First fight with family (on the gaming board at least)

Greetings Fellow Children of the Damned (One of my favourite Maiden Songs)

This weekend I decided to have a game with the kids (Daughter aged 9 Son 5) as my gaming board is OK enough to play on (see pics below) and they have been hasseling me for ages to have a go - also I live in a small country town and they will hopefully want to play mordheim when their older because I dont think anyone else will.

Anyway to make things simple we had 5 figures each and all had the basic profile of a human mercenary henchman. This didn't work too well as rally tests were failed due to low leadership and the kids started to get bored.

Happy for any tips on how to introduce the game to new players (Im going away for a week so please dont think im being rude for not responding)

Take care

James

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VERY NICE Gaming Table! You've got some REALLY nice pieces scattered about there. WELL DONE!
I wish I could give you some decent advice for maintaining your children's interest in the game, but my own boys never really got into the miniature games. They ALL tuned in on the AD&D games I ran for them however. I think it's the story aspect that appeals to younger folk. Perhaps if they named their little warriors, worked in a little story as to why they were battling it out, & you bent the rules slightly [an increase in LD & maybe fudge on the route tests]. I think it's cool they're trying it out & it would be great to see your little ones following in their Dad's footsteps...at least on the Gaming Table. THE BEST OF GOOD LUCK!

I see novelty chess-pieces! I use them too.

Well, as for introducing children into the dark art of tabletop-gaming, I've successfully managed to get my now nine year old son to play Mordheim (his favorite), Fantasy Battles and 40K. I agree on the story being essential in keeping up the interest. Also the concept of characters developing early on caught my son's interest - he's very eager to get new advances for his Ork heroes. Naturally he still needs a lot of help when playing, as the game mechanics are somewhat complicated, and his English is not very developed. So, I'd say the keys are the following:
- Character and model creation: include the children in the modelling choices (weaponry, colours, bric-a-brac), name the characters
- Character development: make sure the children keep in mind possible future developments for the warband (skills, additional warriors) by discussing these before the game and afterwards. The discussion before the game fills them with anticipation of the warbands performance.
- Strategic help: Discuss briefly before the game starts what happened last time you played, and try to help them make a new improved strategic layout, preferrably using the new skills as this encourages them to look forward to the game and the specifics of their warband.
- Help during the game: At the start of the childrens turn offer help regarding decisions and movement. Remember that the point of the game for the kids not is the rules, but the story being played. Try to embellish the happenings with a little roleplaying (keep the bloody parts out of this, though!).
- When speaking of the game, remind the children of their characters and what they did, and what they might do in the future.
- Keep it short and sweet! Too sad developments due to dice rolls might be ignored (at least partially). Choose scenarios that include a story, but not ones that take too much time. Do the paperwork yourself in the beginning - they will take an interest in that eventually, as with the rules.

Hopefully some of the above is useful to you or others with kids. My son wants to play every weekend now, and is getting more interested in the rules every time - and the gaming also improves his English. talk about hitting two birds with one stone!

When I was about 11 I tried to teach my youngest brother how to play. Unfortunatley, he was still young enough to confuse Mordheim with food. Man, was I in trouble. My other brother caught on fine, though; maybe the little-one's old enough now, maybe a bit more reading practice...,

It's tough trying to compete with electronic mediums that require very little reading, very little imagination and very little work. I remember my teen years, if we had xbox and pc games back then i probably wouldnt have been interested in Table top games with 100+ page rulebooks either..lol.