fun way to do Party vs Party?

[Deremir]

Ok so I've been playing with this same d&d group for a little over a year now and during the last few months things have gotten pretty stale. im not that great at making my players feel like they have a choice in what happens, the one good dm in our group never wants to dm because hes too busy, and the dm that is good at making the players feel like they have a choice is terrible at keeping a game together, her campaigns never last more than three sessions. we had all kinda gotten board of our d&d group during the last month or so and just haven't been gaming. so i was delighted when she said that she knew a group of people (six i think) from a town over that played and had recently had their dm leave for college. she said she wanted to invite them to a session and have me dm a one shot Halloween adventure. that's the background

Lately the girl that came up with this idea has been really pushing me to make the session a "our group vs their group" thing. which i admit sounds at the surface to be a really cool idea, the problem is that im having trouble coming up with a fun way to do it. shes sort of the alpha of the group and if she wanted to take over as dm the rest of the group would probably support her, but while shes great at story telling she is really bad on the mechanics side of dming. so im worried that if she took over the session would be a bust. before i confront her and tell her that her idea just wont work i wanted to ask the playgrounds advice, so, have any of you had any success in doing a party vs party session? and if so how should i proceed?

(im sorry about the rant, that was probably way more than was necessary)

[Curbstomp]

I've done a full intrigue campaign this way. Wednesday morning group vs. Friday morning group. That said, the campaign was run on separate days over the course of a year with maybe 3-4 joint sessions in that entire time. What you are looking for is more of an arena-style head-to-head fight. Maybe have the groups cooperate in a series of arena battles against NPC opponents, then if they live the final match is against each other. Winner takes all my friends. Winner takes all.

[Cazero]

Well, I did it several times.

It sort of became a style of play for some acquaintances of mine after the first "success" of the thing. I had them split in two groups, and would go from group to group depending of how they progress. The big flaw is that one group is idling doing nothing (or distracting themselves with something else) in the next room while the other makes progress, until they catch up in game time, at wich point the idling team swap, until they catch up physically, and there it gets bloody.

I also did it as a player during a convention. The two groups were playing opposite sides of INS/MV (angels versus demons), and both team naturally assumed that the other was responsible of the trouble we were investigating. We had 3 GM, one for each team and a communication manager between GMs. And it didn't stop the same problem than before to happen, but that's because we demons had a crazy sick plan to get clues, involving 'poisoning' a whole city with the weird goo we found. It put the angels waaay behind us in time, and we had to wait for them.

The lesson here is that in a group vs group play, the hard part is to make sure everyone is entertained the whole time. A single DM can manage the story, but one groupe will have to be left on the touch regularly. Multiple DM require heavy organisation and can still run in that problem. The easy way is to put both group together since start, but in that case the versus part make it bloody quick or might get forgotten.
I guess a good scenario would be to make both group cooperate on a misunderstanding that is revealed at the end, putting them against each other. But that might break the intended teams.

[Nahro]

The DM I am currently playing with plans this as follow up to our current campaign.

The idea is that both groups are somewhat higher ranked individuals for opposing Groups, both trying to take over the Kingdom.

Each group would play on different days - but close to each other (So say: Friday Group A, Saturday or Sunday Group B)
The first Sessions would be free exploring of the Land and aquiring ressources towards either faction - logically ending in final confrontation where both groups meet and duke it out.

It sounds interresting in Theory - but knowing the other Group has several long time Roleplayers AND people that know the system - I am pretty scared for our all-newbie group :P
(Especially because we REEEEALLY suck at stratetgic decision Ending in 2-time deus-ex-machina to save several people of the group)

[daremetoidareyo]

The two parties are in a race to find some trophy of power for their respective group deities. Each group has a dream where the deity appears before them makes the request, shows an image of the opposing group, and tells them about the dire time limits. The deity then gives them a circlet that a member wakes up wearing. The circlet allow the PC to see everything that the other group is doing. This player is allowed to sit in on the other groups' session. Then the race is on.

[jaydubs]

I'd second the race idea. Have the two groups move toward the same goal from opposite directions. Then, so half the players don't sit out all the time, give them control of the NPC enemies that the other group runs into. You might even let them help design the type of challenges the other team has to face, so they're more invested in how the various encounters or challenges play out.