I'm starting a campaign next week (for the first time in years) with a bunch of new folk, some who've only played 4th edition, some who've never played any rpgs before.
I'd like to find nice method of easing them into the pathfinder rules and was wondering if anyone had ever been in a similar situation and how you handled it. At the minute I was thinking a basic 'on your way to your first major location you need to fight a few things' scenario but it doesn't help them much when they're choosing characters and so on.
Any thoughts would be much appreciated!
Ask them all the kind of character they would like and their character background, and then you do the actual design work. That way all the characters are competently built and you can just walk through what they can do with them.
Per-made stat blocks. Basically don't swamp them with options just given them a few decent pre-gen characters to pick from. You don't even need to assign personalities and deep background to theses pre-gens. Let them focus first on the play of the game.
Start at 1st and run a short intro campaign up to 3rd level. Make sure to cover each part of the system. Combat, Combat Maneuvers, Skill Checks for movement modes (climb, swim, etc), Skill checks for out of combat (bluff, diplomacy, knowledge), Spells and magic items (scrolls and wands, UMD for some characters). Let them level 2 times to get the basic feel for it.
Maybe even let them swap out characters to try different classes over the 3 levels.
Then start over and help them through the character creation process.
I would make it very clear to the 4e players that this is a different game and they need to be careful about being haunted by 4e rules. It happens, it still happens to this day with veteran players coming out of 1st or 2nd edition.
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Before the game I would probably give your own knowledge of the rules a once over to make sure you've got a firm handle of them and then remember to have patience with everyone as they settle in. Don't get too controlling and try to play their character for them, but go through and explain how they're going to have to do it.
I think a few starter games call for being kind of lenient too. Let them settle into the game gradually instead of just dumping them into it.
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If you have the time and energy, walk them through character creation, step by step, recommending a few good feats/skills/spells but leaving the final decision up to them. That way, with your recommendations, they'll avoid choosing irrelevant feats or spells, but the final choice would be up to them, allowing them to feel that they truly made a unique character, something that is valuable for tabletop RPGs and PF in particular.
I think there's a really good "gameplay cheat sheet" in the back of the Gamemastery Guide that I've been contemplating handing out to new players.
The other thing you might want to do is mimic the power card structure for the 4E players (and for the total newbs, seeing cards with options on them might help with understanding of action types and the limits on certain feats and spells).
Personally, I would take some index cards, and write each type of action on one (Standard, Full-Round, Move, Swift, etc.) with a bullet pointed example list of things you can do and maybe an explanation ("Attack: 1d20 + Strength + Base Attack Bonus vs. Target's AC; Move 30 feet; Drink a potion, Cast a spell, etc.).
Maybe put characters' spells or feats/skills that require special actions on cards of their own, too, that have the ability's description and a little reminder that this card replaces the standard action, etc.
If that's too much work for too little time, I'm pretty sure I've seen spell cards from a few of the 3PPs, so you wouldn't have to write up the spell cards yourself.
I personally, if I had the time, would write up skill cards too, so players would know that there are important noncombat actions they can take as well.
I know that's a lot of work, but it is how I would ideally like to bring in new players (something I, too, am looking at doing soon...one complete tabletop newb and one who is transitioning to PF from Old World of Darkness and 7th Sea as her only games prior to this one)
I am in a similar position. I am preparing for a game with players of varying familiarity... a 3.5 DM, 2 complete newcomers to pen-n-paper, and 2 with limited experience. Some things I am doing:
1) Created a Yahoo group for sharing information and handling Q&A beforehand if possible. Using polls there to get a feel for what their comfort levels are with adult topics like drugs, gore, and sex in the game.
2) Posted sample characters to the group site (Dwarf Fighter, Elf Wizard, Human Cleric, and Halfling Rogue) to let them get a look at the mechanics and what a character sheet looks like as soon as possible.
3) Share the Pathfinder 3.5 conversion guide with them. That, I think, will be of most use to the 3.5 DM in getting an idea of what's what.
4) Running the Crypt of the Everflame adventure initially (and perhaps the rest of the Price of Immortality arc after). It is a Pathfinder intro module, and highlights things like Power Attack and Combat Expertise nicely.
5) Stick to basics.. core rulebook only to begin with. If the group gels, there will be time to add more later.
Briefly, let me describe my first RP experience. A new friend of mine ran a StarWars RPG game and he didn't let us look at the book. We played for 6 months while he told a story, rolled all the dice, and didn't let us look at books. It was amazing and let us all focus on Role playing versus mechanics in the future. Of course, he was like the best DM ever, and this must have been super time consuming. That is one way to avoid option paralysis for players :p
Briefly, let me describe my first RP experience. A new friend of mine ran a StarWars RPG game and he didn't let us look at the book. We played for 6 months while he told a story, rolled all the dice, and didn't let us look at books. It was amazing and let us all focus on Role playing versus mechanics in the future. Of course, he was like the best DM ever, and this must have been super time consuming. That is one way to avoid option paralysis for players :p
I wanted to do this once, but my more experienced players rebelled...
As to the original topic, if you aren't going to do the quoted section above, premade characters are the way to go, but even then don't use standard character sheets. Ever seen Dungeons & Dragons For Dummies? They have a series of premades in there that list a few basic stats, then just list the options of what the character can do - almost converting it to 4e from 3.5 - for example, the wizard listed Magic Missile, called it a spell, and said it was castable once per day. It didn't go into spell slots or alternatives.
Of course, at some point (since the objective is to teach them PF) you are going to have to go deeper into mechanics. Gradually, preferably, introducing one or two new mechanics at a time.
I would probably take the "completely new to RPG" folks on their own first, individually if possible and run a relatively "short" adventure with each one of them.
This would give you one-on-one time to help Them get their minds wrapped around the basic concepts. Show them what the ability scores do, the skills, do etc. with some "in combat" stuff to show them what all the numbers actually mean without having some other person there to help them.
This way each individual has a chance to learn the rules rather than the risk of someone getting carried along who basically has no idea what is going on. Its very, very easy in a group setting to just be quiet rather than to ask- again, for the 4th time- what AC means.
After you have done that, get the whole group together and do some other low level things to show the "other game" guys how this game works, as well as to help reinforce the 'new comers' to RPG's.
Its alot more work on your part but I think in the end it'll pay off for you and them both.
-S
Step one: skill checks! Have the players walk around town , try perception rolls against something static , then perception rolls against someone trying to hide, get them used to the d20 +stat +ranks + training bit.
Step 2 Mortal combat! A battle mat is almost necessary with attacks of opportunities. The players basic options are attack move. Move attack. Move move. And charge. Have them fight a bunch of inept kobolds and give one a longspear.
Step 3: each individual rule. Design an encounter around disarms or grappling or balancing one at a time and have them fight it out.
4th ed player should get the hang of it.
Now, If it was people that never RPG before or kids, then i would
1) Get ride of skills.
2) Get ride of feats.
3) Get ride of Combat maneuvers.
4) Get ride of cleric domains.
5) Give them 4 base classes: Fighter, Cleric, Rogue, and Sorcerer.
Then play the game, once they get use to the concept of role-playing/Acting. Slowly, would add skills back to the game, Then Cleric domains, then combat maneuvers, then feats, and then extra classes back to the game.
The idea is easy them into it; much like us old-timer were. Make the game Fast, Simple, and Fun. Adding in extra rules, as they get use to and conferrable with what they know.
Anyway, my 2 cents worth :) Good luck :)
Cheers for all the advice folks - I was away for the past few days so didn't get a proper chance to reply!
I think some of the ideas (such as cards)and going through situations which require them to make skill checks and a light combat are excellent while others I'm going to ditch
(example - I never ever use battlemats or minatures so attacks of opportunity are next to worthless in my games. Of course that means a lot of combat based skills suddenly become worthless so I need to think of some way of dealing with this pronto :) )
Also great idea about encounters dealing with disarms, grappling etc. I'm not really much of a rules player at heart (my longest lasting game basically involved 'roll some dice. Impress me') but my players love statistics... :) Damn programmers! ;)