So, with rtjs I have enough for two very solid parties and still those I need to turn away. The thing is I like both possible parties really well. Is it feasible and/or doable to have two different parties in a single game off doing their own thing? I was thinking by using groups you could keep them separated. Has anyone done something like this?

It is absolutely possible.  I have been in several games, mostly D&D, in which there are as many as 10-12 parties running simultaneously in the same world.  Groups is the way to go to keep people in their own threads without knowing what others are doing.  It can become a bit complicated if people switch from one party to another.  Either you need to allow them to see all previous posts for that group or setup new groups.  So if you had Group 1 and 2 and someone from group 1 moved to group 2, make groups 3 and 4.  All group 1 and 2 members remain in group 1/2 and all current group 1 members now post in group 3 (minus the person who moved) while all current group 2 members (including the one who moved) post in group 4.  This can get complicated quickly, so normally people just allow people moving between groups to see all the old stuff.

Thank you for the advice, that helps immensely. I don’t mind people knowing what happened. I would only keep the separation to avoid confusion for the players.

 its  good  if  folks are split up, when other people can read what's going on  for the 'Entertaiment' Value,  gives them something to read about  while they wait their turns, and they can have fun commenting on in OOC threads.

   i have threads  set up  for various places , and   when folks split up and go there, it  is all happing  at the same time as everyone else. ( no one can be in two places at one time)

 years ago we added  'tranistion   arrows  or cues  when some one left on thread, to go to another. It helps  GMs   find   back posts   when they look something up.

 Good players   help with that , as well as they keep up with the transitions  and  don't  try to be 'everywhere'

.............

 You can use  groups? I never liked that, it  seems   like you are  separating  folks  from each other.. its much simpler  to have   Threads that cover , where the groups are going.

I use the numbered groups for group play and I use the letter threads to give each player a solo thread.  I have even set up a game specifically to allow multiple small parties instead of one big party :)

In reply to donsr (msg # 4):

I hear what you are saying about not grouping. And I am a player in games that do it without groups. The only reason I thought of it was to reduce confusion of players about who was where. More to think about, thankfully I am still waiting on two submissions before I decide everything.

This is how I do it too. You can always put everyone in group 1 for full-game OOC and/or major climactic moments where parties cross paths or work together to tackle larger challenges while maintaining smaller parties in groups 2-9 for regular play and private party OOC.

One technique I've seen used successfully, in lieu of groups, is to label threads with the names of the PCs allowed to post in each. You can establish a continuity of events by noting the Season, Episode, Act, and Scene numbers... e.g. S01 E02 A03 S04 would be Season 01, Episode 02, Act 03, Scene 04. Tack on a location and the PCs present and you then know who is where and when. Two threads with the same SEAS are unfolding at the same time, and you could further refine that with a lower-case letter after the scene number. That way, you can handle things like flashbacks without mucking up your timeline.

I have my game broken into different groups, and then different forums. All of the game playing forums is group 1 and every player can see everything. Now, if I have a couple of players who wish to have a little hanky-hanky, then will assign them their own private group. I asked the players what they wanted and that was the majority vote. Also, if I have a story Arc then I make that a separate group and put everyone in that would be part of that...granted both of these things have only happened once.

As for characters moving from one forum to another, we put an arrow with where they are going. I don't really need to know where they were, even though players put that when they come into a forum.

In reply to cnic (msg # 1):

I routinely do this in my RPoL campaigns: using groups you can have multiple parties on different locations of the same campaign world doing different things at the same time.
Various threads are assigned to their specific group as well as the characters. If by chance a character moves from a thread in a group to another thread in another group (or to a solo part of that adventure), you just modify accordingly the groups assigned to that character. If the solo de-tour is reasonably short, you can manage it with private posts in the same thread.
This message was last edited by the user at 07:27, Sat 16 Mar.

Thank you again to everyone. I think I figured it out and it actually worked out perfectly for balancing the number of submissions that overlapped.