Has anyone had much luck playing S&S with 6 characters?
We played the starter scenarios and adventure 1 with a 4 (Lirianne, Jirelle, Alahazra, Seltyiel), then whilst we were waiting for adventure 2 (much delayed, we started again with a 6)
Our party is Damiel, Feiya, Lini, Ranzak, Lem, Oloch.
We've made it to scenario 3 (I forget the name, it's the one with Gemma Redclaw and the Bucaneers), and got stuck.
3 attempts so far have all timed out - the characters are too fragile (no feats at this point) and the requirement for multiple (most) characters to fight a Henchman every time one appears just wipes us out - Lini and Feiya particularly often have no cards left on their turns to be able to explore.
If we group together to avoid having to fight the henchman, then the chances of the villain escaping (assuming we ever find her) go up massively.
Because of the lack of feats, recharging cures seems to fail more often than not.
In RotR, our 6-character party generally relied on a good roll on the Holy Candle, but without it, and with all the increased difficulty (so many barriers!) we just end up running out of time constantly.
Can anyone suggest ways of getting through?
I don't have many constructive suggestions for you, but I can certainly sympathise.
I've done the same thing as you - reached the end of adventure 1 with a group of four (in my case, Seltyiel, Valeros, Lirianne and Alahazra) and while waiting for AD2 (still waiting...), gone back to the start with a group of six.
I've also mixed in the Wizard and Ranger class decks, and my group of six is Lem, Merisiel, Jirelle, Oloch, Radillo and Wrathack. Scenario 2 took 3 or 4 attempts (it took 3 attempts with my group of 4 too) and another one - I forget which - took 4 attempts. (A footnote to this: while I can't remember the name or number of the scenario, it was the one with the rule that failing to defeat a henchman makes you discard 1d6 blessings. In one attempt, four turns from the end Radillo rolled a double one on 2d10 and next thing I knew it was game over. You cannot afford to lose a single henchman in that one. Punishing.)
Oloch will start pulling his weight a bit more when he takes the power feat to return his displayed cards to his hand at the start of his turn, but that doesn't help you get through the base adventure. One choice I consciously made was to more aggressively discard unusable cards. In particular, Jirelle would get her hand clogged with 3-4 weapons and only be able to explore once. I had to grit my teeth and throw away those surplus weapons. Any turn where you don't explore at least twice is holding you back.
Also on the subject of exploring, only take Allies who you can discard to explore. I felt my fortunes improve slightly when I culled all my Lookouts and Dolphins, even taking weak cards like Old Salt just because they give an exploration.
You have to permanently close at least two locations to corner the villain, so gang up for those to start with. I've found that I've been closing nearly all the locations in most games (mostly through bad luck in finding the villain last), so if you can keep the rate of exploring up, maybe you should try ganging up all the time and work your way through, closing as much as possible.
On a final note, much as I don't want to complain about having more scenarios to play, I have found that five adventures with only 'B' cards to pick up and no feats can feel like a looooong slog compared to Perils of the Lost Coast. Especially having as much trouble with Rum Punch as I do.
For your party MightyJim, I recommend starting the characters at the following locations:
Fog Bank: Lem & Lini
Cannibal Isle: Oloch
Tempest Cay: Damiel & Feiya
Lonely Island Ranzak