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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Brimshack" data-source="post: 3172946" data-attributes="member: 34694">From my own experience, I would say that there are 2 main problems with splitting the party:1) Most of the time one section does more than another. If it's one character per player, then somebody gets to game more than the next guy.2) The group is weakened, and it's tough to imagine an enemy worth defeating that wouldn't have been better defeated by the whole party.Since my own campaigns are always multi-character campaigns, we always just make sure each player gets someone going with each faction. I have had fun playing campaigns in which the party MUST split from time to time. The key there is to make sure the reason for splitting the group is sound, that deciding who goes what direction is actually part of the challenge, and that the characters can actually accomplish more by splitting up than they could as a whole party.I've had 3 campaigns that I can recall where this worked well:1) We ran a police force that was responsible for protecting a region. The players had a party about 40 string (this was 1st edition D&D - heavily modified 1st edition), and they had to respond to incoming reports. They had to balance the characters abilities, power, etc. and spread them out as well as possible. There were instances in which half the party travelled a day or so to deal with a dispute over a pig eating someone's garden. There were also incidents in which 3-4 characters ended up dealing with a high level mage or a small army (and they had to run and get help). Loved this campaign. My favorite incidents include the time the night watch left to investigate an incident in a neighboring village - and forgot to tell the sleeping characters from the previous watch. I also liked the time a dozen characters took off to a village and not one of the characters in this well balanced party (good cleric, good mage, goot missiler, meat shield, etc.) didn't take ANYONE who spoke the local dialect, so they couldn't talk to the victims.2) Ran a patrol boat campaign based on the Vietnam War. Yes, it was still D&D (1st edition -modified) again, but we used magic to create the qualities for the boats. There were 2 patrol boats (8 man crews), a seal team (6 assassins, some multiclassed so we had all the necessary skills), and a back-up boat (with about a 20 man crew). They would sail up a river, deposit the slow moving back up boat to create a fall back position (which the back up team would fortify), and the 2 boats would head up and deposit the seal team for an inland mission. Then the boats would patrol a bit, pick up the seal team and come back. Any given game the real battle could be in any one of those sections. 3) My current seagoing campaign. When the ship lands, the party has to split, because someone has to go inland to check things out and someone has to watch the ship. If the gaurd on the ship is token, the party could end up stranded. If they send a landing party out that's too weak, the ship's crew could end up waiting a long time for a party that isn't returning.</blockquote>

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