Adventure recommendation for children

[nickl_2000]

I’m DMing for my 10, 8, and 6 year old and I’m looking for an adventure to play out with them. We have played several one shots, but I’m looking to play a game with leveling for them. I’m guiding the 6 and 8 year old a lot, and expect to continue, but am letting the 10 year old read my books and figure it out himself.

Any suggestion on adventures? Ideally it would be one where there isn’t a whole lot of killing humans (verses lizard folk or orcs or goblins that are different enough from real life things).

Also, I’m planning on letting them go buts and be kids and explore the world around them as much as possible.

Thanks!

[Chugger]

Mines of Phandelver - you might have to adjust parts.

[Composer99]

Tomb of Annihilation with some adaptation? You're mostly fighting dinosaurs, or zombies, or zombie dinosaurs.

But really, for kids, go with any of the three starter box sets.

If you want to generate your own adventures, consider adapting something from media the children enjoy.

[Zhorn]

Another vote for Lost Mine of Phandelver.
Swap out the Redbrand for an occupying force of orc or hobgoblins, or refluff Glass Staff as a necromancer and have undead in their place... Actually that could be a fun reveal. Animated skeletons that are masks and cloaked in the redbrand garbs, with a bunch of Magic Mouths cast on them to give the illusion of them talking, but they only have a couple of pre-scripted phrases each.

Back when I refluffed this module, I had a group of doppelgangers as minor antagonists trying to take over the town. Mayor got replaced and was working against the party, with the 'quests' to send them out of town was an attempt to get the party killed by some other force, as the doppelgangers just wanted to leech off the town and didn't want to risk their own lives.

[TripleD]

Have you thought about changing systems to something like “Hero Kids”? It’s a fantasy tabletop RPG designed for kids aged 4-10.
What’s more, there are lots of adventure modules available for it at about $3 each.

[nickl_2000]

Have you thought about changing systems to something like “Hero Kids”? It’s a fantasy tabletop RPG designed for kids aged 4-10.
What’s more, there are lots of adventure modules available for it at about $3 each.

I hadn't since I have the books for 5e and the knowledge of 5e. I will take a look though, thanks.

[Spiritchaser]

Have you thought about changing systems to something like “Hero Kids”? It’s a fantasy tabletop RPG designed for kids aged 4-10.
What’s more, there are lots of adventure modules available for it at about $3 each.

I ran my kids through hero kids for a few years and they generally had a good time, but at age 9 my son began to want something more tactically complex, and my 7 year old daughter was pretty cool with trying D&D as long as she could be a magical fairy princess (feylock, as advised by others on these boards)

For a 6 year old? I don’t know... hero kids would likely be best

That said, I was at one point looking for almost exactly the same type of thing. there’s an adventurers league group of small adventures, suitable for shorter attention spans called treasure of the broken hoard.

Mostly non-human foes, beasts, goblins, Kobolds and some other monsters...

It’s a bit episodic, and there’s a puzzle you’ll maybe want to rework in the second part.

Most of all though, It contains an opportunity to get an adorable non-combat pet that REALLY goes over well with youngsters.

[Segev]

Tomb of Annihilation provides lots of exploration and is pretty forgiving (in my experience) if you use standard 5e rules, because they'll get into (on average) one encounter every other day or so, until they hit a dungeon.

Alternatively, Tales From The Yawning Portal has the Sunless Citadel, which is a level 1-3 dungeon with its own little storyline you can piece together.

I actually put the latter into the former (I placed the Citadel one hex north of Firefinger) and replaced one of the members of the adventuring party that preceded them with Tiryiki, son of Merchant Prince Ekene-Afa. And had the adventurers who preceded them be the ones hired by Syndra Silvane, rather than the PCs be that party.

Spoiler

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Because I had Tiryiki be the one killed by the hobgoblin captain, I used the failure to resurrect him as the introduction of the party to the nature of the death curse.

I also decided that the hobgoblins who'd taken over the goblin tribe were the ex-captain and his closest crew on the pirate ship that mutinied and is now headed by a wereboar.

Storm King's Thunder also has an introductory adventure involving goblins, and eventually leads into exploring the wilderness of the North. There's more hand-holding involved, too, with scripted events early on, which might be ideal for little kids. And who doesn't like meeting a cloud giant wizard in a flying cloud-tower that is dopped by a humongous wizard's hat?

[EnnPeeCee]

How about the Lost Laboratory of Kwalish? Just remove/replace the cult folks in the first area with something else, and you have a flavorful and relatively lighthearted adventure, mostly focused on exploring, rather than killing.

[nickl_2000]

Mines of Phandelver - you might have to adjust parts.

How about the Lost Laboratory of Kwalish? Just remove/replace the cult folks in the first area with something else, and you have a flavorful and relatively lighthearted adventure, mostly focused on exploring, rather than killing.

Looks like this can go from level 1-5 in the Mine and 5-10 in the Laboratory. That should be enough to keep me busy for the next few years.

Thank you!

[Theodoxus]

This is less for the OP, and more for other DMs. I just started this month, DMing for one of my player's kids - 5 and 9. The 5 year old girl is playing a half-elf barbarian named Astrid and basically likes rolling dice and doing simple math (her first interaction with subtraction was with this game, so I'm kinda proud to be helping her education). The 9 year old boy is playing a half-elf rogue named Ulf, and as a typical 9 year old, gets a thrill out of killing things. (He also has a knack of rolling crits, so one-shots a lot of my mobs...)

The other adults in the group are very understanding (despite all of us being childless losers), so it's going well (other than our session yesterday, where Astrid told me "DM", (both kids only call me DM), "there was too much talking this time, and I got bored.")

So, I'm learning, along with the children, how to make the game interesting for everyone concerned. They've gone on a few kid friendly side quests (including a one-shot one-page adventure where they got shrunk down by an evil wizard). And Astrid has contracted lycanthropy (from a werebear), much to the jealously of her brother, who tried to contract it as well, but made the Con save after being knocked out by the bite...

Their father is keeping an eye on both, helping with the math and correct dice to roll, and helped make their characters. Having never DM'd for anyone so young, it's been fun watching their imaginations soar, bringing us all with them into the wonderment of children.

I highly recommend anyone with the temperament to try it. Only 3 sessions in, it's already made me a better, more attentive DM.

[TripleD]

I ran my kids through hero kids for a few years and they generally had a good time, but at age 9 my son began to want something more tactically complex, and my 7 year old daughter was pretty cool with trying D&D as long as she could be a magical fairy princess (feylock, as advised by others on these boards)

For a 6 year old? I don’t know... hero kids would likely be best

Thanks for the heads up about ages. My kid is too young for RPGs, or board games in general, and I’ve been wondering how Hero Kids plays in practice.

[cullynthedwarf]

This campaign idea I have used several times, its good for new players and old alike.

If you have ever played the old sierra game called Hero Quest or as it was later known Quest for Glory. That is the quest and it runs through several different campaigns so figure out what works and where and your golden

The campaign begins with your PCs having received their hero license from a correspondence course in their class. An early thaw in the mountains allows for the PCs to make there way in to the Valley of Spielberg. Spielberg has a small town with a thieves guild, bar over said guild, a common good store a farm stall, an apothecary out side the city and a magic shop. The sheriff Otto Von Bismarck greets the PCs and can answer general questions about the town and its inhabitants. He gibes a friendly warning not to drink a alcoholic beverage called dragons breath before they leave the first time.

The adventures guild has a few job notices including the missing baronet (barons heir) and his daughter. The bandit leader and his warlock adviser each which will pay well.

Exploring around the valley will introduce the PCs to the wicked ogress BabaYaga and her chicken legged hut, the frost giant Brauggi, and the arch magi Erasmus and his wise cracking rat familiar, Fenris.

The goal is to rid the valley of a curse that Baba placed on it years ago depending upon who you talk to depends but basically she curses him to loose all he loves. The wizard Erasmus tells however of a protect made at the same time

Comes the hero/es from the East (the spot you came in at is the most eastern part of the playable map)
To free the man from form of beast (the baronet has been shape changed into a bear by a magical collar.)
Bring the child from out the band(the daughter has had her memory wiped and is the leader of the brigand band, her adviser is the court magician who went missing)
And force the curser from the land (a magical mirror of reflection rebounds 1 incoming spell)

The journey ends with the final brigands being rounded up and imprisoned by the now no longer depressed baron.

The second part takes place in the distant dessert land of Shapier to stop an elder Ifreet from escaping his confinement and terorizingnthe world once again. And this will be in another post if people are interested.

The third part is the Savannah of Tarna where a cult is about to force the land into civil war

Finally you are brought to the lands of Mordavia to stop the resurrection of a dark god.

Truly an amazing set of games that lends itself very well to D&D story telling.

[Spiritchaser]

Thanks for the heads up about ages. My kid is too young for RPGs, or board games in general, and I’ve been wondering how Hero Kids plays in practice.

My daughter was marginal with Hero kids at 5 and fine at 6, certainly in the simpler roles. There are some moderately complex group tactics possible, but character powers aren’t varied or versatile enough for a lot of choice.

In the words of my 9 year old: Dungeons and dragons is complicated but once you know how to play it’s better”

My daughter would really be better with hero kids at 7 but we can make D&D work with patience.

My son isn’t the most patient... but since he really wants to play D&D, he has at least managed to be less impatient

[Sariel Vailo]

Adapt media have fun and remember talk no justu is the greatest tool. Sometimes the mischeivous ghost is just lonely and wants a friend.

[sithlordnergal]

Lost Mines of Phandelver is a good place to start.

Tomb of Ahnniliation is decent, but some of the puzzles might need to be simplified a bit.

Personally, a favorite adventure of mine is called Dragon's Breath. You can find it on DMSGuild, and it has a fair bit of what you're looking for, and I bet the kids would enjoy it if they enjoy role playing stuff. It has you start out fighting skeletons, you meet a friendly dragon who gives you a quest and carries you to a forest, you play with some fairies and a gryphon, and go through a cool forest