Greg Gresik
United States
Bolingbrook
Illinois
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First, I found it fascinating then when I came to post this, there was already a session report about teaching TTR to a 6 year old. Apparently TTR is a great "gateway game" in many ways!
Over the holidays, we got Tiki Topple and Incan Gold as simple games to play as a family that could include the 6 year old (we also have two teenagers). He loves them, but we noticed TTR:E on the game shelf and thought...hmmmm....
So last week, we figured we'd "dust off" TTR:E (it's been over a year at least since we've played) and teach the youngest to play. My wife and I each played a game with him (2 different nights). We figured a 2 player game was the way to go with a little less route competition and just one other player doing things (less down time for him).
The first night, she played with him with all the cards being played face-up (route and train cards) and explained to him throughout the game what she was doing and why. He had numerous questions (many of which she explained to me, were very good questions), and seemed to grasp the game very well. He completed all his routes. In fact he did so well, he won (his routes gave him "longest route" - so the extra points helped!)
The next evening he played against me - no face up cards this time (although my wife helped him chose which route cards to keep - all 3!). He didn't ask any questions and did very well. He made all his routes again. One thing I noticed is that he ALWAYS chose to take one locomotive card (instead of two blind or two colored cards) when the opportunity was there. I mentioned this to my wife and she said he didn't so that the previous evening. Apparently he was trying out different strategies...hmmm...I'll have to keep my eye on this young padawan...
I have a feeling this won't be collecting dust very long.
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Charles the Dragon
United States
Missouri
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Awesome!
I have twin boys who are only 2.5 y/o right now and am very anxious to get them playing awesome boardgames. I love TTR:E and hope to get them started early. This session report ensures me that the yung'ns can get started on TTR early!
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Greg Gresik
United States
Bolingbrook
Illinois
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Tiki Topple is great for the younger ones too. Our 6 year old has asked to play that almost daily since we got it...well, until he learned TTR.
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Andy Leber
Canada
Orillia
ON
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I have a 3 month old girl. I keep asking the wife if it's too soon to try a game...
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Chris Funk
United States
Springfield
Ohio
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Holmes108 wrote: I have a 3 month old girl. I keep asking the wife if it's too soon to try a game...
Nope.
Teach them young.
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Thumbs up for Catan!
I have a 3.5 year old who LOVES trains... can't wait until he plays TTR:E with us.
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John W
United States
Sacramento
California
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FunkyBlue wrote: Teach them young. Just as an alternate voice:
I agree to expose youth to boardgames young, but not too young.
How young is too young?
Impossible to quantify - it depends on the child, the game, the play environment, how well they're focusing that day, etc.
But if you're trying to get a super-young kid to play something tactical or strategic, look into some of the very-early variants for the games, if they exist (like they do for TtR).
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Ken Henderson
United Kingdom
Seaham
County Durham
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It's a great introduction to "proper" gaming for kids of that age.
We also started our six year old daughter playing "The Train Game" last week, figuring she was old enough to graduate from her two long-time favourites: "The Balancing Game" (Tier Auf Tier) and "The Maze Game" (The Magic Labyrinth).
We've started with simplified rules:-
 Each player is dealt three short routes and picks one to keep. This is played face up. New routes are picked again in the same manner once the first is completed.
Tunnels and Ferries are treated as normal grey routes.
Station rules aren't used, but each player places two stations on the board to show the two cities that make up the current route (this makes it much, much easier for her to work out where to place her trains).
The game ends as soon as any player has completed a fixed number of routes agreed in advance (we'll generally play for between 2-5 routes depending on how much time we have).
My main aim here is simply to make the game simple enough for her that she doesn't have to worry too much about rules, and enjoys it enough to want to play (which she does - she asks if we can have a game several nights a week without any hints dropped by dad...). The idea is that we'll gradually introduce more of the rules over time.
It's been fantastic to watch the way she's started to grasp strategy a little and discuss the merits of going for different routes.
As soon as I explained the rules, her first question was "Am I allowed to block Mammy?". I was so proud. 
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Greg Gresik
United States
Bolingbrook
Illinois
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reapersaurus wrote: FunkyBlue wrote: Teach them young. Just as an alternate voice: I agree to expose youth to boardgames young, but not too young.How young is too young? Impossible to quantify - it depends on the child, the game, the play environment, how well they're focusing that day, etc. But if you're trying to get a super-young kid to play something tactical or strategic, look into some of the very-early variants for the games, if they exist (like they do for TtR).
I agree with what you're saying here. When he was 4 or 5 we never even considered it. The fact that he was doing well with Tiki Topple even from a strategic standpoint lead us to consider TtR.
He was super excited (he has seen us play it) to play "the train game" - and as I said, did very well.
I think that's another important point in terms of teaching children "older" games - don't push them. If they are interested, and excited, they'll do much better. Often, if we have time to play with the youngest, we'll ask him "What do you want to play?" - giving him the option of choosing something lighter (in his mind) or something heavier (again, as he would define it).
When ever we play all 5 of us, it's usually something fairly indirect in terms of "competetive" play (Incan Gold or Yahtzee or Tiki Topple - although when we play that it can be - but it's not against him. His older brother (16 years old) will occasionally try to go after his little brother a little to aggresively - then dad does the same to him. He doesn't do it that often.  )
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Chris Funk
United States
Springfield
Ohio
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reapersaurus wrote: FunkyBlue wrote: Teach them young. Just as an alternate voice: I agree to expose youth to boardgames young, but not too young.How young is too young? Impossible to quantify - it depends on the child, the game, the play environment, how well they're focusing that day, etc. But if you're trying to get a super-young kid to play something tactical or strategic, look into some of the very-early variants for the games, if they exist (like they do for TtR).
Sarcasm meter must be broken around here...
My son's now 4 and I won't introduce something heavier like Settlers until he's at least 4 more. I could totally see 6 being a good age to start on certain gateways, though.
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Greg Gresik
United States
Bolingbrook
Illinois
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As a somehwat interesting aside (at least imho it's interesting) a bad game to use with younger children in a family setting (i.e. with older siblings) is...
Monopoly.
Now, I realize some will say "it's a bad game all the time" - or some such, as it is chic to hate (or faux hate) Monopoly on BGG.
The reason I say that is that trading is such an important aspect of the game - and young children (in the 4-6 age range that we're talking about here) don't usually grasp the overall value (or prospective value) of properties very well. Ironically, for most of us that played as kids, that's probably about when we learned it.
Don't get me wrong - it can work (we used to play Monopoly with our two teens when they were 5 & 6), but usually with special rules. One we had was that the other adults could "veto" a trade that the 5 or 6 year old was involved in, if it was thought to be unbalanced. Since my wife and I are both mature (relatively, on my end) we were both fair about this (i.e. we didn't "veto" trades simply because they might threaten us).
Settlers is probably better for younger kids than Monopoly. While it is a little deeper, it's still has similarly simple mechanics - roll, do what the dice say, then build or trade. Trading is Settlers can be tricky as well - but not often as game changing with one bad trade.
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