D&D General DMs, how do you handle 'split party' situations?

[Jmarso]

Just like the title says. I'm curious how different groups handle it. (I'm always on the lookout for 'best practices'...)

 

[payn]

I try to make sure and give as equal time to all groups when split. It's no fun to sit back for half a session while half the group is playing. Either each split unit will engage in something interesting, or they will dead end quickly drawing everyone back together.

 

[Maxperson]

I try to make sure and give as equal time to all groups when split. It's no fun to sit back for half a session while half the group is playing. Either each split unit will engage in something interesting, or they will dead end quickly drawing everyone back together.

I do that as well, but with one exception. Scouting. For some reason my players are all content with letting the party scout, whoever that is, get 80% of the play time when they are in dungeons, and if they're happy with it, I'm happy with it.

 

[Oofta]

Kill them. Kill them all. Never split the party.

 

[Shiroiken]

Splitting the party is usually a player based decision, so I don't worry too much about splitting play time between them. I do try to got back and forth after each scene, just in case the party decides to regroup. With scouting I describe everything to everyone, so that the entire party is engaged, even if they're not technically active.

 

[Lanefan]

If the players decide to split the group the players by default are accepting they'll have to play in shifts.

I'm fairly hard-line on players not knowing what absent PCs are doing, so what I'll often do is boot out the non-active player(s) to another room while dealing with the active ones, then switch. Or, if one or both groups aren't doing much or if the split is likely to be very temporary, I'll do it all by note. Sometimes if a big split happens near the end of a session I'll send one group of players home a bit early and deal with the other, then start the following session with the sent-home group while telling the dealt-with group not to worry about showing up on time.

The tricky part sometimes can be keeping the two (or more*) groups aligned in time and place such that if they're going to meet, they meet, and if not, they don't.

* - a magic surge once split a 10-character party I was running into ten 1-character parties: the surge teleported each character to a random place in the rather large dungeon (Dark Tower) they were exploring. That one got done by email during the week.

 

[Maxperson]

Kill them. Kill them all. Never split the party.

I have an average of 1 PC death per campaign and my campaigns last about a year. Two of the last three PC deaths were due to a party member going off alone(party split) and encountering something that would be a challenge for the entire group.

 

[payn]

Oh, man i've done the separate rooms thing and its just not worth the effort. We came to game together, not sit on phones and smoke cigs or whatever folks do when the game doesn't need them. I understand that players can decide to split the party but as GM I have control over how that time split is handled. I wouldn't want a GM to kick me out of a room for 10, 20, 30 min of a session just to keep up some sense of metagame protection going.

VTT on the other hand does have some nice private chat functions that can facilitate some of this, but at the same time I find the GM only has so much attention to give a game table. I want engagement from start to finish for all involved. Also, its why I prefer smaller groups of 4-5 max these days.

 

[Lanefan]

Splitting the party is usually a player based decision, so I don't worry too much about splitting play time between them. I do try to got back and forth after each scene, just in case the party decides to regroup.

Agreed.

With scouting I describe everything to everyone, so that the entire party is engaged, even if they're not technically active.

I'll never do this, for numerous reasons:
--- IME many players are incapable of separating player knowledge from character knowledge, e.g. if the scout gets into trouble the other PCs will immediately try to mount a rescue mission even though those PCs have no way of knowing the scouting's gone sideways. I-as-DM will shut this down. Arguments follow; arguments that are 100% avoidable if player knowledge and character knowledge are kept aligned.
--- IME some players are also incapable of shutting up and restraining themselves from offering suggestions as to what the scout should do, where it should go, etc. in situations their PCs have no knowledge of. This had led in the past to some fearsome and - again - completely avoidable arguments between players.
--- describing everything to everyone takes away the scout's ability to "tailor" her reporting when she returns to the party, or to (intentionally or otherwise) forget and-or embellish things; further, it denies the scout's player any ability to have the scout do anything the rest of the group might take issue with.

 

[Lanefan]

Oh, man i've done the separate rooms thing and its just not worth the effort. We came to game together, not sit on phones and smoke cigs or whatever folks do when the game doesn't need them. I understand that players can decide to split the party but as GM I have control over how that time split is handled. I wouldn't want a GM to kick me out of a room for 10, 20, 30 min of a session just to keep up some sense of metagame protection going.

If you don't want to lose that 10-30 min of game time then don't split the party.

VTT on the other hand does have some nice private chat functions that can facilitate some of this, but at the same time I find the GM only has so much attention to give a game table. I want engagement from start to finish for all involved. Also, its why I prefer smaller groups of 4-5 max these days.

Even a small group can split a party - I've had situations with two players where one got punted for a while while the other did an away mission.