4e for younger gamers

Howdy all, been a while but I see the community is just as thriving as it ever was! Back into D&D after a couple year hiatus and have just picked up the 4e stuff. Its all a little new to me but for the most part I like what they've done with the game.

My 12 yr old stepson recently got into my toybox and discovered all my minis, books and battlemats, and has expressed some interest in D&D. Of course, he's a kid weaned on console games and I'm sort of afraid D&D might be a little too much of a drain on his attention span. Has anyone had any experience playing 4e with kids? Are there certain parts that give some kids trouble? Should I look at streamlining or de-emphasizing some of it?

One of the things that gives me slight pause is the "one rule-many exceptions" thing. Playing with adults who get it isn't a problem, but I'm afraid (for example) that with each variety of goblin or kobold and the at-wills and the encounter powers they all have, that it will look too much like I'm just randomly pulling special monster abilities out of a hat...or am I worrying too much about that? I can tell them that its sometimes the DMs job to make stuff like that up, but I alo want to foster the idea that I'm playing fair with them.

I used to play with my nephew when he was about the same age, and the one part that he had a problem getting his head around was that the DM was essentially the guy that held all the cards. I recall stressing over and over that I wasn't his "opponent" per se...but he never quite bought into it. I remember even after explaining it, a number of times he still furrowed his eyebrow with suspicion and said "I think you just made that up" (I don't know if that was just him, his age, or if it was that he just didn't grasp the idea of an RPG. )

Any thoughts on this, or about playing with kids in general?

My sons have played off and on since they were 8 or so.

Keep the adventures themselves shorter. I think the best way to do this is to have the kids take over an area that has multiple portals in it (or do a stargate campaign), and have them go to an adventure that is 3-5 encounters long. That way they don't have to concentrate on one adventure too long. It also allows you to vary the terrain, style, etc.

The DM is the story teller, the players are helping to write the story. There is not a winner an loser. Don't worry about the rules and balance and all that stuff that for some reason adults are concerned about. Worry about having fun. Let him bend the rules for fun, but not so much that he's making everything easy. As adults, imo, we get way too hung up on this kind of stuff, when the game is just about having fun.

Find 1-3 other kids to play also.

I've started playing with my 2 oldest, their friend and one of my friends son. So far it has been pretty good.
I did not think keeping attention would be a problem, but it really depends on the kid. My oldest girl has dropped out.. it did not keep her attention. But the other 3 are totally loving it and want to keep going.
They are a bunch of dungeon crawl players.. they really like the hack and slash part of the game.. not so much on the role-player.. So.. they will have mostly combats.

We play every other week at the local game store. Not enough to spoil the game.. but enough that it is something they look forward too.

I am running a kids only game at our next meetup. Part of what I expect to make it very exciting for them is that they don't know about things like kobolds shifting as a minor action. I'll begin by explaining that monsters often make exceptions to the rules, that is what makes them unique.

I am using the delve book and adding in some roleplay by blatantly stealing from Raiders of Oakhurst. The adventures are only 3 encounters long, and with perhaps a skill challenge or two thrown in to find the kobolds, and some roleplay with the final fight it should be easy for them to handle.

I am planning on using mats to track hitpoints, surges and action points with glass beads. This should make the math go faster for the younger ones, as well as a visual cue as to health of everyone at the table.

I'll report how things go after next Saturday.

My son's first experiance was very recent with D&D Game Day at our local FLGS. I didn't really explain much about mechanics, except what 3d6 means or when you have to roll what to roll. I explained how to read the sheet, but he took it from there. Here is what I wrote on my Facebook Journal

Game Day was great. My local FLGS hosted it. I just walked in and was given a table to play at. Thing is...this...was...VERY special to me. My son...age 10 asked me if he could game with me not to long ago. I was very moved by his request.

This happened after and incident in which I caught him playing with my mini's in the basement. It was cute...I sent him down to unload the dryer. He didn't come up so I went down and saw he had out a manticore, about 6 PC' looking minis and a couple of wolves that a ranger looking mini was ordering to attack the manticore. He was doing voices for them and little sound effects. Oh GAWDS it was cute. That was when he just turned 9.

Anyhow I told him "someday" I would teach him. Thing is...I had no "simple games" to show him. I was leaning to old school MSH RPG since I still have it somewhere. Then Game Day came up. I have looked at 4E and have some of the material. To me...the PHB seems soooo simple. I keep thinking it's just the quickstart rules. I am like "thats it"? When Game Day rolled around, the Friday before I decided sure...why not. Let his first game be this.

He LOVED it! We walk in. He was the only "kid" there rest being every stripe of geek from fatbeards to skinny pasty with t-shirts to the rare "girl" gamer. A few came over said hello and commented like "ahh you couldn't find players? Had to make your own right?" as a joke. We got a table with a married couple around my age, clean cut looking not geeky on the outside whatsoever, and another guy I know who is a hardcore grognard. My son looked at each character sheet, stopped on the dragonborn and warforged and asked about the warforged. I explained and he said "oh...a magically powered droid right?" He loved "Squeeks" and had SO much fun raging and using Devastating Strike on things.

He was mad we had to stop. He wants to play more and have an ongoing game now. He even asked if he could get his own set of dice. I must stay...I cried a little that day. So what his first game isn't something I am a HUGE fan of. He has different tastes then me...that's fine. I am just glade he wants to be a gamer and we now have something other than martial arts to share.

Heck, I play about once a month with my 4 year old son and six year old daughter. I tell my son what die to roll and how high the number needs to be to succeed (He likes being a Warforged) but my daughter does great on her own (Elven Sorceress). It takes time to come up with adventures on their level, little to no violence (Enemies are "defeated" or run away/surrender), mostly skill checks and role playing. We did Escape from Pirate Island last time, even my wife joined in. Now they have ship crewed by pirate goblins. Now I have to come up with the next adventure...

I do long for the day when we can play a more conventional game as a family.

My only advice, keep descriptions short and to the point. Maybe break up area descriptions (Describe, interact, describe more, interact...) to avoid information overload.

I've been playing with my kids for years now, they are 9, 11, and 25 (long story.)

Anyway, I started the kids off early using the miniatures rules, which were pretty easy to understand and all the stats were on little cards. They loved it.

They have participated in numerous gamedays and RPGA events. It hasn't always been an even experience. However, I have to say that my children are often more mature than some of the adults at the table. I've seen them outperform adults as well, both at rules (my son, at an early 10, played a druid to full capacity and often was they key player in encounters) and at roleplay (both kids took over an RPGA interactive once and led the investigation, it was very cool.)

Benefits are pretty clear, the kids learn to:

A.) Social game skills, waiting turns, not interrupting, being prepared for your moment. All this translates into a conference room.
B.) Math, especially mental math addition, subtraction, and probabilities.
C.) Reading, my kids pour over their books. My girl constantly reread "Confessions of a Part-time Sorceress" and my son has read more of my 3.5 books than I have.
D.) Geek literacy. There is something to this, D&D is part of the new virtual history of our internet obsessed world. As a reading teacher, I know it helps for children (and adults) to have background connections to make to comprehend new information, even if that information may not be directly relevant.

Challenges:
A.) Attention span was a big problem at first. The delve format is perfect for this, since you can cut off by encounter. Keeping the 4e grind down is the biggest issue here.
B.) On task, the kids will often be distracted until they get the "swing" of roleplaying. This is largely a maturity thing. Lots of breaks, keep it short. Hard to RPGA days, where players want to go for hours on end.
C.) Security, at events I have to keep the kids close, this can be pretty hard to do sometimes.
D.) General behavior. It took some time to get the kids to the point were they can sit down with a group of adults and play on their level. You have to go over expectations a lot until they get drilled in there. I noticed that my son, who used to have constant behavior troubles in school, started focusing at the D&D table shortly before in the classroom (he is now very successful at school.) I can't prove it, but I believe one thing led to another.

4E is pretty much designed to be accessible to 12 year olds. How much younger do you wnat it to get?!?!

I think you'll find that 4E IS the "for younger gamers" edition of D&D.

I play with my 2 younger cousins. I go with the professional adventurer route and give them missions to complete. Save X, Escort Y, Destroy Z. I keep roleplaying and descriptions light. I learned not to use too many tropes or surprises. Adventures are 3-5 encounters, with a few skill checks and maybe a side quest.

The only problem is that younger kids don't have the PCs ddo normal things and has a lot of questions. They want me to name everyone.. especially the enemies so they can make the gravestones and kick them.

Morrus said:

4E is pretty much designed to be accessible to 12 year olds. How much younger do you wnat it to get?!?!

I think you'll find that 4E IS the "for younger gamers" edition of D&D.

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Very much so, having the powers laid out in a format really, really helps. Since the game involves more movement of the figures, it is much more engaging. The grind (the seventh inning stretch is how I think of it) can be a problem.

The game is also more appealing overall, with more interesting choices, especially for girls. Even dwarf girls have been made more attractive to play. My girl was immediately attracted to the eladrin, of course. If a kid wants to play a dragon, now he can as a dragonborn.