If you're already leading Dungeons & Dragons games, you might as well get paid: 36-year-old earns $37,000 a year.

The Millennial Money series by CNBC Make It showcases how individuals worldwide manage their finances, including their income, expenditures, and savings.

It's astonishing to discover that Mari Murdock, 36, is a skilled game master who leads and narrates tabletop roleplaying games such as Dungeons & Dragons.

She tells CNBC Make It that many people don't view hobbies or artistic pursuits as potential sources of income.

At first, she didn't anticipate that running D&D games would become a lucrative career; it was merely a pastime she shared with her college friends.

The narrative in Dungeons & Dragons is shaped by the players' choices, which can be expressed through combat, puzzles, or negotiation. The GM serves as both the world-builder and narrator, enforcing and explaining the rules, acting as a mediator or referee.

A skilled GM must be able to adapt to unpredictable events in the game, such as a character being swallowed by a gelatinous cube or crushed by a group of centaurs, in order to keep the story flowing smoothly.

As Murdock honed her skills through tabletop games in the 2010s, she became more confident in running a good game, which eventually led to her becoming a paid GM.

"Teaching, writing, and playing games have been an interesting career path for me as they are all things I love to do," she says.

Murdock earns his primary income as a GM for Dungeon Master Direct, a Utah-based company that offers online and in-person tabletop roleplaying game sessions ranging from $375 to $750 since 2021.

As a dungeon master for the company, she earns $24,000, and also teaches writing at nearby Westminster University in Salt Lake City, where she resides with her husband, Scott. In contrast, he earns $96,000 as a communications director at a state agency.

Murdock transformed her hobby into a successful career.

Becoming a tabletop gamer

Murdock, the oldest of two siblings in a Latter-day Saints family, was "willful" and "liked being my own boss" while growing up.

She spent most of her childhood in Michigan and Utah, where she spent her days "climbing trees, catching frogs, playing make believe." At night, she would stay up reading books, immersing herself in "any type of storytelling."

In 2007, Murdock's family relocated to Hawaii when her father secured a teaching position at Brigham Young University-Hawaii. At the school, she pursued her studies in literature and experienced her first tabletop role-playing game at a friend's home, which she thoroughly enjoyed.

In 2010, she left school to become a full-time missionary and was assigned to Japan, the country of her mother's birth.

In Japan, Murdock met Scott, her now-husband, who was also engaged in missionary work in a different region of the country.

In 2012, Mari returned to Hawaii and graduated from BYU-H with a bachelor's degree in literature. She then obtained a communications job on campus, which was soon followed by Scott's move to Hawaii to be with her and complete his degree.

Since she worked for the university, Murdock has been acting as the faculty advisor for the gaming club on campus that they helped create.

The club was a success and became the second-largest student group on campus. Murdock became more involved with the club, hosting tabletop RPGs for new players. In 2013, she won an open audition to write fiction for Legend of the Five Rings, a popular collectible card game set in feudal Japan.

According to Murdock, his success as a professional fiction writer opened doors to networking opportunities for other types of work, as his name became well-known among those seeking a skilled writer.

Getting hired as a professional Dungeon Master

Murdock claims that even if she didn't earn a living from it, she would still be organizing D&D campaigns for her friends, reading game literature, or writing fiction.

Remembering that creative work is work is crucial when hobbies can turn into side hustles, she emphasizes.

Her friend once said to her, "Since you're going to be doing it anyway, you might as well find someone to pay you for it."

In 2016, Murdock relocated to Salt Lake City with Scott to pursue a master's degree in transatlantic literature. Simultaneously, she continued her freelance writing, primarily for Legend of the Five Rings.

Murdock states, "I was coerced into writing anything they required me to, which encompassed novelizations of the game, explanations of game mechanics, character backstories, and text on game cards. Initially, I was compensated with free products, but later received payment in cash."

In 2020, an old friend from Murdock's university gaming club, Dax Levine, founded Dungeon Master Direct, a professional dungeon master service that gained popularity during the pandemic.

In May 2021, the company's success allowed Levine to hire Murdock as a game master, commonly known as a dungeon master when playing Dungeons & Dragons.

Murdock states that she spends approximately four to five hours per week on each ongoing game, which amounts to about three games in a busy week.

She is also involved in organizing company events, including the record-breaking largest game of Dungeons & Dragons ever played, which took place at a mall in Provo, Utah, and saw all 1,227 participants triumph over an evil wizard named Vecna in the final battle.

Although Dungeons & Dragons has fantastical elements, Murdock's interest in gaming has not been discouraged by her church. In fact, many members of the LDS church enjoy fantasy games.

Since the "satanic panic" of the 1980s, attitudes towards kids and their activities in basements have shifted, with people no longer believing that they are summoning demons and other supernatural entities.

Murdock believes that gaming fosters creativity by allowing individuals to immerse themselves in a pretend scenario and develop problem-solving skills and empathy.

What Mari and Scott spend in a month

Here's how Mari and Scott spent their money in February 2024:

• Student loans, credit card debt, PayPal Credit, and personal loan repayment totaling $2,450.
• Mortgage: $2,147
• Food: $1,390 on groceries and dining out
• Discretionary: $832 for home goods, a Kickstarter contribution, hair salon
• Utilities: $452 for Wi-Fi, heat, water and electricity
• Savings: $400
• The cost of subscriptions and memberships on Hulu, Spotify, Amazon Prime, Midjourney, Patreon, Nebula, and Max is $235.
• Insurance: $161 for health, dental, vision, car and home
• Phones: $140
• Gas: $71

In June 2023, Mari and Scott bought a detached two-bedroom home in downtown Salt Lake City for $535,000, with a down payment of $40,000. To cover the cost of the home, they took out a personal loan from their family, which amounts to $777 in monthly payments, in addition to their mortgage.

The couple aims to pay off their $15,000 credit card debt by implementing a "financial reset," which involves reducing their monthly expenses. To achieve this, they allocate nearly $1,400 each month towards credit card payments.

In a few years, Scott hopes to be eligible for public service loan forgiveness because he works for a government agency and also has about $25,000 in student loan debt.

The couple had been giving a tithe of one tenth of their income to their church regularly. However, they have temporarily stopped making monthly contributions to their church to focus on paying off their credit card debt.

Murdock typically devotes up to 10 hours per week to volunteering for the Relief Society, an LDS charitable women's group. She believes that her current contribution to the church is primarily through her time commitment rather than her financial contributions.

They have a fully paid off 2018 Jeep Compass, which means they save money on transportation costs, as they only pay approximately $200 for gas and car insurance each month.

The couple has approximately $20,000 saved for investments through Scott's 401(k) and pension. "Once we are debt-free except for the mortgage, we plan to allocate more funds towards our retirement accounts," says Murdock.

Looking ahead

Murdock says, "After paying off our debt, we hope to foster or adopt children, as that has always been our interest."

Juggling freelance writing, GMing, and teaching can be overwhelming at times, but it's fulfilling to all of the parts of my brain that love doing all sorts of different things.

Murdock aims to continue her existing endeavors while also exploring the possibility of writing her own novels.

"I went to school to become a creative writer, and I love that GMing is a creative outlet that helps me improve my storytelling, plotting, and characterization skills. I feel fortunate to have this opportunity and am grateful for it."

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