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Every time my kids see my whfb figures they want to have a game.

I thought I would take them up on the offer with a few 500pt games.

Do you have any advice on simplifying the rules for little kids (ages 5 to 10)?

Thanks!

YES! simplify the rules REALLY far.

like this, on a 4+ the unit gets hit, armor saves them on a 4+ ( or whatever it is)

make the units "even". any unit with regular sized weapons are all the same.

25mm based mini's all have the same stats.

40 mm minis are stronger (big guys)

vehicles are exactly that, just go with it.

everything moves the same, shoots the same.

as they get older and start to understand the concept more, add more and more rules.

My daughter has the basic concept of the game, from here out its applying rules as we go.

#1 rule they taught us in giving demo games (i'm a former red shirt) The rules don't matter. Only fun matters. MAKE IT FUN. lots of noises, excitement, ham it up. the kids will enjoy it.

best piece of advice I can give you if anything else, is make sure YOU are having fun with your kids. everything else is inconsequential. happy gaming from one gamer Dad to another.

Rimmy nailed it, that unit has 20 models so you get 20 attacks, keep it simple 4+ to hit 4+ to wound 4+ save, forget combat res and break tests, hell skip magic at that age it's all about rolling dice and killing figures. For the 10 year old after a few games go buy some binders from the dollar store and make some 1250 lists, this is what I did for getting my wife into the game, in these binders is the list with the stats for each unit entry below it for quick finding and another page opposite for key notes of the army, for example see below I left out the stats of course but you get the idea.

Herald of Tzeentch -Master of Sorcery -Spellbreaker 165
Herald of Khorne -Armor of Khorne 115
37 Bloodletters -Full Command, Icon of Endless War 499
19 Horrors -Musician 234
3 Flamers 120
Fiend 55
Fiend 55
1243

Key Notes:
-FEAR TEST!!!
-All attacks are magical
-Immune to Psychology
-Everything gets at least a 5+ ward save
-Herald of Tz knows all spells in lore, gives horrors a 4+ ward Save
-Spellbreaker=Dispel Scroll
-Herald of Khorne gives Bloodletters Hatred = reroll misses in first round of combat
-Horror Spells Tzeentch Lore see page 61 they can channel for power/dispel dice
-Flamers: D6 S4 shots 18inch range, flaming attacks, see Rules Update for Details
-Fiend: STOMP!, Armor Piercing (-1 AS), Soporific Musk: Units that Flee rull 3D6 discard highest result.

Then I laminated a quick reference sheet for the game on cardstock at kinkos, 2 copies ran me $10 but you can use dry erase markers on the "to hit" and "to wound" charts, if you are interested this is where I downloaded it from (the smaller file is better IMO) http://hotfile.com/list/1163384/907ed42

Working out great so far, Sundays we've been playing, just grab a binder with the reference sheet and a tray full of models, lay out some terrain and we're ready in minutes and it takes an hour or 90 minutes to play.

Is there any way of working some of the uniqueness of each army or unit into your simplified rules? I'll mainly be using my greenskins. I think the kids would enjoy knowing they were playing the 'tough' orcs or sneaky goblins.

5-10 is really young. At least 5. But it would also be good to teach math skills.

I would do it even more basic like you do normal movement but once you fight I roll 6 you roll 4, you lose 2 units. Maybe add +1 for each unit. So you have simple addition and subtraction and movement. You could make big units better and ranged units ranged and maybe some terrain.

 Rimmy wrote:
YES! simplify the rules REALLY far.

like this, on a 4+ the unit gets hit, armor saves them on a 4+ ( or whatever it is)

make the units "even". any unit with regular sized weapons are all the same.

25mm based mini's all have the same stats.

40 mm minis are stronger (big guys)

vehicles are exactly that, just go with it.

everything moves the same, shoots the same.

as they get older and start to understand the concept more, add more and more rules.

My daughter has the basic concept of the game, from here out its applying rules as we go.

#1 rule they taught us in giving demo games (i'm a former red shirt) The rules don't matter. Only fun matters. MAKE IT FUN. lots of noises, excitement, ham it up. the kids will enjoy it.

best piece of advice I can give you if anything else, is make sure YOU are having fun with your kids. everything else is inconsequential. happy gaming from one gamer Dad to another.

This has to be one of the best posts ive seen on dakka dakka in a long time.

 grimgrimly wrote:
Is there any way of working some of the uniqueness of each army or unit into your simplified rules? I'll mainly be using my greenskins. I think the kids would enjoy knowing they were playing the 'tough' orcs or sneaky goblins.

Maybe Orcs wound on 3s but goblins strike first? Just an idea to make it simple, still keep the unit sizes to like 20 per unit play with 2-3 blocks each army. Trickle in war machine or chariots/pump wagons or have it be a good excuse to start a 2nd army, hell buy the Skaven end of IoB for $40 on ebay and let them go wild on the painting.

I say give them low model count armies.

I made the mistake of starting my younger brother out in 40K with an green horde ork army.

"Ok, so your unit of 30 orks charges my 10 space marines... yes you do need to measure for each of them... ok... so 30 dudes at 3 attacks each is 90 attacks"

*hands bucket of dice to little brother*

"I'm going to go make a sandwhich while you start rolling those..."

 Nurgle wrote:
This has to be one of the best posts ive seen on dakka dakka in a long time.

Much appreciated, but can't take the credit for it. Gamer Dad's have been doing this LONG before I said it. I shared what some of my friends parents shared with me. (my father is not a gamer)

I adore my children. That said, anything I can do to be part of their lives I am happy to do. (I messed up my ankles and knee's in the service so I can't play sports or anything)

OP: please share with us what you do. I'd love to maybe put together some kind of Dakka version of Kidhammer. something free we can PDF and give out so people can play with their kids or younger cousins/siblings etc etc.

Mordheim.

 grimgrimly wrote:
Is there any way of working some of the uniqueness of each army or unit into your simplified rules? I'll mainly be using my greenskins. I think the kids would enjoy knowing they were playing the 'tough' orcs or sneaky goblins.

you could keep Animosity just explain that Orcs and Goblins don't get along with each other so they have to see if they stay friends or fight with each other.

however on the failure I would only use the squabble result.

You really need to "unbox" the rules here.

don't worry about squabbles or animosity. make the big orks get an extra attack. give the sneaky ones an extra save die. its JUST that simple.

conventional rules are hard enough for most adults to understand. Get your kids into the idea of what gamers are for. as they progress, you add in the rules you feel they need to know to grow in the game.

over complicating the game for young children is only going to frustrate them and turn them away from it.

Use it as an aide for counting, adding and subtracting, distances, measuring etc etc.

We made a small dice game for my oldest daughter to help her add and subtract. We are using Heroquest figurines to help her get into the idea of war games.