What's the best size of a gaming group?

[Mercule]

They don't have to quite just cuz they have a baby, me and my husband still game once a week, we just bring the little guy along.

Grammar issues aside (Tewligan is dead on, FWIW)....

My wife and I didn't have much problem when our first daughter was born, but we're concerned about the viability of both playing when #2 comes in May.

Still, I hope to have my daughter playing my familiar soon (seems a good place to start).

As far as size goes, even in RP heavy games I still like 4 or 5 players (plus DM). Three is fine, but seems a bit small. 6 starts to bog down unless everyone is _very_ comfortable with their role in the group.

Eight is probably the maximum I'd do. And that's under optimal conditions: a long session (6+ hours), good friends, cooperative, stylistically compatible, etc.

 

[mistergone]

I think 5 players and one game master is good. I have a big old table and enough chairs to comfortably seat 6 people around and there's room for books, dice, drinks, the battlemat... A table which I sit at the head of alone and sob quiety because right now I have no game group to come play with.

 

[John Crichton]

As of now, I run for 2 PC's. Since I am heavy on RP it works well even though one of the players isn't a huge RPer, he does well enough for my tastes as I have seen much worse. I would like another player or 2 but more than 4 (unless that 5th person was an excellent RPer who really added alot) would be a burden because I love plot and working with the character's backgrounds.

Actually, one of the best campaigns I ever ran was with just one regular PC and different PC's would come and go all the time. I had a bunch of recurring NPCs including one that was the best friend of the 'main' PC that seemed to work well. I'd have to say that about 40% of the sessions in that campaign I just ran one-on-one. Interesting stuff that I know I'll never be able to duplicate because that player no longer is in my group. Great stuff. That said, I have high hopes for my current group and one other that I am a PC in.

In short: For heavy RP (As others have said before I), 3-4 is right. More than that is too limiting to the story.

For combat you need at least 4 perferrably 5-6. More than 6 is too much for me to handle at any length of time. I have done it for a few indy sessions but nothing campaign length with any success.

 

[S'mon]

Thanks Tallarn.
I think 4 players around the table plus the DM is ideal; more is okay but hard work for the DM and some player characters can be under-utilised; less than 4 makes the game very risky with high chance of TPK. Not all my 7 players can make it every week, 4-5 is average although it was nice to see everyone last Sunday.

Incidentally, since my group reached 7 I've had to start turning away applicants for the first time, so I guess 7 is the maximum I'm comfortable with. The primary PCs are 3 fighter types, 1 fighter-rogue, a cleric, a wizard and a sorcerer. The cohorts are 2 clerics (the obvious choice for a cohort) and a fighter, plus one of the PCs has an NPC fighter girlfriend who's been sticking with them recently. Effectively therefore at full strength they have 5 good fighters, 3 clerics, 2 magic-users and 1 fighter-rogue whose abilities seem limited either as warrior or scout, levels mostly 9-12.
The group has massive magical firepower and good combat ability but is currently short on scouting abilities.