How to run a young party?

[whisperwind1]

Like it says in the header, what's the best way to run a campaign where the players are adolescents or tweens (to abuse a term)? I read up on the rules in Ultimate Campaign (Pathfinder) and they give an ok base, but they don't really explain how to convey the sort of tone and feel one would expect from an adventure with kids. I'm not terribly well versed in young adult fiction (although I have read Harry Potter, Eragon and watched the Narnia movies), so i'm not confident I can craft such a game. There's a couple of things that are nagging at me in particular:

- How to avoid "Oh its just a regular campaign, except we're kids!" syndrome. Adventures with young characters shouldn't feel like those for older characters, even if the challenge should be comparable. Like I want a justification for why the players' characters are 11-14 and not just adults, there needs to be a point. Otherwise its just D&D except everyone's got a -2 to Str,Dex and Wis.

- This grows out from the first point. The kind of story that can be told with young characters. I get that in the middle ages, kids weren't treated as such if they could carry their own weight, but the idea is still to have a story that focuses on the idea of younger heroes. Obviously you could go super grimdark (Song of Ice and Fire) or rated E for Everyone, but i'm neither trying to depress people or make them feel like they're playing a kid's show. The only idea I can think of is Narnia, a group of children are saddled with a great destiny that only they can fulfill, and they need to get started right now. But that's just one thing, I know there's other stories to tell (less generic ones).

- related to the second point. How much danger and "grittiness" is appropriate for young adventurers. Sure most young adult heroes get into lots of danger, but its rarely as "direct" as in adult fiction. Perhaps there needs to be more non-violent (or simply sneaky) ways of overcoming threats, instead of just "roll initiative!". Grittiness again can get really intense in some stories, but i think its important to keep that sense of discovery and wonder that defines youth. Young adult fiction always has that optimism or excitement that's such a great part of childhood (well it should at any rate), and its hard to marry that well to medieval era hardship. Thing is I want the danger and peril of classic fantasy, but don't want players to feel like they're watching children suffer.

If there's other considerations I should be aware of, please tell me! I feel like the idea of a teen campaign has great potential, but I want to do it right!


P.S. I find the restriction to NPC classes pretty absurd for Pathfinder. I mean no one can tell me Arya Stark was an adult when she took her first level in Rogue, or Harry Potter when he took his first level in wizard.

[lonewolf1210]

Feel free to ignore this, but my suggestion would be to actually NOT play D&D but a different System with this concept.
Burning Wheel for example has built in rules to play characters for any age and would work quite well for this.

[whisperwind1]

Feel free to ignore this, but my suggestion would be to actually NOT play D&D but a different System with this concept.
Burning Wheel for example has built in rules to play characters for any age and would work quite well for this.

I am toughly familiar with how Burning Wheel works, but its not as "accessible" in its mechanics as say D&D (which my group is relatively familair with). Don't get me wrong the idea of Burning Wheel is great, and the lifepath system is super fun, but is there perhaps a more easy to learn and wield system to be had?

[lonewolf1210]

hmm
I would guess that there is probably a dungeon world hack out there that could work for this as well. In any case I believe Dungeon World is easier to adjust to this style of play than D&D is.

[whisperwind1]

hmm
I would guess that there is probably a dungeon world hack out there that could work for this as well. In any case I believe Dungeon World is easier to adjust to this style of play than D&D is.

I'm actually not too familiar with Dungeon World. Isn't it also based off the 3.5 system?

[lonewolf1210]

I'm actually not too familiar with Dungeon World. Isn't it also based off the 3.5 system?

nope
It uses very similar flavor, but the mechanics are totally different. It combines oldschool style with a modern rule system and is easy to get into. You can find the basic rules available for free here (http://www.dungeon-world.com/).

[Red Fel]

First off, it sounds like you've already seen the mechanical options, such as the Young template in Pathfinder. It sounds like what you're asking for isn't the crunch of how to do it mechanically, but the fluff of how to tell the story.

Here's the thing. D&D/PF is a game of high adventure and great peril. Even setting aside the fact that you're describing subjecting children to great peril at the hands of dragons and monsters, it still doesn't work very well, and here's why: The genre is designed for adult characters.

I don't mean that the mechanics turn the characters into adults. I mean that, when a character takes on a quest to destroy the ring, or slay the dragon, or what-have-you, he ceases to be a child. In terms of the narrative, that character functions as a tiny adult.

Let's look at the three examples you give. Narnia: The kids in this aren't the actual heroes. They're bystanders. Their job is to be awed and amazed at this magical land, and to be confused, distracted, and deceived; they are basically decoys until the real hero, Aslan, shows up to save the world from evil. Even in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, where they are instantly crowned royalty and made generals, very little of their action is shown. In the big battle, they are generally described as fighting, albeit alongside stronger, more experienced, more capable troops; their role is to be mascots, not soldiers. Eragon: Let's get the ugly out of the way - this was written by a child, and it is a fairly simplistic story. That said, apart from the fact that the protagonist is biologically young, he pretty much ceases to be a child whenever the narrative requires it. It's lazy writing. When they need him to be a kid, he's all amazed at the cool dragon and neato magic; whenever they don't, he's a super-serious adult, with intelligence and tactical skill, who happens to be in a kid's body. In short, his adventure isn't that of a child, it's that of a small adult. Harry Potter: Okay. Here's the thing about Harry Potter. Of all of them, Harry's adventure is that of a child. He's a schoolkid, he's often confused and deceived, he's frequently unprepared. The problem is that it isn't his adventure; up until the last book or so, the adventure is basically happening around him. Matters are frequently resolved, not by him, but by more responsible or more intelligent people in his life. There's also the problem of narrative convenience - everything and everyone he needs to succeed is provided to him earlier in the book. That kind of narrative convenience doesn't work well in a tabletop RPG setting.
So let's start there: A kid's adventure is fundamentally different from an adult's, unless you're basically turning the kids into tiny grown-ups. There are some systems, as others are discussing, that model this better than others. D&D/PF is not one of them. D&D/PF is about larger than life epic fantasy action. It's about peril and despair and monsters and fear. It's not about the heroes being kids, or having lives, it's about them being heroes. And there is nothing about that which is fundamentally kid-like.

What is a "kid" campaign? Well, think about it. What makes kids distinct from adults? Awkwardness, physical and emotional. A lack of experience or knowledge. A sense of wonder. The pressures of fitting in and developing an identity. These are things you can see a lot in YA novels and films. It's about developing a personality, gradually coming to grips with who you are, who you can trust, what you can believe, what friendship is.

I guarantee you if you try to introduce a school setting, or try to introduce a place of child-like wonder and excitement, your players will balk. Not because they dislike the concept, but because D&D/PF doesn't model that concept well. D&D/PF is primarily designed around combat. If you use a system like D&D/PF to model your characters, they will likely end up more along the lines of "heroes who happen to be kids," as opposed to "kids who become heroes."



P.S. I find the restriction to NPC classes pretty absurd for Pathfinder. I mean no one can tell me Arya Stark was an adult when she took her first level in Rogue, or Harry Potter when he took his first level in wizard.

The requirement of being an adult doesn't reflect a lack of ability; it reflects a lack of training and experience that puts the character at the same level as any other Commoner, only smaller. Arya didn't take her first level of Rogue until she had endured more suffering and experience than most adults; prior to that she was an Aristocrat. Most combatants in the books could wipe the floor with her. Harry Potter had barely taken his first level in Wizard by the seventh book, given that the first level reflects years of study. Let's face it, until shortly before the end, Harry couldn't handle a fight with a housecat. A child prodigy may be gifted, but years of training and experience matter too.

[JDL]

You could always run the campaign the way these guys played it:

http://cache.coverbrowser.com/image/bestselling-movies-2006/2424-1.jpg

[whisperwind1]

You could always run the campaign the way these guys played it:

http://cache.coverbrowser.com/image/bestselling-movies-2006/2424-1.jpg

Lol this is the part where I say that I never watched this show.

[whisperwind1]

First off, it sounds like you've already seen the mechanical options, such as the Young template in Pathfinder. It sounds like what you're asking for isn't the crunch of how to do it mechanically, but the fluff of how to tell the story.

I don't mean that the mechanics turn the characters into adults. I mean that, when a character takes on a quest to destroy the ring, or slay the dragon, or what-have-you, he ceases to be a child. In terms of the narrative, that character functions as a tiny adult.

What is a "kid" campaign? Well, think about it. What makes kids distinct from adults? Awkwardness, physical and emotional. A lack of experience or knowledge. A sense of wonder. The pressures of fitting in and developing an identity. These are things you can see a lot in YA novels and films. It's about developing a personality, gradually coming to grips with who you are, who you can trust, what you can believe, what friendship is.

I guarantee you if you try to introduce a school setting, or try to introduce a place of child-like wonder and excitement, your players will balk. Not because they dislike the concept, but because D&D/PF doesn't model that concept well. D&D/PF is primarily designed around combat. If you use a system like D&D/PF to model your characters, they will likely end up more along the lines of "heroes who happen to be kids," as opposed to "kids who become heroes."

Fair enough (and very well argued). However a friend of mine brought up a very good point that children often surprise people with their maturity. Alot of kids can be just as reasonable, cool-headed and wise as adults (not all of them, but it can happen). She said that if I were to run such a campaign, then it would likely involve the prodigy archetype you mentioned, very competent and mini-adults. But I think it should be possible to strike a happy middle between an exceptional level of competence (let's face it, children can be heroes just as much as adults) and still retain the core of what it means to be a kid. Obviously the whole point of most YA stories are a coming of age,and that's fine, totally on board with that.

But in order to make the campaign feel like a kid's story, i'd need to work in the themes you mentioned. Knowing players though, I agree that they would struggle with the idea (of course they might surprise me). I agree about the forced places of child-like wonder and school setting (unless its an over-the-top anime school), but then how can I work the themes of a YA story into an actual campaign? Is it a case of building an appropriate world for it, or simply trying to weave them into an existing setting?

Also what's a good system for this that's not D&D? Burning Wheel is definitely interesting, but are there alternatives?

[Vrock_Summoner]

I pretty much agree with everything Red Fel said. (I'm such a poser.)

Games with semi-normal children PCs with no "more responsible adult" characters or contrivances can work, but even then, they usually don't solve any significant problems; often, an appropriate goal for children is just to survive being in a given environment where they don't belong.

Really, the biggest thing about children in high fantasy is that, barring supreme contrivance and/or Saturday morning cartoonism, they can't stay kids, even if they started as them. Forget everything else, just having to kill several adults to succeed will scar the hell out of the characters, who will either become a complete mess or, if they're really willful and lucky, be made into instant child soldier types, which would likely no longer count as a child as far as you're concerned (though it's still distinct from playing an unusually tiny adult).

Rather than try to force the square peg into the round hole, I might suggest having the game start with reckless explorer children who go into a dungeon for no logical reason except that "it can't be as bad as the adults make it out to be," promptly getting tricked into releasing some abomination or another, yada yada everyone they love dies, timeskip, motivated adventurers, boom. Beyond that, there's no serious way to include child characters for a significant number of sessions where they stay believably childlike through the experience.

[Red Fel]

Fair enough (and very well argued). However a friend of mine brought up a very good point that children often surprise people with their maturity. Alot of kids can be just as reasonable, cool-headed and wise as adults (not all of them, but it can happen). She said that if I were to run such a campaign, then it would likely involve the prodigy archetype you mentioned, very competent and mini-adults. But I think it should be possible to strike a happy middle between an exceptional level of competence (let's face it, children can be heroes just as much as adults) and still retain the core of what it means to be a kid. Obviously the whole point of most YA stories are a coming of age,and that's fine, totally on board with that.

But in order to make the campaign feel like a kid's story, i'd need to work in the themes you mentioned. Knowing players though, I agree that they would struggle with the idea (of course they might surprise me). I agree about the forced places of child-like wonder and school setting (unless its an over-the-top anime school), but then how can I work the themes of a YA story into an actual campaign? Is it a case of building an appropriate world for it, or simply trying to weave them into an existing setting?

Also what's a good system for this that's not D&D? Burning Wheel is definitely interesting, but are there alternatives?

Okay. One point at a time.

First, kids can be mature at times. Sometimes frighteningly so. But a game about mature-for-their-age kids really isn't about kids at all; it's about, as I said, tiny adults. The fundamental aspect of any narrative about a kid isn't about the external struggles, but the internal ones. And while there are plenty of stories about adults with internal struggles, the internal struggles of a kid are essential to his story; the external ones are simply an allegory or a backdrop.

Consider, for example, the book Wizard's Hall by Jane Yolen, which preceded the Harry Potter series by quite a few years. Yes, the protagonist is studying to be a wizard, and yes, he is preparing to face a great menace. But the story is more about how he is a person who doesn't fit in; he's not particularly adept, he's awkward, he's unpopular. It's a story about how he learns to find his strengths. The fact that these strengths are what enables him to face the Big Bad is merely illustrative. The point isn't that he has discovered the power to defeat the Big Bad; the point is that he has discovered his own value, and in doing so has defeated the Big Bad.

This takes us right into the second point, which is how to integrate these themes into a campaign. The thing to remember, as illustrated by stories like Wizard's Hall, is that the external conflicts are simply the backdrop that is used to illustrate the protagonists' inner struggles. Overcoming the enemy should coincide with learning a valuable lesson about oneself or about others. It sounds corny, but that's the essence of the child's adventure - growing and learning.

The challenge, then, isn't the worldbuilding. The world is almost extraneous; it can be high fantasy, modern fantasy, science fiction; it can be ancient times, medieval ages, modern, or future. The challenge is the characters, or more accurately the players. The narrative of the child is one of growth. This means that the players have to write serious flaws into their characters, such as naivete, dependence, foolishness, brashness, loneliness, or other hard qualities. The players have to then engage with other characters, and NPCs, in an attempt to hide or overcome their flaws. And you, as DM, have to provide situations where they can achieve this growth, and do it in such a way as to feel empowering and slightly epic.

A classic illustration is the team of apprentices. Think of various kids' stories and movies in which the kids are squires to a knight, or students of a scholar, and something happens; the mentor is either incapacitated or unable to assist them, and it's up to the kids to take on the mission themselves. While there are real pressures and real threats, it's less about overcoming the threats and more about what they learn in doing so.

Consider, for example, the film Once Upon a Forest. While your personal opinion on the film may vary, it illustrates this concept well; a team of three animal children are tasked by their mentor to travel abroad and locate herbs which can be used to save their sick friend. They overcome a series of challenges, some involving violence, some diplomacy, some courage, some intelligence, and in doing so learn lessons about themselves and each other. You can transplant that concept into virtually any setting and get the same result. That's one fairly straightforward way to pull off the kids' adventure.

The problem is that it is highly dependent upon the ability of the PCs not only to roleplay their characters, complete with flaws, but also upon their ability to express the lessons they are learning. That can be kind of forced and corny at times. (If you've ever watched South Park, think of the "You know, I've learned something today," speeches. It's almost "very special episode"-worthy.)

Which leads us into the third point, an appropriate system. The major reason that D&D/PF falls short on this is the combat-oriented nature of the mechanics. D&D and PF are designed around combat. And while combat can be a part of this story, it should be a minor part, and used primarily to illustrate the growth of the characters. (For example, the timid character discovering his courage, and realizing that he is in fact surprisingly strong for his age. First combat, he gets stomped simply because he's afraid to fight back. Second combat, the opposite.) Instead, you want a system that deals with personal connections, a sense of self, and the recognition of one's abilities and talents, as opposed to becoming the baddest dude with the biggest firepower. There are other settings that do this well, depending on what you want. However, this is the 3.X/PF subforum, and such a conversation is probably better suited for the Roleplaying Games general forum. I guarantee you that if you ask your question there, you'll receive a lot of answers - there are actually a number of games designed around the concept of kids, or young adults, or the search for identity.

[whisperwind1]

I pretty much agree with everything Red Fel said. (I'm such a poser.)

Games with semi-normal children PCs with no "more responsible adult" characters or contrivances can work, but even then, they usually don't solve any significant problems; often, an appropriate goal for children is just to survive being in a given environment where they don't belong.

Really, the biggest thing about children in high fantasy is that, barring supreme contrivance and/or Saturday morning cartoonism, they can't stay kids, even if they started as them. Forget everything else, just having to kill several adults to succeed will scar the hell out of the characters, who will either become a complete mess or, if they're really willful and lucky, be made into instant child soldier types, which would likely no longer count as a child as far as you're concerned (though it's still distinct from playing an unusually tiny adult).

Rather than try to force the square peg into the round hole, I might suggest having the game start with reckless explorer children who go into a dungeon for no logical reason except that "it can't be as bad as the adults make it out to be," promptly getting tricked into releasing some abomination or another, yada yada everyone they love dies, timeskip, motivated adventurers, boom. Beyond that, there's no serious way to include child characters for a significant number of sessions where they stay believably childlike through the experience.

I see. That's kind of a bummer way of doing it though. So what you're saying is that big epic fantasy adventures aren't doable unless someone has all the baggage of being an adult. Well I can actually see that (hell most adults in fantasy don't usually go for the murderhobo life after all).

Although you mentioned a smaller scale might be best for a kid campaign. Maybe that's something to consider. I mean RPGs are inherently escapism, but maybe a good campaign would need to have less traumatic threats or setting. Again though, that runs the risk of incurring the "place of child-like wonder" that Red Fel warned about. But that's the only way I can see to have the sort of young adventurers vibe and not force the kids to become child soldiers or severely messed up. Children are resilient though, I think they could probably hack a fight (maybe not to the death). The other alternative would be to run a campaign far less focused on combat, maybe with lots of exploration, problem-solving, travel and similar non lethal D&D mainstays. Are these doable?

[whisperwind1]

The challenge, then, isn't the worldbuilding. The world is almost extraneous; it can be high fantasy, modern fantasy, science fiction; it can be ancient times, medieval ages, modern, or future. The challenge is the characters, or more accurately the players. The narrative of the child is one of growth. This means that the players have to write serious flaws into their characters, such as naivete, dependence, foolishness, brashness, loneliness, or other hard qualities. The players have to then engage with other characters, and NPCs, in an attempt to hide or overcome their flaws. And you, as DM, have to provide situations where they can achieve this growth, and do it in such a way as to feel empowering and slightly epic.

A classic illustration is the team of apprentices. Think of various kids' stories and movies in which the kids are squires to a knight, or students of a scholar, and something happens; the mentor is either incapacitated or unable to assist them, and it's up to the kids to take on the mission themselves. While there are real pressures and real threats, it's less about overcoming the threats and more about what they learn in doing so.

The problem is that it is highly dependent upon the ability of the PCs not only to roleplay their characters, complete with flaws, but also upon their ability to express the lessons they are learning. That can be kind of forced and corny at times. (If you've ever watched South Park, think of the "You know, I've learned something today," speeches. It's almost "very special episode"-worthy.)


Ah I see. Its true that the players would be the ones who need to emote that change, and it might not appeal to everyone now that I think about it. Also I wasn' aware that the general RP forum was the more appropriate venue for this (my apologies). My hope was really to get something like the Belgariad (again, not sure if that counts as YA fiction), which I really liked. But I do understand your point. Who wouldve thought setting up a kid campaign would be this difficult?

[Segev]

I'm going to chime in opposition to some of the "you can't do it in D&D" advice. I won't say that the system is well-designed for it, but I do think you can tell an epic fantasy about hyper-competent kids and still manage "a kids' story."

It won't show up when they're fighting animals and magical beasts in the wilderness, unless the players RP it up. That part is up to them, to decide whether they're children, feeling alone and vulnerable in the world or feeling "grown up" while demonstrating that, despite their competence, they really aren't.

But when they interact with the civilized world - good or evil - it will crop up. Adults will not take them seriously; at best, they'll be "impressed" and condescend to deal with the adorably precocious children. This is advantage and disadvantage: The bad guys won't consider them a serious threat until the kids are ready to strike, proving the bandits wrong, but the authority figures to whom the kids must bring warning also will not heed them seriously without much more significant evidence.

In a modern setting, one of the things that is a regular antagonist for child heroes is child services. The grown-ups in government whose job it is to make sure kids are taken care of, kept out of danger, and are not exposed to responsibilities which are meant to be reserved for responsible adults. This can include teachers and parents, but for runaways or orphans it includes far more interaction with the government. Merely being a child on one's own is, in a sense, a crime. Not in the "going on your permanent record as a miscreant" sort of way, but definitely in a "will be chased down by police-like figures and incarcerated against your will, even if it's with a well-meaning foster family" sense. And in any event, teachers and principals are classic antagonists in children's stories, because again, they represent an authority figure whose job it is to prevent children from engaging in dangerous activities...such as dungeon crawling and fighting evil bad guys.

In a fantasy/medieval setting, there tends to be less officially structured child-care-service provision. Parents take care of kids, adults adopt orphans, and orphans and runaways without parents are often non-entities to be pitied, ignored, or exploited. And you don't have to get grimdark to get into the exploitation: Fagin from Oliver was exploiting his gang of pickpockets; they were tools to him, dependent on him for the emotional space children have for parents as well as for getting the most possible for their ill-gotten goods. Children fencing items are more vulnerable than adults, neither knowing as well (due to less experience) how much things are worth, nor having the sheer physical bulk to persuade a fence not to simply take their stuff.

That said, smart fences know that paying reasonably keeps the brats coming back, but still...it's more dangerous for children because they're looked upon as potential victims far more easily than even grown women (especially in a fantasy setting where she might be a first-level sorceress who could burning hands you in the face). (Children are NOT EXPECTED to be first-level yet, and if they are, the stereotype is "rogue.")


So, your party of children, assuming they're independent (in that they are orphans or runaways who do not answer to parents or teachers or other guardians), will be treated largely as ignorable furniture or exploitable tools by most adults. Honest businesspeople's first reaction will be "where are your parents, kid?" and, while certain businesses will still take their tender without complaint, they will still be overlooked and may well be MORE expected to be unable to pay than an adult would, thus making them less desirable until they prove otherwise.

Some adults, after a bit of interaction, will treat them largely as small adults, if they behave well and with more precocious self-confidence than an adult would need to exert. Most will still be more condescending than respectful, exaggerating their respect and how "impressed" they are.

If they have a warning, they won't be able to give it to the King or Duke or Mayor; they'll have to struggle to find a grown-up authority figure to heed them. Their best bets would be guards and the like, and to play it up as "we saw this and it's horrible." The less scared and more confident they sound, the more likely they are to be dismissed as kids playing around. Children panic in the face of danger. And only when they have an immediate danger - see The Boy Who Cried Wolf and the first reactions he got - are they taken seriously. Children "misunderstand" conspiracies and see them where they aren't.


They also won't be taken into grown-up confidence. They will have to gather information through back channels or trusted intermediaries who can pass in the adult world but who nonetheless do respect them.

That emphasizes an aspect of it: their access to the adult world is restricted to far fewer contacts than most. If they have parents or teachers, it's through those, most likely. If not, it's through whatever few adults they've managed to get to view them as "small adults."


Because that's the key: "small adults" can be taken somewhat seriously, but the way you make it a "kids' story" is by having most of the world not see them that way.

The other thing to play up is the other side of this coin: they're children, but for whtaever reason, they're out adventuring and doing adult things on their own a lot of the time. On the one hand, they should be initially trusted by other children in a way that those other children would not trust adults. To some of those kids, their "grown up" lives will be awe-inspiring; they'll want to use the PCs as their own windows and access points into the adult world and society. To others, they'll be alien, almost like "real" adults, and the trust will vanish (particularly if the PCs behave more like "small adults" than children). This alienation, veneration, and attendent isolation plays into the "kids' story" as well: it's why so many young adult novels focus on kids who are unpopular (even if they shouldn't be); most kids THINK they are.


The long and the short of it is to make sure that adults view them as children and try to treat/dismiss them as such. It should be hard even for the serious villain to get used to the idea that his horrid rival/meddling hero is a child (or group thereof). Even if he realizes it's true, think how embarassing that is. (Also, chilren are often considered moldable; this changes the perspective. Children have different desires than adults, and sometimes are more easily bribed...but they can be shockingly stubborn, too.)

Play up the lack of advocacy and voice in civilized lands. Play up both the greater kindness and more casual cruelty that adults of different stripes show children. Adulthood is a barrier-to-entry in many societies...and in those where it isn't, make the children undergo the formal rite of passage. Played right, this "small adulthood" could be a transformative event for them to stop being children, if you wished.

Children are small and annoying, or adorable and precious, and in either case, they are to be kept from bothering/protected from adult activities. They must make much more effort to demonstrate competence, and even when they do, it will often come off as "throwing a tantrum." This is in part because kids don't know how to assert themselves gracefully, and in part because anybody who's ignored who forces enough attention to no longer be ignored is often thought of as having "exploded." All they did was do enough to stop being ignored, but it was by necessity loud and attention-getting, and probably a little bit on the violent side (if just to make noise), and that's "a tantrum."

The 12th-level Sorcerer-boy who's also 12 years old may be able to turn the Queen into a frog, but he's going to be ignored until he does so...and that's going to make people mad at him for doing it. There's a reason villains are better at the "show of power" than heroes: when a villain does it, he's happy to KEEP doing it until anger turns to respectful fear, while the hero usually just wants respect because he doesn't LIKE hurting people...but it's IMPORTANT that they heed him.

Children almost automatically get ignored.

(Play this up in court situations, for instance, by having the "optimal" path to avoid being tantrum-throwing kids be to interact with the prince, who's their age and used to being ignored but has his own ways of getting attention. Even he, though, might have trouble convincing his royal father of a threat he heard of from a bunch of street brats.)




As a final note: wealth can go a long way towards commanding at least feigned respect. It will avoid the "dirty brat" stereotype most of the time. But the condescention will generally always be there, and people of an unscrupulous nature will MORE eagerly come after the "stupid kids" who "don't know how to handle their money." It will help - money always does - but it won't be perfect. (Clever child PCs might hire a butler to be their faux guardian for such itneractions.)

Again, it's all about the barriers to society combined with the few advantages of being easily ignored by the powerful (even amongst bad guys) which will make the feel, at least from the DM's side of the screen.

The players have a lot of responsibility for the internal struggles, thoughts, and sense of place in the world of a child PC, and that's not something you can enforce nor create. You can discuss and suggest, and describe things in terms of how grown-ups might have been helpful here and emphasizing how alone they are or how they can take pride in not needing an adult, but it's mostly on them.

[Milo v3]

I just want to say that the Ultimate Campaign's rules on young characters can be ignored, since one of the iconics is a kid that ignores those rules and has a PC class.

[BilltheCynic]

To each of your points:

1) I agree with Segev on how to make it feel different, namely, adults have a hard time taking them seriously. As to the point on why they are children...as much as I am growing tired of this, you can have them all be 'the Chosen Ones' who were born special and are destined to stop the evil sorcerer Xagyg. You can represent this 'specialness' mechanically with templates. Slap the Saint template on all of them (without RP requirements) and now they are all uber special snowflakes, and only they can save the world because of their specialness. You could even have a DMPC round up the children and guide them on their quest, perhaps even pulling an Obi-wan if necessary ("Remember, the Specialness will be with you. Always.")

2) Probably "Save the kingdom from evil sorcerer." Seriously, look at The Little Mermaid, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Percy Jackson, Narnia, Harry Potter, even Care Bears and the Smurfs. Evil sorcerer wants to do even things, and only the kids can stop him because they are special. The best part about it is because 'evil sorcerer' is so generic, you can change his how evil/effective he actually is based on the kind of story your players want (see #3 for more on that).

3) My advice here is to let your players determine how dark and mature the setting is. You could start by having a tower with Brooms of Flying at the top that the characters need for travel. Unfortunately, the front door to the tower is being guarded by an ogre with a large spiked club. Now, there are a lot of ways that the players could solve this, and which one they choose would help you determine the tone of the setting. If the players decide to walk up to the ogre and just ask if they have the brooms, perhaps the ogre is a nice guy who just needs X, and if the players do Y for him he will happily let them have the broom. If this happens you know that your campaign should definitely be more idealistic with more creative ways of solving the problem. If the players decide to try to sneak past the ogre, or have one person distract him while the others sneak in, you could probably include a bit more clever intrigue and be a little more gritty with the story. If the players first reaction is to beat the crap out of him, loot his body, then steal the brooms, you know you can be more gritty and dark with them. If the kids decide to find out about the ogres family, kidnap his daughter, threaten to execute her if he doesn't give them the brooms, the infect her with a lethal disease before releasing her in the hopes that she'll infect her father too...well, Song of Ice and Fire it is. In short, let your players set the tone and determine how dark the story is. Kids don't like stuff that's too mature, but they also hate it when people treat them like 'little kids'. Your players might want to explore a wonder-filled land, with talking animals, waterfalls that fall up, and forests inhabited by pixies and fauns. On the other hand, they may also want to hack through legions of evil skeletons to stop the big bad guy from taking over the world. If they set the mood, it will be the mood that they want to play.

TL;DR: 1) Emphasize their specialness 2) Give them something grand and cool to do with their specialness. 3) Let your players decide how dark or idealistic the world is.

[whisperwind1]

I'd say Chosen Ones is the obvious route to go, although i'm pretty sure that there's other ways to do it. I liked the survival suggestion given earlier. Perhaps the party are orphans trying to survive in a tough city. or maybe they are refugees who have been separated from their families and have to make their own way to their original destination (Land Before Time I know, but the plot itself is pretty great for a kid campaign i'd think). Not that I have any particular disdain for the Chosen One thing (although some of my players might), that could easily work. I do think its important to keep the theme of finding one's identity found in most YA novels, so either scenario could work. Although it'd be interesting to have the Great Destiny be the thing that the party is running away from. Maybe they see it as just another thing the adults want to impose on them, and run away from home.

[ideasmith]

My hope was really to get something like the Belgariad (again, not sure if that counts as YA fiction), which I really liked.

The Belgariad's adventuring group was mostly adult: Belgarian and Ce'Nedra were the only adolescents. If you can get 'buy in' to some players playing 'tagalongs' rather than adventurers, that might work. This thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?211278-Unfledged-3-5-class&highlight=ideasmith+unfledged) might be useful.