[4e] Running a game for 15 PEOPLE!

[Gamerlord]

Due to a series of unfortunate,crazy, events I have ended up with the dubious honor of DMing 15 people :smalleek: :smalleek: :smalleek: . Anyone have any tips for managing such a group of characters? How much should I increase the difficulty?

[dsmiles]

GREAT SCOTT, MAN!! :eek:

Can you not split that into at least two separate groups? Co-DM, maybe? *shiver*

[randomhero00]

Due to a series of unfortunate,crazy, events I have ended up with the dubious honor of DMing 15 people :smalleek: :smalleek: :smalleek: . Anyone have any tips for managing such a group of characters? How much should I increase the difficulty?

Yeah, don't do combat at all.

If you must, have everyone state what theyre going to do, then preroll.

[Gamerlord]

GREAT SCOTT, MAN!! :eek:

Can you not split that into at least two separate groups? Co-DM, maybe? *shiver*

Unfortunately, no :smalleek: .

[ThirdEmperor]

Ummm.... Encounter with the tarrasque, thin the herd a little?

Other than that, I would split the group at least into two different groups, maybe three.

[Suedars]

Do you have to run 4e? As much as I love the system, it's probably the worst system I know for unusually large groups like yours.

[dsmiles]

Yeah, don't do combat at all.

If you must, have everyone state what theyre going to do, then preroll.

Seriously. Have everyone roll a series of d20s early on and write down the results. As they use them, have them cross them off the list, but enforce that they have to go in order. Pre-rolling damage dice for their more commonly used powers could be good, too.

[Gamerlord]

Do you have to run 4e? As much as I love the system, it's probably the worst system I know for unusually large groups like yours.

It is the version I have to use, parts of the group don't understand 3.5 that well.

[randomhero00]

Yeah, doing average damage automatically if you hit (so you don't have to roll dmg) isn't bad since, well usually its average cause its average. They still have a chance to crit.

Players can make pre rolled sheets. Or the DM can to make sure there's no cheating if that's a concern.

edit: simplifying things even more. Have the person with the highest iniative roll for everyone and they all go on the same turn. Same for monsters.

[Eorran]

I've done games for up to 12, but that was 2e, and it was still grievously long.

Get co-DMs to manage as much as possible - tracking initiative, status effects, even monster damage and ability use.

With that many PCs, combat's going to go excrucatingly slow, unless everyone knows exactly what they're doing. Battle maps are going to be very crowded. I'd suggest trying to split the party for combats - it's a natural tactic for monsters to try anyways.

Boost monster damage significantly - go 200% or more - and drop their HP and/or defenses way down. You're going to want monsters that hit hard then go away fast. I'd just say leave XP as-is; divided by 15, you won't get much. Brutes, lurkers, skirmishers and artillery are (generally) going to be easier to manage than controllers and soldiers.

Whatever map you're using for combat, have it ready well in advance.

Get your player to prearrange their strategy; who goes for the front line, who goes for the back, what sub-teams do they want.

Book lots and lots of time for the adventure. Figure out the physical layout well ahead of time. Figure at least an hour for pregame chatter, probably.

[randomhero00]

I'd actually say don't use a battlemap. Just explain it best you can and give the players the benefit of the doubt. It'll go quicker. You really don't want people slowing down the game by counting squares.

[Suedars]

It is the version I have to use, parts of the group don't understand 3.5 that well.

I wouldn't recommend 3.5 either. In many ways it would be even worse. I'd recommend a rules-lite system like Barbarians of Lemuria.

[kieza]

Use an Excel spreadsheet for rolls. You can use "=rand()*20+.5" to generate d20 rolls (just make sure to remove the decimal places), and just fill a page with pregenerated rolls. The average damage is also a pretty good idea, but if you want, you can pregenerate rolls for other dice too, just replace the 20 in the formula above with the size of the die.

Other advice:
Get a 1-minute sand glass or timer. If a player hasn't said what he does before it runs out, he loses his turn. It helps curb indecisiveness.
Don't play at high levels. The sheer number of options leads to long turns. This goes double, since it sounds like you have new players.

[Hammerhead]

Use the D&D rules if you have to, but don't actually play D&D.

Try to focus the action on intrigue, intra-party investigation and manipulation, murder mystery style. Get the players to interact with other players to drive the action.

There's no way you'll be able to get anything done if you're supposed to be moving the game along on your own. If you want to play the standard DM-managed game, split the group into three to five smaller groups that you run separately. It'll be less frustrating; believe me. It will probably even take less time.

[Kurald Galain]

Due to a series of unfortunate,crazy, events I have ended up with the dubious honor of DMing 15 people :smalleek: :smalleek: :smalleek: . Anyone have any tips for managing such a group of characters? How much should I increase the difficulty?

Have them fight against each other, in a three-team deathmatch.

[2xMachina]

Yeah, don't do combat at all.

If you must, have everyone state what theyre going to do, then preroll.

... Can that be done? I'm led to believe that 4e is about combat. Removing combat... leaves not much to entertain the players

Then again, even stripping 3.5 of combat removes a lot of things.

[Mando Knight]

Unfortunately, no :smalleek: .

Split them up anyway.

15 is three times too many players. Every tabletop game breaks down well before they hit 15 players. If they don't listen, explain to them again that it's almost impossible to keep a game together with that many players.

[Asheram]

Due to a series of unfortunate,crazy, events I have ended up with the dubious honor of DMing 15 people :smalleek: :smalleek: :smalleek: . Anyone have any tips for managing such a group of characters? How much should I increase the difficulty?

As most people have pointed out here it's not as much of increasing the difficult as actually managing to let every single person take their turn to plot their actions and say their piece
In my group of five players we can spend about 10 minutes on a single turn of combat if we're unlucky. Imagine Fifteen people...
I do Not want to be in your shoes, good sir.

[tcrudisi]

... Can that be done? I'm led to believe that 4e is about combat. Removing combat... leaves not much to entertain the players


Sure it can be done and very well, too. 4e has a great system of skill challenges which would be better for a situation like this. In fact, that's how I'd handle a combat (if I were to do one): make it into a big skill challenge. Other than that, I'd mostly do roleplaying and intrigue.

[Sipex]

How to run a 4e game for 15 people:

1) Somehow agree to run a game for 15 people.
2) Ask the internet for advice.
3) Run, preferrably without telling anyone where you're going and without packing up your stuff. You're going to have 15 people looking for you after-all, that's pretty major.

[kyoryu]

Split the party. Srsly.

Have it be one "party", but have a reason to split into two or three groups at some point during the adventure. Have Co-DMs run each mini-party, and then regroup for the grand finale.

Or, avoid combat, and focus on roleplay and skill challenges.

We recently ran a game with 7 PCs, and it was rather painful (though several of them were new to the system, and the map was entirely Difficult Terrain...)

[Oracle_Hunter]

Unless they've got a gun to your head, you don't have to run a 15 man game of any system. So don't - nobody is going to have a good time.

If you still decide you must do this thing, split the party into 3 teams of 5. Have them all run a single adventure but from different positions with different objectives.

For example: Assaulting a Castle

Team #1 - sneak in through the sewers to get to the Treasure Vault
Team #2 - fly in from above and Rescue the Princess
Team #3 - go through the front door and kill the Tyrant.

Have each team have things they can do to help the others. Team #1, for example, can open the front gate for Team #2. Team #2 can create a distraction to allow Team #3 to fly in undetected. Set this all up very much in advance.

Then, provided everyone is going to be there the same day, work with one team at a time; the other 10 people can play video games or somesuch while they wait. When a team hits an objective, let them take a Short Rest and switch to another team. If a team fails their objective, let the next team know their job just got more difficult as a result.

Make each mini-session a Skill Challenge and a Combat Encounter, with the outcome resolving one objective. Expect each mini-session to take 2 hours.

[Czin]

Due to a series of unfortunate,crazy, events I have ended up with the dubious honor of DMing 15 people :smalleek: :smalleek: :smalleek: . Anyone have any tips for managing such a group of characters? How much should I increase the difficulty?

Take some of those people and ask them to become Co-DMs (with you being the overall GM) and/or DM assistants so you can maintain that ideal ratio of 1 DM per 4 players.. Trust me when I say that the usage of Co-DMs and Assistants really lessens the workload.

[CharPixie]

Stuff them in fewer bodies. Give them some sort of magical accident that fused souls to bodies so that now multiple spirits inhabit each physical body.

Make clear rules for who's in control at what time, but make sure that they all share bodies. Makes combat simplier by halving the number of characters in it, makes the game unique, and the love of Pete cuts down the number of scenes where all 15 of them are in a bar. I mean, where's the room for the NPCs!

It even gives a focus for the campaign -- to regain their bodies!

[werik]

How to run a 4e game for 15 people:

1) Somehow agree to run a game for 15 people.
2) Ask the internet for advice.
3) Run, preferrably without telling anyone where you're going and without packing up your stuff. You're going to have 15 people looking for you after-all, that's pretty major.

You must leave and leave quickly. You must get out of the Shire house. Make for the village of Bree. I'll Someone will be waiting for you at the inn of the Prancing Pony. I must see the head of my order. He is both wise and powerful. Trust me Frodo Gamelord, he'll know what to do. You'll have to leave the name of Baggins Gamelord behind you, for that name is not safe outside of the Shire house.

[Aemoh87]

Don't run a game with 15 people ever. EVER

ITS A BAD IDEA. it's going to get boring, no one will ever have a turn, only one or two players will get to talk and the people on the end of the table might as well not be there. SO what you should do is take your 16 people and divide it up into 3 groups. Enjoy.

[Arutema]

Stuff them in fewer bodies. Give them some sort of magical accident that fused souls to bodies so that now multiple spirits inhabit each physical body.

Make clear rules for who's in control at what time, but make sure that they all share bodies. Makes combat simplier by halving the number of characters in it, makes the game unique, and the love of Pete cuts down the number of scenes where all 15 of them are in a bar. I mean, where's the room for the NPCs!

It even gives a focus for the campaign -- to regain their bodies!
I like this. Have each of 5 bodies shared by 3 souls (players). If the players can't decide what to do withing 6 seconds on their turn, then the body stands paralyzed with indecision and loses that turn.

[MightyTim]

Yeah.... you might as well be asking advice on how to run a campaign when your players are chimpanzees.

In pretty much every area, a campaign with 15 participants is going to be a logistical nightmare. How are you even going to find a time that everyone can get together?

Combat is going to be tedious. There isn't really any way round that. People are going to be bored, and there will be distractions.

You need to split the party. Or better yet, don't let them get into that big of a party at once. If they all are intent on playing a game together, you need a plot that is going to necessitate them breaking up into groups. 15 people makes 3 groups of 5, which is almost ideal in terms of party size.

[Aemoh87]

I have ran something similar to mighty tim but it can be a hassle as well. Because now you are DM'ing 3 different groups which requires a ton of time and effort.

[Chess435]

Run.

Run far away and never return.

[nekomata2]

I'm running a 3.5 game with a group of ...I believe 14 is the upper limit, though there has not been a single session (of only 2 thus far) where everyone has been able to show up for very long. Its generally more consistent at like 8 people. Maybe I got lucky with my players, but combat isn't that slow, though most of the battles have been against around an equal number of enemies, except all of them vs. a huge group of goblins with some worgs.

It's certainly more work than a regular group though.

[Aemoh87]

I just don't see the point, how could you role play with so many people? It's just not possible. As a player I would be tempted to kill half my party members just so I could talk every once and a while.

[Unrest]

Stuff them in fewer bodies. Give them some sort of magical accident that fused souls to bodies so that now multiple spirits inhabit each physical body.

Make clear rules for who's in control at what time, but make sure that they all share bodies. Makes combat simplier by halving the number of characters in it, makes the game unique, and the love of Pete cuts down the number of scenes where all 15 of them are in a bar. I mean, where's the room for the NPCs!

It even gives a focus for the campaign -- to regain their bodies!

Now, that could be very entertaining. What are your players actually interested in? Tactical combat? Role-playing? Crazy adventures that will make people ask you "do you remember that RP when...?" two years later?

For the former, I'd give them a board wargame... and for the latter two, well, something as free as Everyone Is John. The thing you have to provide for most with the 15 people is entertainment of all of them. But you can't do it alone, you just can't pull it off. So have everyone entertain one another! Make them play a scenario like from "The Hangover" - I'd really like to see how that would go!

5 bodies, 3 players per body. It'll be perfect: winning control can be perfectly done inside the groups (players police each other); and because the number of players will be odd, you can actually rule that the body is a democracy. Imagining two girls and a guy fighting over the control of a female PC and then - by GM word's power - you interpreting what the PC does based on all the three decisions brings a wide smile to my face :smallbiggrin:

[grimbold]

dear god you are screwed
ask the more experienced guys 1 of 2 things
1. can they create a new group of those gathered with them dming
2. can they co dm at the same table as you

[Kurald Galain]

How about running How To Host A Murder instead of 4E? That qualifies as roleplaying and requires less DM interaction.

[Talyn]

I wish I had something different from what everyone else was saying, but you and you players will not have fun with a 15 person group. 6 players and 1 DM is the absolutely max for 4e - you MIGHT be able to get away with 7 if everyone knows the system cold and blindfolded, but 15 is INSANE.

Your best bet is to split the group into three groups - you'll have to explain to your group that 15 just isn't feasible. Isn't there someone else who would be willing to run a game? Then you would have 2 groups of 7 (still high, but doable if people stay focused) and 2 DMs.

[Sine]

Run.

Run far away and never return.
Scar (http://www.lionking.org/~unicorn/artwork/Scar.jpeg) makes an excellent suggestion.

Honestly, even if I had the fifteen most organized and friendly role players of all time, I wouldn't run a fifteen-man party. Combat will be slow as sin, and nothing will ever get decided. The game will either fall through or you'll end up with half to two-thirds of the players wandering off to do something fun.

For your own sanity, split the group into three groups, preferably with two other DMs taking over two of them. Or just pick your 4-6 favorites and tell the rest "Sorry, I didn't realize what I was getting myself into. Best of luck finding another DM."

[Shatteredtower]

Draw up handouts for each creature to be faced. Split the group into 3 competing, but not necessarily hostile, factions and place each on a separate path.

Alternate between groups. Have the inactive teams run your monsters for you, either alternating control for groups of 5 or one each for groups of 10 (weaker) monsters.

For variety, the final encounter can be a free-for-all between the 3 teams. Innundate them with 5 squads of 4 minions, each with separate initiative and unlimited reinforcements to keep their numbers constant every round.

After the 2nd or 3rd round, throw a solo monster into the mix, but keep your reinforcements coming. The solo should be 3-5 levels higher than that of the players. Assign each casualty control of 1 or more minion squads, or half squads once more than 5 have died. Optionally, run this as the penultimate encounter, have minions break once the solo dies, give the party time for a short rest, then return with a vengeance. to drive them out. Include a skill challenge?

[Tiki Snakes]

Yeah, don't do combat at all.

If you must, have everyone state what theyre going to do, then preroll.

Seriously this. No Combat.
Keep it light hearted, make everything that could cause damage significantly more lethal, and improvise madly. Perhaps deputising certain of the more reliable ones (especially if they have also DM'ed) to help where needed could be an idea.

So that for example, one can step in and keep sub-groups of them active/interacting whilst the more important and/or painful stuff goes on?

[nightwyrm]

15 ppl...jeez. Go pick up some board games and then host 3-4 tables of board games. I can't imagine any RPG system that could be run well with 15 ppl.

[World Eater]

You're not running a 4e game for 15 people.
No. It's not possible. In the least.

[kyoryu]

Look at it this way - it's a math problem.

The fundamental interaction of any RPG is:

1) DM describes scenario
2) Player tells DM what they want to do
3) DM tells player the result

Repeat until exhausted.

With a 4 person game, the DM can spend 15 minutes every hour on each player. That's reasonable. If you bump it to 5 players, you get 12 minutes each hour. Still not bad, since at least some of what the other players do should be either relevant, or at least entertaining.

At 15 players, each player gets 4 minutes of the DM's time, every hour. And 56 minutes of watching and waiting. That's insane.

The DM's time is the bottleneck. The only way to solve the scenario is to remove the bottleneck - in some way, shape, or form, add additional DMs.

[Valameer]

Take this unique opportunity to run a West Marches (http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/) style campaign.

[WitchSlayer]

Rule 1. No new character sheets, once you're dead, you're out of the game
Rule 2. There are no more rules

Throw your 1st level party up against Lolth, those who survive can continue playing the game.

It's survival of the fittest really.

[Doug Lampert]

Yeah, don't do combat at all.

If you must, have everyone state what theyre going to do, then preroll.

I've run Ars Magica in a group of 23. No group combat is a big part of what made it work. Another big part was letting the players interact with each other without GM intervention. Council meetings, votes, delimas that they have to deal with each other first for.

4th ed running arround the table in initiative order won't work for 15.

At seven one of my main problems is that individual turns are actually substantially longer than with a smaller group. Area effects and multi-character interactions become more significant, terrain bottlenecks become crippling, and worst of all, attention wanders during the long pause between turns.

My current group of seven is maybe a hair too big for 4th ed. 15. Don't do combat. It won't work.


Use the D&D rules if you have to, but don't actually play D&D.

Try to focus the action on intrigue, intra-party investigation and manipulation, murder mystery style. Get the players to interact with other players to drive the action.

There's no way you'll be able to get anything done if you're supposed to be moving the game along on your own. If you want to play the standard DM-managed game, split the group into three to five smaller groups that you run separately. It'll be less frustrating; believe me. It will probably even take less time.

Bingo! Complete agreement.


Sure it can be done and very well, too. 4e has a great system of skill challenges which would be better for a situation like this. In fact, that's how I'd handle a combat (if I were to do one): make it into a big skill challenge. Other than that, I'd mostly do roleplaying and intrigue.

This might well work. But it again involves ignoring the 4th ed rules.

Really, the solutions for a group of 16 with only 1 DM come down to, don't play D&D. D&D is a combat game first and foremost in all editions. It's simply not going to work with 1 DM and 15 players.

Pendragon. Easy. I could do that.

Ars Magica, heck I've done that, twice, it works.

How to Host a Murder, actually DESIGNED for this sized group. I've never opened a box but it should be perfect.

But D&D you need at least two DMs for a group that size, and 3-4 would be better. With 4 DMs you could have one guy design the world and oversee the whole thing, and three DMs running for a group of 4 or so players. All the PCs are members of a common organization, or share a common goal, and players can switch from group to group at different times and the groups can meet and interact every few sessions.

I'd be willing to try that with 3 other people I trusted as GMs (or just trusted to follow instructions). Put different groups in different rooms except when they meet. But with 1 DM, play something other than D&D or claim to be playing D&D and make sure that social interaction totally dominates over combat. (Ask yourself, is D&D really a good choice for a social interaction game?)

[TheEmerged]

Largest I ever ran was 12 people, in Battletech. And you already stated that you can't split the party, so there goes my best piece of advice.

Someone suggested prerolling. I can't recommend that strongly enough. I preroll all the initiatives for our group of 6 (5 players + me as DM) as it is -- the better to create a spreadsheet of everyone's stats in initiative order for every fight.

Get an egg timer or some other regular time pieces. Tell everyone that in-combat they've got *that* long to make their action or the result is a "minion attack" (strictly a basic attack at minimum damage).

[Traveler]

Seriously, break it down abit. I don't know much about 4th ed but in most editions that's alot. I'm in a 8 player group and sometimes that gets bogged down in combat (though some of the roleplaying has some great moments). 15 is just to much at once.

[randomhero00]

... Can that be done? I'm led to believe that 4e is about combat. Removing combat... leaves not much to entertain the players

Then again, even stripping 3.5 of combat removes a lot of things.

Sure like any game. But you need to be more prepared and in character and so do they. You can still have SOME combat. Just make it more about duels between nobles and such. And/or do pregen rolls and stuff.

[MeeposFire]

Seriously, break it down abit. I don't know much about 4th ed but in most editions that's alot. I'm in a 8 player group and sometimes that gets bogged down in combat (though some of the roleplaying has some great moments). 15 is just to much at once.

It is a lot in 4e I can vouch. In fact 4e is normally best played with a soft maximum of 6 players and a DM. More than that gets very slow. You can do more but it really gets slow.

[Katana_Geldar]

I told Ari Marmell, one of the ToH 4e Writers, that my party had eight and he freaked out.

15 people is way way way way way too many.

You need to split, for the sake of your sanity and voice. Most of the night you will be telling people to shut up.

[Kaun]

Yeah, dont bother runing combat. I have done 8 people and what was ment to be "quick combat encounters" were taking 3 hrs.

15 people all at the table at once = NEGATIVE FUN!.

My gaming circle is in a similar situation with many players but few DM's and people just have to sit out. I switch it around as much as i can but that is just the way it goes.

[Jothki]

You could just enforce strict time limits in combat. 10 seconds would probably be enough to describe any action. Given how many turns your players will have to wait between actions, that should give them enough time to decide what that action will be.

[Kaun]

You could just enforce strict time limits in combat. 10 seconds would probably be enough to describe any action. Given how many turns your players will have to wait between actions, that should give them enough time to decide what that action will be.

Yeah but it will generally still take 1 to 2 mins to resolve the actions per player.

So with out monsters you are looking at half an hour per combat round.

[nightwyrm]

You could just enforce strict time limits in combat. 10 seconds would probably be enough to describe any action. Given how many turns your players will have to wait between actions, that should give them enough time to decide what that action will be.

This type of advice is common on all D&D forums I go but the very fluid nature of 4e combat works against planning out your actions far in advance of your turn. Let's say you planned to Dual Strike monster A and B, but the player who goes before you slide monster A away from B into a pit and now you have to re-evaluate the situation and come up with a new action. Or say artillery monster C who was in the back row got pulled next forward by some other player, and now it's much more profitable to Rain of Blows on C and kill it before it runs away. Very often, there's no point in planning what actions you're gonna take before your turn starts because the combat situation can change so much during each and every player's turn.

[MeeposFire]

True I have found that trying to really plan my turn too much just does not work. I just find every time I get a plan something screws it up. In the end I have found it is better to wait until the player before me to make up my plans. Only the most broad set of plans, such as I want that guy dead, really can be thought of before your turn comes up do to enemy and ally tactics.

[Kaun]

I think the true reason behind having people plan their action before their turn and giving them the time limit is to encourage the players to pay atention to the combat when its not their turn.

Mainly to avoide the dm being asked for a recap at the start of each players turn.

[kyoryu]

This type of advice is common on all D&D forums I go but the very fluid nature of 4e combat works against planning out your actions far in advance of your turn. Let's say you planned to Dual Strike monster A and B, but the player who goes before you slide monster A away from B into a pit and now you have to re-evaluate the situation and come up with a new action. Or say artillery monster C who was in the back row got pulled next forward by some other player, and now it's much more profitable to Rain of Blows on C and kill it before it runs away. Very often, there's no point in planning what actions you're gonna take before your turn starts because the combat situation can change so much during each and every player's turn.

That's true to some extent - however, most of the time it won't really be that much of an issue, and even when it is, it's better to have players knowing what their teammates can do, and thinking about how they might change their plans if the teammates screws 'em up during their teammates' turns rather than waiting on their initiative to stop looking at their smartphone/books/comics/etc.

If you're really lucky, you might even get players *gasp* coordinating their actions and communicating with each other.

[Katana_Geldar]

I was in a group of nine the other night, and the only reason the encounter went slow is because people were talking about other things when it wasn't their turn.

We coordinated, but in small groups and when we finished the enemies we could "handle" asked of anyone needed help.

[SilverSheriff]

Tell everyone to average their damage dice to 55% (rounded up) of their average on normal attacks, and 100% on a Critical.

So:

D4 = 3
D6 = 4
D8 = 5
D10= 6
d12= 7

Also, make sure everyone plans their actions before their turn comes around, make it clear that if they don't start talking in 5 seconds of their turn it's forfeit.