Companions For Kids

[BLC1975]

Hi

I'm currently getting to grips with D&D and have DM'd 5 or 6 sessions with my 2 kids (ages 7 and 11). Backstory is that we have a small village with a few shops and NPC, plus they have a house which they share with their great grandmother, who's backstory is basically that she was a fighter in her younger days but being in her late 90's now, all that "adventuring nonsense" is way behind her...hey they're young kids, I wasn't going to leave them home alone and they think the "old lady voice" I came up with is hilarious. She's losing her marbles, or is she? ...talks a lot of nonsense about fighting dragons and giants in her youth.

Anyway, I have run a few simple encounters, "go here, kill that, help the town guard because there's an angry troll trying to break the gate down" and on a couple of occasions, I think because there are only 2 of them, they have almost been wiped out. I think the best way to fix this, and something they would find pretty good fun, would be to give them animal companions who could travel and interact with them as NPC/pets, but would also be useful help in a fight...I was going to go down the large dog/cat route but that's probably because of a lack of experience with the game and I don't want to have to act out NPC companions all the time.

Any suggestions please? They have got to level 2 and I think after a few more sessions will be ready to open the town gates and go exploring the bigger stuff...that's unless they discover how all the goblins and giant rats seem to randomly appear in the cellar at home...in which case they might end up travelling "down".

Thanks in advance for your help.

[SirGraystone]

How about an elf druid, an old friend of their grandmother who secretly keep an eyes on them because she asked him to. He was adventuring with her when she was young but since he's an elf he barely aged. You can have him only show up when they are in trouble or in need of a guide, always in beast form so they don't know he's a druid.

You can have the grandmother tell story about that large bear she traveled with. You can use a bear for fighting, a wolf to track thing but always give clue in the description of the animals that link them, like black fur with a line of white of fur on the shoulder. If they ever see the druid he can have a long scar on the same shoulder.

He can show up to help then leave, let them follow the bear into an alley to only find a black cat scared by the bear hiding in a tree, if they succeed a perception roll on the cat let them wonder why the cat have a white fur mark too.

[BLC1975]

You see, I wouldn't have thought of that...really interesting approach, thank you.

[Vogie]

You can also tie in a third party/DMPC into certain quests or encounters that they may have issues with. The third party should basically be a trope and just do one thing - Whether that means it always runs in to attack, always stays back with a bow taking potshots, always stays back and tosses out heals, et cetera. As a veteran TTRPG player, you'd have an audible eyeroll at such "protect the NPC" quests like you're in vanilla Everquest, but for new players who haven't run into that for an arbitrarily large number of years, it can feel new and exciting.

If they ever run into a other settings, you can also introduce encounters that have a designated ending point, and the PCs will just have to survive until help arrives. The Bandits attack, someone shouts for the guards, a bell starts ringing, and the PCs just have to hold them off until the guards show up and arrest them all - Each round starts off with an notification of approximately how far away the guards are. Or the PCs hear the roar of their bear-friend from above, know he's coming to their aid, and they just have to survive until he arrives.

Making it feel mechanical, as a part of the encounter, can help avoid the 'ex machina'-esque feelings. It also allows you to throw encounters at them they normally wouldn't be able to survive or allowing them to try out new strategies they haven't attempted yet, like a focus on battlefield control, kiting, et cetera.

[Unoriginal]

You could have them meet a friendly Half-Ogre who would help them from time to time.

A big, massive dude with a gigantic beard could be fun to have around. Maybe make him a bit of a Hagrid expy.

[lunaticfringe]

You see, I wouldn't have thought of that...really interesting approach, thank you.

You could have them meet a friendly Half-Ogre who would help them from time to time.

A big, massive dude with a gigantic beard could be fun to have around. Maybe make him a bit of a Hagrid expy.

Firbolg Moon Druid, why pick one of these when you can combine them (sort of)?

Also I may be on a firbolg kick.

Edit: Bah! Quoted the wrong post, the top one should be Graystone's druid idea.

[Dr. Cliché]

Unfortunately, NPCs who come to help out the party just make me think of DM of the Rings:

https://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=900

https://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1108

[BLC1975]

Thanks for all the suggestions, really appreciate it.