Group size?

[Kzinbane]

Just curious as to how many players most Champions games have in them. Mine has 4 total (I am GM currently, 3 heroes).
How big is YOUR group of supers?

[Edsel]

Our group has six core members. Two of us are GMs and alternate campaigns. He runs his game for 4 or 5 months, then I do the same. We only get to meet every two weeks though.

[Blue]

I haven't run in a couple months. But it was ME + 9 Players.

That's down one player from when I first joined the group.

Largest scenario involved 28 Characters, most of them agents (which I had to rotate in, because operating 20 agents at once would make my head explode).

[Supreme Serpent]

Our group has 7 regulars, and just about all of us GM at least from time-to-time, so we all get to be players. Unfortunately, we are only managing 1/month (with several games run each session). Hopefully that will improve.

[Derek Hiemforth]

Our group has eight players total, all but one of whom GM at least occasionally.

[RDU Neil]

There is me (GM) plus five players.

This is max I'd ever want to tackle. So many strong personalities (players) makes it hard for games to run smoothly.

I find 3 players to be the best for regular, weekly games... four players great once they get to know each other and the game has found it's legs...

... five only if all the players are on board and cooperating with the game/each other. One person in a bad mood, and the whole thing falls apart.

Five is good, though, because it allows a player to miss a week, and still have a game.

I can't imagine 6 or more players. You'd have to have a bunch of wallflowers who enjoyed just sitting back and doing nothing, if that was the case.

[Kzinbane]

The problem we have had is that the more players the more trouble getting together regularly. With 4 it has been pretty regular at a once a week Sunday session.
3 heroes seems like not enough in some ways, but then again the campaign city (Portland) has only about a million people in the metro area - maybe 3 is about right.
Back when I used to GM champions though... (1984 - boy am I dating myself) I was used to 6 heroes - twice the current number. I almost found that easier as I didn't have to worry about killing them all off as much! one or more would always come up with some power that would save the day. With my current 3 and knowing my super villains as I do... I worry.

[Blue]

Since we game for about 11-13 hours on our game sessions, I require there to be at least 3 players + myself. I'd actually do it with less, but since it's hosted at someone else's house, I'd have a hard time convincing them to do it for less.

[John Desmarais]

Originally posted by Kzinbane
Just curious as to how many players most Champions games have in them. Mine has 4 total (I am GM currently, 3 heroes).
How big is YOUR group of supers?

Me (GM) plus 4 players.

John D

[Solomon]

My current group consists of six players plus one GM (that would be me). That's about my upper limit for a RPG group; I was going for five players when I first planned the campaign.

[Killer Shrike]

Currently its 5 players plus me as GM. I go up to 6 and down to 4 occasionally.

Some of the most fun campaigns Ive ever played in had as few as two and as many as 8 players plus GM, so I think the players involved are more important for driving quality than the number of them.

In my current domicile I cant fit more than 6 players at the table plus me -- and thats a bit crowded, so thats the logical limit.

[Redmenace]

Currently 7 regulers with 3 others who occasionally show up. i think 5-6 is optimal but if you have three then take the oppourtunity to delve deeper than usual into there stories until more players are found.

[Doug McCrae]

5 - Me ( the GM) and 4 players.

I had 5 players in my last campaign and felt it was definitely too many. 3 and 4 players are the ideal numbers. That's why you should always go for 4 cause when one doesn't show up you still have 3.

[drrushing]

Orginally posted by KillerShrike:

Some of the most fun campaigns Ive ever played in had as few as two and as many as 8 players plus GM, so I think the players involved are more important for driving quality than the number of them.
The quality, not the quantity, has always been more important. Not everyone has to be an excellant gamer, just be able to bring something original or uniquely their own to the table.

If you're the GM, experience and your ability to multi-task will probably have a dramatic effect on number of players you can handle and still provide a creative, challenging, and rich environment for your players.

[Shikarr]

My game for which I have been running almost a year now has 7 players of which generally 4 - 5 show up for each of the games although quite a few games have been with all of them present. It can get a bit hard to keep everybody moving and not let some sit back and watch but I usually have 2 - 3 storylines going at a time.

[Metaphysician]

In my campaign, we have six players plus our GM. Not too many people, especially since we have ended up with alot of partial sessions ( missing players ).

[Dr. MID-Nite]

My group has six players, of which one is a reserve member. Generally, the group is consistantly 5 heroes and me as the GM.

Rob

[Mr. R]

In my last game we had 4 players, plus myself as a GM.

Jerome

[zornwil]

4 regulars, 1 irregular, and myself GMing.

[loraxxx]

i play in two games, one group of 6-7; one 6-8--the core 6 players are in both games, but each has a different GM....

since we only run each game once a month, for short periods, each session tends towards combat....

that's a lot of players, but since we're only 250 pt, 4th edition characters, everybody winds up playing an important role (we nickel and dime the villans to death....)

[Mike W]

The group I'm playing in now has 3 regular players and a couple of people who float in and out, so we can have as many as 5. I think this is a good number. When I GM'ed I tried to keep the group limited to 5 or 6 - which is pretty close to the comic book standard 7 man limit. It's too hard to involve everyone if there are more...I've played games with as many as 9 but there wasn't time to tell much story in them because with 9 heroes and 9-12 villains the fights would take 5 1/2 -6 hours, so we couldn't do much more than get a quick plot hook and send the team off to do battle. It was still fun, especially since it was my first Champs group, but in retrospect I think it would have been nice to have only 6 or so people so we could roleplay a little more as opposed to roll play(of course I was about 8th or 9th in seniority in that group but still...)

[Deathwatch]

In general i Prefer groups of 4-5 it allows a good deal of interaction and role-play for each of the players though i have had teams of up to 14 with 6-7 regulars each week, when you get to this size the threats also need to be bigger. my newest game has just hit 3 players and now the word has gotten out so i expect to see no less that 6 by the end of next month.

Keep in mind the group .. its dynamic and the level of threat you want to maintain for the game and you should be fine, but when you get to larger groups much of it is tied into long melee which can bore many a player and judge.

Nomadprime

[Acroyear II]

The group that I have been GMing for the past 10 years has 12 players. I try to run sessions with only 5 or six players in order to keep things from getting bogged down. Out of the 12 players, 6 are regulars, with the other six on rotation.

[Haerandir]

My group's membership has changed a lot over the years, but has consistently averaged around 5 total members. Right now we're at 6, but we've gone as low as 4 and as high as 7. Personally, I prefer to have no more than 6 players + a GM when I'm running. I've tried running larger campaigns and it's just too much for me to keep track of.

[Mike W]

I agree Haerandir. It also makes it easier to set up fights. When you have to have 7 villains for each fight(unless you're hauling out a supermenace), it means you need a lot more villains made than if you only have 4 players(and so 4-5 villains). It also becomes more of a balance issue since when you expand the group, there is inevitably more variation in power level which makes matching things up a bit trickier.