This is inspired by several comments, in various threads in the Role-Playing Games section, to the effect that D&D isn't a good game to interest young people who don't play RPGs.

If it isn't, then what would a game to interest young people who don't play RPGs be like? Is there an existing system that just lacks advertising?

Well, one thing they should have is a bit more explanation of the "assumed" things we do: How to organize a group, how to set up for play, what things to do, and how things work.

Often games give you "Examples of Play" that have assumed knowledge. You need to tell people: Get a few friends together, tell them about the game, set up some characters with them, and prepare an adventure. These things aren't always explicitly laid out.

I good introductory RPG needs to tell you how to do things without assuming that you can just figure it out.  It should explain how to handle all sorts of common things a player might have their character try to do, either in the rules or in advice on how to use the rules.  If beginners already knew how to resolve those things smoothly, they wouldn't need a beginner's game.

Quote from: Age of FableThis is inspired by several comments, in various threads in the Role-Playing Games section, to the effect that D&D isn't a good game to interest young people who don't play RPGs.

If it isn't, then what would a game to interest young people who don't play RPGs be like? Is there an existing system that just lacks advertising?

D&D Edition 1 was good enough to launch the hobby.  When it came out, as far as I was concerned, it was a magical thing that inspired years and years of fun and joy (oh yeah and angst, but never mind that now).   It had, I would say, what it takes.   Sure, it wasn't a perfect system.  But it was good enough to take people from zero RPG experience and make GMs and Players out of them.   So for all its faults...

A good introductory RPG should have a core scenario paradigm that's inherently interesting and which uses the rules pretty heavily, but it should have a rules set of wide enough potential application that potential GMs will start to get evil ideas for bending twisting and spindling right away.

Quote from: VBWyrdeD&D Edition 1 was good enough to launch the hobby.  When it came out, as far as I was concerned, it was a magical thing that inspired years and years of fun and joy (oh yeah and angst, but never mind that now).   It had, I would say, what it takes.   Sure, it wasn't a perfect system.  But it was good enough to take people from zero RPG experience and make GMs and Players out of them.   So for all its faults...

That's true, but weren't most of the people who played it initially already wargamers (or brought into it by wargamers)? If so, they'd presumably already know how to come up with scenarios, organise a game, the role of an umpire etc.

Here's a side question: what would the setting be like?

Here's another side question: figures and maps. Would using figures and very simple maps (without wargamey rules - just as a visual aid) make it more familiar to people who are used to board games? Then the rules could work up to 'you don't need a board for everything.'

Quote from: Age of FableThat's true, but weren't most of the people who played it initially already wargamers (or brought into it by wargamers)? If so, they'd presumably already know how to come up with scenarios, organise a game, the role of an umpire etc.

Well, that I'm not so sure about.  The knowledge associated to "how to organize a game" and "the role of an umpire" are reasonably generic so I don't think those two items needed to be included in the original game rules.   Most people already understand that.  Anyway, the idea of how to come up with scenarios is something that the D&D rules covered adquately, and I don't think Wargaming experience was required to get into D&D via the D&D rules books.   I had no interest or experience in wargaming before I started playing D&D, and I managed to understand it quickly and easily from the D&D books.  Anyway, I'd at least give them a looksie to find out what they've got in them.  It might inspire you with additional ideas possibly.

PS - what's the goal of your question?

Quote from: VBWyrdeI had no interest or experience in wargaming before I started playing D&D, and I managed to understand it quickly and easily from the D&D books.

OK...although at least some people didn't (Tunnels & Trolls was written for that reason, and Talisman and Sorcerer's Cave were attempts to cut down on the 'paperwork').

The reason for my question is to see whether the people who thought that D&D was 'doing it wrong' wanted to try and do it right.

It would be really nice if you could get a group, sit them down, and be playing within ten minutes ... then be done by the time an hour was up ... all while having a fun time and an experience that was both satisfying on its own and made you look forward to the even neater experience you could have playing the game a second time.

Quote from: TonyLBIt would be really nice if you could get a group, sit them down, and be playing within ten minutes ... then be done by the time an hour was up ... all while having a fun time and an experience that was both satisfying on its own and made you look forward to the even neater experience you could have playing the game a second time.

How would you achieve this? Pre-generated characters? Very simple character creation?

Is it possible to cut down on the time for preparing an adventure? Are randomly generated adventures feasable?

Would being done in an hour be acheived making the adventures very short? Cutting down on the possibilities of interaction? Making combat very quick?

Quote from: Age of FableHow would you achieve this?

Yeah, that's the rub.

Short answer:  Lots of the above, plus other stuff too.

Even shorter answer:  I don't know ... yet.

The whole question of making a manageable footprint, though, is more than just making a game where you can do something in one hour.  If you play out the big combat at the front gate of the wizard's castle, and that's your hour, then people are going to be saying "What?  We don't get to fight the wizard?  What about rescuing the princess?  What about returning victoriously to the village?"  You've told a story, but it's not a satisfying story because it doesn't have a complete cycle of natural pacing.

Honestly, I think that for a lot of stories it wouldn't even be possible to tell the story together in an hour, much less actually have dice hit the table.  They're just too big.  You need to have a story that is assembled out of much-smaller chunks that are satisfying in themselves, but which build easily.  I tend to look to manga pacing, since they do a really good job of breaking up episodic stories into tiny, tiny chunks (as a result of their publishing schema as installments bundled into one large, multi-story, booklet) ... but folks can go to any episodic medium, really.

As a for-instance above:  The adventurers find out about the woes of the villagers, oppressed by an evil wizard (fifteen minutes), they fight some wizardly minions (thirty minutes) and they get to bask in the praise of the villagers, and speechify about how they will seek out the wizard and destroy him (fifteen minutes).  Maybe the villagers give them something useful.  Maybe the mayor who originally wanted nothing to do with such troublemakers admits as how he was wrong, and they're heroes.  Whatever floats your boat.  Last shot is of them heading off into the dark forest that guards the path to the wizard's tower.  That sounds like a reasonable breaking point where something cool has happened, and you wouldn't be heart-broken if it never resumed ("Hey, remember that time we saved Kettle Springs from the face-stealers?") ... but, at the same time, a dark forest filled with evil creatures (and maybe an unlikely ally) lies ahead!

How would you avoid 'pacing' turning into 'railroading'?

Quote from: Age of FableHow would you avoid 'pacing' turning into 'railroading'?

Generally by having the pacing controlled by something other than GM fiat.

As a for-instance from the realm of board games, most Days of Wonder games start off with some mechanical resource that exists to be consumed and used (trains in Ticket to Ride, units in Memoir 44, etc.) and then runs until a set number of them has been used.  Because of the ways in which the games are constructed, the flow of resources naturally leads to distinctly different opening phases, middle games and end-games.

Go and Chess, likewise, have pacing of their own, which emerge from the flow of the rules.

'course, there are other ways of doing it too.  GM can call end-game, and that'd work fine as well.  But since you were specifically asking about avoiding railroading, I figured I'd give you the furthest point on the spectrum away from GM control.  Plenty of good material in the middle ranges, too.