Players' Poll - Splitting the Party

[Mark]

Re: good question

This is a good question and hopefully DM's will take notice.

Thanks. I agree. This is something that happens often enough in games that the various possibilities and ways to handle the situation are important to understand.

 

[Bubbalicious]

This depends mostly on whether the party splits itself, or is coaxed (or forced) into splitting by the DM.

Most often, a group splitting itself is a bad idea. Let's face it, this is a game. DM's come to the game prepared to create challenging situations for THE ENTIRE GROUP!!! If the split is coaxed by the DM it's fine. He has planned encounters that can be readily handled or avoided by a portion of the party. If, however, the party splits itself, then half (or so) of the party is walking into something designed to be a challenge for everyone.

This is when PCs die.

Too many players, I feel, try to get into a battle of wills with DMs over control and direction of the campaign. A good DM will split you up if it works. Otherwise, hold each others hands and stay in the light, 'cause if you don't stay together...someone winds up Troll food.

 

[The_Gneech]

Party splits in my experience are almost always one person going off by themselves, either because the rest of the group won't stop dithering, or because the loner is a glory hog and wants all the attention. Sometimes both. (Rogues and barbarians tend to be the worst offenders, IME.) This generally ends up with one or two characters in big trouble, and everybody else having to scramble to pull their bacon out of the fire. It can be fun, but playing in panic mode all the time does get a little tiresome.

However, there are those rare times when the party splits for a good reason (e.g., "The fighter will bash in the door and make a distraction while the rogue sneaks in the back way and rescues the princess..."), and I have no problem with that. In those cases, the party isn't so much split up, as using effective teamwork.

-The Gneech

 

[the Jester]

Almost always bad, unless there's a great deal of time pressure, the party is extra sneaky, or the party is overwhelmingly powerful compared to the opposition.

 

[Bubbalicious]

("The fighter will bash in the door and make a distraction while the rogue sneaks in the back way and rescues the princess..."), and I have no problem with that. In those cases, the party isn't so much split up, as using effective teamwork.

-The Gneech

I wouldn't really consider that a party split, because you know where the rest of your party is, and you are all trying to accomplish ONE TASK!!!

I consider a split to be when groups take divergent paths to accomplish separate tasks. In my current group (Small Beginnings S.H.), for example, two players just had babies (aided immesurably by their wives) and took some time away. Instead of playing them as NPCs in their absence, our DM sent them on a side mission. He then adjusted our coming encounters to either lessen the challenge, or bring in NPCs to help. (It's just wrong to have a player return from a reasonable leave to be told "Oh, by the way, your character died while you were gone. Roll up a new one.")

Another example is "O.K. Bob, you and Meldrick go scout the army barracks while Django, Johnson and I go see if we can break Lord Fancybritches out of prison". The jailbreak of Lord Fancybritches has probably been drawn up for the entire party, and going in at half strength really SHOULD cause someone to die, or everyone to be captured and imprisoned.