Gael Fairleaf (First RPG Character for a 9 Year Old)

 

This is Gael Fairleaft, a half-elf druid, and the first role-playing character of my nine-year-old daughter. 

A while back, my daughter got interested in the Pathfinder for Savage Worlds book that was sitting on the desk, so I took the opportunity to make a character with her. A couple of days later, I ran her through her first session. This consisted of Gael venturing into a cave, looking for a lost fairy. She found the fairy in a bed of sleep-inducing mushrooms, but managed to rescue the fairy using her wildshape ability to turn into a eagle and lift the fairy out without setting off any mushrooms. Then, a particularly aggressive and mobile fungus chased after her, but she managed to lose it in the caves before making her escape. 

All-in-all, it was a good little session, and my daughter has expressed interest in playing again. Savage Worlds is a pretty easy system for the most part, especially its dice rolling where a '4' is always a success. And I think they've done a great job translating those rules to the high-fantasy Pathfinder setting. We just used pencil and paper for the first session, but I thought it would be fun to use miniatures in the future, at least some of the time. So, I let her pick out a mini from Reaper's website. She actually picked quite a complicated one to paint, but I really enjoyed it (I offered to let her paint it, but she wanted me to do it). 

I'm starting to think about Gael's next adventure. I'm thinking I might have to send her back into the mushroom cave, as I think there a lot of play left there, and I think the mushroom threat works well for younger players. (A lesson taught to us all by Super Mario Brothers!). Plus, I've got some minis I can use.

I'm thinking this could be the gateway to getting my whole family into role-playing. I've bought my son a miniature as well. At 6 years old, I think he'll need the added familiarity of a miniature/game piece representing him.