Running a "Wild West" setting: Tips and Tricks

[Tanuki Tales]

As someone who's never gamed or DMed/GMed/etc. in a setting that draws upon the United States between the early 1600s to the early 1900s for inspiration, I was curious if there's any wisdom that the Playground can share when it comes to either playing in such a setting or when creating such a setting for your own games (I'm sure someone like Admiral Squish could give quite a yarn on this, but I'd hate to bother him).

[lightningcat]

Are you playing in the wild west, the wierd west, or just wild west inspired?

If the first, pick your decade. Check wikipedia for all the historical info you should need. Players will break it anyways.

If the second, pick your decade, figure out how things are different from history.

If the third, its all about the guns and attitude. Frontier spirit and such.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Well... what time period? The West in the days where the natives were being driven back and strip mining and slash n' burn agriculture were going on while the primary weapons were muskets and bows is very different from the late 1800s, in the wake of the Civil War, with breech-loading and integrated-magazine rifles becoming popular.

[Tanuki Tales]

Well... what time period? The West in the days where the natives were being driven back and strip mining and slash n' burn agriculture were going on while the primary weapons were muskets and bows is very different from the late 1800s, in the wake of the Civil War, with breech-loading and integrated-magazine rifles becoming popular.

Let's say Post-Civil War for the sake of discussion.

[Grod_The_Giant]

• Find a nice big list of classic westerns.
• Watch them until you start talking like Clint Eastwood.
• ???
• Profit.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

• Find a nice big list of classic westerns.
• Watch them until you start talking like Clint Eastwood.
• ???
• Profit.

That's actually a good answer to a lot of questions.

Add: Play Red Dead Redemption for a fun/depressing deconstruction of Westerns.

[Rhynn]

We just had this thread (still on the first page in fact), although about half of it is pedantry about the term "cowboy."

[Tanuki Tales]

We just had this thread (still on the first page in fact), although about half of it is pedantry about the term "cowboy."

Huh, must have been buried under all the moved links.

I'm not interested in the whole "cowboy" image and junk, so yeah.


Moving on:

I've always been curious how the justice system worked. From what I can gather, you have a Judge(s) who's appointed by the governor or Federal government or elected or whatever and he/she preside over a certain range of populated zones. The local sheriffs kind of do whatever they want, but pay at least some deference to the judge or at least lip service. And then you have things like detective agencies, who are like the local sheriffs but are more "mercenaries" and not tied down to a specific community.

[Rhynn]

A township elects a sheriff, who is responsible for keeping order an arresting criminals. A circuit judge "rides circuit" (quite literally, in this time period) through the townships, hearing cases when he's in town; if a town isn't part of a circuit court, they may take criminals to the nearest town or just deal out some frontier justice (whether lynching or impromptu court - like the one that found Jack McCall not guilty of murdering Wild Bill Hickok).

Federal marshals enforce the circuit courts' justice, carrying out warrants and summonses, making arrests, and handling federal prisoners. They're essentially the federal government representatives, even more so than the circuit judge.

Agencies like the Pinkertons (originally union- and strike-busters, basically) do whatever they're paid to by a client, which might not be entirely legal - although it no doubt helps to stay on the good side of the local law. They're not really part of the justice system, except in so far as they might be paid to bring someone in.

[FallenGeek]

Law in a Western is vastly different from what we know of it now.
Town Marshalls and Sheriffs kept the peace rather than truly pursue criminals (that's what bounty hunters and Federal Marshalls are for). Killing someone is necessarily illegal in large parts of the frontier - as long as the other had their hand on a weapon it was self-defense with no major argument.

I'd suggest watching Deadwood to see what criminals and lawmen do in a frontier town.

[Rhynn]

Killing someone is necessarily illegal in large parts of the frontier - as long as the other had their hand on a weapon it was self-defense with no major argument.

Indeed, there were (even off the frontier) many defenses against a murder charge, such as being provoked (with insults) and vengeance (e.g. the victim had killed a family member of yours) ... it was wild. But steal a horse and you'd hang.

I'd suggest watching Deadwood to see what criminals and lawmen do in a frontier town.

The scene at the start of the show is actually based on an actual event: after arresting a horse thief (who managed to wing Bullock), Seth Bullock had to hold off a lynch mob (who ran off the executioner) and get on the hanging scaffold himself to hang the man... apparently the difference between a lynching and an execution was worth putting his life on the line!

[Tanuki Tales]

That brings up a good question (at least to me):

Why is stealing a horse a worse crime than murder? Or stealing cattle for that matter.

[FallenGeek]

That brings up a good question (at least to me):

Why is stealing a horse a worse crime than murder? Or stealing cattle for that matter.

Hypothesis: its all about money. Wealthy cattle barons and ranchers could pay the sheriffs while most murders were a pro bono affair for lawmen. And rustling took away livelihoods - without horses and cattle many, many people from all walks of life were at a loss.

Most people went west to make money, whether through mining or farming or ranching.

[pendell]

Note that Kenzerco produces Aces And Eights, a roleplaying western. It might be worth a look.

A horse is of greater value than a man due to the economic value. It's the same reason why in some parts of the world people make their children walk in front of water buffaloes while plowing -- because if a land mine gets stepped on, children are much easier to replace than a water buffalo is.

ETA: Oooh! They have an article on running a western campaign. With links to subtopics!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Tanuki Tales]

So it's a case of corporate corruption and a lack of valuing human life then?

And thanks for those links Pendell.

[pendell]

So it's a case of corporate corruption and a lack of valuing human life then?

Corruption implies a decay from a former state of goodness. So I don't think 'corruption' is really the right word. Many of those companies were started right from the beginning with one purpose and one purpose only: To make as much money for their shareholders as possible by any means necessary. That's why it was called the Gilded Age .

And yes, it is an inability to value human life beyond it's worth as an economic asset. The kind of mind that would assess a human life by it's ability to contribute to the company's bottom line (negligible in the case of migrant workers, practically non-existent in the case of indigenous Americans).

A lot of modern movies like Avatar are, to my mind, a kind of disguised Western to repudiate many of the ideas and attitudes we held back then.


Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Rhynn]

That brings up a good question (at least to me):

Why is stealing a horse a worse crime than murder? Or stealing cattle for that matter.

Well, it's not, as such. It's just that it's worse than killing a person. Murder was, generally, a hanging offense. Shooting a man in the back, though, could be justified to/by a jury, as in the case of Hickok and McCall. Stealing a horse or cattle was something they wanted to discourage in the strongest possible way, however, as there could rarely be a justification, in their view.

Also, yes, a lot of the time cattle theft (or, say, train robbery) would inconvenience very powerful people who would then bring their clout to bear. Shooting, say, a professional gambler (even one as legendary in his own lifetime as Hickok) just angered his friends and any family he had. Shooting a judge would probably see you hunted by every marshal in the state/territory, and possibly the next one over...

And, obviously, a lot of Westerns are set in unincorporated territories, where there is no circuit court, no federal judge, and no marshals, so the only justice around is a gun and a rope, and people being people and the times being the times, capital punishment was seen as the best solution.