# AI Dungeon Master: how to play D&D with an AI DM and your friends

Which AI game masters a whole party can play with, what they cost, where AI DMs go wrong, and what an AI may use from the D&D rules.

Published 2026-10-30 by Richard Kaminsky and Mitchell Lipyansky, the co-founders of Poly. Canonical: https://usepoly.co/ai-dungeon-master
Poly is a multiplayer AI coding workspace: a shared room where your team works with one AI agent, together. Free to start: https://usepoly.co/

**The most complete AI Dungeon Master for playing D&D with friends in 2026 is Friends & Fables: its AI game master, Franz, runs fifth-edition rules for parties of up to six, live or taking turns over days, with maps, battle maps, images and long-term campaign memory. It's free for 25 turns a day in a three-player campaign, and $19.95 to $39.95 a month for bigger parties. AI Dungeon is the famous name, but it's freeform storytelling rather than D&D rules, and Latitude's newer Voyage tracks game state for a more structured game. General chatbots can run a session too, but they forget details and fudge dice, and the group options are thin: ChatGPT stopped new group chats in July 2026 and Claude has none.** Whatever you use, real dice and a written campaign log fix most of what goes wrong.

## Key takeaways

- **For D&D with a group:** Friends & Fables, up to six players, built on the 5e rules.
- **For freeform adventures:** AI Dungeon, where a host shares a code and everyone plays on the host's model.
- **Newer:** Voyage, from AI Dungeon's maker, with a "World Engine" that keeps track of the game separately from the story.
- **Chatbots as DMs:** fine for one player; weak at keeping state and honest dice.
- **The rules an AI may use:** D&D's System Reference Document 5.2.1 is CC-BY-4.0, so rules text is free to use with credit; named monsters, places and characters outside it are not.

*AI Dungeon Masters for groups, from each tool's own pages, October 30, 2026.*

| Tool | Players | Price | D&D 5e rules | Platforms |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Friends & Fables | Up to 6, live or turn-taking | Free (25 turns a day, 3 players); $19.95–$39.95 a month | Yes, with combat and maps | Web |
| AI Dungeon | No hard limit; host shares a code | Free tier; $9.99–$49.99 a month (App Store) | No; freeform | Web, iOS, Android |
| Voyage | Public multiplayer free | Beta; plans announced, not checked | Its own game engine | Web, iOS, Android |
| AI Realm | Multiplayer being improved | Not published on a page we could open | Yes (2014 SRD) | Web |
| ChatGPT or Claude | One typist | Free tiers; $20 a month | Only what you tell it | Web, apps |
| Poly room | The whole group in one room | Free to start; $20 or $50 for those who prompt | Only what you tell it | Web, phones |

Sources: [Friends & Fables pricing](https://fables.gg/pricing), [AI Dungeon multiplayer help](https://help.aidungeon.com/faq/do-you-support-multiplayer), [Voyage](https://voyage.io), [AI Realm](https://airealm.com), [Hidden Door](https://hiddendoor.co), the [D&D SRD](https://www.dndbeyond.com/srd), opened October 30, 2026.

## What is an AI Dungeon Master?

An AI that does the Dungeon Master's job: describes the world, plays every character the party meets, decides what happens when players act, and runs combat. The good ones add what a chatbot lacks: the actual game rules, character sheets, dice the AI can't overrule, maps, and a memory of the campaign that survives between sessions.

## The best AI Dungeon Masters for playing with friends

- **[Friends & Fables](https://fables.gg)** (web, on desktop, tablet and phone): the closest thing to a full D&D table. Turn-based combat on 5e rules, the 5e SRD built in, top-down maps and battle maps, generated images, long-term memories on every plan and narration read aloud on paid ones. Parties of up to six can play live or asynchronously, and friends play free; the host's plan sets the size: Free (25 turns a day, three players), Starter $19.95 a month (four), Pro $29.95 (five), Legend $39.95 (six), with two months free on yearly billing. Its old Discord bot is no longer developed.
- **[AI Dungeon](https://play.aidungeon.com)** (Latitude; web, iOS and Android): freeform text adventures in any genre, not a rules engine. In multiplayer the host shares an eight-digit code, there's no hard player limit, and everyone gets the host's AI model and benefits. It has a free tier; Apple's App Store lists paid tiers from $9.99 to $49.99 a month.
- **[Voyage](https://voyage.io)** (Latitude, open beta since April 2026; web, iOS and Android): an RPG platform whose "World Engine" tracks the game's state separately from the narration, aimed at the forgetfulness of plain storytelling AIs. Public multiplayer is free.
- **[AI Realm](https://airealm.com)** (web, installable on phones): a 5e game master built on the 2014 SRD, with character creation and campaign tracking. Its roadmap mentions bringing multiplayer up to par with single-player, so check how well group play works before a session night.
- **[Hidden Door](https://hiddendoor.co):** free story worlds based on public-domain books, with social games, rather than D&D.
- **Character.AI group chats:** several people and several AI characters in one chat. Good for role-play; no rules or dice.

## Can ChatGPT or Claude be your Dungeon Master?

For one player, yes: give it the setting, your character sheet and the rules you want, and it will run a scene. For a group it's harder. OpenAI stopped new ChatGPT group chats on July 9, 2026 ([what happened to ChatGPT group chats](/chatgpt-group-chats)), and Claude has never had one, so one person ends up typing for the table. Other places a group can talk to one AI are in [how to group chat with AI and your friends](/ai-group-chat-with-friends).

## What goes wrong with AI Dungeon Masters?

Players report the same three problems:

- **It forgets.** A character's race changes, an item vanishes, a villain's motive drifts between sessions. Fix: keep a campaign log the AI rereads each session (party, inventory, open threads, what each NPC knows), and end each session by asking it to update the log.
- **It says yes to everything.** AI models are trained to be agreeable, so players invent items and the world bends. Fix: tell it plainly that it should refuse impossible actions and that failure is part of the game.
- **It fudges the dice.** Models invent rolls, skew them in the players' favor and forget modifiers. Fix: roll real dice, a dice app or a bot like Avrae and type the result in, or use a tool whose dice run in code, as Friends & Fables' do.

## What can an AI Dungeon Master use from D&D?

The rules in Wizards of the Coast's System Reference Document 5.2.1 are licensed CC-BY-4.0: anyone may use them, commercially too, with attribution ([D&D Beyond](https://www.dndbeyond.com/srd)). The SRD leaves out some of D&D's own creations, such as the Beholder and characters like Strahd and Tiamat, and the D&D Beyond Basic Rules aren't licensed for reuse. So a tool can run the rules; your table can bring whatever it likes from books it owns.

Wizards itself offers no AI Dungeon Master. Its 2023 policy asks artists not to use generative AI in D&D products, and D&D staff who began unionizing in October 2026 asked leadership to keep generative AI out of the creative work.

## Playing in a Poly room

Poly (usepoly.co) isn't a D&D app, but it solves the group problem the chatbots have: friends share one room with one AI, Claude, GPT, Grok or Muse, everyone sees every message as it happens, and anyone can speak to it. A group chat beside the conversation is for table talk the AI never reads. Because the AI works in a shared workspace, it can keep the campaign log as a file it rereads every session, draw scenes and portraits, and build the party a dice roller or character sheets they all use in the live preview. Free to start, and only the people who prompt the AI pay. [Poly for friends](/friends).

## Which should you use?

- **A D&D campaign with friends, rules and all:** Friends & Fables.
- **Freeform stories in any genre, any group size:** AI Dungeon.
- **A structured game that remembers more, on your phone:** try Voyage's beta.
- **Your own homebrew, with an AI everyone can talk to and tools you build together:** a Poly room.
- **A human DM who wants help:** any chatbot for prep, NPC voices and descriptions, with the dice and decisions kept at the table.

## Common questions

**What is the best AI Dungeon Master?**

For D&D with friends, Friends & Fables: it runs 5e rules for parties of up to six, with maps, images and campaign memory, free for 25 turns a day. AI Dungeon is better for freeform stories in any genre.

**Can I play D&D with an AI and my friends?**

Yes. Friends & Fables supports up to six players live or asynchronously, AI Dungeon lets a host share a code with any number of players, and a Poly room puts friends in one conversation with the same AI.

**Is there a free AI Dungeon Master?**

Friends & Fables has a free plan with 25 turns a day and three-player campaigns, AI Dungeon has a free tier, and Voyage's public multiplayer is free during its beta.

**Can ChatGPT be a Dungeon Master?**

For one player, yes, if you give it the setting and rules. ChatGPT stopped new group chats in July 2026, so a group needs one person typing for everyone. Roll real dice and keep a campaign log, since chatbots forget details and fudge rolls.

**Is it legal for an AI to run D&D rules?**

The rules in D&D's System Reference Document 5.2.1 are licensed CC-BY-4.0, so they can be used with attribution. Named creations outside the SRD, such as the Beholder or Strahd, are not covered.

More guides: https://usepoly.co/guides · Security: https://usepoly.co/security · Pricing: https://usepoly.co/pricing