JellyPooga
2009-03-01, 04:50 PM
My 8 year old niece has an extremely vivid imagination (as most do at that age!) and my sister suggested that I run a role-playing game for her. Naturally, I accepted the challenge; I remember playing my first game of AD&D at that age and enjoying it immensely. Emily (my niece) joins in the other games we, as a family, play like Settlers of Catan and Agricola and doesn't have too many problems with the rules. She's also played Heroquest (the MB/GW board game) more than once and wouldn't stop pestering me to carry on to mission after mission, so I guess she had fun! The point is, is that I think she'd enjoy playing make believe with rules (i.e. RP-ing).
Being an 8 year old girl, she's into princesses and fairies and such, so I thought I'd run a fairy-tale type of game. I don't want to make it too complex nor do I want any given session to be too long (children are not, generally, known for their patience or long attention spans). Obviously, the rules have to be fairly simple, so I'm going to run the game using Risus; you can't get a lot simpler before you're taking away the rules altogether.
Anyway, to the point...I'm here looking for ideas and advice. For an idea on what sort of setting, think Grimms Fairy Tales, Hans Christian Anderson and the like...evil witches in gingerbread houses, brave knights with magic swords and damsels in distress, cunning goblins with devilish riddles, clever dwarves in the glittering caves and flighty fairies in the enchanted forest, the tallest tower in the castle, magic spinning wheels, talking swans and trees that walk, the fire-breathing dragon, the man-eating giant and the mystical unicorn.
Here's what I've got so far:
My niece is playing a Sorceress, the Queens personal magician. The King died in battle only a few years ago with the Evil Goblin King, leaving the Queen to rule the kingdom and raise their only son, who is only a young boy. For many years, the Evil Goblin King has been trying to usurp the throne, but he's never come so close as he has in the past couple of years since the King has died. The Prince has gone missing and the Queen has recieved a message from the Goblin King saying that he's captured the Prince and that she must abdicate in favour of the Goblin King or he'll kill the boy (or somesuch). The Queen decides to send her most trusted ally, her Sorceress (my niece), to rescue her son accompanied by [anyone else that is playing...an, as yet, undecided number].
That's about it. I only came up with the idea to run a game today, so haven't exactly had a lot of time to plan yet (hence the only rudimentary plot so far), but I thought the sooner I get ideas in, the longer I'll have to weigh up options, ideas and suggestions to make a good first game for my niece. Any help you can give me would be much appreciated...ideas for NPCs, scenarios and encounters, advice for running games for a younger audience or in a fairy-tale setting or generally any tips at all will all be useful!
Cheers,
JP
Being an 8 year old girl, she's into princesses and fairies and such, so I thought I'd run a fairy-tale type of game. I don't want to make it too complex nor do I want any given session to be too long (children are not, generally, known for their patience or long attention spans). Obviously, the rules have to be fairly simple, so I'm going to run the game using Risus; you can't get a lot simpler before you're taking away the rules altogether.
Anyway, to the point...I'm here looking for ideas and advice. For an idea on what sort of setting, think Grimms Fairy Tales, Hans Christian Anderson and the like...evil witches in gingerbread houses, brave knights with magic swords and damsels in distress, cunning goblins with devilish riddles, clever dwarves in the glittering caves and flighty fairies in the enchanted forest, the tallest tower in the castle, magic spinning wheels, talking swans and trees that walk, the fire-breathing dragon, the man-eating giant and the mystical unicorn.
Here's what I've got so far:
My niece is playing a Sorceress, the Queens personal magician. The King died in battle only a few years ago with the Evil Goblin King, leaving the Queen to rule the kingdom and raise their only son, who is only a young boy. For many years, the Evil Goblin King has been trying to usurp the throne, but he's never come so close as he has in the past couple of years since the King has died. The Prince has gone missing and the Queen has recieved a message from the Goblin King saying that he's captured the Prince and that she must abdicate in favour of the Goblin King or he'll kill the boy (or somesuch). The Queen decides to send her most trusted ally, her Sorceress (my niece), to rescue her son accompanied by [anyone else that is playing...an, as yet, undecided number].
That's about it. I only came up with the idea to run a game today, so haven't exactly had a lot of time to plan yet (hence the only rudimentary plot so far), but I thought the sooner I get ideas in, the longer I'll have to weigh up options, ideas and suggestions to make a good first game for my niece. Any help you can give me would be much appreciated...ideas for NPCs, scenarios and encounters, advice for running games for a younger audience or in a fairy-tale setting or generally any tips at all will all be useful!
Cheers,
JP