6d ago

I Need Help for My Partner

I understand there is an LFG community, but it is dead. If this is not allowed feel free to remove it

My partner finally found a decent group to play DnD online with, but it turns out not all of them are that decent. There is an individual with right leaning views that they are not comfortable playing with. They are absolutely devastated, as they have been wanting to play for years

I'm not asking for a game, or group, but hopefully a community of like-minded individuals for them to be a part of. I don't know the first thing about it, so I come here in desperation to try to cheer my partner up

Edit:

They will be turning 30 this year. They are non-binary, and looking for a safe space from any right-wing politics. They use they/them pronouns and needs somewhere that this will be respected

They have a character and back story if that helps

We are in the Central Time Zone in the U.S.

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My wife runs a large online D&D guild, with games 4-5 nights a week (not that you play in all of them, they just have that many people). They're no strangers to kicking people that cause drama, and they have several trans and non-binary members already.
I will say that they might not be able to bring their character in, as-is, if it's heavily based on "official" D&D lore and sourcebooks. The group has spent 8 years building all their own lore and tuning some homebrew rules and classes. It's mostly built on the 5e foundation, though.
I believe this is where they'd go to apply.
- Thank you so much! I will make sure they look at this. I don't have any clue about any of it, but I'm sure they won't mind starting over if it means they actually get to play

I recommend going to Disboard and then searching for dnd, dnd5e, or avrae, or else finding an invite to the Avrae discord server and looking through the latest posts in its looking-for-community channel (Avrae is a discord bot that helps automate D&D 5e gameplay, so I find it to be a convenient search term--but if ypur partner prefers other systems, Disboard probably has searchable tags for them too). Then just make sure the description also includes LGBTQ+ and you're probably golden (at least in terms of finding a community that is not vitriolic to your partner).
These communities are often "Westmarches" style, where players group up for short events, so the specific group of people playing at any given time rotates. Some servers are primarily focused on being a place to find groups for synchronous play (e.g. over voice chat for a few hours), while others focus on slow asynchronous play-by-post that has participation from each player once or twice per day. Some servers combine the two styles.
Good luck!
- This seems to be the way to go. They already found a server, and I think are putting out an application to join a game. I really can't thank you enough for your help
- Passing this along to my partner, thank you so much!

What timezone are we talking about? Might be helpful for suggestions.
- Central in U.S.
  Thanks for the suggestion!

Some info about your partner? Age maybe? I have a group on discord. That's where I found mine(on a generic social server, but it worked).
- They will be turning 30 this year. They are non-binary, and looking for a safe space from any right-wing politics. They use they/them pronouns and needs somewhere that this will be respected
  As far as I know they have a character and back story if that helps
  Even just your time is appreciated friend, thanks for responding
  
  Characters are typically created after joining a group, as opposed to beforehand. There are uncommon cases where a DM will incorporate a leveled character from another group into their own campaign, but I've yet to hear of this from anyone that I know personally - just that it's happened in the past. You may want to recommend that they hold off on character creation, especially production of core stats, until they're found a new DM.

Tell them to make inquiries to the D&D AL (Dungeons & Dragons Adventurer's League), formerly known as the RPGA (Role Playing Gamer's Association - they may have seen mention of it in promotional materials found alongside D&D 3rd Ed. manuals and other products like Dungeon Magazine, or Dragon Magazine before they stopped publication).
This is assuming that you mean D&D campaigns run online (VOIP, Discord, and/or Foundry), and not the D&D Online MMORPG, of course. Barring that, and taking your unknown geographical location into account, they may also be able to find organized/advertised gaming groups by making the rounds of all of your nearest brick and mortar gaming/comic shops. They're well known as consistent sources for tournament organization for things like Warhammer and Magic: The Gathering as official retailers of said products alongside the D&D content released by Wizards of the Coast.
Tell them that I said good luck as well.
- Thank you so much for all the advice. I will pass it along. I'm not purposefully being vague, I'm just out of my element. I've mentioned elsewhere but we are deep south, and any time we think we've found good people they show their true colors. You would be surprised (or maybe not) how quick someone will argue against their own well being
  Edit: sorry, this is for TTRPG. In person would be fine, but we've been burned so many times now it is hard to want to put yourself back out there. I figure it will be easier to find people online that share our views
  
  Aah, the Deep South makes for a whole different kind of animal where these problems are concerned. The best that I can think of it to network with groups operating IRL out of your nearest large city's gay neighbourhood - odds are better to find parties better aligned to your SO's situation, and much, much less tolerant of the kind of abuse which can be expected in the sticks/country outside of urban centers. If the pair of you aren't urban, there may be a way to connect with players & DMs in the same time zone, if not close enough to play around the table.

Does it need to be online? Do you have a FLGS? Do they have a discord or a community board?
- We are in the deep south. Not many if any safe spaces here, regardless of what people claim

I'm in their time zone, willing to treat people as they prefer to be treated, and don't have a D&D group at the moment. If you guys get a game going, hit me up.
- Thank you! I will let them know

25 comments