The Heroes of Hesiod

It isn't often that I have anything good to say about Wizards of the Coast.  In fact, I have so little interest in anything the company does, that almost all of what they do flies beneath my radar.  Consequently, I'd never heard of their Monster Slayers product line for young children.  This morning Shane Mangus sent me a link to a new adventure for Monster Slayers, The Heroes of Hesiod, which can be downloaded for free.

Monster Slayers is a version of D&D that is aimed at children 6 and up, and is promoted as an educational tool to encourage creative thinking and problem solving.  It's also a darned fun little game.  All two pages of the rules are included with The Heroes of Hesiod, and while they are based on the 4E game, they are simplified to such a degree that the game feels more like OD&D than 4E.

The adventure includes character cards which can be printed and cut out.  Each card lists the character's armour class, hit point bubble, and attack powers.  Each attack, whether it be a dagger, great axe, or fireball, deals 1 point of damage and critical hits deal 1d6 points of damage.  For simplicity, all attack modifiers are already calculated so each attack power looks like this: Massive Axe 1d20 + 5. Deals 1 point of axe damage.

Ironically, Monster Slayers seems a lot more like D&D to me than their 4E products, and if 4E had been designed more like this I might even have bought into it.  It's dead simple and easy for young children to learn, and I can see using it, or at least borrowing some ideas from it when the time comes to introduce my daughter to D&D.  It's certainly worth checking out, and the price is right!