D&D The Next Generation

[Reymar]

Hi all,

I'm new here, but an old-school D&D player.

I've decided that it is time to introduce my kids to part of their heritage, to embrace the nerd in their bloodline, to bring them back to simpler times of gaming that actually required imagination and didn't require a joystick.

So I dusted off my old D&D manuals, polished my dice, and collected the relics of my youth to prepare my youngsters for a quest. TO prepare them for the upcoming adventure, I started with stories and adventures of old, and the glorious saga of Reymar the Brave, the hero that helped me survive High School.

Now that I have their interests peaked, tonight we shall gather around the table and create their first characters. The party will include my 12, 10, and 4 year old kids and possibly even my wife.

I've decided to go with the Basic set of D&D to keep it simple, and not bore them with a complicated adventure. After all, this is how I got started.

My question for everyone is for some input on how they got their family involved in RPGs and how it went. Advice and input is appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[Li Shenron]

We haven't played D&D with ours yet, I don't think they are ready for the complexity of even a further simplified Basic. I would be confident that your 12yo and 10yo are ready, but definitely not the 4yo.

With ours (ages between yours), we have played so far:

- a mostly rule-free RPG (storytelling + occasional success/failure dice rolls)
- the Monster Slayer mini-game (which is really only combat)
- Lego's Heroica games with some added RPing

My suggestion when gaming with children, although yours are older and can definitely take more than these:

1) Start with pregens characters. Let them choose a ready-made PC from a short list (e.g. 2-3 more than the number of players) rather than create their own. If asked to create new ones, most likely they will anyway try to re-create characters they know from fiction, and might be disappointed if you or the rules will not let them do so by enforcing some 'balance' with limits, like "...but I wanna be like Gandalf!", then good luck convincing them why they shouldn't. It's so much easier to show them some pregens and tell them "There are the characters of this story.", they will immediately understand that Gandalf just isn't around. Also, character creation takes a long time and delays the start of the game, your 4yo may not want to wait that long.

2) Use visual or physical props. Give a printed picture (or a mini) of their character to each player. Put a map on the table. Show a picture (or a mini) of each monster. When they find an important object (e.g. a key, a magic item), hand them an actual object, a toy representation of that, or a printed picture of that. These will awe the children and will go a long way helping them remember what they have and can use.

3) Forget about grown-ups' concerns such as balance, and simplify as much as you can. Do not even explain mechanical rules until you encounter the situation where you need a rule right now. Handle as much as possible through RP, let them do what they want but tell them that when they want to try something amazing or really important, they can try but a dice always needs to be rolled to see if it worked or not. This is a very understandable concept even for your 4yo.

4) Shorten combat. Children love to see battles, but they will not enjoy more than 10 minutes of the same battle. In our case, we found that the Monster Slayer game is already too long. You got to keep it short, either less number of rounds or less thinking when it's someone's turn. As for D&D, one possible suggestion is to replace damage rolls with fixed numbers: use max damage for the PC, and average damage (already there in the stats) for the monsters.

 

[aries04]

I ran my daughter and wife through an off-the-cuff My Little Pony game using the FATE system. FATE seems to really cater to the improvised one-shot game. They both really enjoyed it.

I'm thinking what I'll do with them is slowly ease them into more rules-heavy systems so I don't flood them with rules.

Best advice I could give is watch how they react and do more of what they like.

 

[Legatus Legionis]

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