Missouri Vet Center Hosts Dungeons & Dragons for Veterans

The Springfield, Missouri, Vet Center hosts Dungeons & Dragons on Monday nights, with an invitation for newcomers to join experienced players at the table. The weekly group meets at 6 p.m., according to the center’s official VA listing. Veterans who already have a character can bring one. Those starting from scratch can get help.

“Have a character already? Feel free to play as them! Need a character? We’ll roll one for you!” the announcement reads.

The game is one of several ways veterans in the Southwest Missouri community can spend time together through organized activities. The Vet Center also partners with local organizations on a weekly guitar group for veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder and moral injury.

Similar gaming programs elsewhere in VA offer a look at why staff and veterans have made room for fantasy adventures alongside other forms of support.

Working Together at the Gaming Table

Dungeons & Dragons puts players in charge of fictional characters who face challenges as a group. A Dungeon Master describes the setting and plays the people and creatures they encounter. The players decide how to respond, using the game’s rules and dice to help determine what happens, as explained in the official D&D rules.

A group might negotiate its way past an obstacle, investigate a mystery or fight a monster. Characters have different abilities, giving players reasons to cooperate and consider one another’s suggestions. Adventures can continue across multiple sessions, with decisions carrying into the next gathering.

VA clinicians have used that format to work on skills beyond the game.

At the Dallas VA Medical Center, psychologist Jared Kilmer started a D&D therapy group in 2018. A 2019 VA report described how players reviewed decisions afterward, including impulsive choices such as rushing into a trapped room. Kilmer used those discussions to address social skills, problem-solving and tolerance for stress.

“This alternative approach gets at the same treatment goals in a way that is approachable to the Veterans,” Kilmer said in the report.

In Orlando, Navy veteran and VA employee Victor Mitchell developed a program called REVEAL, launched in 2023, that uses an ongoing D&D campaign to encourage communication and help veterans connect. Mitchell described gaming as a way to engage people without requiring them to revisit traumatic experiences, according to a February VA account of the program.

Army veteran Jennifer Chester described the appeal in simpler terms. “You get to be creative, try new things and just enjoy being around other Veterans,” Chester said in that account.

Those programs have their own structures and goals. Springfield’s public announcement lists its weekly game but does not identify it as clinical treatment or report health outcomes for participants.

A Weekly Guitar Group in Springfield

The Springfield Vet Center’s local partnerships extend to music. The Center for Music Therapy and Wellness lists a Guitars for Veterans Therapy Group held Wednesdays at 3:15 p.m. at its clinic in Springfield Hall on the Drury University campus, 900 N. Benton Ave.

Its partners include the Springfield Vet Center, the Moral Injury Institute, SMAI Springfield and Wellness for Warriors. The program is intended for military veterans with PTSD and moral injury, according to the music center.

Moral injury can involve lasting distress after events that violate a person’s deeply held beliefs or values. It can include guilt, shame or feelings of betrayal, and someone can experience it without meeting the criteria for PTSD, according to the VA’s National Center for PTSD.

The guitar program’s listing directs interested veterans to Tommy Goode at the Moral Injury Institute, at 417-860-3471 or [email protected], for registration and details.

How Veterans Can Get Involved

Vet Centers are VA community counseling facilities offering confidential services at no cost to eligible veterans, service members and their families. Their work includes help with readjustment after military service and connections to other community resources, according to VA’s Vet Center program.

Eligibility for those services does not require enrollment in VA health care or a service-connected disability rating. Qualifying circumstances include combat service, military sexual trauma and certain other service experiences. Veterans who are unsure whether they qualify can contact a center for help reviewing their circumstances.