Featured Project: Murder of Crows, a woodland murder mystery that challenges kids to ask questions
*As a note, the article below was written by the project’s creator since content is in pre-release/crowdfunding. The article has been reviewed by TTRPGkids before posting to the site.
Recommended age range: 10+
Murder of Crows is a tabletop role-playing game about a murder of crows investigating the murder of a crow.
It’s an infinitely replayable murder mystery game set in a forest full of lively towns, and 48 fully illustrated animal npc’s with their own secrets, motives, and funky animal puns names.
It’s a puntastic TTRPG option for game night for kids who love Nancy Drew or Sherlock Holmes, and want a more interactive version of board games like Clue.
So what makes Murder of Crows stand out? and why is it a good fit for kids?
Question based mechanic
Murder of crows isn’t a game about running around and apprehending violent criminals. It’s a game about detectives asking questions to slowly unravel a mystery. It’s all about the skills of the players: how good their questions are, how well they draw the connections between what they discovered. So it challenges them to truly think for themselves, and not just roll dice and yell fireball. On that note, if your children want an experience that’s full of action and battles- this isn’t the game for them.
Simple rules
The rules of Murder of Crows are incredibly simple.
Players will roll one base die, and add additional ones if they have a tool or a speciality that helps them with this specific question. They always get the answer to their questions, but if their highest roll was less than a 6, there will be some additional consequences like losing time.
THAT’S BASICALLY IT!
Character creation is also very simple and evocative, with most details about your detective crow being randomly rolled, and players filling in the gaps about what type of crow detective they are.
Customizable mysteries
Murder of crows comes with a mystery creating system that’s both very easy (create a murder in 7 steps!) and completely customizable, so the maturity level can be tailored to the specific ages. The GM rolls on various tables to figure out the victim, killer, and then all the details of the mystery, like the motive, opportunity, witnesses, misdirections, etc.
So if you’re running for teenagers, you might create a mystery with multiple misdirections and red herrings, set in the seedy underbelly of the bunny burrows. And if you’re running for younger kids, you can create a more straightforward mystery, about, say, Jenny McCaw, the gossiping barkeep being killed on the eve of the annual onion rings competition.
The ease of making a mystery means that this is a perfect choice if you want to have a TTRPG night but don’t have 3 hours to prepare for it.
Kids 12 and up can also take a gander at creating and running the mystery by themselves! We guarantee they will create something much darker and more convoluted than anything you could’ve come up with.
Get your copy and support the project!
The crowdfunding campaign for Murder of Crows launches Sept 15th, and it’s chock full of goodies that will keep your kids entertained at the table: A map full of little details, a poster and a deck of cards of all the characters, custom crow dice, and an adorable crow detective plushie that also doubles as a dice bag or a trinket pouch.
One of the first stretch goals will also see a dry erase investigation board being added to the box set, making it fun and easy to keep track of all the information gathered in an interactive and visual way.
Follow Murder of Crows on Gamefound.
Follow the project above to support the creator and help this awesome game fund!
And… if you liked this post, make sure to subscribe to the TTRPGkids monthly newsletter and Patreon to stay up to date on the latest reviews, tips and tricks, game and podcast list updates, and more! Thank you for playing tabletop RPGs with your kids and sharing this awesome hobby with the next generation!