My kids began playing D&D with my brother-in-law. Then he bought them the PHB and Volo's Guide for Christmas.

After one session, they were ready for another.

That was Thanksgiving and we were finally able to start on Session Zero over a snow-day induced extra extended weekend. I asked the usual questions about what they wanted. Here is a bullet point version of what I understood:

  • Quest for an item or artifact.
  • They want to find and discern clues to the location as they go along.
  • Multiple groups are after this item, at least one of them with evil intent.
  • No Big Bad required.
  • Visit new places.
  • Learn new skills/feats/magic.
  • The dolphins they have played with since they were 3 must be incorporated somehow.
  • Visit weird places. (This was a separate item to them.)
  • Meet different kinds of peoples and cultures. (Clarified from earlier tweet about this.)
  • Desire to be the guardian of artifact after they find it.
  • Okay to use it once, but not for killing something.

I thought about an artifact as an object of their quest and turned to an old friend for inspiration. Looking through the 1e DMG, I found the Rod of Seven Parts.

Most recently, the kids have asked to include their mother, so we are going to roll up her character soon.

This has generated the world that I call the Staff of the eXo. More to come.