My kids (7 and 11) have been asking me to teach them how to play Dungeons and Dragons. I got to thinking that it might actually be a fun way for us to spend a Sunday afternoon doing something together. My idea is to have their characters be kids the same age as the boys are in real life. I dug out my old D&D books and read through them but couldn’t find any rules concerning child characters. I was wondering if anyone else has run a campaign for children and if so, how did you go about it?
Well D&D characters are meant to be exceptional by their very nature, so I’d have no trouble letting regular characters be that young.
In 3e, there’s rules in the DMG for ageing effects, both younger and older characters. I’ve not used them, so I couldn’t tell you just where off the top of my head. Would be in the NPC section, I’m sure. I don’t know if there was anything similar in earlier editions, as I never ran games under them, so never bothered looking through the DMG.
I wouldn’t use the child character rules for PCs, though. It’d throw the balance off, in the monsters favour. Not insurmountable, but a lot of needless work.
I haven’t, but I would just use regular PC generation, and make any humanoid NPCs in the same age range so it wouldn’t seem weird.
I ran a few games when my kids were little. Although YKMV, there are a few things that I’d do if I started another game with kids.
I wouldn’t tell them they had to play kids. I’d give them the option. I mean, this is fantasy and adults are fantasy figures. There’s an aging table somewhere that shifts stats to represent different ages, but it might not go low enough and it doesn’t sound like very much fun.
In the interest of togetherness and family time, I’d spend an afternoon walking them through character creation. Warn them that there may not be enough time to play the first day. I’d go really slowly and answer all their questions. I’d also simplify the equipment purchasing.
I might require them to be human for their first game, to simplify. I might assume that they have any needed spell components. I might skip alignment. And when I say skip, I’d mean explaining it, but leaving it out of the first game. I’d definitely start them at level 1.
There would be a little speech about meta-gaming and what your character knows vs what you know. Also how what your brother’s character does to your character isn’t something that your brother is doing to you.
I’d make the first game morally unambiguous. No mean people who are technically lawful.
I’d also tell them that they can quit any time they don’t want to sit and do this any more. It’s not insulting me if they want to stop before I’m finished with the story. We can always start again if we want.
Take them through a round or two of practice combat. Take them through a round or two of using skills. Be prepared to coach them on which die to use and what to add to it.
Be prepared to ad lib when their interest starts to flag. One of the most popular things I ever did was work up a table for an arm wrestling contest. It would have been completely boring for an adult as it wavered back and forth, but the kid involved was making a lot of dice rolls and really got into it.
I’m assuming that you know the game well enough to run an adult game. If not, I’d go online for general DM advice, and consider doing a module. Run a few NPCs if you need to round out their party or just to show them how a character can be run.
Good luck and have fun. Running a game for kids can be frustrating or a real blast.
Why should character creation take a lot of time? Pick a class, roll some dice for stats, and you’re done in five minutes.
Next, expect not to even open the rulebooks. Sure, roll dice for combat, but junk everything else. Any other mechanics, just tell them to roll a die and if they roll high then narrate a good result and if they roll low narrate a bad result.
Imagine trying to tell a fairy-tale like story but allowing the kids to decide what the protagonists of the story would do in each given situation.
I wouldn’t give them a young penalized character, just play them as adults. You’re looking for a fun weekend. They may not even like it, and getting really picky with a first time game would kill the fun.
The worst part of playing an RPG as a very young un with my older brothers was that I could not grok spacial relationships - that is, when I was told there was a doorway in front of me and a hallway to the right, I’d try the door, that wouldn’t work, and I couldn’t remember where the hallway was! It was very frustrating for all of us. My oldest brother quickly learned that the sooner I, the character, found a map, the better, and he made a map for me, the player, to consult as often as I needed to.
I still have trouble with finding my way around video games, actually, although I have a great sense of direction IRL.
2nd Edition has relevant rules too. By equally, I’ve never seen anyone use them.
A secret. If you let kids create kid-sized characters who fight adult-sized opponents, only you let them use adult stats instead of kid stats, the D&D police will never find out. They’ll never come to your door and drag you away.
I’d definitely allow kid-sized PCs with adult-sized stats. That’d be the easiest and simplest way of resolving the situation; it won’t affect game balance in the least, and it’ll allow fun.
My basic rule of thumb for running a game is that just about any window-dressing is allowed for a set of stats, the more interesting the better. If you want to call that human fighter an ex-vampire midget ogre, what the hell do I care? Work it into the storyline and go for it.
Daniel
Although I haven’t run D&D for kids, a friend of mine did for his. From what he described, simple characters and simple plots were the key. And not saying “the rules don’t allow that.”
His kids wanted to be “an elf like Legolas” and… darn, something horsey I can’t remember… centaur or unicorn or somesuch. So he made up an elf archer and a horsey somethingorother, with little regard for how strictly they adhered to the rules.
Then he sent them off to rescue the Princess from the Dragon. IIRC he threw in a few “familiar” things – the troll lived under a bridge, waiting for billygoats, etc., etc.
It was apparently a rousing success, and although I haven’t heard updates I think they’ve continued on. I dread meeting his kids when they’re older, though (they live in TX)… “let me tell you about my character” stories from pre-tween years, oy!
I have nothing to add other than a big thumbs up to you for raising kids that want to play D&D with you. You’re obviously doing something right.
I spent six months in Gitmo thanks to the D&D police. I was waterboarded until I parted with my optimization secrets. I folded easier than a cheap suit, and I will never forget it.
Take a look at getting enough dice so you can color code them, and each player can have his own.
“If you want to slash with your sword, roll the 3 blue dice. If you want to defend yourself, roll the 2 red dice.” Then write the info on the character sheets.
Dice are cheap. That might help reduce the number of times someone asks “What dice do I roll now?”
Did anyone else play Shadowrun? You needed a brick of dice to play that one, in coordinated colors.
Doesn’t that go against the Lake Geneva Convention?
Shadowrun? pshaw. We played with the Hero System and then Exalted. I don’t think anyone knows how to roll less than fifty dice at a time, now.
Strangely enough, I have just started letting my kids play. My son is only 7 and has a very simple fighter character. He is a young human, but 15.
My daughter is 10 and has a Elven Mage with a smart cat familiar to help her out. In other words, as the ref, I plan to help her with her character and I am treating both characters as PC/NPC and I am just seeing how this goes.
The two adult players are OK with this so far and we are treating it as an experiment. Besides, they really wanted to get a magic user into the party so they can ID magic items. This was an easy way for them to get that.
My son did OK last week. He went to bed at 10:30 and his character just followed the lead of the Ranger as he had been doing while my son was playing him.
As I am treating the characters as partially NPC, my son barely rolled to make the character and I designed it for him. My daughter got to roll and had more input, but still her character was basically shaped by me.
Jim
Please update us after your first game! I’m kind of interested in how the first session goes…
This is all great advice!
My motivation for having them play child characters is, of course, things like Harry Potter, Narnia and Unfortunate Events. Rollicking adventure where the children are the heroes. I think kids get a kick outa that. In most stories of that type, there’s an “adult” NPC who lends assistance, so I’ll have those strategically placed throughout the story. The boys love the Shrek movies, so I thought I’d include that kind of silliness.
2nd and 3rd editions? Are you guys crazy? The kids are 7 and 11, you need to go OLD SCHOOL, you know back when Halfings, dwarves and elves were also classes, only thieves could pick locks and level advancement didn’t mean midnight pouring over min-max opportunities with feats and skill points.
Ah, the good old days.