Three young players sat down at the table, ready to face the second instalment of the dungeon adventure that they’d begun a couple of weeks before.
Experimenting With Teenagers
What Does “Old School” Mean To You?
For a while I thought that “Old School” just meant D&D retro-clones or playing 0E. The story above would seem to reinforce that idea. But it’s not just that. Actually, the system doesn’t particularly matter.
Old School is about a style and approach to roleplaying games that I’ve found myself missing. And it’s not just nostalgia. It’s about recapturing a way of playing that had me sitting in that player’s chair, grinning from ear to ear, while my hero lay in a bloody and battered heap.
Old School has some qualities that I’m only just beginning to quantify and reflect on. The following points are a starting point… where I am up to right now. They are not definitive or complete.
Old School includes:
- A group of relatively weak characters who, over time, given some skilful play and luck, will become heroes of note.
- Adventures which present situations in which the players of those characters must be challenged to guide their would-be heroes through to a hard-earned victory.
- Stories in which the outcome is unknown and dependent on the skilful play of the players, not just the roll of dice or the pre-determination of the GM.
- Dealing with what you are presented with and not expecting it to be “fair” or “balanced”.
- Detailed description of most actions taken by both the characters and the NPCs, instead of reliance on a die-roll to test some statistic on the character sheet.
- Generally less-detailed rules and perhaps more detailed setting; the focus of the GM is moved away from the rules mechanics and towards creating and presenting each imagined scene.
- A consensus between players and GM in which all understand that poor play will lead to character death.
One Step Further…
- Show them a choice from some pre-generated, relatively weak heroes who (if played long-term) have the potential to become something great.
- Give them an adventure which presents situations in which the players are challenged to guide their would-be heroes through to a hard-earned victory.
- Present a story in which the outcome is unknown and dependent on the skilful play of the players, not just the roll of dice or the pre-determination of the GM.
- Provide the players with a mystery to be solved and a challenge to be overcome, without much regard to how “fair” or “balanced” the situation is for the characters.
- Focus on providing and requiring detailed description of scenes and actions, and not allowing them to just “get away” with making a simple die roll off their sheet.
- Using a simpler, lighter rules set to help take the focus off mechanics: we’re going to try Castles & Crusades.
- Make sure the players understand that character death is a possibility avoidable through skilful play and a bit of luck.
Really interesting read, Che, especially as I’m about to publish an article about miniatures gaming with children. I’ve been thinking about taking my kids on a dungeon crawl and this is some interesting advice – they’re younger than your experimental set, so might take TPK a bit harder.
Tell me, have you read Brian Jamieson’s book, Gamemastering? There are some great ideas in there, but this post strikes me as an important refinement of his ideas.
Nice to hear that this chimes for you – thanks for the feedback! I’ve not read Brian’s book, no. What “refinements” are you referring to? I’d be interested in what you mean in more detail. Oh, and with the teens the trick was letting the dice fall as they may… Eg. failed saves = paralysis = playing through the scene until death; there was always a chance of the effect wearing off before they died… But it was a slim one.
Brian’s approach puts a lot more emphasis on the involvement of the players in planning the nature of the game and it’s setting, but he assumes an abundance of potential players and a degree of mature sophistication. Your approach presents the setting and, mostly, the characters as a fait accompli. But that makes prefect sense coming from the point of view of teens with more familiarity with computer games. Beyond that, you let the game follow the expectations of the players – in tone rather than action!
This gels with what you’re describing in your two different approaches: one for the young players and one for the older ones.
Thanks for the feedback. That makes sense. Thanks also for introducing me to Brian’s book, which I started reading yesterday. Makes a lot of sense at this stage. I think my group are in for a change but one for the better.
Very interesting and very insightful article! It kind of opens my eyes a bit about the younger audience and how to get them interested in playing. Well done! Tim Burns, Troll Lord Games