Tips on Streamlining for a Very Large Party?

[Once a Fool]

Over the course of our current campaign (now level 7-9, once level 1), our group size has climbed from 4 players (and 1 DM) to around 8-10, depending on the weather.

This is the largest group I have ever DMed for, and I find, week after week, I have some severe problems with management.

First, the time. We only have one day a week (most weeks) to collectively get together and then only for 4 hours. To make matters worse, the majority of the group consistantly has difficulties in showing up on time (including my girlfriend).

When we are together, we don't tend to accomplish much, as focus gets divided. I personally am finding that I have problems holding the attention of 8-10 people simultaniously, while still giving each player personal attention.

I need to find a way to streamline some things, but I have a couple of parameters that seem contradictory.

1. I do NOT want to limit inter-party and off-topic discussion, because I feel that these help the party and the players to grow together as a group. I do not want to interfere with the party dynamic by limiting the player's modes of speach.

2. I do NOT want to force knowledge onto the characters. That is to say, I feel that discovery is a fundamental aspect of adventure and the players often create their own puzzles. I do not want to cut down on that.

Now, I have figured that I may be able to get people to show up on time by having all late-comers (including my girlfriend and myself) pay into a "snack fund," though I am loathe to do it, as it makes it seem kind of like charging to play. This is, I suppose similar to P-cat's "Paying of the Pig," but I don't know if it is really a workable solution.

I also have figured that if I get the players to take a few minutes at the begining of sessions to collectively come up with a priority list for the session, they will both refresh their memories about the campaign (since they don't really take notes!) and also help them to focus some. I've had an opportunity to get them to do this once, and the first part was helpful; the second maybe not so much.

But I need more. Combats are slow, attentions drift and I have to find a way to streamline our game.

The best idea I have is one I can only encourage, that being that the players discuss the game outside of the session. This is sometimes possible and sometimes quite unlikely, depending on the players.

So...

Please, anyone with tips here, I could really use them.

Much obliged,

Once a Fool

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

Big groups can be a pain. It really requires everyone to make an effort to keep things moving. Talk to your players, and see if they are as frustrated as you are. Sometimes you get several people that are serious about the game, and others that are just there to socialize. If you try and corral them to focus them on the game, the latter group might get pissed enough to quit or be disruptive.

That said, first thing you need is discipline. Make sure that everyone knows the start time, and that the characters of late-comers will be played as NPCs until their players arrive. If certain people are chronically very late, let them know that their characters won't earn XP when played as NPCs.

You need organization. Get the spellcasters to write down their spells on 3x5 cards so they aren't constantly flipping through the book. Make sure, though, that there are enough copies of the important books (eg PHB, Spell Compendium, whatever) to go around so that people aren't waiting if they do need one. Do group initiative for the monsters. Establish reasonable time limits on how long a person can take on their turn, and stick to it.

Delegate some of the bookkeeping chores to other players. Let one person track initiative for you, for example.

Advance plot stuff inbetween game days as much as possible. Use email, or an online forum, where you can let them do stuff that doesn't necessarily have to happen in order (eg one player searching the town for a specific magic item).

The biggest hassles we always ran into was when a couple of people in the large group weren't really into the game, and didn't take it seriously. It really ticked off the other players and the DM, since it was wasting everyone's time. If you've got a couple like that, just approach them openly and honsetly and like an adult and explain that it's really hard to run the game for that many people, and could they please get with the program. If that doesn't work, kill em and take their stuff.

 

[satori01]

Start the session at the time you announced earlier, even if their is only one person there. Explain to the whole group, that you do not want to feel like their parent/employer/teacher and scold people for being late, but politeness dictates people be on time.
XP, stat awards, gold for being on time really encourages people.

As for speeding up combat...sugest players and yourself use the method advocated in the books, roll damage and attack at the same time. I also recomend you get a 1 minute egg timer, preferably in hour glass form and use that to limit a person's time to act. If a person can not decide at that time, treat it like they delayed their action to the end of the round...thus as more people go they should get more time to decide what to do. 9 people plus the DM should take around 10 minutes a round.

The thing I reccomend for big groups is throw out all of the filler combat and go for big combats on complex terrain with multiple objectives. When in the Temple of the Snake Lords, if half the party has to hold a set of golden double doors shut to prevent the entry of a horde of lizard man, and their Dragon turtle pet, while the some party members fight the stagnant water elementals forming out of the 1' high water in the room, and while 2 other party members try to deceipher the script on a puzzle column that will open the doorway to the submerged basement latter where the Mcguffin is. Large parties means you can, and I think should, create complex scenarios where multiple party members need to do seperate but complemintary actions to achieve a common goal.

People will tend to pay attention, if they feel their actions will affect the group. At the very least those engaged in the action, and in working together will yell at those who are just free lancing.

Large groups are often self correcting, as players will drop.

 

[Once a Fool]

Good tips, but I forgot to mention that a majority of the group is new to role-playing, and most of the others are new to the edition. This gives me a whole lot more work in the rules department.

 

[Stalker0]

I few things we used to do with big groups.

1) If 2 players have some in character discussion, tell them to walk away from the table and have it. It cuts down on chatter at the table, and it helps immersion (other players don't know what they shouldn't know).

2) Push the players to keep the game moving. The more players you have, the lazier they are as far as keeping the game moving imo. Since there are so many, someone also assumes someone else will keep things moving. Constantly ask them, what are you doing now, how are you proceeding, you all have X, are you going after Y or Z, etc.

3) Elect a party leader. The party leader ultimately decides going left or right in a dungeon, things like that. It can helps speed up small decisions immensely.

4) Give players roles. You have a lot of manpower at your table, use it. Have one player keep track of initiative. Have another use a calculator and add up damage. Have another do maps. Things keeps them involved, and lets you focus on other things.

5) Split the party up. One advantage of a large party is you can split them up into 2 groups and have 2 functional parties. This is a quality or quantity argument, the players will be on screen less...but have more personal time with the DM. Some like it, some don't, give it a try.

 

[smootrk]

Honestly, I would try to break the large group into 2 normal size groups, keeping the adventuring locale in proximity to each other (allowing some party member swapping to be possible). Have one group of hard-core players who are there all the time, and the other group consist of the wishy-washy attendence players. If you game only 1/week (as specified above) then I suggest you switch to every other week for each group (although from your perspective, it is still 1/week).

Large groups are only managable with a lot of experience, and even then the chore can become un-fun for the DM. You might lessen the load somewhat by designating an Assistant DM whose job is to take control of designated NPC's or Monsters, especially for combat situations (making it a Party strategy vs. the DM/DMa collaboration). As long as the DMa is following your rough direction with role-play and combat situations, this can really help take a lot of the load off of you. The assistant can also do some other mundane tasks like prepping minis for play (on an per encounter basis), pre-roll initiative figures, record initiative numbers and order of turns, and other innoculous DM time users. All this helps to free you for creative descriptions, major events, pace of events (especially when trying to convey the climax of events), and other more creative endeavors.

In a nutshell, use your group for your enjoyment as well. It has to be fun for all.

 

[XCorvis]

Start the session at the time you announced earlier, even if their is only one person there. Explain to the whole group, that you do not want to feel like their parent/employer/teacher and scold people for being late, but politeness dictates people be on time.
XP, stat awards, gold for being on time really encourages people.

As for speeding up combat...sugest players and yourself use the method advocated in the books, roll damage and attack at the same time. I also recomend you get a 1 minute egg timer, preferably in hour glass form and use that to limit a person's time to act. If a person can not decide at that time, treat it like they delayed their action to the end of the round...thus as more people go they should get more time to decide what to do. 9 people plus the DM should take around 10 minutes a round.

The thing I reccomend for big groups is throw out all of the filler combat and go for big combats on complex terrain with multiple objectives. When in the Temple of the Snake Lords, if half the party has to hold a set of golden double doors shut to prevent the entry of a horde of lizard man, and their Dragon turtle pet, while the some party members fight the stagnant water elementals forming out of the 1' high water in the room, and while 2 other party members try to deceipher the script on a puzzle column that will open the doorway to the submerged basement latter where the Mcguffin is. Large parties means you can, and I think should, create complex scenarios where multiple party members need to do seperate but complemintary actions to achieve a common goal.

People will tend to pay attention, if they feel their actions will affect the group. At the very least those engaged in the action, and in working together will yell at those who are just free lancing.

Large groups are often self correcting, as players will drop.

Quoted for truth. Good tips.

A simple fix: schedule the game half an hour earlier. Expect to start half an hour late.

Here's the best tip of all: Communicate. Tell your players what you think the problem is and how you would like things to be. Be up front and as clear as possible. Don't blame anyone for anything, including your self. Don't suggest solutions - ask the players how they would like to make the change (and IF they want to make the change).

 

[Thunderfoot]

As a fellow DM of a large group (13 at last count) here are a few things we did to help.

1) Reduce the number of times you play to once or twice a month and have everyone committed to that activity on that day. You'll find that longer sessions less times a month will be better than several shorter sessions.

2) Draft the two most experienced players to help you out, frankly you need to have one to volunteer to be a DMs helper (I'm known as the Game Operations Designer (G.O.D.)) to look up rules and help make rulings go faster. Also, since many players are newer or new to the game, the senior player helps the other players learn the rules. (And keeps you honest as well - like a rules lawyer, but for all the right reasons.) Make sure the senior player is not the one making the decisions though. (should not be party leader or caller)

3) With the longer play times, have a "social hour" scheduled, time prior to the game where players can discuss their character otivations, the latest episode of "The Simpsons", their grandmother's Brusitis, whatever. You'll achieve that "group" identity you're looking for while reducing "out of game" conversation during the game. Our group actually meets the night before for social time and stays at the home of one of the players. In the morning we eat breakfast together and then game all day.

4) Be prepared! If you find that you can't keep up on material for the game (which will happen eventually if you spend most of your time trying to solve problems like this) you will find that your game play will spiral into an unorganized mess. This is where the 2nd DM, helper GOD comes in. You sdon't have to do all the work, and if you have a particularly nasty NPC or even one you want to really sparkle, they can play the role while you adjudicate or vice versa. (whaterve floats your boat)

5) Do not despair young padawan! Even though this may be a frustrating time at the moment, it will work out eventually. We have had 4 players move away and our group still keeps growing, one move and come back, children of players start playing, etc. Why, becuase the game keeps drawing them in. You may have started rocky, but it will eventually pan out.

I hope this helps, along with some of the other suggestions (a couple I'm going to snatch as well) you should find a growing grasp on your campaign.
Happy Gaming!

 

[Once a Fool]

Still more good advice, but I have thus far had little success in delegating tasks, such as keeping initiative straight, or having a rules guru.

I can't convince my spellcasters to dedicate time to making spell cards. One player has even been with us since the begining and still doesn't know the basic rules (my girlfriend). In her case, I think she's intimidated by the rules and thinks she doesn't have time to learn them, and I can't seem to convince her that the rules only exist to serve the game.

Anyway, I only have the four hours a week and most of the players want to play each week, so two seperate games are not really an option.

As for the social hour, I'm not so rigid in timing it, but I do allow the group some time to socialize at the begining for reasons mentioned in point 1 of my first post.

Gotta get back to work...

 

[Chimera]

Some good advice all around.

Some of mine, some of which duplicates above;

Rewards for being on-time and sticking to the game. But only if most of the group is on the bad side of things.

XP Penalties for being late, if it's getting to be a serious problem.

Start on-time every time and let the chips fall where they may. Weren't there to do the role-playing when your PC was vitally important? Too bad for the group, who had to do it for you. (Works great for getting peer pressure going!)

As others said, keep pushing to stick on-topic and keep things moving. If they stall too much, start taking actions without them. Especially in an encounter (combat or not). Real people aren't going to stand around long doing nothing while someone stares off into space (ie, the player is looking something up or stalling). Make it clear that they need to be ON THE BALL. Just don't get angry about it - clearly and calmly explain that there's too many people at the table and too much to get done to be waiting for someone to spend 10 minutes contemplating a decision.

15 or 30 seconds for a decision in combat. No more. If they don't act in that time, they don't act at all. Period. May seem harsh at first and draw complaints, but once it's made firm and clear, and combat is demonstrably faster, most people will get with the program. As I keep telling people who stall and drag in combat - you don't just have your time to think about what you're doing, you should have been thinking about it during the time that everyone else was acting.

Remove the small and unnecessary combats, especially if combats really drag for your group. Hand wave obvious things, like your 5 person group encountering 4 normal Kobolds.

Party Leader. Depends heavily on the group, but really helps to keep things moving. In a game that ended a couple of months back, one guy acted as Party Leader, while I acted as Tactical Leader.

One person takes care of record keeping - treasure and stuff. Or if you don't especially need to make use of it during that session, say "you find treasure, I'll detail it out of the session" and move on.