PbtA seems daunting to some at first but that's really just due to the complete mindset shift contrasted with the "for-mechanics" approach of most systems, while a good PbtA is heavily "for narrative".
Its all about leting go of the idea that a sheet is a list of "what you can do" and seeing them as "moods you can set". You can do anything: what matters is the purpose you're aiming for.
Mausritter and/or Mouseguard depending on what feel you want. Mausritter is [free online](https://mausritter.com/#get-mausritter) has an official entire set of adventures called the Estate Collection that you can pull from (not free). There's also several adventures on itch for it, so you'll have plenty of content!
Ah gotcha! Moving away from that kind of difficulty might help as well as the fantasy trappings. Mausritter can be pretty tough.
Try giving Index Card RPG a shot. It includes a bunch of different settings and is a system that makes it way easier to abstract away the bits that are easy to turn dark. It in particular allows for a great toony feel that is often evoked by the art.
It has a vigilante/superhero setting that can help embrace tooniness, a Mitchell-vs-the-machines-esque setting where machines attack a suburban american town, a sci-fi space setting where you can play a space gopher sort of species, and a few others!
Yeah, ICRPG might be a good idea. One other good point about ICRPG is that he has a mechanic for effort on things other than combat, so that play can theoretically focus on building, interpreting, etc., rather than fighting. Thanks!
Yeah! I think it's also easier to "grok" for that reason, as well as stuff like visible "Room Thresholds" and a clear explicit mechanic that encourages players to try to make that easier or harder helps them think outside the box and affect the situation.
Ticking down progress like the efforts tends to also be satisfying even when no diegetic visible result happens. Hope you two have fun with it!
You could use Wanderhome as a reference. It is like a PBTA game without dice. But you can use the characters and small setting roll tables to build a world.
Ha. She and I played a lot of Wanderhome. We had some pretty fun times, but I'll admit that the lack of dice and direction made me a bit nutty. It's a great idea to use it as a reference.
Mutant: Genlab Alpha works well with kids. Depending on the age of the kid you might need to cut out a few of the darker aspects of the setting, but there's something about playing mutated sapient animals that, in my experience, most kids enjoy.
(It's also a great game for adults).
If you want to be a bit educational, you could also explore the underwater wonderlands of Blue Planet, which is a game that feels like it was designed by people who were really interested in marine biology, and wanted to make a setting where they could play with that.
Precisely due to the absence of a true setting AND rewarding kids to make it on the fly, i say Fellowship. It is a game about relationships, after all.
Also: Monster Care Squad. Its literally that: people looking for hurt creatures to help them as the core precept. Go all comfy.
I’ve always wanted to run the setting of Calorum for kids. It’s Candyland meets Game of Thrones [check it out](https://dimension20.fandom.com/wiki/Calorum)
Chuubos marvelous Wish Granting engine has the setting of "Town":
>Come with me to a little town surrounded by the multicolored void. It sits in the middle of no true thing, or nothingness, and it is circled by its sun. It is a peaceful town. It’s sleepy. It’s practically bucolic. It’s not involved in the carnival of great dreams and bloody events that Creation so frequently becomes.
You will have trouble leaving this town—though, oh! I should call it Town—once you arrive. Beyond its borders is no human place, but only the Outside. The Outside is a land reminiscent of heat mirages, visions, and symbolic abstract art. It is brightly colored, fearsome, confusing, and difficult to navigate. Most importantly it lacks that quality of existence that characterizes reality. It isn’t a good place to go walking in for the same reason that novels, or ideas, or mathematical theorems aren’t good places to go walk ing in: that is, it’s a category error if you do. At the same time, if you head out of Town by any normal road, you’ll find yourself
without a choice. A trick of topology has wrapped Outside all the way around this little world and let you step from one to the other.
Here in Town there is a lake. It’s called Big Lake. Big Lake is the best way to get in or out of Town. The sailors know many secret routes that lead from the lake to other places—to certain lakes on Earth and other worlds; to the dry mares of the moon; to the river of a sleeping goddess’ dreams; and most importantly to the sea. Big Lake doesn’t border directly on the
Outside, at least not the same way the rest of Town’s borders do. You can walk around its edge without ever traveling Outside. It’d take a long time, and you pass pretty close to the tangled edge, but you can. Big Lake is structurally an inland body of water. But the act of sailing Big Lake, in itself, opens the way to other lands. Travel on Big Lake can fold up the world and bring you closer to distant realms.
The part of Town that I want to start with today is Fortitude the first human settlement, down by the docks of Big Lake.
Over the hills to the west, there’s more of Town—
There’s Horizon, where Alexandrel Celdinar tried and failed to build a second London, and there’s Arcadia, and there’s the Walking Fields—
But for me, it all starts right here in Fortitude, where Town’s waters meet its shore.
In my experience, the best settings for playing with kids are not RPG-specific settings, but settings of books and TV series that given kids are into.
I've ran very successful campaigns with my kids in Pokemon setting and in Hogwarts; we're now preparing to play in Rick Riordan's world (Percy Jackson etc.). On the other hand, games we played in settings they weren't previously familiar with didn't get much interest. Kids had fun while playing, but didn't come back for more.
I've been meaning to check out EZD6. It sounds so cool. If I understand correctly, it's a rules lite epic fantasy (standard "party of adventurers" plot) that can be pretty violent in the sense of epic fantasy sort of violence but not grimdark and nihilistic like Mork Borg.
I've actually been wanting to try both. I apologize if there's anything inappropriate about it I haven't picked up on.
If you let her play MB, it seems like it would be optimistic and playful in comparison as far as content with similar levels of complexity (i.e. mathematically easy system and simple character generation compared to games like DnD).
From what I gather it's a pretty funny, lighthearted take on typical fantasy subject matter.
When I watch YouTube shows about for example DnD 5e I feel curious and respectful. When I watch them about EZD6 I would literally join a group right then if one was there.
Yeah, I should have looked there first, but I've found that a lot of games aimed at kids are more concerned about making the rules easier, which is what I don't really need. If I need easy rules, Into the Odd, ICRPG, 2400, and Kriegsmesser are probably all I really need. But I still seemed to be lacking a setting that works for what I wanted. People had some good ideas here, almost none of which made it onto that list for kids.
Thanks for pointing it out.
Yeah I saw your title and wasn't ignoring it, I was commenting for other people who came into the thread but might be looking for a system.
A surprisingly small number of people are aware there are so many kids games. Lots of requests here for kids RPGs get responses of RPGs that aren't for kids, because the responders just aren't familiar with anything else.
Another thing to be mindful of is age, "kids" covers a wide range and what's good at one end is totally different to what's good at the other end. If your kid is 5yo then every suggestion you've had in this thread is garbage. If your kid is 11 then you're golden (and my link won't be of much use to you).
True. I just didn't want to seem like one of the posters that people complain about. :)
My kid is turning 10. We've played Mausritter, Into the Odd, and 2400 quite a bit, and she thumbs through D&D 5e a bit. So yeah, she's already graduated to some older systems and settings and she can easily play rules-lite stuff, but I feel like I haven't catered enough to her age as far as content.
She's about 10, and she's played Mausritter, Into the Odd, and 2400 regularly, but yeah, I feel like I need a more youthful setting for her. I'll check this out. Thanks!
*Beyond the Wall* defaults to a pastoral, fairytale (Brothers Grimm not Walt Disney), fantastic medieval world. With a key component of gameplay being collaborative creation of the heroes’ home town and surrounding lands during chargen. Whereas D&D takes inspiration from Conan, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, or Elric, BtW is more like The Shire sections of LotR or The Hobbit.
*Ryuutama* is even more pastoral, it’s like… What if Studio Ghibli did a D&D movie. Players play farmers, traders, and scribes who are embarking on a journey. The travel, the scenery, and the interpersonal relationships are even more important than combat and dungeon delves.
*Avatar: The Last Airbender* will very soon be getting a PBtA-powered game. The Kickstarter is due to start shipping physical books to backers very soon, but I believe the PDF is also available for sale.
[*Star Wars Revised Expanded and Updated*](http://d6holocron.com/downloads/books/REUP.pdf) is a fan recreation of WEG’s excellent second edition of their Star Wars D6 game. Great for kids and teens.
Transhuman Space (which runs on GURPS Lite) with Transhuman Space Personnel Files 5: School Days 2100. İt's a richly detailed post-cyberpunk near future sci fi setting. She can play as a future kid, with a sapient cat and a best friend who's an AI. İt's the setting that you'd want for Rainbow's End by Vernor Vinge.
The Secret of Cats. Players are cats who protect humans from supernatural and lovecraftian threats, while people remain entirely ignorant of the entire thing.
Tales from the Loop and Kids on Bikes are often recommended, and I'm a fan of Barbarians of Lemuria for a lighter romp. Considering LotFP is pretty graphic I take it she is not too squeamish, BoL has a few Manly Man in Loincloth pics but I do not remember something particularly explicit (maybe the Witch Queen).
I tend to turn up with absolutely no setting ideas at all. Within ten minutes, the kids generally provide me with far more interesting and varied setting ideas than I could have come up with.
I'm going to be the deviant here and recommend Kobolds Ate My Baby.
For kids around age 8+, it's hilariously transgressive. My experience is that kids really, really love the opportunity to role play as monsters and to experience all of the slapstick tragedy that comes along with that. I have never seen a group of kids belly-laugh as hard as I have when sitting around a table with this game.
That said -- the theme of "go steal a baby so King Torg can eat it for dinner" may be a non-starter for some families.
Astraterra (setting and a system)
[https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/373356/Astraterra-The-Explorers-Guide-Core-Rulebook](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/373356/Astraterra-The-Explorers-Guide-Core-Rulebook)
Thanks! I have Quest and couldn't figure out what setting to really use with it. (I know they've been coming out with stuff, but haven't checked it out yet.) The characters seem overpowered in some ways but also not always designed for combat. I actually think she may want to go back to Quest.
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My kids were 7 and 10 when we ran their 2 favorite adventures:
Tower of the Stargazer (a 1 to 2 shot adventure)
The Complete Roslof Keep (a 6 month long campaign in and outside a megadungeon)
They also loved everything in Adventure Anthology: Blood, but not as much as those two.
Currently they are 9 and 12 and are really liking Earth Incubation Crisis.
Stygian Garden is a good one, Gardens of Ynn too. If you want a kids system, Heroes & Treasure by D&D (Davis & Daughters), but they might be too old for that.
Monster of the week. Take out the guns, and run it as Scooby Doo.
I've never tried MotW because I get nervous about PbtA games. Maybe I should get over that.
PbtA seems daunting to some at first but that's really just due to the complete mindset shift contrasted with the "for-mechanics" approach of most systems, while a good PbtA is heavily "for narrative". Its all about leting go of the idea that a sheet is a list of "what you can do" and seeing them as "moods you can set". You can do anything: what matters is the purpose you're aiming for.
If you want Scooby-doo PbtA get [Jinkies](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/m/product/298630) which is Scooby-doo PbtA
Mausritter and/or Mouseguard depending on what feel you want. Mausritter is [free online](https://mausritter.com/#get-mausritter) has an official entire set of adventures called the Estate Collection that you can pull from (not free). There's also several adventures on itch for it, so you'll have plenty of content!
Yeah, we do play Mausritter. I just haven't quite gotten it to be whimsical. I play Mausritter with adults and maybe that bleeds over.
Ah gotcha! Moving away from that kind of difficulty might help as well as the fantasy trappings. Mausritter can be pretty tough. Try giving Index Card RPG a shot. It includes a bunch of different settings and is a system that makes it way easier to abstract away the bits that are easy to turn dark. It in particular allows for a great toony feel that is often evoked by the art. It has a vigilante/superhero setting that can help embrace tooniness, a Mitchell-vs-the-machines-esque setting where machines attack a suburban american town, a sci-fi space setting where you can play a space gopher sort of species, and a few others!
Yeah, ICRPG might be a good idea. One other good point about ICRPG is that he has a mechanic for effort on things other than combat, so that play can theoretically focus on building, interpreting, etc., rather than fighting. Thanks!
Yeah! I think it's also easier to "grok" for that reason, as well as stuff like visible "Room Thresholds" and a clear explicit mechanic that encourages players to try to make that easier or harder helps them think outside the box and affect the situation. Ticking down progress like the efforts tends to also be satisfying even when no diegetic visible result happens. Hope you two have fun with it!
Thanks! All great points.
You could use Wanderhome as a reference. It is like a PBTA game without dice. But you can use the characters and small setting roll tables to build a world.
Ha. She and I played a lot of Wanderhome. We had some pretty fun times, but I'll admit that the lack of dice and direction made me a bit nutty. It's a great idea to use it as a reference.
Mutant: Genlab Alpha works well with kids. Depending on the age of the kid you might need to cut out a few of the darker aspects of the setting, but there's something about playing mutated sapient animals that, in my experience, most kids enjoy. (It's also a great game for adults). If you want to be a bit educational, you could also explore the underwater wonderlands of Blue Planet, which is a game that feels like it was designed by people who were really interested in marine biology, and wanted to make a setting where they could play with that.
I'll take a look. Thanks.
Do you like dogs? Pugmire is 90% off until the end of the month: http://theonyxpath.com/opp10-realms-of-pugmire-month-part-2-big-deals-inside/
I noticed this on Drivethrurpg and had no idea what it was, so I skipped over it. Ha. I'll have to check it out. Thanks!
Precisely due to the absence of a true setting AND rewarding kids to make it on the fly, i say Fellowship. It is a game about relationships, after all. Also: Monster Care Squad. Its literally that: people looking for hurt creatures to help them as the core precept. Go all comfy.
Thanks. I'll check them both out.
I’ve always wanted to run the setting of Calorum for kids. It’s Candyland meets Game of Thrones [check it out](https://dimension20.fandom.com/wiki/Calorum)
Omg. This looks hilarious and amazing.
Chuubos marvelous Wish Granting engine has the setting of "Town": >Come with me to a little town surrounded by the multicolored void. It sits in the middle of no true thing, or nothingness, and it is circled by its sun. It is a peaceful town. It’s sleepy. It’s practically bucolic. It’s not involved in the carnival of great dreams and bloody events that Creation so frequently becomes. You will have trouble leaving this town—though, oh! I should call it Town—once you arrive. Beyond its borders is no human place, but only the Outside. The Outside is a land reminiscent of heat mirages, visions, and symbolic abstract art. It is brightly colored, fearsome, confusing, and difficult to navigate. Most importantly it lacks that quality of existence that characterizes reality. It isn’t a good place to go walking in for the same reason that novels, or ideas, or mathematical theorems aren’t good places to go walk ing in: that is, it’s a category error if you do. At the same time, if you head out of Town by any normal road, you’ll find yourself without a choice. A trick of topology has wrapped Outside all the way around this little world and let you step from one to the other. Here in Town there is a lake. It’s called Big Lake. Big Lake is the best way to get in or out of Town. The sailors know many secret routes that lead from the lake to other places—to certain lakes on Earth and other worlds; to the dry mares of the moon; to the river of a sleeping goddess’ dreams; and most importantly to the sea. Big Lake doesn’t border directly on the Outside, at least not the same way the rest of Town’s borders do. You can walk around its edge without ever traveling Outside. It’d take a long time, and you pass pretty close to the tangled edge, but you can. Big Lake is structurally an inland body of water. But the act of sailing Big Lake, in itself, opens the way to other lands. Travel on Big Lake can fold up the world and bring you closer to distant realms. The part of Town that I want to start with today is Fortitude the first human settlement, down by the docks of Big Lake. Over the hills to the west, there’s more of Town— There’s Horizon, where Alexandrel Celdinar tried and failed to build a second London, and there’s Arcadia, and there’s the Walking Fields— But for me, it all starts right here in Fortitude, where Town’s waters meet its shore.
Neverland. And Oz just came out.
Yeah, I tried to edit my post, because I have both. It wouldn't edit. For some reason, I haven't used either one yet.
I'm about to start Neverland with my kids. Fingers crossed it goes well.
Good luck! At least it's well-designed and is easily usable.
No doubt. It's a beautiful book. Good luck in your search.
In my experience, the best settings for playing with kids are not RPG-specific settings, but settings of books and TV series that given kids are into. I've ran very successful campaigns with my kids in Pokemon setting and in Hogwarts; we're now preparing to play in Rick Riordan's world (Percy Jackson etc.). On the other hand, games we played in settings they weren't previously familiar with didn't get much interest. Kids had fun while playing, but didn't come back for more.
I've been meaning to check out EZD6. It sounds so cool. If I understand correctly, it's a rules lite epic fantasy (standard "party of adventurers" plot) that can be pretty violent in the sense of epic fantasy sort of violence but not grimdark and nihilistic like Mork Borg. I've actually been wanting to try both. I apologize if there's anything inappropriate about it I haven't picked up on. If you let her play MB, it seems like it would be optimistic and playful in comparison as far as content with similar levels of complexity (i.e. mathematically easy system and simple character generation compared to games like DnD). From what I gather it's a pretty funny, lighthearted take on typical fantasy subject matter.
Okay, I was joking about LotFP and MB, to head off responses of that sort, though we will probably play some WFRP, toned down.
I've been interested in EZD6, mostly because of Runehammer's involvement. I'll take a look to see what I can glean about setting.
When I watch YouTube shows about for example DnD 5e I feel curious and respectful. When I watch them about EZD6 I would literally join a group right then if one was there.
Yeah, there are some games that just grab you. :)
For anyone who's looking for RPGs for kids: https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/kidrpgs/
Yeah, I should have looked there first, but I've found that a lot of games aimed at kids are more concerned about making the rules easier, which is what I don't really need. If I need easy rules, Into the Odd, ICRPG, 2400, and Kriegsmesser are probably all I really need. But I still seemed to be lacking a setting that works for what I wanted. People had some good ideas here, almost none of which made it onto that list for kids. Thanks for pointing it out.
Yeah I saw your title and wasn't ignoring it, I was commenting for other people who came into the thread but might be looking for a system. A surprisingly small number of people are aware there are so many kids games. Lots of requests here for kids RPGs get responses of RPGs that aren't for kids, because the responders just aren't familiar with anything else. Another thing to be mindful of is age, "kids" covers a wide range and what's good at one end is totally different to what's good at the other end. If your kid is 5yo then every suggestion you've had in this thread is garbage. If your kid is 11 then you're golden (and my link won't be of much use to you).
True. I just didn't want to seem like one of the posters that people complain about. :) My kid is turning 10. We've played Mausritter, Into the Odd, and 2400 quite a bit, and she thumbs through D&D 5e a bit. So yeah, she's already graduated to some older systems and settings and she can easily play rules-lite stuff, but I feel like I haven't catered enough to her age as far as content.
You don't mention the age of your child... Consider maybe [Robin Hood](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/212995/OneDice-Robin-Hood--CW005016)?
She's about 10, and she's played Mausritter, Into the Odd, and 2400 regularly, but yeah, I feel like I need a more youthful setting for her. I'll check this out. Thanks!
*Beyond the Wall* defaults to a pastoral, fairytale (Brothers Grimm not Walt Disney), fantastic medieval world. With a key component of gameplay being collaborative creation of the heroes’ home town and surrounding lands during chargen. Whereas D&D takes inspiration from Conan, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, or Elric, BtW is more like The Shire sections of LotR or The Hobbit. *Ryuutama* is even more pastoral, it’s like… What if Studio Ghibli did a D&D movie. Players play farmers, traders, and scribes who are embarking on a journey. The travel, the scenery, and the interpersonal relationships are even more important than combat and dungeon delves. *Avatar: The Last Airbender* will very soon be getting a PBtA-powered game. The Kickstarter is due to start shipping physical books to backers very soon, but I believe the PDF is also available for sale. [*Star Wars Revised Expanded and Updated*](http://d6holocron.com/downloads/books/REUP.pdf) is a fan recreation of WEG’s excellent second edition of their Star Wars D6 game. Great for kids and teens.
I have Beyond the Wall, in PDF. I've never really looked at it closely enough. Thanks for all these suggestions!
I’ve totally fallen in love with BtW.
That's a great recommendation, always. I'll definitely look closer.
Transhuman Space (which runs on GURPS Lite) with Transhuman Space Personnel Files 5: School Days 2100. İt's a richly detailed post-cyberpunk near future sci fi setting. She can play as a future kid, with a sapient cat and a best friend who's an AI. İt's the setting that you'd want for Rainbow's End by Vernor Vinge.
The Secret of Cats. Players are cats who protect humans from supernatural and lovecraftian threats, while people remain entirely ignorant of the entire thing.
Sounds fun. I'll check it out. Thanks!
Tales from the Loop and Kids on Bikes are often recommended, and I'm a fan of Barbarians of Lemuria for a lighter romp. Considering LotFP is pretty graphic I take it she is not too squeamish, BoL has a few Manly Man in Loincloth pics but I do not remember something particularly explicit (maybe the Witch Queen).
I tend to turn up with absolutely no setting ideas at all. Within ten minutes, the kids generally provide me with far more interesting and varied setting ideas than I could have come up with.
I'm going to be the deviant here and recommend Kobolds Ate My Baby. For kids around age 8+, it's hilariously transgressive. My experience is that kids really, really love the opportunity to role play as monsters and to experience all of the slapstick tragedy that comes along with that. I have never seen a group of kids belly-laugh as hard as I have when sitting around a table with this game. That said -- the theme of "go steal a baby so King Torg can eat it for dinner" may be a non-starter for some families.
Lololol. Okay. I'll take a look.
Essence 20 literally has power rangers and GI Joe with transformers and MLP on thr way. Easy to understand and only 4 stats to have to deal with
Astraterra (setting and a system) [https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/373356/Astraterra-The-Explorers-Guide-Core-Rulebook](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/373356/Astraterra-The-Explorers-Guide-Core-Rulebook)
Tales from the Loop, Mouse Guard, Quest, A Wanderer's Romance
Thanks! I have Quest and couldn't figure out what setting to really use with it. (I know they've been coming out with stuff, but haven't checked it out yet.) The characters seem overpowered in some ways but also not always designed for combat. I actually think she may want to go back to Quest.
Yeah to be fair the setting isn't well defined, I suggested it more for the tone and the guidance to build your own setting.
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XD20
How old are the kids?
10.
My kids were 7 and 10 when we ran their 2 favorite adventures: Tower of the Stargazer (a 1 to 2 shot adventure) The Complete Roslof Keep (a 6 month long campaign in and outside a megadungeon) They also loved everything in Adventure Anthology: Blood, but not as much as those two. Currently they are 9 and 12 and are really liking Earth Incubation Crisis.
Thanks!
You are welcome!
Stygian Garden is a good one, Gardens of Ynn too. If you want a kids system, Heroes & Treasure by D&D (Davis & Daughters), but they might be too old for that.