What a Cowboy Lawmen v Mexicans and Navajo's

Back to Mexico for another WaC game, this time with my Lawmen taking on Jerry's Mexicans and Dave's Navajo. The objective was to capture a treasure-laden donkey tied up in the village.

As another experiment I went with only four characters this time, a Legend (Wyatt Earp), two gunslingers (Morgan Earp and Doc Holiday) and a shootist (Virgil Earp with a shotgun).

The village is quiet but probably won't stay that way for long:

The Earp's move in lead by Wyatt and Morgan with Doc and Virgil following behind:

In the distance the Mexicans are closing in on the donkey. Wyatt has been shot at by a Navajo and has had to dodge back into cover:

Numbers of Navajo close in on the village:

Wyatt is targeted by more Mexicans and has to dodge back into cover again:

Doc is wounded:

Mexicans and Navajo close in on the donkey:

One Navajo climbs down from the roof into a building Morgan has occupied:

Morgan knocks the Navajo out. Meanwhile the Mexicans have taken control of the donkey:

The situation is not great for the Lawmen, Virgil has taken a head wound, Doc is also wounded and Wyatt is pinned down. Morgan holds the house but can't stop the Mexicans running off with the donkey:

Doc and a Mexican shoot it out:

Doc loses the encounter and is shot down:

The Mexicans quickly took the donkey to safety giving Jerry the win!

This was my fourth game of WaC and, while it was fun, I think I'm coming to the conclusion I prefer Dead Man's Hand with it's greater depth and characterisation.

Everything in WaC is very generic, there was no difference other than random skill allocation between the Lawmen, the Mexicans and the Native Americans. You could just as easily call it 'What a Pirate' or 'What a Highwayman', which I guess is both good and bad!

I guess you could add that in but in DMH it is a big part of the rules and all the different gangs have appropriate advantages and disadvantages which make them play in a different style.

Perhaps next time I'll dust off DMH and see if Jerry and Dave want to give that a go, I also understand there is a 2nd Edition of DMH coming out soon which might be interesting.

What a Cowboy Mexicans v Yankee's

Another game of 'What a Cowboy; this time with my Mexicans taking on Dave's Yankee's partly as I wanted to use some newly finished Mexican/Mediterranean/North African buildings I'd recently finished.

My gang consisted of Tuco (Legend), Big Pedro (Shootist with rifle), Loco, Raoul and Ernesto (Greenhorns) and a Henchmen group (The Three Amigos). Dave's Yankees had a more even spread of abilities with several shootists but no legend.

The mission for the Yankees was to rescue a captive being held by the Mexicans:

Raoul takes up position on a rooftop and observes the advancing Yankees:

The Three Amigos cautiously advance:

Big Pedro, Raoul and Tuco combine to take out the Yankee leader:

The Three Amigos try brawling another Yankee:

One of the Three Amigos goes down while Loco and Raoul move to support them:

Tuco guns down another Yankee:

Ernesto puts another Yankee down:

With only two men left and no injuries to the Mexicans at all the Yankee's flee giving Tuco and his men a comprehensive victory! 

In this game I think I made better use of the Bonanza tokens and the legend abilities of Tuco though I still forgot mostly to use the Desperado cards. Mostly the victory was down to Dave's lack of ability to dodge, he hardly managed to dodge any shots and largely missed when he fired!

Having played a few games now I quite like the way the game plays but it very much lacks the depth and variety of Dead Man's Hand. 

In WAC everything is very generic on the character front so you can't give your gang a distinct flavour and way of operating which very much occurs with DMH. The differences between the various gangs (cowboys, lawmen, outlaws, desperados, bandits and Apache's among others) is really brought out in DMH and there is much more depth to each character. However, DMH is more complicated to play and learn so perhaps less suited to casual play.

What a Cowboy rules try out #2

Another try-out of What a Cowboy, this time with my Desperados taking on Dave's Lawmen and Jerry's Mexicans in a three-way fight!

One of my gang, "Black Bart" has been captured by the Law and is languishing in jail. My gang need to rescue him, Jerry's Mexicans want to kill him and Dave's Lawmen want to uphold the law:

A Deputy keeps an eye on Bart:

Outside the General Store Wishbone loads up his chuck wagon:

It's lively in the saloon!

The stage to Tucson prepares to depart from the Grand Hotel:

The town of Billington is quiet before the storm:

The Desperado's! Left to right "Wild Billy" Williams (Gunslinger), "Big Frank" Cannon (Gunslinger), "Desperate Danny" Reagan (Shootist) and "Frenchie" Dupont (Greenhorn):

First confrontation. Wild Billy takes aim at a Deputy in the Grand Hotel:

Big Frank joins in and guns the Deputy down:

Big frank then goes on to confront Sheriff Pat Garret in the alley. Garrett had crept up on Big Frank but Frank won the fast draw:

The Greenhorn Frenchie has been lurking behind the hotel:

Suddenly a Mexican appears behind Big Frank! The Mexicans have been battling it out with a couple of Deputies and some Law henchmen:

Big Frank turns to face the Mexican hoping Garrett does not recover from his shock quickly:

Desperate Dan approaches the Sheriff's Office and encounters another Mexican:

Wild Billy to the rescue! The Mexican is down:

Wild Billy then takes out the Sheriff as well:

Desperate Dan and Frenchie finish off the Mexican by the jail:

Frenchie enters the jail and releases Black Bart:

Bart and the gang retire from the town having achieved their objective:

Another fun game which ran much better than the first one now we understood the rules better! There was also more use of the 'Bonanza' tokens, cards and abilities as we remembered them more often.

Poor Dave's Lawmen suffered from being caught between the Desperados and the Mexicans and were not helped by the 'Legend' Pat Garrett being unable to hit the proverbial barn door, rolling a succession of 1's for his shooting and falling in a hail of lead from Wild Billy and Big Frank!

I anticipate the town of Billington will see more action in the future.... 

What a Cowboy rules try-out

Dave and I tried out the new 'What a Cowboy' rules from the TFL last week. We used to play Dead Man's Hand quite a bit a few years ago so I already had all the buildings and figures and, from the You Tube videos, WAC seemed like an interesting set of rules so everything came out of the various boxes it had been stored in for a game!

We went for four characters each for the first game, I chose Bandito's (not that there is any difference between the gangs in WAC). From left to right Tuco (Gunslinger), Big Pedro (Shootist), Ramon (Greenhorn) and Jesus (Greenhorn):

Big Pedro cautiously advances down Main Street:

A Chuck Wagon picks up supplies outside the General Store:

One of Dave's men takes up position on the balcony of the Grand Hotel:

Jesus dodges a shot and takes a pinned marker:

He makes it into cover but is shot in the guts and out of the fight!

Tuco and Ramon exchange shots with Dave's men hiding behind the wagon:

One of Dave's men enters the Saloon, one of the few buildings I actually did interiors for before realising how much effort it would be to do them all:

Big Pedro is shot dead! With only two men left and Dave's gang having taken no losses my gang calls it a day and retires:

With it being our first attempt at the rules (and myself having barely looked at them) we did quite a few things wrong but it was a good learning experience to encourage further reading of the rules!

Based on this game the combat system seems more interesting than DMH but the characterisation of the individuals is far less varied especially as it does not include the concept of different gangs with varying abilities relating to their type which was the best thing about DMH. Perhaps it will be possible to combine WAC gameplay with DMH gangs and character traits.....