Wild West Shootout in Denderleeuw

This weekend I ran a Wild West game using our house rules, at the invitation of Dirk D. of the wargaming group PMC Denderleeuw. Dirk invited me over to show our approach towards Wild West gaming. I think it's always nice to have some good discussions across different wargaming groups, to inject some new ideas into each other's playing styles, and also to see firsthand where and how others are organizing their games. In this case, Dirk's garage!

I loaded up all my Wild West scenery and figures in the car, and once I arrived, I let the "locals" set up the terrain the way they wanted. Not all terrain and scenery was used, but the idea in such skirmish games is always to mix dense terrain with some open areas.

5 players were present, with me taking up the role of umpire. We managed 3 games, each player controlling one shootist each. As is usually the case in Wild West games, emotions ran high, especially when shootists are killed with headshots ;-)

I had a stack of pregenerated characters ready. Every player draws a random shootist, as well as a random weapons card.

The first game was a little test game to explain the mechanics. For the second and third games, each player had a secret mission ("Kill 3 shootists", "Free your friend from jail", "Dug up a sack of gold on spot X", etc.) Such missions give some flavour to the game, instead of having a "last man standing" game, which can really drag out the proceedings.

Pictures shown below, courtesy of Dirk D. Figures and scenery all painted by the Schild & Vriend wargaming group, in some cases over 20 years ago! Most houses are from Hovels, figures mostly from (Guernsey) Foundry.

Overview of the table.

Hangman stand from 4Ground

Shootist in action. Two blue cats from Black Cat Bases.

Indian Village

Barn. Plastic ducks from a toy animal set.

The not-so-historical OK Corral

Umpire in action

Shootist in action

Dead shootist. Using red cardboard templates is a nice way to visualize fallen figures.

Shootout in front of the church

Another overview of the table

Cactus from Grand Manner

Plastic toy sheep

Indian village

Another overview of town

Bandit shot dead before the jailhouse

Shootist hiding behind stack of wood

Another farm