I don’t know if it’s because of the ubiquity of the streaming service, but occasionally a Netflix property will end up being such a big hit that it sparks interest in an element of the show or movie. Kpop Demon Hunters has gotten people to check out a genre of music that may have been unfamiliar to them. The Queen’s Gambit got people talking about chess again. Perhaps the biggest of them all is the way Stranger Things made many people interested in the classic tabletop roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons.
It’s no surprise either, as D&D is baked into the DNA of that show in a way that makes it essential to the plot. Not only do the characters play it all the way back to the first episode, but the terminology they use to describe the monsters that they come up against is pointedly taken directly from the mythology of the game. Now, right before their final season begins, they’ve teamed up with Hasbro to release Stranger Things: Welcome to the Hellfire Club, a new boxed set of D&D adventures that are heavily themed after the show.
This isn’t the first time they’ve partnered with the company on a product like this. In 2019, they released a 5th Edition starter set that featured Demogorgon miniatures, premade character sheets, and an adventure “written” by Stranger Things character Mike Wheeler. From what I can tell, that release was more like a reskin of the standard D&D starter set with a couple thematic elements thrown into the mix. Welcome to the Hellfire Club feels more like a full Stranger Things product, featuring tons of in-universe pieces that are lovingly rendered for fans of the show.
While there aren’t any miniatures, the contents of the Welcome to the Hellfire Club package is impressive. You’ve got a D&D Play Guide, four adventure modules that each run eleven pages, 72 tokens for characters and monsters, two double-sided maps, four handouts to go along with the adventures, a dungeon master’s screen, a pad of combat tracker sheets, decks of reference cards, premade character sheets, Hellfire Club poster and photo card, and, of course, a full set of dice. Not only is it a comprehensive set that gives you everything you need to run a game, but it has a visual design that’s meant to evoke an older era of the game to match the show’s time period.
As someone who’s played D&D for years, even I haven’t read the many rulebooks cover to cover, but the D&D Play Guide in this set does a great job of distilling the many ins and outs of the game into exactly what you’d need to play the game for the first time. In the 31 pages, you’ll learn the basics of play, from combat to social interaction to exploration. It’s the most standard D&D rulebook stuff in the game, peppering a couple Stranger Things-themed images among fairly dry and academic writing that gets the job done without much flair. Its conciseness is appreciated, especially for first time players, but it doesn’t do as much to sell the theme of the game.
Same goes for a lot of the ease-of-use items in the box. Beginning adventurers often have trouble keeping track of everything going on with their character, so the decks of cards help with that. They plainly lay out the details of spells and items as a helpful reference, rather than forcing you to either check the rulebook or write down all the details as the DM reads them. The combat tracker is also a nice touch, giving you columns for initiative, hitpoints, and conditions for each person or creature in the fight. Creature tokens and cards will help the DM set up the combat, and these feature fun illustrations in a stark black and white artstyle. A helper card that lays out your action options for combat is also included, so that new players know all the options in front of them. All these elements are fairly basic, but they go a long way to making sure the package is friendly to people trying out D&D for the first time.
The real focus of this set is the four adventures, each their own complete story, but meant to build on each other sequentially to take players from Level 1 to Level 3. The writing within is again a bit on the dry side, but it is laid out and organized for maximum ease of use, making it easy to run even for an inexperienced DM. These are meant to be the final adventures that Hellfire Club DM Eddie left behind after (spoilers) his death at the end of season 4, so there are small handwritten notes from him in the margins that help bring a bit more life to these booklets. The notes are little pieces of DM advice for running the specific module, but they often include references to the characters of the show that will bring a smile to fans’ faces.
Each of the four adventures feature allusions to the events of the seasons, in a way that’s clever enough that doesn’t rely on knowledge of the show but rather just acts as a fun set of references for fans. The first adventure is “The Vanishing Gnome”, which starts with a gnome challenging them to hide and seek and ends with a showdown in a shadowy realm that mirrors the dungeon they started in. “Scream of the Crop” is the second adventure, which has the players investigating a farm where crops are dying because of a strange tree. “Ballad of the Rat King” is a mystery where they investigate a string of murders that seem to be tied to a corrupted former adventurer. And finally, “Devil, Metal, Die” sends players to Hell to survive increasingly deadly arena games.
These adventures each have a map that corresponds to them, and the module will very clearly lay out the contents of each location on the map and what events should take place there. There’s also some in-fiction handouts you can give the player to bring your session to life a bit more, often in the form of notes the characters receive. These are all helpfully color-coded to match the colors of the modules’ covers, making it easy to figure out what belongs to what at a glance. All the handouts and maps bear the same art style as the booklets, looking more old-school with some fake wear and tear to sell the illusion that these are from the Stranger Things era.
The actual writing and setup of the modules are well done, if not too unique. They all feel like pretty standard Dungeons & Dragons adventures, with dungeon crawling, townspeople interrogations, and some classic monster fights. Each of them are meant to run a session or two in length, so they’re not the meatiest modules, but they pack in just enough to keep you intrigued throughout and get out before they wear out their welcome. It seems like these adventures were designed for not only first-time players, but also first-time DMs, which is great for newcomers, but might leave veterans wanting a bit more.
Since these four stories are meant to take players from Level 1 to Level 3, the set also comes with a trio of character sheets for each of the five prewritten characters. These characters are the ones that are featured in the show when they play D&D, so it’s another treat for longtime fans. Leveling up characters can often feel like an intimidating thing to figure out, so the fact that you get sheets for each level is a smart decision that will help make first-time players feel more at ease with the process.
There are a couple other items in the package that are fun for fans. The poster has great style, with lively illustrations of all the player characters with Eddie looming large over the scene. The DM screen is great, with rad art on one side and helpful hints for running the game so you don’t have to look up some of the more common rules and terms on the fly.
Welcome to the Hellfire Club may not impress longtime D&D fans, but this set is perfect for Stranger Things fans who want to check out what the hobby is all about. Everything about the set smooths out the experience for first-time players, from the premade character sheets to the stripped-down players guide to the helpful spell and equipment cards. The adventures themselves are pretty basic, but they offer a good sample of what D&D has to offer, while also being well-organized for people new to running the game. Fans of the show will be delighted by the presentation, and its ease of use will make them happy to finally try out the hobby of the show’s characters. With this holiday season coming up, this will make a perfect gift for the Stranger Things fan in your life, but might be slightly less satisfying to give to longtime D&D players.
Review sample provided by publisher.
Stranger Things: Welcome to the Hellfire Club is available now. The first four episodes of Stranger Things Season 5 debut on November 26.
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