Monster Compendium Editing...

Spent the week editing the Hero Kids Monster Compendium.  I'm noticing a pattern that little projects develop into big projects...

The compendium is now 120-ish monsters, but also includes details about the monsters, a sprinkling of history, and a boatload of adventure hooks.  As Brian Beniot states:

"From the perspective of a GM, I absolutely love all the hooks you've included in the book.  You could literally flip to any page and run an off-the-cuff adventure off of any one of the hooks provided, so I love the book from that perspective."

The compendium also features an amazing new cover by Eric Quigley:

Hero Kids - Monster Compendium preview

Quick update on the Hero Kids - Monster Compendium.  Each of the types of monsters will include a description of the monster, plus extra gameable details about their tactics and adventure hooks.

Here's a preview of the Elementals and Cultists:

New Adventure - Wizard's Tower

A new and somewhat light-hearted Hero Kids adventure is now available on DriveThruRPG:

The Wizard's Tower adventure takes the heroes from Rivenshore to the wizard's tower on the eastern peninsula that encloses Brecken Bay.  The wizard, Mortain, has gotten himself into trouble and needs the kids' help!

•  Adventure with five encounters and six new maps
•  Includes five monsters: Froglings, water beast, rickety construct, and the fearsome helm knight!

Here's the link to DriveThruRPG:

Hero Kids - Fantasy Adventure - Wizard's Tower

Map of the Wizard's Tower

Here's another composite map from the upcoming Wizard's Tower adventure.

This map shows the four levels of the titular tower.  Starting at the bottom, the rough-hewn basement has an ancient well to catch intruders who fall through the trapped floor above.  The stuffy and dusty ground floor level has a circular fountain in the center, and walls lined with stacked barrels.  The level above is the Wizard's laboratory, currently overrun by crazed automata.  Finally, the top level is the Wizard's living quarters, where he is held captive by his crazed servants.

This new adventure – Wizard's Tower – will be out on Monday.

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Putting together Fire In Rivenshore maps

Attentive Hero Kids dad Angus Graham asked me a bunch of questions about the various maps included in the Fire In Rivenshore adventure, which prompted me to throw together this composite showing how the maps fit together.

On the left are the three levels of the Block and Tackle inn.  On the right are the various ground level maps of Rivenshore, including the ground floor of the inn, the stables at the rear of the inn and a watchtower, the market area, and the town square.

I'm here to help... :-)

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Adventures in Bayhaven - Caravan to Rivenshore...

I mentioned last week that Brian Benoit was planning a series of Hero Kids adventures, and (as if by magic), the first of his adventures is out:

Adventures in Bayhaven - Caravan to Rivenshore

More Hero Kids adventures coming!

Brian Benoit, long-time friend of Hero Kids and designer of Yuletide Journey and Fire In Rivenshore adventures, is embarking on a yearlong project to release 24 new Hero Kids adventures!

To launch his campaign, he's running a location design competition for the town of Bayhaven.  You can read all about the adventures and the competition on Brian's blog:

Bayhaven: A Hero Kids Contest!

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Sneak peek at Space Heroes!

Work continues on the next big leap for Hero Kids, into a galaxy far, far away...  Here's a sneak peek at the heroes:

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Work, work, work...

Ages ago Ted Arlauskas did a Star Wars hack of Hero Kids, which inspired me to start work on a sci-fi expansion for the game.  I'm not finished yet, but here's a quick look at the work that's gotten us from the original Hero Kids hero cards to sci-fi versions of the cards.

I'm sure you can all work out the various changes yourselves, but from here I need to create all ten of the sci-fi heroes, a bunch of monsters, and an adventure!  Easy!  :-)

The new sci-fi heroes (and monsters) are by Eric Quigley, as usual, and the custom border is by David Graffam.

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Playtesting Yuletide Journey with the kids

Just did a playtest of the new Christmas-themed Hero Kids adventure: Yuletide Journey.   Violet took two heroes through the adventure and Dash insisted on coming along. But he's way too young, and wandered off half way through before he did any real damage...

In keeping with the normal polytheistic and pagan setting of Hero Kids, this adventure presents kids with Christmas as a midwinter Yuletide festival, and Santa is taken back to his pagan roots as Odin (who delivers presents for kids who leave out food for Sleipnir, his eight-legged horse).

This adventure is relatively light on combat encounters (there are two), focusing more on role-playing and adventuring.   But it does include two new elf heroes (who will be part of the upcoming Hero Cards III expansion), two new pieces of equipment, and a new monster, the Ettin Brute.

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Printer friendly map of the Brecken Vale...

+Nathan Rogers asked for a printable version of the map of the Brecken Vale, which looks like this when it's little:

You can all find a huge version of the map after the jump:

Hero Kids review at Roving Band of Misfits

Several moons ago, while listening to a Dice of Doom podcast, I came across this comment by Benoit from Roving Band of Misfits:

"I love Paul's idea of assigning dice to 3 key abilities for a 'rules light, kid friendly' RPG.   Super quick, easy, and understandable. I may try this with my kids."

I figured I'd save Benoit the trouble and just send him a copy of Hero Kids instead!   Luckily, Benoit has taken the challenge, played Hero Kids with his family, and posted a comprehensive review of the game on his site:

Hero Kids the new RPG for kids

Quotes?   These are quotes:

"The game is smooth, simple, fun, and definitely geared towards kids.   But that doesn’t mean 'dumbed down.'   It just means 'not overly complicated.'"

"I had a chance to sit down with my kids and wife last week to play a couple of sessions, and we had a blast.   We used the adventure that comes with the base RPG (Basement O’ Rats)"

"Each character also has some special attacks or benefits that are situational, but if you’re playing with younger kids, they’re completely optional. My two youngest (3 and 5) played just with their dice pools, and had a blast.   My wife and oldest daughter (12), on the other hand were able to use the special options on their character sheets, which made the game more interesting for them.   The game did not break from either ignoring or using the special abilities on the character sheets."

"Most of the monsters that come with the modules are 'minions' (one hit and they’re dead), with the bigger bosses having 3 hit points.   This makes the combats go quickly.   This is an advantage not to be underestimated when playing with kids."

"Finally, the production values of this game are top notch.   Each character is fully illustrated in a kid-friendly cartoony style, and many of the statistics on the character sheets (stats, skills, and inventory) are symbols so that even the younger non-reading kids can understand their character sheet."

"Every adventure module comes with print out maps and monster standees included.   And bonus: the maps are all interchangeable!   The entrances and exits to cave maps are all in the same place, so pieces of the 'Basement O’ Rats' maps can be used with map pieces from 'The Lost Village' adventure, which are interchangeable with the 'Minotaur Maze' map pieces."

"All in all, I highly recommend this game.   It is a great introduction to RPGs for kids, and the simple smooth mechanics guarantee that it will also be a staple on your gaming table for a long time to come."

Nice!

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Check out Hero Kids and its adventures at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

The Brecken Vale

The setting for Hero Kids is The Brecken Vale.   All Hero Kids adventures take place in the Brecken Vale; some in the kids' home town Rivenshore, some on the towering Druinhowe Mountains, and others in the dark and mysterious Darkenwold woods.

You live in a small village, Rivenshore, which is nestled in a tight valley beneath a range of towering mountains. Rivenshore would be a beautiful place to live, if it weren’t beset by an endless series of calamities. The village is on the eastern shore of the Camarva River.   The river runs fast and crooked from the mountains, down through the valley, The Brecken Vale, and out into a small bay.   To the east of the village are the dark and wild Darkenwold Woods, which have claimed many foolish travelers. The Brecken Vale is bounded by the Druinhowe Mountains, their snow-covered peaks cloaked in cloud. The vale should be a haven for its civilized inhabitants, but instead it keeps them in close proximity to no end of threats that offer boundless opportunities for adventure.