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Jan 21, 2013 -- 3:33AM, TomtheLegend wrote:

Please see the edit to the OP. please know that this is an opt in activity. i am by no means forcing them to do anything. remember i know these children, and thier parents, i belive i can explain things so they get it. I mearly want advice on the DM style or edition advice.

on that note. thanks ToeSama for your input, 4th is looking like the easier one to run i think.

I am also a Scout Leader (in the UK) and do not see any issue with what you have proposed. As long as you have consent, it isn't interupting you pack meetings and you have been upfront with the parents about what the group is going to do how is it any differnt to any other club? As far as I can see it looks like ou have made a Dnd club for kids rather than an add on to Scouts.

On to you original question..

I don't see vast issues with 4th.  Just keep the level low so they are not overwhelmed with a massive list of powers.

Also think about party balance. I know when I was that age I wouldn't have wanted to play anything but a striker (and know adults that are still like that) but as you say you know the kids so know if someone is going to be happy being a cleric. If there are not don't have a leader and have lots of potions.

Maybe look at the E-Classes as they are reall easy to play as mostly work off MBA's to a certain degree.

Also if you know there is one kids who's math isn't as hot as the others maybe have his PC's attack modifier +10 so it is easy for him.

Also try and get input from the kids, if hey wanna fights orcs because they have seen and love LOTR, fight Orcs. The more input that they give you that you put in will get them to want to join in more and suggest other things to add (BTW this advise isn't just for DM'ing Kids!)

P.S Good Luck

I am an Asst Den Leader for my son's cubscout den.  He is 9 years old and I have started running a small D&D campaign for him 4 months ago.  Albeit that isn't a lot of experience with DMing for kids but I do have some perspective on both DMing for kids and scouting.

I agree that 9 years old is definitely NOT too young.  My son picks it up no problem and he has a blast.  He's always asking me when we can play next.

From a scouting standpoint, my understanding is that the OP is not having this as a scouting activity.  As stated by someone else before, this is basically a D&D club just like any other after school club.  So if the parent understands what the club is all about, they can then make the decision as to whether or not they want their child to be part of it.

As far as which edition to use, I think 4e is probably the best to go with for right now.

Thank you Tom for your edition. 
FYI I have a friend who brings his 10 year old son to our games time to time.  I didn't like it, but he wanted his son to play.  So we allowed it but made major adjustments.  We treated the game sort of Disney & hero theme, and rest of us adults behaved.  We play 4e.  Really is one of the best, easiest system. 

We play paragon level and with the varied encounter, daily powers it can be confusing for beginner kid so what we did for his son was, we made a stream down version of his charactor.  Made his charactor with 1-At Will, 1-Encounter (recharge at 4-6 on 1d6), and 1-daily as encounter, 1-utility as Daily.  This made it easy enough and he was able to jump right in quickly, picking his actions by himself out of the 4 choices he had.

Kids out of their pure innocence can be actually more mean & brutal then adults.  Ever watch kids play in play ground?  They can be mean towards each other not knowing they are being mean, and adults constantly have to keep them in line, how to treat or not to treat other kids.  What's right & wrong etc.  Share your toys what have you...  Don't push or hit...Go apologize etc. 

So it is in the game as well.  Gave my friend's kid a barbarian and a big axe and all he wanted to do was break everything, hit things, "I want to kill it!" all the time.

So we also made sure to keep him in line, and npc's respond accordingly.  We really had to cater our game for him so he can have fun but also maintain acceptable behavior in game, no different then out of game.

Sometimes as adults we can forget where we came from, & how impressionable our minds were when we were that age.  We quickly realized running a game with a kid wasn't just about having "fun".  You can do whatever you want that you can't do in RL thing like how us adults play.  We really had to cater our game for my friend's son.  But it was the sacrifice our table was willing to make for him to participate, and we didn't mind.

His kid came 1st, before our adult fun so heh.

I had the opposite experience of Centauri. I began playing at an early age with my much older uncle as DM. He let us know what our characters knew but kept secret from us things our characters did not know. Many of our adventures were dungeon crawls where there were many secret tunnels that involved interacting with the environment. Rather than saying, "There's a secret door in the room," my uncle would say something like "The walls of the damp cellar are covered with a dark green moss except in one spot in the middle of the opposite wall, well above eye level where there is a very big handprint."

Discovering such mysteries was a big part of the fun for my brothers. Many of the challenges he created could often be overcome with creative uses of our equipment, meaning we weren't just writing them down for our health. When we went into one of his dungeon, we knew we'd have to be prepared.

As far as editions go, there are plusses and minuses with each system.

Second edition is I think a very simple version of the game but has some really quirky mechanics.

3.0 has better mechanics but quirky rules scattered everywhere.

3.5 has better mechanics and many of the quirky rules were eliminated... also the layout of the books are better organized. Characters are customizable in a systematic way. It's pretty easy to simplify any rules that become over-complicated by simply setting a difficulty number and having the player make a check. This is the one I recommend; there are actually simplified versions of the various rules intended for younger players but I think they were designed with younger DMs in mind.

4th edition is enjoyed by some people as well, although I'm not one of them. I felt like this version actively did everything it could to alienate people who enjoyed playing dungeons and dragons by eliminating aspects which required problem-solving and learning how to deal with setbacks. Much of the advice given in editions prior to this one have stood the test of time. The 1st edition DMG is still worth a read from time to time. Much of what is advised in 4th edition is workable only for a small subset of players with a specific play style or people who haven't already tried the recommended play style "ages" ago and discovered that (at least for them/us) its flaws outweighed its merits. Bad advice and philosophy wouldn't be enough to avoid this edition, but these concepts sneak into the rules as well. Otherwise, mechanically, 4th isn't drastically different than 3.0 or 3.5... a high roll is good; a low roll is bad generally. Positive modifiers are good and negative modifiers are bad. It's difficult to make a critique without appearing overly negative. These boards have plenty of 4th edition fans, I just wanted to provide a counterpoint to their positive review since I was disappointed in the edition.

I figure the kids are going to have a blast no matter which edition you pick.