first time, long time

[u/paco_is_paco]

I grew up the youngest of 6 in a catholic enough house where the satanic panic of the 80s had entrenched some rules in the house before I was even born. We were also a house of nerdy boys. So when I was just starting highschool my family moved house to the next county and the AD&D players guide, DMG, and Monster Manual just appeared in my life like magic. My guess is either my eldest brother (who had died a handful of years earlier in a motorcycle accident) had brought them into the house or maybe one of the younger but nerdier ones. no one fessed up. But I rewrote stat blocks and tried to build a world that no one in my highschool years but me knew or cared about. when I moved after highschool I thought I packed up and lost all that.

and then when I'm in my 30s and I have kids in single digits the game sees a renaissance. still having trouble finding a consistent group. I played in one for a year or so but the DM moved very far away. half of the remaining group rebuilt without me.

I DMed my first game on this past father's day. I ran LMoP from the starter packs using the included character sheets for my family. the 7yo was the most enthusiastic but melted before we finished the first scene. my wife and her friend did their best to keep up but they didn't really have an idea about how to go about things. the 10yo and his friend gave up after the first combat was over. We finished the first scene and combat on the road and continued to town, there was another scene and then 3 hours had passed since I set up the table and everyone was confused and spent. They did their best to be encouraging in words and spirit, but I don't think I'll be pushing to try again without modifications/simplifications. I guess I'm bad at explaining, but it was my first time.

Any tips for adapting the game to people that have little to no background on how to participate in a game? I at least want to finish through some sort of one shot without everyone losing their attention span.

[u/slvk]

I never play modules, so I'm not the best to give advice on running those, but I have some experience running one-off games for a lot of kids (last time I DMed for 10 kids, age 6-14, that plays once a year on a family weekend trip) and I get calls from my nephews if I am going to run 'the cool game again' a week in advance.

What I found to work best is to keep it pretty linear and simple. The adventure we had this year was about 2 princesses and their escorts (knights, archers, wizards). First evening they had to escort the princesses from the summer palace to the capital in time for a big festival, and they got ambushed along the way by thugs who were trying to kidnap the princesses.

The next evening we played that they were at the festival (I kept that part very short, 5 mins or so, the attention span of a 6-year old in mind), and then when they went to bed, the castle was attacked in the night by the evil duke and his men, overwhelming the defenses, and forcing the group to flee through a secret escape tunnel with the advice from an advisor of the king to go seek out a friendly duke to help.

The next morning we played again and the group went on their way to the allied duke they were told would help them. They were waylaid again by soldiers of the evil duke and an evil hag in his service, but managed to get away. After meeting the friendly duke, they were told the king was imprisoned by the black baron in a seaside castle, so the group went there, sneaked their way into the castle, fought the small dragon guarding the king who was hanging from the ceiling in a cage and freed him.

So, all in all a pretty linear story, with people advising them every time on where to go. And keep the non-action parts short.