Advice sought: game getting boring

[Phlebas]

Another possibility for large groups is to require PCs to "buddy up" in pairs of two. They aren't linked to each other like Siamese Twins, but they have a reason to spend most of their time together, both in and out of the dungeon. Brother, lovers, best friends or deadly enemies would all be possible "buddy" concepts. 3 pairs of 2 are easier to manage than 6 adventurers running in different directions.

thats quite clever. is it just an idea or have you used it in a campaign?

 

[Phlebas]

I'm having the same problem ... and I'm also running Shackled City!
........................

I wonder if its the fact its a published adventure which means instead of 'winging' it you have to constantly refer to the book to make sure your getting the RP right that makes it take a long time for the RP

............
One possibility is to reduce the number of combat encounters and then add character interaction scenes with CR rewards. This reduces combat (which is slow!) and rewards roleplaying scenes without skewing the balance of the module. (If you let them fight all the monsters AND get lots of story XP, they'll advance too quickly.)

Much as i agree with the sentiment, but given the OP's original query, I've gotta say that in my experience RP with large groups is NOT quick and puts a lot of workload on the DM. Combat, especially with initiative turns at least, means you can focus on one player at a time and everyone gets a go. Since i'm not a fan of all combat adventures and want to have RP and plot and non-combat encounters and puzzles, all of which needs a lot of DM - player interaction, that means either cloning the DM or limiting the numbers of players

........
The last session was just NOT fun, and nearly resulted in a TPK. I've called a one-month vacation while I examined the game's problems and tried to address them. The overwhelming feedback is that people want the game to continue, so that's the path I'm gonna go. Since they can't really afford the raise dead scrolls, I'm gonna need to pull out some serious Deus Ex Machina, but that's ok - my motto is to always put the game before the story........

slightly off topic here
I'm playing in shackled city too, and we have queried how tough it is - more because of the number of breaks we need before going back in to finish of an area than the danger of TPK since we've only had one fatality so far. But i do think there's an issue that some published adventures are designed to challenge an optimised gaming style that doesn't always mesh if you have a RP bias to PC's or don't want to play SWAT d20. Just MHO and hope you can get the game back on track.
/off topic

 

[Shawn_Kehoe]

thats quite clever. is it just an idea or have you used it in a campaign?

Not yet. We recently ran a d20 Call of Cthulhu game with three characters (FBI Agent, University Professor and a journalist) when half the D&D group couldn't make it, and the players really enjoyed it. I later decided that if we did play again with the full six player group, I would institute this rule for the new characters - one could be the prof's grad student, another a local police officer who works with the FBI agent, etc.)

My existing D&D campaign already has fully-formed characters, so it might be a little harder to implement.

Shawn

 

[Shawn_Kehoe]

slightly off topic here
I'm playing in shackled city too, and we have queried how tough it is - more because of the number of breaks we need before going back in to finish of an area than the danger of TPK since we've only had one fatality so far. But i do think there's an issue that some published adventures are designed to challenge an optimised gaming style that doesn't always mesh if you have a RP bias to PC's or don't want to play SWAT d20. Just MHO and hope you can get the game back on track.
/off topic

One BIG issue with Shackled City (and not one that's well known) is that the adventure is balanced for SIX characters, rather than the standard party of FOUR. So if the encounter levels seem a bit much at times, that's because they are assuming a larger party.

Unfortunately, that feeds right into the primary problem of the OP.