Pulp Alley with children?

[BugPope]

Thank you. Follow up question: are these rolls affected by multiple combats, running, range and other penalties?
It would make sense: it's hard to sound cool when you're out of breath from running and are shouting from twenty meters away.

I'm over at the family summer house right now and brought some terrain and models, but V doesn't seem interested anymore. Seven years olds are fickle. We'll see if he changes his mind again tonight when I'm setting everything up on a table and play with his grandpa (my dad).

I also asked my sister about the violence, and as I predicted, she thinks that V is not ready for games where humans are fighting other humans, no matter how little gore there is. She likes the ideas of humans against monsters or replacing the violence with the social conflict rules. Either are fine with her.

[gary42]

I'm pretty sure there's a free download.  The full version is really inexpensive also!

[BugPope]

No need, he just told me the rule a couple of posts ago.

[gary42]

I was referring to your follow up questions.  The download is free and would answer all or most of your questions.

[dinohunterpoa]

Oh, please, JUST BUY THE BOOKS!

I'm pretty sure you will enjoy them and have memorable games with your family! 

[BugPope]

I will buy the book (I already own all the other Pulp Alley books), when I'm not dead broke. Ten bucks for one rule (that I'm not even sure I'll use) in a book that is outside of the genre I'm currently collecting is a lot for some of us, and you're acting like I'm trying to steal the whole game. Calm down, and don't be so dramatic.

[d phipps]

Thank you. Follow up question: are these rolls affected by multiple combats, running, range and other penalties?
It would make sense: it's hard to sound cool when you're out of breath from running and are shouting from twenty meters away.

Short Answer = No

Long Answer =

1. For this scenario, because it is intended to be occurring at some sort of important social affair (wedding, party, opening night, political event, business meeting, and so on) - running was prohibited. You can't run, so the penalty can not apply.

2. The "social jousting" can only occur when you are in base-to-base contact with an enemy, so range modifiers can not apply.

3. Multiple combats penalties only apply when rolling Shoot or Brawl. Neither could be rolled during this scenario so this penalty can not apply.


I hope this helps.


HAVE FUN

[BugPope]

Anyway, just played the game with V and his 4 (soon 5) years old sister J, and it was... interesting. Also went better than I expected. I can't provide a full length battle report (since it took all my energy just to keep up with the kids), but here's a summary:

Set-up
First, I opened my bag of terrain and told them to set up a nice-looking jungle. While this created a rather lopsided battlefield (most of the LOS blocking terrain ended up in a corner), this was fun for them, and balance wasn't really a goal here. Interestingly, just as I was going to explain that some terrain was perilous, V began to declare that there was "traps" in the statue and the jungles. In other words, he had already started introducing the concept of perilous terrain before I had even told him it would be a thing in the game, because he expected there to be dangerous places in a jungle adventure. This made it very easy to explain Perilous Terrain, and decide where it was (around the statue, on the ruin floor, in the crocodile filled water, under the hut and near a spiky plant.
I kept army building as simple as I could: everyone got to choose three models each, and decide which of them would be the  Leader, the sidekick and the Ally. I took the advice to keep stats simple, so the Leader had 3d10 in everything, sidekicks rolled 3d8 etc.
They also decided to name their characters and leagues before I had to ask them to. Adults players I've met usually find naming characters a chore, so that's an interesting difference right there.
The rules were slimmed down a lot (movement was handled loosely, and we skipped modifiers), but V wanted to do stuff like flying and "special sources of power" (power-ups, basically). So I'll try introducing the cards next time.


Things that went well:
They grasped some parts better than adult players do. When V's Leader got attacked, he declared that he wanted to jump away, which was easy to represent with a dodge move. Meanwhile, I've played with veteran wargamers who just can't wrap their heads around dodging.
And while I handled the math parts, they both quickly grasped concepts like characters rolling smaller dice when they get hurt or both fighters hitting each other at the same time, and nobody ever complained about the outcome. Overall, the fact that they had never played a game like this before actually helped a lot, since they had fewer preconceived ideas than adult players.

Things that caused problems:
Initiative was very confusing to them, and caused some angry complaints. For example, J would have the initiative for a while, and V would become impatient that it didn't become his turn to direct. And when J eventually lost the initiative, she got confused and upset that it suddenly wasn't her job to direct. It felt random and unfair to them, and bogged down an otherwise very fast game.
It didn't help that since I handled matching, I couldn't really explain what a clear victory is.
Note that the initiative system has baffled many adults I've played with too. Sure, part of it is that it's different than the normal turn system, but it's honesty one of the least intuitive parts of the Pulp Alley rules.
So the next time I'm playing with kids, I'm replacing it with a more traditional system where we take turns.

Overall, it went very well. We went on for one and a half hour before I decided that it was time to stop, but they wanted to keep going. My sister was amazed, because neither of them have ever been able to sit and concentrate on something like this for this long.
It's now 02:25 in the morning, so more details will follow later.

[BugPope]

Short Answer = No

Long Answer =

1. For this scenario, because it is intended to be occurring at some sort of important social affair (wedding, party, opening night, political event, business meeting, and so on) - running was prohibited. You can't run, so the penalty can not apply.

2. The "social jousting" can only occur when you are in base-to-base contact with an enemy, so range modifiers can not apply.

3. Multiple combats penalties only apply when rolling Shoot or Brawl. Neither could be rolled during this scenario so this penalty can not apply.


I hope this helps.


HAVE FUN

Thank you for being helpful and polite, unlike certain others here.

[d phipps]

Cool stuff. THANKS for posting the pic. And it is always nice to see what other players think of our rules.

As always, we strongly encourage players to change the things they don’t like. A traditional my-turn/your-turn sequence may work better for you guys.

When we designed Pulp Alley, we really designed it for the way we enjoy playing. Because we really play. A LOT! 

We wanted the Initiative to be engaging and meaningful. We wanted it to be more like initiative in the real world, rather than a child’s boardgame. We wanted it to be based off of events occurring in the course of the game, rather than some arbitrary die-roll or predictable I-Go/You-Go sort of action.

Anyhoo, that’s a few reasons why we like the Pulp Alley Initiative system the way it is.

I’m so glad to see y’all playing and having fun. THAT’S what matters. 


HAVE FUN

[BugPope]

I'm not saying the initiative system is necessarily bad, but it confused the children. Part of this is that one of the few preconceptions they had was that when you play games, you take turns. And keep in mind, I handled the dice matching, so from their point of view it was completely arbitrary if they got the initiative after winning a fight or not.
Another issue that I had with both them and adult newcomers is that to a beginner, it's hard to really see the point to it. It just appears unnecessarily complicated to them, especially next to how intuitive the rest of the game is.
They usually get it after a while, just saying it's a very common first impression in my experience. I also should have used a hat or something to mark who has the initiative.

Another thing about the initiative system that slowed us down was that we were three players, so an element of "pick me! Pick me! Why didn't you pick me!?" appeared.
J tried to solve this by inventing her own house rules on the spot.
When it was her time to direct, she would pick up a random die and declare something along the lines of
"I'm gonna roll this, and if it becomes a... four, V moves. And if it's any other number, Bugpope moves." and it would be different numbers every time.
It was adorable, but really slowed things down.

[Commander Roj]

I'm not saying the initiative system is necessarily bad, but it confused the children. Part of this is that one of the few preconceptions they had was that when you play games, you take turns. And keep in mind, I handled the dice matching, so from their point of view it was completely arbitrary if they got the initiative after winning a fight or not.
Another issue that I had with both them and adult newcomers is that to a beginner, it's hard to really see the point to it. It just appears unnecessarily complicated to them, especially next to how intuitive the rest of the game is.
They usually get it after a while, just saying it's a very common first impression in my experience. I also should have used a hat or something to mark who has the initiative.

Another thing about the initiative system that slowed us down was that we were three players, so an element of "pick me! Pick me! Why didn't you pick me!?" appeared.
J tried to solve this by inventing her own house rules on the spot.
When it was her time to direct, she would pick up a random die and declare something along the lines of
"I'm gonna roll this, and if it becomes a... four, V moves. And if it's any other number, Bugpope moves." and it would be different numbers every time.
It was adorable, but really slowed things down.

All very helpful, thanks all. I have a seven year old and a five year old, so I will get around to playing with them some time. Good ideas and helpful guidance. Food for thought.

[BugPope]

All very helpful, thanks all. I have a seven year old and a five year old, so I will get around to playing with them some time. Good ideas and helpful guidance. Food for thought.

If they're anything like V and J, they'll do great. I'm going to test the game on another nephew of about the same age later, but this far Pulp Alley seems to work well with kids. The most important thing is to just jump in and play, rather than trying to explain the rules beforehand, or bother them with memorizing modifiers and exact stats.
Here's a paraphrased example of how we handled combat:

Me: "My rock monster moves out of the jungle and attacks Tarzan."
J: "Tarzan cuts it with his knife!"
Me: "Okay, roll these dice."
[Tarzan gets 2 hits, the rock monster gets 3]
Me: "Okay J, you decide: should both Tarzan and the rock monster get hit a lot, or should Tarzan defend and get just a little bit hit instead?"
J: "Hm... I want Tarzan to defend."
[I match two of my dice with two of hers, leaving one hit on Tarzan]
Me: "Okay, roll this [health] die."
J: "I got a two."
[I mark one damage on a paper]
Me: "Tarzan got tired from wrestling with the rock monster, so he won't fight as well for a while. He might feel better soon, though. You can move one of your figures now."
J: "Okay. I'm moving Monkey Boy to go help him."

Note that in the above example, I technically broke the matching rules quite a bit (according to the rules, it would be up to me how the dice were matched, but it's more fun for them if they get to decide. And I kinda forgot, honestly) and I didn't really factor in the rule about dice having to be equal or higher than the ones you match them with. But we had fun, so no problem.

Also note that J decided she wanted to have Tarzan as her leader even before she saw that I had a model of him. Can't have a jungle adventure without Tarzan, after all (I think she's seen the animated Disney version). V kept calling him Zlatan, as in the Swedish football player.

[pistolpete]

that's a really great summary on how to use narrative to describe the actions instead of using game mechanic terms - i'll have to remember that.

you didn't just say Zlatan as a leader of a pulp alley league did you?  because now that's given me a really crazy idea.  globe trotting soccer players working for undercover spy organization. hey it happened - the US did it in wwII with baseball.

[BugPope]

Just had Experiment #2. This time with my older brother kids : L (boy, about 7 years) and N (girl, about 5. Yes, about the same age and order as their cousins).
When he saw the game I did earlier in the summer, my brother was interested in seeing my terrain and models (he used to paint a long time ago).
However, when I started unpacking the stuff he told me to not actually play the game, I would just show the models to the children and maybe let them set up some terrain.
Now, I'm not really sure why he didn't want us to play, but it was pretty close to their bedtime, so it's understandable that he didn't want me to start something when there's little time, and the kids were tired.
I also think he might think that the rules would be too complicated, despite it evidently working well with their cousins. Who knows.

Anyway, we set up terrain and look at some of my models, and my brother goes for a walk, leaving me (and their grandma, as support) with the kids for half an hour.
L and N were content at with just looking and moving models around for about five minutes, but then they ask me to teach them how to play.
20 minutes to teach Pulp Alley to children who have never played a miniature game? I can do that.

Similar setup and rules as before, but even simpler:
Everyone pics a model they like, that's your entire league. Everyone roll 3d10 for everything, unless they get hurt.
Penalties are ignored, and no players have cards. Perilous Terrain is Extremely Perilous. There are a bunch if plot points on the table, go get them.

Note: as an experiment, and to save precious time, I replaced the initiative rules with a simpler "take turns clockwise" system, and it went a lot quicker.
Again, I'm not saying the initiative rules are awful and should be removed, I'm just noting that in my experience, it's really more trouble than it's worth, especially with beginners, and when I don't have time for mistakes or explaining to the kids that it's not as unfair as it feels when you're five years old and suddenly it's not your job to decide who goes first anymore.
Also, initiative becomes a lot less important when everyone have a single model.

Interestingly, I observed some things that were very similar to the earlier game, while other things were a bit different:

Again, children get the idea of perilous terrain immediately, and when it came to declare where the Perils were, they picked pretty much the same as their cousins (if there's any water anywhere in a jungle, of course it's gonna be full of crocodiles. Duh. And ancient tiled floors are always booby-trapped.

It took about two seconds for them to understand what a hit is (and that the number of hits is much more important than getting high numbers on the dice), despite never having played a game like this. I still handled the matching, but they never got confused by it, and understood how challenges work.

Shifting down due to wounds also seemed to be very intuitive to them. I handled the bookkeeping for that, but they seemed to get why a tired or hurt model rolls smaller dice. Things are harder to do when you're hurt, that's just common sense.

The biggest difference was that L and N were a lot less interested in the storytelling aspect of the game. They didn't want to name their models or come up with backstories and narration like their cousins did, but I chalk that up to difference in personality, and the fact that they don't know me that well. And L and N are Germans, raised on super abstract German board games, which might also have something to do with it.
They seemed to have fun anyway though, and it went much, much quicker when we didn't have to pause the game to describe a cool flip or listen to a model's backstory.
Long story short, we had to strip down the game to the bare bones to fit it into twenty minutes, but it went well. My brother was surprised.