What Exactly Is a D&D Duet?

Druidry and Lore

Introduction

Hello duet-ing friends, and welcome to episode one of Druidry & Lore, a D&D Duet podcast that explores themes of fantasy, folklore, and adventure!

My name is Beth Ball, and I’m a game designer and fantasy author specializing in atmospheric one-on-one adventures for 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons and in immersive, character-rich epic fantasy novels.

I’m also one of the two writers behind D&D Duet! In case you’re unfamiliar, D&D Duet creates adventures and advice for creating a whole world, just for two. You’ll find these adventures and advice on our blog, dndduet.com.

But with this podcast, we’re casting a slightly wider net. Some episodes will be how-to heavy, exploring the ins and outs of duet gaming. But in others, we’ll look at fantasy more broadly, what I’ve come to think of as a combination of druidry and lore: celebrating the magic and potentiality of the natural world, embracing the power of storytelling, and weaving together new stories and legendary adventures.

In this episode, we’ll look into what a D&D Duet is and why we’ve decided to start a podcast about it.

I’m so happy we’re on this journey together! Let’s dive in.

Episode Sponsor

Each episode of Druidry & Lore is sponsored by our amazing patrons in the Story Conclave over on Patreon! If you’d like to support the podcast, head over to patreon.com/groveguardianpress, where our patrons have access to our library of duet adventures and fantasy novels in addition to lots of bonus content from the Storyverse!

The Episode

So in the first part of today's episode, we'll talk about what a game of duet or one-on-one D&D is, who I am, and why I’ve started a podcast on fantasy, folklore, and duets!

First things first: What is a D&D duet? I'm so glad you've asked! Basically it's a game of Dungeons and Dragons with one player and one DM/dungeon master. (You may also hear Game Master, and I’m becoming increasingly fond of Storyteller.)

And speaking of terms, there are a couple of different terms for this style of play. Some people call it one-on-one D&D, others D&D duet, two-person D&D, two player D&D, and sometimes solo D&D. You'll hear me use all of these terms except for the last two.

When referring to this particular two-person style of play, there's a separate branch of D&D and other RPGs that involves just one person. In these, you’re functionally DM-ing for yourself, similar to a “choose your own adventure” or litRPG. That's also called solo D&D, and I reserved that title specifically for that particular playing style, because otherwise I think it gets kind of confusing, but you are of course welcome to call it whatever you would like.

As long as you have one person who wants to be the guide through the narrative and someone else who wants to play the main character for said narrative, you're all set for one-on-one D&D!

We’ll talk in episode two about how our duet game got started, which I hope will help you if you’re wanting to start playing with a friend or partner but haven’t jumped in yet.

Now, who am I and why am I talking to you about this?

As I said in the introduction, my name is Beth Ball and I'm a narrative designer and fantasy author. A little over three years ago, all the way back in January of 2019, my husband, Jonathan and I launched dndduet.com, a site specifically for one-on-one D&D, where we provide adventures and advice for creating a whole world, just for two.

But our home duet game, of course, started before then, and in the months leading up to starting our blog, Jonathan and I kept seeing people asking for help with playing D&D one-on-one, either with a friend, a partner, or a family member, and while they would receive some advice and recommendations of resources, they were just as likely for someone to say, “You really need to find a group;” “D&D is a group game;” “Just play a two-person RPG;” or some iteration of that, which I really didn’t find to be very helpful.

Jonathan would see this and tell me about it and mention this website, rpgduet.com, that was super helpful and covered so many ideas for how to play D&D as a pair. So finally I said, “okay, show me this website.” And that was when we learned that rpgduet.com didn’t exist.

Of course you know what happened next! We talked it over and decided to create it for ourselves, and dndduet.com was born.

And it’s been such a whirlwind since! In those first months, even that first year, I never could have imagined all the things that D&D would open up for me, and I really hope you find that to be the case for you too. When I first started playing, I was struggling with depression and anxiety in a stressful part of my PhD program, and D&D provided an amazing outlet for me to process through that.

I also wrote so much for our duet game—ephemera, character diaries, things like that—that I found the inspiration to undertake my lifelong goal of writing a novel, the first of which, Buried Heroes, I published in 2020!

Writing a weekly blog post and publishing adventures that people enjoyed was a huge part of the impetus behind the realization of that dream, and one of my favorite things that’s happened since has been other authors approaching me and saying that our work has inspired them to write!

But before we jump forward into episode two, I want to talk for a second about why we've started a podcast and why now. You’ll find lots of advice about duet gaming on dndduet.com, but I know that not everyone has time to sit down and read a blog post.

I also love podcasts and there are several that I look forward to listening to every week. It is one of my favorite ways of staying up to date with information in the world, especially in niche areas of interest.

This is not an actual-play podcast, though there are lots of those floating around the interwebs! If you’d like to watch us play, check out our YouTube channel, Grove Guardian Press, and look for Tales of Eldura.

I also want to tell you that this podcast is sponsored by our amazing patrons who have been asking for us to start a podcast for a while now. So patrons, thank you! Jonathan and I are so grateful for your support every month without which this podcast wouldn't have come into being.

I am hoping that in some future episodes, Jonathan will be able to join me, but for the most part, I’ll be your guide through the various topics. If you just can’t get enough of my voice, you can find me on my other podcast, The Storyverse of Verdigris, which explores my epic fantasy fiction!

In episode two, we’ll look at how mine and Jonathan’s duet got started and cover some best practices for convincing a duet partner to take the plunge with you.

Future episodes will cover topics like adjusting combat, tweaking your PC, researching encounters and building campaigns, RP best practices, co-creating a world and more. I’m also hoping to share updates from our home duet game. Right now we’re in a double-rogue campaign, and our characters are exploring the Shadowlands and trying to assassinate an empress, so that’s super exciting!

All the Links!

If you'd like to support the podcast, join us in the Story Conclave on Patreon!

Check out our adventures and advice on D&D Duet! (Be sure to visit the shop to start your own adventures!)

And you'll find Beth's epic fantasy fiction—inspired by our duet adventures—here! (We recommend starting with Buried Heroes where you'll meet Iellieth and Marcon, our first two characters, who I allude to in the episode.)

Finally, we'd love for you to join our community, the Circle of Story! You'll even get a free 5e adventure!