D&D 5E Single Players with Multiple Characters?

[Snoring Rock]

Does anyone allow players to run more than one character at the same time in a campaign? I see possible issues, but wondered how that works if anyone one allows it?

 

[Bayonet]

I have a group that I game with regularly, but one of them, one of my best friends, is as much of a D&D fanatic as I am and down to play whenever. So, there are times when he'll be over for a drink and I'll haul out a One Page dungeon and run a short game. On those occasions I usually let the guy run a pair of characters.

I haven't really seen any problems with it yet. There's less roleplay since the 'party' is just one guy, but we both have fun with the game. Not sure how it would work with a campaign, but if it's just a one shot, it works pretty well.

 

[Illithidbix]

Biggest problem I see is trying to keep two in character mindsets at once is kinda difficult in social scenes and in general in campaigns that focus on characters and roleplay immersion.

So perhaps a clear "Main Character" + "Loyal Sidekick" is probably a very eminently doable version, one character is clearly calling the shots.

 

[Lehrbuch]

Does anyone allow players to run more than one character at the same time in a campaign? I see possible issues, but wondered how that works if anyone one allows it?

Usually if a PC has a retainer or similar, rather than making it an NPC, we make it a kind of "second tier" PC. In fact, thinking about it, this is reasonably common for us. Most parties (3-5 players) usually have 1 or 2 additional "retainer" PCs who may be with the party for either short or extended periods of time.

It doesn't seem to create any problems: what problems are you envisaging?

 

[MostlyDm]

I have a campaign closing in on 4 years now. Two players. System is a homebrew E6-style system loosely based on various editions of D&D.

I think each of them currently has about... 8 characters? Let me count through them

Original pair, mercenary captain (leader, support, extremely durable warrior) and his right hand man (rogue, alchemist, very mobile and high damage with a thousand tricks up his sleeve)

Second pair of PCs along with a character I made when one of them took over DMing for a six session diversion. A mobile shield fighter, a medico, and a magic-dabbling priest.

Third pair of characters, a dour sharpshooting longbowman and a dumb-as-stump axewoman.

One of them introduced a fourth character, a reedy steward/accountant/engineer for their mercenary company. The other introduced a clubfooted adolescent who ran away from home to join their mercenary company.

Then they played as a general and his second in command for a different army. Rivals but not enemies, they have worked together a few times.

Then came outright villains, working to bring down their PCs. I eventually confiscated one to turn him into a future BBEG (at the player's suggestion) and he rolled up a new villain.

Then one of them ran a few sessions for me and the other guy, so I added a second PC in the form of an impetuous noble, and the other guy added a gruff jerk who eventually died and was replaced by a combat-worthless con man.

Then the other guy brought in a Joan of arc style delusional religious warrior. And an assassin with a peculiar moral code.

I think that's it.

So I guess one of them has 7, the other has 8, and technically I have 2 who are generally NPCs except when one of the guys wants to run a mini-arc.

I'd say it's the most successful campaign I have ever run. We average 1 session per week, typically 6-10 hours long. Their primary PCs are effectively 26th level (kind of) at this point.

It's not uncommon for them to have extended conversations and even arguments with themselves. I can just sit back and watch, which is pretty amusing.

Definitely recommend giving it a whirl!

 

[jayoungr]

Doing it in a campaign right now, and have been playing that way for a couple of years. I have three players and a party of four PCs. One player always plays two characters, and another takes over a second character when our third player can't make it (which is relatively often).

It works well enough; the main thing that it's bad for is when you have any sort of inter-party intrigue or secrets. For instance, I ran a campaign a couple of years ago where an NPC was secretly an Erinyes devil. Ideally, she should have tried to seduce one or more party members and turn them against each other or against the rest of the group, with a heavy exchange of notes between DM and player leading to a shocking revelation, preferably in the middle of combat. But it just didn't seem like it would be as much fun to do that when the betrayer and the betrayed would be played by the same person. It would be especially tricky if one player was in the know while the other(s) were not.

However, that's really the only difficulty it's caused for me. And it's definitely less of a headache to wrangle schedules with fewer players.

 

[MostlyDm]

If you get player buy in stuff like that can actually play out even better sometimes.

It was really fun watching one of my players (as a villain) pulling out all the stops to murder other PCs. Or the time their villains caught some of their heroes and brutally tortured them.

Good stuff.

 

[discosoc]

It works if your game is more about the mechanics and combat than roleplaying. It's kind of weird if you put any focus on roleplaying though. Generally better to just adjust your encounters down if you're short a few players.

 

[MostlyDm]

It works if your game is more about the mechanics and combat than roleplaying. It's kind of weird if you put any focus on roleplaying though. Generally better to just adjust your encounters down if you're short a few players.

Definitely disagree. We probably average 1 fight per 2-3 sessions (with occasional spikes of epic multi session battles, and long lulls of nation building, economics, and diplomacy)

 

[Arial Black]

Many times over the decades there have been one DM and one player. Usually the lone player plays two or three PCs while the DM may play zero to three PCs. The DM's PCs are the same level and don't come up with the brilliant ideas (unless the player is truly stuck). Just don't fall into the trap of making the DM's PC more powerful than the other PCs.

However, I've been playing in a campaign since around 2000 or so, first in 3.0 and now in 3.5. We have just made epic levels (by beating the Tarrasque!). There are four players each with two PCs. There is also a cohort and animal companion, familiar, etc. It make combats long and complex, and we need a lot of high level baddies to challenge us, but it is great fun and probably plays smoother than eight players playing one character each because there are only four people trying to make a plan rather than eight.

Go in with your eyes open and it will be okay.

 

[Dausuul]

Does anyone allow players to run more than one character at the same time in a campaign? I see possible issues, but wondered how that works if anyone one allows it?

I would allow it if anybody asked. This is the sort of thing that, if I can't trust my players to handle it reasonably, those players don't belong at my table.

However, nobody asks.

 

[Lehrbuch]

Just don't fall into the trap of making the DM's PC more powerful than the other PCs.

Agree. If you must have one or more DM PCs in the party, make them weaker than the player PCs. A couple of levels behind is usually fine.

 

[Sunseeker]

I think it works best when the players run simple characters. Otherwise the overhead can get a bit unweidly.

 

[ccs]

It works if your game is more about the mechanics and combat than roleplaying. It's kind of weird if you put any focus on roleplaying though. Generally better to just adjust your encounters down if you're short a few players.

Hmm. My xp is quite the opposite.
I'm in a Mythic powered PF game where 4/6 of us are DMs (we rotate). So 4 of us are well & truly adept at flipping between characters RP-wise. The other two have trouble RPing 1 character sometimes.
In the current game - 1 DM/5 players, we have 8 Player controlled characters. The DM of course is running gods knows how many NPCs - friends/foes/misc.
The RP is/can be great. (& it's funny when people have to "talk" to themselves) It's when initiative is rolled that things bog down. (the two that struggle with RP are also not the best mechanically.... Though to be fair the other three of us are nearing our own walls of mechanical complexity.

 

[Ancalagon]

I think this is a good idea if there is only 1-2 players. But I had to run a 3 player game for some time, and 3 well designed PCs is amply enough to have a solid party. So if you have 3 or more players... why? I don't see the need.

And incidentally, 3 players is a *great* number to run - it's much more focused and each player has a bigger share of the spotlight. The downside is that if one is missing you basically have to cancel the game because 2 isn't enough. That and having some restriction on character design - every PC needs to be able to pull their weight.

 

[Sunseeker]

Agree. If you must have one or more DM PCs in the party, make them weaker than the player PCs. A couple of levels behind is usually fine.

I disagree, what matters is how the DM PC behaves. He could be level 20 in all classes and have the ability to sprout one wing and summon Meteor. Like Gandalf. Gandalf was a super-powerful wizard who was also an angel in human form. Yet for the most part, he ran around getting stoned with Halflings and doing research.

IMO: typically DMPCs should be plot devices. They should take a support role in the party. You don't want a DMPC to have to be coddled, and you don't want to look like you're playing favorites by having the monsters only go after the party when the DMPC is clearly the weakling. A DMPC who behaves fairly, provides a needed role (even if it's just helping to balance the encounter math) and doesn't steal the limelight but comes in handy when things get dire is exactly what a DMPC should be, it doesn't matter what their level is. Heck, I've made DMPCs who don't even have classes. They're just there to provide some role the party feels it needs.

Beyond that, DMs want to play too. A DM shouldn't be forced to never play because the alternative means a short, bad or otherwise no game at all.

 

[Li Shenron]

Does anyone allow players to run more than one character at the same time in a campaign? I see possible issues, but wondered how that works if anyone one allows it?

I've actually suggested this myself when starting a group a few months ago. I have only 3 players, two of which were new to D&D when we started and the third had tried out only a playtest version of 5e but was experienced in previous editions. So I suggested that she played 2 PCs at the same time. I pre-designed 4 characters (classic Fighter+Cleric+Rogue+Wizard), leaving some details up for the players to fill, and she let the two inexperienced players pick their class, while she played the remaining two (Cleric and Rogue). We started at 1st level.

It works very well if the player is a fair player (which she is) and is already familiar with the dynamics of a RPG. She said she didn't really remembered the playtesting rules, but clearly remembered previous editions of D&D, so I am not sure how much this affected her ability to play 2 PCs at once, but we did not encounter a single problem.

 

[Zardnaar]

Biggest problem I see is trying to keep two in character mindsets at once is kinda difficult in social scenes and in general in campaigns that focus on characters and roleplay immersion.

So perhaps a clear "Main Character" + "Loyal Sidekick" is probably a very eminently doable version, one character is clearly calling the shots.

This is how we do it. If we are short of player or if we decided to erm remove a few players from the game.

 

[Lehrbuch]

I disagree, what matters is how the DM PC behaves. He could be level 20 in all classes and have the ability to sprout one wing and summon Meteor. Like Gandalf. Gandalf was a super-powerful wizard who was also an angel in human form. Yet for the most part, he ran around getting stoned with Halflings and doing research.

IMO: typically DMPCs should be plot devices...

While something like that sort of works in literature, it gets really old fast in-play (in my experience).

NPCs (whether friendly or hostile) are plot devices (or alternatively one of the sources of plot), and can be whatever level or power is appropriate to the adventure.

But DM PCs, who are members of the party and present for multiple adventures, shouldn't be higher level or more powerful than the player PCs; simply because otherwise the DM PC will be the natural leader of the party, the one calling the shots. If the powerful DM PC then doesn't lead it seems really weird, and the explanation for this becomes more and more convoluted and unlikely as the campaign progresses. On the other hand, if the powerful DM PC does lead, it kind of reduces the player PCs to sidekicks.

DM PCs that are lower power/level than the PCs are much better, as mostly they will just do what they are told by the player PCs.

 

[Ancalagon]

I fully agree with you that a DM has to be *very* careful with powerful PC. However, power =/= leadership.

In my game one of the DM's "PCs" at the moment is basically a demi god. (it's not D&D but whatever). If he gets mad, he can level a city (but he tends to kill *everyone* so the PCs really don't want that to happen). However he is letting the party lead him around (it's part of a quest) because he knows he can't trust himself in a fight (due to berserk-ness) and in general due to faulty memory. Even though he's immensely powerful, he's a terrible choice for a leader and he knows it.

Let's look at lord of the ring. Gimli was a dangerous warrior, but he wasn't the leader. But let's say he wasn't just a very good fighter, but the *best* of the land. Would he have lead the party? No, it wasn't in his character/nature to be a leader, no matter how good he is at swinging an axe...