The reasons why Dungeons & Dragons is absolutely NOT a "nerd" game

Everyone knows nerd people love fantasy stuff. Much more at ease among elves and spells than in a mall (exactly like me), these shy, very casual-wearing creatures often live in fantastic worlds where they can be super-cool heroes with no glasses nor fat. Someone call them geek, and this word is often related to people with a flair for informatic knowledge as well - since virtual worlds and videogames are usually the two halves of the same need to escape. In general, they need a lot of time to get used to standard relationships between human beings, and that's why the role play games (RPGs), whose the most famous one is obviously Dungeons & Dragons (fantasy stuff), are often cherished by these artists of imaginary life. 

Maybe you don't play D&D just because you haven't got a social life, but because you've got a serious one. Source: funnyjunk.com

BUT: let's explain why Dungeons & Dragons, which is basically the only RPG I played (seamlessly) for many years (and I've been a wonderful Dungeon Master for most of the time - cough cough -), it's NOT a game for nerds; to be more precise: you must NOT be a nerd to live totally the real, difficult pleasure this great game can provide to a group of people being in good vibes with each other, insofar as it is played with the proper means and spirit. The feeling of achievement and satisfaction such a game can provide has NOT to be related to your nerdoid skills. I'm talking about D&D just because it is the game I know the most, but I guess I'd express a similar opinion about other simulative RPGs I'm a little acquainted with, like Vampires: The Masquerade or Warhammer: Dark Heresy.

First of all: there are many types of nerds, but here, whenever I'll type nerd, I'll mean someone who always interprets reality in terms of data, bonuses, technical names, numbers, tactics. Someone obsessed with the technical aspect of any games (Magic is one of the most common field teeming with nerd minds). "Burnt brains" are the kinds of people I'm dealing with here, and they're usually the ones using games to avoid life's convolutions. This type of nerds is often not very confrontational. 

When a fantasy setting is displayed, a creative mind thinks about the mistery and the history of its magic environment; the nerd thinks about standard terms like tank, buffer, party, dodging, loot, feats etc., words which, given their technical meaning, remained exactly the same in other languages (sometimes with very funny adaptations). The "burnt one" doesn't realize the pleasure of living in another world with some friends, but yearns for victory and lots of EXP points; therefore, a D&D campaign led by nerd people is an odd mess made of battles and numbers and cunning cheats to get stronger and stronger.

Being a DM means living a second life. No: it means living many. Source: nerdsourced.com

Now: What I think is that when you play this game your fighting/destruction/I-must-win-and-conquer ability is not what really matters. Come on, you're an entirely different person in a totally different world; you have special powers, you're from another race, you can travel throughout beautiful lands: would you really think just about your gold coins and your next spell levels? The fact is: if you really care about the beauty of this game and the huge expensive tomes it is described in, you already know you CANNOT really win here, nor lose. You can just run a good or a bad game. You won't be necessarily a VIP, and your character won't be necessarily interested in becoming a VIP.

The typical crash the door, kill the monsters, take the loot, buy more powerful stuff, enjoy your EXP points method is a really nice entertainment in many videogames, either from the D&D saga or not. There's plenty of virtual RPGs where you do this all the time (I'll never get how some people fell in love with Diablo), alone or with many companions, and many players, as I said above, play D&D exactly that way, since they expect to see their characters's skills grow up as quickly as possible. Waiting for the "level up excitement", a lot of burnt-minded people just struggle to kill enemies without building a multi-shaded personality. 

The core of what I'm saying is that in order to enjoy completely his/her job a DM needs not only a particular type of playing characters (PC), but a particular type of people, someone who can keep the metagame to the minimum level. Metagame means the ensemble of terms and attitudes which debunk the fiction of the game unrevealing its technical, mathematical frame. Example: if, during a battle against a hydra, you say something like "Buff me mate, I'm going to tank" you're doing metagame: in such a situation, you are supposed to think about the simplest way to save your and your companions' life. The very beauty of this game is that it is not supposed to be considered a game all the time, exactly in the same way an actor/actress is not supposed to remind the audience he/she's acting.

Having some fights is absolutely necessary to build any party's identity. Source: tribality.com

In certain occasions, jokes are a nice way to break the ice or make the atmosphere more relaxed; but it is quite frustrating when the players don't really care about the details of the ancient elven city they're in, or the terrible story of the cursed swamp, or the solemn words of the worried major. Players are supposed to shut up most of the time, because if they lived these situations for real, they would do so. Striving for "the game" can make many people forget about the fact everything in D&D, even the simplest dialogue, is part of the game, exactly like in real life, where many kinds of things, even the most boring ones, define what we are. 

Let's tell the truth: the real nerd is often a little opinionated, and they're rarely quiet while recollecting a quotation from The Lord of the Rings or Twin Peaks; if their character is a warrior, they'll be a super warrior, if wizard, a super wizard; they'll never dare to create a warrior who's got a flair for cooking, or a wizard affected by aracnophobia; they need stock super-cool feats, not personalities.

D&D is the game of life, because its system is a perfect mixture of natural abilities and casual events, exactly like in real life. I think no RPG can be more realistic. Life is not like Skyrim or Lineage: your D&D character is limited by conditions of birth, wealth, nature, and cannot just wander and fight because it's fun; he or she is risking their life, and needs a proper reason to do that. "Becoming stronger" is a good reason only if the character really considers strenght important because of their background. For the same reason, a character is not supposed to have giant horns or claws, neither a red or scaled skin, just because these things are cool.

By allowing the players to create any kind of character a DM builds a helter-skelter campaign where anything, with no reason, is possible; namely, absolutely not like in real life. Fun will not last for long, because when everything is possible you have no reason to struggle. Limits must be put, restrictions must be told: you cannot decide many things about your life, that's why D&D must not allow you to decide anything; if you're looking for total freedom, play a videogame, which, having no restrictions, allows you to be totally disconnected by the rest of the world while venting your frustration in front of a screen; this is much simpler, of course. D&D is a social game, because you have to interact properly with other people, not using just standard answers. Using fantasy is much harder than using numeracy, and that's why this game requires creative individuals.

Should all of us be PCs created in another dimension, how boring this game would be. Source: pinterest

 
So: next time you feel like laughing at this game, just think about the meaning of the word nerd and the peculiarity of D&D. If you asked me if I've ever felt ridiculous while playing in an imaginary world with imaginary characters, I'd answer yes; but I could also ask an actor/actress the same question, or an energy drink promoter. Only someone living intensely can play this game intensely, without being in a hurry, without talking too much or too rarely. I have no reason to feel "nerder" than an actor/actress or a Softair sniper, since fiction makes our life richer and more beautiful, especially if we live it together with some friends. 

So life goes: there are variables, there are costants; accidents, catastrophes. We don't know anything, we cannot be sure about anything. And the reason I love this game is that it reproduces life, without denying it. It's not just about fighting, but also about why you fight. Every single action you're meant to do is translated in a die; you cannot be sure about the aftermath, you just know your probabilities. And whereas some of your actions are completely up to you, many aspects of your story are just decided by your destiny; this is something difficult to explain to a modern age videogamer. There are too many pictures, especially because of videogames, surrounding us and reminding us the difference between this and a fantasy world; but around a D&D table, most of the details you love thinking about are up to your personal imagination, namely, the depth of your feelings.

According to this standpoint, D&D is more than a game, and that's why a "standard" nerd, namely a person who just looks for games, cannot really embrace its beauty: to appreciate a proper D&D experience, you don't have to be a gamer nor an actor, but a gaming actor, an acting gamer - and isn't this exactly the funniest method to play life? So many times we've got the feeling everything is determined by some celestial dice, and so many times we suppose everything is up to us; the only problem with real life is we cannot complain with any DM.

A map of Faerun, the most famous D&D campaign setting: lots of novels and videogames have been set here, and you cannot even imagine how big it is... Source: forgottenrealms.wikia.com