, then the rules cyclopedia!

 

[akr71]

I was probably 8-ish when my dad brought home the Red Box to play with me and my older brother. I'm 50 now, but there was a long time in the 90's, 00's and early 10's where I didn't play and my only exposure to D&D was through video games (Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, Neverwinter Nights).

 

[Oldtimer]

I was 17 when my brown boxed set arrived in the mail.
I'm 64 now.

 

[Burnside]

Started at age 10, in 1986, with the Mentzer Basic red box. Played Basic for a year, then 1E for a year, then 2E came out and switched to that.

Played until age 18, in 1994, then went to college & stopped playing for 23 years (I did play various CRPGs).

Resumed playing at age 41 in February 2017 with 5E. I'm now 45. One of my current players was in my D&D group at age 10 in 1986.

 

[Horacio]

I started some 35 years ago, when I was something like 10 years old...
Then I spent some years doing mostly MERP and Call of Cthulhu , but went back to AD&D some 30 years ago, then a new pause in the last part of 90s, and back to D&D in '99 just before 3e, when I stumbled upon a small 3e news website, from a certain Eric Noah...