Larger in this case being five players plus a gm, which may not be larger to some of you but then that's why I'm asking for some advice.

Ok, I tend to run historical games often with an emphasis on intrigue and things like that.  Five players seems to make that unwieldy as while one guy is chatting to the informative NPC someone else is likely sitting around with nowt to do.

Tactical games like a DnD style dungeonbash work well with larger groups, but don't really interest me.

So, what systems do you think work better with slightly larger groups for a starter (DnD obviously is one, but I'm aware of it and not a huge fan so it's probably not the best suggestion for me) and what kinds of campaign do you think work best with larger groups?

All thoughts welcome.

As combat and other action stuff can easily be done with that many players, I assume we're mostly talking about the icky acting stuff, right?

Well, someone who's always talking to NPCs gets boring enough in a game with only two players, especially if you can't shorten the discussions. So basically you want to support a playing style, where most of the time when you have discussions, several players can chime in. It usually helps if there's no strict hierarchy amongst the characters, then everyone will try to push his agenda. But then cooperating is the difficult part... Having a major plot line that has the hard choices but no long discussions and several small plots where the players all try to reach a common goal -- and each one wants to be first is a good idea.

Three Musketeers -- all against the Cardinal while everyone tries to woo the same pretty wench/maid/heiress.

This is the number I have, so what I do it make frequent use of scene cutting.  If you aren't doing exploration/dungeoneering then the group splitting up at least some of the time is almost a given.  Don't fight this but embrace it.  Ideally there should be multiple conflict going on so while one group is fighting in a dark alley, another group is trying to talk their way into the duchess's ball.  Bounce between the two to keep everyone engaged.

Also, if each character has their own subplots going on make sure to spend some time addressing them each game session, at least a bit.  Your biggest risk is feeling like someone gets overlooked by the more agressive players.

"Hold that thought".
 
In a non-combat situations, that's the way to do it.
 
Combat is easy: your turn, your turn, my turn.
 
If You have a part of the group that is not involed in the combat, "hold that thought" and see what the other players are doing during that time, then go back to the combat.
 
During an in character conversation, and if you're talking for more than a minute or two hold that thought" and ask some of the other players what they are doing at the time. I like the White-Wolf systems, because you can break down almost any situation and approach to that situation into a die roll if you need to hurry it along.
 
The biggest difficulty for me is matching up the timeline if the group gets split up. Because 3 characters in a combat could only take thirty five seconds, but the hacker has got on a pl;ane and flown to another city, which takes hours, and then negotiates with mega-corps for days. Meanwhile the other players are living day to day in the main city.

Quote from: BalbinusLarger in this case being five players plus a gm, which may not be larger to some of you but then that's why I'm asking for some advice.

In my experience, a second GM produces an experience for 4-8 players comparable to the experience I'd get with a single GM and 2-5 players.  There are problems that come with using two GMs but it can work really well.  Consider annointing a second GM.  It would allow one player to be chatting with an informative NPC while the other players do something else with the other GM.

As general advice, it usually helps for the two GMs to have different responsibilities (e.g., one does the big picture while the other handles details), if both GMs check their egos at the door and are willing to go with what the other GM decides even if it's not what they'd do, and if GMs control specific NPCs and don't try to run each other's NPCs.

If you want to run a larger game with a single GM, the key is to put them in a situation where they don't split the party and have to stick together.  That often means keeping them out of cities and a little off balance so they don't feel comfortable wandering off on their own.  Some interesting models include the ship or starship on a long voyage (people can't get off), disasters where everone is trapped and has to escape together, and strangers in a strange land scenarios.  Another thing that can help is to put all of the characters into a command structure and group that's required to stick together (e.g., the King's or Queen's guards, a troubleshooting team, etc.).

How about Warhammer 2e? I've run it a couple times, and I like it. It's moderately tactical, modular, somewhat gritty, and is well suited to handling a large-sized group of players. A very charming game, indeed.

Quote from: KrakaJak"Hold that thought".

KrakaJak speaks truth.

I've found that using this method requires a good grasp of how much game time has passed to avoid the problems of which he speaks later in his post.  But it works very well and keeps things moving and lively.

Finding a way to get them back together, now, that can be problem once in a while....

I'm currently running five and I'm not finding it all that difficult.  I'm still well within my intellectual comfort zone.  The only tiome I was pushed to keep track of what everyone was doing was when there was an incident involving the seizing of 25 barns and grannaries and I had to keep track of where all the characters were, where they were going, what they were doing AND the actions of 20 or so groups of soldiers who were seizing buildings and sending runners back and forth.  That got a little hectic and when the opportunity for combat presented itself I just hand-waved it.

The assumption I'm operating under is that playing with a largish group means that you have to write in depth.  By this I mean that you can't just have a plot and expect everyone to come to spend their time contributing to it, you have to also allow there to be sub-plots involving each of the characters so that they have something to do when not participating in the main plot.

In some cases this is easy because the players are self-starters and will generally find something to do for themselves.  In other cases, this is more complex because the player might be a little bit shy so you have to not only pitch stuff directly at them but also find something that they'll be interested in doing.

I think the key is to have a lot going on and it's fun if the main plot and sub-plots interract with each other.

I recently played Dogs in the Vineyard with five players and a GM, which I thought was about on the edge of the game's zone.

Pendragon worked well, especially during the early years (big battles and court scenes). I was regularly running for 6-8 players.

Superhero games work pretty well in general for casts about that size.

I think Primetime Adventures might work for five players.

In point of fact I've run for five players more often than not, but now I'd rather not.

Amber and True20 work well with large groups.

A good trick is to leave them at a cliffhanger of sorts, when you switch to another player:

GM: "You search the room for Dr. Mesmerus body, without luck. Suddenly, someone knocks the door. What do you do, Mike?
 
Mike: "I pull out my gun, approach the door and ask who is it."

GM: "Ok, you do that. I'll be back with you in a moment. Jack, you were hiding in the Casino's elevator..."

Dude... don't mention Amber you'll tempt me.

Quote from: JongWK...A good trick is to leave them at a cliffhanger of sorts, when you switch to another player:...

I know someone who does this often, and it's also quite good at it.:pundit:

I don't want to overstate the difficulty, a few years back I did this routinely, just not lately.

Still, interesting replies so far, thanks all

I also think that to a certain degree, it's up to the players to make your job easier in running this kind of game.  I mean if people are excluded from the decision-making or others keep insisting on going off and doing things on their own then there's a problem.

I think this is another reason why the pre-packaged roles you find in D&D and such are popular.  Even outside of combat, you can run those kinds of games with big groups because everyone's thinking "I'm a mage/thief/priest... here's what I do".

But yeah, I don't think that people should really be looking to play in the same way with 5 or 6 people as they do when there's only 2 or 3.

Spot on with D&D and similar games, they give everyone a clear role and make it easy for them to know what to do at any given time.  By contrast, in a game with less clear role delineation people may get characters that turn out not to be that necessary to the group or may overlap a lot.

That's not an insurmountable issue by any means, but it is one needs a little thought.  If you're playing Gurps and you get four characters who're good in a fight and one social bunny then the social bunny may be sitting around a lot if you're not careful.  Similarly if you have five social bunnies they may just overlap too much, and if you have four and one combat guy then combat guy probably gets bored.

Some genres also work better with different group sizes.  With two or three players a mystery game can work really well, with five or six trad fantasy can work well, though possibly a game about a crime syndicate could also cope as the relevant movies often have several core characters.