GMMichael
Guide of Modos
If you're running a module, double the number of monsters in all encounters. Baseline 5E combat is a cakewalk. You have slightly less than double the assumed number of PCs. So doubling the monsters will fractionally increase the difficulty compared to the baseline. Adjust from there if necessary.
These are probably great power-level considerations, but what about player engagement? I barely want to wait for 6 other players to take their turns, much less 6-14 kobolds. Sure, you can speed up a turn to, "Hit. Move. Okay you're done." Which, yes, seems like brand-name D&D to me, but is not something to write home about. I'd cap the number of monsters at the number of PCs (and I know someone's going to want to play a ranger with a companion and play a summoner), and increase monster damage first, then maybe HP, to add difficulty.3) Increase the number of goobers they're fighting - roughly double. But don't over concentrate your forces any more than you would for half the players. Example: If the initial combat encounter was for 3 kobolds, make it 6. But don't gang up more than 3 on any one of the PCs because that's the most you could have done that with if you only had the original numbers (doubling the encounter numbers but ganging all 6 of the kobolds up on one PC would really shift the terms of the encounter).
So, yeah. This sounds perfect!I am not familiar with the adventure, but with that many players I think you will have to increase the difficulty of the encounters, even for casual players.
Also, to keep people interested / things moving quickly I have two suggestions:
- Use the players roll option in the DMG. Instead of you rolling the monster attacks the players roll to defend. Saves you time and keeps the players engaged.
- Alternately or in addition: set a time limit for players to resolve their turn. People seem to frown on this idea in D&D circles, but I think it adds a lot of excitement to the game and people outside of D&D are normally OK with time limits (a lot of games have them). Personally we allow 30 sec. for a person to resolve their turn and it has work really well for us since we started doing it in 4e, so much so we continued in 5e.