>>When I was evaluated for autism, one of the, the huge deficits they had for me charge at everything was imaginative thought.

Is it true that I would line up toys and books as a child?

Yes.

Is it true that my imaginative play probably looked different?

Yeah.

But what's great about a game like Dungeons and Dragons, other tabletop roleplay games is you have a framework, right?

There's, there's an adventure, there's a quest, there's some limits, there's some bounds, and just having that little bit of support then opens up the, the creativity.

>>Oh, that's, hello.

One of our number, unfortunately couldn't make it last minute.

Mom was game to jump in and play d and d.

>>I've seen Christopher play >>Before online.

Yeah.

So we just came up with a character, you know, two hours ago.

But yeah, she was Game.

>>Dungeons and Dragons is a collaborative storytelling game.

You're getting together with a group of people and imagining a world where you are some version of a hero.

>>So what's, what's the party's vibe?

I heard archeologist.

Oh, sure.

So my character's name is Veil and he is the type of archeologist that like did really bad in school.

He's just going in >>And touching rocks.

I'm playing Warlock.

She's also very much running off of vibes.

>>This is definitely what Roach thinks he looks like.

He looks like he believes he's descended from powerful trolls, and so he is trying to get glory for goblins who are sort of traditionally overlooked and ignored and things like that.

So I, that's kind of like, really?

>>That is amazing.

>>Make as much noise.

>>You read about what are autistic people like, and then you start drawing a boundary around who you can be.

So there is something really nice about Dungeons and Dragons, letting you be someone else for a little while and go, I do have some personal charisma, or I can like talk my way out of a weird situation.

>>You dodge outta the way gracefully.

>>Thank you very much.

You get to walk in someone else's shoes, metaphorically, or fly with their wings.

The, the scariest thing about Dungeons and Dragons is that usually the Dungeon Master describes, you know, a setting and then looks at you and says, what do you wanna do?

And you can try to do anything >>If - You're totally brand new, it can be hard.

Can >>I do an acid splash on that thing?

Ooh, probably.

What's the range on that?

>>Dungeons and Dragons really exploded during the pandemic.

A lot of autistic people were even more socially isolated than the average person.

It wasn't just a hobby or an activity.

It was a lifeline for a lot of us.

This is episode 14.

I've asked the d and d professors, a lot of people in this little group here at Virginia Tech wanted to play d and d. You could play it on Zoom.

It was a great activity for this except for the fact that it's not terribly cognitively accessible.

>>Looking at things in the book is really poor D and d, >>This is a traditional character sheet.

Very, very tiny print.

Lots and lots of words, all black and white.

There were some very small interventions that we could make so that people could play this without changing any of the rules.

We made three tools with a small library grant and then we realized, well, we really need three more to decide.

We've got the character sheet.

This is the stuff that you usually need when you're playing your character, if you're exploring or doing social interaction.

The spell cards and the ability cards and our decision guide for when we have those moments where the DM says, what do you wanna do next?

And your mind goes blank.

So it's more just to kind of trigger conversation with the DM instead of giving you a list of like, this is what your character's good at.

The great thing about what we're trying to do with Open the Gates gaming is that you tell stories together.

You look at things from a different perspective.

>>Your pig goes to slam its body into this enormous fire creature.

>>It's very empowering, not just for autistic people, but especially for us.

We are at the heart of a lot of cool things that happen, a lot of advancements.

All of these different dreams that we can have might start at a gaming table or might just start by goodness, getting to know other people.

Realizing that you're not the only one dealing with problems.

It's not a one.

We're also the one that has the solution.