Level Up (A5E) Troupe style play and downtime?

[Selganor]

Has anyone experimented with downtime and troupe style game?

If every player has more than one character but only plays one at a time the character(s) not played may have time to do downtime activities even if the plot "requires" the group to continuously tackle the problems at hand.

While one character is actively fighting the hordes of evil the other uses the distraction of the evil armies to hunt for a magical beast that can provide the materials for an important magical item.

This will probably only work if:

• all characters are part of the same group that coordinates its activities (like the "resistance" in the WotBS where I try to implement things)
• the players/characters have a chance to regroup and exchange members

(or am I missing something)

If there also is a "playable npcs"-pool from which you can recruit your current character it might help if (for whatever reason) your "normal" character would be problematic to impossible to play in a certain adventure.
They could also be good introductions to longer running campaigns if someone new (or a guest for one session) wants to join in.

Comments, ideas?

Am I missing something?

 

[Stalker0]

So a common campaign element I use is the "James Bond Mission" style approach.

Effectively the group works for an organization that sends them on missions. they are equipped (Q style) with whatever magic items they need, and then they go. Its an extremely flexible model, I can run any kind of adventure I want, and its very easy to justify it in game (your going cause the boss said to go).

One additional benefit of this style is it allows for troupe style play. A player can play character 1 in the current adventure, and could play character 2 in the next. In this style, its perfectly reasonable for different missions to have teams of slightly different members, so it works seamlessly with the flavor.