Hi, Deranged--I'm new here and just saw your post, I know it was a while back but just wanted to add my $.02 since we keep Russians.
If you ever wind up having another opportunity to get some, do it--they're terrific! However, I would only keep females together in multiples aside from breeding times.
Russians come from a pretty extreme climate where they're only active for about 3-6 months out of the year (they're otherwise hibernating or estivating) and the food is pretty scarce. So they're sort of internally programmed to eat and mate like crazy when they're awake. Thing is, if they live in a captive environment that has a relatively constant and warm temp, they don't seem to really alter those patterns.
That is to say--if you keep a male with a female, he's likely to harrass her endlessly. Kinda funny to watch for a short while, but it's got to get exhausting for the female. We put our Russians outside in a pen from late spring through fall, and it's truly amazing how manic the males get when they get out in the sunlight! I never imagined tortoises could be so speedy.
If you keep more than one male together, esp around a female, there's likely to be aggression between the males. We had to separate ours after the dominant male took a chunk out of the lower-status male's leg.
So--if you do decide to keep Russians together, I'd suggest either multiple females, or one male and at least 2-3 females (that way the harrassment at least gets spread around).
If you somehow wind up with multiple males (like we did, through rescues), be prepared to house them separately!