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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James Heard" data-source="post: 3772386" data-attributes="member: 7280">I don't often run a game where there aren't at least 9 people, and most of the stuff here is all good advice so I'm going to repeat some of it:Cliffhangers: When players split up always try to leave the action at a dramatic precipice. I can't stress it enough: When the time comes around for the players to do their thing again they should have been sweating it out the whole time chomping at the bit to strut their stuff or see what's next. Since combat takes a while with a large group, I often stop play entirely right beforehand (so the next session can open with combat) or else take a 5-15min break so the players can talk it over and get a handle on things. If the combat is especially long or complex, I've sometimes even taken breaks between rounds (and not just for the players, managing the NPCs intelligently can be a drag too)Rules Lawyers Are Your Friend: Yes, they can sometimes be annoying - but the guy who knows exactly which rule is where and who can reliably tell the other players (and you) "you're doing it wrong" is awesome with a lot of players to juggle. Don't let them push you into an argument, but lean on them heavily. We've played games where the players were enlisted to stat up traps and encounters (roughly outlined) between games.Talk to your Players Between Games: In person or on the phone, asking how the game is going between sessions isn't just fishing for compliments or dishing out clues. Rather than railroading the players, just asking them all what they think is going on can reap great benefits in planning out what exactly you need to have ready for them the next session. Again, you can enlist players to help you sometimes, especially with subplots.Your game is only going as well as the least interested player's interest: When you have this many people, they're going to compete for face time. Some of them will be better at it than others: Don't let it happen. Encourage the other players and yourself to involve the guy or gal whose only contribution to the game is to call out numbers they're reading off the dice, because frankly the more people who have interesting things to contribute to the game the less of the work you have to produce to entertain everyone yourself.Encourage players to take notes for you: You're going to make up things on the fly, right? Giving out a little bit of XP or cards with bits of combat bonuses for doing your notetaking for you is like having an extra set of hands, and everything you do in a large games should be mindful of getting other people to do work for you.Treasure: Keep a running tally of what you've given out as treasure from day one and you won't be sorry. It's a scary bit of accounting sometimes, but keeping a list allows you to figure out if you're over or under the expected wealth charts, perform audits (because it's not all that hard sometimes for one item to become two in a large party as different players think they own something), etc. Do the same with XP and you'll have a neat little document that you can hand to the players to do that nasty bit of auditing for you (for XP, of course). Trust me, players will scrutinize other player's character sheets with a lot more of an eye for detail than you will most of the time.Dice: Sometimes when I'm running a large game I even have to borrow dice for when I actually need to make a roll that the players shouldn't see, or else (if I can convince them to do it) I bring my own set of extra extra large dice and make everyone use them. Let the players roll their own dice. Let them roll for the monsters. You've got a lot to do with managing the combat (which should almost always have a horde of mooks in the wings to make sure that everyone has something to attack and so that combats don't end up "a bunch of adventurers gang up on the bad guy and kill him"), why spend it rolling dice?</blockquote>

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