RPGs for kids

The Game Room
1

I’m currently running a 4th Edition D&D campaign for a group of kids ranging in age from 10 to 13. It’s going okay … not great … and it occurs to me that part of the problem is that the rules are just a little too complicated. It wasn’t so bad when they were lower level, but now that they’re getting more powerful they’re having a harder time playing effectively. And we’re spending so much time sifting through the rules that there’s not a lot of emphasis on actual role playing.

What alternate RPG systems would you recommend? I’m looking for a simpler system with more of a storytelling focus. I’d prefer something that’s not tied into a an existing fantasy world (Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, etc.). And horror is out because of the age of the participants. But other than that, I’m open to a variety of genres.

2

Have you looked at the White Wolf games?

They’ve got a strong roleplaying emphasis - the GM is called the “Storyteller”, and the players are collaborating with each other and the Storyteller to create a story together. While you do play “classic monsters,” they’re not “horror” games per se - the goal is not to frighten the players (like Call of Chthulu, for example).

Werewolf, for example, has you playing a defender of the Earth (Gaia) against encroaching civilization, and can lead to discussions about striking the balance between what’s good for the planet and what’s good for humans. You aren’t “cursed” with being a werewolf, you’re born that way (though you don’t actually start changing until you’re an adolescent), and you can be born to either a human or lupine family.

You might want to check it out. There’s also a supplement to it that lets you play werewolves in the Old West (!!!) which seemed supercool to me.

3

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy?

4

From the Husband:

You may want to look at an earlier D&D version - 3.0 or 3.5. Pathfinder is another option - it’s basically the same as 3.5, but published by a different company.

He says that 4.0 is very rules-heavy, and that moving back to the earlier versions could help a lot.

5

It’s become hard to find 3.5 books now; a fair number of people wanted to stick with the 3.5 rules, but WotC obviously stopped publishing the books. Paizo has picked up the torch with Pathfinder, and those books are readily available.

I’m not sure I entirely agree with that. I do agree that one drawback of 4E is that there is no such thing as a simple character – in earlier editions, you could just play a fighter or rogue, and it was pretty straightforward. In 4E, every class has all sorts of powers, and that’s where you do run into having to look things up in the middle of a game.

But, the basic rules of 4E are considerably simpler than 3.x, IMO.

6

Kobolds Ate My Baby - the entire point is to behave as idiotically as possible, and the rules are barely there.

7

Mouse Guard uses a lighter version of the Burning Wheel system and tends to be more structured than the usual pen and paper RPG. There are rules for building encounters (but nothing as complex as in the DMG for D&D 3.5th or 4th) and characters have traits which give hints on how a player should role-play.

There are some debate as to whether it is a kid’s RPG, but the premise (that you are a bunch of mouse against the more hostile natural world) seems to be a good one.

8

Missed the edit window. Here are some more to try out:

  1. Dragon Age Pen and Paper RPG - roll 3d6 + stats system. Simpler tactical combat than D&D 4E

  2. Tunnels and Trolls

  3. Warrior, Rogue and Mage - you just have three stats, the titular Warrior, Rogue and Mage. Warrior is used for brawl and combat and so on. You roll 1d6 + stat to resolve tasks. It’s now available as a free PDF.

  4. Microlite D20. You can even use other D20 stuff with it!

  5. Spirit of the Century. A pulp game where the player plays a larger than life pulp hero. The system focus more on story-telling. It uses something called “Aspects” which allow players to interact with characters, environments and the story.

9

Toon sprang to mind right away for me, as being light years easier,. [As I recall, only 2 d6 are used, period.] The fact that your character never dies, but must wait 3 real life minutes might help the situation a lot.

Not so sure if the book is still being printed. I ended up buying two copies of the base book, in paperback, and BOTH books started to lose pages from the binding, UGH.

Our D&D group had a 9th grader in it last campaign, and it was my 2nd campaign [as a player] ever. I know the exact situation you are talking about. I started out the gate as a 6th level or so Druid, and the paper work I had overwhelmed me. I spent 90% of my time trying to choose what to do, often going for the more impressive, not so much the grind it out practical. Then again, I have ADHD and I’m known to think outside the box on things [[Look at the HAGGLE games played in this thread, if you don’t believe me.]] and If I had to bet, I would put money down that the 9th grader has ADHD as well. I played as a Fighter in my 2nd campaign, and not having to memorize [read having to spend times guessing what spells I’m going to need] spells sped things up a lot for me. Perhaps there might be character types you might want to steer them towards for next campaign.

I’m 27, building my first character was a LOT like a “kid in a candy shop”, the DM and another player had all of the 3.5 books between them. I picked up things that looked cool and flashy, but were very limited in use. Likewise, just because an item can be used in game, doesn’t make it practical. You might want to steer them towards certain items here, as well.

Our group has talked at length about 4.0 and how dumbed down it is. There is an option where you can get your second wind [so I’ve been told] and take one round to rest, taking no action. You get a majority of your HP back next round.

We all agreed that the game is getting stupider, [[and Magic The Gathering seems to be going the same way.]] and we half jokingly decided on a D&D 3.75 where we take the best rules from the past 3 iterations, ignoring 4. We also employ some house rules:

1.3 Natural 20s in a row, in combat is an instant death to the creature you are fighting. [We actually had this happen, ONCE.]

2.Once you are at 0 hp, you don’t die at -10, but you die at -X where X is your base CON

I’m pretty sure both of these are un-original ideas, but we decided to keep both of them

10

It’s not but is available from Steve Jackson Games in PDF form.

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I second Spirit of the Century wholeheartedly. It’s the most fun you can have as a dirigible battlecruiser captain with a band of misfit treasure hunters along for the ride. Essentially, you have a pyramid of skills (so everyone has the same distribution of one excellent skill, two great, 3 good, four above average, etc), all die rolls are 4d6 on Fudge dice (essentially each die is printed with two -, two + and two blanks, roll and add plusses/subtract minuses), and you get five slots for interesting abilities/powers/items (for example, it took me three slots to have the dirigible battlecruiser, IIRC (one for a hidden base, one added to make it mobile, one added to use it as a weapon).) but there are lots of abilities listed for gadgeteers/mad scientists, pilots, archaeologists, master thieves, whatever.

I would love to be able to second the recommendation for Mouse Guard, but while the rules look good on paper and the setting is exquisite, in practice it’s a very clunky and unforgiving system by the book–the healing rules and artificial GM Turn/Player Turn divide are basically nonsense, to the point that by book rules every character we rolled (and we’re all experienced gamers in my group) was on a steady downward spiral of skill loss due to the healing rules combined with the healing difficulty thresholds combined with how easy it was to have the entire party get wounded on one bad roll.

12

Thanks for the recommendations, guys. I downloaded Spirit of the Century last night and I think we’ll try it in a few weeks.

13

Find a copy of Hero Quest on ebay.

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If it was me, I’d run 2nd-edition AD&D with some modifications just because that’s what I like and am familiar with. I think the choice of RPG game system is less important than the creativity of the participants. But I’d take on more of the mechanistic part of the game–specific rules, tracking numbers, some of the dice–and let the kids concentrate on the imagination and role-playing and improvisatory theater or co-storytelling aspect.

Also, I’ve found that “low-level” campaigns with slow advancement can be a lot of fun. It’s the gamemaster’s responsibility to come up with the new plots and scenarios to keep things interesting, and it’s the quality and variety therein that keep games going. If the powers of long-term characters develops more slowly, the kids have more time to get comfortable with the greater spells or fighting tactics or special skills.

15

I think Star Wars RPG went D20 since the days I ran it in middle school stairways (yup, nerdy nerd, right here), but if you get your hands on the original version of the game, they’ll probably like it. The system’s reaaaally simple and intuitive. At least until you get into the space combat rules… but there’s ways around them.
I know you said “no SW”, but the system can be adapted without effort to any setting.

Also, while it was my very first RPG at 9 years old (bought with my own money and everything) I … wouldn’t recommend Rolemaster. No sirree.

16

Small children should not be given Rocket Propelled Grenade Launchers, as one end is pointy, & they might hurt themselves.

17

Hero Quest is a good suggestion. It’s a board game you run a campaign, with scenarios. There is even some advancement in the form of cumulative treasures for beating dungeons – magic items found and gold to buy better gear. The task resolution is pretty straightforward – there are skulls and shields on the dice. Subtract the skulls the attacker gets from the shields the defender gets.

Check it out:

18

Not quite sure a later version of D&D is the best choice. Why not consider Labyrinth Lords? It is freely available as a PDF and it’s a clone of a simpler version of Dungeons and Dragons. Here is the link: Contact Support

I think all version of D&D past AD&D (so AD&D, D&D 3, 3.5 and 4) might be overly complex for children. Labyrinth Lords is a legal clone of one of the older versions, and it’s much simpler to pick up.

19

My kids have already started coming up with their characters for Spirit of the Century.

So far we have an African warrior woman exiled from her ancient matriarchal civilization for failing in her duties to protect the sacred temple from treasure hunters, and Chinese acrobat movie star (think of a female Jackie Chan) with a pet panther!

20

That sounds awesome - I wanna play!