D&D 5E Help with 7 players

[Brotton Goodfellow]

Hey folks,

My regular Friday night games involve 7 players, and as such things can easily bog down. Now to be clear, it isn't combat that bogs down. I've got tried, tested and true methods of keeping things entertaining enough during combat for a group of 5+ that it doesn't become too much of a grind. Where I find things start to go off the rails is when the party isn't in combat. Especially if it's that time when they are either in between adventures or prepping for one and every single player wants to do something random and different (Buy potions, magic gear, have a drinking contest with the barbarian). I'm finding that during these times everyone loses focus and instead of 1-3 small, mini side bar adventures, there's 5-7. And by the time these get resolved everyone else has lost interest or focus and I have to bring them all back on track. There was one time, after everyone finished doing what they wanted, that a player had sincerely forgotten what the adventure was. I'm not saying it was the best adventure ever and how dare he not think it was, but come on man!

Anyway, anyone got any ideas for me to keep things running smoothly out of combat?

Cheers

 

[iserith]

Generally, I try to think of game play in terms of challenges - combat, exploration, social interaction. A challenge is any situation that the PCs can win or lose. Something is at stake that matters to them. At any given point in my game, the PCs are either in a challenge or in an exposition scene. That's a scene where I'm doling out information necessary to form the context of whatever adventures lay before them.

For challenges, I welcome the players to take the time they need within reason overall (but to take their individual turns fast and don't hog the spotlight outside of combat). For exposition scenes, I try to dispatch with those as quickly as possible - get the information out there and move on to the challenges the players want to tackle. If a player wants to do anything that isn't these two kinds of scenes, which may be miscellaneous mundane tasks or scenes for color or flavor, we don't play those out. A brief statement will do. Sometimes even a "flashback" of sorts is just fine e.g. "Oh, when we were back in town, I bought a..." I'd much rather be lenient with that than spend time shopping. I hate shopping when I'm not gaming, so I'd really rather not have in my games if I can avoid it.

While it's good to have breaks from challenges just to keep things varied, I try to keep the focus of my games on bold adventurers confronting deadly perils. It hurts the play experience in my view to spend too much time on mundane things. To underscore this, I recommend using XP rewards in ways that incentivize overcoming challenges and explaining to the players that completing more challenges per session will result in faster advancement. Assuming that is something they are interested in, you may see some more focus on getting out there and adventuring.

Now, that is what I do generally. In certain campaigns, like the city-based one I'm running now, I handle tasks in town via a town task system that breaks the basic tasks an adventurer might want to do in town into a mechanic that resolves quickly while providing some meaningful choices and outcomes. Much of these are based on downtime activities, more or less. I set some kind of limit on the number of tasks that can be performed per PC per day and make sure that Team Villain's agenda is on a timer, too. So it's like rounds of combat and just as quickly resolved. Of course, spending too much time on this kind of stuff, while beneficial, just means that the antagonists get further along with their plans and are that much stronger when the PCs face them. (The town tasks are also not worth XP whereas pursuing adventure and its inherent challenges is!)

 

[Wulffolk]

Just narrate anything of little consequence. Give each item only a brief amount of time. Decide the outcome and tell them what happens. Anything that does not directly influence the story that your group is supposed to be participating in can be glossed over in this way. If a player complains then gently explain to him that nobody wants to read a book or watch a movie in which 7 people spend most of their time doing completely random things that are unrelated to the story, and that every minute of time they demand for themself is 6 minutes of time lost by others.

 

[ad_hoc]

#1. Narrate - Declare what happens, set the scene, and then say 'what do you do?' Don't wait for the players to say they're headed to the dungeon. A big part of the DM's job is to manage pacing. At a certain point it's just time to go. Narrate/Montage until something interesting happens.

#2 Downtime - Downtime is not played in character. It's not interesting. Just have the players mark down the things they're getting/doing. If you are using the downtime rules then you will need to pay attention to each player in turn to adjudicate their rolls. Don't actually play anything out. The players are part of an ensemble. No one character is the protagonist. Don't let them. Exploration and Social Interaction encounters should be played out in a group just like Combat is. Either everyone is present or it gets hand waved b/c it's not interesting.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I find keeping things turn-based outside of combat helps tremendously with larger groups. Go clockwise or counterclockwise around the table and keep things short. Each PC gets their action and a response, then move to the next PC.

Another option is to require both group consensus on what they’re doing and everyone sticking together. That can be a bit more restrictive, but it can be easier to manage for the DM.

 

[GlassJaw]

I find keeping things turn-based outside of combat helps tremendously with larger groups. Go clockwise or counterclockwise around the table and keep things short. Each PC gets their action and a response, then move to the next PC.

Another option is to require both group consensus on what they’re doing and everyone sticking together. That can be a bit more restrictive, but it can be easier to manage for the DM.

This!!

Even with smaller groups, I've definitely found out of combat actions/exploration can get bogged down, if not more so than in-combat. I've also had situations where one player was louder and more demanding than the rest of the group. He wanted to run the show but it would create conflict and players would feel left out.

Anyway, to expound on this idea, if there are a lot of options or the group is having trouble getting on the same page, I also go around the table and have each player declare one thing they want to do. However, I make it clear that nothing will happen in game yet. Once all the players have declared what they are interested in doing, they can then decide what they want to do. It gives the players a chance to get their ideas out in the open and then decide on the best course of action.

If everyone still wants to do their own thing, I then go around the table and have each player take their action. If things are really unruly, I will require an Initiative roll, with or without Dex or sometimes even using Int or Wis.

tl;dr In my experience, things get bogged down when there is no structure and players are talking over each other.

 

[LordEntrails]

Take down-time activities off-line and do them by email before the next regular session.

 

[Stalker0]

Some others have given some good options. I am going to give you a darker one.

Drop one of your players from the game.

Painful I know. Controversial absolutely. I had to do it in my game (I had 8 people wanting to play, and I dropped 2). I hated the agonizing decision of choosing how to lose, as they were all my friends.

And....it was the best decision I could have made for that game. I have run games with large parties, and ones with smaller ones. Smaller groups run better. Now you can manage large groups, I'm not saying you can't. But there is a crispness, a good pacing, and just generally more enjoyment per time spent with a smaller group.

It feels so terrible wrong to consider, but for everyone else playing, it was the absolute right decision for my group...and it might be the right one for you too.

 

[iserith]

Some others have given some good options. I am going to give you a darker one.

Drop one of your players from the game.

Painful I know. Controversial absolutely. I had to do it in my game (I had 8 people wanting to play, and I dropped 2). I hated the agonizing decision of choosing how to lose, as they were all my friends.

And....it was the best decision I could have made for that game. I have run games with large parties, and ones with smaller ones. Smaller groups run better. Now you can manage large groups, I'm not saying you can't. But there is a crispness, a good pacing, and just generally more enjoyment per time spent with a smaller group.

It feels so terrible wrong to consider, but for everyone else playing, it was the absolute right decision for my group...and it might be the right one for you too.

I'm of a similar mind, but didn't want to say it.

For myself, I've got 8 players in my game, but only 5 PCs can adventure at one time. So the players decide among themselves who plays week to week. This takes me out of having to deal with scheduling which I hate and it means we hardly ever miss a session since we've always got at least 4 PCs (which is quorum for us). Basically as long as I can DM, there's a game.

 

[Oofta]

You've already got some great advice that I'd agree with. Limit size of the group somehow, narrate things that aren't all that important, etc.

Another thing I've done is to make sure that you move the spotlight. There are several ways of doing this including using a loose "initiative order" for different people or groups. If one or more people want to do "X", focus on them for a few minutes and then switch focus to another person/group. You can even do this across sessions ... if Bob and Sue got a lot of the spotlight in the last game, try to focus it on Joe and Tim next session.

There's only so much time in a game so do it like TV shows with a big equal-opportunity cast. Everybody gets their time on-screen, but sometimes the story arc focuses on one or two individuals while other things are just kind of shuffled to the background.