Dungeons and Dragons’ Popularity Grows—And Science Follows

Science Quickly

Scientific American

Science

4.4 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2025

⏱️ 22 minutes

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Summary

Brennan Lee Mulligan is a professional dungeon master, playing Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), a popular tabletop role-playing game, for audiences online and in person. In January his D&D show on Dropout.tv, Dimension 20, played a live game at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The show—and the game—experienced a resurgence during the COVID pandemic. Now researchers are diving into D&D science, showing how the game and the togetherness it creates can benefit mental health. Rachel Feltman chats with Lee Mulligan about the success of Dimension 20 and the psychological and cultural need the game may serve for its players. Recommended reading: LARPing Made Me a Stronger Person. It Can Do the Same for You, Too Find the Perfect Game to Play with This Interactive Quiz E-mail us at sciencequickly@sciam.com if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter. Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman. Our show is edited by Alex Sugiura with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:52.8	Last April, I spent a harrowing hour of my life trying to get tickets to a show at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1:00.9	I walked away with the cortisol levels of someone who'd just been hunted for sports and feeling lucky that I'd only spent like twice what I'd expected to.
1:10.0	And sure, that's a pretty typical story these days.
1:13.1	But I wasn't trying to snag tickets to see Taylor Swift or Beyonce.
1:17.7	I was competing with tens of thousands of people to go watch other people play Dungeons and Dragons.
1:38.3	Woo! play Dungeons and Dragons. No, I did not think that would happen. I did not think that I would be DMing at Madison Square Garden.
1:41.3	How could you imagine of the goal 10 years ago?
1:45.3	I'm like walking past Madison Square Garden to hit up another frozen yogurt shop for free samples
1:50.5	because I can't afford lunch.
1:52.1	I'm like, one day, baby, I'll be in there playing D&D.
1:56.9	You count on it, bet on that.
1:58.6	No, I would never have anticipated.
2:00.8	That was Brennan Lee Mulligan, a professional dungeon master or DM.
	...

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