Looking for introductory material

[mkill]

Hey everyone, I'm thinking about running a session for a few people who haven't played an RPG yet. I have a big cupboard of minis, the 4th ed PHB and a pile of other books, a DM screen and a color printer.

Now, my first thought was to run KotS, but there are a few issues with it.

* The pregens are from 4th ed as it was at first. Among others, that means the Fighter is pretty complicated. Is there a pregenerated Knight available somewhere? I think I can use the other pregens as-is.

* KotS is pretty long. For a first session, I'm looking for something that can be played in 3-4 hours, with 2 or maximum 3 combat encounters and a meaningful conclusion. Something like the module in the Robot Chicken Podcasts. Is that one available for download somewhere?

* Are there any good large dungeon maps available for download? Is there a tool for the Mac to print large image files on several A4 sheets?

Thanks for helping. If you have any other advice for introducing new players, bring it on.

(Btw., I'm located in Tokyo, so there is no FLGS that runs encounters or similar)

 

[scylis]

Red Box.

"hhWHAT?"

Red Box!

"OOKAAAAAY!"

Red Box.

"Yeeah-HEAAAH!"

Look for it on the 21st and beyond. (Crunk not included)

[sblock]Seriously, take a look at the Red Box. It is geared specifically towards people who've never played an RPG ever, with solo adventures to create their characters and stuff for an adventure or two that will take them from 1st to 2nd level, all done in an easy to approach write up for the basics of 4E rules. It comes out this month and it sounds perfect for what you're looking for.[/sblock]

 

[hopeless]

An Introduction?

Hey everyone, I'm thinking about running a session for a few people who haven't played an RPG yet. I have a big cupboard of minis, the 4th ed PHB and a pile of other books, a DM screen and a color printer.

Now, my first thought was to run KotS, but there are a few issues with it.

* KotS is pretty long. For a first session, I'm looking for something that can be played in 3-4 hours, with 2 or maximum 3 combat encounters and a meaningful conclusion. Something like the module in the Robot Chicken Podcasts. Is that one available for download somewhere?

* Are there any good large dungeon maps available for download? Is there a tool for the Mac to print large image files on several A4 sheets?

Thanks for helping. If you have any other advice for introducing new players, bring it on.

(Btw., I'm located in Tokyo, so there is no FLGS that runs encounters or similar)

Well have you listened to the podcast with the penny arcade people?

The first one dealt with keep on the shadowfell and chris perkins allowed them to just head straight to the keep with an opening statement that they had fought kobolds in the area and learned the name of a goblin leader.
They dealt with the first level and he then had them skip to the next level before dealing with the lower levels and their confrontation with the real bad guy.

If you want you could restrict your game to the opening sequence where they're ambushed by kobolds and simply have them go looking for their missing mentor and just leave it open once they find him to see if they want to continue.

What other books have you got?

Map wise you could take a gander at the dungeons and dragons community section I remember there was a few examples of maps there mostly dealing with adventures such as den of slave takers.

Me I'd just draw up something suitable in a book and when it comes to the occasion sellotape a few sheets together and draw it out as they proceed and go from there...

For example I watched Louie the rune soldier and in the first episode they recruited Louie to open an enchanted door which led to a crypt which they thought hadn't been plundered but Louie found a secret door where some goblins were lairing and after the resulting fight they discovered another band of adventurers' had broken in and looted the place.

My version was 3.0 and involved the PCs stumbling onto a group of the scarlet brotherhood who they eventually defeated leading them on to other adventures.

In any case have fun!

 

[Kralin Thornberry]

If you have DDI, you could look at the Chaos Scar stuff.

 

[Festivus]

You could also take a look at the Living Forgotten Realms modules, those are all designed to run in about 4 hours. One of them is even located within the DMG itself, "Kobold Hall".

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Terrible Trouble at Tragidore !

<ducks>

 

[UngainlyTitan]

If you have DDI, you could look at the Chaos Scar stuff.

Chaos Scar stuff is pretty good in my opinion.
Ran a session of it recently for a 3rd level party as it worked well and was easy to run.

 

[mkill]

I have a DDI account, both DMGs, and most splatbooks except for some obscure stuff like the Tiefling book. My main reason not to get the Red Box is that I'm running out of shelf space. The other is that it doesn't add anything for my regular group. Oh, and shipping costs to Japan.

Back to my original question, I'm still looking for a good set of pregenerated characters (or a Mac version of the Character Builder. Do you hear me WotC)? Any recommendations?

 

[hopeless]

Character pre-gens?

Back to my original question, I'm still looking for a good set of pregenerated characters (or a Mac version of the Character Builder. Do you hear me WotC)? Any recommendations?

On the dungeon and dragons site they should still have KOTS as a free download to introduce d&d 4e including a separate download for some pregenerated characters.

I guess it depends on what kind of characters you think you'll need.