Wizards of the Coast and G4 announced today that the D&D developer and resurgent tech TV channel are teaming up to produce the first Actual Play series to air on cable television.
The series, called Dungeons & Dragons Presents: Invitation to Party, will premiere on G4TV later this month and feature a cast of recognizable faces from across the D&D/TRPG community. "G4 was the Nick Fury to our Avengers," says B. Dave Walters, the veteran TRPG storyteller, writer, and game designer who will be the show's Dungeon Master, "they assembled this incredible squad."
The players around the table include internet personality Kassem Gharaibeh (co-founder of Maker Studios), actress Fiona Nova, Indiana Black (perhaps best known as the LoL caster Froskurinn), and TV writer/actor Ify Nwadiwe (who D&D streaming fans may remember from Dimension 20's Bloodkeep mini-series). "I had only known Ify beforehand, but getting to know Kassem, Fiona, and Frosk has been incredible," Walters told IGN. "I think the most interesting thing is the broad spectrum of background and interests everyone brings to the table, and how that's manifested not just in their character choices, but in how they embrace this new way of playing D&D."
According to Walters, the cast's characters will "be pulled in a bunch of very different directions, and still have to find a way to survive...and maybe just become heroes themselves along the way!" The show will be broadcast live on G4's Twitch and YouTube channels on Friday nights, where viewers can interact with the cast and vote on potential story beats, NPC appearances, obstacles, and other prompts for the players and DM to interact with. While it sounds like the majority of audience interaction will take place on Twitch and YouTube, Walters says TV viewers will "still have a hand in the fun," too.
Taking a page out of improv shows from ages past, the series will also encourage the cast to step away from the table to actively play out character interactions in real-time. "This is going to be a very different take on the D&D we all know and love," Walters said. "This show is going to be equal parts TTRPG, LARP, and Improv – actually, reverse that: Improv, TTRPG, and Larp!"
D&D Presents: Invitation to Party's inaugural live stream will be Friday, November 19, 2021 at 6pm ET / 3pm PT and will then be broadcast on G4TV the following Monday (Nov 22) at 9:30pm ET / 6:30pm PT.