Starting a New Game with Complete Newbies

[Li Shenron]

I'm starting a new game with a group of people who are complete newbies. My girlfriend has played with me in another game for a while now, but she's never been into it enough to really get with the rules, and only one other player has ever played even once.

Any pointers on making a game for complete newbies? I know I can't expect them to know D&D tactics and the like, so should I plan encounters specifically to teach them about things like Flanking and such? Or should I hold a tutorial session to show them the basics, even though that might not be as much fun as just starting into the game?

Any anecdotes/insight/advice are appreciated.

The first time I played 3ed I had to be the DM in a party of 6, two of which were 100% new to RPing, 2 were mildly used to play RPGs but never played 3ed and the other 2 were new to 3ed but veteran champions in old D&D editions (well... one was REALLY champion of the national AD&D Italian tournament 1998, which he won with his team "Warriors & Wizards" and got the special jury prize as "best player in the finals" ).

I try to summarize my own suggestions, but I am quite rushing now and didn't read the other posts... so I apologize if I repeat something, in the case of which just think that if it was said twice it may be a good suggestion after all

1 - start at level 1 and let players use only PHB material: there is already a lot of stuff there and it's all new for them, adding more may just get them lost

2 - let them choose their chracter by their imagination, don't tell them stats or special abilities before they have chosen, or they'll start thinking "this is stronger, this weapon is better..." and you'll never start playing; instead, just tell them the 7 races and the 11 classes, say few words for each ("The Paladin is a champion of faith, devoted to destroy evil by sheer force") and link them to famous movies - everyone has seen LotR

3 - once they have chosen who they want to be (at least class & race), give them a char sheet each and instructions to all step by step; don't even mention what is beyond level 1

4 - use PHB starting packages to quickly choose details: if one doesn't like the sword and want an axe, you know what to switch it for, don't let them start reading weapon charts, but rather let them choose from the mental image they have of their characters (obviously compatibly with proficiencies)

5 - don't tell them combat rules. At the first combat, just let them roll initiative and tell them in a round they can attack+move or cast+move. Don't tell them about special attacks, but be prepared that before round 2 someone will already ask you if he can trip, grapple or try something different. Except spells and other supernatural stuff, a player can easily figure out from reallife what his PC can do and how difficult it is

6 - you can either run a dungeon crawl or a simple story, there is no problem, but keep the story simple (and tell the players that is it, if they start thinking absurdities like everything is not what it seems)

7 - use low Int monsters which don't always take AoOs and don't always do the right thing

When I ran my first game, I didn't use AoOs, but now I don't think I would do it again. It's not so complicated after all. But don't explain beforehand: they will get confused and definitely won't remember all the rules until they need them, when you have to explain them again. Really keep in mind point 5: players can just think what they want to do, let them tell you, and then correct if it goes over one round worth of actions.

 

[Senior Bobo]

New players

My experiences with running a campaign for 2 completely new players, one who knew rpg's a little and one who never saw one before.

First, I generated 1 charatcer of each class and laid them out for them to pick. I included the basic stats and equipment while giving them each a short background story and lots of flavor about what the charatcer type does. I helped them narrow down the choices as they indicated they wanted a 'tougher' character or a more crafty one.

The first adventure was just a basic dungeon crawl with nothing but simple combat. Let them get used to the rules they'll use most.

The next adventure made heavy use of saving throws. Just about every encounter had some saving throw be important whether it was basic poison (which also taught about stat loss), simple spells or reflex saves to dodge a trap, or whatever.

The third adventure leaned heavily on skills. Lots of detective work, search, listen, gather information, knowledge checks, etc. Having pregenned the characters makes it easy to create an adventure knowing what skills are going into it.

Make heavy use of trial by example. Instead of explaining the 'take 20' rules to them I had a thief npc take 20 on a search for a secret door the players failed to find. At first the players were complaining the thief was taking to long since they didn't find anything on their checks. When the thief finally found the secret door in question I stopped and said "OK, here's what he was doing according to the rules" and they immediately saw the use to it.

Varying the play experience is fun as well. For example the players in my case (a cleric and sorcerer) had a warrior and a rogue with them as npc's. After they were comfortable with their own characters (around 4th level) I had them in an adventure where they were cut off from the npc's. So I had them play out their half of the adventure, and then gave them the npc's character sheets and had them play as the npc's so they could see the game from another class perspective. They really enjoyed that.

Lastly, do not over frustrate the players. I had one player drop out when I had them captured by the BBEG in order to introduce the BBEG to them. They were quickly rescued and I really didn't do anything mean to them, but one player reacted horribly to the railroading and has never been interested in playing since. Be subtle and patient.

 

[Dunjin]

Thanks again! I love reading these.

For enemies, I've planned a mixture of half-orcs, humans, and possibly hobgoblins. They're slavers who don't really know what they have in the PCs (the PCs have value beyond slavery to some mysterious figure), but they have instructions not to overly damage them (besides, killing a slave is like tossing out money--right?). Subdual damage will be most common, at least until they've angered the band of slavers enough that the slavers ask for their heads. That's assuming they don't just manage to sneak out--the slavers aren't too numerous, and they're not too smart, and the prison is underground, so there won't be much use for ranged weapons beyond thrown daggers and other short-range stuff.

That said, smart play can help them, too. Obviously it'll likely be easier to talk your way past a half-orc (not too smart) than a hobgoblin (raised under a lawful evil society, no minuses to Intelligence or Charisma). I'll let the group roll Knowledges to figure these things out. I'll have NPCs flank enemies if the players don't do it themselves. The ex-paladin can shout out tactical advice if they're doing poorly, but the poster above is right--D&D newbies usually come up with much more interesting combats than your average "I flank, I grapple, I tumble" fights seen with more "seasoned" groups.

Thanks for the guideline to keep the CR of the BBEG low. Party level + 2 sounds about right.

More!

 

[Nifelhein]

As for the tatics, just use the npcs and say: "He moves to the other side and you see that the hobgoblin has a hard time defending himself from both of you, he has to divide atention and that means easier time for both of you" by the way that is what we call flanking, when you use it you get bonus X and can use that nice sneak attack of yours, since the hob can't cover all his weak spots from you...

As for the subdual damage, make them use it when they are under arrest and use an occasional noral attack to show the enemies cruelty and also show them that damage can be used in a different way...