Although this is my 800th post, I’m not going to focus on this.
(Well, okay, just a bit. Yay!)
Obligatory Background
As many of you know, late in 2008, I sent a query to Dungeon Magazine about making an adventure called “Where’s Francis” for preteen players. It was to feature a bunch of young adventurers trying to find the missing badger minion of the well-known gnome from the D&D 4e Web Spots. About 7-8 months later, I got a reply from our very own Chris Sims who expressed interest about the idea and asked me to provide an extended outline of the adventure.
A few weeks later, I sent an adventure plan such that all my friends reading it told me “I’d totally play that!”, a clear sign that I was onto something good. Long story short, Chris eventually lost his job and I never heard about the adventure again. D&D for kids was not going to be something I’d work on for Dungeon nor as a stand-alone adventure/product for Wizards of the Coast.
Wait! They What?
A few weeks ago, I repacked my proposal and sent it to Wizard’s Mirrorstone novel imprint, selling the idea as a picture-book-story-RPG with a primer for parents. It was turned down with a polite and firm “We do not accept unsolicited game proposals” response.
Ooookay . . . .
At the time my friend Math, who works in a patent office, told me that this was standard practice should Wizards come out with a D&D for kids project. Thus they’d avoid being sued by people like me. Dave also told me that stuff like kids RPGs were a common office subject in RPG companies, and Chris chimed in to calm me down too.
All right, all right, I did.
Of course, just a few days later, I stumbled upon a Twitter post by Forgotten Realms novel editor Susan Morris that announced Wizards was going to release a D&D adventure for kids she wrote, roughly 1 year after I was asked to provide an outline for my adventure proposal.
I was annoyed and hurt. However, I started asking around, letting my emotions settle down and trying to see more sides to the issue. I congratulated Susan. I try hard to be a good sport, and she might not have known about my initial proposal. Oh, and being whiny hardly ever achieves anything. In retrospect, I actually was happy that such a project had been greenlighted, regardless of who ended up doing it.
A Marketing Initiative?
Susan rapidly mentioned back to me that the adventure was a marketing initiative to garner interest in the latest Mirrorstone novel, Monster Slayers.
Wha? A marketing initiative for a novel? Seriously?
Yes, it is “a promo bit” she said.
Oh, god, no! That’s like taking an awesome idea such as near-frictionless bearings and using them as toilet seat hinges first.
That’s not what I wanted the first official D&D for kids product to be. That’s not what I seek as a parent-customer who wants to play D&D 4e with his kids. Nor is it what I want as a writer dying to write an awesome D&D adventure game that would make groups of preteens feel like they were playing in a movie like Labyrinth and The Goonies combined.
Still, I calmed down and stayed silent on the subject. I was way too busy to obsess about it anyway.
So when Heroes of Hesiod came out last week, I kept a low profile and focused on my seminars. When the buzz around it built up on the blog-sphere, I took a quick look at it, found the illustrations cute and the simplified PC mechanics nifty. I Twittered that it was a nice product.
Boot-to-the-Head Microreview
That’s what I thought until a good friend of mine more or less kicked my butt and said, “Dude, have you actually read the whole thing?”
So I set my seminar work aside and read the 14 pages PDF from start to finish.
Heroes of Hesiod is a microgame featuring highly simplified D&D combat mechanics reminiscent of Milton Bradley’s/Games Workshop Heroquest games from the late 80s. Mind you, I don’t have much to say against the mechanics. They are simplistically clever, and I like how they adapted 4e’s “special powers” to such an easy to grok level. Susan did a good job. The whole product is well written and has a certain whimsical potential that screams to be exploited.
Sadly, I strongly feel that this potential lies neglected. Although the game engine showed some promise (except the part of using 3d6 instead of a d20), I’m very disappointed with the adventure itself.
The story is about a group of kids living in the village of Hesiod, a hamlet constantly threatened by monsters. The adventure’s heroes, all young kids, are sent into a house to be trained to kill monsters, as all citizens must do on a yearly basis. That’s it. No more story, no roleplaying, no significant choices, no tapping of the sheer power of the child’s creative mind. Just chuck some dice and use your special powers.
The whole adventure is just one combat with limited or no info to help parents deal with young gamers, such learning to say “Yes!” and roll with it. Believe me, it’s quite a challenge.
Here’s one quote that resumes the whole adventure (emphasis mine):
Before you can protest, Loomis pulls free a pin from the cage door. The reaction is immediate. The door flies open, slamming against the side of the cage with a loud clang, and the [monster name] rushes out.
Now, I have been a huge 4e advocate these last 2 years. I’ve been arguing that 4e was more than just fighting. Some of the published adventures seem to disprove my view. Still I prevail, arguing that those adventures target an audience that is more “into that” than I am. Yet, here is the very first D&D adventure targeted specifically at kids, and the only option is to fight.
I don’t want to use D&D to teach math to my kids. They do that all day long at school. An incentive for doing maths will come later when they expect more complexity from the game. I want to introduce them to an experience, beyond how to beat up a monster, in which they get true control of something (possibly for the first time in their lives) like the story or their character’s faith. Let’s have something that gives kids choices that drive the game session in directions that require parents to nurture improvisations skills.
What if the 6-year-old Sally, playing the wizard, wants to befriend the bulette? What if the Russ, the 10-year-old thief, wants to use a mirror to scare the beholder?
To address this, I would have added just one paragraph to the document:
If a player wants to try something unexpected that isn’t covered by these rules, listen attentively to what he or she wants to achieve and how he or she plans to do it. Then ask the player to roll a d20. If the idea is really cool, give the player a +2 bonus (or more) to the roll. The action is a success on a roll of 10 or more. Describe the action as colorfully as possible. If the roll fails, describe the failure as something funny and wacky that still makes the character look cool. Don’t be afraid to break the adventure’s mold and explore where the players ideas lead.
So that’s why I think that Heroes of Hesiod, while not a bad implementation of a simple D&D-themed game, is a missed opportunity. It fails to do something new and awesome while a market hungry for RPG material for children awaits. It wastes this first attempt by making it a mere tool for the promotion of a product line that’s only arguably related to the actual adventure. As far as I can tell, Monster Slayers is not a children’s book for those who might require the simple rules of Heroes of Hesiod. Lastly it feels more like a marketing ploy than an actual first step into an unknown and largely untapped new market.
Dear Wizards, I wanted you to share my vision of what I know many parents expect to see from the world’s leading roleplaying game publisher. The third generation of roleplayers is here, being reared by 80s RPG gamers. As geek parents, we want tools to teach it to our kids and enhance the experience we lived 25 years ago tenfold. Can you feel the wave passing by? Indie designers are already well ahead of you.
So, Whachu Gonna Do About It Phil?
When I’m bothered or unhappy about an issue, I prefer to act on it. Since I believe I can do better than Heroes of Hesiod, here’s me putting my money where my mouth is. I’m announcing, with this 800th post, that I shall go forward with my original RPG for kids proposal. I plan to write and self-publish a physical 4e-derived book that will contain:
- Rich and whimsical art, along with notes and sidebars for the kids
- A simplified character generation
- A game master’s primer
- Basic rules for skills and checks, as well as combat
- Emphasis on shared narrative control and making failure fun
- Options for playing with or without miniatures and battle maps
- A ready-to-play adventure, with notes on adventure creation
- A short, bestiary for making new adventures.
The adventure is based on my original Dungeon magazine pitch, tweaked to remove the use of Wizards’ IP:
Curse of the Ogre-King (Working title)
As the final test of their training, a group of teen adventurers must set out into the wilderness to seek out and challenge the ogre Grumbar the Chained. The teens track the ogre’s minions from the cursed village of Dusk, their home, through a dark forest. With exploration and teamwork, the young explorers overcome challenges and piece together the truth–Dusk’s fate is tied to Grumbar’s. When they finally reach Grumbar’s lair in Faerie, the young heroes have a chance not only to free Dusk but to also to redeem the ogre.
I plan to tap many of the contacts and friends I made in the last three years to help make this project a reality. Many questions remain unanswered, and all that I posted up there may be subject to change, but this is where I’m going for the next year. I hope you’ll follow along . I might also call on your help . . .
. . . but one thing at a time.
In the meantime, see you at 900! Thanks for being here!
Awesome plan. Brilliantly fiendish.
I’ve never played 4e. Never even picked up one of the books. I have kids though, and soon they will be ready for this. I’ll be following along avidly….
I support you whole-heartedly Chatty. Here is WHY I believe your project will be a success over ANYTHING WotC do.. Passion vs Marketing.
Your post nailed it on the head. It also nailed it on the head a little too close to standard company tactics. You have the passion to do something and it will make the product real, enduring, and well done. While many Official RPG products are well done, glossy, and have a shiney gleam to them, they lack heart and are geared more towards marketing to reach that demographic (Us) to make a profit.
While I believe making a profit to keep the Role-playing industry alive and well is vital and important, I also believe that something gets lost when pursuit of that dollar becomes priority.
I can’t wait to see how your idea pans out and if you need help on any level (even if it is just making fun of your looks), you know where to find me!
.-= wrathofzombie´s last blog ..Wrath of Zombie Playtest Part II- An Addition. =-.
@Nevyn: Thanks mate! Hopefully I can convert you and your family when it comes out!
@Wrath: Thanks man. Don’t dish out too much on the big one. Large corporations have ingrained inertia that upstarts like me don’t have to deal with. At my level, I can afford to be bolder and more focused on passion than bottomlines…
… but don’t get me wrong, I hope to make SOME money with that thing. 🙂
As always, you never fail to impress and amaze me. Good luck (not that you need it) and keep working your magic.
@ Chatty: Oh I don’t mean to knock on the big bad beast.. too much! Most of my favorite products and games come from WotC or Pinnacle or White Wolf. I know that they are necessary and that these giants have spawn mondo mucho inspiration and creativity for “upstarts” like you or I to pilpher and warp and twist to our own machinations.
As for making money, hell yeah make some cash! I’m merely saying don’t lose the passion for the dollar.. That’s all 🙂
.-= wrathofzombie´s last blog ..Wrath of Zombie Playtest Part II- An Addition. =-.
@Rauthik: Rock on! Thanks for the kudos and good wishes!
@Mike: I hear ya. They are fundamental to keep the industry alive while us basement boys and girls are building the next Paizos. 🙂
And yeah, XPs before GPs!
@chattydm – lol, I’m a Paizo fanboi through and through I’m afraid 😉
@Nevyn: Ahhh, a Mono-gamist huh? I used to be that too. Let’s just say I’ll do my best to sway you 🙂
@chattydm you can but try 😀
Rock on Phil! I’m sure that the new project is going to kick butt.
.-= gamefiend´s last blog ..Characters with Character: Break Class Archetypes (Nihial) =-.
Hey man, I think it’s great that you should take the idea and run with it. I remember you talking about the D&D for kids project over on your other site, and when I saw the first few tweets about the HoH, I thought for sure it was your project that they finally released. A little surprised to see it wasn’t.
When I actually read it, it was pretty apparent to me that it was alll about marketing. First, they gave it away for free, and I think the first 2 pages of the thing are talking about all the benefits ‘roleplaying’ can have for kids. It looked more like a ‘lets sell this idea to the parents’ which reminds me of the way kids used to try to say video games helped hand-eye coordination to get their parents to let them play more.
It felt very much like it was geared for the non-gaming parent to ‘try it out’ with their kids, and then say ‘hey, I’d like to do more of this with my kids, I had fun’, and be directed to buying the 4E books – implying that they are comparable enough for the transition to be seamless – which is of course not true.
I think you could do much, much better if you focused on a few things:
Make it compatible with 4E – maybe leave out some of the more complex rules in 4E such as CA, or saves, or skill checks, but make it so that the attack rolls are sort of similar, and the “+2 coolness bonus” on roleplaying checks is great, then you can make it easier for parents and their children to graduate to 4E.
Make it standalone – as much as possible I think you should keep it all self-contained in a way that a parent might play with their kids for years with just your book, everything they need to play any adventure they want to make up is there. HoH seemed like this was a one-shot thing, you could replay the same adventure/story/whatever over and over, but they didn’t give you much to build your own… again sort of a “play this once, if you like it, here’s a dozen books you can buy to play a completely different game”…
Make it flexible: Thinking about what kids would like to do when they roleplay, I can think of a million different characters class/races I would want to include – the standard d&d fantasy fare, plus pirates, ninja, robots, cowboys, etc. So I wonder if you could come up with a way to make character building much more open – I’m thinking kind of like they way they made Wild Shape work in 4E: you get this kind of effect, but you can choose (within boundaries) what kind of animal you change into and how it looks. For characters, you could say ‘each player gets to pick from these possible powers: they get 3 green, 2 red, 1 black and they are each slightly different in what they do, damage and such, but they get to come up with all the flavor themselves. And let each player pick from a list of passive bonuses every few levels: If I wanted to be a gunslinger, I might pick my powers that are ranged attacks, and call them things like “quick draw”, etc, and pick “+2 ranged attacks” as my level 1 passive…this means you can get a group of stubborner kids who all want to play from different genres be able to work together: Batman and Pokémon and a magic Princess, etc.
I think HoH was a good try, it might be fun for some people to try, but it just seems to me like they let the Marketing Dept. get way too close to it, and it got a little corrupted by their Fel Presence.
You can do better, and as a parent myself (although my daughter is only 2 1/2, so it’ll be awhile before we’ll be playing and RPGs) I eagerly await the finished project!
Let me know if there’s anything I can help with!
.-= Tim´s last blog ..Episode 15: Epic Battle Time! =-.
Grats on the 800 bro, and excellent initiative, nothing but the best of lucks i wish to you in your future endeavors, sounds like and great project outline, ill surely be following closely its development 🙂
I’m smiling, smirking and grinning at the same time.
Took your time to get there, eh? 😛
This has potential for awesomeness 🙂
.-= Eric Maziade´s last blog ..Revenge of the dailies =-.
Good column, and I agree with a lot of what you said. I plan on using the base of the “Heroes” module to play some D&D with my sons, but will be tweaking the storyline quite a bit. I’ve never been into the “kill the monster, loot the body” style of play, so I want to make the adventure a little more dynamic and a little less shooting fish in a barrel.
Looking forward to seeing your kids module. I agree, it is an untapped market.
ME
Not sure how to reply to this, except with this: AWESOME.
.-= adamjford´s last blog ..adamjford: @morgoid Not even Pathfinder? Drat. 🙁 =-.
@Chatty… this is a brilliant idea. My 3 yo daughter loves to play with my dice when my players come over for our games. I’d love to introduce her to RPGs at a young age. To be honest I’ve been following your blog for a while and I’ve already started to use some of your ideas and concepts to do coopperative story telling with her.
Kids have the amazing capacity to be able to imagine without limits, and we as parents should be encouraging that in anyway we can. It saddens me when I see so many kids choosing not to read, imagine, and exercise thier minds. I’ll definately be keeping up with this project.
Wish you the best of luck with this.
Heck, I’d buy one for me and my daughter instantly but I’d like one localized since she doesn’t know English yet. She has dm’d my B/X (which is in Finnish) and I’d like her to share it with her friends who are 8-9 yo. I have even thought about translating S&W or LL just to get them gaming.
Yesterday I was elated and excited when I noticed a poster for Arpacon. It’s a new gaming con for kids and their parents, organized by same people who organize the largest Nordic gaming con Ropecon. This is in Finland, btw.
I’m so going there and I hope I’ll find some games and ideas there.
As a wise man (Mike Shea) once pointed out to me, big companies such as Wizards lack the agility to do things like this not because they have no desire but because their organizational structure and other concerns (legal, current schedule, workload to employee ratios, etc.) prevent them. Bigger organizations are also more risk averse, particularly in a down economy. This is just normal; it’s nothing bad about Wizards in particular.
It’s a shame they couldn’t innovate at this point, or earlier when I was there. I didn’t think, then, that DDI was the best place for this project because of what I thought was the nature of the DDI subscriber base. I wanted it to go to a Practical Guides connection, but the system was sluggish for reasons I state above. Trying to innovate on an unscheduled initiative is very difficult, as I found out on a personal level and take personal responsibility for. But a connection to Practical Guides would have a game like this even more golden than it is by itself. And the production values . . .
Then again, for personal and other reasons, I’m not so keen on seeing Hasbro’s stockholders well fed while creative talent suffers through a tough work environment, as well as lack of proper consideration and remuneration and/or outright lack of work. I know it’s not easy for my fellows who still work at Wizards, and I wish they didn’t have to labor (brilliantly nonetheless) under such forces. But gone are the days of the independent private business there in Renton and the business agility that state might have allowed.
.-= Chris Sims´s last blog ..Mailbag 4 – All By Myself, Part 1 =-.
Hey Chatty,
In terms of “rich and whimsical art,” might I suggest Mike (Gabe) from Penny Arcade? He’s done some 4e art for WOTC, and his current ‘Lookouts’ storyline-style seems like the perfect fit for this project:
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/4/26/ (first page of new ‘Lookouts’ storyline)
Anyways, just a thought. Congrats on 800, and good luck with this game – I think a lot of us are eagerly awaiting the results!
Risk-averse companies (often an oxymoron) with enough capital will prefer to purchase a small, somewhat successful license and apply its marketing muscle onto it.
(Internet provides the opportunity for investors to wait and see which idea can actually work *before* they invest..)
.-= Eric Maziade´s last blog ..Revenge of the dailies =-.
Wow, I am so looking forward to this when released. I have two kids under 3 and I am trying to wait patiently to get to RPG time with them! This sounds fantastic! My 2 year loves to play with the dice rolling app on my phone, so I can’t wait to see what she thinks of the REAL dice!
And congrats on the 800 posts!
Congratulations on your 800th post, Phil. And good luck for your project. While I neither have kids nor do I play D&D 4E I am quite excited about this and if anyone can pull this off, it’s you. And if you need someone to do the layout, just give me a shout!
.-= Stargazer´s last blog ..Ask the Readers: What do you eat at the gaming table? =-.
Big grats on your 800th post! I just found your blog in the last few weeks, and I am totally in love with it! Two recent articles in particular really resonated with me – the one about your AD&D1e roots, and the pre-bedtime game you played with your kids.
I have a 15-month-old daughter, and I can’t wait to play these games with her. She was out running around during our gaming session this past weekend and she learned to say “dishe” and fell in love with rolling the dice.
There is a game out there already that I strongly suggest taking a look at if you have never seen it before. It is called TOON from Steve Jackson games. It is an absolutely awesome game I was introduced to about 15 years ago. The game has very minimal rules and guidelines and promotes imagination better than any game I have ever played. There are no races or classes. If you can think of an animal or person or creature you would like to be, you can do that. There is a list of skills you can choose from, but you are also encouraged to make up your own. Items and equipment also have no limit except for the imagination. The rulebook contains a lot of adventures, and it is easy to see from the adventures provided that it is super easy for any person with a good imagination and a good heart to run games for anyone of any age.
I would definitely be on the list of potential buyers of any product that embraced this same spirit.
You are in a great position to produce such a product in that you don’t have to answer to anyone except yourself and your own integrity. I know you will create something based on your own experience with your own children, and that it will be great!
I have a broad skill set, and I would be honored to assist with any tasks, no matter how menial, related to this project for free. Just being able to be a part of what I consider to be such a meaningful endeavor would be enough compensation for me. Don’t hesitate to ask for help with anything!
Good luck and best wishes!
Regarding the project you’ve taken on: Yes please!
Hey Chatty,
I’m glad to hear you are going through with the project. The first time you brought it up (way back when), I thought it was a terrific idea, but I was worried that WOTC would make it a clone of the old cartoon or some such. What you describe is much richer and meaningful, and it plays well to children’s overactive imaginations. Good luck to you and let me know if you ever need any monster or adventure submissions. I’d love to make some small contribution.
Gary
@Gamefiend: Thanks man! You’re on the list you crazy-assed dreadlock genius!
@Tim: Your suggestions are very much along the direction I hope to drive this project. Thanks for taking the time to share them. Simple, sleek, roleplaying friendly 4e is what I aim at.
I’ll get back to you about the Pirate Robot Ninjas. 🙂
@Papabaloo: Thanks for the good wishes!
@Eric: Yes, I have been way too careful about trusting myself, but the time is right and the stars are aligned! I’ll call you for playtesting 🙂
@Micheal Erb: Add a task resolution system (I used Rock Paper Scissors for a long time) and you have a full game to explore wherever your sons want to take you.
@adamford: THANK YOU! 😀
@John: Start slow and let her set the pace of the experience. Nico and Rory have been in and out of the RPG experience and we’re slowly making things more complex. Thanks for the kind words.
@Pekka: Wow, thanks for your trust! I swear I will go to Ropecon one day. Maybe I’ll run a demo of that adventure or another of my adventures. 🙂 Here’s to your daughter playing my game with you!
@Chris: So in essence, I can blame it all on you huh? 🙂 I hear you 100%, I don’t hold it against Wizards… The last few months have just finished hammering into my thick skull that I don’t plan to spend much of my energy marching to other people’s tunes more than I’m already committed in terms of freelance writing (like working with Wolfgang on Kobold Quarterly articles).
As my safety net builds itself, my confidence and energy to tackle this have reached the ‘do it or shut up’ point 🙂 So let’s do it!
@Darkside: Great idea… I’m not quite sure he knows who I am yet or if he’d do commissioned art for such a project. But I’d love to work with him. Jared von Hindman (Headinjurythearter.com) who’s style hits one of my definition of whimsical has already stepped forward to offer his services.
Hell, I’d love to also get Tony Diterlizzi to do a piece of the Fairie part of the adventure as the Spiderwick Chronicles are a fundamental inspiration for the project. Thanks for the suggestion.
@Tim F. I’m so incredibly glad that so many of you have young kids that will be of age (or near it) when this thing comes out. It makes the trepidation I felt while writing it all the more worthwhile… I can feel the need for the product, it’s so awesome. Thanks!
@Stargazer: Thanks friend. I shall not forget you!
@Jeremy: Ya know… I have been a huge Steve Jackson fan and customer for more than 15 years and have often thought of buying Toon but never actually did it. I’ll go and get the PDF if it’s still on sale.
@TheKyle: I’ll strive to be able to tell you “There you are” as soon as possible!
@Gary: Thanks for the feedback on my proposed outline.
Thanks everyone for your wishes and offers of help. I’m in pre-planning mode, once I settled the actual specs of the project, I’ll keep you informed!
@Chatty:
OMG if you can somehow get diTerlizzi for even just a tiny bit of art, it will be the best ever… he’s one of my favorite artists-of-all-time, ever since my old MTG days.
.-= Tim´s last blog ..Episode 15: Epic Battle Time! =-.
@Tim: I got his permission once to use one of his MTG art piece to represent one of our PCs in one of our campaign posts and he agreed. So I have some sort of a channel opened.
But seriously, Jared is already an awesome catch (plus I get drunk with him on a yearly basis now… he he he) and I’m sure others will crop up! 🙂
I’m eyeing a simple game to play while my family goes on a road trip this summer, and I think the Heroes of Hesiod rules meet that need.
I was planning run with a non-combat style adventure;
http://community.wizards.com/dndparents/go/thread/view/79117/22631285/A_Non-Combat_Adventure_Idea_for_Kids
I have been running 10-12 year olds in a 4e group for almost two years (started on my son’s tenth birthday). It has been a considerable learning experience for me and your blog has been very useful. I particularly needed to learn the importance of turning off the mechanics in order to let coolness occur. That has been a learning experience on both sides: they kids love slaying stuff and the sheer geekery of rules and mechanics, but if you can get them lose from that, let them try something wacky and get a result (sometimes a scary one) then something special happens.
We are almost through the KoS module (I customized it liberally) and they ended up in the room with the titan statue and force-blasting dragons. I lovingly described the halfling fighter (10 year old tomboy) sailing through the air clinging desperately to the titans arm, hacking at the joints, while the rogue (11 year old storyteller) attempted to disable a dragon statue. I gave him a choice: make a dangerous attempt to destroy the statue straight away or keep plugging away… The scene ended with him flipping away from the exploding trap and skidding to a halt skateboard style with his hair smouldering. Best rogue moment disablement EVER.
Most of the thoughtful stuff in the DMG2 I have applied (including vignettes – you would be amazed what acting skills came out and how difficult they found it). It has taught them to be systematic, work as a team and tell stories. Our group has grown steadily and I can now say that I have the six smartest kids in my son’s class, plus a gifted older brother (minmaxer slayer).
So I think there is a market for D&D for kids, particularly if you can give parents a role and make clear to them how valuable the experience is. When my son goes to secondary school after the summer, I am confident that the Sunday afternoon D&D sessions will survive for a while at least and give him a simple way to make new friends.
Good luck with your project, let me know how to pre-order. I like D&D (though I was a Runequester iat University) but for pure roleplaying goodness and superb storymaking, do not forget Mouseguard…
.-= Tim´s last blog ..Mind like Tomatoes =-.
I released my Fantastic Adventures rules (inspired by you and NewbieDM) a week before Monster Slayers. It’s focused on combat like Monster Slayers, but I tried to be a little more creative with the adventure scenarios. I really like your “something unexpected” rule, and may incorporate a variation (I use opposing rolls instead of roll-vs-number) in a update.
Looking forward to the results of your project.
.-= Kameron´s last blog ..Monster Slayers and Fantastic Adventures =-.
I agree with your philosophy; if you are upset by something do something about it. I do also agree that D&D for kids is a huge opportunity WotC is dropping the ball on.
.-= Thadeous´s last blog ..Ritualistically Speaking: seek rumor =-.
Awesome post. I don’t have kids and I haven’t had the time to check out 4e, but I’d love to see something like this on the market.
Hey Chatty, Firstly Congrats on the 800th. I predict that once you have this product built and available it will not only sell like Hotcakes + Bacon. On the subject of marketing and brand name, i’m thinking the Chatty brand name is bigger than you realise. But thats just my thoughts
Scott
.-= Scott´s last blog ..An Undead History =-.
I don’t know if there is anything I could do, but if you can think of anything, I’m game!
-Tourq
.-= Tourq´s last blog ..Screw Combat! Why sometimes the best fights aren’t even about fighting at all =-.
Great stuffy, Chatty! I’m not happy about WotC making decisions based on marketing, but I can understand it. However, when they start cutting out some of the substance of roleplaying in a product designated for children who may grow up to be future members of the hobby, I become very concerned. I think your solution is an elegant one that allows for both the fighty kids and the imaginative kids to get involved and have some fun play. Well done and good luck with this. I think you should definitely see it through to the end.
.-= walkerp´s last blog ..episode 9 – Luke Crane on FreeMarket =-.
Wow, I mean just Wow. If my kids weren’t already grown I would so play this. I have a 50 year old (he only looks about 30) half-dragon son named Issaic and a cross between a brass and a red. His name is Charmortis. Funny story about him. Turns out he was, um, is the reincarnation of Io. And for you non draconian historians Io was the very first dragon he is made of all dragon types, but was split in half in a great battle and his two halves formed into Bahamut and Tiamet. But enough of the history lesson. I have high hopes for you. This will not fail, by the dragon gods this must, this will succeed!
@Chris: “As a wise man (Mike Shea) once pointed out to me, big companies such as Wizards lack the agility to do things like this not because they have no desire but because their organizational structure and other concerns (legal, current schedule, workload to employee ratios, etc.) prevent them.”
I said all that? I seem to remember linking an article about that, I think, but it certainly wasn’t an original idea.
Good luck, Phil! Less pontificating, more writing =)
.-= Mike Shea´s last blog ..Making Terrain Fun =-.
Not to start a flame war, but have you considered Savage Worlds for your rules set? I am running my boys through a pulp era campaign. I picked SWEX since it allowed and encouraged out of the box thinking and even rewarded it. Kids already role play and a system / adventure / concept that encourages them to dig into that imagination is great.
I look forward to seeing it when published!
Hey, Phil-
Your proposal sounds great. I have a 4 year old who is already becoming a budding gamer. We play lots of board games together (Kids of Carcassonne is a favorite) and I’ve been experimenting with exploring and making up our own stories together to help with his verbal skills. Mostly it’s just an open ended conversation about characters, activities, and outcomes, but its been a lot of fun.
We also like the wordless picture books by illustrator Barbara Lehman. The sequential pictures suggest a whimsical plot, but its up to the reader/storyteller to fill in the details. My son loves these books and some of my favorite quiet moments with him have been listening to him tell me the tales that Lehman’s books illustrate. My friend’s (Troy aka Doc) review of the books is here: http://resqueezed.blogspot.com/2010/03/looking-red-book.html
. I think you might be able to draw some inspiration from this type of adventure layout perhaps.
Troy/Doc plays a lot of games with his kids and has some interesting ideas for making gaming accessible to them on his blog. They’ve had a pretty good run for a homemade Pokemon RPG and recently his boys (6 and 8) wanted to try Old School D&D. Those posts are pretty interesting: http://resqueezed.blogspot.com/2009/11/playing-old-school-d-with-boys.html http://resqueezed.blogspot.com/2009/11/playing-old-school-d-with-boys-part-2.html http://resqueezed.blogspot.com/2009/11/playing-old-school-d-with-boys-part-3.html and http://resqueezed.blogspot.com/2009/11/playing-old-school-d-with-boys-part-4.html .
I am looking forward to the day that I can explore slightly more structured story and RPG play with my son. Currently I am thinking about playing Mouse Guard (or some version of it) in a few years with him. He’s seen the graphic novels when I brought them home from the library and is in love with the idea of talking mice ever since I read him Mouse on a Motorcycle.
I think your chances or making a good game that is accessible to kids goes up once you are divested from a company like WotC. I would almost encourage you to stray a bit further from 4e while having an obvious path to D&D and other genre Role Playing Games down the road. WotC’s attempt inspired game designer, John Harper, to do his own version of a game that looks similar to Penny Arcade’s Lookouts strips. If you haven’t seen or heard of the Wildings, check the starter kit out: http://www.onesevendesign.com/wildlings/wildings.pdf . It’s a great start and he was completely free to try anything he wanted.
Good luck. We’ll be watching.
Sounds like the advice for adapting an RPG for kids will be worth the price of admission. I’ll buy it and use it with a simplified version of GURPS when my 4-year-old is ready for gaming.