PC interaction and party split-ups

[Jason Lee]

I disagree.

Generally, when I'm running Multiverser I'm jumping between characters and worlds pretty frequently; but I don't give people equal time; I give them attention commensurate with their needs. Tense and exciting scenes require more attention that routine ones. Certainly in other games, in the situation Jason suggests, I wouldn't divide my attention by number of players, but more by the needs of the groups. Let's suppose a party splits up into three groups, one of four, one of three, one of one. It might be that that one is doing the critical thing. Let's take Prisoner of Zenda: one guy, alone, has to get inside the castle, prevent them from killing the king, and open the gate for the rest to enter. More focus is going to be on that one guy than on the bunch waiting to be let inside. Seriously, can you see it?

[snip]

I admit that actual play cannot necessarily be delimitted into nice little fractions.  Some scenes may require different pacing than others.  However, if through the overall course of the session Bill is getting four times as much attention as every other individual I think that's a problem.  With the Bill senario I see this as one party - they are all doing the same thing, even if Bill is doing most of the work.  Group switching in related situations like this can be done quickly without it seeming choppy.  It's also easy to insure that the other players are interested in how the events unfold for Bill, because his results relate directly to their own.   Senarios where this would be bigger concern is where the split groups aren't connected, such as four people at a dinner party looking for clues to the chancellor's murder and one person off somewhere else killing orcs.  If you gave the orc guy as much play time as the dinner party group, and neither was more important than the other, the way I see it you are short changing the dinner party crew.

Anyway, you've got a lot of good suggestions for pacing and maintaining interest for inactive groups, so you seem pretty away of the issues that might arise outside of combat with a split group.