Archade
Azer Paladin
Hey all,
My kids (Alex and Katie) and their friends (Patrick and Alliya) are chomping at the bit to be gamers, and I thought I'd share with everyone what does and doesn't work in my experience as I try to run something for them.
My family and I recently attended Gen Con, and my son and I went to the seminar "Getting Your Kids Into Gaming", which was well-run and enjoyable for both of us. Previous to this, my son has already burned through the 3E Basic Box adventure (the Black Dragon version), has figured out D&D Miniatures reasonably well, and is now ramping up for the big hurdle of the Player's Handbook (which is going to take a while, since he's 8 and his reading skills and attention span just aren't quite there yet). I must admit the preview of the new Basic Game at the seminar seems to be geared towards a group of independant 12 year olds vs the previous version, which is friendlier to an adult running a game for 8 year olds, but I came away from the seminar with some really thoughtful ideas.
The seminar run by WOTC gave me several great ideas which I liked. They suggested the use of tactile items such as miniatures, poker chips or pennies for hit points, and expendable index cards for spells. Thy also suggested to keep the adventure simple and get the kids' input on the kind of monsters and goal of the adventure they would like.
I didn't agree with all the suggestions that the seminar had, such as throwing rules out the window in favor of imagination, allowing kids to fight human-like monsters like goblins or orcs, or allow the characters to die, but I see why they made these suggestions with kids in mind, and I'm keeping them handy in the back of my mind if need be.
After the seminar, my son has been bugging me constantly to run a game for him again, so here's my experience thus far ...
Last night, I built custom character sheet for the kids that is simple and with big boxes (see attached), based on the Black Dragon Basic Box character sheet. I talked with the kids about what kind of characters they wanted (Alex wants a Half-Orc Barbarian, Katie wants an Elf Druid, and their friend Patrick wants a Half-Elf Sorcerer).
We created characters tonight for Alex and Katie (about an hour each), and here's what I've streamlined for the kids:
* We picked a miniature first so they had a visual reference
* simplified alignment (good, neutral, evil)
* simplified skill choices (they had to pick class skills and automatically got 4 ranks in each)
* used the basic equipment packages in the PHB, except they picked their own weapons
* I gave them a few feat choices to choose from the PHB to keep it simple.
Things I learned tonight:
* My kids learned a whole bunch of new words (illiteracy, empathy, etc)
* The math on rolling 4d6, keep the best three took a while but was worth it
* They wrote out their own characters, and copied hard words from the PHB
* Showing them pictures of armor and weapons helped them choose
I still need to write out the Druid and Sorcerer spell index cards (keeping them simple, removing wierd choices, and color coding them by level).
I asked them all over the last few weeks what sort of adventure they want, and they told me they want to fight zombies and find the king's ruby and return it to him for a reward. I'll be using the Dungeon Tiles and the Basic Set Tiles to build a 5-8 room dungeon they can explore. I plan on including 1-2 simple traps, some zombies, some spiders, a rat swarm (so the druid can shine), and finishing up with maybe a Vargouille.
I should be running the game in the next week or so, and I'll keep you informed how it goes... if any one wants to chime in with their experience or ideas, I'd enjoy that.
My kids (Alex and Katie) and their friends (Patrick and Alliya) are chomping at the bit to be gamers, and I thought I'd share with everyone what does and doesn't work in my experience as I try to run something for them.
My family and I recently attended Gen Con, and my son and I went to the seminar "Getting Your Kids Into Gaming", which was well-run and enjoyable for both of us. Previous to this, my son has already burned through the 3E Basic Box adventure (the Black Dragon version), has figured out D&D Miniatures reasonably well, and is now ramping up for the big hurdle of the Player's Handbook (which is going to take a while, since he's 8 and his reading skills and attention span just aren't quite there yet). I must admit the preview of the new Basic Game at the seminar seems to be geared towards a group of independant 12 year olds vs the previous version, which is friendlier to an adult running a game for 8 year olds, but I came away from the seminar with some really thoughtful ideas.
The seminar run by WOTC gave me several great ideas which I liked. They suggested the use of tactile items such as miniatures, poker chips or pennies for hit points, and expendable index cards for spells. Thy also suggested to keep the adventure simple and get the kids' input on the kind of monsters and goal of the adventure they would like.
I didn't agree with all the suggestions that the seminar had, such as throwing rules out the window in favor of imagination, allowing kids to fight human-like monsters like goblins or orcs, or allow the characters to die, but I see why they made these suggestions with kids in mind, and I'm keeping them handy in the back of my mind if need be.
After the seminar, my son has been bugging me constantly to run a game for him again, so here's my experience thus far ...
Last night, I built custom character sheet for the kids that is simple and with big boxes (see attached), based on the Black Dragon Basic Box character sheet. I talked with the kids about what kind of characters they wanted (Alex wants a Half-Orc Barbarian, Katie wants an Elf Druid, and their friend Patrick wants a Half-Elf Sorcerer).
We created characters tonight for Alex and Katie (about an hour each), and here's what I've streamlined for the kids:
* We picked a miniature first so they had a visual reference
* simplified alignment (good, neutral, evil)
* simplified skill choices (they had to pick class skills and automatically got 4 ranks in each)
* used the basic equipment packages in the PHB, except they picked their own weapons
* I gave them a few feat choices to choose from the PHB to keep it simple.
Things I learned tonight:
* My kids learned a whole bunch of new words (illiteracy, empathy, etc)
* The math on rolling 4d6, keep the best three took a while but was worth it
* They wrote out their own characters, and copied hard words from the PHB
* Showing them pictures of armor and weapons helped them choose
I still need to write out the Druid and Sorcerer spell index cards (keeping them simple, removing wierd choices, and color coding them by level).
I asked them all over the last few weeks what sort of adventure they want, and they told me they want to fight zombies and find the king's ruby and return it to him for a reward. I'll be using the Dungeon Tiles and the Basic Set Tiles to build a 5-8 room dungeon they can explore. I plan on including 1-2 simple traps, some zombies, some spiders, a rat swarm (so the druid can shine), and finishing up with maybe a Vargouille.
I should be running the game in the next week or so, and I'll keep you informed how it goes... if any one wants to chime in with their experience or ideas, I'd enjoy that.