For the past few weeks, I've been preparing to run a game session.

An introduction to DnD for a few 10 year old kids.

I haven't been DM in about 12 years and - obviously - never using 4.0... which I've only played once.

Armed with a basic knowledge of the rules, I roamed on the Internet to find information and wisdom about DMing for kids

I have been pointed to an article by Wil Wheaton by the fine guys over at the 'RPG Kids' group.

Wil talks about a rule he uses when playing games with his chiildren that allow re-rolling dice.

Basically, he gives them three 'mulligan tokens', which allows them to reroll a roll they didn't like.

I love this concept!

It removes a lot of frustration from multiple bad rolls (we feel it too - some of us just handle it better). The child is empowered - he decides when to reroll. There are still consequences and strategy - the number of rerolls is limited, the child needs to choose what to reroll wisely.

I'll be incorporating this mechanism in my introduction scenario - I'll be giving every player three magic stones of luck (haven't looked for a better name yet), that they'll be able to use to reroll rolls they don't like.

Only small setback is that some of the character's powers already work that way (I'm thinking about 'elven accuracy', for instance - supposing I remember the name right).

I figure that the gains far outweigh the losses here - the elf's power ends up being a bit less special, but the possible nipping in the bud of dealing with reactions multiple fumbles seems like its worth it.

I haven't been DM since college... that's war roughly in 1995... 13 years ago.

I've offered one of my friends to DM for his 10 year-old boy and a few of his friends. They never played real role playing games.

I've been obsessed by the idea ever since.

I had prepared a small scenario which basically has them killing rats before getting entangled in a kidnapping story involving kobolds.

Turns out I hadn't read the dungeon master's guide 'till the end, because the scenario I was building was already built for me there - I just had to adapt it.

So I did and I play-tested it today, Marianne (awesome mother of my now-awesome and soon-to-be-awesome children) was roleplaying... the whole party.

First thing: I'm a rusty DM. Not enough confidence, so I bombed most of my planned role playing scenes - that's no biggie. Just have to practice my improvisation skills a bit.

Second thing: this is going to be way to long. I don't know what's the stamina of 10 year olds when it comes to DnD, but that thing could take 6 hours with one person deciding for the whole party... one person already moderately at ease with the rules.

So I think I'll have to forget the rats and cut the kobold adventure short a few rooms - or at least be prepared to cut everything short and provide a story ending.

Playtesting allowed me to figure our which information the players will need and not need - so I'll be able to adjust the simplified player sheets and power cards I prepared for them (more work!).

Playtesting also brought a few rules questions:

Does using second wind cause opportunity attacks?

As far as I can tell: no. Using second wind means you're concentrating on defense (while spending a healing surge).

What is the minimum distance from target for a ranged attack to work (using a bow)?

Target must not be adjacent - you can't use a range weapon as a melee weapon..

What's the difference between blast and burst?

Burst does not covert the point of origin. Bast does.

I've been hit by a bit of news from a friend that first scared me: updates to the DnD 4th Edition core set of books.

It immediately brought back memory of the painful "3.5" edition books that came up not so long after I had purchased my "3.0" books.

I took a quick look at the changes in the Player's Handbook (I don't own / am not familiar with the others) and found that there were all simple changes, and fixes. In fact, I took note of them on post-it notes which I spread all around my 4th ed PHB.

Not much to report on the changes; they all are details about rules, adjustments in wording - even an omission as to which attack vs defense stats to use with a power. None of these changes would warrant a "4.5" edition book - though they could (and should) be fixed in ulterior prints. Who knows, maybe they will print a 4.5 edition with these changes. But so far, there wouldn't be any need to purchase them if you have the ones that are out now :)

You can fin the changes in here: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/updates

I've been looking for some DnD material on the Web. There's not much out for 4.0 yet, but there's a lot of nice little communities and open source tools.

Here's a few that I find are really worth it:

GameTable

A nice tabletop software that allows you to share maps with remote players. I have hope that this - in combination with online chat software - will allow our group to playtest 4.0 a bit before we actually switch.

Geeked On Dungeons and Dragons

A forum that I would like to adopt that likes to speak about miniatures and DnD. They're talking more about the miniature game than DnD and - as most veterans of an older version - don't seem to welcoming of 4.0. They've been welcoming to me at least :)

Massawyrm Has Played Dungeons And Dragons 4th Edition!!

A nice article about the joys of 4.0 (along with Part 2 and Part3) This article pretty much says what I feel that playing 4.0 will be like. A nice read for DMs and players alike.

Players Pre-4th Edition Handbook

Nice informative information on 4th editing if you're planning on moving up. It was pre-release info so I'm not sure that everything is exactly as in the rule books but nice nonetheless.

Of course, you can grab whatever DnD related link I think are worth checking out from my del.icio.us account here: http://del.icio.us/themaze75/dnd