Best Solos for Kids?

[Baron]

I have a bunch of old T&T solos, and the 5th ed rules. My 12 yr old daughter has expressed interest in playing them. I can go thru chargen with her, but what old solos would you recommend that would be fun and not too discouragingly hard?

[nebless]

Having introduced my son to T&T around the same age here's some I've played:

- The Blood War of Saxon
- Dark Rising (the follow up to Saxon)
- Four Jars of Mead
- Goblin Lake

On the really good side all 4 are free download games. Blood War & Dark are nice low level games where you do need to make some choices and 1 of the fights can be difficult but if you also run a character as her assistant (to step in only as needed in a fight) she should be fine.

Mead is fun as it's more of a 'fetch and carry' mission than dungeon crawl.

Goblin Lake is very much an intro game, but does limit the race she could be.

These are also games I've enjoyed playing solo as an adult.

Good gaming.

[Baron]

Well, we just finished trying Buffalo Castle, Weird World, Beyond the Silvered Pane, and City of Terrors. She died a lot, not one survivor after six tries. I think she's pretty discouraged, having asked me if T&T was supposed to be so hard. I tried to explain about old-school style, stables of characters, and 'challenging' solos. Anyway, I'll take a look at your recommendations and try to entice her to try again. Thanks.

[ProfGremlin]

Hey, Baron! Welcome aboard! Have you tried any of the Free RPG Day solos, such as Goblin Lake (included with the free rules), or the solos in the Trolls!zine (psst, these are free - produced right here on the 'Bridge!)? Those might be a touch easier to work with. The older solos, as you've indicated, are rather - shall we say - unforgiving?

Beyond any and all of that, I've found a couple of threads with home brew rules and/or approaches to playing solos and making them more survivable/fun:

Solitaire Dungeon Protocols
How to survive a solo

My favourite house rule out of those is where a player can burn 1 Luck point, permanently, if they 'die' to go back in time to the previous paragraph and make another choice.  While it is a bit of handwavium (This is not the death you are looking for...), it does have the effect of (d)evolving the character and making them unique (kinda like getting your first dent in your shiny new car).

Y'know... there's nothing saying you can't take a solo and GM it for your daughter and modify the outcome on the fly.  In the end, it all has to do with having fun.  If you both are, then that's what matters.

Here's a few of threads from other members who have introduced the game to their younglings:

first game for me and my daughter
From the Lair of the Wyrm to Florinburg and Back  Offsite but relevant
Stealing the Rhinegold: Seeking Suggestions Ties into the above post
Almost TPK in Dungeon of the Rat
tales from Moribund and Ur - Quite possibly the longest running parent/youngling campaign I've ever come across.  If Devadasi catches your post I hope she chimes in with some suggestions.  She's had some brilliant stories to tell.

If anyone can think of any other threads, please feel free to post links to them here.

That's about all I have at the moment.  If/when you get a chance, stop by the Introduce Yourself! thread and give us a chance to better know you.  We love meeting new people!

[dekh]

Ken once said that he thought it was reasonable to make a L1SR on Luck to go back to a previous paragraph in a solo.

Almost all of the Flying Buffalo solos are character killers. They have to be, otherwise there would be no replay value.

[Baron]

Thanks for the replies. I'm a gaming grognard, and I've been rpg'ing with my 12 yr old since she was five. This foray into actually trying out the T&T rules with her was sparked by her dragging out some “pick a path” books I'd bought for her years ago. I reminded her that I had plenty of T&T solos in the cabinet, if she wanted to try them. The plan was for her to be able to do them by herself. If they keep killing her, she's not having fun.

And I'm gonna have to agree with her on that, as far as my own taste goes. I can't agree with Dekh; when I played them, I would mark which choices I'd made previously, and then try one of the other choices on subsequent runs. That was the only replay value they had for me. And after getting killed a while, I'd just cheat and continue. I didn't like having to cheat, but IMO it's not fun to get killed over and over again trying to get past a room. Sorry, you have to ratchet the “deadly-meter” down a few notches, or I wander off to do something else.

Yes, I could run her through the solos, or use the T&T gm'd modules that I have. Defeats the purpose though, we wanted a solo activity. And unless she falls in love with T&T itself, I'm much more likely to run games for our friends using one of the rules sets we usually use.

Again, thanks for the suggestions. I'll download some of the free solos that may be less “unforgiving.” I'll tell her the saving roll is “officially OK.” What about, say, reducing the listed MR's by ten? I don't have a good feel for the T&T rules, not having used them in thirty years. Would that be a good adjustment?

Thanks again, I'll go introduce myself. Had some weird issues, sort of had to re-register in order to post, although I've lurked here from time to time in the past.

[nebless]

Each solo in the pre-game intro / admin section will either out right say 'for levels 1 - 3' or (in the case of Silvered Pane) 'for characters with up to 70 combat add's. Now I'm sure there's some on here that know the 'add's vs level' ratio breakdown but to me 70 add's is a higher level character.

In my 'stable' so to speak; I have a Lvl 7 with 29 add's (from a FB T&T game), Lvl 1 with 17, Lvl 2 with 15, Lvl 2 with 27 and my highest a Lvl 27 with 43. Now granted I no way claim I know what I'm doing and the fact that my first character got to Lvl 27 pretty much show's I didn't understand the rules when I started, but I can't even get through Silvered Pane with the Lvl 27.

I too have a bunch of the solo's, both the book one's and one's I've pulled from the internet and I went through them and put them in order of lowest to highest add's which pretty much matches easiest to hardest. The one's I orginally listed are for Lvl's 1-3 and Dark Rising is Listed as Lvl 2 - 4. Yes you can still die in even the low level one's, but it's a bit harder to. Also I see nothing wrong with running those or even the harder one's as a 2 person solo. Let her make the decisions or flip a coin to decide which para to go to and have your equally new low level character just tag along and help as needed in the fights. I know (can't remember whcih, but it involves climbing up to a castle and facing a armored knight at the enterance) thaat's there's a solo that my son & I have yet to be able to beat. We've never gotten past that first foe. The games can be brutal, but having a 'do over' rule in place while introducing a newbie is not a bad thing.

[Baron]

"Each solo in the pre-game intro / admin section will either out right say 'for levels 1 - 3' or (in the case of Silvered Pane) 'for characters with up to 70 combat add's. Now I'm sure there's some on here that know the 'add's vs level' ratio breakdown but to me 70 add's is a higher level character."


My copy of Beyond the Silvered Pane, 8th printing, Dec 1980, has absolutely nothing in it about recommended levels or adds. Nothing. But it does allow spellcasters, which is why we gave it a try; she wanted to try a spellcaster.

And yes, your comment is uncouth, sir. If you wanted to be “harsh,” you could've looked at the module first, before posting.

[nebless]

I didn't mean to upset you and nor do I wish to start a flame war. I didn't make clear what I consider the 'intro / admin' of the modules as I feel the back cover pane should be included in those terms especially if these are / were every sold shrink wrapped as that would be all a potential buyer would have to go on.

I did look and while mine is a 9th printing from Aug 1983 it says on the back cover pane '...., with up to 70 combat adds.'

Since you mentioned it, it goes on to say 'Spell-casters will find their options very limited, but some magic can be used to good effect.'

Now in all fairness to you it also has 'Recommended for 1st to 4th level characters.' Which I hadn't caught although I do feel 70 adds would be a higher level character, but as I said that could just be me not knowing the rules well enough to see where all the add's come from.

With respect to my being wrong, I've edited my post.

[Baron]

Well, there's nothing on the back cover of my Pane edition about the strength of characters or the difficulty of the module, either. But I accept your good intentions. Thank you.

[mahrundl]

Baron,

I've always had a soft spot for Sorcerer Solitaire, which is a solo for Wizards. You can end up with a fairly amazing character, but there are a number of situations that can just straight out kill you too. By which I mean, there are a fair number of paragraphs where you can roll D6: a roll of 1 and you're dead, a 6 does something pretty good (boosting an attribute is common), and 2 through 5 give a variety of lesser positive or negative effects.  The possibility of instant death aspect may not be to your daughter's taste though.

You may also find it worthwhile to check out Bean!: the D2 RPG for your daughter. You can find it here. I believe that there are at least a few solo adventures available, and from what I can recall it tends to be a fairly forgiving system.

Mahrundl

[zanshin]

Another option is to create a stronger starting character with the usual dice roll methods (roll 4d6 drop lowest etc)

Also , first aid kits that give back some hit points can help. They are official in 7e.

Hope your daughter finds the fun.

[Baron]

Update. We tried again, briefly.
We rolled states 4d6, drop the lowest, arrange as desired.
We took maximum starting funds for equipment.
We used a "heritage" table I spotted online for some extra oomph.
We agreed to make a Luck saving roll to back off.
We agreed to get a missile weapon shot off prior to closing into combat.

But then we played Goblin Lake, meaning we were only playing goblins. We both played at the same time, so there were two of us. At least we got to play through a few times! I'll try and give her a little encouragement to try again.

What's the first aid kit do, and what's the cost?

[zanshin]

In the 7.5e rules, a 5 use first aid kit for 10gp cures 1 con damage/use. In a solo I would rule each use could be taken whenever a character could take a rest.

[Odder]

You guys send your kids off on solo's? Holy cow and I thought my kids had it rough! You know those things just kill!!