Aabria Iyengar

Aabria Iyengar ( ; ; born May 11, 1985) is an American web series actress known primarily for tabletop role-playing game anthologies, streams and podcasts.

Iyengar is one of the creator-owners of the actual play podcast Worlds Beyond Number. She was the Dungeon Master (DM) for the first season of Exandria Unlimited. Iyengar has been both a player and a Game Master for multiple seasons of Dimension 20 and a guest DM on The Adventure Zone. She also joined the main cast of Critical Role as a player in the fourth campaign.

Career Iyengar is the former chief marketing officer for the dice-maker Dice Envy.

Actual play Iyengar appeared as both a player and as the Dungeon Master (DM) in multiple actual play podcasts between 2018 and 2020 on the Happy Jack's RPG Network.

In 2021, Iyengar was the DM for two actual play anthology web series – Misfits and Magic, the tenth season of Dimension 20, and the first season of Exandria Unlimited, a spin-off of Critical Role. She was the first Critical Role DM after Matthew Mercer outside of one-shots. Chase Carter, for Dicebreaker, stated that "both appearances were hits within their respective fandoms, leading many to clamor for more Iyengar". Christian Hoffer of ComicBook.com highlighted that "Iyengar has quickly built a reputation and fanbase due to her fantastic storytelling and rapport with players".

In August 2022, Iyengar appeared as gamemaster on Dimension 20: A Court of Fey & Flowers, a combination of Dungeons & Dragons and the Jane Austen-inspired game Good Society. She also joined the cast of the Vampire: The Masquerade web series NY by Night, playing as Margot "Fuego" Walker. Em Friedman, for Polygon in 2022, commented that Iyengar's actual play credits now "span nearly the entire industry" with her By Night debut.

In January 2023, it was announced that Iyengar, alongside Erika Ishii, Lou Wilson, and Brennan Lee Mulligan, would star in the creator-owned actual play podcast Worlds Beyond Number; the show premiered in March 2023 and ranked in Patreon's top twenty accounts within a month. Also in March 2023, Iyengar joined the third campaign of Critical Role as a guest star playing as gnome cleric Deanna. Iyengar returned to Dimension 20 as the gamemaster for Burrow's End in 2023 and the second season of Misfits and Magic in 2024. This was the anthology's first Side Quest campaign to receive a sequel season. Duncan Butcher for Polygon opined that "particular credit needs to go" to Iyengar as "her use of props, projections, and battle maps across her Dimension 20 seasons has consistently pushed what the medium is capable of". Also in 2024, Iyengar was a guest star in the stage production of Dungeons & Dragons: The Twenty-Sided Tavern which combines actual play, improv, and immersive theater at Stage 42 in New York City.

In 2025, she reprised her player role in The Twenty-Sided Tavern before acting as the show's first guest Dungeon Master; in August 2025, she also guest starred during the U.S. national tour in Chicago. Iyengar also contributed a short story in the anthology Critical Role: Vox Machina–Stories Untold (2025).

Iyengar is the writer, with artist Mari Costa, on the comic series The Fade; the first issue was published by Boom! Studios in November 2024. In June 2026, it was announced that Iyengar and Louangie Bou-Montes were the co-authors on the upcoming romantasy novel Rogue x Gambit (An X-Men Love Story); it is scheduled to be published by Marvel and Random House Worlds on February 9, 2027.

Personal life Iyengar, born Aabria Lipscomb on May 11, 1985, attended the University of Iowa where she was a member of their Division I volleyball team. She also attended the University of California, Los Angeles where she competed for the UCLA Bruins track and field team.

Iyengar first played Dungeons & Dragons in 2015 or 2016 when she was invited to her now husband's board game group and was given a cleric character sheet to play. Wired highlighted that "Iyengar was often the only woman or person of color at the table, and she faced a lot of other players questioning her knowledge of the game, as well as more overt harassment. As a GM, she now works to ensure her players don’t have to face those same challenges. [...] With the increased visibility of actual play games, [...] Iyengar has increasingly been able to tailor her playing experience to what she wanted it to be for both herself and her audience". In April 2023, WizKids announced a new miniature boxed set of Exandria Unlimited characters including a figurine of Iyengar.

In 2026, Iyengar had a child.

Filmography

Web series Patreon exclusive prequel podcast for The Wizard, the Witch, and the Wild One Space CramGame MasterMain cast; 2 episodes

Video games Year Title Role 2023StarfieldCrowd voices

Stage Year Title Role Venue 2024–2025Dungeons & Dragons: The Twenty-Sided TavernMage, Dungeon MasterStage 42