The Beginner Box is the spiritual successor to the original Dungeons & Dragons "Red Box" in almost every way, only this time a black dragon assumes the role of iconic, evocative image. Unlike other boxed sets since the Red Box that are within the D&D tradition, there is a complete game here: rules for players, and advice and guidelines -- replete with monsters, perilous traps, and magic items -- for game masters to create their own adventures. And it comes with all the accessories you need to run a game: a blank flipmat, dice, and plastic bases on which you can put the cardboard PCs and monsters. The flipmat and the cardboard pieces are also very thick and built to last. A kid could take this box and find literally hundreds of hours of enjoyment with his or her friends.
The other strength here is that it eases young people into the Pathfinder RPG with extreme ease. The rulebooks are gorgeous and have scores of full-color illustrations. The solo adventure introduces attack rolls, skill checks, and saving throws as they come up. The Hero's Handbook makes the character creation process fun and holds your hand through it, with bright-colored letter references to similarly-lettered sections of the character-creation sheet. What is more -- the Beginner Box also comes with pregenerated characters and a first adventure at the beginning of the Gamemaster's Guide, which has maps and clear instructions for how to run every encounter. Erik Mona of Paizo Publishing said they did playtests with young teenagers in which they opened the box and started playing within 15 minutes, and I believe it.
When the Beginner Box was first announced a year ago, I admit I wasn't sure that it could be pulled off. My first exposure to post-3rd Edition D&D was the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, a 576-page tome that condensed 10 years of rules development, in which every word had important meaning (as a lawyer, I actually found its rule set comparable to what I had studied in law school), and which presumed an audience that had already been accustomed to playing 3rd Edition D&D. Part of the reason for its complexity was that the game's foundations are amazingly robust and can handle nearly every situation, including high-level play during which players are summoning dragons, disarming golems, and felling giants with flurries of blows. To create a complete product and fit it all inside one book, they had to create a dense, concise exposition of the rules.
The result was that the Core Rulebook was an excellent reference book, but an awful introduction to the game. Many players on Paizo's messageboards talk about the reactions they get when they try to convince their friends: they excitedly tell them what tabletop roleplaying is like, but once they heft out this massive brick of a book their friends' mouths drop.
Enter the Beginner Box. The Beginner Box limits itself to PC levels 1-5 and to the classic 4 character classes -- cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard -- thus lessening the amount of information that needs to be absorbed. The game designers take out many mini-systems (such as attacks of opportunity, combat maneuvers, armor check penalties) that exist in the core rules and boils everything down to the game's core: attack rolls, skill checks, and saving throws. It limits the options to the most basic feats and magic spells, and provides a smaller skills list as well. The cleric and wizard have 34 spells each, and each is explained in four lines. And the Player's Handbook introduces young readers to each new concept one at a time, and in the context of the uber-fun exercises of going through the solo adventure and rolling up a character.
The result is something in which non-beginners might be interested: a "rules-lite" version of the Pathfinder RPG. Wonderfully, at the same time it is also compatible with the full Pathfinder rules, so young game masters who love the Beginner Box can also incorporate what they want out of the Core Rulebook and take from the immensely-rich library of Paizo adventure modules, adventure paths, and other supplements with relative ease.
The final result is a product that is a most-excellent "gateway drug" for the hobby, and we haven't seen one of this quality in over 25 years. Let the RPG Renaissance begin.
EDITED 8/18/2012: The Beginner Box won the 2012 GOLDEN "ENNIE" for PRODUCT OF THE YEAR at the largest annual RPG convention, Gen Con. Congratulations to Paizo!
EDITED 12/23/2012: On its website, Paizo also has free downloads to expand upon the options in the Beginner Box, more beginner adventures, and a "Transitions" document for converting over to the full Pathfinder rules. Also, check out EDOWar's blog for simplified Beginner Box versions of 16 additional character classes!
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Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 17, 2011
This box set shows everyone how to do a beginners/intro. Masterfully done on an excellent game system.
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 25, 2014Top reviews from other countries
London looks
Premium introduction to Fantasy Role-Playing Games
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on March 31, 2012A. Elliott
Great Introduction
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 29, 2012E.Evershed
Great for beginners, limited races and classes
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on August 17, 2015
