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Ah! Now I understand. It sounds like what you want is the ability to have HL maintain the contents of multiple different portfolios, which are all opened and managed concurrently. This would entail a dramatic overhaul of how things are handled, which would result in all sorts of implications that would need to be resolved.
The difficulty is that the Dashboard contents are expressly driven by the contents of the currently loaded portfolio. In fact, *everything* within Hero Lab is driven by the currently loaded portfolio. Changing the Dashboard to use a multiple concurrent sources for its data introduces all sorts of questions about how that information is managed, plus how it is persisted.
Have you tried setting up a new portfolio specifically for managing all the PCs at the start of each game? If not, consider the following approach....
At the start of a game, the GM creates a single portfolio that will contain all the PCs during the game. You can import the PCs from their separate portfolios into a single shared portfolio, which you can save, naming it something like "Sydney". Throughout the game, you have access to all the PCs via the Dashboard and Tactical Console for instant review. If you need to save state between game sessions, simply save the portfolio and reload it next game.
This technique can be extended further, though. You can setup all the NPCs for a given encounter within a single portfolio. Once the portfolio is saved, you can then quickly use its contents during play. Let's say that you have the portfolio loaded that contains all of the PCs and they reach "Encounter #1". You've already setup all the NPCs from that encounter in a separate portfolio prior to the game. By going to the Portfolio menu and selecting "Import Hero from Portfolio", you choose the saved "Encounter #1" portfolio. HL then shows you a list of all the NPCs in that portfolio. Since you want all of them, simply click the "Import All" button. HL sucks them all in and you now have them loaded alongside the PCs. You can now use the Tactical Console to view both the PCs *and* the NPCs. If combat starts, the Tactical Console can orchestrate everything for you.
Once the encounter ends, you can unload the NPCs from the portfolio. Using the Portfolio menu, you can go to the "Delete Character" submenu and select "Delete Multiple". From here, you can check all of the NPCs from the encounter and click "OK". All those NPCs are dumped and you're back to just the PCs again. This process can be easily repeated for successive encounters, with all damage, effects, and conditions on the PCs persisting along the way.
If you make changes to the PCs that need to returned to the players at the end of the gaming system, you can accomplish it using the above technique. Simply export individual characters from the collective portfolio and give them back to the players on a memory stick, email, etc.
If you haven't tried this overall approach, please give it a try and report back. I'll put your request on the todo list, but it represents a dramatic change that will entail a lot of work to sort out all the nasty cross-file linkages and dependencies in a reliable manner.
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