What is D&D?
Dungeons and Dragons (usually shortened to D&D or DnD) is a game which can be played with none of the usual boardgame set piece necessities. Any group can play with nothing more than some pens and paper, the rules (available online), and some dice (which are also available online and are a built-in feature of DnD Beyond character sheets).
Someone is the Dungeon Master (DM) and everyone else is a player. The DM sets the scene and tells most of the story, where encounters with friends, foes, and monsters, will happen. Players (and the DMs' characters) create their characters on character sheets (templates for which can be found online or even made and kept online). Character sheets for monsters are generally preset (found online) but can be improvised by the DM as well, to fit your story better.
For further information on playing Dungeons and Dragons, DnD Beyond has good starter information.
What is Paramore?
Paramore is the world setting for the D&D stories in which we have been playing. Paramore is the name of the continent and of the capitol city. The name of the former capitol city is Metallica, but it was tragically lost in 1,000 A.S. - a story which you will hear about in Band of Bards.
Other places of note are the mining town of Goldvein, the coastal village of Blowfish Bay, the eastern town of Bowie by the Dark Woods, and the Northern Wastes mountain range in the north. The continent has one university in the south, Twilight University, and a vast and unexplored desert which extends south.
About us!
Our Dungeon Master is Ryan. He masterfully crafts the maps and stories we play. His characters are dynamic and monsters are sneaky. He created Paramore for us to play around in and save from the bad guys. Many of the players are also dungeon masters of other games. This can be helpful to Ryan when certain niche topics appear and need figuring out; also relieving for me, and other new players, to have experienced players to help explain topics succinctly and understandably. D&D has a large rule set, so a group of all new players & DM would be slow going at first, but it's usually pretty simple to follow.
Players have rolled in and out over time. Lyndon, Sam, Jamie, and Tim, have been the longest playing, along with myself, but a few others have dipped their toes along the way. We've played a few campaigns (stories) now and Ryan likes us to explore new areas of D&D, so he has a rule: In every campaign of his which we play, we're not allowed to replay a specific type of character class. For example, my first character was a ranger (an archer with nature-based skills), but I have now also played a monk (a hands-on fighter), a rogue (who's sneaky and usually a good thief), and a sorcerer (one of the magic-based classes).
We usually play every week, but not everyone is available each time, so we make up fun reasons why their character is missing - they got real sleepy, they knocked themself out walking into something, they got mad and locked themself in their room... or they got glitched and follow us around in a T-pose without being able to speak. Occasionally, Ryan will use their character in a curveball way and create a story point around it. Anything is possible in D&D.
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To start with me, I feel I'm good to play with, friendly, witty and generally kind, and have definitely loved my time playing with the rest of the players in the evolving group that has been those who played the several campaigns in Ryan's setting of Paramore.
Continuing into characters, some of my favourite characters to have played in any game I've been in, both in RP and mechanically, have been the wood elf, Teldrin Rootfoot: a reserved man who, through being mislead and betrayed, became an estranged and presumed dead individual in his home nation, leaving a family behind that he secretly keeps a track on to assure the promises those in power made to him were upheld, would find himself within Paramore, seeking himself in a sense, and finding those who he would come to call his new family.
The other character of note was Grondle “Limbless” Gervona, a chaotic evil bugbear who happened to have aligning goals with the party, and an amulet of proof against Detection and Location. He was carefree, easy to use violence and brute force to solve all issues before him or the party, and more than willing to steal, kill, or betray those whom he didn't personally care for or wouldn't benefit him. I think my favourite part of playing him was that, due to how he treated the party and his general laissez-faire attitude to things not directly concerning him or his “spirits”, as well as a kindness to nature and animals, no one thought to doubt his motives or ideals until the last session, in which he made contact with and then wore “the talisman of ultimate evil”, which basically atomises anyone who isn't of an evil alignment, and didn't suffer any consequences. The reaction from the rest of the group was worth the long play, both in character reactions as well as player reactions to not having even guessed it could be the case over what I think was a 2 year campaign.
And finally in terms of the setting, it was certainly fun to play in and roam around within, I feel it ultimately was more like Ryan knew loosely what was in certain places and was throwing rails down in front of the train to keep the groups vaguely headed in a particular direction and hurriedly making specific things when he knew what we'd be doing the next week. The naming scheme was pretty neat, and some of the lore of the world (especially how we as players influenced it as the setting progresses campaign to campaign).
Fun times all round!