The third day of #RPGaDay2019 brings us an intimidating word for inspiration: "Engage."
While I'm hoping to read some good pieces on Star Trek: Next Gen with that, I'll stick to things nearer or dearer to my heart:
Before the birth of my first child, Maja, back in 2009, I was desperately looking at options to engage my kid (and future kids) into the hobby. At Cold Wars 2009 I was introduced to Gnome Wars and adopted that as the basis of my experiment. The figures were bigger (easily 35mm), sturdier and could be painted in bold colors with the historical/Games Workshop police raiding our home.
Maja was born in May 2019, and in September, Gaming with the Gnomies was launched.
"But ViscountEric," the casual reader will ask, "Gnome Wars is a wargame, not an RPG...."
...and both have initiative and teach being patient and taking your turn.
Fast forward a bit, plus a second child, Millie, and Mja was old enough for some "adventures" to supplement the "big battles" we would do.
Combine some gnomes, some mice (Reaper and Eureka), and some Fisher Price Little People... and I present the Saga of the Stinky Kangaroo...
Still too little to consistently use dice with pips, I initially started with stoplight dice (think FUDGE/FATE dice) with reds canceling out greens for successes. Sometimes I'd determine a large result of yellows could skew a success or smooth over a failure (and this was long before I learned of Apocalypse World and all its children.
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| Princess has been rescued, time for a dance party. |
Ultimately, the stoplight dice disappeared, and I moved onto traditional dice and math lessons for Maja and Millie. My Toddler Interactive Adventure Resolution... Adventure system (TIARA) allowed for a few stats for each character, enough dice to roll to make it fun, and allow a few flourishes
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| Collecting the Animals from the Zoo |
Under 5, you need to either keeps things visual tactile (which people love Monopoly pieces or cars in the Game of Life), or keep it to simple storytelling (Rory's Story Cubes are great for this).
When Maja turned 5 (and Millie 3 and a half), I experimented with something beyond TIARA. I had picked up the D&D 5e Starter Set and wanted to try out the adventures within.
Bad News: They both handled reading and rolls far better than nornal, but even with one-word + picture spell and special ability cards, it was a bit complicated for them:
Good News: We used My Little Ponies as characters, so story-wise, they were engaged and excited. Even if Twilight Sparkle AND Princess Celestia were still kidnapped when we ended the experiment and went back to gnome/mouse adventures.
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| Dungeons and Ponies 5e |
Conventions: Maja attended her first convention at the age of two, cheering on the players of my education Battle of Yellowstone game at Fall-In 2011. While I have scheduled some "Dad Only" weekends and one-days from time to time, Maja is my usual partner-in-crime for historical and RPG conventions.
Mepacon in northeastern Pennsylvania has had a great kid's block of gaming, intermixing kids-level games with arts and crafts, a coloring contest (don't worry there's an adult division as well), and culminating with the Mepacon Kid's LARP. The LARP is a tremendous undertaking, especially when you need to keep kids 3-10 occupied with the same task, but the staff pulls it off admirably....
It might also involved sugaring up the kids before they release them back to the parents for the dinner break.
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| The rocket ship is built to escape the dying Earth (the con theme was Post Apocalyptic) |
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| An Infamous LEGO Pirate game... |
Of course, I'm even more biased by the fact that Maja finally got into the HAWKs' much bally-hooed "Armies for Kids" game at last month's Historicon 2019. She just made the age-off for a great game where the gamemaster taught a Medieval game to a number of kids, and afterwards, they all got to take home enough figures, terrain, rules, and even a ground cloth to run games for their friends at home. It's a fabulous programs that's covered a number of historical eras over the years, and always created a number of happy and appreciative faces, young and old.
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| Maja (left) at HAWKs' "Armies for Kids" Game. |
I'm not saying we need to start buying 5e Player's Handbooks for a D&D Beginner's games, especially since many of the youngsters attending the RPG Conventions appear to be second or third generation gamers, but there should be something for the first-time kids who wander in.
Maja Millie's Savage Style
Maja has been fascinated with all things Egypt since she started Kindergarten, so it made sense for me to tweak our games from pure fun fantasy, to a Pulp Egypt feel. In order to do this, I decided to finally pull away from my TIARA system to something more "grown-up." I finally chose Savage Showdown, the skirmish rules for Savage Worlds.
Why? Because they were essentially the rules I had set up for TIARA, without ever glancing through a Savage Worlds book.
After a number of sessions, three "seasons" of campaigns, and a sizable increase in my Middle-Eastern terrain, we're pondering retiring this game in favor of a similar game using the Pulp Alley rules and looking into other games for role-playing. We may revisit Savage Worlds for a Mousling game, or we could dip our toes into something crazy like Girl Underground, which is on Maja's reading list.
My Little Pony: Tails of Equestria
I don't know what actual tips you might have picked up from my history of gaming with my girls, but the one thing I must stress is unbridled enthusiasm.
One item that was a no brainer for a father of two young girls was the My Little Pony: Tails of Equestria Storytelling Game. It's one of the best RPG rulebooks I've had the pleasure of reading cover to cover, and the rules themselves borrow from a ton of awesome games, magically tweaks each one to work better in the setting (Because Friendship is Magic).
With or without my girls, this is my go-to convention game to gamemaster now. It adds multiple two-hour sessions to the kids block and two or ten players, we have a blast. It's about 30-60 minutes for creation/designing/coloring your pony, and the remainder is a collaborative effort where I actively keep players interested and one their toes by enthusiastically turning to players and switching gears at speed that keeps everybody invested.
Of course, the true embodiment of enthusiasm goes to the Pony Bros at my table.
No, not the Bronies (they're harmless or just a wee bit creepy at the table, I keep a handle on them).
From my Mepacon Fall 2017 AAR:
After dinner was session #2 of 6. I initially had only a father-daughter team, so I pulled my chair around from the GM screen, sat down next to the little girl, and started working on making the most awesome pony of all time.
Then the bros came. Brandon and Anthony had pre-registered for the event, and showed up a few minutes late, but came in with the greatest attitude. They had needed a game to fill the time slot and ponies sounded intriguing, but also challenging fun. If all my players came in with that sort of an attitude to each session, every game would be guaranteed A+ awesome.
As the session progressed, it became apparent that the young lady's pony, Harmony, was becoming the center of the story, bluntly arguing with the Commander of the Gnoman Legions, and when her abilities were needed to stop a catastrophe, three grown men became wildly animated with each subsequent roll, tossing their own Tokens of Friendship at her in encouragement, and to improve her results. It was epic.
Plus they all laughed at my bad jokes, so I give them props for that..
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