Greetings one and all!

Our group has grown recently. Until now we have always run a rotating GM system, where each GM gets to lead the group through their campaign, then passes the baton to the next bright-eyed GM with fresh, new ideas.

Now, however, we have so many players that things are really slowing down, especially if even one player likes to roleplay or check the rules before making his move (sadly both were me last session...). By the time one round of turns is over, hardly anyone remembers what they were going to do next. Quite tedious to be sure.

At the same time, several of our members have expressed disappointment that there is no real threat of character death, as each new GM doesn't want to be too heavy-handed while they're getting their feet wet.

The current GM and I decided that the best way to speed things up is to break the group down into two groups working towards the same goal. As with any group, we have our Thieves and our combat focused characters, then we also have our Pilots and Spacers, so we decided to play to that tendency. The whole group will be approached by a (Rebel affiliated) contact to send a Ground team to infiltrate Fondor, exfiltrate a spy of theirs with plans for the Super Star Destroyer, and meet up outside the city at a predetermined rendezvous (chase scene en route, of course). Meanwhile, the Space group will create a distraction by attacking the orbital shipyard, then escort in the extraction transport to the rendezvous site.

All through this session, adversaries (yes, pun intended) will be toned up. The gloves are off, so to speak. If players aren't careful, they will die. If one party fails, it will directly affect the other party (no-show for the rendezvous, etc).

We are also introducing some morally gray decisions for both parties, just for funsies. The main draw of this session is to lower the group total Obligation, so why not introduce new ways for individuals to increase Obligation as well?

The session will start with the whole group being briefed by the contact, then we'll break off into our separate groups, but stay in the same room together so that the two GMs can pace their scenarios based of each other. We are both fairly experienced GMs at this point, so we are confident that we can pull this off in a way that our group will enjoy. We're actually rather excited about the whole thing. If everything turns out well, we may handle most of our sessions this way in the future. We're not overly-confident, so we'll meet up afterwards and discuss the night and how it could be improved, but it seems fun in theory (I feel like this statement may be the main hurdle...it seems like a fun challenge, but it may be tough to pull off...).

So what do you think? What might we be missing (because I'm sure we are missing something)? Or what should we watch out for?

Thanks in advance!

Really nifty idea! I hope it works.

The only thing that's 'dangerous' is one of the two groups going off the rails, or inadvertently interfering with the events of the other group.

It's a good idea for managing a large single player party. I think you can maybe go as high as 6 at a table if they all know the rules and aren't rule lawyer nitpicks, but that is a busy table. More than that slows things down too much imo to the point of boredom.

I wouldn't worry about it coming off the rails too much, sounds like you kept the objective pretty broad and the two missions separate and simple.

Out of curiosity - how many players do you have now?

On topic: good idea and I hope it works. In the future you might also consider a system of Main-GM and two Sub-GMs. It works really well with big groups.

Main-GM does what GMs usually do - narrate the story, makes decisions etc.

Sub-GMs, (LTs), take roles of various NPCs (makes conversations between NPCs MUCH better), control the music playing in the background, find the rules that are needed, roll for NPCs etc etc.

I have 2, but that is likely to shoot up to 6 or maybe even 7, ugh, shortly.

Thanks all, I'm really excited to get this under way. We have 9 potential people in our group, but will probably be at around 7 next week. Still a lot to deal with for the GM, though.

@opsnafu and 2P51, we kinda hope one of the groups gets off the rails, actually. The two parties both have to successfully make the rendezvous, otherwise they jeopardize the characters in the other group. We're hoping that this will instill a sense of urgency. Our groups are tending to treat encounters more like dungeon crawls, looting every body and all that, so this session is attempting to scare that out of them. Run in, break the spy out, run away, and don't get shot. If they stand around looting bodies, there's a good chance they'll end up as just a body themselves. There is a Hired Gun Body Guard/Marauder who has crazy high Soak and Health, so we're going to hit her with the "warning shot" to kick things into motion whenever they trip any sort of alarm (which they will, no doubt). We are wanting the party to run, not fight. They already are aware of the more dangerous nature of this session, so full disclosure and all that.

@Skie, I like that idea. I think we'll suggest that route for anyone else that wants to GM but doesn't have any experience. I like that it would let the new GM focus on their story without having to worry about looking up the relevant rules or pull up their visual aides. I also would love to have someone playing some of the NPCs while I GM (I hate it when I accidentally end up talking to myself!).