We ran our first session of Lost Mines of Phandelver yesterday. We're a couple of dads running with our two boys, both 11, one of which has significant reading barriers, so the two of us are trying to carry the lion's share of the rule knowledge through the campaign. Both the dads played many moons ago (I last played 1st edition, so it's been awhile), and this is my first time running a campaign, so I'm trying to mull through things I want to improve before our next session in a few weeks.
In Lost Mines, the party made it to the ambush and survived (which was probably my biggest concern). They captured one of the goblins, found the trail to the hideout, and interrogated him and found out about the hideout and the castle, but decided to run the wagon to town before backtracking and following the trail.
A few questions that I'm thinking about:
1. How do you choose who the enemies attack? They had two of their guys at the horses and one in the wagon when they were attacked. I was a bit concerned about the wizard at the horse, so I just rolled a d6 for each of the four goblins and had them attack the character I assigned that number too. I'm curious other approaches you might take to that kind of decision.
2. When they go to town, how much would you populate the town with details and quest opportunities at this point? I think the other dad and I could probably steer them to the cave pretty easily, but I also want to learn to adapt to the unexpected choices the party makes.
The first go was an absolute blast (when you're son spontaneously says "This is such a great game" in the middle, you know something is going right!). I just want to keep getting better at running it as I go.
I base who the enemies attack just, tactically, on who the best target for them would be. Adjust a bit for intelligence... The goblins in the cave aren't particularly smart, so they'll likely continue to attack the biggest, scariest looking guy in the party like the fighter, and wouldn't think to prioritize the less intimidating looking wizard hanging out in the back. That said... you also play with kids, so just try to think of what's fun for them. If they make a silly choice and put themselves in more danger than they expected, maybe switch tactics a bit... have the enemies grapple them instead of outright attack to give them opportunities to fix the problem and learn from it.
When it comes to town.. I'd say just give them one plot thread in town to focus on. Don't push them to any of the side quests, but be ready. Odds are good that they'll express interest in something other than the main quest and if they want to focus on that... let them. Show them the map of Phandalin, and if a particular building catches their interest let them go there and participate in whatever adventures it might lead to. And if they really get obsessed on some dead end that doesn't actually lead anywhere... just make it lead back to the main adventure so they feel like they uncovered some kind of secret.
I agree with T-DDS. Each encounter should be handled based upon the creatures involved. Are they intelligent, stupid, fearful or fearless? Are they tanks, so used to just smashing through any opposition or do they rely on shock tactics? Random target selection is fine in a pinch but it only goes so far.
I try to teach my players about how to make sensible tactical choices - gentle application of damage is the rule here and it’s wonderful when they take on board lessons they’ve learnt and surprise you with a clever strategy. As an aside, even if their clever plan is difficult to implement or unlikely to work, I’ll usually reward them by allowing it to go ahead, though perhaps with an “okay that worked but....”.
Reading ahead each session will also help tremendously - knowing what a monster’s abilities / spells are and how they work makes for a much smoother game and fewer distractions result in much happier / attentive kids.
On and I would definitely award experience levels based upon milestones rather than XPs - you can really control how the adventures progresses that way and judge when your kids are ready to progress. Lastly be very cautious about TPKs (Total Party Kills). TLMoP has surprisingly tough encounters and it’s really quite easy to kill everyone off if they fail to run away at the right moment. I’d recommend judicious use of sidekicks and one use magic items here (a ring with 3 charges of Bless or Aid, a bag of Goodberries, etc).
Once again, TDDS has hit the nail on the head with Phandalin. Keep the options down as it has so much going on. I’d certainly recommend pushing the Redbrand encounter early on as it can help get the town on the PC’s side. Gently controlling the direction the adventure takes works very well and if handled carefully won’t result in the sense of a railroaded adventure. As your skills improve, you’ll be able to back off a bit and allow them more and more control over the adventure and the game world itself.
Hope it goes well you guys - get it right and everyone has a great time and a hobby for life :)
For monsters of average or below intelligence, I usually just have them attack whichever thing is closest. If they have multiple options I just roll for it. I assign each player a number and roll a d6. I do this with full knowledge of the players so they know that I'm rolling to decide who gets hit. It adds some suspense!
As for Phandalin, the first thing they need to do is take down the Redbrand hideout. So push that on them pretty hard. That should get them leveled up enough to be able to take on the stuff in chapter 3. At that point you can start having the NPC's throwing hints about the other stuff.
I usually go with who's closest/who just dealt damage to that monster/baddie. If who dealt damage doesn't provide a clear target and I have more than one character in melee with the baddie, I'll roll 1d6 and have one of the players call odds or evens and if it lands on what they call, they don't get attacked. If the entire party is in the running for being attacked, I roll 1d4 and have usually just assigned numbers to the players starting to my left and going clockwise.
We ran our first session of Lost Mines of Phandelver yesterday. We're a couple of dads running with our two boys, both 11, one of which has significant reading barriers, so the two of us are trying to carry the lion's share of the rule knowledge through the campaign. Both the dads played many moons ago (I last played 1st edition, so it's been awhile), and this is my first time running a campaign, so I'm trying to mull through things I want to improve before our next session in a few weeks.
In Lost Mines, the party made it to the ambush and survived (which was probably my biggest concern). They captured one of the goblins, found the trail to the hideout, and interrogated him and found out about the hideout and the castle, but decided to run the wagon to town before backtracking and following the trail.
A few questions that I'm thinking about:
1. How do you choose who the enemies attack? They had two of their guys at the horses and one in the wagon when they were attacked. I was a bit concerned about the wizard at the horse, so I just rolled a d6 for each of the four goblins and had them attack the character I assigned that number too. I'm curious other approaches you might take to that kind of decision.
2. When they go to town, how much would you populate the town with details and quest opportunities at this point? I think the other dad and I could probably steer them to the cave pretty easily, but I also want to learn to adapt to the unexpected choices the party makes.
The first go was an absolute blast (when you're son spontaneously says "This is such a great game" in the middle, you know something is going right!). I just want to keep getting better at running it as I go.
Thanks.
I base who the enemies attack just, tactically, on who the best target for them would be. Adjust a bit for intelligence... The goblins in the cave aren't particularly smart, so they'll likely continue to attack the biggest, scariest looking guy in the party like the fighter, and wouldn't think to prioritize the less intimidating looking wizard hanging out in the back. That said... you also play with kids, so just try to think of what's fun for them. If they make a silly choice and put themselves in more danger than they expected, maybe switch tactics a bit... have the enemies grapple them instead of outright attack to give them opportunities to fix the problem and learn from it.
When it comes to town.. I'd say just give them one plot thread in town to focus on. Don't push them to any of the side quests, but be ready. Odds are good that they'll express interest in something other than the main quest and if they want to focus on that... let them. Show them the map of Phandalin, and if a particular building catches their interest let them go there and participate in whatever adventures it might lead to. And if they really get obsessed on some dead end that doesn't actually lead anywhere... just make it lead back to the main adventure so they feel like they uncovered some kind of secret.
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I agree with T-DDS. Each encounter should be handled based upon the creatures involved. Are they intelligent, stupid, fearful or fearless? Are they tanks, so used to just smashing through any opposition or do they rely on shock tactics? Random target selection is fine in a pinch but it only goes so far.
I try to teach my players about how to make sensible tactical choices - gentle application of damage is the rule here and it’s wonderful when they take on board lessons they’ve learnt and surprise you with a clever strategy. As an aside, even if their clever plan is difficult to implement or unlikely to work, I’ll usually reward them by allowing it to go ahead, though perhaps with an “okay that worked but....”.
Reading ahead each session will also help tremendously - knowing what a monster’s abilities / spells are and how they work makes for a much smoother game and fewer distractions result in much happier / attentive kids.
On and I would definitely award experience levels based upon milestones rather than XPs - you can really control how the adventures progresses that way and judge when your kids are ready to progress. Lastly be very cautious about TPKs (Total Party Kills). TLMoP has surprisingly tough encounters and it’s really quite easy to kill everyone off if they fail to run away at the right moment. I’d recommend judicious use of sidekicks and one use magic items here (a ring with 3 charges of Bless or Aid, a bag of Goodberries, etc).
Once again, TDDS has hit the nail on the head with Phandalin. Keep the options down as it has so much going on. I’d certainly recommend pushing the Redbrand encounter early on as it can help get the town on the PC’s side. Gently controlling the direction the adventure takes works very well and if handled carefully won’t result in the sense of a railroaded adventure. As your skills improve, you’ll be able to back off a bit and allow them more and more control over the adventure and the game world itself.
Hope it goes well you guys - get it right and everyone has a great time and a hobby for life :)
Thanks to you both! Fantastic advice. I'm looking forward to the next foray...
For monsters of average or below intelligence, I usually just have them attack whichever thing is closest. If they have multiple options I just roll for it. I assign each player a number and roll a d6. I do this with full knowledge of the players so they know that I'm rolling to decide who gets hit. It adds some suspense!
As for Phandalin, the first thing they need to do is take down the Redbrand hideout. So push that on them pretty hard. That should get them leveled up enough to be able to take on the stuff in chapter 3. At that point you can start having the NPC's throwing hints about the other stuff.
I usually go with who's closest/who just dealt damage to that monster/baddie. If who dealt damage doesn't provide a clear target and I have more than one character in melee with the baddie, I'll roll 1d6 and have one of the players call odds or evens and if it lands on what they call, they don't get attacked. If the entire party is in the running for being attacked, I roll 1d4 and have usually just assigned numbers to the players starting to my left and going clockwise.
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